Chapter 52 – Twin Bracelets Around the Wrist
“I’ve caught you.”
Chou Bodeng tilted his head back, his dark pupils reflecting Shi Wuluo, who was propped up above him. His silver-gray eyes were like a frozen lake, capable of reflecting a person’s image with perfect clarity. The white moon hung high behind him, and the young man’s lean but not frail body cast a shadow that could completely envelop a person.
Envelop, catch, hold.
“Then it’s settled.”
Chou Bodeng began to laugh, his whole body shaking. His robes were half-open, the red fabric clustered around his snow-white shoulders, and a line of his collarbone was slick with cold sweat.
“Don’t you lie to me.”
Shi Wuluo pulled him up, pressing him tightly into his embrace.
In his arms, Chou Bodeng laughed until he was breathless, until his whole body trembled. And with every tremor, every bone and every piece of flesh erupted with a pain that could drive a person mad.
The more it hurt, the more crazed his laughter became.
A black tide surged into the sky.
An endless stream of black mist poured from Chou Bodeng’s clothes. Countless vengeful ghosts, countless bitter poisons, countless resentments broke through the skin that had imprisoned them, laughing and howling madly.
They burst from the confines of the moon’s reflection. The Cangming Sea, which had been calm without a single ripple, instantly began to boil. The wind howled and the sea roared. Raging waves transformed into vicious ghosts, rolling back towards the bright moon in the sky.
In this hellish scene, only the small patch of sea where Shi Wuluo and Chou Bodeng were remained quiet.
It was a precarious quiet.
Chou Bodeng bit down hard on Shi Wuluo’s shoulder.
He bit with ferocity and hatred, his teeth piercing through the fabric and sinking into flesh. The lean, firm muscle beneath the clothes muffled the desperate cries that almost escaped his lips:
Love me. Save me.
I believed you.
Shi Wuluo wrapped one arm across his back, pressing him tighter, making them inseparable. He freed his right hand to once again grasp Chou Bodeng’s cold, rigid left hand. Chou Bodeng’s knuckles were white from how tightly he clenched his fist, and blood seeped from between his fingers. Shi Wuluo forced them open, interlocking his own fingers with his, knuckle against knuckle, flesh grinding against flesh, leaving no gap.
Chou Bodeng’s bloodless fingers curled, leaving long, bloody scratches on the back of his hand.
Click, clack.
With a series of dense, metallic clicks, the Kui Dragon Bracelets on both their wrists came to life.
The Kui Dragons stretched their bodies. The one on Shi Wuluo’s wrist bit down on the one on Chou Bodeng’s. The two sets of Kui Dragons intertwined, like a twisted, tail-biting serpent, locking their wrists together, inseparable.
The cord tying Chou Bodeng’s hair snapped.
Black hair cascaded down like a waterfall, flowing over his snow-white skin. His clothes were in disarray, revealing a small part of his porcelain-like back. The red lapel slanted across his slender shoulder blades, like a white butterfly that had died at the moment of breaking its cocoon, its wings bleeding. The loose black hair covered the snow and blood, spilling onto the silent, pale reflection of the moon.
The two of them were half-kneeling in the sea’s moon.
The moon’s reflection could shatter at any moment. The terrifying waves around them could swallow them at any moment. At any moment, they could sink together to the bottom of the sea, where there was neither day nor night.
***
Waves crashed against black rocks, shattering into white spray.
Huff—huff—
Amidst the sound of the tide, a bare-chested man was vigorously pulling a bellows. Air was forced into the furnace’s belly, stoking a fire that leaped over three meters high and burned a large patch of the small, dilapidated wooden hut’s roof with a whoosh.
“Are you done yet? It’s just patching up a blade edge. Why are you dawdling?”
Jun Changwei shook his empty gourd and urged him on repeatedly.
“Hurry, hurry, hurry, are you in a rush to die?!”
The short old man pulling the bellows let go and turned to glare at him fiercely.
“Back in the day, you could forge a hundred sabers and a hundred swords at the same time in a flash. How come after holing up by the sea for a thousand years, you’ve regressed to the point where you can’t even pull a bellows?” Jun Changwei squatted on the window sill. “Have you really become a pile of old bones? Looks to me like you’ll be in your coffin long before I am.”
“Pah!” The little old man was fuming. “Can the Taiyi Sword be compared to that scrap metal? If you have time to make sarcastic remarks, don’t you have time to come help?”
“Can’t be helped,” Jun Changwei said sincerely. “According to the sign you hung outside, this is the only place I’m allowed to squat.”
The little old man glared at him angrily. “I’ll go take down the sign right now.”
“No need.” Jun Changwei rummaged in his sleeves and pulled out a tattered wooden plank, tossing it to him. “Here, I was afraid the wind would blow it away, so I brought it in for you.”
The little old man glared at him as if he wanted to eat him, but didn’t take it.
The wooden plank fell to the ground. The light from the iron furnace illuminated the words on it, written in sharp, fierce strokes full of killing intent:
Taiyi and Dogs Not Allowed.
“Are all of you from Taiyi this shameless?”
Jun Changwei set down his gourd, jumped off the window, and reached the bellows in two steps, rolling up the sleeves of his tattered linen robe. “How do I do this?”
“Here, pull this. Stop, stop—not so hard! This rope is made of dragon tendon. If you break it, you couldn’t afford it even if you pawned your saber!”
A shiver of fear ran down Jun Changwei’s spine, and he immediately lightened his touch.
“Is that a breeze? Are you fanning your mother?!” the little old man shouted, standing on a wooden box in front of the furnace. “Haven’t you eaten? So slow! Faster, faster, can you even do it?!”
Jun Changwei’s face darkened as he endured the man’s bossy instructions with gritted teeth.
After a while, Jun Changwei got the rhythm. The little old man grudgingly gave him a passing grade and started busying himself on the smithing platform, hammering away at something. Jun Changwei pumped the bellows while peering over, watching him use a small hammer made of Gold-Azure Stone to crush one unknown ore after another into powder on an anvil of Cold Iron.
“Your Heavenly Works Mansion is so damn rich.”
Jun Changwei, who was so poor he could only afford the cheapest wine, fell silent for a long time before speaking, his voice dripping with envy.
“No amount of money can withstand a couple more shameless freeloaders like you,” the little old man said, smashing a piece of meteoric iron with a hammer. The force of the blow was so fierce it made Jun Changwei shrink back. “Damn it all, including the money for the Gold-Inlaid Saber, you owe me two hundred and thirty thousand taels of gold. When are you going to pay it back?”
“I’ll pay when I have money, I’ll pay when I have money.”
Jun Changwei expertly brushed him off.
“When you’re dead, I’ll pull out your Saber Bone to settle the debt,” the little old man said with a cold, sinister sneer.
“Deal.” Jun Changwei was overjoyed, afraid he would go back on his word. “I’ll take on a disciple soon. When I die, I’ll entrust him to deliver my bones to you. Besides the Saber Bone, what else do you want? How about my scapula? I’ll count one for ten thousand taels. After you finish repairing the sword, forge me a sword box. Use ten-thousand-year-old Azure Pine, or Ruomu Wood if you have to.”
The little old man was dumbfounded.
“See what other bones you want. I’ve got my eye on a disciple, haven’t taken him in yet. I was thinking of giving him a saber as a master-disciple gift. You can help me forge another saber, the kind that can be reforged and recast in the future…”
“I want your cranium!” the little old man interrupted, shouting, “To use as a chamber pot and piss in every day!”
“Sure, sure,” Jun Changwei readily agreed. “Just remember to make my disciple’s saber look cool. Young lads love that stuff.”
The little old man was utterly speechless.
When a person has no shame, they are invincible under the heavens!
The ancients truly did not deceive me.
“Get lost, get lost,” the little old man said, utterly defeated and crestfallen. “Whoever wants your damn bones can have them. The sight of them annoys me. I get it now, you have no face at all!”
Jun Changwei was not ashamed.
What was face? Could it pay off debts? If it could, it was a good thing. If not, whoever wanted it could have it.
“Next time, I’m nailing the window shut too.” The little old man huffed, shaking the mixed powder into a small dustpan and walking to the furnace. “Stop for a second.”
Jun Changwei let go.
The furnace fire quieted. The little old man poured all the powder into the furnace, then shut the furnace door with a loud clang. The moment the powder went in, a deafening, explosive rumble began to roll inside the furnace. The little old man muttered a long, rapid string of incantations, then shouted and pressed both palms against the furnace.
Frost shot up like lightning, sealing the entire furnace in an instant.
“What are you gawking at! Come and help!”
The little old man turned his head and yelled at Jun Changwei, who was standing to the side.
“My cultivation is not high enough! Are you trying to watch me die from exhaustion?!”
“What did you throw in there?!” Jun Changwei leaped to the little old man’s side, slapped a palm on his back, and continuously channeled spiritual energy into him. “Are you trying to blow up the whole furnace?”
“Talking to a guy like you who hasn’t passed a metallurgy class in a hundred years is a waste of breath!” The little old man, who had just been claiming to be on the verge of exhaustion, mocked him in a booming voice. “Do you think the Taiyi Sword can be mended with common iron?! This is a Heaven-Bestowed Sword! You can try mending it with common iron if you want! But don’t blame me if the inscriptions aren’t repaired properly!”
“Don’t joke about the inscriptions!”
As they spoke, a ground-shaking tremor erupted, and an extremely sharp, cold shriek came from within the furnace. The little old man and Jun Changwei were thrown backward by a tremendous force, one after the other.
“Did you really put in the wrong thing?!”
Jun Changwei grabbed the little old man, who had almost smashed his head on a rack of scrap blades, his expression changing.
The little old man coughed violently, spitting up dark blood. “Impossible! I’ve studied the Taiyi inscriptions for three thousand years! I couldn’t have mixed it wrong!”
With that, he rushed toward the furnace, about to pull open the door to see what was wrong.
Jun Changwei grabbed him by the back of his collar and dragged him back.
Bang—
The ice sealing the furnace shattered, and crimson flames shot out in all directions. The furnace broke apart. After the flames surged out, the scene within was laid bare: the Taiyi Sword was suspended vertically, bound by several chains of profound iron. A viscous, liquid-like black mist flowed rapidly over its body. The black mist continuously poured out, only to be sealed back by countless inscriptions that suddenly lit up on the blade.
The little old man whipped his head around, staring intently at Jun Changwei.
“He left the mountain?”
“Yeah, he’s in Zhunan,” Jun Changwei replied, confused. “Didn’t you know?”
“How the hell would I know!”
“You didn’t know, and you just started the furnace the moment you saw the sword?”
“Nonsense!” the little old man roared. “The Soul-Sealing Sigil has been undone before, and the Taiyi Sword has been corroded to that state. I’m not blind! Where is he now?”
“He’s at…” Jun Changwei paused awkwardly. “At Qin Tower, I think?”
“Qin Tower?” The little old man was stunned, then flew into a rage. “Red Railing Street? How dare you let him go there?!”
“He’s the Little Martial Ancestor. If he wants to go, can I stop him? Although going to a brothel is a bit improper…” Jun Changwei felt even more awkward.
“Who’s talking about that,” the little old man was about to explode with anger. “I’m saying, how dare you let him enter the city! Not only did he enter Zhunan, but you also let him go to the most crowded place in all of Zhunan?!”
“What’s wrong?”
Jun Changwei’s expression changed as he vaguely realized something.
Clang—
A sword’s cry rang out like a howl.
One of the profound iron chains snapped with a twang.
The little old man slapped the ground. Countless crisscrossing formation patterns lit up on the floor, walls, and ceiling. Iron chains shot out with a whistling sound, wrapping around the Taiyi Sword.
The sword’s cry was like thunder, rumbling like an approaching storm.
There really was a storm.
Seawater poured in through the window, drenching them both in surprise. They turned to look and saw that a storm was raging on the Cangming Sea. Waves hundreds of meters high pressed forward, one after another, rushing towards the sky before crashing back down into the sea, like thousands of cities rising from the ground only to collapse, like billions of demons breaking free from their cages.
The little old man cursed, took a deep breath, and turned to look Jun Changwei in the eye. “Right now, find him immediately. Take him somewhere with no people, as far away as possible. After I finish patching up the Soul-Sealing Sigil, you take him back to Taiyi immediately… You should never have let him leave the mountain! He is a walking disaster, a walking calamity!”
“That’s your fucking bullshit! Since he left the mountain, he hasn’t hurt a single person! He saved two cities! A hundred thousand people, a million people!”
“It has nothing to do with how many people he saved!”
The little old man roared, his voice rolling like muffled thunder along with the tide.
“Only in Taiyi can the karmic obstruction on him be suppressed. Once he leaves Taiyi, not even he knows when he will lose control. Do you understand?! A single Taiyi Sword is not enough to lock him down!”
“He himself is a vicious weapon!”