Chapter 128 — Cloud Traces, Sparrow Marks
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 4
Not far off, Yue Qinghong suppressed her shock and came over with the wolf slave, looking down from the cliff. Yun Que lay at the foot of the cliff in nothing but bloodstained white shorts, still unconscious.
His white shorts were not so precious as the monk's robe; they were made of common cloth.
"Yun Que was useless. He couldn't even force out Shen Mu's full strength. But this Shen Mu is indeed very strong. Wolf slave, how do you compare to him?" Yue Qinghong asked.
The wolf slave's eyes flashed with keen light, and he said in his rolling tongue, "I have the demon blade art, blades of slaughter from the battlefield. I can force out his full strength! But I can hold out only ten moves; after ten moves I will surely lose."
Yue Qinghong's eyes lit up. "Go."
The wolf slave bowed in assent, reached both hands behind him, and with two hisses the paired curved blades crossed on his back left their sheaths. Two blades of a dull black without a trace of any other hue, as though forged from the blackest metal.
And these two blades were more than ten feet long, narrow and curved.
The wolf slave strode forward, his steps quickening, then suddenly released his hands; threads of vital essence flew out, and he drove the blades by essence. The two demon blades flew through the air without a sound, slashing at Shen Mu!
Just as the two demon blades were about to strike Shen Mu, their light suddenly blazed: one blade swept horizontally along the ground, the other swept horizontally at his waist!
As though he had eyes in the back of his head, Shen Mu's body suddenly contorted into something exceedingly strange, his whole frame becoming like a flat fish: one foot stamped down on the demon blade sweeping below, the other kicked the demon blade sweeping above. It was hard to imagine a human body could fold into such a posture.
The upper demon blade was kicked away; the lower one he stamped with one foot into the mountain rock.
The wolf slave was startled, and saw Shen Mu flicker like a ghost, charging at him.
The wolf slave's essence threads quivered; the two demon blades came shrieking back, black light weaving up and down around Shen Mu. He wielded the demon blade art of the Kingdom of Langjuxu to the fullest, yet not one blade touched Shen Mu, who slipped past them by a hair's breadth.
His blade art was no common blade art but a killing skill of the battlefield: no superfluous moves, only the single purpose of cutting down the enemy!
Even so ferocious a blade art could not touch Shen Mu at all.
Yet Shen Mu too was forced by the blade light so that he could not advance; not only could he not advance, he was steadily retreating.
Shen Mu's retreat was like an azure dragon winding along its way. The wolf slave's pupils shrank: this was no retreat. This was a dragon coiling!
A dragon can be great or small, can stretch out or coil; when a dragon coils, it is preparing a killing pounce.
The wolf slave had originally been a personage of standing in the Kingdom of Langjuxu; captured on the battlefield by Yue Qinghong, by the customs of Langjuxu he became her wolf slave and served her. Yet his strength was not much inferior to Yue Qinghong's own.
Moreover, he had long endured the battlefield, had passed through life-and-death struggles one after another, and his combat experience was exceedingly rich.
Shen Mu's retreat felt to him exceedingly perilous, as though he were being eyed by a savage primeval beast!
His demon blade art grew fiercer still, but Shen Mu had gathered his force to the limit. Suddenly Shen Mu struck out a fist, breaking past that limit, and at once dragon roars rolled out in a mighty surge; the two demon blades lost control and came shrieking back at the wolf slave!
With the demon blades came Shen Mu's own fist, vast and domineering, its fist-intent taking the form of a ferocious, malevolent great dragon that lunged straight at him.