Chapter 5: She’s Not Fragile
The porcelain spoon dipped with measured grace. Gu Qingxi's movements were unhurried, rhythmic.
The last plump wonton vanished from the bowl. Only then did she set down the bamboo chopsticks with a sigh of contentment. A deep, visceral warmth spread through her, a luxury forgotten in the bone-hunger of the apocalypse—free of gritty nutrient bricks, replaced by rich marrow broth and tender fillings, tastes preserved like pressed flowers in memory's book. Such comfort felt almost… illicit.
Copper coins clinked on the weathered wood of the stall counter.
Gu Qingxi rose, intent on finding a serviceable horse in this nameless border town for the journey to Tianshan Peak.
Outside the rotting shadow of the Gu city walls, the voice within the bracelet finally gathered its threads. Wuling Laozu, hesitantly, proposed his bargain: deep within a concealed spirit-grove—the celestial cave of his zenith—lay the treasures of a lifetime. Could she retrieve them?
Her answer sliced clean through any preamble: "Done."
That night in the Gu compound, she could have escaped without his aid. Yet, the tide of warmth that shattered her bonds was a tangible boon. She didn't traffic in debts. This karmic thread, she would sever.
The speed of her acquiescence stunned the ancient spirit into silence. This little calamity… agreed so readily? The expected haggling, the volley of demands he'd braced for—it never materialized!
"The fruit of your aid," her tone was matter-of-fact, dawn light catching on her lashes, softening the angles of her face for a breath, "I bear it."
The Laozu said nothing, but a phantom knot loosened in his spectral core. Brief though their acquaintance was, a chilling certainty accompanied her words—a sense of ironclad honor that felt more reliable than half the proclaimed "righteousness" he'd witnessed.
Inquiries to the stall owner yielded directions to the Li family—the only likely source of horses in this provincial place. Gu Qingxi gave a slight nod of thanks, turning towards the stone-paved alleyways of the town.
Then—!
A shriek of splitting air tore through the tranquil morning!
The stall owner and remaining patrons jerked their heads skyward, cries of terror erupting!
Gu Qingxi looked up.
Dark jade pupils constricted infinitesimally.
Against the vault of heaven, two meteors of power tore across the blue!
Swordflight! True mastery of the blade and sky!
The leading streak flickered like a dying candleflame, its rider a scarecrow figure swaying precariously—skeletal, corpse-pale, a trail of dark blood staining his chin, terror etched into every line.
The trailing light was a comet! A figure in robes of azure and frost-white stood ramrod straight upon its back, brows knotted with a furious intensity, the air around his chilling aura seeming to crackle. Most striking was the blade beneath his feet: forged of deepest obsidian metal, nearly five chi in length, its sheer mass and thickness stood alien against the usual elegance of spirit swords, vibrating the surrounding air with a palpable hum!
"FLEE! Devil's Path Cultivator!" The azure-robed rider's roar was thunder made manifest! He'd harried this butcher out of the mountains, only to be tricked into letting him bolt towards mortal settlement!
The words "Devil's Path" ignited pure panic!
The humble stall erupted into chaos! Benches overturned, patrons scrambling over each other in blind terror—lambs scattering before the scent of a direwolf! For mortals, a Devil Path cultivator meant only agonizing, lingering death!
The desperate fiend saw his chance! His beady eyes glowed with crimson malice. He plunged like a diving raptor, angling unerringly towards the single stationary figure—the slender girl at the dim corner table!
Fortune favors me! Perfect position! And that face… an unexpected bounty! Seize her, threaten the righteous fool, then savor the prize… sweet victory!
Venomous glee surged! He plummeted, landing with a jarring thud, one gnarled, black-nailed hand snapping out to close around Gu Qingxi's delicate throat! Triumph flared in his eyes!
"Mistress! RUN—!" The azure-robed warrior's cry tore from his throat, his massive sword held high but frozen—unleashing its power now would shred the seemingly defenseless girl as easily as the fiend!
"GAAAHHH! Run, Little Ancestor! A crippled Foundation is STILL Foundation!" Wuling Laozu's psychic shriek pierced Gu Qingxi's mind like a rusty nail! What cursed luck dogged her?! Always injured beasts above her tier? Last time… ah, last time… what remained of that arrogant Elder? Atomized dust…? A sliver of morbid excitement pierced the terror—this butcher was about to get pulped, wasn't he?
On cue!
Gu Qingxi's gaze hardened like forged steel. Her hand swept through empty air!
Dozens of jet-black talismans burst forth like ink-soaked butterflies! They wove instantly into an intricate, cage-like net, layer upon layer, enveloping the leering fiend! The sigils pulsed with a chilling lethality that made the air snap cold!
Her feet barely touched the earth as she flowed backwards with the grace of wind-scattered petals—she had no desire to taste her own creation's embrace, nor compete for brightness with the sun.
The azure warrior's eyes widened to saucers!
In that frozen sliver of time: awe wrestled with utter disbelief!
The girl—not mortal! This effortless conjuring of lethal arrays, this instinctual precision—it spoke of profound mastery!
The trapped fiend, confronted by the swirling ink-dark glyphs, felt a spike of surprise: this bitch wasn't ordinary?!
It vanished instantly under a wave of contempt. Her spirit aura? A mere flickering ember! These pitiful paper scraps couldn't tickle his boots! He snarled, raising his sword. A surge of his waning dark Qi flowed into the blade as he hacked directly at the formation's heart!
The following moment—
*KA-RUUMB-B-BOOOMMMM!!!*
Light and sound annihilated the scene!
An eruption ripped apart the earth! A shockwave of brutal force tore outwards in all directions! Stall remnants shredded; a pot clanged down the street. The terrified stragglers who hadn't run far enough were thrown to the ground like ragdolls! Through the deafening, skull-splitting roar echoed a scream—a sound so inhuman, so raw with torment, it curdled blood!
It came from the butcher!
The azure warrior stood paralyzed. His enormous sword remained frozen mid-air. He could only stare, transfixed, at the scene of carnage unfolding.
That girl he'd labeled "defenseless"… packed this much devastation?!
The smoke cleared enough to reveal the fiend. He lay twisted at the epicenter of a smoking crater. His form was a charred ruin, skin peeled back to reveal bubbling flesh and bone. His right arm and left leg bent backwards at impossible angles, jagged splinters of bone piercing through blackened skin. Animalistic, agonized shrieking confirmed he still clung to a shred of life.
Gu Qingxi's gaze drifted past the grisly tableau, settling on the azure warrior. A spark of raw curiosity, clear and untroubled, lit her obsidian eyes.
Swordflight… the true weight of it. Flickers of inherited memory, scenes from those story-telling boxes called 'televisions' in her past life… none captured the visceral pressure, the sheer kinetic force of metal tearing the heavens.
"Tsk, a Blade Cultivator. But this kid's sword… novelty," Wuling Laozu drawled internally. "Five millennia old, and I've never seen a Cultivator lugging around what looks like a smith's door panel. More hammer than rapier." The volcanic-black greatsword was thick enough to stop a chariot, approaching the youth's own height—an implausible choice for the fluid art of flying blades.
"Mistress, are you… unharmed?" The azure warrior finally found his voice, striding forward swiftly. His face, sculpted with sharp angles despite his youth, remained etched with concern, his striking clear eyes locked on hers.
"Unscathed." Gu Qingxi inclined her head minimally. Now she could observe him properly.
He wore the layered robes common to disciples of Tianshan Sect, crisp azure and icy white contrasting like sky meeting glacier. His posture was unwavering, like a young pine enduring mountain gales. Features seemed hewn from legend beneath the dawn light: eyes like mountain lakes reflecting stars, a nose bold as a cliff's edge, a mouth defined with clean resolve. An uncommon mold of the Heroic Path.
At the very tail end of his words—
From the smoking ruin behind him, the not-yet-dead fiend gave a final, convulsive lunge! His remaining arm, driven by muscles spasming in mortal agony, shot upwards! He gripped a jagged sword-shard, stabbing with every ounce of corrupt hatred and venom left in his ruined body, straight for the azure warrior's undefended spine!
Gu Qingxi's fingers twitched, a shimmer of black-gold light gathering at her fingertips!
Yet the azure warrior moved as if choreographed! Without a flicker of surprise, without even turning his head fully, the colossal greatsword in his grasp became a blur! It wheeled through the air with terrifying momentum and brute, remorseless power—a primordial avalanche condensed into steel—and descended with crushing finality upon the fiend's broken skull!