Chapter 253 Junior Sister in Danger?
From the moment Ouyang Rong first uttered his real name, he established a connection with "craftsmanship".
They then realized that the cauldron sword had a massive demand for spiritual energy.
No wonder most swords and cauldrons are not something an individual can possess.
I've heard that the "Emperor Wen" in the hands of the Great Zhou Dynasty has a whole group of people serving him, and is supported by an entire system. My junior sister even jokingly said that "the Emperor Wen is an ironclad figure, but the swordsmen come and go."
He discovered that since the first cauldron sword was created in the Qin Dynasty, after so much time of exploration, it seems that the Qi cultivators, both inside and outside the world, have reached a consensus.
If one wants to go far, the swordsman must have a top-tier power behind him to support him, just like the Wei family's Wei Wang Mansion was to Wei Shaoxuan.
Ouyang Rong vaguely guessed that this was probably the reason why the old swordsmith wanted to transfer A Qing, who was full of vigor, along with the "craftsmanship" to the reclusive sect Yunmeng Sword Marsh.
Because cultivating a swordsman requires a massive investment of resources. While killing with a sword is exhilarating, the amount of energy replenishment needed to quickly restore one's spiritual energy and combat power after using the Dingjian ultimate technique is not something an ordinary Qi cultivator can easily squander.
Moreover, the path of the swordsman is not necessarily paved, after all, it is a mythical and rare lineage, the sword techniques are hard to find and the true meaning is hard to comprehend, and the bottleneck of each grade is like an insurmountable chasm.
Even a promising cultivator like Junior Sister, if she chooses the wrong path, becomes blinded by a single leaf, and embarks on a mythical, deadly path, she will find it difficult to comprehend the true meaning of the Cauldron Sword and get stuck at a bottleneck. That would be a waste of her great talent.
Even so, there were still people like Liu Zian and Liu Zilin who followed one after another, like moths to a flame, willing to snatch food from the tiger's mouth in an attempt to become a swordsman.
Because of the scarcity of the "Extinction Meridian," it represents a significant bargaining chip, allowing one to seize the initiative and easily join any faction.
As you can see, Donglin Temple in the Lotus Tower Alliance only needed to provide one sword wielder to have the opportunity to cooperate equally with Yunmeng Sword Marsh and sword-making families, although it later fell apart.
And who doesn't yearn to experience mythology?
Especially those at the bottom of society.
This has been the case in every era: the struggle among the lower classes for precious resources has always been brutal, a phenomenon commonly known as involution.
Putting aside their cunning and treachery, as long as the three Liu brothers can break free from the chessboard of Longcheng County and obtain the two tickets of "Sword Bearer" and "Ding Sword", they can go anywhere without any worries.
Unfortunately, they encountered an even more determined and experienced graduate school applicant.
For a noblewoman like Xie Lingjiang, these things are hard to understand, because her background as a member of one of the five prominent families and seven prominent clans, along with her father being a renowned scholar, naturally gave her a higher platform and a broader perspective.
This allowed them to see the pros and cons of wielding the sword more clearly, and they were less envious. It made it difficult for them to understand the crazy things the three Liu brothers did for a cauldron sword.
But this also means that this noble lady of the Xie family has a more romantic and idealistic way of looking at problems, so she really loves to eat the empty promises that her senior brother likes to make, and she eats them all to her heart's content...
Let's get back to the main topic.
At this moment, on Dagushan Mountain, Ouyang Rong was lost in thought, watching the scene below the mountain where the Zheyi Canal had transformed decay into something miraculous and subdued the raging flood.
The cheers of thousands of people on the entire Dagushan Mountain, along with the sound of wooden fish reflecting the surge of merit points, caused him to temporarily lose his hearing and experience tinnitus.
The "craftsmanship" naturally appeared, close to Ouyang Rong, surrounding him intimately.
Ouyang Rong's eyes turned a pale purple as he slowly reached out, his fingertips touching a trembling "arc" in front of him.
A hazy, clear blue light stained his fingernails.
It was both icy cold and scorching hot.
The moment Ouyang Rong first intimately touched the physical form of the cauldron sword, he suddenly realized that the paths that severely restricted the cauldron sword and its wielder, and heavily relied on the support of powerful forces behind it, seemed to be... not a problem for this "craftsmanship".
The old swordsmith, drawing upon the accumulated skills of his predecessors, painstakingly forged this new Ding Sword, which seems somewhat different, no longer exclusive to kings, generals, noble families, or sects.
The "arc" in the air, after being touched by Ouyang Rong, had its clear blue sword light tinged with a familiar purple that seemed to appear out of nowhere.
I fed it some.
One point is deducted from the merit.
Ouyang Rong felt the "arc" at his fingertips tremble even more, as if... it was eager to try.
"You eat this too..." he murmured, a glimpse of the true meaning in his voice: "Mortal bodies, forging myths?"
"What did you say?" Li Guo'er suddenly turned her face.
“It’s nothing.” Ouyang Rong shook his head and withdrew his finger.
After observing the successful flood discharge of the Zheyi Canal together outside the courtyard, Ouyang Rong briefly touched the "craftsmanship" before putting it away. He suppressed the strange light purple glint in his eyes and immediately turned to find his junior sister, with Li Guo'er following behind.
The two left the Beitian Nursing Home together.
Head to the Manjushri Bodhisattva Hall.
Along the way, Ouyang Rong frowned, carefully pondering the sentence that had just suddenly come to mind.
The "craftsmanship" is reborn today. The true meaning and unique skills of the Dingjian are not like those of the "poor scholar," which have been summarized into sword techniques by legendary sword masters.
So far, he's been walking ahead in a daze, figuring things out on his own.
The fact that the "craftsman" had just reacted to the purple mist of merit he had accumulated was a major discovery.
There were people beside him at the moment, so it was impossible to fully verify... Ouyang Rong remained calm.
In addition, Ouyang Rong was not idle either. As the crisp sound of the wooden fish gradually faded from his ears, he took a moment to glance at the Pagoda of Merit on the way.
Before today, I had accumulated nearly 20,000 merits.
After redeeming the "Return to the Homeland" blessing, he consumed several more blessings on the Mirage Beast Mask, leaving him with only a little over three thousand merit points.
At present, the construction of the Zheyi Canal, which Ouyang Rong has been vigorously promoting for several months, has saved many houses, fields and thousands of people in the mountains of Longcheng County, which is another great achievement.
[Merit: 11,311]
The little wooden fish, exhausted from being slapped repeatedly today, had a line of still, cyan-gold characters directly above it that caught Ouyang Rong's eye.
“After deducting the original three thousand two hundred, the merit points increased by about eight thousand.”
Ouyang Rong understood, left the Pagoda of Merit, and opened his eyes.
A short while later, Ouyang Rong and Li Guo'er arrived at the Manjushri Bodhisattva Hall.
There was no one in the hall.
The two walked out of the main hall. In the square, Ouyang Rong squatted down, lightly wiping the bloodstains and footprints on the paving stones with his fingers, and looked around at the signs of fighting in the square.
"Where did Sister Xie go?" Li Guo'er looked around.
Something's not right.
Ouyang Rong twirled the bloody mud between his fingers and looked up:
"Junior Sister, together with an unknown Yue woman, repelled Liu Fu and the others. Logically, if Junior Sister is safe and sound after escaping danger, she should come looking for you and Uncle Li. But we haven't encountered anyone along the way... Where did Junior Sister go?"
Li Guo'er glanced at someone and said, "Is it possible that she went to find you?"
Ouyang Rong did not answer, thinking that he understood his junior sister better.
He suddenly stood up and pointed to the haphazardly scattered corpses of the black-clad swordsmen in the square:
"The wounds are all throat-severing sword wounds, which should all be the work of Junior Sister. However, there are bloodstains on the floor tiles, which means that the body was moved behind the scenes."
Ouyang Rong frowned and looked around. "But Junior Sister is a germaphobe and won't move these corpses."
Li Guo'er nodded and said softly, "Right now, there are two types of people who can move corpses: the monks in the temple and the people from your county government. They discovered the mess here and came to move and clean it up."
Ouyang Rong nodded, then shook his head:
"But why not clean it up and leave it here? Judging from the bloodstains and the neatness of the place, these bodies were only moved halfway before the people left."
Li Guo'er pondered for a moment, then said in a clear voice:
"You mean, the monks or minor officials were interrupted by outsiders and external affairs? But Wei Shaoxuan and Liu Fu were executed, and your other accomplices were tricked down the mountain. What danger could possibly be here right now?"
Ouyang Rong remained silent, then suddenly pulled out a cracked deer-shaped jade ring from his sleeve.
He followed the same method he had observed his junior sister use last time, channeling some of the spiritual energy that had just been restored in his dantian into the deer-shaped jade ring.
If he wasn't mistaken, this jade ring should have come from the academy master that his junior sister had been searching for. As for why it ended up in Wei Shaoxuan's hands and was full of cracks, was there any need to guess?
Her jade-like body slowly began to heat up.
"Um?"
Ouyang Rong suddenly turned his head and looked at a magnificent hall a hundred feet to the southeast.
This main hall is separated from the Manjushri Bodhisattva Hall, where Ouyang Rong is currently located, by only a dense bamboo forest; the two halls are neighbors.
"That's... the Sutra Copying Hall?" Ouyang Rong asked hesitantly.
He vaguely remembered that he had been dragged there by Xiufa during breakfast because of the strange noises coming from the Buddha statues in this hall.
“That’s right, it’s the Sutra Copying Hall.” Li Guo’er said casually, “Wei Shaoxuan and his group occupied this hall before, and because it’s separated from the Manjushri Bodhisattva Hall, they discovered us…”
Ouyang Rong remained silent, reached into his robe, and pulled out a Sanskrit Buddhist scripture, glancing at it.
This was found among the fragments of Wei Shaoxuan's body.
As he expected, this Buddhist scripture was not the same Sanskrit Buddhist scripture that the old swordsmith had given to Liu Zian. Clearly, it was a way to fool the two of them; the scripture was not some kind of sword manual for the poor scholar.
But Wei Shaoxuan had previously regarded it as the true Sword Manual of the Poor Scholar, so it makes sense that he had someone translate the Buddhist scriptures in this Sutra Copying Hall...
"What's wrong? Which way is this academy's spirit ring pointing?"
Seeing the young magistrate beside him, who was holding a jade ring tightly in one hand and a blood-stained Buddhist scripture in the other, frowning and looking at the scripture copying hall in front of him, the jade ring in his hand emitted a faint light.
The clever Li Guo'er asked, "Where is Sister Xie's jade ring?"
Ouyang Rong glanced at her, then pursed his lips in acquiescence.
"Then what are we waiting for?" Li Guo'er walked over and called out.
A moment later, her wrist was grabbed again and pulled back forcefully. Her body involuntarily spun around, and she almost fell.
“You…” The young woman with plum blossom makeup frowned. After regaining her balance, she saw that Ouyang Rong did not even look at her. His eyes were fixed on the silent hall behind the bamboo forest in front of him, and he remained silent.
"What's wrong?" Li Guo'er asked calmly, "You suspect she's not here?"
She paused, then cleared her throat in a low voice:
"You think there's a trap? But that doesn't make sense. If they were Wei Shaoxuan's accomplices, how would they know that you have this jade ring? Or are they lying in wait for you to come to them?"
Ouyang Rong sensed the direction the jade ring in his hand was pointing to, and pondered for a moment: "The two jade rings of the Qi cultivators in the academy are close together, so they can sense the surrounding area, but Junior Sister is not responding."
Li Guo'er hesitated, "Is that so? Is it possible...?"
"It's possible, very likely."
Ouyang Rong suddenly interrupted Li Guo'er, turned around and walked in the opposite direction, heading towards the Manjushri Bodhisattva Hall:
"Let's go and find out."
"Go find what?"
Li Guo'er followed Ouyang Rong out of curiosity. Together they walked around the Manjushri Bodhisattva Hall, occasionally pushing open doors, especially the small huts in some corners behind the hall, which Ouyang Rong patiently examined.
unmanned.
Ouyang Rong turned around and led Li Guo'er to search the woods around the Manjushri Bodhisattva Hall again.
There was no one there.
After a short while, Ouyang Rong stopped, turned his head, and looked at a solitary pagoda not far from the Manjushri Bodhisattva Hall.
He continued leading Guo'er away, but did not immediately head towards the Sutra Copying Hall, which was believed to be connected to the Jade Ring.
Li Guo'er's eyes remained clouded with doubt, yet she quietly followed.
"Squeak—!"
The pagoda's doors slowly opened.
Sunlight streamed in, casting shadows across the ground.
Li Guo'er's almond-shaped eyes widened slightly, and she blurted out, "Who did this?"
On the ground inside the stupa, there was a group of monks who had fainted.
Ouyang Rong, who had been silent all along, let out a long breath, then immediately frowned and looked back at the Sutra Copying Hall in the distance.
How did you know someone had fainted here?
Li Guo'er looked at Ouyang Rong with a somewhat incredulous expression.
Ouyang Rong squatted down, examined the way the monks had fallen unconscious, and sighed:
"Practice makes perfect, and you'll naturally gain experience."
Previously at Xiaogushan, he and Aqing led a group of militia carrying dragon oil up the mountain, and they were dealt with by a terrifying figure in the same way. That person seemed quite wary of slaughtering civilians.
So they knocked out the two militiamen and threw them into the woods. They then sealed Ouyang Rong and A Qing's acupoints and took them to the Jia-character sword furnace...
“Qiu Shenji has been here. In the Sutra Copying Hall… there was not only Junior Sister.” He nodded.
The young magistrate in front of her was meticulous and thoughtful, which impressed Li Guo'er. However, she noticed out of the corner of her eye that his hands were clenched into fists under his sleeves, and his palms seemed to be soaked with sweat.
"So your previous speculation was that these monks were originally cleaning up the corpses outside the hall, but were all knocked unconscious by Qiu Shenji who suddenly arrived and thrown into this place?"
Li Guo'er seemed lost in thought:
"So Qiu Shenji must have come to find Wei Shaoxuan, but ran into Sister Xie instead?"
Ouyang Rong nodded solemnly.
"Then, Sister Xie, now..."
“Let’s go,” Ouyang Rong suddenly said.
Turning away from the pagoda, he and Li Guo'er tacitly circled around the Sutra Copying Hall and arrived at a rooftop in the distance directly opposite the entrance of the Sutra Copying Hall, offering a good view.
The two climbed onto the roof and observed from a distance.
In front of us, the Sutra Copying Hall had collapsed, with the door torn down, revealing the general scene inside.
Take a closer look.
Sure enough, three familiar figures could be vaguely seen.
A woman in red, an old monk in a cassock, and...
A man in hemp clothing.
The latter was covered in blood, his hempen clothes were torn, and a sword wound that exposed pink flesh on his chest. It seemed that he had fled in panic from the fierce battle at Xiaogushan and was seriously injured.
However, Xie Lingjiang and Master Shandao, who were standing together opposite, were not in much better condition.
Xie Lingjiang stood in front of Master Shandao, her figure motionless, a jade ring at her waist occasionally emitting a crimson light.
But she seemed unable to free her hands and did not respond at all.
As for the unknown Yue woman that Ouyang Rong had heard about from Liu Fu, he did not see her in the main hall and her whereabouts were unknown.
I observed for a while longer.
Ouyang Rong frowned and noticed that there seemed to be something subtly separating the two junior sisters from Qiu Shenji.
Qiu Shenji stopped two zhang in front of them, pacing slowly, like a tiger or wolf surrounding its prey, but not taking a single step forward.
It seems as if a forbidden zone has been placed across it.
Inside the Sutra Copying Hall, the positions and situations of the two sides were more complicated than Ouyang Rong had imagined.
On a rooftop several hundred meters away, Ouyang Rong silently observed for a while, then lowered his head and took out a small porcelain bottle from his pocket.
He opened the seal, poured the last Qi-replenishing pill into his palm, and swallowed it calmly.
Li Guo'er frowned, vaguely guessing what he was going to do.
"What are you going to do?" she asked, feigning ignorance.
Ouyang Rong took out a mask, jumped off the roof, and said without turning his head, "Junior Sister can't hold on any longer."
Li Guo'er asked in return:
"Is Qiu Shenji, a high-grade Qi cultivator, as easily fooled as Liu Fu?"
"No."
She stated, "He should be very familiar with Wei Shaoxuan."
"Yes."
She added, "With his knowledge, he should be able to understand the 'Humble Scholar's' opening stance with a cloth sword."
"rational."
"Isn't that incredibly risky?" She nodded helplessly and asked, "How will you set up your sword? How will you survive for fifteen breaths... or even longer?"
“We can try.” He stubbornly shook his head and replied, “Openly repair the plank road while secretly crossing the Chencang pass.”
Li Guo'er remained silent, glancing at Sister Xie's precarious sword strike in the distant main hall. She pursed her lips and gracefully leaped down.
A young woman with plum blossom makeup, her sleeves tucked behind her, followed the young magistrate. Beneath the thin veil, her pretty face was stern.
"Then this time, could you please not grab my hand or put your arm around my waist?"
Ouyang Rong calmly replied, "Okay, but this time, let's switch places."
“Okay… wait a minute.” Li Guo’er tilted her head in confusion: “What do you mean?”
"You arrested me."
"...??"
Ouyang Lianghan, you're getting more and more outrageous...
Near the Sutra Copying Hall.
Ouyang Rong tossed a moonlight longsword behind him, which Li Guo'er caught in perfect unison.
...
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
