A Blind Swordsman's Sword Coffin

—Li Guanqi, don’t come save me.

Those seven short words pressed down on Li Guanqi’s chest like seven mountains. He finally realized just how important Tang Ru was to him.

They rarely kept in touch, but Tang Ru had helped him immensely when he was at his lowest. In many of those situations, Li Guanqi had appeared to be the one who benefited. And behind the scenes, Tang Ru had borne immense pressure to help him.

Although Tang Ru’s unintentional leak of his location had once nearly cost Li Guanqi dearly, he had never blamed Tang Ru for it. As for the Purple Sun Pavilion affair, if Tang Ru hadn’t renounced the pavilion, stripping off his robes and tossing them onto the snow before telling Li Guanqi what had happened... the consequences could’ve been disastrous.

Li Guanqi sat at the summit and took several deep breaths before the storm in him finally quieted. He gripped the jade slip and discovered that Tang Ru had shattered his own slip long ago. There was no way to contact him.

His shoulders sagged. He took a jar of strong liquor from his storage ring and cracked open the clay seal. The liquor scorched a path down his throat and into his stomach. Liquor spilled from the corner of his mouth as he drained the entire jar in one gulp.

He wiped his lips with his sleeve. Fine red veins threaded his eyes. With a dark expression, he took out another jade slip.

“Tell me what you’ve been doing all this time,” he said in an eerily calm voice.

A moment later, a familiar voice came through the slip.

—I’m sorry. I didn’t think something like this would happen.

Li Guanqi suppressed his fury and spoke again, his voice icy. “I’m asking what you’re doing right now! Why haven’t I been able to reach you?”

Silence followed before Ji Yuchuan replied softly.

—I’m sorry. I can’t tell you right now.

Li Guanqi shot to his feet, clutching the jade slip as he roared, “I don’t need your apologies! Ji Yuchuan, from this moment on, you are no longer the vice pavilion master of Guanyun Pavilion! To hell with our hundred-year pact. Get lost!”

He hurled the jade slip away. Several bolts of lightning pierced it before it struck the ground.

This time, Li Guanqi was truly furious. He couldn’t understand why Ji Yuchuan had cut off contact as if deliberately hiding something from him.

Ji Yuchuan stood at the entrance of the Heavenly Intelligence Pavilion and sighed. He had to return immediately. He turned and tore open a spatial rift.

He took out a jade slip and said, “Senior Gu, I need to return to the Daxia Territory right away. We’ll have to talk about the Heavenly Intelligence Map another time.”

He glanced over his shoulder. Wariness flickered in his eyes. His deep gaze seemed to pierce the vast distance, settling on an old man seated at a writing desk, brush in hand.

Ji Yuchuan’s lips curved into a faint smile, and he put the matter out of his mind. Still, the thought of Li Guanqi’s anger made his head ache. He’d been inside a spatial transport tunnel. How was he supposed to receive a message there?

He turned and plunged back into the transport tunnel, racing toward the Guanyun Pavilion.

In a stretch of void so deeply hidden that no one knew where it lay, a world of its own rested within a grain of dust drifting through a chaotic storm. Its distinctive black architecture gave away its identity at once. A masked man in red robes glanced at Lu Hengtian and sneered, demonic qi surging around him.

“Useless. This is all you brought back? What good is this chubby kid?”

Lu Hengtian and Zhu Ying’s faces soured. The masked man extended a hand, and Lu Hengtian hastily presented the array tray with both hands. The man pocketed it and snorted.

“Go inside and wait. Whether the leader allows you to undergo conversion remains to be seen. Where’s the kid?”

Lu Hengtian and Zhu Ying let out sighs of relief, then threw Tang Ru to the ground. He lay there with his eyes fixed on them and his mouth full of blood.

The masked man frowned, and Lu Hengtian hurried to explain. “He tried to kill himself, so I sealed his cultivation and tore out his tongue.”

The masked man’s eyes flickered, fine lines forming at their corners. He planted his foot on Tang Ru’s wrist and pressed down.

Crack! Crack crack!

Tang Ru’s wrist turned to mangled pulp, barely attached. Tang Ru writhed desperately, his face twisted in agony as cold sweat poured off him.

The man laughed coldly. “If you’re going to do something, do it properly. You’re too soft. As long as he doesn’t die, it’s fine.”

His feet blurred. Within a breath, he broke all four of Tang Ru’s limbs. Tang Ru’s right hand remained attached to his wrist by nothing more than strands of shredded flesh.

The masked man bent down, grabbed Tang Ru by the hair, and dragged him toward the rear hall.

Only after he was gone did Zhu Ying dare to gasp for breath. The pressure he gave off had been suffocating.

She leaned close to Lu Hengtian and whispered, “What rank is he within the organization?”

Lu Hengtian let out a long breath. “He must be a Wang, the highest rank. As for Sha, the leader, he must be at least a half-step Tribulation Realm cultivator.”

Then he sighed. “Forget it. That’s not something we need to worry about. Once we’re converted, neither of us will ever again have to hide from the heavenly tribulation of reincarnation! Hahaha! This is what countless people dream of...”

They walked side by side toward the great hall, nervous and eager at once.

Creak!

The doors swung open, and a strikingly beautiful woman with a cold, aloof air stepped out of the hall. She wore a sweeping black gown.

A black light flashed at her brow. Her indifferent gaze swept over the two of them, and then she was gone.

Lu Hengtian frowned as he watched her leave. He hadn’t expected such a young woman to be at the mid Illusory Refinement Realm.

The hall was dim and empty. Eerie green flames flickered as they barely made out a figure in blood-red robes seated upon a massive throne.

An inexplicable pressure enveloped them, forcing their heads even lower. Hunched over, they made their way to the center of the hall and dropped to their knees.

Behind his mask, the eyes of the man on the throne remained perfectly calm, betraying neither pleasure nor displeasure. “Two imbeciles. You had the array tray, yet you still couldn’t find Ye Feng and the others.”

Lu Hengtian’s heart shuddered. He explained hurriedly, “A man appeared and intervened. I... I was afraid of jeopardizing your plans, so I left in a hurry.”

The man on the throne laughed coldly. “I know You Ming intervened, obviously. If I hadn’t stepped in at the end, all of you would have been trapped there! Yu Chang’an’s death is a bit of a shame, but he was bound to die. You Ming despises all men who act like women.”

Zhu Ying couldn’t put her finger on why, but the man’s tone seemed to carry a hint of... playfulness, as though there were some deeper meaning behind his words.