บท 51: Three Against One
Wang Jingyuan still thought it was unfair for Liu Xiaochen, but Mo Xian pulled her back down into her seat. "Jing-Jing, what are you doing?!"
"It's so unfair! I can't just watch them bully my senior brother!" Wang Jingyuan wanted to shout at the sect leaders again. "Didn't you hear them? They were going to fight five against one! No matter how good my senior brother is, he can't fight five chiefs at once!"
"Yes, but now you have called attention to yourself. You were trying to keep a low profile, remember?" Mo Xian reminded Wang Jingyuan. "Your goal here is to find your senior brother, not to get caught in the sect feuds."
"It's too late for that; I'm already in one." Wang Jingyuan patted her sword. "Qingsha Sect is already after me, aren't they?"
"Yes, but you don't want to get involved in more." Mo Xian changed his wording. "Let your senior brother handle this. Then when the Hero Assembly is over, we can go find him and decide our next steps."
"Okay." Wang Jingyuan relented. She sat up straight at the edge of her seat, locking her gaze on the stage. There, Abbess Huiyuan, Tian Haiwei, and Lang Yu formed a semicircle about twenty meters away from Liu Xiaochen. Everyone had their weapons out and were in their battle stances.
"Seniors, please." Liu Xiaochen nodded for the chiefs to make the first move. They did.
Lang Yu, using a soft sword like his disciple Song Xinglan, launched into the first form of the Eighteen Deadly Forms of Feiyue. Abbess Huiyuan performed the Catkins Sword Skills. Tian Haiwei began his Qingsha Sword Skills. Three blades became three deadly streaks that headed straight for Liu Xiaochen.
Liu Xiaochen sidestepped Abbess Huiyuan's strike, parried Tian Haiwei's stab, and blocked Lang Yu's slash. Then he ducked under Abbess Huiyuan's second slice and kicked at Lang Yu's abdomen, while stabbing towards Tian Haiwei's chest. The four people went back and forth on the stage, as three whirls of teal, white, and purple surrounded the blur of black and white. Wang Jingyuan watched anxiously. Senior Brother, you have to win!
The chiefs have their reasons of being chiefs. Compared with their head disciples, the chiefs performed the same set of skills with much more precision and power. Every slash carried a powerful gust of wind sharp enough to cut skin. Every stab was enough for the blade to pierce through the body entirely. Every strike was at a fatal position.
Liu Xiaochen did not hold back either. He channeled one hundred percent of his internal forces into his sword skills. His eyes looked in all eight directions for oncoming danger, and his ears constantly picked up on the rush of wind generated by striking weapons. His sword never stopped moving and never stopped clashing with the other blades.
They twirled, jumped, flipped, slid, kicked, slashed, stabbed, sidestepped, slid, and cut. Lang Yu's soft sword was a deadly snake that never stopped striking, while Abbess Huiyuan's sword was creating a suffocating cocoon of blades. Tian Haiwei's short sword always came stabbing through when you least expected it and always aimed for the most fatal of locations.
Liu Xiaochen had confidence he could beat Tian Haiwei, but throw in Lang Yu and Abbess Huiyuan, he was unsure if he could match all three even with Song of the Phoenix. Besides, he had already fought six disciples; he was not at his peak battle form.
When all three chiefs came charging at him again, Liu Xiaochen crossed his arms in an X in front of him and separated them fiercely, slashing his sword out as he did so. A blast of power sent the three chiefs stumbling back, giving Liu Xiaochen a split second to breathe.
Tian Haiwei was the first to recover. Perhaps it was because he was farther away, so he didn't get that much of a direct hit. He engaged in direct combat with Liu Xiaochen, who parried aside all of his attacks.
"Give me the scroll, Liu Xiaochen, and we can end this right now," Tian Haiwei said as he brought his sword down on Liu Xiaochen's head. "I will put in some good words for you to the other chiefs, and we will let you go."
Liu Xiaochen scoffed as he raised his sword and blocked the blow. "As if. I would rather die than give you the Song of the Phoenix!"
"Eh?" Tian Haiwei realized that something was off. "You said that if we win you, you'll give us the Song of the Phoenix!"
"You must be stupid to think that I would just hand it over after you and the other sects mercilessly slaughtered my entire sect!" Liu Xiaochen's eyes spat fire. "I am here to get justice for my sect and my mentor! What better opportunity to show the world than beating the chiefs at the Hero Assembly? You all behaved exactly as I predicted."
"So the scroll—"
"There is no scroll. If you didn't find it during your attack, then my shifu has already destroyed it." Liu Xiaochen's lips turned up in a cold smile. "The likes of you do not deserve to even wipe the dust from the scroll." Then he kicked the shocked Tian Haiwei on his abdomen and sent him flying back as Abbess Huiyuan and Lang Yu came charging towards him again.
This conversation happened when Liu Xiaochen and Tian Haiwei were in close proximity, so no one else heard. Abbess Huiyuan and Lang Yu were still in the dark, as was everyone else watching.
"You liar! Liar!" Tian Haiwei gasped as he stumbled to his feet again. "There is no scroll! He tricked us all!"
"What?" Lang Yu was too focused on his Eighteen Deadly Forms of Feiyue. He found Tian Haiwei's sudden shout annoying.
"He's probably complaining about being kicked." Abbess Huiyuan rolled her eyes as she concentrated on trying to defeat Liu Xiaochen. This young man was holding his ground far better than she had expected, especially when he was fighting against three chiefs. But he couldn't hold on forever.
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