Chapter 524 — One Hand, One Foot

CHAPTER 524

One Hand, One Foot

Lin Langtian bowed to the crowd with a roasted potato in his hand, and nobody was surprised.

“Thank you! Please, sit down!” Lin Langtian called, though nobody was standing. “I know you came for your handsome chief disciple. Don't clap. I get embarrassed.”

The main court of Thousand Forge Peak was packed to the walls. Outer disciples hung off the bell tower rails. The inner-court elders sat in a row under a rented awning, and Nascent Soul Elder Tian Luo stood at the edge of the stone slab with his register open. On the slab, someone had drawn a white circle three zhang wide.

Shi Feng stood at its edge with a trial blade from the rack. It was blunted iron-wood and cost two coppers. He'd broken six of them this week, and the armoury had started to look at him sadly.

“Ghost face,” someone muttered in the crowd.

“Poor chief disciple. Imagine fighting that.”

“Imagine looking at that.”

Shi Feng didn't turn his head. The soul-fire had twisted and mottled the left half of his face, and the sect had had a week to get used to it. They hadn't managed.

Lin Langtian stopped bowing.

“Who said that?” Lin Langtian asked pleasantly.

The court fell quiet. In the back rows, several disciples hurriedly looked away from Lin Langtian. Whoever had spoken didn’t intend to admit it. Shi Feng waited without turning around.

“Nobody? Good. I'd hate to bill someone before lunch,” Lin Langtian said, and took a bite of potato. “Elder Tian Luo, may I add a term?”

“Chief Disciple, the terms have been read,” Tian Luo said.

“Then I'll read mine. One hand.” Lin Langtian put his left hand behind his back. “And my left foot stays on this chalk. If it moves, I lose. If Junior Brother leaves the circle, he loses. If he yields, he loses and I'll be very sad.”

“That is not in the rules,” Tian Luo said wearily.

“It's in them now. It's good for morale,” Lin Langtian said.

“One hand?”

“Against a peak Golden Core? He's courting death!”

“Is the chief disciple insane?”

“He's showing off again.”

“Ten stones says he's showing off.”

“…”

Shi Feng watched Lin Langtian’s raised right hand. It had flattened Tuoba Hong at the gate with a squashed potato. He hadn’t forgotten that scene. One hand wasn’t a reassuring limit when this was the man offering it.

At the front row, Gongsun Ce sat with his ledger closed on his knees. Wu Qiang leaned over from the next bench.

“Prince Gongsun, you're not taking bets?” Wu Qiang whispered.

“I'm watching,” Gongsun Ce said, without turning his head.

Wu Qiang sat back, frightened by Gongsun Ce’s seriousness. He’d never seen the prince watch a contest without calculating the odds. Whatever Gongsun Ce expected from this duel, he didn’t want a wager distracting him.

“Begin,” Tian Luo said.

Shi Feng moved first.

The Severing River Sword came off his shoulder in one flat arc, aimed at nothing in particular. It was the stroke that cut what had no edge. A trial blade wasn't much of a vessel for it, but iron-wood hummed anyway.

Lin Langtian turned his wrist and guided the trial blade along his palm. The iron-wood split down its middle. Shi Feng felt the break through the hilt before he could complete the stroke.

“Blade seven!” Zhu Liu squeaked from the crowd, clutching his receipt book.

“Left foot, Junior Brother?” Lin Langtian said cheerfully. “No, that was your right foot. I saw it before you did.”

Shi Feng stepped back. He'd noticed it too. Lin Langtian never looked at his sword. He looked at his feet, a breath before they moved. That was Spirit Sense, and Shi Feng didn't have any yet.

So he sees my decision before I make it, Shi Feng thought. Then I'll stop deciding.

He took a new blade from Zhu Liu's armful and went in again. The Drifting Ash Step carried him to the left, the right, the left. Every time, the potato hand was already there. A palm touched his ribs. It was almost gentle, and it threw him across the circle.

His heels dragged on the stone and stopped nine inches from the line.

“Ooh!” the crowd cried.

“He's almost out!”

“Come on, ghost face!” someone yelled, and then, quickly: “I mean Senior Brother Shi! Senior Brother!”

Lin Langtian pointed his potato at the man.

“I know your voice,” Lin Langtian said sweetly.

The man vanished into the crowd.

Shi Feng breathed in, then breathed out. He turned his weight toward the near edge of the circle, as if to retreat. Then he stepped onto the air.

One. Two. Three.

The third stair was his old limit. Weeks ago it had supported him for only a breath. Shi Feng stepped onto a fourth and felt it hold, then a fifth. The sixth lifted him a full body-length above Lin Langtian. Below, the crowd stared in astonishment. His Cloud Ladder Step, the Golden Core-grade art and not the old Drifting Ash, had advanced.

[Cloud Ladder Step: Entry → Minor Success | Note: the stairs have stopped lying]

“He's standing on nothing!”

“Three days apart, and one must look at him with new eyes!”

“That's Golden Core-grade! He's climbing it!”

“That's not a ladder,” Lin Langtian called up, laughing. “That's a rumour! Look at you, Junior Brother! You walk like a debtor sneaking out the back door!”

“Is it working?” Shi Feng asked from the sky.

“It's… hold on, let me find a better insult—” Lin Langtian said.

Shi Feng stepped off the sixth stair and dropped.

Shi Feng dropped with the full weight of his blade behind the strike. Lin Langtian raised his right hand to meet it. Wood hit palm with a heavy crack. For a moment, neither man drew back from the impact.

The shock rolled across the stone. Dust jumped off the slab. Lin Langtian's hair blew back from his forehead.

Then the court saw the chalk.

Under Lin Langtian's left boot, the white line had a fresh scratch. It was a pale streak the length of a finger. His heel had slid, just once, by exactly that much.

“Chief Disciple,” Tian Luo said slowly. “Your foot.”

“It's an inch!” Lin Langtian said.

“It moved,” Tian Luo said.

“It trembled! There's a difference! A foot can be nervous!” Lin Langtian cried, and glared at the scratch as though it had insulted his mother. “It's still on the chalk! The rule says leaves the chalk! Read it again!”

“The rule is yours,” Tian Luo said.

The whole court exploded.