Unsheathed

Chapter 22: Halted Realm

In the private school was a small cottage that had no plaque hanging above the entrance, and inside the cottage, Qi Jingchun was in the process of playing out a game of go according to a manual. It wasn't a historically renowned game, nor was it even a game played between masters.

Right as he was about to place a white stone onto the go board, he suddenly heaved a faint sigh. Even though he was following a manual of set moves, he suddenly seemed to have grown rather hesitant about where to place the stone down, and in the end, he withdrew his hand, but the stone was still hovering in mid-air over an inch above the go board.

Qi Jingchun remained seated in an upright manner. As the current Sage responsible for overseeing this place, and the former master of Mountain Cliff Academy, one of the 72 academies of Confucianism, he was still indisputably one of the purest and most knowledgeable scholars under the heavens even though he had been condemned to this town in order to atone for his past crimes.

In the eyes of the normal townsfolk, the years passed by one after another, and during this past cycle of 60 years, the schoolteacher had been replaced quite a few times. Each successive teacher had a different age and appearance compared to their predecessor, but that indescribable scholarly aura was something that had been common to all of them. They were stern, dogmatic, quiet... Essentially, all of them had been quite bland and boring.

No one would've imagined that all of the schoolteachers who had come and gone from the town had actually been the same person. Not only that, but in the vast world outside of the town, the quiet and unassuming Mr. Qi had once been a figure of unfathomably lofty status, possessing peerless mystical powers of righteousness.

In the next instant, Qi Jingchun's soul left his body in the form of an immortal in flowing white robes, instantly freeing itself from the confines of his body as it drifted toward a certain alley in the town.

In the blink of an eye, Qi Jingchun arrived at his destination, and he first took a glance at Cai Jinjian, who was laying in a puddle of her own blood, while her soul was wavering and flickering like a dying flame in the wind.

After pausing there momentarily, he arrived beside Chen Ping'an and Fu Nanhua.

Fu Nanhua was leaning back slightly with his mouth and eyes gaped wide open, and a complex combination of shock, confusion, and despair etched on his handsome face.

As for Chen Ping'an, he was suspended in mid-air, maintaining a forward-pouncing posture. There was a porcelain shard that was as sharp as a blade in his left hand, and even in this life-and-death situation, his eyes were still as calm and resolute as ever, completely unlike the expression one would expect to see in a situation like this on the face of an ignorant young boy who had grown up in a secluded little town his entire life. The only thing that seemed to fit with his character was the resignation that was hidden deep within his eyes.

This type of resignation wasn't unfamiliar to Qi Jingchun. It was the exact same emotion displayed by a farmer who relied on the will of the heavens for his livelihood. In seasons of drought, the farmer would squat down on the dry, cracked, and barren earth of his farmland, looking up at the scorching sun. In situations like those, there would be no heart-wrenching emotions of despair, fury, or indignation in the farmer's eyes, only a deep sense of resignation and helplessness.

As the temporary master of this place, Qi Jingchun was naturally aware of the history of Chen Ping'an's family. Even though he hadn't personally seen Chen Ping'an's ancestors, he was able to roughly deduce the family's history going back centuries, even over 1,000 years in the past. The reason for this was very simple.

It was just like if the magistrate of a county administration wanted to see the family history of one of the residents of the county, all he would have to do would be to pull up that person's file from the ministry of revenue, which held all of the county's family registries, and everything would be laid out before him.

Throughout the past 3,000 years of the town's development, it had extended its branches far out of the town's boundaries. Every single generation would always produce several prodigious talents, and even though they couldn't return to their homes, they could reciprocate their clans through secret avenues, and that was what had given rise to the current set of most affluent clans in the town.

Chen Ping'an's clan had a long history, and his ancestors had always once lived in luxury and prosperity. However, following two periods of tumultuous and unforeseen change, the Chen Clan gradually fell into decline on the Eastern Treasured Vial Continent, which was home to countless empires and vassal states.

As a result, it had been taken over by other clans, and by the time Chen Ping'an's father had been born, the Chen Clan had already been in decline for over 1,000 years. It had well and truly fallen into decay on the entire Eastern Treasured Vial Continent, let alone the Great Li Empire, in which the small town was situated. It was as if the clan had somehow been cursed and condemned to never be able to make a resurgence.

During the 60 or so years after Qi Jingchun had arrived in the town to oversee the operation of the formation, he had strictly upheld the doctrines of fairness and objectivity, never altering the trajectories of the town residents' fate based on his own personal preferences. Otherwise, as a scholar who had once detested evil and upheld justice with all his heart, he would've been far too inclined to condemn the abundance of shady dealings taking place in the town's affluent clans, or to help the town's impoverished and suffering clans.

However, through a lens of objectivity, Qi Jingchun was able to see that the affluent clans had their own hardships, while the impoverished clans were just as capable of evil. As time passed, Qi Jingchun had become a deity-like existence in the town, refusing to meddle in the affairs of the townsfolk. Instead, all he did was stand by and watch, with observation serving as his sole purpose.

There was a hint of surprise on Qi Jingchun's face as he stepped forward to take a closer look, then gave a gentle nod of approval. As it turned out, even though it appeared that Chen Ping'an had pounced with the intention to kill, in the end, he had only slammed his wrist into Fu Nanhua's neck, which was a far more lenient fate than the one that Cai Jinjian had suffered.

After receiving this heavy blow, Fu Nanhua's entire body was sent flying horizontally toward the wall, following which Chen Ping'an locked his hand around Fu Nanhua's neck while pressing the porcelain shard against his abdomen with his other hand.

Qi Jingchun was rather curious about why Chen Ping'an had refrained from going for the kill here. This was a perfect opportunity, and if he were to let it slip by, the consequences could've been catastrophic. Qi Jingchun was a devout follower of the teachings of Confucianism, strictly abiding by the code of conduct and etiquette set out by Confucius himself, but he wasn't one to dogmatically follow rules.

He wasn't one of those narrow-minded scholars who only knew how to preach directly from books. When it came to people of Fu Nanhua's personality and level of aptitude for cultivation, he couldn't be more familiar with their patterns of behavior. Even if he were to be intimidated by Chen Ping'an into temporarily giving up on seeking revenge, he was definitely going to see this as the most humiliating disgrace in his life.

In fact, Qi Jingchun wouldn't have been surprised if this were to become an internal demon in his Dao Heart. If that were to happen, then it wouldn't just be Fu Nanhua hunting down Chen Ping'an. Instead, he would have to face the wrath of the ruler of the South Sea, the entire Old Dragon City itself.

There were some selfish elements involved in why Qi Jingchun had come to stop Chen Ping'an from killing Fu Nanhua, but mostly, it was for upholding fairness. At the moment, the town was like a cracked piece of chinaware, and it was only a matter of time before it completely shattered. What Qi Jingchun had to do was delay this inevitable outcome as much as possible, doing everything in his power to arrange a way out for as many people as possible.

The best outcome would be to hand Chen Ping'an over to the blacksmith, Master Ruan, then hold the town together for one more cycle of 60 years, and all sides would be relatively happy. Those on the mountain peak would obtain the fated opportunities they had come here for, while those at the foot of the mountain would be able to live in safety and stability.

One had to realize that in the eyes of those on the mountaintop, the lives of countless ants at the foot of the mountain were entirely expendable as long as they could further their own journey on the path to attaining the Great Dao.

The heartlessness of the royal empires was nothing compared with the lengths that countless cultivators were willing to go to for the sake of their pursuit of the Great Dao.

After a moment of contemplation, Qi Jingchun faded out of sight.

Heaven and earth returned to normal, and the Halted Realm from before silently fell away.

Chen Ping'an's wrist finally slammed against Fu Nanhua's neck, and the latter's head was thrown back as he was sent crashing horizontally into the wall of the alley. The tremendous impact had him reeling from dizziness, and after landing on the ground, Chen Ping'an quickly closed down the distance between them before throwing a vicious elbow into Fu Nanhua's abdomen.

Fu Nanhua still hadn't regained his footing yet, and he reflexively doubled over in the wake of the elbow strike, almost throwing up the contents of his stomach in the process.

Chen Ping'an had one hand around Fu Nanhua's throat, while his other hand kept his porcelain shard digging firmly into Fu Nanhua's abdomen.

It was incredible to Fu Nanhua that this thin and frail-looking young boy who was significantly shorter than himself could have so much strength in his fingers. In particular, the sharp and ice-cold sensation of the porcelain shard digging into his abdomen was like a harbinger of death, and he knew that he was currently skirting the fine line between this realm and the afterlife.

Fu Nanhua was naturally unaware of the fact that Chen Ping'an had been forced to perform all manners of grueling manual labor tasks for survival from a young age, nor did he know that Chen Ping'an had only mustered up such astonishing strength from tapping into his limitless potential, which was fueled by an urge even stronger than that for survival.

Back when Chen Ping'an had been rolling around in agony after eating the wrong the medicinal herb, he had only been at the age where he should've been attending school with all the other children, but even back then, it was this very same urge that had driven him to crawl back home in order to deliver that bamboo basket full of life-saving medicinal herbs.

After that, everything that he did, including chopping firewood, burning charcoal, pottery molding and firing, digging and tasting dirt... there wasn't a single thing that hadn't been a test of his stamina and endurance.

Outside the town, Fu Nanhua could easily crush 100, even 1,000 Chen Ping'ans with just the simplest of mystical abilities, but he had made a grave error in trying to corner Chen Ping'an in this town, one that had placed him in a dire situation.

Suffering from intense humiliation and pain, he had completely lost the ability to think rationally, and a ferocious look appeared on his face as he growled, "If you kill me, you'll be sure to fall to an early grave! Even if you don't kill me, you're still going to die! Your fate is sealed, you piece of scum!"

Chen Ping'an had to raise his head slightly to look up at Fu Nanhua's deranged face, and he said, "You know that I don't want to kill you. There's no bad blood between us, I only retaliated because you wanted to hurt me."

A sinister grin appeared on Fu Nanhua's face as he retorted, "What right does a piece of scum like you have to reason with me?! What gives you the courage to be so insolent?!"

Chen Ping'an was silent for a moment before asking, "You're not going to let me live no matter what, right?"

As Fu Nanhua looked into Chen Ping'an's eyes, he quickly calmed down.

His face was quickly turning red from strangulation, then rapidly transitioned to blue, then purple. Chen Ping'an hadn't actually tightened his grip any further, but this was already enough to strangle a grown man like Fu Nanhua to death.

"Would you believe me if I told you that I won't kill you?" Fu Nanhua asked, speaking with great difficulty.

At the time, he tried to struggle free from Chen Ping'an's vice-like grip, but almost at the exact same moment, Chen Ping'an tightened his grip, and Fu Nanhua immediately gave up on his futile efforts.

Chen Ping'an shook his head.

Fu Nanhua could feel his own consciousness slipping away, and he wanted nothing more than to smash Chen Ping'an's head open like a watermelon, but he still did his best to remain as amicable as possible as he proposed, "What if I swear a vow to the heavens? For people like me, such vows cannot be broken without dire consequences."

Here, Fu Nanhua was attempting to play a trick on Chen Ping'an. While it was true that vows sworn by cultivators were extremely binding, Fu Nanhua had only told Chen Ping'an a half-truth here. Even if he were to swear a vow, he would only do so as a surface-level declaration without actually taking it to heart.

Hence, such a vow was completely non-binding, and he could easily break it without any consequences. Furthermore, even a cardinal vow sworn by a cultivator wasn't completely unbreakable, it was just a matter of whether one would be willing to pay the price for breaking the vow. In general, the price for breaking a cardinal vow had a direct correlation with the magnitude of a cultivator's cultivation base and the contents of their vow.

To his surprise, Chen Ping'an shook his head once again.

Breathing was becoming more and more difficult for Fu Nanhua, and he was becoming so dizzy that he had lost the ability to speak and negotiate further.

Am I about to die? Am I going to be killed by this piece of scum, just like that idiot, Cai Jinjian? Once word of this gets back to Old Dragon City, will I become the laughingstock of the entire city? Will that be my legacy?

He didn't even have the chance to activate the hidden mechanism on his jade belt. As it turned out, the white jade belt around his waist was actually formed by the remnants of an earth dragon's soul.

"That's enough."

All of a sudden, a voice rang out nearby, and this was undoubtedly music to Fu Nanhua's ears, but he just so happened to fall unconscious at this exact moment, so he couldn't be sure whether that had just been a figment of his imagination.

Chen Ping'an turned around with a surprised expression to find an ethereal Mr. Qi, whose entire body was giving off a white glow.

Qi Jingchun was watching Chen Ping'an in silence with a faint smile on his face, but Chen Ping'an's expression remained determined and resolute, and he didn't loosen his grip in the slightest.

Qi Jingchun wasn't furious at the fact that his well-intended intervention was being ignored, nor was he pleased by Chen Ping'an's determination and mental fortitude. Instead, he merely waved a sleeve at Chen Ping'an, as if he were scooping something from the boy's body into his hand.

He then spread open his hand to see what he had taken, upon which an amused look appeared on his face.

It was a ball of filth that was as black as ink.

As it turned out, someone had planted an inclination on his body, but it was already completely devoid of luster, indicating that it had perished long ago.

He then turned to Chen Ping'an with a rather forlorn expression as he sighed, "No wonder my teacher told me that for those who go on to do great things, an unshakeable will is far more important than exceptional aptitude. You've taught me another valuable lesson in my teacher's stead, Chen Ping'an. Unfortunately, I am no longer in a position to be taking any more disciples."