Instead, two short bolts shot out from atop the cabinet, striking his lower back with a pair of sharp whistles. Once the Earth Trap technique was triggered, the mechanism of the miniature crossbow activated alongside it to wound the intruder with concealed bolts.
He Lingchuan had mastered this entire set of trap techniques while hunting monsters and completing missions on the Chipa Plateau; he could easily adapt them to any terrain.
Another dark figure flipped in through the window—Fu Shanyue.
He scanned left and right, then stepped forward to haul up his companion.
Just as he was about to leap back out the window, a sudden warning bell sounded in his heart, freezing his leap in mid-motion.
Right behind it, an inconspicuous flash of a blade swept silently past the window frame, sending a chill prickling across his scalp.
Had he not checked his momentum, that stroke would have sheared him in two.
A third figure slipped into the room through the window, fluid as a windblown leaf, even lingering for a split second in midair.
On high alert as if facing a mortal enemy, Fu Shanyue shoved his companion aside just as a snow-bright arc of blade-light slashed down like the Heavenly River cascading from above.
The blade Fusheng had finally revealed its true face.
The inner force behind the slash was ferocious, trailing a long, relentless undertow. Fu Shanyue did not dare meet it head-on, dodging and shifting across the darkened room several times to evade its edge.
A storm of flashing blades and shadows erupted within the pitch-black chamber.
Both moved with blinding speed—so fast Fu Shanyue's subordinate could barely follow.
The two had finally clashed.
"Since you're already here, why not stay a bit longer?" He Lingchuan said as they fought. "Otherwise, it might look like poor hospitality on my part."
If Fu Shanyue struck back, He Lingchuan was confident he could press the advantage and ride the momentum—the lingering force of a fully formed Wave Slash was formidable. But frustratingly, the fellow seemed to recognize the danger, choosing only to retreat rather than advance.
Back when He Lingchuan had attained enlightenment with the saber at the northern front camp in Xia, he could already slice through seven raindrops in a single stroke. Now that the Emperor's Flowing Dew had aided him in opening his second dantian, his speed and power were far beyond what they had once been.
Yet Fu Shanyue was like a loach, always slipping away by a hair's breadth.
Such agility was matched only by certain ferry ghost whelps in the Panlong dreamscape.
Still, the room was small; continuous retreat would inevitably lead to defeat.
Fu Shanyue chuckled softly. "Very well. A guest should defer to the host." With a flick of his wrist, two sleeve arrows flew.
The mechanism did not require lifting an elbow; a mere tilt of the wrist sent the sleeve arrows darting straight toward He Lingchuan's eyes. The arrowheads glinted with a faint blue sheen—clearly dipped in something nasty.
Less than three feet separated the two of them throughout. Fu Shanyue's sleeve arrows were masterfully crafted, with powerful springs and short, narrow shafts—ideal for close-quarters ambushes.
He Lingchuan had no time to parry with his blade and could only tilt his head aside to dodge.
Back in the flesh-and-blood fortress when locked in combat with a young ferry ghost, he had suffered a blast of venomous saliva at similarly close range, blinding one of his eyes on the spot.
Ever since, he had harbored deep wariness toward close-quarters brawling.
After all, failing in a dream meant merely waking up, but having an eye blinded or a skull pierced in reality offered no second chances.
The instant his offensive faltered, Fu Shanyue seized the opening and snapped his fingers.
With a sharp snap, the oil lamp on the cabinet behind him flared to life.
The lamp had originally sat on the table. When setting his traps, He Lingchuan had casually moved it to the chest of drawers, putting it right at eye level.
The gentle light of an oil lamp was hardly glaring, nor would it draw the attention of bailiffs on the street.
Yet light and shadow always went hand in hand; where there was light, there was shadow.
He Lingchuan stood directly facing the lamp, casting his shadow onto the wall behind him.
Having dodged the hidden bolts, he raised his blade once more, only for his upper arm to seize halfway up.
It felt as though someone had grabbed his arm and was hauling back with all their might.
From diagonally behind him, Fu Shanyue's injured companion shouted urgently, "Hurry, hurry!"
The man had dragged himself to the wall and clamped both hands firmly around He Lingchuan's—shadow, wrenching back with desperate effort.
Upon closer inspection, thin vine-like tendrils wrapped around his forearms, each glowing with faint black light that sank directly into He Lingchuan's shadow.
This obscure technique was known as the Shadow Binding technique, which restricted the true body's movements by controlling its cast shadow.
Fu Shanyue showed no mercy. Raising his water-parting spike, he thrust straight for He Lingchuan's eye, intending to punch clean through from front to back.
In the blink of an eye, the tip was almost pressing against his cornea; He Lingchuan could even feel a piercing stab of pain at the back of his head.
That was his spiritual perception sounding frantic alarms.
Fu Shanyue had pushed his speed to the absolute limit as well. The longer the night dragged on, the more complications would arise; he needed to end this quickly.
He Lingchuan did not blink.
Though his arms were restrained, his fingers, shielded behind the shadow of his torso, retained their flexibility. Raising them slightly, he commanded, "Appear."
With a metallic clang, Fu Shanyue's water-parting spike struck solid matter.
A round shield had materialized out of thin air.
The thrust was deflected, and Fu Shanyue let out a muffled grunt as the recoil shuddered through him. But the round shield was knocked aside as well, and he continued lunging straight for He Lingchuan.
At that moment, he simply resorted to his old tricks, snapping his jaws open to bite at his opponent's neck. His neat white teeth instantly transformed into sharp fangs.
Even a serpent monster dozens of feet long was not enough to satisfy his hunger—how could a mere human fill his stomach?
Though He Lingchuan's body was constrained, his mouth was completely free. Gathering his true qi, he exhaled forcefully. With a rushing whoosh, a wave of air swept across the chest of drawers.
The oil lamp snuffed out instantly.
No light, no shadow.
It was hardly an elaborate countermeasure, but coming up with a solution in the blink of an eye demonstrated godlike reflexes.
His hands freed once more, He Lingchuan had no time to reposition his blade and instead drove a hook straight into Fu Shanyue's chest and abdomen.
Though delivered in haste, his true qi surged forth without holding back in the slightest.
The Blackspine Ring on his finger, acquired from the rebel, not only augmented its wielder's physical strength but also injected rotting venom into an opponent's wounds—a splendid tool for an ambush.
With a heavy crash, Fu Shanyue blasted through the wall and flew backward.
Beyond lay the courtyard of the guest wing.
He Lingchuan took two paces outward, feeling a cold sensation on his neck.
He reached up to touch it. Blood, dark in color.
His neck had not been caught by Fu Shanyue's fangs, but a claw had raked across it, missing his carotid artery by a hair.
Close, but a miss was a miss.
There was corpse poison in the claws. He Lingchuan quickly swallowed an elixir pill, then circulated his true qi to purge the tainted blood from the wound.
When he felt it again, the oozing blood had turned bright crimson, putting his mind at ease.
Fortunately, he had addressed it in time.
All of this took no more than six or seven seconds, his eyes never leaving the breach ahead.
Then He Lingchuan stepped through the ragged hole in the wall.
Fu Shanyue had snapped a small tree in the courtyard and shook his head before getting back up. The brick wall he had just crashed through had been sturdy enough.
Seeing He Lingchuan emerge blade in hand, Fu Shanyue waved his hands repeatedly. "Hold on, no more fighting!"
Seeing the blade shift slightly, he hastened to add, "I'm serious. I only attacked just now to test your mettle—no harm done. I didn't harbor any killing intent; you should have felt that."
This person had never even drawn a weapon before, yet had made him suffer four setbacks: once by Three Hearts Lake, once in Fufeng City, and twice at Wind Demon Rock.
Thinking back on it made Fu Shanyue's blood boil; he simply had to test the man's true capabilities, or his resentment would never settle.
He Lingchuan did not seem surprised. "And how was the test?"
He had fled halfway through speaking on Wind Demon Mountain, fully expecting the fellow to trail after him.
Fu Shanyue was an opportunist who would shake every tree just to see if any fruit fell.
Sure enough, it was as he thought.
Still, this guy was remarkably tough—taking a direct punch like that and acting as though nothing had happened.
"Not weak. You're qualified to take the spirit seed."
He Lingchuan said flatly, "What spirit seed?"
"Nothing, slip of the tongue. I don't know what a spirit seed is either." Fu Shanyue let out a hearty laugh. "It'd take far too much effort for either of us to finish the other off, and we don't have a blood feud. Why not make peace?"
He Lingchuan pointed back at the gaping hole in the guest room wall. "Making peace requires sincerity."
He knew very well that Fu Shanyue had come tonight looking to settle scores and avenge those earlier embarrassments. Now that he wanted to call a truce, it was only because he found He Lingchuan truly too prickly a target, where the price of fighting to the death would be far too steep.
Had he judged He Lingchuan weak and easily manipulated, he would never be wearing this pleasant face.
Friendship or slaughter—in the end, strength was the only arbiter.
Fu Shanyue waved a hand and tossed over a large silver ingot. "I broke it, I'll pay to fix it."
Sure enough, footsteps sounded outside, followed shortly by a tap-tap on the door. "Guest? Did something happen in there?"
In the dead of night, with a wall getting smashed clean through with an almighty crash, no innkeeper could play deaf and pretend not to hear.
He Lingchuan held the large silver ingot Fu Shanyue had tossed over, casually pinched off a small chunk, and tossed it over the wall. "Nothing major, just knocked over a flowerpot. Come clean it up tomorrow."
Smashed pots and smashed walls sounded entirely different; the innkeeper outside knew full well he was being fed nonsense, but the silver thrown out was pure enough and more than enough to rebuild an entire wall.
Whatever was left over was his tip.
So the innkeeper muttered, "Then please get some rest, honored guest," and scurried off.
Before long, Second Master Shi was alerted as well and came by with anxious inquiries. While he had traveled with He Lingchuan from the Fu Kingdom initially out of mutual interest, he now regarded Young Master He as a grand bringer of good fortune, terrified that anything might happen to him.
He Lingchuan brushed him off in a few words as well, though without needing silver this time.
Fu Shanyue sauntered through the hole in the wall and strolled back into the room with leisurely ease.
As he passed He Lingchuan, both circulated their true qi in tight guard, yet the smiles on their faces were warmer than a spring breeze.
Walking over to the corner, Fu Shanyue helped his subordinate sit upright and said to He Lingchuan, "How did you know I would come?"
All the traps laid out in the room had clearly been prepared as gifts for him.
He Lingchuan said calmly, "You don't know when to quit while you're ahead."
That remark struck right at the heart of his flaws, making Fu Shanyue choke for a moment. "No friendship without a fight. Allow me to introduce myself properly: I am Fu Shanyue, from the Chiyan Kingdom."
"He Xiao, from the Fu Kingdom."
Fu Shanyue looked a little surprised. "Such a tiny nation produced someone like you?"
He rubbed his nose. "I hear you've been traveling alongside the Jeweled Tree King's escort detachment these past few days, getting along famously. Those fools—haha! None of them know it was you who helped the Wind Demon break free, killed their captain, sent them running for their lives like stray dogs, and left several thousand dead."
The escort detachment had numbered only three hundred; most of the dead that day were merchants and travelers.
Had the Wind Demon remained suppressed by the root orb, the ground would never have ended up strewn with corpses.
Trying to pin the karma on him? He Lingchuan did not even bat an eye. "I have no idea what you're talking about. Weren't you the one who released the Wind Demon?"
Fu Shanyue shrugged. The kid before him was ruthless too, and burdened by not an ounce of guilt.
He Lingchuan found a chair and sat down opposite him. "You didn't climb through my window in the dead of night just to make small talk, did you?"
Chapter 403