Book 24 Chapter 8 – Battle for the Print Scroll

The moment Xu Ziling was about to take the collected works of demonic way’s two sects’ great accomplishment, recording the pinnacle skill of the present age, the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’, from Shi Qingxuan’s hand, a beam of yin, incomparably cold, brimming with sinister, damaging yin flavor – qi energy was striking down on the vital part of his back like an iron rod. If he evaded it by moving to the side, Shi Qingxuan would bear the brunt. Left with no choice, Xu Ziling was forced to hunch his back, ready to receive the strike.

At the same time, from behind the statue of Buddha on the left, a large beam of glittering light rolled up; it poured down like a shower on the two, in concert with the sneak attack on Xu Ziling’s back, like a seamless heavenly clothes.

If not for unusual situation where Xu Ziling’s mind was enraptured by the idols inside the temple, no matter how brilliant the enemies were, he would not be this distracted that he only sensed the attack when it nearly arrived. The other reason was that he was relying on Hou Xibai to be on guard outside, hence his vigilance was naturally reduced. However, this moment it was already too late to be sorry, hence he could only give it his all to receive the arriving tidal wave.

In this moment of life and death, divine light suddenly flashed in Xu Ziling’s mind; a Luohan statue that left a particularly deep impression on him appeared in his mind.

That Luohan, remaining calm and unruffled in the midst of chaos, was stretching out his muscles and bones, in a wonderful pose of lowering and raising his head, and bending and stretching to the greatest extent; at that time he was wondering if it was some kind of a stance in the martial art training. This moment, where life and death was hanging on a thread, he suddenly had a flash of understanding. Laughing aloud, he continued stooping over, but the instant the enemy’s qi was about to reach his body, he suddenly flung everything aside, and stretched out his limbs just like the pose of that statue. Wonderful thing happened.

The true qi invading his body could no longer seek certain vital acupoint to be attacked, but dispersed throughout his entire body instead, and then it was distributed into the four limbs of his body. Just like the flood, although it was intense, but because there are enough river courses to clear the way, it will not overrun. Of course, if the opponent’s punch exploded solidly on the back, naturally it would be difficult to avoid injury. But now the opponent was simply sending a punch power across empty air, plus the fist was at least two zhang away, with the intention of catching Xu Ziling off guard. Unexpectedly, the amazing move that he comprehended at the last moment was more than enough to deal with it.

The entire course of events happened in just the blink of an eye. By this time Yang Xuyan’s signature Phantom Sword has started to rain down on him.

From behind came An Long’s surprise cry; obviously he never expected that Xu Ziling did not flee, did not evade, but received his attack head on, so that he was at a loss.

If Xu Ziling dodged the attack by moving sideways, then Shi Qingxuan would at least receive a little bit of injury, giving Yang Xuyan the opportunity to snatch the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’ away.

Just with a slight difference like that, the two men’s counting-their-chickens-before-they-are-hatched plot has fallen apart.

But Xu Ziling and Shi Qingxuan have not escaped danger yet. Although using skillful hands of extraordinary stroke the former managed to withstand An Long’s fierce attack, yet in order to neutralize the opponent’s true qi invading his body, momentarily his entire body was paralyzed, his meridians felt like bursting, and he was powerless to help Shi Qingxuan countering Yang Xuyan’s terrifying sword strike.

But Shi Qingxuan appeared to have already anticipated that Yang Xuyan would come out like that. The instant the sword light reached her body, she spun around and using the scroll as a flute, she thrust it up to meet the sharp light of the sword, which appeared like an exploding fireworks, head on.

Xu Ziling abruptly raised a mouthful of true qi, and instantaneously the qi power was restored. At this time, An Long already launched the lotus steps. Scrambling to the blind spot on his right side, he used two fingers like a fork to pierce his eyes, while down below, his right leg silently kicked to attack his groin; it was sinister to the extreme point.

It was the first time that Xu Ziling encountered such a crafty and mysterious footwork. The originally ordinary attack, feign on the top and real on the bottom, immediately shed its mortal body and exchanged its bones to become difficult to ward off. If it were Kou Zhong in Xu Ziling’s place, quite possibly when his saber technique could not be unleashed, he would dodge the attack first, and then An Long could leisurely help Yang Xuyan to deal with Shi Qingxuan. Luckily Xu Ziling was quite adept in close, hand-to-hand combat, so that although he was fully aware that the opponent’s skill was above his, he still clenched his teeth and executed his marvelous footwork; first, he staggered a little, and then he blocked the top and sealed the bottom.

The fantastical sword dispersed, Yang Xuyan recoiled awkwardly, revealing his back-of-a-tiger-and-waist-of-a-bear, the white-horse-heroic body tightly wrapped inside black cloak, black clothes. If he did not pull back, it could be guaranteed that the sheepskin scroll, along with Shi Qingxuan’s jade hand, would be twisted and broken at the same time. If that happened, not only he could not get the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’, in the future it would be difficult for him to escape Shi Zhixuan’s revenge.

Although he was the unequalled assassin that everybody in the world was scared of, he had some kind of innate and heartfelt reverence toward Shi Zhixuan. Since he knew that Cao Yinglong was rescued, even if he had gargantuan guts, he would not dare to touch even half a strand of Shi Qingxuan’s hair.

Only by obtaining the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’ would he have the hope of breaking away from Shi Zhixuan’s clutch.

‘Bang!’

An Long withdrew his right hand attacking the enemy’s two eyes, but down below his kick solidly hit the edge of Xu Ziling’s sealing-the-bottom palm.

His heart filled with murderous intent, this kick was launched in full strength; nearly sixty-year cultivated demonic power, without the slightest bit of reservation, was sent out with the intention of killing the enemy once and for all.

Suddenly he felt as if the sole of his foot was heavily stabbed by a sharp awl, followed by a vortex of strange, strong and swift energy rushing in, digging into his vigorous demonic power directly, so that at the point of contact with the edge of the opponent’s palm, it splashed and discharged to all directions, and the true qi – able to invade the enemy’s system, was severely diminished by half. It was only now did he know that the marvelous power from the ‘Secret to Long Life’ did not become a legend in vain.

An Long grunted in pain; unexpectedly he could not even borrow a fraction of strength to continue executing the lotus steps. Without being able to continue, he had no choice but to evade sideways. Seeing Xu Ziling was jolted so that he flew backward, he could only sigh for the lost opportunity.

This moment Yang Xuyan was about to reorganize his offensive; while rushing to grab the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’, the sound of cutting fan came from behind, hence he knew that his martial brother of the same master but different school has arrived to attack. Anger welling up in his heart, he launched the Phantom Sword Technique with all his strength to meet the enemy behind him.

Shi Qingxuan pulled the jade flute with her left hand, producing the illusion of a puff by a puff, appearing there but not really there, what is true and what is false is difficult to distinguish – dark green shadows, rolling toward An Long, whose footings were still slightly chaotic. At the same time, she threw the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’ in her right hand to the air, toward the successfully somersaulting Xu Ziling, while shouting tenderly, “Catch! Quickly go!”

‘Bang!’

An Long crash hard onto the sitting down Buddha image with benevolent look, concentrated eyes, which immediately exploded into powder. But the collision enabled him to borrow a little bit of reaction force to sidestep Shi Qingxuan’s flute shadows entangling him. Curling his body into a ball, he shot out, swift like shooting star – toward Xu Ziling, who was still flying about two zhang off the ground, and was trying to snatch the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’. If he could shoot his internal energy out of his five fingers to chase after the scroll across the empty air, it would really be not much different than if he snatched it using his hand.

From his high elevation looking down, Xu Ziling was able to see everything clearly. He saw the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’ being thrown toward him was slowing down suddenly, as if it was being pulled back by an invisible thread. Finally he focused his attention to the air, and cried inwardly, ‘Bad!’ Being able to think fast in an emergency, he turned his hand over to push upward, his qi power knocked against the beam, and he dropped down fast. But he was still a hair too late.

An Long’s demonic skill was really brilliant, indeed it greatly exceeded his expectation; he was really worthy to be ranked among the Eight Major Martial Art Masters of the Demonic Way.

An Long pulled back his five fingers, the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’ flew toward him, closing in rapidly toward his fat body, which was flying up to meet it. He could not help but was greatly delighted.

While success was within his grasp, suddenly the flute made a sound. It was not that Shi Qingxuan’s refined and elegant attitude of mind suddenly opened up and she played a tune; rather, she sent her true qi through the pipe that it resonated and produced a tone. The jade flute’s true energy stabbed from below and went straight up, ferociously knocking the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’ over.

And thus, with such a fraction of hairbreadths difference, the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’ was knocked sideways, and was thrown into the middle of the surrounding Luohan troops disposition.

Xu Ziling used his unique school’s ability of taking a breath in the air to the fullest; he changed direction from dropping vertically down to moving horizontally sideways, to chase after the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’.

Letting out an angry snort, An Long made a somersault, but the very moment he was about to chase after with all his strength, he was already rolled into the phoenix-dancing-in-the-sky, the elegant-and-amazing-without-equal dense flute shadows from Shi Qingxuan’s hand.

This moment, Yang Xuyan was barely able to withstand Hou Xibai’s main assault, which came with Yangtze River’s momentum, whose folding fan’s offensive came round after round like the unceasing torrent of the Great River, while he still could not find any loophole or any gap that he could exploit.

The Phantom Sword Style’s most formidable aspect was in fusing the true and the false together, a technique relying on deceiving the eyes of the opponent, forcing the enemy to reveal the gap; hence victory could be determined in every moment.

Who would have thought that Hou Xibai’s folding fan was opening and closing swiftly in myriad changes? Moreover, the way he exerted his strength was very peculiar; whether it was pushing, sweeping, tapping, or striking, the timing and the angle of attack were as accurate and as precise as plucking the guzheng [long zither], while accumulating countless strange-move, wonderful-stance in secret – at the same time, so that even with Yang Xuyan’s skill level, he was put into the situation where he lost the initiative and could only counter every move. Momentarily it was difficult for him to counterattack.

Hou Xibai’s Fan of Beauty has already reached the transforming-the-rotten-into-magical realm. It was brimming with creativity overtone of changes born of his heart’s desire, like-a-heavenly-steed, soaring-across-the-skies [i.e. unconstrained style], while also carrying some kind of confident and at ease style, which differed greatly from his own ruthless, strict sword move. Even though Yang Xuyan really wished to decide this opponent’s fate by the blade of his sword, inwardly he could not help applauding and admiring Hou Xibai’s skill. He thought that under different circumstances, this battle would definitely be a delightful occasion.

‘Tchak!’

Yang Xuyan launched the skill that was usually hidden at the bottom of his trunk; his sword fantastically shook, producing three sword-flowers in triangular formation [orig. 品 character], forcing Hou Xibai to raise his fan horizontally to block.

Book 24 Chapter 8 - Part 2

Spy, Ysabel, HPC, Jaya, you are welcome. Xiaohu, here’s a bit more. Shirak, you seem to know the story already. I have no idea. Sky, Lance, LOL.

Since the battle began, the two have been attacking each other fast and violent, with fantastical, exquisite, and profound-mystery techniques; so tight that there was no gap to take a breather. Strange moves and wonderful stances more and more emerged; in essence, you advance I retreat, I attack you dodge – all the way until the Print Scroll was knocked to a distant place by the force of Shi Qingxuan’s flute.

Only after seeing the deteriorating situation did Yang Xuyan march the troops to dangerous situation by using returning-to-the-western-paradise [i.e. die] together and exhausting-everything technique to force Hou Xibai to also stake everything and fight hard.

‘Qiang!’

The sword and the fan collided. Hou Xibai cried out ‘Bad!’ because he realized that Yang Xuyan took advantage of the reaction of the impact to pull back and flew at an angle. Like an arrow he shot toward Xu Ziing.

Hou Xibai was mentally prepared that the bottom of the hand of this world famous assassin must be extremely stiff, but only after fighting with him for real did he begin to know how overbearing he really was. He thought that if he obtained the Print Scroll, it would be really dreadful. However, although he had such thought, his body still had to stagger back to neutralize the sword power before he was able to pursue closely. In the end, he was still one step slower.

This moment An Long landed back on the ground, while Shi Qingxuan was like a goddess descending to the mortal world; she seemed to be performing heavenly music and wonderful dance around him. Even with his level of experience and knowledge, it was still the first time that he came across such a fantastic martial art.

Through the jade flute, Shi Qingxuan’s true qi could exit alternately via any hole on the flute; it could attack from any angle, swiftly moving like a non-directional wind, yet each attack was sending out a stream of powerful qi. Correspondingly the flute pipe was producing high and low, strong and weak, all different notes, as if she was blowing into it, disturbing the heart and mind to the extreme point, making An long could not help thinking that if these notes could be strung together into a melody, it would be the moment his life would enter hell.

Even more frightening was that Shi Qingxuan ought to have deep knowledge of his Tian Lian Zong’s unique martial art, because all of her techniques, hands and feet, were targeted against his weak points. Therefore, although upon self-introspection he knew that in all aspects he surpassed Shi Qingxuan, this less-experienced younger generation, momentarily he was entangled by her that he was at a loss to know what to do, and found it difficult to free himself.

Meanwhile, Xu Ziling in the air saw the Print Scroll fell into the bosom of a Vajra statue with closed eyes in deep meditation with folded arms. Behind him there was the sound of rustling sleeves; to his horror he found out that Yang Xuyan soared into the air with overbearing sword qi, in a pursue-and-attack move that although he started later, he arrived sooner. In an instant he calculated that the moment he would pick up the Print Scroll would coincide with the dangerous moment the fantastical sword would arrive. At that time he would fall into a completely passive situation, and perhaps he might even turn into a corpse under Yang Xuyan’s sword. Yet he was still unable to find the opportunity to counterattack.

Hastily he applied his qi to drop vertically down, while his right hand created a strong wind at the same time, sweeping the Print Scroll, which has just landed onto the statue’s bosom so that it was thrown toward the dark floor on the right.

At the same time, he let out a long laugh to cover the sound of the Print Scroll landing on the ground, while crying inwardly, ‘Sorry for the offense!’ as he tapped the head of a revered Luohan statue in stooping down posture like a dragon goblet with the tip of his left foot, to reverse the direction of his leap back to the left.

As expected, Yang Xuyan was duped; kicking another glaring-angrily Luohan statue with his right foot, he changed direction horizontally to chase after him.

Hou Xibai flitted across the arena where An Long was battling Shi Qingxuan, while striking An Long with his fan in passing, angering An Long that he roared an angry shriek. He was about to catch up with Yang Xuyan, with the intention of joining hands with Xu Ziling to take care of him, when a strong wind blew across from behind the Guanyin with many hands, as a beautiful and alluring, tender and charming maiden came out to attack him.

Although he wanted to see the graceful bearing of this Persian beauty, Lian Rou, he really did not wish that it would happen under this kind of circumstances. Without any choice he made a sharp turn, while his folding fan launched a full-strength attack. It was such a ruthless move to destroy the flower; but for the sake of ‘Immortal Print Scroll’, he could not change much.

From his higher position looking down, Yang Xuyan watched as Xu Ziling, who had been defeated under his hand, safely landed between two revered Luohan statues, taking a posture that appeared slow but looked fast, so that even with his usual grim and deeply ruthless character, he could not help being greatly startled and was confused of what was actually going on.

Both statues on Xu Ziling’s left and right were about six chi tall, their body was entirely cast of metal, as majestic as the real Luohan; but their stances were completely different.

The one on the left was slim with long neck, beaming with smile from ear to ear; one hand on his knee, his body leaning forward, while the other hand was scratching his back, in a relaxed, careless posture. It was naturally very fitting.

The other Vajra had his eyes bulging out angrily, the muscles on his right arm were bulging as he stretched out his fist forward; very exquisite and lively, a very vivid display of his prowess.

Xu Ziling was standing between the two revered idols. First he mimicked the leisurely and comfortable posture of the idol on his left, and then he changed to the glowering Vajra on his right; both postures preserved the resemblance, preserved the wonder of the statues. Under the golden beam of light from the moon outside the hall, plus the weak light of the lanterns at the edge of the hall, there was little doubt that Xu Ziling has transformed himself into a Luohan, a protector of Buddhism. Even more, it appeared that one of the revered Luohan has come alive. This kind of feeling was certainly weird beyond human comprehension.

The sound of whistling wind suddenly arrived.

While Yang Xuyan still could not figure out how to deal with the situation before his eyes, a fierce and severe finger wind shot out of Xu Ziling’s index finger, piercing the body of his sword, ad well as the net of sword qi he formed around his body.

Spiraling qi energy broke through the net, with a great deal of piercing-the-universe overbearing momentum.

Letting out a stifled groan, Yang Xuyan applied his qi to move sideways, while brandishing his sword to block the danger.

‘Dang!’

Originally the sword shadows filled the air with ferocious torrential momentum, but now it was like dispersing cloud, scattering smoke.

Xu Ziling laughed aloud and said, “Much obliged for the experience. Yang Xiong, watch this move.”

The fist he held above his head suddenly moved backward. It bent behind him, while he lunged forward just like the posture of the glowering Vajra by his side. But his other hand was drawing seemingly meaningless circles in front of his body.

Yang Xuyan was still about a cun away from setting foot on the solid ground when the fist wind arrived. He was an expert in assassination; before touching the ground, he urged his sword qi to pierce upward across the empty air toward Xu Ziling. Who would have thought that unexpectedly it was like Xu Ziling had a prophetic ability that by relying on his left hand drawing circles he created qi power that was able to meet the sword qi head on, immediately dispersing it.

It was too late for him to make another attack; hence he was forced to flee behind another revered Luohan in an extremely awkward position. The most aggravating thing was that he knew for sure that his martial art skill was above Xu Ziling’s, yet under the pressure of endlessly appearing strange moves, he was at his wits’ end; he had the power but did not have any way of using it.

On the other hand, Xu Ziling was extremely delighted. At the beginning, he was only thinking of borrowing the Luohan’s prowess to confuse the enemy’s heart, to seize away his fighting spirit. This was the way of scheming of the Art of War, a superior design in martial art study. Who would have thought that as he simulated a certain Luohan’s stance, unexpectedly the true qi within his body was surging in accordance with the posture as if it happened naturally, just as wonderfully effective as when he neutralized An Long’s sneak attack previously. How could he not suddenly realize it? He understood now that these five hundred Luohan’s various styles and amazing postures were most likely coming from certain expert of an empty gate school [i.e. Buddhism] of the present age’s design. Intentionally or otherwise, the mysterious school’s gongfa came out of the Luohan’s thousand poses and hundred postures. Inadvertently he obtained it. This could be considered a strange and rare occurrence.

By this time he had already forgotten about the ‘Immortal Print Scroll’ completely. An opponent as strong as Yang Xuyan was hard to come by. In the blink of an eye he flitted across the more than a dozen Luohan statues standing side by side on his left and right while launching a chain of punches, taking advantage while Yang Xuyan was falling into a disadvantageous position – to unleash a staking-it-all technique.

In his heart, Yang Xuyan knew the situation was bad, and promptly counterattacked. In his heart and mind, Xu Ziling has turned into an alive revered Luohan, constantly mimicking the posture of the statues all around him perfectly. However, whether it was a fist punch, a finger slice, a palm push, or a foot kick, all carried the devastating-the-mountain-shaking-the-peak vigorous imposing attitude. In the weaving sword qi right and left, the whistling fist wind, the statues shattered and turned into dust. And so both sides were meeting attack with attack, as desperate as the life and death, hand-to-hand combat of the battlefield among the magnificent army with thousands of men and horses.

The longer he fought, the braver Xu Ziling became, the more his hand accomplished what his heart wished.

Yang Xuyan already lost the decisive opportunity, his qi and his will to fight were hard-pressed. In this situation, where one side was vanishing while the other flourishing, although it had not come to the difficult situation of momentum-exhausted, power-distressed, the fact was that he was forced to retreat step by step; in all his life, this was the most painful predicament where he felt so useless.

Shi Qingxuan’s tender shout suddenly rang out, “Xu Ziling, be careful!”

Xu Ziling came to his senses; sending out a double punches, he forced Yang Xuyan to go back three more steps, and said with a laugh, “Thanks for letting me win!” And then he flew back before turning around and rushing forward.

Battling Lian Rou, Hou Xibai has already gained the upper hand. Were it not for this beauty’s body was nimble and flexible like a snake, each time she was in desperate situation she was able to save her own life relying on bizarre shenfa, he would have sent her to the Western Paradise early on.

This moment he saw An Long was unleashing his special ability – the Lotus Ring in the Center of the Sky, to force Shi Qingxuan to retreat. Promptly he got away from her to intercept An Long, angering him so that he nearly vomited blood.

Upon seeing this, inwardly Xu Ziling was greatly delighted. Although Yang Xuyan was rushing over like mad, this moment he was still more than four zhang away, so he could not be considered a threat. With Shi Qingxuan keeping a close watch over Lian Rou, she could only stand on the side, not daring to act blindly without thinking. The Immortal Print Scroll appeared to be already in his bag.

What in the world was he going to do with this ghost thing? He saw the Immortal Print Scroll was about a zhang away next to a lying-on-the-ground Luohan statue.

Suddenly there was a tender laughter, followed by a stream of ribbon shooting out from the dark, and wrapped itself around the Print Scroll lying on the ground.

And then Wanwan’s sweet-sounding voice said, “Turns out it is in here. Thanks a lot Ziling, after looking at it, Xiaomei [little/younger sister] will return it to you.”

Immediately Xu Ziling broke out in cold sweats. If the Print Scroll fell into Wanwan’s hands, perhaps even if all six people, both the enemy and his side, joined hands, it would still be difficult to get it back.

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