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Chapter 227 – When a Plan Comes Together
🕑 Added 2025-03-26 12:33:14 +0000 UTCKang Lin’s eyes darted all around, looking for any avenue of escape. The Golden Core cultivator from the Jade Chameleon Sect hovered above them, and he and his five juniors were clearly out from blood.
There was no way to outrun them. Even if the trio had all been able to use movement techniques, it wouldn’t have mattered against someone an entire major realm above them.
They were trapped. The only way out was after a confrontation. If then.
The only good thing about the situation was that the Golden Core cultivator could not participate in the fight other than by keeping his quarry from getting away. Though the street was deserted, Kang Lin could sense cultivators from the auction house watching from inside. Those witnesses were the best protection the trio had.
She fingered the contingency ring that Master had given her. Though she hesitated to summon him to the city as that act might escalate the situation, using the ring might be the only way for the twins to escape with their lives.
Kang Lin glanced at her companions. Yang Xiu was quivering. Which was understandable as such a thing happened to a lot of cultivators. They’d stand brave in their first battles, but after seeing a friend cut down, they’d lose their nerve. There was no shame in it. Eventually, she’d be okay.
Next to her, Yang Ru wasn’t doing any better. The normally stoic boy was fidgeting, shifting his weight from foot to foot, too nervous to stand still.
They must be terrified.
Kang Lin’s finger hovered above the etching on the ring that marked where to break it, but she still hesitated. The situation wasn’t an emergency yet, though it was quickly headed in that direction. She’d hold out as long as she could just in case someone like the City Lord somehow decided to intervene. The twins would just have to suffer a little longer.
As if to prove her point, Yang Xiu suddenly said, “This is not fair.”
Kang Lin’s heart broke. Oh, her poor almost sister.
###
Yang Xiu practically jumped for joy at the sight of the Jade Chameleon cultivators. Her hands trembled in excitement. Finally, no more waiting. Their enemy had presented themselves.
The forces arrayed against her were … lackluster. Not counting the Golden Core who shouldn’t interfere, there were five enemies in the early stages of Foundation Establishment, none above the third minor realm. Since none of them had yet broken into the middle of the realm, she doubted that any individually held an advantage of either her or her brother.
She glanced at Yang Ru. He was shifting his weight from foot to foot, building up Momentum for his charge. Good.
The only thing that would have made the situation better was if the enemy had brought more or better combatants. She wanted a challenge.
No, she wanted to beat down what seemed like a superior force to show them the power of the Rising Tide Sect. The five trash cultivators weren’t strong enough.
“This is not fair,” she said.
“Fair, little girl?” The Golden Core cultivator on the flying sword said from above them. “My juniors are going to teach you a lesson you and your master are never going to forget. Five on three is much better odds than you deserve for what he did.”
Yang Xiu was stunned. Was the elder cultivator delusional?
###
Kang Lin fingered the contingency ring. The Golden Core cultivator confirmed his intentions. There was no point in waiting any longer.
“Wait,” Yang Xiu said.
Kang Lin hesitated, thinking that comment was meant for her.
“You think I’m worried that you aren’t being fair to us?” Yang Xiu laughed, and it wasn’t just a light chuckle. She laughed several great big belly laughs.
Kang Lin didn’t know what to think. The comment had definitely been addressed to the Golden Core cultivator. But what was Yang Xiu saying? And the laughing! Had she gone mad?
“First of all, Kang Lin here is from the Poison Claw Sect,” Yang Xiu said. “I doubt she’s willing to risk pulling her sect into this dispute, so your juniors will only be facing my brother and me. More importantly, though, I meant this situation isn’t fair to your trash juniors. You should get them more backup.”
She grinned. “Oh wait. You probably can’t since you no longer have a branch sect here in the city. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
Was she taunting a Golden Core cultivator? She was mad!
###
Yang Xiu rolled her eyes at the pompous jerk hovering above them. He sounded like one of the cultivators in the stories she liked. One of the really trashy, poorly written books.
If he represented the threat the Jade Chameleon Sect posed, her sect had nothing to worry about. The look on his face after she set him straight, though! And using the same level of dialogue.
Master would have burst out laughing had he been present. He’d have called both of them cheesy.
Yang Xiu had no idea what cheese had to do with anything, and she didn’t care. The important thing was that the man was unable to harm her, Yang Ru, or Kang Lin. The rules of honor for sects protected them. And if he did try something… well, that was why Master had given them the contingency rings.
All Yang Xiu and Yang Ru had to do was to defeat the five Foundation Establishment cultivators. And she had no doubt that, between their talent and the superior cultivation methods and techniques bestowed upon them by Master and their body cultivation, they’d have no trouble.
The Golden Core cultivator’s face turned bright red. “You… You…” He turned back to the juniors on the sled. “Kill her and kill him. If the other one raises a finger, kill her, too.”
“Yes, Elder Fang!” his five sycophants yelled.
Since the fight was about to begin, Yang Xiu took a moment to cement her surroundings into her memory. Master taught that using the environment to one’s advantage was an important part of the martial path, and she did not plan on making him disappointed in her.
The entrance to the auction house was off a courtyard. The three-story building, probably re-enforced by formations, was at her back, and ten-foot stone walls surrounded them except for where the open iron gate was. A rock-paved path ran down the middle of the courtyard, leading from the gate to the door, and trees lined it.
She could definitely make use of many of those elements.
The sled was about twenty feet in the air, and the five Foundation Establishment goons jumped down. Such a distance was easy for cultivators of their realm even if they didn’t practice Body Cultivation, so they all landed softly on their feet in roughly the same formation they’d been in on the sled—two in front, two behind them, and one in the rear.
Next to her, Yang Ru began stomping his feet faster and faster. Timing was important, so she made sure to note when he started forward.
In the meantime, it was up to her to keep their enemies back.
With a thought, she pulled her bow from her spatial ring, and it landed perfectly in her outstretched left hand. It was a move she’d practiced at least a hundred times since reaching Foundation Establishment, and even after mastering the skill, she still felt cool every time she did it.
Another thought landed her quiver in her hand, and she quickly attached it to a hook on her left hip placed there for that purpose.
Remove arrow, nock, draw, aim, loose.
Master had told her that an expert mortal archer could shoot, at most, an arrow every five seconds. She wasn’t a mortal. Between her Spiritual and Body Cultivation and a qi aspect that allowed her limbs to slide through air, she’d shaved a good four seconds off that rate, four and a half if she wasn’t worried about accuracy.
In the ten seconds it took Yang Ru to finish building up the Momentum he desired, she’d shot ten arrows, equally dispersed at the two lead enemies. Each hit an eye. And each was, of course, thwarted by the enemies’ qi shield.
That was okay, though. She’d anticipated just that result. Her arrows were not yet powerful enough to penetrate qi shields without help.
She still achieved the result she desired. Those front two cultivators were so distracted that they didn’t move an inch forward, and since they were in front, neither did the three cultivators behind them.
Even better, she hadn’t bothered supercharging the arrows. The ten had cost her a truly minimal amount of qi, less than she regenerated in half a minute. In contrast, each of her opponents had to engage their full shield for each hit, draining their qi rapidly.
At very little cost to her and much cost to them, she’d kept them frozen in place while her brother prepared his charge. As Master would say, she loved it when a plan came together.
With her brother on the move, though, it was time to step up her game.
Each of the five enemies were sword users, and they all appeared to use similar techniques, holding their hilts in both hands with the right above the left and the blade elevated ahead of them slightly to the right of their bodies.
Since the lead cultivators were distracted, she chose the one on the right of the middle two as her target. Intensely concentrating, she hesitated a moment as she lined up her next two shots.
Remove arrow, nock, draw, aim, charge, loose.
Before the arrow quite hit its first target, she repeated the process.
Remove arrow, nock, draw, aim, loose.
The first arrow deflected off a tree and flew toward its goal, the right wrist of the cultivator she’d selected. The second arrow, just the tiniest fraction of a second behind the first, sailed toward the exact spot as the first one.
The first hit, expending its overcharged qi as it made impact, disrupted his qi shield for an instant, and in that instant, that most minute sliver of time, the second arrow found its target, the exposed skin of the cultivator.
Thunk!
The wet, meaty sound of the arrow penetrating the Jade Chameleon’s skin was much to Yang Xiu’s ears. The boy let out an agonized cry, forming the next note in the victory melody she was composing.
That was one enemy who wasn’t going to be much use the rest of the fight. Not that he was of much use in the starting phases, either.
Yang Ru, still in the process of building up a full head of steam, wasn’t even halfway to the lead enemies. Yang Xiu hit each of them in the face with another arrow to keep them distracted.
For an instant, she almost thought the range advantage the bow granted her to be unfair. But then she remembered Master’s teachings. He had his cheats. She had hers.
When she next chose a technique, though, she definitely wanted one that gave her the ability to shoot two arrows simultaneously and have them arrive at the same target a split second apart. Accomplishing that feat without a technique took a lot of setup and concentration.
Yang Ru was clearly aiming for the cultivator standing behind all the others, probably to gain a few extra steps to build Momentum. With the front two distracted and one of the middle line more worried about the arrow stuck through his wrist than the cultivator charging at him, there was only one other opponent who could attack her brother.
Well, who could try to attack her brother. She had no doubt that the shield Master had gifted him would hold up to any force one of the Jade Chameleon cultivators could muster.
Still, she could at least pretend to take those guys seriously.
The only problem was that the trees were out of position to use to hit the holdout. There was a nice rock of just the right shape in just the right position, though.
Yang Xiu frowned. It would have been nice to give the two of them matching injuries, but she remembered well her lesson all those months ago when her brother got injured because she refused to take a suboptimal shot.
She was no longer that girl. Efficiency and perfection were good. Results and getting her job accomplished were better.
Two quick shots later, and the remaining cultivator had an arrow sticking through his calf.
She glanced up at the Golden Core cultivator and smirked.
Comments
BWFoster78 Last
Yes. Thanks!
Dark Phoenix
Jade Chameleon’s skin was much to Yang Xiu’s ears. I assume 'much' was meant to be 'music'
RedFaux
Good kids
