“What is he, I’m asking?”
Quan asked, glaring at Yang Dang.
“A wandering swordsman I haven’t disposed of yet.”
“You should have disposed of him! The original agreement was that you would only hand over the woman and the child, wasn’t it?”
“I’ll handle him.”
“Handle him now!”
Yang Dang drew his sword and approached me. He was confident he could beat me. I wondered just how much arrogance and delusion my youthful face would stir up from now on, how many more Yang Dangs it would summon.
“At a glance, you lot look like scoundrels who betrayed your master. Do you really think you’ll get paid properly? They’ll probably kill you to silence you and swallow the money they owe you too.”
At that, Quan’s eyes flared.
“What? Scoundrels who betrayed our master?”
“I only stopped there because there’s a child present.”
Quan laughed as if dumbfounded.
“This one’s a strange kind of madman.”
“You’re flustered because I hit the mark, aren’t you? You really were planning to kill him and pocket the money, weren’t you? Don’t. He killed all of that man’s companions to get this far.”
Unable to hide his thoughts, Quan’s face flushed red.
“You vermin of a wandering swordsman!”
Quan shouted to his men.
“Kill that bastard first!”
Three masked men stepped forward.
“See? He said that bastard first. Doesn’t that mean you’re next after me?”
At those words, Yang Dang could not hide his dismay.
“Even if you’re going to run, you should at least get paid before you go.”
Yang Dang, who had taken one step back, flinched in surprise.
“What nonsense is that? When did I run?”
The very moment he burst out in anger—
Swish!
A hidden weapon Quan had thrown in a surprise attack cut through the air. Unable to dodge the sudden projectile, Yang Dang toppled over where he stood.
“Idiot, handling things this badly.”
I looked at the dead Yang Dang and said,
“If you live like that, this is how it comes for you. Your turn too.”
This time, I spoke to Quan.
“You’re no different from him. You should have kept even one of them alive to face me. How could you kill him just because you lost your temper? If none of you can control your anger, how do you expect to live long?”
“How long are you going to listen to that bastard run his mouth?”
At Quan’s shout, the three masked men drew their swords and advanced.
Indeed, they were skilled enough that there had been no need to keep Yang Dang alive as a shield.
I looked at the woman and gestured for her to cover the child’s eyes. She held the child close and covered both his eyes and ears.
I did not drag out this fight.
Before they could attack, I launched myself forward first.
I unleashed the King of Hell Step from the Four Steps of the Wind God.
I had only just reached the stage of taking my first steps in it, but it turned my opponents into newborn infants.
They were given no chance to defend themselves or do anything at all. In a flash, I had closed in right before my opponent’s nose, and the moment he perceived me, his throat was cut.
I saw the eyes beneath the second man’s mask widen. If I could have read his thoughts, I imagine they would have been something like, “Huh! What—” before his throat was also slit.
The third masked man failed to respond properly even though two of his comrades had died.
Because, in truth, the time that had passed was still less than the blink of an eye.
Now that the Four Steps of the Wind God had been added to my original martial arts, this was an attack that men of their ability could not have blocked even if they had prepared for a hundred years. As before, I dug in with the King of Hell Step and cut down the third masked man with the Flying Heaven Sword Art.
Quan stared at me in horror. To his eyes, three lines of sword light must have appeared at once, and his subordinates must have seemed to collapse simultaneously.
“A swift sword art?”
“I didn’t even use a swift sword art, but I suppose that’s how it looked to your eyes just now.”
“Who—who are you?”
Quan’s voice trembled with terror.
Instead of answering, I asked the woman,
“Who is that man?”
“He is Quan Yuan, one of the retainers who guarded our house. I am Jin Silian, daughter of the Master of Golden Manor.”
“Golden Manor!”
I reacted as though startled, but in truth, I already knew who she was.
This woman’s father was Jin Ashu, a great merchant said to rank among the top ten in the Central Plains, the richest man in Fujian and the master of Golden Manor.
He was the reason I had come all this way.
The rebellion at Golden Manor.
That was the incident Im Chu had told me about. The incident in which the Master of Golden Manor was betrayed and killed by the retainer he trusted most.
The daughter of the Master of Golden Manor, who had escaped the villains’ clutches because her schedule had happened to change, had hired wandering swordsmen and tried to flee, but in the end, all of them lost their lives.
“I want to hire you, young hero. Please help us.”
“The situation has changed, so my price has gone up.”
“That’s fortunate. We can afford any price, no matter how high. Please kill that man and save my father.”
At that, Quan Yuan pleaded with me.
“Spare me and join our side. I’ll speak to the elder and have him pay you more than that woman will!”
“You’ll pay more than the daughter of the Master of Golden Manor? How?”
For a moment, Quan Yuan was rendered speechless.
I walked toward him and rebuked him coldly.
“You said you were a retainer, didn’t you? Then your place should have been in front of that woman and child.”
Quan Yuan desperately tried to avoid my sword, but the gap in ability between us was not something that could be filled by a frantic struggle to survive.
My sword split through Quan Yuan’s flesh and bone, then pierced his heart as well.
He fell with a single scream. Only after seeing him die did Jin Silian finally look relieved. Of course, she still had the child’s eyes and ears tightly covered.
I searched Quan Yuan and the masked men and took the daggers they carried to use as hidden weapons. The place we were headed from here would be swarming with enemies.
“Let’s go.”
“We have to take our Yang somewhere safe first.”
Climbing onto the driver’s seat, I said,
“Get on. Right now, the safest place is beside me.”
Jin Silian did not hesitate for long. She had seen my skill with her own eyes, and in any case, if not for me, she would already be dead.
Once she climbed aboard with the child, the carriage turned back the way it had come and began racing swiftly.
* * *
Lü Xiang.
The master of the Lü Family Manor, the guardian clan of Golden Manor, and the ringleader of today’s betrayal.
He had prepared for this undertaking for a full ten years. During that time, he had won over the key martial artists of Golden Manor, eliminated some by disguising their deaths as accidents, and sent far away those martial artists who could neither be bought nor removed.
He thought he had succeeded perfectly. Until I appeared again with Jin Silian, that is.
When Jin Silian and the child got down from the carriage, he smiled brightly. He had mistaken it for his men having captured the two alive.
“Wahahaha!”
From his perspective, if he had let this mother and child escape, he would never have slept soundly for the rest of his life.
“Where has Quan Yuan gone?”
He thought I was one of Quan Yuan’s subordinates.
“He’s dead. Everyone but me is dead.”
He must have felt something off in my tone, but he was more curious about his next question.
“By whom?”
“A young, handsome, mysterious expert.”
“What?”
Lü Xiang shouted, his expression full of incomprehension.
“You pathetic fool! What on earth are you thinking, praising an enemy like that?”
“Because it’s true.”
“Fine. Let’s say it is. Then how did you survive—”
Lü Xiang flinched, then grasped the situation.
“It was you!”
I answered with a faint smile.
Lü Xiang shouted and gathered his men. They came pouring in and surrounded me and the carriage.
“If you saved the woman and child, you should have fled far away. Why return to the tiger’s den?”
I looked around.
“Where is there a tiger here? All I see are packs of dogs that bit the master who fed them.”
Not only Lü Xiang, but also the men surrounding us began to emit killing intent. They were Lü Xiang’s arms and legs, and the martial artists of Golden Manor who had betrayed their master. Because they had guilty consciences, they hid them behind even colder anger.
Standing beside the carriage, Jin Silian held her son tightly. It was a situation that should have terrified her, but she showed no sign of fear. She knew well that composure belonged only to the strong, and as befitted the blood of a merchant, she was quick-witted. So that I could fight freely, she took her son and went into the carriage.
Lü Xiang, too, sensed that I was no ordinary man and became extremely cautious.
“Who are you, young hero? First, let us go inside and speak over a drink. I will serve you good wine.”
“No need for manners. I won’t go easy on you even if you pretend to be decent. I won’t go easy on you even if you beg. So curse and rant as much as you like.”
Realizing that persuasion would not work, Lü Xiang gave a cold order.
“Attack together and kill him!”
He emphasized the words “attack together.”
As soon as the order fell, they charged from every direction.
Swish! Swish! Swish! Swish! Swish!
With the refreshing sound of wind, daggers flew from my hand. By the time they thought to dodge or deflect them, the daggers had already severed even those thoughts and lodged in their vital points. The martial artists rushing in fell one after another and rolled across the ground.
The throwing knife art I had learned in my life before regression was the Life-Seizing Secret Art of Ximen Zhe, the Grandmaster of Flying Knives.
Before or since, I had never found a throwing knife art superior to it. It was a martial art worth carrying with me for a lifetime.
When I ran out of the daggers I had brought, I saw the survivors rejoice. It was a very brief joy born from the misconception that I was an expert in throwing knives.
I drew my sword and charged at them. Their abilities varied across the many stages between experts and middling warriors, but before the fully mastered Flying Heaven Sword Art, they could show no meaningful distinction.
After I swept through the courtyard once, all the enemies had fallen, and Lü Xiang’s face had gone pale.
“Who are you, great hero?”
The sword dripping with blood had turned a young hero into a great one.
“Great hero, my ass. I’m just a passing blade who smelled money.”
“How much will it take for you to simply withdraw?”
“Do you have a lot of money?”
“Enough to change one man’s life.”
“If you had that much money, why did you do something like this? If you wanted to change your life, you should have used your own money. Why touch someone else’s? And your own master’s money, at that.”
Unable to give a decent answer, Lü Xiang merely chewed at his lip.
Just as he was racking his brains, hesitating over what to do—
“Throw down your sword!”
From the building behind him, one of his men came out with a sword held to Jin Ashu’s throat.
It seemed that the subordinate intended to stage a hostage situation and force me to submit, but at the sight, Lü Xiang sighed and looked utterly dismayed.
He had been trying to hide Jin Ashu somehow and use him to negotiate with me, but a foolish subordinate had brought him outside. In any case, the matter had already happened, so Lü Xiang shouted fiercely and pressured me.
“Hurry and throw down your sword! Otherwise, the Master of Golden Manor dies!”
In that instant, a streak of sword qi tore through the air.
The fourth form of the Flying Heaven Sword Art, the Blazing Heaven Form.
It had already been a wild and tyrannical sword qi projection, but when it was unleashed through the Black Demon Sword and loaded with powerful internal energy, its momentum was enough to startle the heavens and overturn the earth.
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-kwak!
The sword qi flew like a living whirlwind and swept through the martial artist.
He had been using Jin Ashu as a shield, hiding two-thirds of his body behind him, but the exposed one-third had vanished. Leaving only Jin Ashu standing, the dead body collapsed with a thud.
Perhaps he thought now was his chance, since I had poured out internal energy to launch the sword qi; Lü Xiang thrust his sword like a lightning bolt in a surprise attack.
Because I had been prepared, that attack in which he had put all his hopes naturally missed. With each successive attack, Lü Xiang’s openings continued to show.
Even if he had spent his entire life honing his craft, he would not have been a match for me. But when greed had filled the place where training should have been, there was no way he could be my opponent.
I could have subdued him at once, but I gave him a few more exchanges. If I suppressed the master of the Lü Family Manor too easily, their curiosity and fantasies about me would grow too large.
Lü Xiang’s sword flew in repeatedly, aiming for my vital points. Because his life was on the line, his attacks were desperate.
Those watching must have held their breath at the seemingly neck-and-neck duel, but my heart was as clear and still as a polished mirror.
After about thirty exchanges—
Thuk.
With the sound of flesh tearing, the fight ended.
Lü Xiang’s thrusting sword had stopped in midair. Reflected on its blade was the sight of Jin Ashu rejoicing.
My sword, which had crossed obliquely through Lü Xiang’s attack, was embedded in his heart.
Lü Xiang’s eyes as he looked at me were filled with resentment, but I spoke to him calmly.
“You were the head of the guardian clan, weren’t you? You, of all people, should not have done this. In your next life, if you want to earn money, become a merchant. If you want to kill people, become an assassin.”
Lü Xiang, already dead, could give no answer. When I pulled out my sword, he crumpled.
Jin Silian, who had been watching outside through the carriage window while holding her breath, let out a cheer and got down with her son.
“Father.”
“Grandfather!”
Jin Silian and the child ran to Jin Ashu and embraced him.
“Silian! Yang!”
Holding her father tightly, Jin Silian shed tears, and when his mother cried, the child cried after her.
A short while later, the imprisoned martial artists of Golden Manor were released.
Once the courtyard was put in order, Jin Ashu once again expressed his gratitude to me. Having heard the earlier story from Jin Silian, he was far more grateful that I had saved his daughter and grandson than that I had saved him.
“I will never forget this grace. Young hero, you are the benefactor who saved our clan from annihilation. Might you please tell me your honored name?”
Having dealt with Lü Xiang and his men single-handedly, I could imagine just how great his curiosity about me must be.
“I am nothing more than a wandering swordsman who happened to pass by.”
“Even if the King of Wandering Swordsmen had come, he would not have handled them so easily.”
“You flatter me.”
When I still did not reveal my identity, Jin Ashu asked no further.
Jin Silian told Jin Ashu about the promise she had made with me earlier.
“I promised our benefactor. I said the reward would be money.”
Jin Ashu praised his daughter with a satisfied expression.
“Well done. You made the surest promise possible.”
Now that he had regained his composure, he finally revealed the bearing of the richest man in Fujian.
“If what our benefactor needs is money, then today, you have come to precisely the right place.”