Chapter 411: Exchanging Blows, Friendship Grows

What flew out were two short bolts from the cabinet above. They slammed straight into his lower back and waist. Once the Sinking Earth Spell was triggered, the miniature crossbow mechanisms embedded in the furniture activated in tandem, loosing hidden bolts to strike from the shadows.

This entire trap setup was something He Lingchuan had long since mastered. Back when he was out on missions to hunt monsters in the Chipa Highland, he had practiced these kinds of terrain-adapted trap setups until they were second nature to him.

𝓯𝓻𝒆𝙚𝒘𝓮𝙗𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝒍.𝙘𝓸𝙢

Another dark figure flipped in through the window. This time, it was Fushan Yue.

He swept a quick glance around the room and immediately stepped forward to haul his companion up.

Just as he was about to leap back out the window, a sudden spike of danger flared in his heart, causing his movement to halt mid-jump.

The next instant, an unassuming streak of saber light brushed silently past the window frame. It made his scalp prickle with cold fear.

If he had not stopped in time, that single slash would have taken his head clean off.

A third person leaped in through the window. His movement was smooth and weightless, like a leaf lifted by the wind, even pausing briefly in midair.

Fushan Yue reacted as though facing a mortal enemy. He had just shoved his injured subordinate aside when a dazzling saber light came crashing down like a river of stars spilling from the heavens.

Fleeting Life finally revealed its true face.

The force carried in that strike was ferocious, its undercurrents deep and unbroken. Fushan Yue did not dare meet it head-on. Inside the cramped, dark room, he darted and twisted repeatedly, yielding ground to avoid its edge.

The dark room erupted into a storm of saber light and sword shadows.

Both combatants moved at terrifying speed, moving so fast that Fushan Yue’s men could barely follow the exchange with their eyes.

At last, the two had truly come to blows.

“Since you’re already here, why not stay a while longer?” He Lingchuan said lightly as he fought, “I wouldn’t want to seem like a poor host.”

If Fushan Yue tried to counterattack, He Lingchuan was confident he could seize the opening and press the advantage. The lingering momentum of his Wave-Cleaving Slash was formidable. Unfortunately, the other party clearly knew better, only retreating, never advancing.

Back when He Lingchuan had been comprehending the saber at the northern frontline camp of Xia Province, he had already been able to sever seven raindrops with a single slash. After imperial nectar helped him open his second dantian, his speed and power were on an entirely different level.

Even so, Fushan Yue was as slippery as an eel, always dodging at the last possible instant.

An opponent this nimble reminded He Lingchuan of only one thing: the handful of specialized ferry-crossing ghostspawn he had encountered inside the Panlong Dreamscape.

However, the space in the room was limited, so retreating endlessly meant inevitable defeat.

Fushan Yue let out a low chuckle. “Very well, a guest should follow the host.” With a flick of his wrist, two sleeve arrows shot out.

These did not require raising the elbow—just a twist of the wrist, and the arrows streaked straight for He Lingchuan’s eyes. The tips glimmered faint blue, a clear sign that they had been treated with poison.

They were barely a meter apart. The sleeve arrow mechanism that Fushan Yue had was exquisitely crafted, equipped with powerful springs and short, narrow shafts. It was ideal for deadly close-range sneak attacks.

He Lingchuan did not have time to parry with his saber and could only snap his head aside.

He had once suffered something similar while grappling at close quarters with the blood-and-flesh fortress ferry-crossing ghostspawn. Back then, toxic spittle had splashed directly into his eye, blinding him on the spot.

Since that incident, he had always remained wary of hidden tricks in close combat.

After all, losing in the dreamscape was one thing. In reality, having an eye destroyed or a skull pierced meant there were no second chances.

His assault stalled for just a moment, and that was enough for Fushan Yue to seize the opening. He snapped his fingers sharply.

Pah.

The oil lamp atop the cabinet behind him flared to life.

Originally, the lamp had been on the table. When He Lingchuan set up his traps, he had casually moved them onto the five-drawer cabinet, placing them almost level with his eyes.

The light was not bright enough to catch the patrols’ attention outside, but light always brought shadows with it.

He Lingchuan stood directly facing the lamp, and his shadow fell cleanly against the wall behind him.

He dodged the bolts and struck again, but halfway through raising his arm, it locked in place.

It felt as though someone had seized his arm and was dragging it backward with all their strength.

From the rear corner of the room, Fushan Yue’s injured companion shouted hoarsely, “Now!”

He had already crawled over to the wall and was gripping He Lingchuan’s shadow with both hands, hauling it back with desperate force.

On closer inspection, his forearms were wrapped in thin, vine-like tendrils emitting faint black light. Each tendril pierced directly into He Lingchuan’s shadow.

This obscure divine technique was known as the Shadow-Binding Technique. By restraining a person’s shadow, it restricted the movements of their true body.

Fushan Yue wasted no time. He raised his twin water piercers and thrust straight for He Lingchuan’s eyes, aiming for a clean in-and-out kill.

The tips reached his corneas in the blink of an eye, and at that instant, even the back of He Lingchuan’s skull screamed with piercing pain.

That was his intuition howling in warning.

Fushan Yue had pushed his speed to the absolute limit. After all, prolonged fights bred complications, so he needed to end this now.

He Lingchuan did not blink.

His arms were restrained, but his fingers, which were shielded by the overlap of body and shadow, still had room to move. He lifted them slightly. “Appear.”

Clang!

The twin water piercers struck something solid.

A round shield appeared out of thin air.

The piercers were knocked aside. Fushan Yue let out a muffled grunt, clearly shaken by the rebound force. The shield itself was knocked away as well, but he still lunged forward.

This time, he reverted to his old habit. His mouth snapped open as he went for He Lingchuan’s throat, neat white teeth transforming instantly into razor-sharp fangs.

Even a python monster several meters long would not be enough to satisfy his appetite, so how could a mere human possibly suffice?

He Lingchuan’s body was restrained, but his mouth was free. He drew in a surge of true energy and blew out hard.

Whoom!

A gust of air swept into the five-drawer cabinet, extinguishing the oil lamp.

With no light, there would be no shadow.

It was not a sophisticated solution, but he had found the countermeasure in an instant. His reaction speed was nothing short of terrifying.

Freedom flooded back into his limbs. There was no time to fix his saber grip, so he drove a hooking punch straight into Fushan Yue’s chest and abdomen.

It was hurried, but the true energy behind it was abundant and ferocious.

The blackthorn ring on his finger, which was loot he had taken from a rebel leader, not only enhanced his strength but also inflicted corrosive poison on contact. It was tailor-made for dirty fights like this.

Bang!

Fushan Yue smashed through the wall and went flying backward.

Beyond the wall lay the guesthouse courtyard.

He Lingchuan took two steps forward, then felt a cold sensation at his throat.

He reached up and touched his neck, then, after bringing his hand out to check, he saw that there was blood, black blood.

His neck had not been bitten by Fushan Yue’s fangs, but it had been raked by his claws, the claws having been just a hair’s breadth from the carotid artery.

Just barely missed.

The claws carried corpse poison. He Lingchuan immediately swallowed a pill and circulated his true energy, forcing the tainted blood out of the wound.

When he checked again, the blood flowing out was bright red. Only then did he relax.

It appeared that he had dealt with it in time.

The entire sequence took barely six or seven seconds. His gaze never left the front.

Afterward, He Lingchuan stepped through the hole in the wall.

Fushan Yue had smashed a small tree in the courtyard. He shook his head, staggered, and climbed to his feet. The brickwork of that guestroom wall had been impressively sturdy.

Seeing He Lingchuan emerge with a saber in hand, Fushan Yue waved both hands frantically. “Stop! Enough, we’re done fighting!” Seeing the saber still shift, he hurriedly added, “I’m serious. That was just a test of your mettle! No hard feelings. I had no intent to kill. You should’ve felt that.”

Before tonight, Fushan Yue had not truly fought back once, yet he had suffered four humiliations already—once by Three-Heart Lake, once in Fufeng City, and twice at Mount Fengmo.

The more Fushan Yue thought about it, the angrier he became. He had needed to see things through this time, or his heart would not be at peace.

He Lingchuan did not look surprised. “And? What are the conclusions that you’ve arrived at after this little test of yours?”

Back at Mount Fengmo, He Lingchuan had cut his words short and fled. He knew fully well that this man would go after him sooner or later.

Fushan Yue was an opportunist. Whether there was fruit on the tree or not, he would always give it a shake first.

And sure enough, here he was.

That said, He Lingchuan could not help but admit that Fushan Yue’s body really was tough. The other party had taken his punch head-on and still looked mostly fine.

“Not weak. You’re qualified to take the spirit seed.”

He Lingchuan said lightly, “What spirit seed?”

“Nothing, nothing, I misspoke. I don’t even know what a spirit seed is.” Fushan Yue laughed. “We’d both have to pay dearly to finish each other off, and we’ve no mortal grudge. Why not call a truce?”

He Lingchuan gestured back at the gaping hole in the guestroom wall. “A truce requires sincerity.”

He knew perfectly well that Fushan Yue had come tonight to reclaim face after his earlier losses. His willingness to talk now was simply because he had realized that He Lingchuan was too thorny a target, and that the price it would cost to kill him was too high for comfort.

If he had thought He Lingchuan was weak and easy to bully, his tone would never be this conciliatory.

Friendship or slaughter, strength decided everything.

Fushan Yue flicked his wrist and tossed over a large silver ingot. “I’ll cover the repairs.”

Sure enough, footsteps sounded outside. Soon, someone knocked hurriedly. “Sir? Is something wrong over there?”

In the dead of night, with a wall crashing down, no innkeeper could pretend not to hear.

He Lingchuan took the ingot and casually pinched off a chunk, tossing it out through the hole. “Nothing major. I just broke a flowerpot. Come clean it up tomorrow.”

The sounds of breaking a pot and breaking a wall were entirely different, and the innkeeper knew he was being fed nonsense, but the silver was genuine and more than enough to rebuild the wall.

The excess would be his to keep.

So the innkeeper simply said, “Please rest early, then,” and scurried off.

Before long, the disturbance even drew Second Boss Shi, who came fussing over He Lingchuan’s safety. If his original intent in accompanying He Lingchuan from the State of Fu had been mutual benefit, by now, he practically saw Young Master He as a walking lucky charm and desperately hoped nothing would happen to him.

He Lingchuan dismissed him with a few words. This time, no silver was needed.

Fushan Yue calmly stepped back into the room through the hole in the wall.

As he passed He Lingchuan, both men subtly raised their true energy, guarding against each other, yet their smiles were gentler than a spring breeze.

As Fushan Yue helped his subordinate sit down in the corner, he asked, “How did you know I’d come?”

Every one of those mechanisms in the room had been prepared for him.

He Lingchuan replied flatly, “You don’t know when to stop.”

That struck squarely at Fushan Yue’s character, causing the man to choke for a moment. “Well played, it is out of exchanging blows that friendship grows. Allow me to reintroduce myself. I am Fushan Yue, from the State of Chiyan.”

“He Xiao, from the State of Fu.”

Fushan Yue looked surprised. “Such a tiny state, yet it produced someone like you?” He then rubbed his nose and said, “I heard you’ve been traveling with the Baoshu King’s escort unit these past few days, getting along splendidly. They don’t know the item’s in your hands, do they? Mantis stalking the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind. Truly impressive.”

The escort unit numbered only three hundred. Most of those who had died that day were merchants and travelers.

Fushan Yue had left corpses everywhere, yet the final prize had been snatched away by the man in front of him.

Trying to dump the karma on me?

He Lingchuan did not even blink. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Did you release the Wind Demon? Did you abduct the envoy?”

Fushan Yue shrugged and said no more.

He Lingchuan pulled over a chair and sat opposite him. “You didn’t break in through my window in the middle of the night just to engage in small talk, did you?”