Chapter 39

“Elder Wenhu and the descendants of the Volcanic Sect there. I don’t want to spare the big guys and those who deserve to be big guys, but it’s going to be hard as long as you’re here. The damage will be great, and we’ve lost a lot of time. It’s no good fighting any longer. Let’s go.”
Huang Xin gestured to the masked man behind him.
The masked man, who had long since unsheathed his sword and finished stopping the bleeding, bowed his head, looking a little better.
“You understand, I leave no trace.”
“Shit!”
The masked man said and pulled out something.
Pfft!
“What……!”
Elder Wenhu’s voice.
I was also puzzled.
It was a smoke screen.
It was so dark that I couldn’t make out a single thing.
“This is troublesome…….”
Ma Jintian muttered and swung his sword.
Woof!
Sword wind.
The smoke was swept away by the sword wind, and his vision cleared.
“Oh no…….”
The bodies of the masked men had all disappeared.
No, they were disappearing.
The bodies of the masked men turning into red water.
“Is it a skeletal acid?”
The poison used by the Sama’ödo horde to vanish without leaving a trace.
It was a highly toxic poison that destroyed corpses.
The bodies of the masked men, scalded by the boiling hot water, and the eleven late leaders of the Huashan Sect and the Sect of the South, lying on the ground.
Elder Wen Hu, frantic, shouted.
“See if anyone is still alive! And you, Elder Shen, go inside the hall and see if Elder Lingfeng is still alive!”
The surroundings became chaotic.
Disciples placed their hands on their wrists to check for survival.
Tearful disciples mourning their dead comrades, moving them around.
My heart clenched in my chest.
I knew their faces, if not all of them.
Their deaths weigh heavily on my heart.
And then there was another, more troubling thought.
“For now, help them. As for Qingwu and Ma Jintian, we’ll hear about them later.”
Elder Wenhu looked at me and said.
His eyes burned as if his anger hadn’t yet subsided.
I turned away and helped the others clean up the mess.
The dead were to be mourned, and the guards were to be sent to the Huashan and Zhongnan factions.
The living were sent out to the villages to be treated at the clinics, as the clinics at the checkpoints were not enough.
Rumors spread like wildfire.
Late exponents of the Zongnan and Huashan factions were seriously wounded.
Half of them were dead.
Moreover, Elder Lingfeng of the Zongnan Sect is dead, and Elder Wenhu is slandered.
Our pride as an old sect has been greatly wounded.
And we don’t even know who the Beast is.
The Zongnan Sect’s Flying Bird Pavilion and the Huashan Sect’s Flying Plum Pavilion have only been able to get a little information.
He traveled to Hubei through the southern part of Shanxi. Untraceable after that.
The Huashan Sect and the Zhongnan Sect.
The weaker of the two sects is the Gu Sect, which is said to have only one landowner.
It cannot be said to be the work of Huashan and Zhongnan alone.
The other seven sects began to stir.
Turbulence.
The quiet and peaceful era ended, and turbulence began to set in.
The entire Zhongyuan Forest was agitated.
Some even said that it might be a sign of the Martial Spirit.
However, it would be unreasonable to invoke the Martial Alliance without knowing who the beast was, so the Huashan and Zhongnan sects simply coordinated with each other and exchanged information.
Late leaders of the Zhongnan and Volcano Sects who fought against the mysterious group.
They hadn’t left the checkpoint yet.
I arrived at the guest house with Elder Wenhu, Ma Jintian, and Elder Wen after finishing my treatment.
As we walked through the door, we could smell the faint aroma of rosewood.
There was a table made of rosewood, a sanshou painting hanging on the wall, and a scroll in front of it with words written in a dragon-like handwriting.
On the table against the wall was an antique piece of china.
“Sit down.”
I sat down at the elder’s command.
“I don’t know where to begin…….”
Elder Wenhu muttered.
Ma Jinchen sat quietly with his arms folded, while I tried to figure out how to respond.
After a moment of silence, Elder Wenhu spoke up.
“Rather than talking about trivial matters first, we should start with the sect’s affairs.”
Elder Wenhu glanced at Ma Jintian and me.
“That masked man, do you know who he is?”
“I am well…….”
“You must speak properly. Tell me everything you know.”
His eyes were intense.
I couldn’t ignore it.
He lowered his head, and Ma Jinchen opened his mouth.
“I don’t know exactly. I just felt something strange in this joint exercise and prepared for it.”
“You felt something strange?”
Ma Jintian nodded.
“The terrifying of the Blood Heaven three hundred years ago. Since then, the Volcano Sect hasn’t interacted with anyone except shamans and Shaolin, and then all of a sudden, they had a meeting, and they announced that they’re having a joint exercise. Do you think it makes sense? No, there’s no reason for this to happen unless something happened. It’s a feeling that’s been going on for three hundred years. It can’t be broken easily. It’s been diluted a lot, but it can’t be broken so suddenly. That’s why I was suspicious.”
“You have a point.”
Elder Wenhu’s words were echoed by Ma Zhen Tian.
“And on the evening of the day Elder Lingfeng and Elder Wenhu had us step forward to demonstrate our skills, I noticed a shadow that had somehow attached itself to the late-stage martial artists who were exceptionally skilled.”
“Such…….”
Elder Wen Hu looked puzzled, as if he didn’t know.
“I got to know Qingwu from the first day, and I found the shadow attached to him, attacked him to remove it, and succeeded in tracking him down.”
“What happened?”
Elder Wen Hu urged, feeling like he was getting a clue.
“We found it in the Nokcheongsan Mountains. Do you know the Bidong Dynasty?”
“Bie Gumdog Zhu?”
Elder Wenhu’s face hardened.
“Why is he a demon?”
“I don’t know. All I know is that he became Wang Zheng’s servant after Wang Zheng was defeated by someone, and that he is either a powerful enough force to make Wang Zheng submit to him, or he has a wicked heart.”
“A group or an individual?”
“Even if it was an individual, if he took someone under his wing, it likely became a group, so it’s better to think of it as a collective.”
“I see.”
“Wang Zhengqi was killed. It was dangerous, but we were saved by Qingwu.”
“I don’t believe he’s the kind of person that Huang Zhengqi would be able to capture?”
Elder Wenhu said in a tone of disbelief.
“You saw him on the day of the raid, didn’t you?”
Elder Wenhu nodded with a ‘I see’ in response to Ma Jintian’s words.
“On the way back after capturing him, we encountered his men, and we fought.”
“What was the result?”
“He was using a wall bomb.”
“Wall grenades…… things get more serious…….”
The wall shot.
A lifelong masterpiece of a wall power master, it has a powerful explosive power that can devastate a radius of more than a dozen zhang.
A feat of the pre-Blood Heavens.
It is said to have self-destructed along with over two hundred of the Faction’s adherents in the final Battle of Blood Mountain Peak.
That’s how powerful a wall bomb is.
That’s why I was injured like that…….
“That’s why Qing Wu was injured. Oh, and I have something to ask you, why did you stop the investigation after only one day at that time?”
Ma Jinchen asked.
Elder Wen Hu replied expressionlessly.
“Do I need to tell you?”
“You know, it might have something to do with one of the pieces of information I got from Wang Zhengtian.”
Elder Wenhu nodded at Ma Jintian’s words.
“If that’s the case, then…… the reason I stopped pursuing at that time was because of Sect Master Baili and Sheng Yi.”
“Teacher Mo is one thing, but Sung Yi?”
Ma Jinchen asked, seemingly unaware of the councilor who cured me.
“The councilor who treated me is Sung-yi. He said he was close to Dr. Mo.”
“I see.”
“The Bamboo Forest Master and Sheng Yi, people of great reputation. Qingwu, they said that your injury was caused by their own personal affairs, and they asked me to stop investigating you.”
“It was a disciple of the Gu Sect who was injured. No matter how sincere they are, and no matter how much of a bamboo forest master they are, there’s no reason to stop, is there?”
“I sent a telegram to the main mountain, and they told me to quit. Said Zhang Wenyin.”
“Master Zhang said…….”
After muttering quietly, Ma Zhen Tian spoke.
“The Bamboo Forest Sage, Sheng Yi, and the Plum Blossom Sword Master told him to stop…… might have something to do with it…….”
“That’s for later. Finish the explanation first.”
“Yes, and then there was the fight, with the drones who attacked the checkpoint.”
“Do we have any indication of a group so far?”
“No. Just the weapon the last man had, which I believe was a three-horse soldier, Private Chuhon Chilmachang…….”
“You mean the blood cloth……?”
“Probably not, the Blood Cloth has been dismantled. It could have come from another faction. There have always been factions that want to destroy the Martial Kingdom and threaten the world.”
Elder Wenhu’s face turned grim at Ma Jintian’s words.
“Report to Elder Wenyin Zhang…….”
“Yes, send the information to the Non-Sale and Non-Sculpture. Maybe they’ll have some more information.”
“I see. But you said it was an unknown force, why did they appear in such a peaceful time…….”
“Three hundred years of peace, enough time to prepare for anything to happen.”
“Yes, that’s true.”
Elder Wenhu thought for a moment, then shook his head.
“But it’s okay. The Volcano Sect may be weakened, but it is not defeated. We just need to continue to improve our relationship with the other Gu Sects little by little. The Gu Sect is not weak.”
Elder Wenhu’s words are full of pride.
The landowner of the Jungle Forest had a strong belief in the power of the Gu Fa.
“A hidden trick is more frightening than an open sword.”
“That’s true, but it’s okay. We are strong.”
Ma Jintian shook his head.
“You’re too confident…….”
Ma Jintian muttered so quietly that only I could hear him.
“Anyway, I guess that’s the end of the explanation, then Qingwu, it’s you this time.”
Elder Wenhu turned to me.
“That strange ability of yours back then, and that strange martial prowess when you fought the head of the Masked People. What happened?”
“That was…….”
“How should I answer?
As I was pondering, Elder Wen Hu said.
“Is that the same thing as your Jiang Tianxuan?”
“Oh, yes…….”
That’s all I could think of to answer.
Fortunately, Elder Wenhu beat me to it.
“Then it must be so…… Okay, I’ll take your word for it. I’ll tell Elder Zhang about it, since we’ll be returning to the main mountain tomorrow.”
“Ah, thank you.”
“By the way…….”
“Do you have any more questions?”
Elder Wenhu shook his head at Ma Jintian’s words.
“No, you may leave.”
“Okay, then…….”
He took a bow and left the hall.