Chapter 30 — One Realm Wasn’t Enough

CHAPTER 30

One Realm Wasn’t Enough

The flying sword crossed the quarry before Wei Renshan finished lowering his hand.

Shi Feng turned his shoulder. The point passed beside his neck and cut through the binding over his left arm. Blood warmed the cloth, but the blade didn't touch the bone.

He stepped forward.

Wei Renshan pulled two fingers back. The sword turned behind Shi Feng and came for his spine.

Shi Feng heard its sharp whistle and dropped his right heel. He turned his body without straightening his shoulders, shortening the old clan movement. The sword passed above his bent arm.

His teachers liked a broad, upright turn. A blade aimed at his back didn't care how good his stance looked.

Wei Renshan frowned.

“Quick feet won’t save you!” Wei Renshan shouted.

He kept his left hand behind his back, still trying to look like an elder disciplining a child. Shi Feng closed the distance between them. The old man’s hidden hand came forward in a hurry.

The sword rose and struck downward.

Shi Feng caught the flat behind its point with his left hand.

The blade stopped inches from his chest.

Wei Renshan's face changed.

Qi blazed along the metal. Shi Feng felt the sharp force scrape his palm, but it couldn't cut through his grip. He twisted the sword sideways and forced its point into the ground beneath his foot.

The old man pulled with all his strength.

The sword shuddered.

It didn't come free.

“Impossible!” Wei Renshan cried.

Shi Feng's shoulder throbbed. Holding the weapon pulled at the torn flesh, so he changed his grip and put more of his weight through the foot pinning it down.

“It's a decent weapon,” Shi Feng said. “You rely on it too much.”

Wei Renshan struck with his palm.

A wave of qi swept across the shallow pool between them. Water burst upward. The blow hit Shi Feng's chest and tore a strip from his robe.

He didn't step back.

The old man's eyes widened.

“Bone Refinement?” Wei Renshan said. “You're only in Bone Refinement!”

Shi Feng thought: and you're only in Foundation Establishment. You should've asked before you started. He released the sword, crossed the distance in two steps, and drove his left fist into Wei Renshan's raised guard.

Bang!

The protective qi broke. Wei Renshan's forearm folded against his chest, and the old man flew backward into the quarry wall. Cracked stone fell over his shoulders.

Shi Feng stopped in front of him.

His left dressing was wet. His right wrist ached beneath the splint. Neither injury prevented him from standing where Wei Renshan couldn't escape.

The old man raised his other hand.

Shi Feng caught that wrist too.

This time, Wei Renshan's face went pale before the bones broke.

“Wait!” Wei Renshan gasped. “We can discuss this!”

“You wanted me to kneel,” Shi Feng said.

“I was angry!” Wei Renshan cried. “A father loses his son. Wouldn't you be angry?”

Shi Feng increased the pressure.

“I'd be angry with the fool who taught him to rob people,” Shi Feng replied.

Wei Renshan screamed as his wrist broke. His knees gave way, but Shi Feng held him against the wall.

The flying sword trembled behind them. The old man still tried to call it back.

Shi Feng drew his ordinary knife.

“I have spirit stones!” Wei Renshan shouted. “Take them! I'll forget everything!”

“You won't,” Shi Feng said.

He drove the knife through the old man's throat and held him until the gathering qi scattered.

The flying sword dropped into the mud.

Shi Feng stepped away. Wei Renshan slid down the stone and lay still.

A Foundation Establishment cultivator died in a quarry outside Yunze Town. The fight took less than ten breaths.

Shi Feng wasn't pleased about the fresh blood on his sleeve. Otherwise, he didn't feel much about it.

Wei Kuo tried to rob and kill him. Wei Renshan came to finish the same job.

He wiped the knife and put it away.

“Still eight stones,” Shi Feng muttered.

He sat on a flat rock and peeled the loose edge of his dressing away. Sun Cheng's work wasn't entirely ruined, but the shoulder needed another clean binding. He took water and salve from his pack and dealt with it before searching the corpse.

The right wrist was worse. When he caught Wei Renshan's second hand, he used it without thinking. Now the swelling pressed against the wood again.

Shi Feng loosened the splint and tied it carefully. After a short rest, he returned to the body.

Wei Renshan carried a cheap storage bag inside his robe. Shi Feng could open that. It wasn't a sealed storage ring or some high-level refined artifact needing Foundation Establishment qi.

He tipped its contents onto clean cloth.

Eight hundred and fifty-six spirit stones. Two spare robes. A packet of dried meat. A few bottles with labels he didn't trust enough to swallow. Several household papers and a narrow jade token completed the pile.

Shi Feng put the papers and jade back beside the corpse. He didn't need proof of who owned the quarry's dead man.

The spirit stones went into his own bag. He kept the dry meat and the useful spare cloth. The uncertain medicines stayed closed until someone qualified could tell him what they were.

He picked up the flying sword.

Even cold, it looked much better than a town stall's ordinary steel. Pale lines ran near the guard, and the edge showed no damage from being forced into the ground. Shi Feng sent a thin thread of qi into the handle.

Nothing moved.

He tried once more, then stopped. Bone Refinement couldn't activate a refined artifact. Beating its owner didn't change that rule.

“Fine,” Shi Feng said. “You'll buy me something I can use.”

He cleaned the blade, wrapped it in spare cloth, and secured it along his pack. He could sell it at a proper trading house. Sky Pavilion's appraisal would settle any argument about its quality if a buyer wanted to try something.

The old man's body stayed against the quarry wall. Shi Feng didn't burn it or try to arrange a beast attack. His meridians remained his own business.

He lifted his pack with the good arm and climbed the slope. At the top, a crow landed near the abandoned road marker. It looked at him, looked toward the quarry, and gave a harsh cry.

Before putting the knife away, Shi Feng repeated the shortened turn once. The footwork kept his wounded shoulder away from the next stroke. He made the movement slowly, checked his balance, and decided to practice it each morning.

“Don't look at me,” Shi Feng said. “I didn't invite him.”

The crow flew away.

Shi Feng turned toward the road out of Yunze Town. His shoulder and wrist would need days, but he had money, supplies, and no reason to return to the Wei household. There was a roadside shed beyond the western ridge where he could change the bandage in peace.

Behind the thorn bush, Gao An waited until Shi Feng's footsteps disappeared. His master's attack had been first. That much he had seen clearly. The rest happened too quickly for a household servant to understand.

He hadn't seen a meridian examination or any device measuring cultivation. He knew only that Wei Renshan died and the supposed cripple walked away. Gao An pressed both hands over his mouth until he stopped shaking, then crawled back toward town.

The Wei household would hear his account. He had no wish to shout it across the market and invite Shi Feng to come looking for him.

On the climb out, Gao An met the carter, whose mule stood braked at the trough with its muzzle still wet. The man had seen the sword drop and had waited for it to come back up. “The old master slipped on the wet stone above the cutting,” Gao An told him. The carter nodded and drove on toward town with that. At the Wei gate, Gao An told the steward the truth instead: the master struck first, and the boy walked out of the quarry alive.

Shi Feng continued west. The little storage bag rode beneath his robe, heavier with spirit stones than any purse he'd carried before. His shoulder needed rest. His next meal no longer needed to be cheap.