Xie Bie was having a rough day.
First, his Young Master was plagued with insomnia every day for the past week, as though he had fallen into the initial throes of love.
As the youth struggled around in his heavenly blankets and bedcovers attempting to lure himself to the land of dreams, the servant struggled to complete his morning and night duties with heightened vigilance.
As the servant of the precious Young Master of the Heavenly Sword Sect – the literal apple in Tian Mu’s twinkling eyes – Xie Bie found himself staring upon a mountain’s worth of tasks and duties containing his name.
Although he had never issued a complaint ever since his years of servitude, it was evident from his latest performance that the young and invigorated servant was facing his decline.
After all, he had to take care of his Young Master’s eating habits, clothing habits, drinking and bathing habits, and so forth and so on…
Xie Bie could be said to be the sole person on the entirety of the Shattered Star Continent who knew every iota of Ming Xia’s life.
Every food that passed Ming Xia’s lips was tasted and validated whether it possessed poisons, and every drink was personally managed by the young servant to ensure that the Young Master did not, and could not, encounter any harm whatsoever.
This had resulted in the young servant evolving into a jack of all trades in the truest sense.
Business, scholarly arts, martial arts techniques and cultivation, alchemy, poisons, medicines – Xie Bie knew every art and profession to their purest essence.
In several aspects, particularly related to the safety and health of Ming Xia, the youthful servant had surpassed even the age-old masters and experts of past generations.
In short, there was nothing that Xie Bie could do.
There was also nothing Xie Bie could do to prevent the flat blade of a taijijian slapping directly onto the back of his neck, chopping the servant’s consciousness into a brief chat with his bittersweet dreams.
Plunk!
“Xie Bie? What’s wrong?”
A soft voice could be barely heard from within the black steel carriage, the opened window being the only visible crevice permitting the sound to escape.
And as such, the occupant within could only hear his treasured servant topple onto the ground, but was not privy to any other information.
“That was… oddly easy.”
An Fei muttered to herself as she deftly sheathed the taijijian, her finger tapping against the elegant sword’s hilt in an absentminded mood. The young girl stared at the black steel carriage’s exterior with furrowed brows, clearly unsure as to how to act next.
The steel carriage did not possess a visible keyhole, and she was nowhere confident enough to dare attempt to search for a hidden unlocking mechanism.
It was equally uncertain that the occupant would even dare open the carriage from the inside, if such a device was placed.
How should she act, then?
From the brisk and controlled actions of Xie Bie, An Fei had determined that the youthful servant was the one responsible for the ‘elderly’ presence that shocked the elderly shopkeeper to the depth of his heart.
After she had knocked down the carriage drivers with her sword, the young girl had helped herself to a brief tour of the squadron arrangement of the black steel carriages.
There were clearly many, many more people housed within the carriages, but from the faint noises that escaped through the cracks at the windowsill, the occupants within belonged to military backgrounds.
From simply listening to their voices as they discussed strategies as to how to properly assault and defend against the border skirmishes of Bei Tang, An Fei could vividly imagine an environment filled to the brim with beating hearts of dripping blood, violence rending the sky as though a sheet of paper had encountered a divine sword.
The carriage that she stood before was the only exception – it was deathly silent, save for some barely inaudible yawning that seemed to belong to a child or youth. Next to the carriage, however, stood a young servant dressed in a grey robe.
Each instance the elderly voice reverberated throughout the plains, the youthful servant opened his mouth to speak. Each time Wang Qinian bellowed in frustration and embodied his spiritual essence to retaliate, the youth was performing an obscure combination of symbols of his hands, arms, etc.
Just how was that not suspicious, ah?
“However… why did he only fall after a single hit? If he’s of the supposed Nascent Soul Realm… surely he would been tougher to strike?”
An Fei shook her head in befuddlement as she threw a final glance towards the unconscious Xie Bie cruelly discarded on the ground.
Returning her attention to the seemingly indomitable carriage of black steel, the young girl initiated a brutal stare, the corner of her eye trembling in indecision.
She knew that her following actions, were bound to inflict a large amount of harm and pain onto her body.
However, her need for resources was overwhelmingly more important!
She couldn’t just leave Wang Qinian to die of starvation on the plains; though she knew of the general direction towards Tianfeng City, the young girl did not know of the specifics or any foreseeable dangers.
Furthermore, even if she did make it into the city, An Fei lacked a plausible identity to utilize a transference array to return to Jiang’an.
A Guardian of the Hundred Clan Coalition’s words possessed greater influence compared to a random young girl of average appearance – hence, the elderly shopkeeper with his annoying, saintly expression couldn’t die.
…at least not yet.
“Oh, oh, oh – I’m going to regret this so much later on…”
An Fei tightly clenched her fists as she delivered a final preparatory talk to herself.
Tightening and relaxing her grasp on the hilt of the taijijian, the young girl slowly drew the blade, raising it to be level with her head, the tip of the sword pointed directly towards the unwavering walls of tempered black steel.
Coalesce.
The murmur silently resounding within her heart, the young girl expelled all of the breath from her lungs. The instant the final breath departed from her lips, the compressed ball of golden light broke through its restrictions, flooding her heart with its radiance and splendor.
An Fei immediately felt a surge of heavenly warmth and vitality spread throughout her body, enhancing her sensory abilities by at least a dozenfold.
The young girl’s eyes twitched as she rapidly adjusted herself to her prime condition, using the grace period of seven breaths to acclimate her body to the familiar yet foreign sensation.
Pu!
A trickle of blood escaped through the corner of her lips, and the sinister pain began to spread throughout her lower abdomen. Extending its volatile energy as though branches of electricity, An Fei felt as though her vision had fragmented into multiple layers partially overlapping one another.
One instant, her vision was normal. The next, it had warped into a distortion of black spots and splotches of red.
Pierce through!
Her acupuncture points had been sealed off by a mysterious entity or force, that not even the spiritual essence of the Sanctum could permeate them. Nonetheless, though the acupuncture points responsible for the creation of the horrifying fiend of a steel sword had been removed, the young girl could still utilize her meridians, albeit at a great cost.
And as such, An Fei willed the golden threads of light to weave through her meridians and blood vessels to pass through her fingertips and into the tip of the elegant taijijian.
The young girl withstood the aching pain as she witnessed the steel blade gradually detach itself from its reflective property, morphing into a blade formed from an opaque substance of black that threatened to swallow all existence.
“Stab!”
The shout was accompanied with a short whistle, and the small tip of the elegant taijijian buried itself into the thick walls of the black steel carriage.
The young girl experienced a brief moment of resistance, and the astonishing defenses of the Heavenly Sword Sect’s prized carriages found themselves to become the second shame of all of the Shattered Star Continent.
Not even the carriage drivers themselves had suffered such humiliating fate, to be pierced and debilitated by a practice sword.
“AH!?”
A frightened and delightful screech graced her ears, and An Fei swiftly realized that the occupant must have been pressing his ear to the side of the carriage in an attempt of discerning the situation on the other side.
A light smile graced her lips at the entertaining thought, and the young girl quickly continued to press her advantage as much as she possibly could.
She had successfully won her gamble.
If a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator was serving as the guard outside of the carriage, then there had to be circumstances in which the Young Master within couldn’t receive protection.
Hence, in this world strife with spiritual essence and artefacts, surely the rational cultivator would think about infusing the walls of the black steel carriage, to provide defenses capable of withstanding attacks of greater severity than the material could originally handle…
Alas, it was a pity that it had met her spiritual essence!
She couldn’t pierce through armor made from pig iron, but anything infused with a cultivator’s spiritual essence immediately lost its defenses even if it were a gift bestowed from the heavens, ah…
“Oh?”
When the taijijian had cut out a rectangular section of the black steel carraige’s walls to reveal the exterior, an astonished and amazed surprise flooded the young girl’s lips.
