From the chaos of the crowd, a girl burst forth in a blur of motion.
Her upturned fox eyes glinted with a razor's chill. Her gray clothes were soaked in blood, scarlet drops splattered across her delicate face.
That icy, frost-bitten poise—
far above the gaudy powder of the common courtesans.
The moment Li Zhexian's gaze fell upon Hu Liena,
her eyes also locked on him.
Not that she recognized him—
For the Li Zhexian before her wore a mask, his aura cold and austere,
utterly unlike the carefree young man in white she once knew two years ago.
The only reason she noticed him at all
was because, in this inner city filled with filth, gore, and depravity,
the sudden appearance of a tall black-clad youth
was like a blade of cold steel stabbing through the mire—impossible to ignore.
"Fighting is permitted here in the inner city?"
Li Zhexian's eyes swept across the bloody street,
where slaughter still raged—
his voice calm as he turned to the veiled guide beside him.
The black-veiled woman nodded, warning sternly:
"Exactly so—and that is why I advised you to remain in the outer—"
Zheng!
A crisp sword cry tore through the reek of blood.
An aura of auspicious brilliance, divine wrath, and peerless sharpness
erupted from Li Zhexian's body.
In an instant—
even the clinging stench of blood was swept away by that sword intent.
The black-veiled woman's shroud fluttered in the surge of force.
Though the sword intent was not directed at her,
cold sweat still pricked her skin;
a chilling dread washed through her from head to toe.
Hu Liena, who had been about to flee, froze mid-step.
Her fox-like pupils widened.
Her gaze fixed upon the blade in Li Zhexian's hand—
its edge shrouded in a hazy aureate-blue light—
and a storm surged through her heart.
Who is this man?!
His sword pressure… is even more terrifying than Li Zhexian's once was!
That sudden eruption of sword intent—
cold, pure, unrelenting—
poured over the chaos like a douse of freezing water.
Those who survived in this infernal city
were all wolves with keen instinct for danger.
One by one, the killing stopped.
All eyes—filled with caution and fear—
turned toward the black-clad youth.
Here, where every breath meant risking death,
a single wound could end a life.
Now—
no one dared to move first.
Hu Liena realized her pursuers had halted in confusion.
A faint sigh of relief escaped her lips.
She smiled slightly, turning her gaze toward the black-clad figure.
But what answered her—
was a streak of blade-light tearing through the night.
Zheng!
The sword flash struck like lightning.
Hu Liena's pupils shrank to pinpoints.
She twisted aside desperately.
Shrrk!
A few strands of hair drifted through the air—
and pain lanced across her torso.
Her gray garments split soundlessly,
revealing skin and flesh beneath—
slick with fresh blood.
The red quickly soaked through her clothes.
The onlookers were stunned.
They had thought the youth meant to save her—
never expecting a strike more merciless than her pursuers'.
"Ugh!"
Hu Liena gritted her teeth, clutching her bleeding wound.
Blood gushed through her fingers.
Staggering backward, she glared in fury and disbelief at the masked youth,
then turned and fled into a pitch-dark alley.
"Why attack me?!"
Her anguished cry echoed through the bloody night wind.
"When have I ever wronged you?!"
Li Zhexian's voice, cold as forged iron and distorted by Spirit Power,
drifted after her.
"This is the Slaughter City—does one need a reason to kill?"
Hu Liena was speechless. All she could do was grit her teeth and urge her Spirit Power to the extreme, boosting her speed.
The beads of blood spraying from between her fingers drew a tragic, gorgeous thin line behind her.
Li Zhexian's eyes gleamed like drawn steel.
With a thought, small azure-gold swords materialized from the void before him.
The Fourth Realm of Sword Dao — "All Becomes the Sword."
It was not a Spirit Ring or Spirit Ability, and thus was unrestricted by the laws of the Slaughter City.
Each small sword flared to life,
slicing through the drifting blood in the air,
grinding it to nothing.
With another thought,
the small swords changed direction, turning into streaks of deadly cold light, shooting straight for the center of Hu Liena's back.
Li Zhexian's eyes were darker than the slaughter-night around him.
Since I have entered this city…
I shall follow its laws.
Hu Liena bore no kindness toward him—only old resentment.
In the past Spirit Master Tournament, he had been bound by rules.
Here and now, in the Slaughter City, there were no such restraints.
If she could be killed—then she should be killed.
"Damn it!"
The chill of death rushing up from behind turned Hu Liena's beautiful face pale.
She dropped low, knees bending—then leapt.
Her body shot skyward like an arrow.
Landing on a nearby rooftop,
Shhh—! Shhh—!
The spot she had just left was riddled with holes by the pursuing sword qi,
stones bursting and scattering into dust.
Still shaken, she cast a glance behind—
the black-clad youth still chasing, relentless as shadow.
Her heart cursed fiercely.
To the roof she sprang again,
bounding from eave to eave,
fleeing deeper into the twisted maze of the inner city.
Li Zhexian's black robes billowed as he followed close behind.
Under the purple moon,
the hunt stretched on for a full hour.
At last—
Li Zhexian halted atop a slanted rooftop.
Before him rose a tangled maze of buildings,
layer upon layer, woven together like a colossal hive.
He stood alone on a jutting eave,
his black garments whipping in the wind,
the dim purple moonlight glinting off his mask.
His brows furrowed as he swept his gaze over the scene.
The trail of blood on the ground… ended here.
The air in the Inner City was already thick with the reek of blood;
it was impossible to distinguish one scent from another.
"It seems Hu Liena has been in the Slaughter City for some time."
he murmured coldly.
"With her Spirit Emperor-level cultivation
and familiarity with this maze…
that fox is a slippery one indeed."
He let his voice, imbued with Spirit Power,
carry across the empty streets:
"I find it most displeasing that you still live."
"From this day forth—
whenever I see you, I will hunt you."
His words hung in the night like a curse.
Then his figure flickered—
disappearing into the shrouded alleys like a ghost.
Minutes passed.
A shadow appeared silently amid the honeycomb structures.
Half an hour later,
Li Zhexian returned once more,
searched the area,
and, finding no trace of her,
let out a cold, mirthless laugh before finally leaving.
"Haah…"
In a hidden corner within the honeycomb of ruins,
Hu Liena leaned weakly against a damp, cold wall.
Her face was pale as snow;
she slowly sank to the ground.
A fiery red fox tail coiled around her waist,
binding the wound across her abdomen.
Most of the tail was already soaked in blood—
concealing her trail.
"Damn it!" she gritted her teeth.
Then, slowly,
a strange gleam flickered in the depths of her fox-like eyes.
"To think I'd meet such a monster in the Slaughter City…"
She drew a ragged breath.
"His sword—its sharpness, its dominance—
not weaker than Li Zhexian's own."
"I had no enmity with him.
He hunted me only because of the law of this place…"
Her eyes narrowed.
"If I could bring him under the banner of the Spirit Hall…"
With trembling hands, she pulled out a healing pill from her robes,
placed it on her tongue,
and felt the medicinal warmth spread to her torn flesh.
A faint itch of regeneration began.
Her fox eyes gleamed with deeper calculation.
...
Everyone who entered the Inner City
was allotted a small, crude shelter.
Those who desired more comfort
had to pay for it—with Bloody Mary, the city's currency of blood.
Now—
Li Zhexian sat cross-legged on a rickety, worm-eaten wooden bed,
eyes glinting coldly in the dim light.
"Since Hu Liena is already here…"
"Then according to the story's path, Tang San will also arrive soon."
"My purpose this time…"
"The Yellow Springs Dew must be obtained."
"And my new sword form—and a new celestial brew—
must both be forged here,
in the Slaughter City."
Li Zhexian slowly closed his eyes.
"I will go to the Hell Slaughter Arena tomorrow."