Outside Jiugao City, deep within the western mountains.
The mist grew increasingly heavy. Tall, slender fir trees stood in silent vigil amidst the peaks, their crowns vanishing into the white expanse. Only their jagged trunks remained visible among the wintry branches. Occasionally, the startled cry of a crow broke the silence as it took flight, creating an atmosphere of ancient, desolate beauty—much like the deep, mist-shrouded forests of winter depicted in a scholar’s ink wash painting.
However, no one was there today to wash bamboo or craft flutes, nor to moisten a brush in the cold pools. There was only invisible killing intent and a symphony of slaughter waiting to be triggered.
Suddenly, the silence was shattered. It sounded like a startled herd of deer, yet it was lighter, faster, and more erratic. The hunters followed close behind like pursuing shadows, resembling a north wind sweeping through the forest—but colder, swifter, and more solemn.
The hunters bared their teeth and claws with the determination of a fatal strike. They were masters of tracking, having pursued their quarry from the city outskirts into these desolate mountains; though they had suffered losses, their bloodlust remained undiminished. The fugitives, meanwhile, were infinitely patient and cunning. They were clearly familiar with the mountain paths, alternating between using the terrain and vegetation to hide their tracks and using those same tracks to mislead their pursuers, eventually drawing the pack of martial world assassins into the labyrinthine depths of the forest.
The chase left countless intersecting, invisible trails in the empty mountains. The most secretive of these belonged to the woman who had escaped through the water gate, carrying a heavy mission. As the most critical prey in this hunt, everything concerning her had to be settled by the finest hunter.
The towering walls of Jiugao City had stopped almost everyone, but they could not stop the few top-tier experts of the martial world. The bladesman who had walked out of the fires of hell had shed his last layer of humanity, devolving completely into a murderous beast. He would rely on instinct to break through all deceptions and tear apart anyone standing in his way, until...
Ren Xiaohan suddenly stopped and looked behind him.
There was nothing in the depths of the chaotic mist.
But for a beast well-versed in the laws of the jungle, one who had survived through slaughter, there were things far sharper than eyes—scents, sounds, and an indefinable aura.
"It seems you aren't quite that fast after all."
A youth’s voice echoed from the depths of the mist, yet his figure remained nowhere to be found.
Ren Xiaohan recognized that voice. In a sense, he existed solely to kill this person. Their first probe on Lixin Lake had been somewhat playful; their encounter in this forest would leave no room for mercy.
Only this time, the roles had reversed. He was the one being intercepted mid-pursuit, and the one striking was Jia Shisan.
It turned out he wasn't the only one capable of leaping over the walls of Jiugao and breaking through the city guards.
The sound of the Qingwu Blade unsheathing rang out behind him, instantly closing the distance from where the voice had originated. This near-supernatural speed was aided by the mist, but it was mostly because the ambusher had chosen to draw his blade at an extremely close range. Facing a powerful enemy, one felt more secure with a weapon in hand, but the sound of unsheathing would also expose the ambusher's position. Though the difference was but a fleeting moment, it could be the key that decided victory or defeat, life or death.
For the round-faced bladesman, however, such troubles never existed. Because his blade had no scabbard.
The ear-piercing screech of clashing metal tore through the silence of the mountain forest. Two figures moved in such perfect unison they seemed to be dancing before a mirror, only to separate instantly after the exchange, retreating back into the mist to wait with bated breath.
They were top-tier bladesmen with equal cultivation and similar movement techniques. The heavy fog added an invisible layer of peril to the duel, but neither side hesitated or wavered. Both were prepared to fight until their strength failed and they met their end.
If their first encounter on Lixin Lake was like swinging a blade at a mirror, then this life-and-death struggle in the mist of Mount Xizhu was a gamble between the void and the solid, the true and the false. Only the victor would possess a solid silhouette of his own; the loser was destined to become a shadow scattered to the wind.
A soft *pitter-patter* began to rise in the forest. It was the sound of cold air condensing into sleet.
Li Qiao closed his eyes and listened intently. His breathing almost merged with the sound of the wind, while everything in the environment became magnified. The sound of tiny ice crystals falling on leaves differed from those hitting the mud, and if one listened closely, there was a crisper sound among them.
It was the sound of ice pellets striking cold iron.
Li Qiao opened his eyes. The Qingwu Blade was already aimed diagonally behind him. The blade’s light arrived a step faster than the sound of breaking air, slicing through the grayish-white mist.
The sounds of blade clashing against blade erupted in rapid succession. Only someone with extraordinary hearing could distinguish the number of strikes within those brief intervals.
After three rounds, the ice and snow startled from the branches finally hit the ground, drawing an imperceptible line in the damp, cold mountain mud before instantly melting away.
Li Qiao lowered his gaze, staring silently at the spot where the line had vanished.
This was the bottom line he would give everything to defend, even if this decision turned the line into the end of his life.
"As long as I am here, don't even think about appearing before her again."
"Why..."
The round-faced bladesman finally spoke, his voice becoming hoarse and terrifying, as if he had swallowed iron sand and hot coals.
The mist grew thicker. He seemed to step out of the void. That subtle, rain-like killing intent had changed; the cold air gathered to its limit, causing even the mist to freeze.
Half of his face had been licked by flames until the flesh was a blurred mess. The hand gripping the blade seemed to have fused with the weapon. Charred marks spread from his arm to half of his body, yet he was entirely oblivious, staring straight ahead with his remaining eye.
"Why... I never wanted to hurt her, never... I just, I just wanted to ask her, why did she treat Master like that? Master was so good to her, even better than he was to Xiaohan..." He muttered those doubts and confusions repeatedly, his burned face gradually twisting with resentment. "But why? Why?! Just why..."
The sudden sound of wind interrupted his questioning. The youth’s figure entangled him like a ghost. The Qingwu Blade swung down vertically, locking tightly against the round-faced bladesman’s horizontal blade. The sharp friction grated against their ears.
Even after countless exchanges, they were still dazed by the vibration brought by each strike.
They possessed the same killing power, the same angles of attack, the same footwork, and the same intense desire to defeat the other.
The more elite a martial artist was, the fewer such moments they experienced in life. They should have felt fortunate and joyful, greeting each other with a hearty spar, then making a ten-year pact to meet again.
Unfortunately, fate had not designed their paths to intersect that way.
Two sets of footprints had entered this forest today, but only one set could leave.
Li Qiao stood with his blade, his face as pale as paper. The unhealed wound on his chest had split open from the previous strike, yet he was unaware, merely tightening his grip on his long blade.
Ren Xiaohan looked at the bright red blooming on the other’s chest and spoke truthfully.
"My previous strike injured your heart meridians. If you force your internal energy, your meridians will shatter and you will die within fifteen minutes."
Li Qiao slowly raised the tip of his blade. The Qingwu Blade was in his hand, and killing intent gathered in his eyes. Two points formed a line, pointing directly at the other’s throat.
"Fifteen minutes is enough to take your life."
With the experience of their first encounter, he had tried his best to adjust his form and footwork. But a bladesman’s weight, speed, and the transitions between moves were deeply etched into their blood and bone. Even if he changed his posture and disrupted his rhythm, there were still shadows he could not escape. The opponent only needed to step on his shadow to toy with him.
Another perilous clash of blades sent killing intent surging outward. When the last crushed leaf fell, the opponent had struck him three times, while he had only managed to slice the fabric at the other’s waist.
That familiar feeling surfaced again. The more he was suppressed step by step, the deeper his suspicion grew. Aside from him, his Master had never taken another disciple. Why was this person...
"Li Qingdao indeed never took another apprentice." The opponent seemed to know what he was thinking, or perhaps someone had long ago previewed this scene for him. "Master said you would surely be confused. Though Li Qingdao is no longer in the martial world, there are countless people who have fought her. Master spent years capturing them and pitting them against me one by one, until I could mimic Li Qingdao’s blade style to seventy or eighty percent. Besides that, the martial artists who died by your blade are also my 'masters.' Master would help me analyze the depth of the blade marks, the angle of entry, and the damage to their weapons on every corpse. The more people you killed over the years, the more I learned."
Li Qiao looked up, his vision beginning to blur from blood loss as he barely tracked the afterimages of the blade light in the air.
"Did your Master never tell you that the one who talks too much is always the first to die?"
The corner of Ren Xiaohan’s mangled mouth curled into a grotesque smile.
"From the day I first held a blade, I have never touched any other martial art. There are twelve moves in Li Qingdao’s style, and Master has had me master them all. Master said that for a martial artist, purity is superior and complexity is inferior. My heart is simpler than yours, and my blade is faster. No matter how much I tell you, you will never win."
Before the words could land, the cold blade edge sliced past his left shoulder. In the next moment, the blade would strike at a cunning angle to sever his left hand. Forced by the fierce offensive, he could only raise his elbow and twist his wrist to parry with his blade.
From the moment the opponent started the move, he recognized it.
Back on Lixin Lake, the opponent had used this very move to snap the rusty blade he had carried for seven years, before knocking him into the lake with a single blow.
This time, the opponent wanted to snap not just the Qingwu Blade, but also the hand that held it, the spine he had finally managed to straighten, and the dignity of a martial artist that she had personally helped him reclaim.
The opponent had calculated his blade’s trajectory, the gaps in his offense and defense, and even his breathing. He could not break it; he could only push back with all his might.
Everything seemed to be repeating.
He could almost see the blood congealed in the fuller of the opponent's blade. It was his blood.
That bone-chilling cold from the depths of his memory surrounded him again—the exhausted body, the heavy gasps, the boots soaked in snow-water and cold as iron, and the endless despair.
The white mist he exhaled condensed into ice in the void, and his vision fell into a murky whiteness. He was stuck in the cracks of time once more, unable to break free.
It was still the familiar cave, still the sunset that never faded, still the woman humming a tune while gnawing on a chicken bone.
In the life-and-death moments of past battles, he had returned to this place countless times, yet he had never received the answer.
This time, he had met an enemy he could not defeat. He was about to have his blade snapped, to become a headless ghost in the mountains, separated by the veil of death from the woman waiting for him to come home.
This was the last time he would return here. This was his final chance.
Li Qingdao’s figure looked toward him in the twilight. Unlike the countless previous memories, this scene became so clear—so clear he could almost see the white hairs at her temples and the withered yellow flower in her hair.
"If the day truly comes when you encounter such a foe, remember one thing."
That was it. He had met the greatest enemy of his life. To defeat him, he carried the question he had struggled to answer, yet his Master had given him the answer seven years ago.
"What is it?"
What exactly was it? He was ready. Today, he had to have that answer.
The woman slowly extended three fingers and said, word by word:
"Three words: Not afraid to die."
He stood frozen in place. She had already retracted her fingers and was happily gnawing on the chicken bone again.
A sense of despair and absurdity hit him at once. He stepped forward, glaring at the woman sitting cross-legged on the rock.
"It is human nature to crave life and fear death. Not everyone can always keep righteousness in their heart and use life and death to fulfill everything. In the end, it’s all just the instinct to survive. What do you mean, 'not afraid to die'?"
Li Qingdao held the bone in her mouth, looking at him with a half-smile, clearly unbothered by the anger in his words.
"The Azure Blade style is a style of severing wrists and carving flesh, of finding life in a dead end. If you do not have the courage to seek life after placing yourself in death, you cannot carry the soul of this style."
"When Master was ambushed by Li Kuchen and lost an arm, did you realize a new blade style?" he asked coldly, his tone growing more urgent. "The fact is, you can't even hold a blade now. Even the Qingwu Blade is going to fall into someone else's hands."
"I told you where the Qingwu Blade came from, but I didn't tell you that what I found in the cave was actually a snapped jade blade." The woman finally tossed away the chicken bone. Her calloused hand touched the withered spring flower by her ear, and her voice softened. "The first flower to bloom in spring is destined to wither first. The blade that unsheathes a step faster is destined to be broken first. But that is their mission. It is but a flower, a fleeting moment of courage, yet you see it as heavier than the mountains, harder to cross than the vast seas. You have the killing aura to cut down all the trees in the mountains, but you lack the courage to be the first flower in this early spring scene."
A withered petal fell, lightly touching his brow. To him, it felt as heavy as a thousand pounds, forcing him to his knees.
"But how can I be more 'unafraid to die' than a monster at a dead end who cannot feel pain? He has no weaknesses, nothing to lose. But I am not like that..."
"The martial artists who reach the highest peaks in this world are but mortal flesh and blood. They have weaknesses, flaws; they feel pain, they get tired, they give up. But it is precisely because of this that we need an even more indestructible will to support the blades in our hands. This will is the hardest thing in this world. This will is the final move that will allow you to win."
"What exactly is this supreme, strongest will?" He raised his hands high above his head, his earnest voice almost trembling. "Master, tell me. It’s the final moment. Please tell me the answer..."
"Little Thirteen, why are you so confused? Isn't that answer already in your heart?"
Li Qingdao’s voice echoed and faded in the cave, never to ring out again. He looked up blankly; he was the only one left in the cold cavern.
A strange sensation suddenly came from his palm. He looked down to see a fluffy baby swallow huddled there, its pointed tail twitching as it tilted its head, staring at him with dark, beady eyes.
His hand trembled, and the swallow took flight. After a somber flip in the air, it landed on the shoulder of a small, thin figure.
The person didn't turn around. She just sat by the cave entrance, her two legs dangling and swinging. The wind blew the stray hairs on her shoulder, carrying a familiar scent of mint.
He stared at the figure in a daze for a long time before dragging his feet forward, embracing her tightly from behind.
She let him hold her, raising a hand to gently pat his trembling arm.
"The letter I gave you... did you ever read it?"
*Li Qiao, I hope this letter finds you well. If you are reading this, it means we failed to see each other one last time.*
The scene of their parting at the city gate suddenly surfaced. The cruel monologue of the letter crashed into his mind without warning.
*"That night, I didn't agree to stay in Dingweng Village but insisted on returning to the city. You must have felt some resentment and regret. The night you bought the bronze mirror, you asked me by the river if all this was worth it, what exactly I was doing all this for. That day when I pulled you to sit on Bobo Street to eat sugar cakes, I actually already had the answer in my heart, but I wasn't certain enough to say it then."*
*"Li Qiao, I have never had the enlightenment of a saint. My departure is so that we can spend our lives together under a roof called home. I do all this for ourselves. A blade must return to its sheath, and a person must return home. But 'family' isn't just a few people gathered together, living under the same roof forever, excluding everything else. Because Dingweng Village and Jiugao City exist, the Guoran Residence can be our safe harbor. Because of those passing travelers, the companionship between you and me can be considered long-lasting. Because there is an outside world, home can be called home. If one day the outside world ceases to exist, the four walls of the Guoran Residence will also vanish. Moments of life and death or vows of eternal love are not the meaning of life; the roadside scenery and slow moments that fill the cracks of our lives are what truly matter."*
*"I promised you before that I would teach you what the human heart is. But thinking back now, I also saw the human heart as narrow and shallow. Just because I am a few years older and have tasted a few more years of life, I felt I could see through everything."*
*"You live in the martial world; I live in the mortal world. I think we have many differences, but some things are shared. We always feel our hearts aren't strong enough and want to use various ways to mend the flaws. But you must know that the human heart is not meant to be perfect and flawless. It is precisely because of the flaws that we understand the reason to become strong. It is because we are small and fragile that we understand the preciousness of life. It is because we are of lowly birth that we understand the meaning of suffering."*
*"I think by my former standards of ideals, my life is so full of regrets. I failed to save enough silver, failed to own a roof of my own, failed to protect the people around me. But when I think of you, my heart unknowingly grows the courage to face these regrets. Perhaps you are willing to let me be your courage."*
The woman in his arms turned to look at him, her gaze lingering gently on his features.
*"If one day fate requires us to part, I hope you won't forget all this. Only then will the time we spent together not be in vain. If, when you think of me, you can become more steadfast and fearless than before, I think the promise I made to you will have its best answer."*
Her hand locked firmly with his, but her voice was drifting away.
*"Do not fear. I will always be by your side. In life or death, our futures are tied tightly together..."*
The handwriting on the scrap of cloth grew increasingly messy until the final word was written, becoming somewhat chaotic and indistinguishable.
He stared at it without blinking until his eyes burned. In the blink of an eye, his palms were empty. The person in his arms was gone, along with her words, leaving no trace. Only the baby swallow remained on his knee.
This time, the swallow did not linger. It leaped lightly onto his scabbard, transforming into dense, intricate patterns carved into the bone and sinew of that blade, into the depths of his soul.
Courage... she said she would be his courage.
He had survived until now by the instinct to crave life, so he never believed in so-called courage, considering it a fig leaf for the foolish.
What shape was courage? What did it taste like? Could it be seen? Could it be touched? Would it jump out to block a blade for him at a life-and-death moment?
What an absurd notion. He originally would never have believed it in his entire life.
But when she called his name from a very distant place, he seemed to understand the answers to these questions in an instant.
Courage was dry and thin, with a faint scent of mint. When you thought of it, it would enter your dreams to drive away the gloom. When you kissed it, it would become the softest, most delicate thing in the world. At a life-and-death moment, it could become so hard and tenacious, not only standing by his side forever but also leading him through the trials of life and death.
Courage was not being fearless, but moving forward with fear.
Courage was not standing tall without falling, but standing up while covered in mud.
Courage was not being born great, but the difficult choice made by every ordinary, fragile person.
She was his courage.
The blood-red mist cleared before his eyes. Tears rolled from those bloodshot eyes, falling onto the tip of his blade. The hottest and coldest things in the world collided, sparking infinite power within the infinitesimal.
If she and everything she wanted to protect were behind him, then he would never fear being the first one to stand up, even if it meant he would be the first to die.
Li Qiao’s left hand, which held the blade, loosened. In the moment the Qingwu Blade lost its balance, his right hand grabbed the scabbard at his waist and swept it out. Li Qingdao’s blade style was one of fierce attack without retreat; the Qingwu Blade’s body was rigid and unbending. Yet now, the blade in the youth’s hand curved in an incredible arc. The following scabbard struck the middle of Ren Xiaohan’s long blade. A crisp clashing sound rippled out, and the blade tip dangerously grazed past his ribs.
The round-faced bladesman clearly hadn't expected this. Everything he had learned about Li Qingdao obviously didn't include this move. In his daze, the opponent had already escaped the killing blow and counterattacked, seizing the initiative.
Pain is a martial artist’s best teacher. With every strike taken, the body remembers more clearly than the mind, to the point where it can trigger potential in a life-and-death moment, responding in a faster, more accurate, and more stable way in the next round.
Ren Xiaohan sensed the change in his opponent but did not lose his composure. Li Qingdao’s blade style was concise to the extreme, with only twelve moves in total. Now, the opponent had exhausted all twelve moves. The line between life and death drew the two of them to an unprecedented distance. They could almost see their own reflections in each other's eyes and feel the temperature of the white mist from each other's breath.
In a split second, a cold light flashed. The cunning blade finally pierced the youth’s body, pinning him against a tree trunk.
"Jia Shisan, it’s over."
Ren Xiaohan’s hollow voice rang out. Blood spilled from the corner of Li Qiao’s mouth, yet it could not hide the smile radiating from the depths of his soul.
"You're wrong. There is one last move."
This thirteenth move was taught to him by his Master, and also by Qin Jiuya.
He might only be able to use it once in this life, but for this once-in-a-lifetime confrontation, it was worth it.
His gaze fell on the cold iron at his chest. It was a blade that had never possessed a scabbard. But today, he would use his own body as a sheath to let it return.
The lacquer-and-linen scabbard was slender and thin, yet at this life-and-death moment, it blocked his chest, lying with the Qingwu Blade between the enemy’s blade and his flesh. The more force the opponent used, the more he held the intent to kill, the tighter the blade would be caught within it.
For someone who had never used a scabbard in his life, someone for whom "unsheathing" and "returning to the sheath" were entirely foreign concepts, he would never know the meaning of all this.
Ren Xiaohan seemed to realize something. He used all his strength to pull the blade out. As blood sprayed and the scabbard shattered, the Qingwu Blade also let out a clear whistle as it struck.
At the moment of life and death, the speed of both sides was pushed to the limit. Originally, it would have been impossible to distinguish who was faster. However, the addition of the "sheath" broke a certain balance. The subtle difference was like a crack on an iceberg, growing rapidly and becoming more obvious as the blade advanced.
Li Qingdao’s blade style was unstoppable. The world said it could cut through the heavy, the hard, and the vast. They did not know that the profound depth of the style lay in its ability to cut the light, the soft, and the thin as if they were nothing.
Ren Xiaohan’s eyes widened as he retreated. His hollow pupils were like a frozen lake in winter—dark, silent, and desolate. The only thing reflected in them was the sleet falling from the sky. His gaze was like a thin line moving forward, passing through countless tiny white specks until it reached the cold end. The silent blade tip stepped out from the depths of the mist. Every tiny ice crystal that fell before the blade was sliced apart, making a faint *ding-dong* sound. Everything seemed to become as slow and light as falling snow, yet everything truly happened in a thousandth of a second.
Ren Xiaohan blinked, and that invisible thin line snapped.
In the air, it was replaced by a trace of white smoke—the trajectory left by the sliced and shattered sleet. One end was still deep in the mist; the other was already before his eyes.
He looked down. The hilt of the Qingwu Blade was pressed firmly against his chest, leaving no gap. The blade had vanished into his body. Something spread within him—something cold, something heavy, some uncontrollable trembling. He didn't understand what it was, because he had never felt such a thing since the day he was born.
"So... it still hurts here..."
Li Qiao slowly twisted his wrist, and the Qingwu Blade withdrew from the flesh.
*Drip, drip.* It sounded like the melting of hard ice in early spring.
Red and white intertwined, gradually blurring the boundaries.
"If you hadn't intended to take her life, perhaps we could have been rivals."
"I never... never thought of taking her life..."
The tiny, hard ice pellets gradually turned into large flakes of white, falling like goose feathers. The round-faced bladesman fell backward onto the ground, yet he felt his body was as light as those "feathers," lighter than ever before.
The last disciple of the Ren Camp of the World's Number One Villa would completely vanish in Jiugao’s first snow.
His life was extremely short. Everything he possessed was fleeting, melting as soon as it condensed like a snowflake. No one had ever been sincere to him, except for the person he met on the morning he entered the city gate.
"She was the only one... besides Master... who ever gave me food..." Ren Xiaohan’s eyes were wide. As he spoke, blood flowed from his mouth, but he was entirely unaware. "...Because she is a good person. Master said... people willing to give me food are all good people..."
His hands, which never used to tremble, now found it difficult even to open the charred cloth bag at his waist. A few crumbs of rice crust spilled from the bag, instantly mixing with the mud and dust on the ground. As if he couldn't see the dirt, he used his last bit of strength to reach out, haphazardly grabbing them and stuffing them into his mouth, chewing them along with the blood, and swallowing them with a gulp.
Something warm returned to his body at this moment.
For some reason, this bag of things the woman had given him always made him feel a warmth from the inside out. Though he didn't actually know what that feeling of warmth was.
He didn't know now, and he would never know.
***
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