Unsheathed

Inside the government prison located in Imperial Accompanying City, a strange ray of sword light that was far more pitch-black than the night sky pierced through the ground and drew an extremely thin and long black line through the sky, after which it rapidly soared into the distance.

As if in tacit understanding, both Ye Han, who was standing in the pavilion atop Black Glaze Mountain, and Fan Weiran, who was standing in the dragon palace under Verdant Bamboo Lake, issued a command in unison, ordering the disciples of their immortal forces to get ready to fight for the valuable treasure.

Like sprouting bamboo shoots after a bout of spring rain, hundreds upon thousands of people rushed after the black line in the sky. There were official immortals from a variety of backgrounds, vagrant cultivators who were attempting to snatch the treasure, and martial artists from the cultivation world who usually depended on Qi refiners.

After the pitch-black sword light soared fifty or so kilometers into the distance, a small monkey suddenly appeared in the sword light’s path and swallowed it into its belly. Afterward, an elderly cultivator hid the small monkey inside his sleeve before turning around to flee.

A frenzied pursuit and a chaotic battle thus broke out.

Only an unremarkable cultivator from the Ghost Axe Palace rapidly sprinted toward Imperial Accompanying City.

Including the city wall, all of the structures taller than twenty-one meters in Imperial Accompanying City looked as if they had been decapitated by a single sword slash.

The young man dressed in snow-white armor leaped onto the severed city wall and hesitated for a moment before deciding against entering the city straight away. He walked along the city wall and circled around the entire city once, and what he saw was the city god temple which had already transformed into a pile of rubble. Many tall buildings belonging to wealthy clans had collapsed to the ground as well.

There was a cacophony of harsh sounds rising and falling in the city, including the deafening shouts and loud wails from countless people. Lights were blazing in almost every single house, and ever since the founding of Imperial Accompanying City, there had most likely never been a single night when everyone in the city had lit their candles and lamps in unison, regardless of how wealthy or poor they were. It was so bright that it almost appeared like day.

Du Yu gritted his teeth and made up his mind. He didn’t dare to fly through the city, so he retracted his Divine Dewbearing Armor and placed the armor pellet inside his sleeve before quietly jumping down from the city wall. He didn’t dare to walk along the main streets either, so he purposely made his way around the small streets and alleys as he sprinted toward the city god temple.

There was the incessant sound of wailing children as he navigated through the city, and the women were busy consoling the children as the men swore and cursed. Most of the elderly residents were reciting religious scriptures and kowtowing to deities at home, with some of them striking their wooden fish if they owned one.[1] Meanwhile, some bold hooligans were snooping around and hoping to find a chance to strike riches.

As for the wealthy families, they started to put up the talismans that they had spent huge sums of money to purchase from the shrines and Daoist temples, not caring about whether these talismans worked or not and simply focusing on getting them up first.

After arriving on the main street outside the city god temple, Du Yu rushed inside the temple, only to see a bloody and mangled… person who didn’t have a single patch of uninjured flesh on his body. He was standing still with his hands resting on his sword.

Du Yu glanced at the long sword that was glowing with a dim golden light. However, he furiously shook his head and violently slapped himself a few times, after which he put his palms together in a prayer and said softly with a determined expression, “Rest assured, Senior, and trust me this one time. This isn’t a place to linger around, so let me carry you to a quieter and more secluded place!”

After saying this, Du Yu waited for a short moment before continuing, “Since Senior isn’t saying anything, I’ll take that as a yes?!”

In the end, Du Yu walked over to the bloodied person and his sword.

He was just about to squat down and place Chen Ping’an on his back.

However, this resulted in him failing to witness a sight that could have shattered his courage.

The mighty senior, who barely resembled a human at this moment, slowly turned his head ever so slightly and subtly moved a finger.

High up in the sky, an outsider cultivator who was hovering in mid-air hesitated for a moment before flying into the distance.

Du Yu smacked his head in realization. The mighty senior’s sword was in the way, so how could he possibly carry the senior like this?

Du Yu wanted to lightly pry open Chen Ping’an’s fingers, but he discovered that they wouldn’t move at all. A sullen expression appeared on his face as he thought anxiously about what he should do.

His finger lightly brushed over the hilt of the sword, and he was surprisingly thrown back in a violent manner, with his soul shuddering violently. This instant burst of pain was no inferior to the time when the mighty senior had imprisoned his soul at the water immortal shrine of Peony Stream’s canal master.

Du Yu struggled to get up, with his face deathly pale as he coughed up a large mouthful of blood. He spread his hand open, only to see that his offending finger had almost been directly transformed into a stick of charcoal.

However, the sword suddenly shuddered by itself and flew out from under the mighty senior’s hand, gracefully flying behind him and lightly returning to the scabbard on his back.

The powerful cultivator hovering in the sky and continuing to use an immortal observation technique to observe the matters in the ruins of the city god temple heaved a soft sigh, one that was seemingly filled with a sense of pity. Only then did he truly leave.

After all of this, Du Yu was finally able to carry the bloodied Chen Ping’an on his back, with the latter’s wounds so deep that his bones could be seen in many places. Du Yu was like a headless chook as he walked through the narrow alleys and leaped onto the severed city walls, and in the end, he was finally able to find an abandoned and derelict courtyard after a long period of difficult searching.

Du Yu kicked open the door of a small room that was covered in cobwebs, and he had initially planned to place the bloodied Chen Ping’an on the bed. Upon seeing the dusty broken wooden bed and had no blankets, however, he had no option but to use his foot to drag a rotten rocking chair over and gently place the mighty senior onto the chair that was creaking in protest. Du Yu was now covered in blood as well, and he retrieved a porcelain bottle and lightly placed it beside the rocking chair. He then took several steps back and wiped away the sweat on his forehead, saying, “Senior, I’m scared of death — I’m truly very scared of death — so this is all that I can do.”

He then smiled bitterly and continued, “If Senior doesn’t die, yet I’m captured while Senior is still recuperating, then I’ll still truthfully reveal the address of this hiding place to my captors.”

The person on the wooden rocking chair remained deathly silent.

Du Yu cupped his fists in respect and left the small room, quietly closing the door behind him.

His brain had already turned into mush at this moment. He had initially wanted to flee from Imperial Accompanying City as quickly as possible, deciding what to do after he returned to the Ghost Axe Palace and reunited with his parents. However, he immediately came to his senses after he left the small room and stepped into a gust of cold wind.

No, he definitely couldn’t return to the Ghost Axe Palace by himself. Not only that, but the most important thing to do right now was to wash away the discontinuous trail of blood! This was both in order to save the mighty senior and to save himself! After making up his mind, Du Yu’s legs no longer felt like jelly anymore, and he started to silently backtrack and clean away the blood. As he did so, Du Yu started to ponder how he would deal with the current situation if he were the mighty senior.

After Du Yu closed the door and left…

Chen Ping’an, who was half-dead as he lay limply in the wooden rocking chair, slowly opened his profoundly deep eyes before slowly closing them again.

When dawn arrived the next day…

All of the officials in Imperial Accompanying City, regardless of their rank, and all of the residents in the city, regardless of their wealth, started to busily clean up in apprehension and unease.

When the residents gradually heard about the incident that had taken place at the city god temple last night, a rumor somehow started to spread, claiming that it was the city god who had helped them block the mysterious sea of black clouds last night, ultimately causing the entire city god temple to suffer a huge calamity.

Upon learning of this, the residents of the city started to flood toward the ruins of the city god temple, offering incense and kowtowing in respect outside the ruins. It wasn’t long before all of the incense shops on the surrounding streets were cleared of their stock, and there were even many cases of chaotic brawls erupting due to people fighting over incense sticks.

The fire god shrine also experienced the same commotion as the city god temple. Of course, the shrine had already become rubble as well, and the clay-crafted divine statue honored in the shrine had already fallen to the ground and smashed into countless pieces.

Two days later…

Many unfamiliar faces started to appear in Imperial Accompanying City again, and one day later, the previously grief-stricken prefectural overseer of the city no longer appeared as disheveled as an ant on a burning wok. There was a healthy red glow on his face as he issued a command, ordering all of the petty officials to search for a young person in azure with a vermilion wine gourd by his waist. Everyone was handed a portrait of this young man, and it was said that he was a terribly vicious criminal who had traveled here from the outside regions. The more they looked at the portrait, the more they believed that this young man was indeed a sinister criminal.

In addition to this, the prefectural office was also offering a huge reward for any news regarding this criminal’s whereabouts, with one hundred gold coins rewarded to anyone who provided valuable information. If someone could lead the officials to the criminal’s hiding place, then they could even receive the prefectural overseer’s recommendation and become a ranked official!

This being the case, it wasn’t just the petty officials who scoured the city for the young man in azure. Instead, many wealthy clans well-informed about matters in the city also treated this as an enticing opportunity to potentially strike riches, with many of their servants and descendants pouring through the streets to look for the young criminal.

Not only was Imperial Accompanying City hunting Chen Ping’an, but all of the surrounding prefectural cities and provincial cities were going all out to hunt this so-called criminal as well.

One day passed, and the residents of Imperial Accompanying City all noticed the strange nature of the matter.

Many more fabled immortals appeared above the city, soaring through the sky and riding on mists and clouds.

Upon catching sight of these immortals, everyone in the city would fall to their knees and kowtow, regardless of whether they were old or young, men or women.

On this night, however, a big-bearded man who looked like a clay-crafted divine statue suddenly appeared from the fire god shrine, towering dozens of meters into the air. He relied on the extremely sincere incense offerings that he had obtained a few days ago to forcefully summon one last burst of energy, summoning his true body as his godly body teetered on the edge of destruction and loudly describing the righteous deeds of that sword immortal! The sword immortal definitely hadn’t been trying to harm the city god temple, and he definitely wasn’t a criminal from outside who had brought calamity to the city.

The frantic words of the fire god instantly spread throughout the entire city.

The residents exchanged baffled glances with each other, while the prefectural overseer felt anger and embarrassment as he stood inside the prefectural office.

However, before he could say anything, an immortal treasure flew over from extremely far away and violently slammed into the deity of the fire god shrine.

The big-bearded fire god instantly shattered into pieces, transforming into specks of golden light that dissipated into the surroundings.

Even so, the immortal treasure was relentless as it directly annihilated the entire fire god shrine.

Evening arrived, and a young man dressed in snow-white robes and carrying a vermilion wine gourd by his waist walked toward the abandoned ghost residence, walking inside and closing the door behind him.

Night fell, and he held a bamboo fan in one hand as he sat on the roof ridge, admiring the moon as he drank. In the end, he surprisingly became drunk, lying down on the rooftop and falling fast asleep.

Apart from being slightly pale, this young man truly appeared like an otherworldly immortal in the eyes of Imperial Accompanying City’s residents.

After he appeared, almost all of the Qi refiners in the city silently retreated like a receding tide.

This was because two cultivators had been unwilling to give up and had approached the ghost residence late one night. However, two specks of sword light had pierced through their heads just as they neared the courtyard wall, killing them on the spot.

Afterward, Chen Ping’an had visited the fire god shrine and offered three sticks of incense, following which he had returned to the eerie ghost residence.

On this day, an especially eye-catching visitor appeared in the ghost residence.

It was none other than the Ghost Axe Palace’s Du Yu.

In the courtyard of the ghostly residence, the sword immortal in white was sitting on a small stool while Du Yu stood beside him and said in an aggrieved voice, “Senior, I’m truly going to die this time! Why is Senior insisting on keeping me here? I simply came here to check on Senior’s safety!”

Chen Ping’an lightly rocked his bamboo fan back and forth, and Du Yu felt like the smile on Chen Ping’an’s face was slightly strange and unfamiliar as the latter said slowly, “No, you would have truly died if I allowed you to leave today.”

————

Inside the dragon palace at the bottom of Verdant Bamboo Lake…

City Lord Ye Han of Yellow Axe City was surprisingly sitting opposite to his archenemy, the Treasure Basin Immortal Realm’s Fan Weiran.

The two immortal forces and their subordinate forces stood to the left and the right based on allegiance, and they stood in order of the power of their immortal forces and then the cultivation base of each person. This was the first time that so many immortal cultivators had gathered in the dragon palace.

Lake Lord Yin Hou didn’t sit on his dragon throne atop the platform either, and he instead sat lazily on the steps leading to the throne. This way, it appeared like the three forces were on equal standing.

Yan Qing and He Lu were respectively sitting beside Fan Weiran and Ye Han.

The two immortal forces had already reached a consensus regarding one matter.

Since the valuable treasure had already been snatched away by an accomplice of the sword immortal with the surname Chen, and the sword immortal had suffered severe wounds due to the heavenly tribulation, forcing him to stay in Imperial Accompanying City to recuperate, there was no reason to let him leave the Silver Screen Nation alive. The most favorable outcome would be to directly kill him in Imperial Accompanying City.

According to the explanation of Lake Lord Yin Hou, this sword immortal possessed many more valuable treasures in addition to the immortal sword on his back. In fact, everyone who participated in the hunt and execution of this sword immortal could receive a fair share of these treasures!

Fan Weiran smiled coldly and asked, “Then who should we send to gauge this person’s strength? The two pieces of Lower Five Tier trash who died confused deaths clearly weren’t up to the task. City Lord Ye, your Yellow Axe City has a large number of disciples, so how about you send some people?”

The cultivators on Ye Han’s side started to smack the tables and abuse Fan Weiran in anger.

After facing many twists and turns during their pursuit of the elderly cultivator whose small monkey had swallowed the valuable treasure, both Yellow Axe City and the Treasure Basin Immortal Realm had already suffered a brutal number of casualties.

He Lu suddenly smiled faintly and said, “Cultivators with low cultivation bases and the even more inferior martial artists will be completely unable to gauge this person’s true strength. In reality, I feel like even I won’t necessarily be able to succeed if I go.”

Sitting on the steps leading to the platform in the middle of the palace, Lake Lord Yin Hou Yin Hou smiled and said, “That person is shrewd, scheming, and ruthless, making him incredibly difficult to deal with. All of you have seen how miserable things are in Verdant Bamboo Lake now, so let me say these unpleasant things first. I’m simply giving you a space to meet and discuss matters, so please don’t go for wool and come back shorn. If he still has enough strength and chases you to my dragon palace, then your two immortal forces can easily run, but I’ll definitely be done for at that time.”

He Lu used the bamboo flute in his hand to lightly tap his palm as he proposed, “How about we kill Du Yu if we truly want to gauge this person’s strength? This is not only simple but also very effective. After we kill Du Yu, we can toss his corpse outside Imperial Accompanying City, and our two immortal forces can temporarily set aside our differences and work closely together to set up an immortal formation beforehand. That way, we’ll only need to sit back and watch him charge headfirst into the trap.”

Fan Weiran smacked the table in front of her and exclaimed through loud laughter, “Young lad, you’ve never appeared more pleasing to the eye than right now. We’ll go with your plan!”

She then shifted her gaze and asked, “What do you say, City Lord Ye?”

Ye Han smiled faintly and nodded in response.

Yan Qing’s gaze was lowered, with her eyelashes trembling slightly.

That night…

Everyone inside the dragon palace at the bottom of Verdant Bamboo Lake exchanged baffled looks as they heard the latest news.

He Lu’s expression was extremely dark.

Lake Lord Yin Hou couldn’t bring himself to laugh anymore.

He was worried about whether his current role as a peacemaker between the two immortal forces would end in disaster, and he prayed that he wouldn’t follow in the footsteps of those canal masters and river gods who were almost all dead. He didn’t want his dragon palace to be destroyed by a single sword strike as well.

“Severe wounds take one hundred days to heal, and this is the case for ordinary mortal humans. That being the case, things will only be more troublesome for cultivators like us. Since the sword cultivator has suffered extremely severe wounds, how about we compose ourselves and plan things slowly and carefully?” Ye Han suggested in a quiet voice.

————

It was the end of the year already, yet there was no atmosphere of joy or celebration in Imperial Accompanying City. People were gloomy and in low spirits as they visited friends and family, complaining and grumbling about the terrible situation that they were in.

And thus, those who hadn’t felt especially frustrated and resentful to begin with started to feel increasingly resentful as well.

Over at the ghost residence, some unfamiliar faces dressed like ordinary residents of the city gradually started to appear.

Afterward, more and more of these people arrived in the city and gathered near the ghost residence.

As time went on, legitimate residents of the city started to gather around the ghost residence as well, pointing at it and talking quietly among themselves.

When one child threw rocks at the ghost residence and angrily shouted curses at it, it was as if the floodgates were finally blasted open.

There were spirited discussions among the residents of the city, with most people complaining in dissatisfaction. In the end, people started to feel a sincere sense of resentment and anger at the situation.

They complained about the sword immortal, questioning why he had allowed so much wealth and infrastructure of the city to be destroyed since he was such a powerful person.

Du Yu almost exploded in anger as he stood near the courtyard wall and listened to the people’s abuse.

He strode over to the mighty senior’s side and plonked down on a small stool, clenching his hands into fists as he said in an aggrieved voice, “Senior, if this continues, then people will even start to throw faeces at the courtyard wall, to say nothing of rocks. Do you truly not want me to go outside to deal with the situation?”

The young man in white was lying on a bamboo chair, lightly rocking his bamboo fan back and forth as he asked with a faint smile, “What day is it today?”

As for the long sword in the scabbard, Chen Ping’an had casually tossed it beside the bamboo chair.

This mighty senior was truly very relaxed, and he had personally crafted this bamboo chair after chopping some fresh bamboo from the bamboo garden.

Moreover, after interacting with Chen Ping’an for an extended period of time, he had a nagging feeling that this mighty senior was somehow different from before, although it couldn’t be said that he was completely different from the very beginning.

After hearing Chen Ping’an’s question, Du Yu faltered for a moment before counting on his fingers and replying, “Senior, today’s the second of the second!”

Chen Ping’an suddenly sat up, snapping his folding fan closed as he stood up and remarked with a faint smile and squinted eyes, “Today’s a good day.”

1. A wooden fish is a Buddhist religious instrument. ☜