Eternal Swordmaster
Chapter 149 - 142: Narrow Path - Below

Chapter 149: Chapter 142: Narrow Path - Below

"Quite the bold claim. Zhao Yunshan, you would have the right to say that if you had broken through to the Fourth Layer of the Flying Locust Technique, but now? Aren’t you afraid the wind might blow away your tongue!"

The sharp voice of the woman rang out, giving off a fierce feeling.

"Whether it’s a boast or not isn’t for us to say now!" Zhao Yunshan drew out his Wolf Fang Club, its red glow becoming increasingly dense. "Since you’re intent on destroying the Zhao Family, be prepared for our desperate counterstrike!"

Crack.

Suddenly, footsteps sounded from behind him. Zhao Yunshan’s expression changed slightly, and he whirled to the side.

Out of the darkness behind him emerged a Confucian Scholar with a pale face.

The Scholar was dressed in a grey and white long robe, holding a folding fan in his hand, with deeply sunken eyes like a morally depraved young master who had indulged in excesses. However, he exuded an air of refined elegance mixed with an aura both righteous and evil at the same time, giving people a complex impression.

Upon seeing this man, Zhao Yunshan’s face turned ghastly pale.

"Song Zheng! Weren’t you supposed to have gone to the Outer Regions and not come back...!?"

"Outer Regions? How could I bear to go there when Brother Zhao hasn’t shown up to die? I couldn’t possibly leave," the Confucian Scholar said with a sinister, mocking smile, an eerie chill to his words.

Zhao Yunshan stared intently at the newcomer, beads of sweat forming on his brow within moments.

"Father!"

At that moment, in the dark of the night, two young teenagers, a boy and a girl carrying crescent-shaped blades, rushed forward. Seeing Zhao Yunshan surrounded, they immediately showed a look of anxious concern, leaping over in a few bounds to stand beside him.

"Yue’er, Long’er! How did you come back!!" Seeing the two, Zhao Yunshan revealed a look of despair.

The Red Tower of Star Calamity Hall wanted to exterminate his Zhao Family; his deadly strike was intended to buy time, to create a sliver of hope for the children’s escape. He had not expected them to foolishly come back.

"If we’re going to die, we’ll die together! If father dies, we will not live on! The vengeance... Big brother will seek it for us!"

The young boy declared fiercely.

"If father dies, Yue’er will not live alone!"

The girl didn’t say much, but her tone was even more resolute.

Tears welled up in Zhao Yunshan’s eyes, and his grip on the Wolf Fang Club began to tremble.

"Tsk tsk tsk, such a touching scene..." Song Zheng, the sinister Confucian Scholar, chuckled lightly.

"If the Hall Master likes it, why not capture these two brats and send them to the Hall Master’s bedroom for daily enjoyment?" suggested a man with a pale face from the Mountain God Temple, belonging to Star Calamity Hall.

"Exactly my thoughts," the woman replied coldly, with a wicked smile.

Zhao Yunshan’s face instantly showed a look of utter despair. He gripped the Wolf Fang Club tightly, his spiritual energy roiling and ready to erupt in a fight to the death.

Suddenly, another set of footsteps emerged from the darkness of the woods.

Another person walked quietly out of the forest, an ordinary-looking middle-aged man, indistinguishable from a passerby in Jianghu.

The only unusual feature was the three swords hanging at his waist, one silver, one black, and a third one entirely red.

"Star Calamity Hall?" The man approached, and before anyone could speak, he took the initiative to inquire.

"Over there, is that the mysterious scholar, Song Zheng? I’m here to post a task. Is it a convenient time for you to accept it?"

The sinister Confucian Scholar’s eyes narrowed slightly.

"Post a task? You wish to hire me? Can you afford the price?" He was curious, as the man had approached amidst a tense standoff without any hint of fear.

"I understand the pricing rules. A high-class expert of the Third Layer of Qi Cultivation naturally comes at a steep price." The other man began to smile. "But my task is relatively simple; just to inquire about a piece of news."

"News?" the mysterious scholar’s tone softened, "If that’s the case, could you wait until after I deal with this trifling matter before we discuss it?"

Star Calamity Hall didn’t just take on assassination tasks, but also handled lighter jobs like gathering information or finding lost items. It wasn’t unusual for this man to appear, but if he was willing to pay a high price for news, it wouldn’t be an ordinary deal.

Having said that, he turned his gaze back to Zhao Yunshan and his two children, ready to make a move.

"No," came a resolute rejection from the man.

Song Zheng was taken aback, seemingly not expecting such urgency from the other party. He frowned deeply and looked toward the man, about to speak.

However, the middle-aged man chuckled, a smile on his face that was peaceful but somehow exuded a strong scent of blood.

"If you make me wait too long, I’m afraid I won’t be able to stop myself from killing you... " His tone was calm as if stating an ordinary fact.

"Isn’t it kind of me to let you take on a job before you die?"

His smile turned sly, and a palpable chill filled the air.

The atmosphere fell silent in an instant.

The cold wind continued to brush past them, but nobody dared to speak.

Zhao Yunshan and his children thought they had misheard as they stared wide-eyed at the middle-aged man who had suddenly appeared.

The mysterious scholar Song Zheng, too, was stunned, as if he couldn’t quite grasp what was happening.

The two from Mountain God Temple grew visibly anxious, subtly shifting backward as they sensed something ominous.

"Your Excellency... What do you mean by those words?" After recovering, Song Zheng’s voice grew icy. "Do you understand the significance of what you’re saying?"

The other party smiled faintly.

"It seems you don’t want to answer my question," the middle-aged man slowly drew his sword blade and held it by his ear.

Suddenly, he plucked it.

Humm!

The sound of the sword, like the whistling of jademite, echoed slowly in the night sky. Everyone was so shocked by the sound of the sword that they felt their spirits shake, and in a moment of bewilderment, they found that the man had disappeared.

Song Zheng only felt a flash by his side; the man had suddenly appeared behind him, with such incredible speed it was frightening.

He hurriedly turned around, and his folding fan struck viciously backward. The image of a Black Fox on the fan came to life and abruptly started to move, hissing as it transformed into a stream of black light flying out, lunging toward the man.

Hiss!

The bright silver sword blade, piercing like autumn water, penetrated the inky Black Fox, touching the surface of the fan.

An irresistible force transmitted to Song Zheng’s hand, almost causing him to drop his fan.

His face filled with shock, his spiritual energy surged throughout his body as he rapidly retreated. He launched the Black Fox from the fan again, and in the midst of the brilliant black light, it lunged towards his opponent.

His Black Fox, formed from blood ink, and combined with a mix of 49 kinds of potent poisons, had undergone refinement and sacrificial refinement for twenty years. Touch it, and death was certain; its tyrannical power was extraordinary! It was his greatest reliance since he became well-known. Moreover, this time he was exerting his full strength, making it much more powerful than before.

But as soon as the Black Fox appeared, the man laughed heartily. A piercingly intense white light burst forth, pushing the sword light through the darkness and slashing through the Black Fox in a streak of white, slicing straight down from Song Zheng’s forehead.

In front of Song Zheng, a pristine white scroll suddenly emerged, blocking the path of the sword light.

At the same time, a trace of green aura flashed across his face, and his right index finger combined to form a Sword Finger, shedding black light as it pointed towards the man’s chest.

The bisected Black Fox recovered again and lunged from behind the man.

Crack.

Just then, the pristine white scroll suddenly showed innumerable cracks.

Glancing up, he saw a blinding white light explode behind the man without knowing when.

Boom!!

The sword light turned cold.

In the final moment, he felt a chill at his neck. Looking down, he saw his own body soaring higher and higher, while below, his headless torso collapsed.

"Star Calamity Hall...." Lin Xin sheathed his sword, and with a light sound, vanished from the spot.

Within the Mountain God Temple, a man and a woman burst out of the door, fleeing in opposite directions as if flying.

A gray shadow flashed, and Lin Xin pierced through the man’s back with his sword, including the black light shield. The sword light twisted, and the entire corpse exploded into pieces.

He accelerated at full speed using the Sky-Soaring Cloud Technique, his feet bursting with white light as he gained velocity mid-air. His body, almost like an apparition, appeared behind the woman.

Using the force of the explosion, the sword light flashed, and the woman’s running body was bisected, collapsing to the ground, silent thereafter.

The three core members of Star Calamity Hall faced life and death in less than twenty breaths and were utterly extinguished.

Only then did Lin Xin clearly feel that his strength had unknowingly risen to such a level.

Struggling between life and death in the secluded manor every day had provided him with tremendous tempering. Coupled with the massive boost from his attribute points, the combination had brought him to this current level.

Even Song Zheng, at the Third Layer of Qi Cultivation, was dealt within an extremely short time.

His strength was already far beyond that of average cultivators, with 14 points of destructive power among them. Even those natural born with Divine Power wouldn’t have more than five points; his physical strength had reached an abnormally extreme level.

"I originally thought we could trade a few more moves... but compared to the experts in the secluded manor, he was far too weak." He shook his head slightly, returned to Song Zheng’s body, picked up his folding fan and waist bag, and without looking at Zhao Yunshan and the other two whose faces were pale with fright, he prepared to leave.

"Benefactor, please wait!" Zhao Yunshan took the initiative to call out loudly, "May I have the honor of knowing your name? My name is Zhao Yunshan. Although I can’t compare to the vast power of Star Calamity Hall, I have some assets in the Plum Blossom Sect. Should we meet in the future, I will certainly repay this favor!"

Lin Xin paused for a moment.

"There’s no need for my name; just keep tonight’s events confidential," he responded.

He wasn’t in the mood to talk to these three people, attuning himself to the traces of external Spiritual Energy flowing into his body.

These Spiritual Energies were naturally much less than what he gained from the old man of the Heaven-Slaying Sword, but it was still one of the larger gains in recent days.

He glanced at the progress of his cultivation.

The Return to Origin technique remained stagnant, evidently due to the broken state of the Red Flower Sword, causing a leak of Spiritual Energy.

He strode off into the night. There was another Red Chamber stronghold nearby. Once eradicated, the entire region for thousands of miles would be devoid of any Qi Refinement-level Suppressors.

The Suppressors for both the Red Chamber and Star Calamity Hall were Xie He Nu and the three he had killed tonight.

Normally, cultivators in the Qi Refinement Realm wouldn’t stay within the inner realms; most of them would serve as main combatants sent to the Outer Regions to handle various dangers.

Lin Xin had seized this window of mismatched strength and timing. It would take days for reinforcements to rush back from the Outer Regions. This time was ample for his unrestrained actions.

Additionally, he had gone out this time to verify what would happen if he entered the secluded manor from the outside.

He had already acquired the Earth Fire Golden Plum; with Liu Zong escorting it back and processing the materials taking some time, this period was an opportune moment to repay the Red Chamber for hiring Star Calamity Hall to assassinate him.

His self-created swordsmanship also needed honing in combat, serving multiple purposes with a single action.

The only pity was, without repairing the Red Flower Sword, his cultivation could not improve. This made him internally cautious not to recklessly use the Red Flower Sword in combat anymore. (To be continued. If you enjoy this work, welcome to Qidian (qidian.com) to vote for recommendation and monthly tickets. Your support is my greatest motivation. Mobile users, please visit m.qidian.com to read.)