Chapter 672 — Indigo

CHAPTER 672

Indigo

“Do I get paid either way?” Shi Feng asked.

“Double, win or lose,” Rao Mingshen said. “Bench One insists.”

The man in the iron mask stepped onto the floor and planted his spear butt on the stone. He was tall and lean, about thirty-five, and his hands were still.

The benches knew him.

“That’s Qiao Zhaoxing!”

“He was sixty-first on the Tianxing list before he turned thirty!”

“Peak Deity Transformation against Soul Formation? Has the house gone mad?”

Qiao Zhaoxing looked Shi Feng over once, slowly, from the wooden mask to the wet boots.

“You fight like a man with a hand tied behind his back,” Qiao Zhaoxing said. “I want to see what you’re tying it with.”

“Nerves, mostly,” Shi Feng said, and took a fresh house sword from the rack.

The gong rang.

Qiao Zhaoxing didn’t rush. He took two steps to his left, and his spear tip drew a slow crescent in the air between Shi Feng and the black water.

It was Hanging Moon Spear, a Deity Transformation-grade art. The crescent stayed where he’d drawn it, a thin pale line hanging over the floor. When Shi Feng moved toward the water, the line moved with him.

He’d watched the last two bouts from the top bench, and he knew where Bench Nine went to win. Ma Jiu and Xie Tieshan had fought what was in front of them. A genius fought what was coming.

The spear came.

It was fast, and it didn’t stop. Thrust, thrust, sweep, thrust, and every one of them aimed at a place Shi Feng had to give up. He turned the first with Iron River, slid the second along the flat and ducked the sweep. The fourth thrust came under his guard and opened his side through the robe.

Blood ran down his ribs.

Shi Feng gave up three paces and stood with his back near the dye vats, where the steam was thickest. Qiao Zhaoxing followed on dry stone and kept the crescent hanging between Shi Feng and the water.

Mo’s Left Fold shimmered. In the hot air, the frightened boy seemed to stand a hand’s breadth to the left of himself.

Qiao Zhaoxing didn’t thrust at the shimmer, and he didn’t thrust at the gap beside it. He swept low across both.

Bang!

The spear shaft caught Shi Feng across the ribs and threw him against the vat. The golden bones held, but the breath left him all at once. Before he could rise, the spear tip flicked up at his face. It cut the cord of his mask.

The wooden mask dropped.

Shi Feng caught it with his left hand. His fingers closed a finger’s width off true, as they had since the ice at Hanyan, and the mask nearly slid through them. He held it against his face and stood up.

The benches gasped.

“He nearly unmasked him!”

“One more inch!”

The two men stood apart for a moment. Qiao Zhaoxing let the spear tip rest low.

“Show me,” Qiao Zhaoxing said quietly. “Whatever it is you’re hiding. Or the next one takes the mask off and keeps it.”

Shi Feng thought about the Sunset-Splitting Sword. One cut would end this. But that cut had been seen on the Wanhe wall, and the Cistern was full of capital people with long memories. One cut would end his mask too.

He wasn’t going to show this man anything. He was going to use what was in the room.

“Give me a breath to tie my mask,” Shi Feng said, “and you can have a good look.”

He knotted the cord with one hand. Then he turned, and the house sword went sideways into the iron hoops of the indigo vat behind him.

It was Stone Splitting Slash, the oldest art he owned.

The three hoops snapped together. The vat staves burst outward, and a whole vat of indigo came down across the dry stone in a wave, ankle-deep and steaming.

Now the whole floor was water.

Qiao Zhaoxing understood at once. He drew a second crescent, fast, but there was nowhere left for it to guard.

Shi Feng ran on the indigo. Riverless Step took him straight across the surface while Qiao Zhaoxing’s boots sank to the ankle in it, and the spear’s next thrust found only blue spray. He came in from the right, inside the reach of the spear.

He bound the shaft against his blade and sent the Thousand Forge Flame into both.

Qiao Zhaoxing held on. His palms smoked, and he still held on. He was a genius, and a genius didn’t drop his spear because it was hot. He let go with one hand instead and grabbed Shi Feng’s collar to throw him into the wall.

Shi Feng had been waiting for that hand.

The All-Devouring Physique drank a palm’s worth of qi straight out of it. Qiao Zhaoxing’s deity pressure faltered for half a breath.

Half a breath was enough for golden bones.

Shi Feng drove one palm into his chest. Qiao Zhaoxing flew back across the floor and sat down hard in the indigo, and the spear rolled away from his hand.

He looked at his burnt palm. Then he started laughing.

“I yield,” Qiao Zhaoxing said.

The Cistern stood up as one.

“Bench Nine! Bench Nine! Bench Nine!”

The chant shook the vats. Dye water ran down the stairs. Somewhere up in the dye works, a foreman started shouting about his indigo, and nobody listened.

Qiao Zhaoxing got up slowly, dripping blue to the knees.

“You never showed me,” Qiao Zhaoxing said.

“You got a good look at the vat,” Shi Feng said. “That was my best trick tonight.”

Madam Rao counted the purse into his hands herself, in a bundle of Deity Transformation-grade herbs and a stack of notes. It came to 1.4 million in all, double for the off-card bout, minus the price of one vat of indigo.

She hadn’t even waived that.

With it, his money stood at 9.7 million.

“The house would be honoured if Bench Nine took the title bout next week,” Rao Mingshen said. “Tonight was off-card, so the Cistern’s title still belongs to Bench One. The purse is four times tonight’s.”

Shi Feng tucked the herbs under his arm. They were exactly what the 4 Mark sitting would need, and he hadn’t paid a copper for them.

“Thank you, Madam Rao,” Shi Feng said politely, and handed back the mask. “I’ll take the money. I’ll pass on the title.”