Chapter 299: Astonishing Odds

The crowd’s mood surged again.

Skinny grew even busier, hands flying as he took bets, but he still found a moment to ask Sun Fuling, “You putting a bet down?”

He Lingchuan immediately shot him a warning look, but it was too late.

Sun Fuling had already brought out a tael of silver and said, “Yep!”

She was still backing the high-odds side.

“Lady, come on! This guy looks even more unreliable than Wild Boar!”

Why are you putting a bet down on him?

He Lingchuan grabbed her wrist. “Shouldn’t you think this over?”

“I already did.” Sun Fuling’s long lashes flickered as she blinked. “That’s why I’m only putting down a single tael this time.”

“...”

Her eyes curved as she smiled. “A small wager is just for fun. Nothing to worry about.”

But then, about five minutes later, Sun Fuling was clutching his arm, head drooping as she said sadly, “My money...”

He Lingchuan could not help but laugh. “A single tael of silver could have bought you a few hundred buns.”

The words were barely out of his mouth when he felt her grip tighten. The hold on his arm shifted from a polite grasp to a serious clamp.

Anyone with a brain knew that this was not the time to be saying something like I told you so. He thus immediately changed his tune and said, “It’s fine. Meng Shan is bound to get what’s coming to him sooner or later.”

Just as he said that, a familiar voice suddenly came from close by, “Why wait for sooner or later when you could make it right now?”

He Lingchuan turned and was taken aback to see that it was actually Xiao Maoliang!

Hu Min burst out laughing. “Boss, what took you so long?”

“The meeting lasted until just now. It looks like I almost missed the good part.” Xiao Maoliang’s gaze shifted to Arena Seven. “So it’s Meng Shan guarding the arena today?”

“Yeah. He’s already put down four challengers,” Hu Min said, shaking his head. “At this rate, Arena Seven will close early today.”

Arena Seven was the public ring. Ordinary civilians could watch every fight from beginning to end. As far as Panlong City was concerned, it was their favorite form of entertainment, and so the arena opened once a week, with extra days added when things got lively.

There was not much to do in the city, so people clung to any distraction. Xiao Maoliang, for all his rank, was not about to pass up a spectacle like this.

If no one stepped up to challenge Meng Shan and the break went over half an hour, it would count as a successful defense. The day’s Arena Seven matches would then be declared over.

Skinny hurried over, bowing and scraping a greeting to Xiao Maoliang. He was still technically only a city guard, and in front of a Gale Army officer, deference came naturally. Still, he could not help but lament, “Two more challengers would’ve been perfect.” He clearly had not made what he considered a satisfying profit yet.

Xiao Maoliang smiled at He Lingchuan.

He rarely smiled at all. The warmth on his face made a knot tighten in Lingchuan’s chest.

Why is Officer Xiao smiling at me of all people?

“Broken Blade, why don’t you go on up?”

“Me?” He Lingchuan pointed at his own nose. “Right now?”

“You’ve challenged Meng Shan six or seven times already. You’re the opponent he least wants to see. I’ve watched two of your matches.” Xiao Maoliang lifted a hand and pointed at the stage. “This is a rare opportunity, so why don’t you give it a try?”

The two Gale Army soldiers standing behind him had also fought in Xiqing Gorge. They knew both He Lingchuan and Meng Shan and had crossed weapons with the latter themselves. They jumped right in, “Yeah, yeah, Broken Blade, get up there and win one for us!”

“Let that fat brute learn there’s always someone stronger waiting in line!”

Skinny’s eyes lit up, and he bobbed his head eagerly. “Yes, yes, your odds are sky-high, Broken Blade. This time I’ll definitely bet on you!”

If the underdog actually won, he would be rolling in money.

He Lingchuan shot him a glare.

Some squadmate you are.

Whenever he fought Meng Shan in the southern courtyard arenas, it had not been too shameful. Everyone watching was a fellow soldier or warrior. However, Arena Seven was different, as even commoners were able to watch the fights that went on here.[1]

The fights that took place in this arena turned into citywide gossip.

Xiao Maoliang clapped him on the shoulder. “What do you train for, day in and day out? You have to meet this kind of moment eventually.”

Sun Fuling had been listening quietly this entire time, but now, she suddenly spoke up, “If you go up there and challenge him, I’ll put an entire year’s salary on you.”

Her almond eyes shone, alive with energy and expectation.

He met that gaze, and suddenly, the weight on his heart eased. Maybe it was Xiao Maoliang’s words hitting right where his pride lived, maybe it was the look in her eyes, or maybe it was that familiar itch that always drove him toward trouble.

He looked at Sun Fuling and said, “I have a condition. If you agree, I’ll go up.”

She replied without hesitation, “Say it,”

He exhaled, leaned close to her ear, and murmured, “Win or lose, you have to kiss me once.”

The din around them was deafening. People were shouting, cheering, calling odds, drums boomed, and vendors hawked roasted skewers and cheap wine. In all that chaos, almost no one could have overheard him.

Sun Fuling’s eyes sharpened, a focused gleam flashing through them.

The moment the words left his mouth, he felt the heat rush up his own neck. He suddenly realized how it sounded. He had not thought it through at all before saying it aloud. The condition had just slipped out.

He Lingchuan waved his hands and said, “Forget it, just pretend I was speaking nonsense. That condition doesn’t count. I’ll go up anyway.”

After saying that, he started to turn toward the arena.

But then, Sun Fuling suddenly shot her fist toward him. “Fine, I agree. But only if you win.”

He Lingchuan stared for half a breath, then grinned like a wolf. He bumped his fist lightly against hers. “Then it’s a deal.”

Out on the arena, Meng Shan had already sauntered over to one corner. He yawned so wide that half of those in the front row could probably see his back teeth.

It had been a full fifteen minutes with no challengers. Another fifteen minutes and he would be able to claim that he had held the arena successfully.

Boring. So boring!

Just as he was thinking how dull it all was, someone moved in the crowd below, and a figure sprang up from the edge of the platform, landing with a thud.

The response was immediate. Applause crashed through the arena like waves, cheers rising to the rafters for this fool—or hero—who dared follow four broken men onto the arena.

Everyone Meng Shan had beaten today had left either coughing blood or being carried out half-conscious. To step up now took more than courage; it bordered on madness.

Even Meng Shan’s lips curled in a cold sneer.

Good. Let’s see which brat has the gall to come up here and... Eh?

It’s him?

The challenger walked forward with a familiar, easy swagger and greeted him like they had merely run into each other at the teahouse. “Yo, Meng Shan, it’s been almost half a month!”

Broken Blade!

“You’re still set on sending yourself to your death?” Meng Shan growled.

Is this going to be the seventh or eighth time I’m fighting this brat?

He Lingchuan had tangled with him so many times already in the arenas of the southern courtyard. Every single time, He Lingchuan had ended up sprawled on the floor, but deep down, Meng Shan knew that each fight had grown more difficult.

The last time that Meng Shan had knocked He Lingchuan down, he had been forced to stagger off to patch himself up as well, and then he had gone straight home to recuperate for several days.

In all of Panlong City, the person Meng Shan least wanted to see on a battlefield, aside from the Red General, was this persistent cockroach right in front of him.

“I’ve already placed my bet. I have to win it back, don’t I?” He Lingchuan said, stretching his hand toward the other party in a taunt.

Even though he had prepared himself mentally, standing on Arena Seven was still different.

He felt it as he turned to face the crowd. He bore an almost physical pressure, like a mountain of eyes pressing down from every direction. Their stares, their pointing fingers, their excitement, malice, and idle curiosity, all of it condensed into a weight on his shoulders.

A thousand gazes, a thousand pointing fingers, a thousand threads of emotion, all of them coiled together into something almost like a tangible field.

He remembered something he had read in a book once. It was a story of a beautiful man who drew such crowds that one day, too many people came to see him, and they literally “looked him to death.”

He could not recall the man’s name, only recalling that he had scoffed when he read the tale.

But right now, there was not the slightest trace of a smile on his face.

If he lost here on Arena Seven, it would be a very public defeat in front of most of Panlong City. For the next half month or maybe even longer, old grannies and old grandpas would be laughing about it over their evening porridge.

The pressure was immense.

He drew a deep breath.

I’ve crossed the line between life and death more times than I can count. I’ve bled on real battlefields. Am I really going to be scared off by a crowd?

Xiao Maoliang’s right. At some point, I have to face this kind of moment.

Meng Shan snorted and walked to the weapon rack. He selected a wolf’s fang mace with wooden spikes and paired it with a round shield.

Those who knew his usual style murmured in surprise. Meng Shan isn’t choosing one of his signature heavy weapons?

Xiao Maoliang frowned. “So he does have a brain after all. You’d almost forget just by the look of him.”

Skinny smirked and said, “He’s suffered under Broken Blade before. He’s not planning to rely entirely on brute force this time.”

On the other side of the rack, He Lingchuan reached up and grabbed a wooden saber.

He weighed it in his hand, checked the grain, pressed a thumb along the edge to feel for cracks. The balance was decent. At the very least, it would not snap the first time he put force into it.

Even so, for all the glamour of Arena Seven, the weapons provided were as shoddy as ever. A cheap arena got cheap gear. Fortunately, the wood was decent enough. If the saber broke halfway through, then things would get interesting.

Both men wore light leather armor, but when you set a simple wooden saber against Meng Shan’s bulk and power, it was hard not to feel that the scales were tipped. Without technique, He Lingchuan would never be able to get through that defense; he would just shatter his own saber.

They had fought six or seven times already. Each understood the other’s habits and tricks. There was no point in the usual feeling-out dance.

Meng Shan lumbered forward in huge strides. He swung the wolf’s fang mace in a brutal horizontal arc, followed immediately by a stomping step that made the boards tremble.

Most opponents did not dare meet that kind of blow head-on. They would instinctively leap backward to avoid the swing, which was when Meng Shan’s earth-shaking steps came into play. When the floor shook beneath them, their footing faltered, and he would slam the shield into their guard, smashing through any attempt to block.

As long as his opponent showed the slightest opening, the shield would be there, turning defense into a blunt, crushing weapon.

But He Lingchuan knew this pattern too well. There was no way he was going to eat the same trick again.

As the wolf’s fang mace whistled down, he did not retreat. He surged forward instead, body snapping into sudden acceleration as he slipped under the arc of the weapon. Man and saber shot straight into Meng Shan’s chest range.

This move, light and precise, was a form from the Swallow’s Return movement technique known as “Nest-Seeking Swallow.” To those watching from below, he seemed to blur. All they could see was an afterimage cutting through the air. The next instant, the tip of the wooden saber had already thrust into Meng Shan’s abdomen.

It was a breathtaking gamble. If he had been even half a beat slower, that descending mace would have turned his skull into pulp.

Below the platform, Xiao Maoliang let out a soft “Hm?” that even he could not suppress.

He had once faced Meng Shan head-on in battle at Xiqing Gorge, so he knew how terrifying the man’s full charge could be. Once he started moving, a pressure field surrounded him—an invisible force that tugged and dragged at his opponent’s limbs and weight, slowing them by just enough to ruin timing. This was Meng Shan’s greatest weapon against nimble, quick-footed enemies.

Most agile fighters were wiry and lighter in build. Their advantage lay in speed and precision. But once Meng Shan’s “field” grabbed hold of them, the angles of their attacks changed, and their carefully measured steps slipped off course. Then, Meng Shan showed them what it meant to be crushed under a mountain.

But this time, He Lingchuan had read that invisible pull as clearly as if it were a current in water. He had paid for that understanding in blood.

No field, no force, no aura was perfectly uniform. Even the most solid-seeming wall had cracks. After a day of directly facing those storm-ridden waves in the river, he had started to feel how formless power shifted, how it rose and fell. Now, stepping into Meng Shan’s pressure field, he sensed the tiny, uneven gaps in it.

He found one such gap at the edge of the field and slipped through.

His strike landed right under Meng Shan’s ribcage, targeting the solar plexus—the same spot Meng Shan had struck Wild Boar at.

Meng Shan had been exhaling as he roared, his belly swelling to push power out. The jab landed at that exact moment, forcing his upper body to rock backward. Air caught in his chest, and discomfort flared bright and sharp. However, his stance was solid, and his feet were planted like stakes. He did not give up even half a step.

Moreover, He Lingchuan’s attack, for all its clever timing, was not perfect either. From He Lingchuan’s perspective, it was like he had stabbed into a taut-drum belly. He could not even tell whether it was packed with true qi or just layers of fat. Either way, it was springy and tough, making it difficult for his saber to bite into.

In that instant, he missed Fleeting Life with a bone-deep ache. If he had that saber in his hand, he was sure Meng Shan’s physique would not have held.

Unfortunately, this was an arena in the dreamscape. He could not even use ghost-shadow cicada shells, as they were just too expensive here.

Almost no one noticed that the tip of the wooden saber had actually shot out a third of a meter or more of vigorous qi as it struck.

Meng Shan’s response was purely instinctual. He wrenched his arm around and tried to clamp his opponent in a crushing bear hug.

His strength put Wild Boar to shame. If he locked He Lingchuan’s upper body with both arms, he could easily squeeze the breath and the guts right out of him.

He Lingchuan had seen him do it once; Meng Shan had embraced a man so hard that the poor fellow’s spine snapped with an audible crack.

1. I feel like Arena Seven probably still counts as one of the southern courtyard arenas, but it’s just the southernmost one. I’m not too sure, though, so I’m leaving it a bit more vague. ☜