Realms In The Firmament

People on the street started gossiping. A crowd had gathered around the fighters and were talking about the fight. Ye Xiao had been quite quickly identified as the foppish lord by some and they quickly disclosed his identity to those near them. After a while, everyone had learnt about Ye Xiao and they kept on spicing up the gossip.

“Whoop! I had thought that I knew who that is. It turns out to be the young lord Ye, the General Ye’s son.”

“No wonder he acts brutally. He just rode the man and didn’t stop punching.”

“He is Ye Xiao. You know, the young lord. For him this is so ordinary, just like any other day, like a routine…”

“That’s right. It would be very uncommon, very strange, and very unearthly that he doesn’t beat someone… But who is that punching bag?”

“… I have no idea. This must be his unlucky day…”

Finally, the two guards of Mu Cheng-Bai arrived on the scene with furious howls. They burst in through the crowd and launched their fists towards Ye Xiao. Ye Xiao calmly looked over his shoulders for a bit and stood up without any particular hurry. He then firmly stamped his foot and leapt up in the air. He turned his waist in the air and a large snap of breaking bones was heard when his right foot connected with one of the two guards.

Aaahhhhh! A scream of misery was heard from the mouth of the guard who had been ruthlessly kicked.

Whether Ye Xiao did it on purpose or not, when his foot landed on the ground, he managed to stamp it right on Mu Cheng-Bai’s crotch.

The piteous cries of Mu Cheng Bai were world-shaking and one could imagine how painful it would be to get kicked in the crotch!

Mu Cheng-Bai curled his body while holding his crotch like a prawn. Tears were rolling out of his eyes, snot was dripping out of his nose and a look of extreme pain was clearly visible on his twisted face.

On the other side, Ye Xiao and the two guards had already begun fighting.

There were many expert cultivators in the clan of Mu. No one would doubt that. But Mu Cheng-Bai had been a tyrant in the capital for many years, so he wouldn’t need to use any martial force to solve problems.

And for this reason, he had only brought two guards with him who were only good at bootlicking. And while they were at the Grade of Renyuan, they were still at a lower level than Mu Cheng-Bai. He had planned to just hang around on the street, so he had anticipated that he wouldn’t need any heavy protection. Besides, the three of them were all at the Grade of Renyuan. That was enough for any common situations…

But he didn’t know he would come across Ye Xiao – an unreasonable foppish young lord with ridiculous strength!

Due to this miscalculation, Mu Cheng-Bai took a real beating this time.

However, Ye Xiao was not aware of all these details. He was simply wondering why the guards were so lame, though they looked like some expert cultivators – steady steps, sharp eyes and strong bodies.

“What is going on? Why are they so… weak?”

While Ye Xiao’s curiosity was piqued, he suddenly heard an exhausted scream from behind him, “Go get him! Beat him up! If he dies, I will take the blame!”

The voice was no longer calm and deep. Instead it was utterly abashed.

Mu Cheng-Bai was the young generation of the well-known clan of Mu. Although he was not a direct descendant, he had never suffered through any difficulties. In the Kingdom of Chen, he was the older cousin of the crown prince, so he always got what he wanted. A powerful clan was behind him. Who would dare to mess with him?

How could he bare to suffer such disgrace?

Today Ye Xiao had beaten him as easily as a father would beat his son. Even though he was usually shrewd, at this moment an immense rage had taken over his rationality.

Even more so, knowing that Ye Xiao was a foppish fool, had increased his feeling of humiliation. “When eventually the news of today’s event spreads throughout the capital… The whole kingdom will come to know that I, the famous young lord Mu, had got beaten by one of the three foppish lords, Ye Xiao … How can I live through the shame which comes from this?!”

When the order was given, the guards instantly turned ferocious.

Honestly, they too were very upset about what had just happened. In their eyes Ye Xiao was just a fool with impractical steps, some useless punches and no spunk, but they just couldn’t seem to touch him. In fact, these two experienced guards were pushed towards the limits of their abilities time and time again!

They were feeling exceedingly gloomy.

However, now that they had received the order form their master, they would naturally go to any lengths to beat Ye Xiao up.

Shiiiing! They both quickly drew their swords, which gave of a resplendent reflections, showing their beauty, in the sun. They then quickly aimed their swords and swung at Ye Xiao.

The first sword was aimed at Ye Xiao’s throat after it had deceptively changed its direction thrice! Meanwhile, the other sword was aimed at Ye Xiao’s waist to make sure that dodging was not an option for this foppish lord!

The two swords were in unison as they slashed towards Ye Xiao. They really didn’t care that Ye Xiao was from the General’s House. They just wanted to chop this foppish lord apart!

In the eyes of the Mu clan members, to kill the son of a mere general in a kingdom of the mortal world was just a casual monday morning.

His status meant absolutely nothing to them!

They had gotten the order, but even if no one would have ordered them to kill this foppish lord it wouldn’t have changed a thing. Killing someone just didn’t mean anything to them, with the backing of the royal forces, they would always be in the right!

Meanwhile, at a corner of the street, Wang Xiao Nian was still hiding. If one would look at him closely, they would see beads of sweat rolling down his forehead as an immense fear was plastered on his face! “WTF! You aren’t seriously going to chop him apart, are you?!” He panicked, “I… I… I couldn’t take the guilt.”

...

A cold light flashed in Ye Xiao’s eyes.

“In this crowded market place, there are too many onlookers. Many of them have actually surrounded us to enjoy the show. Those three can ignore all this because they have the royal force behind them, but… I can’t.” He thought, “But I really want to kill them…”

As he was pondering over this issue, he suddenly made his move. He flexibly turned his waist and slipped away like a fish in the ocean. He then started to loudly scream, “MURDER!!! HELP!!!” as he quickly ran away!

Ye Xiao ran away with tottering steps, all the while acting like he was scared. At this point he wasn’t interested the slightest about something as trivial as embarrassment. He reached the first corner in the street and quickly darted into it, disappearing in the blink of an eye.

It seemed like he was too scared to tell right from left as he took the wrong turn and ran westwards even though the General’s House was to the east.

He had chosen to run in the opposite direction from his house and was getting further and further away from this safe haven…

“You two are truly useless! Go get him! Go!” Mu Cheng-Bai furiously repeated his command.

While he had finally managed to stand up, his hands were still tightly enveloping his crotch area as the pain had not subsided by the slightest amount. The muscles in his face were twitching heavily and he was gasping for air.

He really had suffered a huge loss of face and he was determined to catch Ye Xiao no matter what!

He had never been humiliated like this in public before.

The guards were also infuriated by this foppish lord, so they rushed after Ye Xiao without further ado.

Mu Cheng-Bai was so resentful, that he beared with the pain smouldering in his crotch, and followed after his two guards.

Within a space of a few seconds, all the action had disappeared, both the assailant and the assaulted had ran off and the spectators were left speechlessly looking at each other.

Only after a while did the spectators regain their wits and quickly started chatting, “He truly is one of those ‘three foppish lords’… Fighting on the street in front of the public, he did it like it was for his glory…”

“That man who was beaten up didn’t seem like a good guy either. He actually wanted to kill someone in the middle of the street in broad daylight.”

“He wasn’t just thinking it, he was actually going for it. If the lord Ye didn’t run fast enough, he would already have been chopped into many pieces…”

“I have seen enough for a year. The world of these lords is really something beyond our comprehension…”

…

Wang Xiao-Nian had joined the crowd to look at the spectacle with a foxy smile on his face.

He thought disdainfully, “Humph, Ye Xiao. You have neither realised the trouble you have put yourself in nor the person you’re messing with, but all in all, you are definitely dead meat now! Even if your father came back, he wouldn’t be able to save you! For these men, killing you means nothing at all!”

Showing a sinister smile, he turned around and quietly left.

He was definitely not going to follow these four men and watch the slaughter of Ye Xiao. Firstly, he simply wasn’t able to do so and secondly, he didn’t want to get involved in Ye Xiao’s murder…

The General Ye might not be able to deal with Mu Cheng-Bai, but he certainly could deal with Wang Xiao-Nian.

Therefore, although Wang Xiao-Nian was happy in his heart, he wouldn’t dare say anything.

He was already worrying about how he would confirm that Mu Cheng Bai wouldn’t mention his involvement in this ordeal.

….

Ye Xiao went along the streets and alleys. It looked like he was fleeing through any path he could find. In fact, he was choosing these routes on purpose. The surroundings got more and more dilapidated as he ran further and further. Ahead of him there was the city slum.

All he could see were ruins.

Beyond the ruins in the city slum there was a rather large hill. After one went over the hill they would arrive in a forest and on the far side of the forest there was a lake.

These were created by mankind in the Chen-Xing City – ‘a hill, a forest and a lake’.

The three men were chasing after him!

They showed an attitude like ‘we will chase you up to the highest point in heaven and down to the lowest level of hell’!

But what they didn’t know, was that the closer they got to Ye Xiao, the closer they got to their own death!

Ye Xiao was slowly building up his killing killing intent as he ran!

…

Ye Xiao knew that the guy he had just beaten up, must be someone special. He might not have recognized the guy, but his guts told him that he shouldn’t act rashly against him. He wasn’t interested in looking for useless trouble, so even though he had punched mercilessly, he had never had the intented to kill him.

But Mu Cheng-Bai definitely wanted to kill him!

The two guards had already made a killing move!

Usually Ye Xiao would exterminate his enemies; Especially those who tried to kill him.

‘You want to kill me? I will kill you!’

That’s why he had chosen such a complicated route – he had wanted to draw them to this isolated place.

Ye Xiao had pretended to be extremely exhausted for a while. He had arrived at the top of the hill while breathing heavily. It looked like he was about to fall down at any moment. The three men felt their desire to kill this foppish lord rise to an even higher level!

“Bastard, you finally have nowhere to go!”

“We can even kill you in the middle of a busy street and now you brought us in such a desolate place? How could we not dare to kill you? Bastard! You really made a mistake in coming this way! This is your way to the hell!”

Ye Xiao ran off the hill and looked around. He happily noticed that those three were right and that there were indeed no signs of people anywhere near him. “This really is a perfect place to get rid of their bodies without anyone noticing…” He thought.

Dusk had settled in by the time Ye Xiao arrived at this desolate place!

Ye Xiao finally stopped with the totter and suddenly increased his speed, he was like an arrow, shooting through the air. Whoosh! The leaves on the trees shook as he rushed into the forest!

The two guards followed Ye Xiao with great urgency. However, as they enter deeper into the forest, uneasiness slowly crept inside their hearts. They felt something was wrong and when they looked in the direction where Ye Xia run off to, they were instantly stunned.

The foppish lord, who had seemed like a stray cur, was now standing in front of them with a calm and composed demeanor. He looked completely at ease and that fact made them uneasy!

Ye Xiao was standing there with both his hands clasped behind his back. He disdainfully smiled and calmly looked at the approaching guards. He deviously nodded his head and said with a chilling smile, “Well done guys. You have fulfilled your responsibilities and you have obediently chased me all the way here on your master’s command. However… The road of life is long and boring. You burn in the sun and freeze in the snow. You have to overcome the bumps and survive the thorns of the brambles. To Live like the two of you is true suffering. Why don’t you let me ease the pain that is your life and let me end it?”