Chapter 221: Farewell
"Don't we... need to step in?" Otto asked, his brow furrowing as he observed the chaotic skirmish unfolding below. He cast a sideways glance at Rovel. It was obvious the man cared for the young girl's well-being, yet he stood perfectly still, leaving her surrounded by a sea of hostile blades.
"Without being tempered by blood and tears, she will never truly grow up," Rovel replied, his voice calm and unyielding.
Li Sushang was, without a doubt, a piece of unpolished jade. While her innate talent might not rival the monstrous heights of her master, Cheng Lingshuang, her potential remained absolutely terrifying., Rovel's meta-knowledge reminded him of a crucial detail: Li Sushang possessed the dormant bloodline of a Stigmata Awakener. The only difference was that Cheng Lingshuang had been born fully awakened, whereas Sushang's power still slumbered deep within her veins, waiting for the right catalyst.
Down in the dust, the battle raged. Under the sharp barks of Eagle's commands, the hundred-strong mob of sand bandits moved with the terrifying cohesion of a veteran army. They formed a tightening net of steel, their synchronized strikes severely restricting Li Sushang's evasive maneuvers. She was forced into a bitter, grinding struggle.
Relying on her family's signature Flying Swallow Technique and the deep Taixu Sword Qi: Soul Essence, she danced through the flashing blades. She parried and weaved, holding her ground for the moment, but the sheer volume of attackers was exacting a heavy toll. Her stamina was draining at an alarming rate.
Yet, even backed into this desperate corner, her strikes lacked lethal intent. She hadn't braced her heart for the reality of taking a life. Instead of driving her blade home, she opted for blunt force, striking pressure points to knock the bandits unconscious before tossing them into the sand. It was a fatal miscalculation. Within minutes, the stunned men groaned, shook off the dizziness, retrieved their weapons, and rejoined the fray with renewed viciousness.
The inevitable consequence of her mercy finally caught up to her. A bandit's scimitar slipped past her tired guard, biting deep into her calf. Li Sushang stumbled, a sharp gasp escaping her lips. The sudden, searing pain shattered her rhythm, forcing her to abruptly halt the fluid footwork of the Flying Swallow Technique.
"Hahaha, excellent!" Eagle roared from the sidelines, his eyes gleaming with greedy delight. "Whoever landed that cut gets double rations and silver tonight! But remember, you bastards—do not scratch her face! That pretty little mug is worth a fortune!"
Eagle dragged a rough tongue over his chapped lower lip. A high-quality 'piece of cargo' like Li Sushang belonged in the absolute top-tier of merchandise he had ever trafficked.
Li Sushang bit down hard on her lower lip, tasting copper. The suffocating tide of grimy, bloodthirsty men pressing in from all sides weighed heavily on her chest. To make matters worse, Eagle—the undisputed strongest fighter of the Golden Sand Gang—was still watching her every move with the predatory patience of a vulture.
If she took another hit, her mobility would be completely crippled. She would be captured.
I can't afford to hold back anymore.
"Blade Launch—Mountain Collapse!"
Planting her uninjured foot into the dirt, Li Sushang surged forward. She drove her palm squarely into the chest of the nearest bandit. The impact sounded like a cracking whip. The man was launched backward like a broken ragdoll, crashing into his comrades and bowling over an entire row of attackers. The primary target hit the ground in a heap, violently coughing up a spray of dark blood. He couldn't even muster a scream, his chest caved in at an unnatural angle. At least four of his ribs had been instantly pulverized.
Up on the ridge, Rovel narrowed his eyes. Even now, she's deliberately avoiding their vitals.
He let out a quiet, exasperated breath. This little girl is incredibly stubborn. Is the concept of taking a life really that abhorrent to her? These men viewed her as nothing more than livestock to be chained and sold to the highest bidder. Every single one of these desert rats had innocent blood staining their hands. Yet, she still clung to her moral high ground.
Well, Rovel mused, watching another bandit get launched through the air, at least she's finally putting some real stopping power behind her strikes. I suppose that counts as character growth.
With every sweeping palm and precise kick Li Sushang delivered, another bandit hacked up blood and collapsed into the dust. Within minutes, the sheer brutality of her martial arts had decimated their numbers. More than half of the hundred-man mob lay groaning on the ground. The remaining dozens tightened their grips on their sabers, their knees trembling. Not a single one dared to take another step forward.
"A bunch of useless, pathetic trash! You can't even subdue one injured woman!" Eagle spat, his face twisting in disgust. He finally uncrossed his arms and stepped into the clearing. If he allowed this humiliation to continue, the fearsome reputation of the Golden Sand Gang would be reduced to a bad joke.
Li Sushang leaned heavily on her uninjured leg, her chest heaving as she gasped for air. Her internal Qi reserves had plummeted to less than thirty percent.
"Humph. Finally decided to show your ugly face?" she sneered, her voice dripping with raw contempt. "Hiding behind a wall of your own lackeys like a spineless coward! And you call yourself a gang leader?"
Earlier, Eagle had manipulated her naive sense of honor to make her relinquish the Xuanyuan Sword. Now, she was turning the tables, weaponizing her words to shatter his composure.
The effect was instantaneous. The muscles in Eagle's jaw locked, and a dark, ugly flush of rage crept up his neck. Those afflicted by the madness—corrupted by the chaotic energies of the world—were notoriously volatile. Had Eagle been a normal martial artist, he might have brushed off a young girl's insults with a cruel laugh. He might have even respected her grit; that was simply the nature of the Jianghu.
But the corruption boiling in his veins made that impossible. A suffocating, bloodthirsty aura erupted from his body. Ever since the madness took root in his mind, his temper had become a hair-trigger. It was the exact same volatile fury that had caused him to brutally execute his own men just moments prior for failing to recognize Rovel. He hadn't given them a single second to plead for their lives.
Any lingering thoughts of capturing her alive to sell vanished, entirely eclipsed by a blinding desire to butcher her. He had ruled the criminal underworld of the Northern Desert for years; no one had ever dared to humiliate him so brazenly. Now, a quick death was off the table. He was going to tear her apart piece by piece.
Gripping the stolen Xuanyuan Sword tightly, Eagle kicked off the ground, leaving a crater in the sand as he launched himself at Li Sushang.
The clash was explosive. Yet, against all logic, Li Sushang held her ground. Despite operating on fumes, bleeding from her leg, and fighting bare-handed against a legendary divine weapon, she matched the gang leader blow for blow.
Eagle's eyes widened in genuine shock. The girl's martial foundation was terrifyingly deep. He realized with a sickening jolt that during their brief skirmish earlier, she had been holding back a massive portion of her true strength.
However, Eagle was a veteran killer. He quickly identified the weak link in her defense. Her injured calf made her footwork inherently unstable. Shifting his grip, he unleashed a flurry of vicious, low-angle slashes aimed directly at her bleeding leg.
"Blade Guard—Weeping Willow!"
Li Sushang had anticipated the dirty tactic. Her body suddenly went entirely limp, swaying backward with the unnatural flexibility of a willow branch caught in a violent storm. The heavy blade whistled harmlessly past her waist.
Using the momentum of her sway, she snapped forward.
SMACK!
A sharp, echoing slap rang across the desert.
"Returning the favor!" Li Sushang declared triumphantly, landing gracefully on her good foot. Seeing the bright red handprint rapidly swelling on Eagle's cheek filled her with an immense surge of satisfaction.
That single slap snapped the last fragile thread of Eagle's sanity. A guttural, beast-like roar tore from his throat. His attacks devolved into a frantic, hyper-aggressive frenzy.
From his vantage point, Rovel observed a chilling transformation. The dark roots of Eagle's hair were rapidly bleaching white, spreading across his scalp at a visible rate. It was the obvious symptom of the madness—the Honkai corruption—deepening its hold over his physical body. Eagle's meridians greedily devoured the ambient True Qi in the environment, forcefully supercharging his muscles and imbuing every swing of the Xuanyuan Sword with a lethal, cutting shockwave.
The overwhelming barrage quickly wore Li Sushang down. Her reflexes dulled, and a series of shallow, bleeding cuts bloomed across her arms and shoulders.
Inevitably, her exhausted guard faltered. Eagle seized the momentary opening, raising the heavy golden blade high above his head.
"DIE!" he bellowed, bringing the weapon down in a devastating executioner's arc.
Li Sushang stared up at the descending edge of death. There was no fear in her eyes. Instead, an absolute, crystalline stillness washed over her mind. Time seemed to grind to a halt. The dust motes hanging in the air, the frantic pulse of her own heart, the roaring wind—everything slowed to an infinite crawl.
In that razor-thin margin between life and death, the final barrier in her mind shattered. She grasped the ethereal truth of her lineage, finally breaking through to the fourth stage of the Sword Heart: Taixu.
Chiiiiing!
A clear, resonant chime of metal echoed through the clearing. Eagle's eyes nearly bulged out of his skull. The unstoppable momentum of the Xuanyuan Sword had been effortlessly deflected by a single, precise flick of Li Sushang's fingertip.
The divine sword spun wildly into the air. In that split second, a silent understanding passed between them: whoever claimed the blade would walk away alive.
Both fighters lunged for the falling weapon. But the deep gash in Li Sushang's calf betrayed her. Her injured leg buckled just a fraction of an inch, making her a heartbeat too slow.
Eagle's rough hand snatched the hilt out of the air. Twisting his wrist into a brutal reverse grip, he instantly drove the blade back toward Li Sushang's chest.
Yet, Li Sushang did not retreat. Stripped of all hesitation, her eyes burned with the absolute resolve to kill. Foregoing all defense, she channeled every last drop of her newly awakened Taixu Qi into her palm, thrusting it directly toward Eagle's skull in a desperate bid for mutual destruction.
Clang!
A sharp, metallic crack shattered the tension. A tiny, seemingly innocuous pebble shot through the air like a sniper's bullet, striking the flat of the Xuanyuan Sword with terrifying precision. The kinetic impact was monstrous. Eagle's entire arm went instantly numb, the weapon nearly flying from his grasp as ninety percent of his lethal force was violently dispersed into the wind.
Eagle froze, his pupils shrinking to pinpricks. He slowly dragged his gaze away from the girl in front of him, looking up toward the ridge.
There, standing casually with his hands resting in his pockets, was Rovel.
The young man offered the corrupted gang leader a polite, almost gentle smile. He raised a hand, giving a slow, mocking wave. Though no sound crossed the distance between them, Eagle could perfectly read the shape of Rovel's lips forming a single, damning word.
Farewell.
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