Chương 3: Surviving the Storm

The setting sun painted Plum Blossom Village golden, casting the empty plaza and old, worn rows of simple wooden buildings into stark relief. Sweet floral scents mingled with the earthy richness of freshly tilled fields. On an ordinary day, one would hear the pleasant choruses of birds set against a constant backdrop of haggling, idle chatter, and filthy gossip which pervaded every small town. Today, those comforting sounds were sundered by the thunderous clash of cultivators.

Dry stone crumbled beneath the warriors' feet with the force of their movements, the old foundations insufficient against their might. Plum Blossom Village was a speck of dirt in the great expanse of the Sunbeam Empire, unseen on any but the smallest of maps. For these humble villagers, the day that five cultivators from one of the Great Nine Sunbeam Sects dueled in their plaza would live on in legend for centuries. Or until an errant breath from a mighty cultivator swept this hovel away.

For Hao, it was a little more personal. Yuchen moved like a living storm, his qi crackling like lightning, and forced Hao back again and again. Every last motion was swift, efficient, and deadly—Yuchen rushed Hao like a bull, boxing him in with strikes, leveraging his superior cultivation to overwhelm him despite his lack of a weapon. Not that Yuchen really needed one. A Ruminator's fists were more terrifying than mundane steel. Yuchen flowed seamlessly from one form to the next, forcing Hao to his absolute limits.

Qi lashed out like thundershocks, rattling Hao's bones, and every second threatened death. Hao landed, gasping, and raised his spear just in time for his deadly foe to advance upon him.

"Dog!" Yuchen snarled as the Fourth Stage cultivator punched with blinding speed. Even Hao's keen eyes struggled to track those strikes. He was at the peak of the Third Stage, Distillation, while his enemy was at the bottom of Rumination. Such was the gulf between cultivation stages. Turbulent qi crashed down upon Hao like a tidal wave. Hao grimaced as Yuchen's wild aura tore against him, untamed and raging recklessly.

He barely forced the Ruminator away with a surge of qi unleashed from his spear tip, sparking a storm of cinders that attempted to swallow Yuchen. Yuchen leapt away effortlessly, landing with the easy grace of a jungle cat, and locked his feverish eyes onto Hao.

"Ruminators ought to aspire for tranquility, Yuchen," Hao called out, panting. The demonic wolves hadn't tested him overmuch, but he cursed the exertion now.

"Shouldn't your aura be as smooth as a still pond? You're doing a shit job."

"Silence, traitor!" Yuchen roared. His aura thrashed, briefly escaping his control. Good. Every wisp of wasted qi was a stroke of good fortune for Hao.

"I'll tear that arrogant tongue out."

"My tongue? What could you ever want that for?" Hao waggled his eyebrows, taking the moment to extend his spiritual senses outward in search of Yuchen's lackeys. Yuchen blazed to his senses, but the Calcinators were mere embers burning only a shade brighter than their surroundings.

"I didn't think the White Rivers encouraged such filthy thoughts. But maybe I'll make an exception for the heir to the glorious Cheng Clan." Yuchen's face turned a particularly fascinating shade of puce. Hao just grinned, subtly grasping into his robes for a tiny bomb. The wolves hadn't been dangerous enough to demand such measures.

"You perverted wretch! As if I'd soil the purity of my body with one such as you!" The Calcinators slowly encircled Hao as he and Yuchen traded words. No doubt they hoped to force him into Yuchen's waiting jaws by snapping at his ankles. Clumsy! All the while, the deadly Sister Fu was a serpent slithering around the edges of the battlefield, waiting to steer Hao precisely where she wanted him with the flight of her arrows.

Yuchen's aura surged, power erupting from him in a peal of thunder which rattled the rotting wooden buildings of Plum-Whatever Village, and he shot forward— Right into Hao's bomb. A spark of flame caught the bomb's fuse as it left Hao's fingertips, igniting it into an eruption of sickly sulfuric smoke. The chloric fumes billowed into Yuchen's lungs, settling deep within, and filled the village with a bitter odor.

The gas was potent enough to kill or maim mortals in an instant, but Yuchen only fell into a hacking fit. His Ruminator aura swiftly filtered out the toxins and shoved away the rest in a gust of wind, clearing the air around him. Hao's Wildfire simmered within, lashing around his spirit, urging him to lay waste to his enemies. Lunge forth. Burn my lifeblood with the Transient Burning Leaf technique. Thrust the Cheng Spear through Yuchen's heart. Savor the crunch of bone and squelch of flesh.

Hao spun instead, directing his fury upon another target. Yuchen was still too fresh. His aura would protect him from Hao's attacks.

"Nice try, children!" Hao roared, shooting like a burning arrow towards the terrified Calcinators flanking him while Yuchen shrugged off the poisonous gas.

"I can't wait to paint my spear with your blood!" Mad laughter bubbled from Hao as he flickered away from the sputtering Yuchen towards the terrified Brother Li. Brother Li desperately flicked his sword upward to bat Hao's thrust away. Unfortunately for the younger man, he was only a Calcinator. Barely more than a mortal.

"It was only a yang pill, Brother Li. Hardly worth dying for!" Hao bellowed as the Cheng Spear drove straight through the flesh and bone of the Calcinator's thigh with a crunch.

"Hardly worth killing for either!" Brother Li shrieked as Hao spun and tore his weapon free in a spray of steaming blood. He suppressed the wild urge to finish Li with a thrust through the heart. Crippled enemies served Hao better than dead ones. If he killed the Calcinator, Yuchen could give Brother Li an honorable burial and then chase after Hao again. Forcing Yuchen to expend resources on a wounded Brother Li would cost him far more.

Abandoning one of his supporters would lower Yuchen's standing in the eyes of the White Rivers.

"Who sent you off on this suicide mission?" Hao growled at Brother Li, who proved a rather poor conversationalist by only screaming in response.

"Don't they know Calcinators should stay nice and safe in the sect?"

"And don't you know better than to steal a lady's precious ring?" Sister Fu countered from afar. It was all the warning Hao had before an arrow swept dangerously close to his neck, twisting midflight to skim past his throat. It left behind a red trail, but drew Hao's attention to Yuchen, who'd finished hacking and barreled towards him.

"Rude, that!" Hao barely raised the Cheng Spear to catch Yuchen's thunderous palm strike upon its shaft. Boom! Nearby buildings rattled with the shockwave, the closest splintering beneath the force of the blow. Only the superb strength of Hao's Wildfire Physique and the Cheng Spear's excellent make allowed him to match Yuchen for an instant. Otherwise, he would've been hurled across the plaza. Hao blasted flame qi from the Cheng Spear, scorching Yuchen, though his aura easily absorbed the spike of power.

"Your ancestors forged a fine weapon!" Hao cried, leaping a short distance back as Yuchen recovered. He slowly shifted towards the nearby tavern, keeping his spiritual senses open. Fighting in the plaza was a surefire way to get killed. Restricting Yuchen's options was the only way out of this without burning more of his lifeblood with the Transient Burning Leaf.

"I ought to thank old Elder Cheng. I can practically feel his spirit guiding me!" The Cheng Spear twitched in Hao's hands even as Yuchen's fury exploded outwards, casting aside Sister Fu's next arrow and flinging back Sister Wei.

"Silence, thief! Your traitorous tongue doesn't deserve to speak my ancestor's name," Yuchen said, his eyes brimming with rage.

"I will reclaim my family's spear and skewer your unworthy heart upon its tip!" With that proclamation, he erupted forward in a blur of striking limbs and lashing qi. Yuchen's lack of a weapon allowed Hao to stick close and prevent Sister Fu from putting an arrow through him, but every second fighting Yuchen exhausted him, forcing him to his limits just to match his enemy's superior cultivation. Yuchen might be the stronger cultivator, but Hao had the superior weapon.

He wasn't the best with his words, so he communicated with the Cheng Spear instead. I hate you, Hao told Yuchen with the ferocity of his strikes. I hate the way that you preen and expect the world to bend over so that you can fuck it. I hate the way that you sneer. I hate that an entitled cunt like you is genuinely talented! Hao painted a story with every thrust and snarl and flash of golden flame. He hated Yuchen, he hated Master Bolin, and he hated the godsdamned White Rivers Sect!

Beneath every forced grin, beneath every jab, beneath every mocking joke, was a pure black hatred that seethed, snatching Hao's heart in its furious grip. Then Yuchen roared, his Ruminator aura erupting outwards in a wave of wasteful fury, and flowed into the whirling storm of his White Surging Current style. Yuchen was faster and stronger, but painfully predictable in his anger. Directionless. As hot and bright as Hao's spirit burned, it was a caged flame. A furnace, not a wildfire.

Hao was swiftly exhausted, forced to only focus upon the pounding of his own heart, to the core of flame there which extended brilliant little filaments through every last blood vessel, carrying vital energy wherever it ventured. Fire was life. Fire was death. And so was Hao. Through the spray of sparks and veil of hot air wrapped around him, he felt Yuchen's movement and responded faster than his eyes should have allowed. He felt the burning air twist and bend with every motion.

He felt the mounting fury of his foe and the burst of flame qi in Yuchen's lungs with every breath. All living things burned. It was only a matter of knowing how to look. As Hao set himself ablaze with power, his spiritual sense grew ever stronger, channeled through the fire qi permeating the little village. Inefficient at this stage in his cultivation, but quite potent. He felt the explosive yang movement of Yuchen's endless aggression, arrogant in its lack of defense.

He felt the Calcinators fleeing the battlefield, unable to stand the heat or clash of the greater cultivators. Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. Only Sister Fu was night invisible, a deadly shadow next to Yuchen's inferno, bereft of aggression. Whereas Yuchen followed his body, Hao followed his spirit, listening only to his Fire Sense.

He danced to the beat of his heart, moving to defend before Yuchen could properly strike and attacking in the gaps between his stronger opponent's movements. His meridians ached as the battle continued. Another arrow whirred past Hao to skitter off Yuchen's aura. It bought Hao a precious second. Yuchen's aura shredded a wall off a building as they fought, leading it to collapse in a crash of splinters and wooden beams.

Produce and household goods scattered across the square, steadily pulverized into mulch by Yuchen's wild power. Hao finally saw his opportunity. He lunged towards the tavern, mocking Yuchen, goading him. None of his efforts would matter if Yuchen didn't follow him into the large, very flammable building.

"I use your spear better than you ever did!" Hao mocked. An angry Yuchen was an even stupider Yuchen.

"Perhaps I should be the Cheng heir, eh?"

"Traitorous beast!" Yuchen raged, covering the distance between them in the blink of an eye. His flowing flurries of strikes grew a fraction sloppier, though that was little consolation as one nearly took Hao's head off.

"You'll die for your arrogance, little peasant. Always sniffing after your betters, like when you tried asking Senior Sister Zhou out on a moonlit stroll—" Hao flung a satchel of black alchemical powder and ignited it, shutting Yuchen up with an explosion. It didn't penetrate Yuchen's aura, but it gave Hao time to fling a toxic smoke bomb at him before he charged into the tavern, barreling through the flimsy door. Despite the dire battle, Hao's cheeks flushed red as Yuchen's words struck home.

How did Yuchen even know about that old shame and Senior Zhou's cold rejection? The only one Hao had ever told about that was... Damn it, Sister Fu! Hao spun and cycled qi frantically, dredging up the impurities left behind in his lungs and spitting a putrid cloud of stinking black cinder-laced smoke into the doorway to cut off his enemies' line of sight while he worked. He spun, ready to prepare a welcome gift for Yuchen, only to blink at the sight of a horde of frightened mortals clustered in the inn.

A few trembling guardsmen clutched their weapons, but didn't dare raise them. Children sobbed into their mothers' breast as Hao stood before them like a fiery demon with cinder-laced smoke billowing from his nostrils. The villagers froze in place as the blazing heat pouring from his flushed skin filled the musty room. The chieftain rushed forward, kowtowing alongside his wife.

'Master Cultivator, please spare us! We don't—" Hao didn't have time for this shit!

"Run!" His voice cracked through the inn like a whip.

"Run if you want to live!" Villagers—including the previously petrified guardsmen, little more than upjumped peasants who someone had passed a spear to—shrieked and ran like rats, fleeing through the back door as swiftly as their legs could carry them. With that taken care of… Hao's eyes widened as a half-blind, spitting mad Yuchen simply charged through the inn wall, tearing the flimsy wood down with his lashing aura. That was fast! He'd expected at least ten seconds from that bomb.

The bastard was tougher than he thought. He frantically leapt away from Yuchen's crackling fist, flinging three more satchels of black powder beneath him in the same motion. He needed them in position if this plan had any hope of succeeding. More than that, he needed to make sure that Yuchen didn't notice the explosives.

"You're better with a spear!" Hao taunted.

"A shame you misplaced yours. Where could it have gone, I wonder?"

"Perhaps the same place you threw away your chastity, sense of humor, and decency," Yuchen said in a wholly un-Yuchen-like way. His words came stiffly, like he'd been fed a line and overly rehearsed it.

"Or when Sister Song touched your leg when you were kissing and you—" Damn it, Fu! I told you that in confidence. Hao turned his exasperation to better use and sprinted up the inn's rickety stairs to the second story. Partially to escape Yuchen and partially to escape whatever other sordid secrets Sister Fu had fed the bastard. A quick survey revealed it to be bereft of mortals, thank the Heavens. One touch of Yuchen's aura would shatter bones or kill them outright.

Yuchen dashed after Hao, destroying chairs, tables, bowls, walls, stairs, and just about anything else touched by the qi which gushed from the Ruminator like a mortal wound. He pursued Hao up to the second floor, spitting venomous promises and insults all the while.

"I'll return your head to the White Rivers!" Yuchen thrust his fist forward, blasting a hole through the second story wall as qi exploded from his knuckles. Mortals shrieked from below as daylight filled the musty old inn.

"I'll throw your corpse into the kennels. Or perhaps I'll have you stuffed to remind my enemies of the fate that awaits them." Fires sparked to life behind Hao as he sprinted around a corner into an ancient sitting room. Threadbare cloths, faded tapestries, and a sad-looking carpet turned into vessels for little tongues of flame, filling the room with smoke. Heat poured through the inn as the flames spread. Most importantly, Hao picked out the rotten flooring of the decrepit room.

He leveled the Cheng Spear and braced himself, recouping what little strength he could as he waited for Yuchen to clobber his way through the second story. Then Yuchen appeared, his aura blazing as power gushed from him and chased away the roiling black smoke. Gases couldn't hope to breach his airways now. Even the Cheng Spear would struggle to penetrate the Ruminator's thick qi. Hao couldn't hope to hurt Yuchen like this, but that wasn't really his goal here in the first place.

Yuchen was too strong to be slain so easily.

"My spear would be sullied by your peasant blood," Yuchen growled, stalking towards Hao like a tiger.

"Better to tear you apart limb by limb!"

"You'll never find your White Surging Current manual like that," Hao warned as Yuchen prepared to lunge at him. Some of the bloodlust faded from the idiot's eyes, buying another precious few seconds for Hao's flames to spread, weakening the structure.

"What did Master Kang say when he learned of your carelessness?" Yuchen's face twisted into a grimace. A torrent of qi bled off the Ruminator in a wild storm, tossing loose items about. The weakened floor creaked, shuddering beneath their feet.

"Where is it? Tell me! I will grant you a painless death when the manual is back in my hands." Qi circulated steadily through Hao's meridians. The spear's tip remained trained on the rotting flooring. With every passing second, Yuchen burned through his reserves. It was the double-edged sword of the unrestrained power he wielded, though he'd have to be bone dry before Hao dared to face him outright.

Burning his precious distilled qi might enable Hao to match the Ruminator for a few minutes longer, but that would be a poor trade when he was only a few weeks from advancement. The Transient Burning Leaf should grant Hao the strength to kill Yuchen, but he refused to sacrifice another drop of lifeblood unless he had to. So Hao did what he did best: he burnt. Time, in this instance.

"You know how it is out in the forest," Hao drawled, selecting every word carefully to needle Yuchen.

"I ran out of toilet paper, see, and the White Surging Current just wasn't particularly useful to me..."

"Impudent fool!" Yuchen's roar could be heard from outside the inn. His qi thrashed, rattling the floor. A charge built.

"When I reclaim my family's spear, I shall shove it up your backside!"

"So many threats!" Hao grinned, his qi boiling within him. His Wildfire spirit begged him to lunge at Yuchen and meet the Ruminator in open combat, but he quieted the urges. He'd accepted the fury into him, but it did not rule him.

"Come and take the spear, Cheng Yuchen! Take back the pride I spit on. Make your worthless family finally glad that your father put you in your mother's womb instead of spilling you on her face—""You dare!" Yuchen charged with all the stupid rage that Hao had hoped for. He sprinted across the rotting, weakened floor with a roll of thunder. Just as he ran across the middle, Hao's spear shuddered with power.

Blazing qi billowed out through the heavenly jade tip, conducting and amplifying his qi, and spat the channeled power in an explosion of flame and light right at Yuchen's feet.

"What—" The rotting floor shattered. Hao had only a moment to savor Yuchen's stunned expression before the Ruminator fell through the empty space and landed heavily onto the floor below. Yuchen grunted, leaping to his feet, ready to jump back to the second story. Such a fall wasn't even a hindrance to one in the Fourth Stage. He hurriedly tossed another two black powder satchels down after Yuchen.

A shower of sparks burst from the spear to ignite the powder scattered throughout the inn earlier— Yuchen's chaotic aura thrashed in panic, burning through more and more qi as it flared out like a wildfire. A maneuver like that would ordinarily be a stupid waste of power, but this time it saved Yuchen's life. Boom! The inn rattled as the explosive alchemical mixture went off, though much of the force was devoured by Yuchen's thrashing qi cloak.

Heat and force tore through the ancient building, shattering furniture and blowing holes in the walls. Walls creaked, folding inward as the inn crumbled around them. Just as Yuchen rose, beaten and bloody but alive, Hao fell upon him. He dropped from the second story like a demon, illuminated in a haze of writhing hot air and billowing black smoke, and struck with the Cheng Spear.

"Bastard!" Yuchen screamed as the Cheng Spear's burning tip slammed against his wavering aura, searing past his defenses to plunge through his foot. It would've gone through his chest if Yuchen hadn't twisted at the last moment. Hao grimaced as Yuchen struck at him, cracking one of his ribs with the sheer force of his fist's passing, but fought back the pain and leapt away from the hobbled Ruminator. Hao would've died years ago if a little thing like a broken rib was enough to slow him down.

He leapt away, spitting more choking black smoke into Yuchen's face with an Impure Exhale, and dashed away, grimacing at the twinge in his side. Yuchen howled as he took his first step on the ruined foot. Hao desperately flung two of his three remaining smoke bombs into the inn, hoping it would slow the wounded cultivator down by even half a minute, and grimaced as he stumbled out of the ruined building to face a horde of mortals.

"My inn!" An old man scrambled forward on his hands and knees, weeping as he watched the shoddy structure collapse beneath the roaring flames. Yuchen's howl cut off as he was trapped by a great heap of burning wood and stone.

"Gone. All gone! I'm ruined!" Something old and mortal squirmed in Hao's heart. He didn't dare stay, didn't dare wait for Yuchen to claw his way out of the burning wreck. It took more than that to kill a Ruminator. And yet… Hao hurled two of the lesser demonic wolf cores at the sobbing innkeeper, who stared dumbly at the greasy orbs. Each was worth a small fortune to mortals, though it was just a pittance to cultivators.

He'd harvested another seven beast cores from the demonic wolves, including the larger fist-sized core of the Beast of Bai Woods. He still had what he needed. Besides, the road had taught him one precious lesson: there were always more monsters to slay.

"Run, fools! He'll fight his way out soon. Don't be here when he does," Hao warned, rushing past the mortals. He didn't pause to see if they took his advice. All he had to do was escape. Yuchen's furious cries followed Hao as he ran. They soon descended into hacking coughs as the toxic gas bombs did their work. They weren't enough to kill Yuchen, but they'd delay him. Even a Ruminator couldn't shrug their effects off. Not when they'd slipped past his aura.

Timber cracked behind Hao as Yuchen tore his way free, though his brutish attempts brought more and more of the ruined inn down on him, smothering him in smoke and cinder. Hao didn't spare him another look. This was Hao's only chance. He ignored his cracked rib, considering himself lucky to have escaped with just this minor bit of misfortune. A proper hit from Yuchen would've taken his head off.

He wouldn't have stood a chance against Yuchen if that idiot had just shaken his pride off and armed himself with a proper weapon. Hao was good. Damn good. Master Bolin's rare pupils were held to standards ranging from 'extraordinary' to 'once-in-a-generation talent'. Anything less would see them discarded or killed. But Yuchen was a great talent in his own right, fed training and resources from the time he could walk.

He'd breached the great gulf between Distillation and Rumination a few months before, beating Hao to the finish line. Hao's only hope to beat Yuchen properly right now was through the Transient Burning Leaf. But burning his lifeblood to kill Yuchen of all people was no victory at all. So he ran. Hao fled the burning building and his furious rival trapped within. His eyes settled upon the small bridge— his bridge, he thought deliriously—and the path to the west.

Then a lonely figure leapt down from a high branch to block his path across the Xiao Hao Bridge.

"Do you have a moment, Brother Hao?" Sister Fu smiled radiantly at him, leaning upon a simple staff as she blocked his way. Her bow was nowhere to be seen.

"I'd hate for you to run away— again —before we had a little chat."