Chapter 860: The Way of the Sail Swordsman (7)

The moment they gathered their opinions and agreed that the Five Poison Sect was suspicious and needed to be dug into, Blood Cult scum barged in headfirst.

And they barged in wearing Five Poison Sect martial robes, and stormed in under the pretext that the Five Poison Sect disciples had been harmed—so now even a ten-year-old child would understand that the Blood Cult and the Five Poison Sect had become one and the same.

“Truly lamentable. Hm. The Five Poison Sect—we of the Diancang Sect will erase it, so you should first hurry toward the Tang Clan of Sichuan. It just so happens I heard there’s a famed daughter of the Tang Family in Kunming, so that works out nicely. Time will be short.”

At that, Qing startled.

“Huh. Did something happen in Sichuan?”

“Hm? How would I know anything about Sichuan? It’s not like I came from Sichuan. Sichuan matters—you ask Sichuan people. The problem isn’t in Sichuan. The problem is with you.”

“Me?”

“You got hit with gu poison, so you need to receive the antidote from the Tang Clan. Ah, this is a secret. If it becomes known that there’s an antidote for the gu poison we’re using now, wouldn’t the Blood Cult scum try to raise a different gu poison instead?”

“Ah, I did know that, but... mm, later. First we deal with the Five Poison Sect, and then I’m going to see Broken-Sword Cliff too. It’s on the way back anyway.”

“If the gu poison explodes on you or something, then even if you’re in the Transformation Realm, it’ll be hard to survive—no, because you’re only in the Transformation Realm, you won’t be able to endure it.”

It was exactly the sort of thing Qing always said to her friends.

They wouldn’t understand someone as lofty as the Transformation Realm anyway—ah, the loneliness of the Transformation Realm. Everyone’s so fragile, just some measly peak realm, so I can’t take my eyes off them from worry.

So then, how did Qing feel, being on the receiving end?

Well, a master of the Manifest Realm can say things like that.

And honestly, below the peak realm, it’s all the same anyway. What’s the difference between third-rate and peak? It’s just one hit’s worth of distance.

But the wall between the Transformation Realm and the Manifest Realm—compared to the gap between third-rate and peak, if you insist on comparing it, isn’t it about ten thousand times bigger? (This is Qing’s personal opinion.)

“No, before that. Weren’t you in pain? When the gu poison burned, you flared up like mad—I heard it’s pain you can’t endure with a sane mind. But if you endured it, I guess it wasn’t much after all.”

Mm. There are people like this.

They just say whatever comes out, with absolutely no malice—so you could say their speech habits were wrong from birth.

But at this point, it was probably too late to fix.

Besides, once you reach the Manifest Realm, what does it matter whether it’s words—or whether it’s mouth-farts that come out of your mouth?

“Oh, really? I didn’t feel anything at all? Ah, I guess mine was a dud gu poison. Wooow. I can’t even feel a thing. I’m totally fine?”

The choppy, clipped words; the awkward way she couldn’t look him in the eye; even the single bead of sweat hanging off her head.

It was such an awkward lie that even a dog wouldn’t believe it.

Of course, Qing was a master of testing the waters.

There was no reason for her to tell a lie that wouldn’t work.

...This seemed like the kind of person it would work on, though?

“Oh, is that so? Your luck is good. Well, even a precious spirit medicine rots if it’s mismanaged. Truly heavenly fortune—and a great blessing for the righteous martial world.”

“Hehe. Don’t go that far.”

“Humility, when excessive, is discourtesy. Even if it’s merely the Transformation Realm, there has never been precedent for reaching it at your age. Your safety isn’t yours alone—treasure yourself as a pillar of the next righteous martial world.”

Especially in times as ominous as these.

Gilun added a thought aloud.

The Blood Cult was stirring, which meant it wouldn’t be long before blood swept through the martial world again.

And after one round of bloodletting like that, an age of chaos even worse than before might unfold.

We old seniors—how many days do we have left, anyway? Before we go, we have to spend our lives clearing away the obstacles and entrust the rest to those who come after.

And isn’t she truly a reassuring junior to entrust that after to?

“Hm. Then, since we’ve confirmed the Five Poison Sect is a Blood Cult den, there’s no need to pretend we’re night burglars. But this one... hmm. For now, I’ll keep him, toss him into the Repentance Cave, and squeeze information out of him.”

“Ghk! Ghhk!”

The Deputy Great Lord pinned under Gilun’s foot gaped his mouth wide, but only spat out muffled sounds.

Qing’s eyes sparkled.

What is it? Some mysterious Manifest Realm method?

If you could seal someone’s mouth this easily, there’d be no need to go to the trouble of making a breathing hole in their windpipe.

More precisely, making the hole isn’t troublesome—but isn’t it incredibly annoying to have to plug it yourself every single time you want them to speak afterward?

“It’s a kind of pressure-point technique, but it’s still too much for your ability. Once you reach a profound realm later, come find me. I’ll gladly teach you.”

Meaning: it was still too much for her.

Mm, just how far do the abilities of the Manifest Realm reach?

That’s something only the Manifest Realm can know.......

*****

The Great Lord of the Blood Guard Brigade’s First Poison-Squad, Jang Choeryang, was a very, very cautious person.

In other words, he was also very cowardly.

And now.

The Deputy Great Lord who had gone out to deal with some acquaintance of the unnamed Five Poison Sect master—didn’t return even after a day passed, and then another day passed, and still didn’t come back.

So Jang Choeryang’s caution climbed to an extreme.

“Great Lord, what do we do now? If the Deputy Great Lord failed, there’s a chance our sect’s identity may have been exposed.”

The worst way to answer a question is, isn’t it, to answer with another question?

Thanks to that, his subordinate’s words clogged in their throat.

Isn’t the one who has to decide what to do from here the commander—the Great Lord?

Even if he was a scarecrow, who rose to the Great Lord position purely because he made poison well and gained the Poison Demon’s favor, and even if the Deputy Great Lord had been the one actually leading the unit—

At a time like this, shouldn’t he either rage and order revenge, or decide it’s dangerous and order a retreat?

At least, that was what the subordinate tried to say.

“Revenge? Revenge—right now, n-no. I don’t know who the enemy is. The Deputy Great Lord got taken down, and—and four Poison Blood Guards, f-four, went with him too. That means—an incredible master, yes, th-that, maybe the Afterglow Hound came? Information leaked from somewhere, then—then what do we do?”

“Calm down. And isn’t it said the Afterglow Hound is currently in Qinghai?”

“Th-that’s what I’m saying. Here and Q-Qinghai are close.”

“They’re not close at all. Then do we prepare to withdraw?”

“N-no. That’s no good either. The—the great, no, the grand plan—my master said to guard this place, and if we run...”

Jang Choeryang exercised his caution again.

The subordinate’s insides were about to burst from that caution.

“Then what should we do? In the worst case, word might spread widely that our sect is here.”

“M-my master, my master has to come back—if only my master comes, my master said to guard this place, s-said it.”

“Then are you saying we just keep waiting like this? There has to be some countermeasure.”

“No, just—just staying still—n-no. The enemy—the Central Plains oppressors—we have to prepare, prepare. Ah! Right, preparation. Traps, formations—what do we have? One jin of Lingering Plum Blaze, one and a half jin of Sparrow-Chirp Cloud Mountain, four jin of Heart-Igniting Poison, three jin of Tea-Lotus Heart Powder, two and a half jin of Rain-Silk Poison—no, I used it blending yesterday so it’s two jin and one sack......”

From Jang Choeryang’s mouth, the poison names of the Blood Guard Brigade and the Five Poison Sect—and their quantities—poured out endlessly, one after another.

As though he were reciting a neatly organized ledger.

It meant the entire inventory of poisons was in his head—truly a genius in a way that was useless, but genius all the same.

“We lay a formation, a formation—right, the Five Poison Sect already has a formation prepared, so on top of that, how—modify—Nine Palaces at Spear-Scar Star, Eight Kun at Right River, Eight Qian at Dwelling Shadow, then the Life Gate—no, not Dwelling Shadow, Five-Thousand Years......”

If someone skilled in formations heard it, they’d gape with their mouth wide open at the technique.

At the base of an old sect, it’s customary for a defensive formation to be installed.

While not damaging that existing formation, adding another formation on top of it—wasn’t this essentially a calculation formula he was computing in his head, as mental arithmetic?

Even though Jang Choeryang was an openly known scarecrow, this was part of why he held his seat as the leader of the Poison Demon’s first combat unit.

So his subordinate didn’t press further, and silently waited for Jang Choeryang’s calculations to end.

“Y-yes! This is it!”

Soon, Jang Choeryang spread paper and took up a brush, then began to whip it around in a burst of excitement.

How much time passed like that?

Jang Choeryang pointed at the stack of papers.

“W-we guard here. My master said to guard it, so we install the formation and poison and traps, and if the enemy comes, we kill them all.”

The subordinate looked down at the top page.

A detailed map—it was part of the terrain of the clearing on the west side of Jeongyakjeon.

A formation and trap design with clear instructions on what to install, where, and how, in precise measurements.

It was clearly complicated, but still—

“How powerful is this formation?”

“Two hundred. We can stop two hundred.”

“What kind of two hundred? Two hundred masters? And if the Diancang Sect mobilizes, that Flash Sword might come out personally.”

“Uh—either way, we can’t stop the Manifest Realm if my master isn’t here. Still—b-but—so, w-wait.”

Jang Choeryang’s hands and feet trembled as he wriggled his fingers wildly.

It looked like he was doing calculations again for quite a while.

And finally, he reached a conclusion.

“If there’s no Manifest Realm, we—we might win. Our odds are about seventy percent. If my master comes, we win everything. But if there’s one Manifest Realm, two Transformation Realm, twenty peak, and the rest are the supreme realm—then we’ll kill one hundred. More than half—more than half will die. At minimum.”

At that, the subordinate accepted it cleanly.

In truth, no matter how amazing a formation you lay, no matter how terrifying the traps you plant, no matter what astonishing mercenary tactics you deploy—

It’s an act of stupidity beyond measure.

If you win once, more enemies will swarm in. If you win again, even more will swarm in.

So in reality, it’s a fate where you’re surrounded and die—and once it becomes that kind of situation, the Poison Demon must not return.

But now that it had come to this, even losing was fine—because it wouldn’t be a meaningless defeat.

If they could make the Central Plains oppressors bleed that much strength—spill that much blood—

Then the revenge would be carried out by the comrades who remained.

That was the ferocity that made the Blood Cult the Blood Cult—blind hatred that even used death as a tool.

*****

With the night reconnaissance canceled, the only thing Qing really had to do was watch in case the Blood Cult bastards tried to run, and wait for the Diancang Sect martial artists who would arrive later.

And maybe keep the captured Blood Cult bastard from dying—keep that life clinging on.

“Come on. You have to eat, right?”

HSSS, HSSK. The sound of air leaking.

In the end, the Deputy Great Lord had a breathing hole blown open between his collarbones—because that Manifest Realm-style “silence” technique wasn’t something that could last especially long.

According to Gilun, it was a simple trick: he’d just spread a very small technique that imprisoned sound, and used it to clamp the mouth shut.

Mm. Is that simple?

Just hiding sound without leaving any presence would already be at the level of “how is that even possible?”

Qing could imprison sound too, in her own way.

If she blasted out brute internal energy and wrapped the surrounding area, that would be enough—but then that sense of presence.

Even ordinary civilians with no martial arts would notice it from far away as a terrifying pressure, because it was similar to the way a master spreads their aura.

So Qing did it Qing’s way.

No need to use a difficult, astonishing method—just make it so air can’t enter the vocal cords.

If you poke one hole with a finger, it’s done.

It didn’t even require internal energy, so as long as you had one sharp tool, even someone who knew no martial arts could do it—wasn’t it an amazing method?

For the record, when Gilun saw Qing’s method, he was deeply impressed.

“Indeed. We should use it in our Repentance Cave too. We put gags on them every time and tell them to repent properly, but it’s a chore to remove them at every meal, and the idiots sometimes even bite. This would solve that.”

Qing has released poison into the Diancang Sect’s Repentance Cave!

But... the Diancang Sect’s Repentance Cave blocks their mouths so they can’t speak at all.......

Well, it’s not like you’d want the worst scum under heaven—caught for doing dog-shit things—to pass the time chatting happily together, so if you think about it, maybe that’s correct.

She’d heard that Shaolin Temple’s Repentance Cave was even worse—they carved caves into a cliff and shoved them into one-man, one-cell solitary confinement.

Thinking about it that way, wasn’t the Kunlun Sect’s Repentance Cave almost too humane?

If they even sometimes provided special meals, then yeah.

Right. Special meals.

Qing looked down at the meal in the bowl.

Some thick, murky-gray slop.

They just threw in a bunch of things, mashed and ground them up, and mixed them into a meat broth—mm, it wasn’t boiled, so you couldn’t call it porridge, but what do you call this? Mm. A liquid meal?

Still, there was meat in it, fish in it, grains in it too—wasn’t this a special meal?

It didn’t contain anything rotten or inedible, so if she’d been a beggar and had gotten a bowl of this, she really would’ve cried and eaten it deliciously.

And the funnel placed on top.

Yes. A funnel.

A general name for a tool you fit on top to pour contents conveniently into a narrow opening.

And in the room—right in front of her—was a Blood Cult human piece of trash, sprawled out, his spine wrecked and his whole body paralyzed, rolling only his eyeballs around.

Add meal time to this.

What kind of picture do you get?

There was no need to explain.

For the record, Gilun was also deeply impressed by this, and said they should actively adopt it.

From the Repentance Cave prisoners’ perspective, it was deeply unfortunate—but then again, they should’ve lived an unfortunate-free life where they didn’t get caught in the first place.