A heavy, petrifying silence choked the courtyard.
Wang Zhi's eyes were wide, frozen with sheer terror as he stared at the headless body of his protector.
I couldn't see anything... his mind screamed, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps. The blade flashed, and it was over. I couldn't trace a single movement!
Without his Qi, the violent world of cultivators had suddenly become a terrifying, unrecognizable blur.
Beside him, the two remaining guards were paralyzed with dread.
Such terrifying speed... the captain thought, his grip tightening around his hilt until his knuckles turned ghostly white. That wasn't just a casual strike. That was the absolute, lethal precision of a Middle Qi Condensation master!
I couldn't even follow it... the second guard's thoughts raced, his chest heaving as adrenaline surged through his veins. He killed him in an instant. A loyal comrade, wiped out like a common fly!
"What do we do?" the second guard mumbled under his breath, his voice barely audible over the wind.
Cold sweat dripped down the captain's face, pooling at his jawline before splashing into the blood-stained dirt. We can't defeat him, the agonizing realization hit him like a physical blow. In a direct clash, we are nothing but lambs to the slaughter. But if we can somehow make a break for it... if we can reach the auxiliary chamber near the main training hall, we might find reinforcements. Elite instructors are always patrolling that sector.
First, we need a distraction.
Keeping his eyes locked on the blind leader, the captain subtly shifted his fingers against his hilt, executing a sequence of rapid, silent hand signals to the guard behind him. The second guard caught the command instantly out of the corner of his eye. Protecting the Young Master was their paramount duty; a tactical retreat was their only lifeline.
Slowly, carefully, the two guards stepped back, dragging their boots across the stone floor to keep Wang Zhi firmly behind their defensive perimeter.
"There is nowhere left to run," the bandit leader sneered, tracing a single finger along the bloodied edge of his short dagger. He took a casual step forward, his heavy Qi Condensation aura rippling through the air like oppressive gravity. "You shouldn't resist. Making a scene will only make your deaths far more agonizing."
Instead of answering, the captain's left hand dipped into the inner lining of his chest armor. Moving with practiced stealth, he slid a yellow paper explosive talisman into his palm, keeping it hidden from the mercenaries' sight.
"Since you have dared to commit this atrocity," the captain barked, his voice booming with forced confidence to draw every eye to himself, "you shall pay with your lives! Trespassing into the sacred domain of the Crimson Clan carries only one penalty—death!"
With a fierce roar, the captain unleashed every drop of his remaining spiritual energy. His Late Qi Gathering cultivation base flared to life, infusing his steel blade with a bright, crackling aura.
He dashed forward.
His boots shattered the stone pavement beneath him as he covered the distance in the blink of an eye, transforming into a streak of silver light. He lunged toward the right flank of the bandit leader, bringing his heavy sword down in a ferocious, horizontal arc designed to cleave the mercenary in two.
"Oho?" The bandit leader's milky-white eye flared with a flash of genuine surprise. "You're fast for a foot soldier."
With terrifying agility, the bandit leader didn't even bother to block. Instead, he bent his upper body backward at an impossible angle, letting the glowing edge of the captain's blade whistle harmlessly through empty air mere millimeters above his chest. The violent slipstream of the swing split the mist behind him.
"But not fast enough," the bandit leader mocked, his voice completely calm despite dodging a lethal strike.
He did not see the true trap.
A sharp, ruthless smile cut across the captain's face. At the exact apex of his swing—right as the bandit leader was locked in his defensive bend—the captain flicked his left wrist. The hidden explosive talisman slid from his fingers, dropping directly above the bandit leader's face.
Before the mercenary could recover his balance or counter with his dagger, the captain slammed his foot against the stone, using the counter-force to spring backward with desperate speed.
The talisman sparked like a dying star, its runes flaring with volatile light.
The bandit leader's milky-white eye widened.
BOOM!
The explosion tore through the courtyard, unleashing a dense wave of heat and blinding fire. Because it was a standard-issue tactical talisman rather than a heavy demolition array, the blast was contained, avoiding an immediate alarm across the distant outer barracks. The concussive flash completely engulfed the bandit leader and his squad in a cloud of thick black smoke.
Yet the captain's desperate gamble fell short.
From the center of the flames, a dense, shimmering barrier of spiritual energy materialized. The bandit leader's Middle Qi Condensation shield had absorbed the entire brunt of the blast without a single mark on his armor. As the smoke cleared, however, his scarred face was a mask of pure, unadulterated rage. His pride had been stung by a common guard.
"Ahhh! You bastards!" he roared.
With a violent sweep of his sleeve, he unleashed a massive wave of raw spiritual pressure.
WHOOSH!
The inferno was snuffed out instantly, reduced to scattered embers.
The distraction had already accomplished its goal.
The bandit leader snapped his head forward, his sharp gaze piercing through the rising mist. A hundred meters down the winding trail, he spotted the white linen robes of Wang Zhi fleeing alongside the two remaining guards. They were sprinting with everything they had left.
"You actually think you can run from me?" the leader sneered, his voice dripping with venom. He turned to his two subordinates. "Chase after the boy! If he resists, beat him until he loses consciousness—just keep his bloodline intact!"
"Understood!" the two Early Qi Gathering bandits barked.
FWOOSH!
The trio erupted into movement, tearing down the mountain path like a pack of hunting wolves. The bandit leader, however, operated on an entirely different level of power. Channeling condensed Qi into his legs, he moved far faster than his men.
BOOM!
An explosive sonic thunderclap echoed from his heels as he broke the sound barrier, leaving a vacuum of displaced air in his wake. In a fraction of a second, he closed the hundred-meter gap. Like a phantom stepping out of the shadows, he vaulted through the air and landed squarely between the fleeing guards, severing their formation.
The guards' eyes narrowed in absolute horror as the scarred mercenary materialized in their path, his suffocating pressure locking them in place.
Before they could even raise their blades, the bandit leader spun on his heel. He infused his short dagger with highly pressurized Qi until the metal vibrated with a blinding radiance. With a brutal horizontal sweep, he unleashed the stored energy at both men simultaneously.
The spiritual energy detached from the dagger, morphing into a crescent-shaped, razor-sharp shockwave that sliced through the air.
"Young Master Zhi, keep running! Do not look back!" the captain bellowed at the top of his lungs.
Both guards crossed their blades to form a desperate barrier, but the condensed Qi strike slammed into them like a battering ram. The impact shattered their guard, the kinetic force driving them backward across the dirt as their boots carved deep trenches into the stone path. They vomited blood, their lungs burning.
Taking advantage of the opening, the two Early Qi Gathering bandits shot past the wounded guards like dark streaks, ignoring the skirmish entirely to lock their sights onto the defenseless young master.
No! the captain thought, his blood burning like liquid fire. We cannot let them reach him!
Gritting his teeth against the searing pain in his chest, he slammed his right leg back into the dirt, anchoring his body against the blast's momentum. With a sharp, resounding SHING!, he deflected the residual energy and flashed a rapid sequence of hand signs to the second guard.
Recognizing the final command, the second guard forced his battered body upright. Side by side, they pointed their glowing blades directly at the mercenary master.
BOOM!
They surged forward in unison. Moving in perfect synchronization, their glowing swords traced a massive, interlocking "X" through the mountain mist.
"AHHHH!" they roared, executing a full-power dual slash the moment they breached his guard.
The bandit leader's smirk never faded. He casually raised his left hand, his fingers weaving through the fluid sequence of the Jade Water Style. His hand blurred into afterimages of glowing Qi, forming a dense, swirling vortex of spiritual energy right before his chest.
BOOM!
A violent shockwave erupted from the point of impact, tearing up the surrounding pavement.
The bandit leader's smile widened. "Now... burn."
The vortex violently detonated outward, releasing a localized concussive wave directly into the guards' lower abdomens. The specialized, crushing force tore through their internal defenses, completely rupturing their Dantians and shattering their cultivation foundations.
SPLAT!
Thick, dark blood burst from their mouths as they crashed onto the stone floor. The light vanished from their eyes, their faces turning deathly pale as their spiritual energy bled rapidly into the dirt. Crippled and broken, they lay motionless.
The bandit leader turned his head, his milky-white eye locking onto the trail fifty meters ahead. His subordinates were still struggling to corner the boy.
"Useless fools," the leader muttered with disgust. "The brat's cultivation is sealed, and they still can't catch a single, helpless child."
He shifted his weight—FWOOM—and the atmosphere violently buckled under his spiritual pressure.
BOOM!
The ground beneath his boots shattered as he launched forward at an astonishing speed. The raw velocity warped the air in his wake, causing reality itself to distort behind him. In a heart-beat, his physical form vanished from the path.
A short distance away, Wang Zhi sprinted until his throat tasted of copper. Tears of sheer terror streamed down his face.
Grandfather, save me! Please! his mind wept in absolute despair.
"Oh, don't worry. If he's not coming... I will save you," a raspy voice whispered directly into his ear.
Before the young master could process the words, an invisible, crushing pressure crashed down upon his shoulders, pinning him to the stone path. His knees buckled instantly beneath the weight.
Terrified, he tried frantically to turn his head to see who spoke.
Looming directly above him was the scarred bandit leader, standing over him like an inescapable nightmare. Wang Zhi could only stare up into his milky-white eye, his face paralyzed with unadulterated horror.