Destiny in Cinders

”Does he have to be captured in one piece?” Wei Gu asked with his fists raised excitedly. ”Is it okay if he’s short a leg or two?”

”Yeah, it’s fine,” Xia Xi said, side-eyeing him. ”But according to our reports, that little troublemaker is a young divine-general candidate. He wields blood lethal qi and was able to kill Vice Apothecary Feng Mancang when he was at the River Aura Stage. I’m sure you all know how troublesome that old man could be. Perhaps he was caught off guard and didn’t get a chance to use his medicines. That doesn’t mean we can let our guard down around the kid. He might be wielding a sword case or some other artifact, so make sure to engage him in close combat. Don’t give him a chance to activate any hidden artifacts.”

The rest nodded. Xia Xi looked at the letter again and said, ”Apart from that, if we have a chance, we should look into the Dustdawner genius Jing Xuan. Supposedly, he lives in Keensight. He’s a young martialist that popped up recently. Not only is he a disciple of Sage Mystic Mirror, he’s also at the peak of the Tide Aura Stage. He excels at blade techniques and kills Aura Realm martialists like pigs. Typical Fortification Realm martialists like you guys would struggle with him as well.”

Everyone fell silent when they heard the secondary objective. After a few moments, the smoking gambler laughed and said, ”Jing Xuan, Xuan Jing (Mystic Mirror). To think that there would be a master and disciple with names so eerily similar.”[1]

”Indeed. I never thought we’d ever meet someone who’s even less cultured than us,” Old Cook said with a laugh. ”Come to think of it, our main target An Jing also uses ’Jing.’ Don’t tell me they’re all related somehow. Do they have a limited vocabulary or something?”

They broke into a fit of laughter, turning the mood in the building rather merry.

”Alright,” Xia Xi said, waving and trying to stifle his laughter. ”Now we know our targets. There’s no rush, however. Sage Mystic Mirror left a while ago, but he’s probably not too far away. If Jing Xuan is still around a month or two later, we’ll consider dealing with him. For now, we’ll just gather information here.”

”What about An Jing?” asked the smoker, desire emanating from his yellowish eyes. ”If we can capture him, Boss, your position as altar master will be secure. I’m sure the cult will also make the arrangements to make us part of Keensight’s defenses.”

”My feeling is that our little divine general has either escaped, or is still lurking around in the mountainous wilderness.” Xia Xi knew what the smoker meant. He must’ve made a bet with some other people in the cult and lost, so he was counting on the mission working out to make his comeback.

Xia Xi shook his head. ”Let’s not be hasty and wait for further instructions. We have more than enough tim—”

Before he could finish, the greedy smoker’s head snapped upwards, pulling parts of his spine and ribs as well as his throbbing white heart and blackened lungs into the air. A pair of hands emerged from the shadows, seemingly forged from the hardest steel and jade. Mere moments ago, they grabbed onto the smoker’s shoulders and separated his head from his shoulders as easily as one might pull wings off a chicken.

The right-diagonal slash was a common blade technique that aimed to cut into the enemy’s body starting from the shoulder all the way to the waist. Yet, someone had used bare hands and brute force to achieve something to that effect.[2]

As the head, upper ribcage and the organs within were tossed to the side, corrosive plumes of yellow-green lethal qi spilled out of the body. Red particulates and white crystals could be seen within the fumes, carrying flame and frost toxins that instantly filled the room. This was a characteristic of the bearer of the Five Poison Completion lifearc. Though it was an evil arc, it was quite a powerful one.

”Enemy attack!” The three remaining crooks were veterans who had just as much fighting experience as many veteran military officers. Xia Xi immediately slammed his table the moment he witnessed the smoking gambler’s death, sending the teaware on it into the air to cast a protective film of water on all of them to block out the poisonous lethal qi. The toxic bodily fluids from the gambler turned into tiny birds that flew toward the mysterious attacker.

This was the power of Xia Xi’s mixed arc, Tidemaker. While it could only be used where there were fluids, it could be paired with his martial technique, Flame-Wind-Water Heron Fist and the tea and bodily fluids in the room to unleash quite a few wonders. Not to mention, he had made other preparations beforehand.

On the other side, Wei Gu roared loudly as his body snapped and expanded. Hair grew wildly all across his skin. His spine popped as a tail grew out of his tailbone. The big, hulking man turned into a savage primate and jumped at the enemy in the shadows. Wei Gu was the bearer of the evil arc, Bestial Walk.

An Jing, clad in his mantle and mask, stepped out of the shadows. The toxic bodily fluids didn’t seem to affect his mantle in the least, merely trickling off its surface like common blood, dripping onto the wooden floor and eating away at it. Though he had been fighting bare handed, he drew the black-iron blade out of its scabbard as he faced the rapidly approaching primate.

Looking down on me, huh? Even though Wei Gu’s thoughts became even duller after activating his lifearc, he couldn’t help but feel an uncontrollable rage rising from the depths of his mind. He grit his teeth and swung both of his brutish pitch-black Vajra Arms toward the man in the mantle. They looked like they were powerful enough to cave a tiger’s head in on impact! Yet, all Wei Gu felt later was a light sensation in his arms. The feeling of weightlessness spread to his shoulders and then his head in a quick daze.

After fighting Lu Jin, An Jing learned the weakness of wonders like Vajra Arms. While they made the lower arms incredibly tough and impenetrable to blades, the upper arms and shoulders weren’t reinforced in the least. If An Jing couldn’t break through the door, he could just take down the whole wall.

He separated the upper arms from the lower arms by slicing through the joints at the elbows and shoulders. Then, he delivered one more slash to behead Wei Gu. Blood spurted uncontrollably all over the place from the stumps in Wei Gu’s neck, shoulders and severed arms.

The whole time, An Jing had never paid particular heed to the simpleton. Instead, he focused his attention on Old Cook, who was hiding behind Xia Xi. Before he began his assault, An Jing asked Xuan Mingjing to cast Hidden Earth on him remotely. It was the first time he took advantage of this ability that seemed to separate him spatially from the environment and he was quite thankful for it. Then, he headed straight to the meeting point that Madam Huai told him about.

First, he listened to their discussion and sized up the four crooks. Once he was sure that they were all outlaws with years of savage deeds to merit retribution, he made his move. According to Yvelbane, the smoking gambler was the most dangerous of the bunch as the five-poison heart in his body could self-destruct to spread a poison mist that could kill hundreds if allowed to spread through the streets, making him the highest priority.

The second-most dangerous was the one called Old Cook. He muttered to himself as he took out a piece of spirit silver and sliced his wrists to get some blood on it. His innards then emitted a black miasma with hints of the spirit-silver’s qi, eventually turning into formless, bestial ghosts that swarmed An Jing. He had used the power of his root arc, Ghosts for Hire.

An Jing closed his eyes and identified the true forms of the apparitions with True Spirit Eyes. Then, he unleashed a flurry of slashes that wiped them up completely as if they were vegetables on a chopping block.

”Gaaaah!” Old Cook suffered the blowback from the demise of the ghosts that he had nurtured using his innards, coughing out a mouthful of blood. He glared at An Jing with a look of disbelief, completely unaware of how he managed to kill all of those formless ghosts with a physical weapon.

The answer was Yvelbane’s sword intent! An Jing didn’t use any blood lethal qi at all to take care of minor ghosts of the Aura Realm. Yvelbane’s sword intent was more than enough to allow the blade to cut through them like a hot knife through butter. Without fiendslaying sword intent, the ghosts would be able to sap away at a Fortification martialist’s vigor, completely blocking their senses and paralyzing their movements.

Even so, Old Cook had done his job to buy Xia Xi enough time for a heavy stomp on the ground that tipped over and crushed the wine jars nearby. The mysterious mixture of oil and wine rose into the air, condensing together as if they were alive, forming a slick, sticky armor of wine. Then, the lamp on the desk was used to set the wine armor alight, giving rise to roaring flames of green and red that released lots of alcoholic fumes. The flaming Xia Xi then leaped at An Jing right as he finished off the ghosts!

1. As mentioned in an earlier chapter, Jing Xuan 靖玄 and Xuan Jing 玄镜 (pronunciation of Mystic Mirror) sound identical, just inverted. ☜

2. Also called the Kesagiri (袈裟斬り) in some Japanese sword martial-arts systems. 袈裟 refers to the kasaya, a buddhist robe worn over one shoulder, which looks like the trajectory of the slash. ☜