Unsheathed

In the tall building in Pond Water City.

Recently, Cui Dongshan had been frequently pacing back and forth within the golden lightning field.

In contrast, Cui Chan spent most of his time resting with his eyes closed, only opening them when he received letters by flying sword of the highest caliber, alerting him to important military and political matters of the Great Li Empire that he had to attend to.

At this moment, Cui Dongshan was standing at the edge of the circle, looking down at a pair of picture scrolls, one of which depicted Gu Can and Tan Xue, while the other depicted Chen Ping’an in his room.

“If Gu Can were to have never encountered Chen Ping’an following his departure from the Jewel Small World, do you think he would’ve been able to become the second Upper Five Tiers cultivator of the Eastern Treasured Vial Continent after Liu Laocheng on his own?” Cui Dongshan asked.

Cui Chan opened his eyes and nodded in response.

“It’s very likely that he would’ve been able to. Someone like Gu Can thrives in a world that is chaotic rather than peaceful.”

“What do you say now, you old bastard?” Cui Dongshan asked with a provocative grin. “The foundation of my teacher’s Great Dao may have been damaged, but ultimately, the situation hasn’t become any more dire than before. You must be even more disappointed than my teacher is right now!

“You invested so much time and effort into arranging these four hurdles, yet my teacher has simply conceded at the third hurdle that’s meant to be a test of his will. Deep down, he’s convinced that what Gu Can did was wrong, yet he finds himself unable to kill Gu Can or abandon him, so as a solution to what appears to be an irresolvable conundrum, he shattered his second bonded item.

“Not only has that reduced your first two hurdles to a complete joke, he also used this opportunity to carry out another bout of severance and delineation, choosing a small side path with the fewest numbers of crossroads. He has temporarily cast aside his feelings and principles to pursue the origin, and while considering the events that led up to this point, he has begun to attempt to make his way out of his ‘faultless’ circle for the very first time.

“Essentially, he has broken down an important barrier and no longer allows his principles to trap him. He has begun to step out into the big, wide world, and in his unfettered state, there’s nowhere under the heavens that he can’t go!”

Instead of addressing Cui Dongshan’s question, Cui Chan said, “I heard that you’ve picked up the art of clairvoyance of Foretellers that we abandoned all those years ago, and that you’ve begun studying the concept of sequence disorder, is that right?”

“I’ve made some progress in those fields, but that’s not even worthy of a mention compared with your grand machinations,” Cui Dongshan replied with a smile.

“If you want to tell me about it, then go ahead,” Cui Chan sneered. “Why hold yourself back? Are you hoping that I’ll beg you to reveal to me the new insights that you’ve gleaned?”

Cui Dongshan rubbed his hands together as he said, “Seeing as you’re indirectly begging me to disclose the insights that I’ve gleaned, I’ll tell you… one thing, something that I’m sure you’ll also find interesting. Let me ask you this: do you want to know how my teacher managed to overcome the hurdle that is his future in-laws during his visit to Stalactite Mountain? I can give you a hint: it has a little something to do with Gu Can.”

“Back in the bamboo building on Downtrodden Mountain, our grandfather mentioned that the most perilous ordeal that Chen Ping’an will have to face on Stalactite Mountain and the Sword Qi Great Wall is whether he can make two breakthroughs in one go, elevating him from the fourth tier to a martial artist at the pinnacle of the sixth tier.

“Someone as careful and calculating as Chen Ping’an would’ve definitely realized this. Looking at the current signs, I don’t think that his experiences in the Lotus Flower Blessed Land would’ve been enough for him to reach the level where he’s able to control his fist intent with such a high level of proficiency.

“Instead, it was most likely during the test that had been prepared for him by his future father-in-law, the one where he had drunk the Forgetting Sorrow Wine sold at the shop on Stalactite Mountain, that was most likely when he reached the sixth tier. As for how he accomplished that and how he managed to return to his original cultivation base, there are countless unfathomable wonders in the world, so that’s not important.

“In fact, I wouldn’t have found it strange even if Chen Ping’an had become an earth immortal in one fell swoop. Hence, the matter of how Chen Ping’an was able to overcome the hurdle is actually very simple to explain. The two sword immortals on the Sword Qi Great Wall had put on an act, posing as a pair of bystanders who had intentionally provoked Chen Ping’an in that wine shop in the Golden Millet Blessed Land.

“As a result, Chen Ping’an had been goaded into abandoning his martial arts cultivation, making successive breakthroughs after being backed into a corner while also standing up for the parents of the girl that he loves.”

“You’re still pretty sharp, aren’t you, you old bastard!” Cui Dongshan chuckled. “Having said that, make sure to be more careful with your wording in the future. ‘Calculating’ is not an apt adjective to describe my teacher. Calculating is an adjective that should be reserved for conniving scumbags like ourselves, not a wise man like him.”

“I bet everyone over at the Sword Qi Great Wall feels like Chen Ping’an is unworthy of Ning Yao,” Cui Chan chuckled.

A perplexed look appeared on Cui Dongshan’s face as he asked, “What’s going on with you, you old bastard? Why are you speaking favorably of my teacher all of a sudden? Are you considering surrender? If that’s the case, then how about we call it a tie and end things right here?”

Cui Chan paid no heed to Cui Dongshan as he continued, “It was only his willingness to abandon his future as a martial artist that allowed him to overcome that hurdle on Stalactite Mountain. In this situation, if he’s unwilling to even stay for Gu Can’s sake, then he would have no right to even take part in all of this.

“Both of us have seen countless people who are unwilling to make sacrifices in the present, thinking to themselves that they’ll only make certain sacrifices once they’ve accumulated more in the future and have more to lose, but it’s often the case that the opportunity will have already been missed by then.”

Cui Dongshan was becoming more and more perplexed by the second.

“Why do you keep saying good things about my teacher? Have you gone mad? Please don’t tell me that’s the case! If you’re going to go mad, then at least wait until that objective of mine has been completed. Rest assured, I’ll make sure to leave a little food bowl for you at the entrance of the bamboo building on Downtrodden Mountain so you won’t starve to death.”

Cui Chan pointed at the room in the picture scroll, then turned to Cui Dongshan with a cold sneer as he said, “What did I tell you? The true complexity of the fourth hurdle lies in the fact that it encompasses countless hurdles.

“The fourth hurdle has only just begun, and the more Chen Ping’an thinks and ponders here, the more hurdles he will encounter in his heart in the future. By then, you’ll be begging me to surrender because you’ll be worried that Chen Ping’an will suffer complete and irreversible Qi deviation.”

As opposed to putting on a relaxed and carefree facade as he had done earlier, Cui Dongshan sat back down as he said, “Brute force can grant one victory once, but reason and principles are the key to consistent victories over time.”

“What if the ‘time’ in this case is a duration of decades or even a century, equivalent to the entire lifespan of a mortal? What will you do then? What will Chen Ping’an do then?” Cui Chan asked with a smile.

Cui Dongshan put on a stern expression as he said, “You have to learn from my teacher and understand the importance of treating others with kindness. Do you take pleasure in being so harsh and overbearing to me?”

A faint smile appeared on Cui Chan’s face as he said, “Ruan Xiu and the others have entered the picture, as has the master of Palace Willow Island who has almost already been forgotten, Liu Laocheng. Perhaps it’s better to come at the right time than to come early.”

“I’m not listening! I’m not listening!” Cui Dongshan said in a singsong voice as he shook his head from side to side like a petulant child.

“This is the price that one must pay for abiding by reason and principles,” Cui Chan continued. “He lost a catfish that was sure to reach the Nascent Tier on Clay Vase Alley, he lost Qi Jingchun’s mountain seal in the Flood Dragon Trench, and he was almost killed by Du Mao in Old Dragon City.

“It looks like your teacher still hasn’t paid enough of a price and still hasn’t suffered enough hardships, but that’s fine. He’ll experience all of the hardships that he could possibly stomach in Bamboo Scroll Lake.”

Cui Dongshan continued to shake his head from side to side as he repeated over and over again, “I’m not listening! I’m not listening…”

Cui Chan turned to him and said, “If you get the opportunity to return to Downtrodden Mountain someday, make sure to be good to our grandfather. If I were our grandfather, I would’ve already beaten you to death for the way that you turned out.”

In addition to shaking his head, Cui Dongshan began to sway from side to side while also sweeping his baggy sleeves through the air, while Cui Chan fell silent and closed his eyes again.

————

Right as Chen Ping’an was setting down his brush, he suddenly noticed the sun outside.

After some contemplation, he emerged from his room to dry his bamboo slips under the sun.

Many of the bamboo slips had text engraved onto both their backs and their fronts. This wasn’t because he didn’t have enough bamboo to use. Having traveled as far as he had, he had naturally encountered no lack of bamboo forests.

Instead, it was because as he read more and more books, he discovered that there existed ties between many principles, even ones from different scholarly lineages across the Three Teachings and the Hundred Schools of Thought. In fact, there were even many common or similar principles across the teachings and schools of thoughts.

If the Three Teachings could be likened to close neighbors, then the Hundred Schools of Thought could be said to resemble friends that had encountered one another in passing, or distant relatives that hadn’t met for many years.

While laying out the bamboo slips under the sun, he picked up one of them, and on its front was the Confucian quote of: “All things have fundamentals and incidentals, just like all events have beginnings and conclusions. One will be close to the Great Dao once they understand the sequence of such matters.”

On the back of the bamboo slip was the Daoist quote: “The beauty of heaven and earth cannot be conveyed through words, the four seasons pass naturally without the need for words, and the principles of all things stand without having to be laid out in words.”

This bamboo slip was rather special. At the time, after reading through a Buddhist scripture, Chen Ping’an had engraved a Buddhist quote in slightly smaller text on a blank section on one side of the bamboo slip: “The intricacies of the most exquisite Buddhist principles cannot be conveyed through words.”

There was another bamboo slip that had the Confucian quote “Only by focusing on foundational principles can one hope to be correct in everything that they do” on one side, and the Buddhist quote “There are no hard and fast rules, only guiding principles” on the other.

With each bamboo slip that Chen Ping’an picked up, he would silently read all of the quotes on them once before gently laying them down.

He picked up another bamboo slip that carried the quotes of “all laws are equal, none are superior or inferior” and “all must obey laws, regardless of status” on opposite sides.

After that, Chen Ping’an picked up one final bamboo slip that carried the quotes of “ignorance is the most pitiful state of existence, even more so than death” and “rock bottom leads to change, change leads to reversal, reversal leads to prosperity” on opposite sides.

It was a crisp autumn day, and after laying out all of his bamboo slips, Chen Ping’an squatted down in the vacant central area with his hands clasped in their opposite sleeves as he observed his surroundings.

He remained in that posture all the way until the sun was about to set, and only then did he pick up his bamboo slips one by one before putting them into his pocket treasure.

He was going to set aside all of these principles for the moment.

Principles only existed in books, while people had to live outside of books.

This was something that Chen Ping’an had already understood even before the fall of the Jewel Small World, and he hadn’t read it from a book. Instead, it had been told to him in earnest by someone, and he had listened just as earnestly and committed it to memory.

Chen Ping’an had only just packed away all of his bamboo slips when he spotted Gu Can and Tan Xue approaching while waving at him from afar.

Chen Ping’an closed the door to his room, then joined Gu Can and Tan Xue, and together, the three of them made their way to Gu Can’s opulent manor.

There were two colorful door gods plastered to the gates of the manor, and as Chen Ping’an gazed upon them, he thought to himself, “These things can ward off ghosts, but not people.”

Gu Can noticed Chen Ping’an looking at the door gods, and he asked, “What’s wrong?”

A slightly disgruntled look then appeared on his face as he complained, “Why did you insist on going to live by the mountain entrance? It’s such a shabby place that you can’t even put up a pair of decent door gods like these.”

Chen Ping’an smiled as he replied, “Let’s go eat.”

Only upon arriving at the table did Chen Ping’an discover that Gu Can’s mother had already poured cups of wine for both Gu Can and himself.

Tan Xue sat down beside Gu Can. It had no appetite for normal food, but it liked to accompany Gu Can and his mother at the table during meals as it made it seem more human.

Gu Can had already told his mother that Chen Ping’an wasn’t going to be drinking, so he was rather concerned that Chen Ping’an would be displeased by the wine that he had been poured, but as it turned out, his concerns were unnecessary.

Chen Ping’an had already raised his cup and proposed a toast to Gu Can’s mother. After downing the cup of wine in one go, he poured himself another cup, then took a small sip before digging into the meal.

Gu Can’s mother did most of the speaking at the table, mostly discussing some trivial matters from the Jewel Small World back in the day, and Chen Ping’an would respond in kind, telling her about the state of the current Dragon Spring Prefecture.

It was a very pleasant affair.

After having his first cup of wine, Gu Can felt like he could easily have several gallons more and still not be satisfied.

Unfortunately for him, Chen Ping’an deterred, “Don’t have too much wine. Even though you’re now a Qi refiner and drinking crow caw wine can benefit your cultivation base, you’re still young, so it’s not a good idea to indulge excessively in drinking. You can have three cups today at the very most.”

Gu Can made a face to express his displeasure, but still nodded in agreement, while an amused smile appeared on his mother’s face.

She was happy to see Chen Ping’an discipline her son in trivial matters like this and iron out some of his bad habits.

After hearing about Liu Zhimao’s reaction to the “nourishing his noble spirit” jade tablet, she had considered the matter for the good part of a night, and she had ultimately decided that this was a good thing. At the very least, it would strike some apprehension into Liu Zhimao’s heart. As long as Chen Ping’an possessed the power required to ensure self-preservation, he wasn’t going to drag down or hinder Gu Can.

As for all that rhetoric about right and wrong, listening to all of that did nothing but agitate her. In any case, she was fairly confident that Chen Ping’an wouldn’t do anything to intentionally harm Gu Can. As long as he didn’t do anything that unintentionally harmed Gu Can’s interests, she would allow him to stay on Cyan Gorge Island.

After the meal, Chen Ping’an embarked on a stroll on the small path along the lake like he always did.

He paused occasionally with no particular objective in mind, and at times, he would encounter some Cyan Gorge Island cultivators.

Most of them were young Qi refiners of the Lower Five Tiers, and as for the servants and maidservants, they naturally didn’t dare to leave their respective manors without permission, so Chen Ping’an didn’t encounter any of them.

All of them greeted Chen Ping’an as Mr. Chen because they had no idea who he really was. All they had heard was that he was an esteemed guest that had been personally invited to Cyan Gorge Island by Gu Can, and on top of that, Gu Can visited him every single day, and this was a level of hospitality that he afforded no one else.

However, as everyone came to discover that Chen Ping’an was very polite and friendly to everyone, the awe and veneration that the cultivators of the island had initially harbored toward him began to fade.

Could it be that he was just an old friend of Gu Can’s with no power to speak of? Perhaps everyone had overestimated him.

All of a sudden, Chen Ping’an stopped in his tracks on the serene lakeside path.

Two people had appeared before him, one of whom was one of Gu Can’s senior brothers, Chao Zhe, while the other was Gu Can’s friend, Lü Caisang. The latter was a handsome young boy dressed in a white robe, and his actual age was close to thirty, but he still appeared and behaved like a child.

It was most likely the case that he had already reached the Abode Tier back in his teenage years, thereby allowing him to keep this youthful visage. Clearly, that Nascent Tier cultivator of Bamboo Scroll Lake had made a very good decision by taking Lü Caisang as his disciple.

Chao Zhe had already stopped in his tracks, while Lü Caisang walked a few more steps toward Chen Ping’an as he asked with a menacing expression, “Is your name Chen Ping’an? I suggest you stop meddling in Cancan’s affairs from now on!”

“What if I don’t?” Chen Ping’an asked in a direct and straightforward manner.

Lü Caisang faltered slightly upon hearing this, and before he had a chance to respond, Chen Ping’an had already looked past him toward Chao Zhe.

After a brief hesitation, he said something rather strange: “I’ll let it slide this one time, but don’t do anything like this again.”

Chao Zhe opened his mouth to say something, but Chen Ping’an shook his head as he interjected, “There’s no need to explain. I already know what you want to say, I just don’t want to hear it.”

“Bold words coming from a sickly brat like yourself! You must think you can say whatever you want here because you have Cancan backing you up!” Lü Caisang sneered.

Chen Ping’an reached out with one hand to his side, and Chao Zhe was struck by the instinctive urge to retreat, but he forced himself to remain composed as he didn’t want to look like a coward in front of Lü Caisang.

Deathly silence ensued.

“What the hell are you doing?” Lü Caisang guffawed.

Chen Ping’an’s brows furrowed slightly as he asked, “Are you sure you don’t want to come? You better make up your mind.”

As soon as his voice trailed off, a golden line rose up from Gu Can’s manor, then extended all the way to Chen Ping’an, concluding in the form of a longsword that hovered above the palm of his hand.

The flying sword had already fallen still around an inch above Chen Ping’an’s hand, but the golden line left in its wake lingered in the air.

Lü Caisang’s eyes widened with shock.

“According to the rules of Bamboo Scroll Lake, you two should already be dead by now, right?” Chen Ping’an asked.

He then took a glance at Sword Immortal, which was trembling with anticipation, and said, “Go back. I’ll let you do as you please the next time I summon you.”

Sword Immortal vanished in a flash, and only then did the golden line fade away.

Lü Caisang remained standing on the spot, unwilling to back down, while Chao Zhe had already stepped away to the side.

Chen Ping’an took a glance at Lü Caisang, who had a look of finality and resolve on his face, and a smile appeared on his face as he said, “I can tell that you’re a true friend of Gu Can’s.”

After that, he turned around and made his way back to his room.

Deep down, there was more than a hint of lingering fear in Lü Caisang’s heart, but as he turned to the horrified Chao Zhe, he continued to put on a strong front as he scoffed, “That guy must’ve been dropped on his head as a baby!”

Chao Zhe didn’t dare to say anything.

Shut the hell up, you idiot! You can always run back to your master for refuge, but I have no one to turn to!

Upon returning to his room, Chen Ping’an lit the lamp on the table, which was laden with local chronicles from all parts of Bamboo Scroll Lake, as well as the genealogical records of many of the major islands.

The reason why Tian Hujun had been able to deliver all of this so quickly was very simple: these were all spoils of war that Cyan Gorge Island had secured, and it was the most worthless category of spoils. If Chen Ping’an hadn’t requested to see them, they would’ve been incinerated as waste paper sooner or later.

At this point, all of the noteworthy lineages on the eleven subsidiary islands of Cyan Gorge Island had already been severed by Gu Can and Liu Zhimao.

He had to read through all of these records and take notes, following which he had to ask some even more in-depth questions, and that would no longer just be a matter of sitting down and putting brush to paper.

However, Chen Ping’an didn’t consider this to be a very difficult task. He was already accustomed to performing menial tasks for extended periods of time, and for him, it was simply a matter of substituting his fist technique practice with taking notes. On top of that, this was only the beginning, so if he already felt like the task was difficult, then he may as well give up right away.

Late at night, with the bright, full moon hanging high up in the sky, Chen Ping’an set down his brush, massaging his own wrist as he left his room to pace in circles as a form of relaxation.

He had already sent out three letters to Cloud Drape Mountain, Peace and Tranquility Mountain, and the Fan Clan of Old Dragon City, but he most likely wasn’t going to receive any responses anytime soon.

However, he was in no hurry, and it wasn’t like being in a hurry would change anything anyway.

He had already traveled vast distances on foot step by step, and flying sword letters were certainly going to travel far faster.

All of a sudden, he stopped pacing in circles and made his way through the entrance of Cyan Gorge Island en route to the ferry station.

From there, he crouched down and scooped up some water with his hands, then washed his face before casting his gaze into the distance.