Chapter 260: Chapter 260 Guan Fei
"Everyone get out of my way."
"Who dares to block my path, Yue Hua, I will make sure they have no path to walk."
"Try me."
Bursts of vibrant internal power exploded like a kaleidoscope amongst the crowd. Some people were swinging axes, others were swinging swords, and the sound of fists and palms colliding rose in the air.
Both the masters of various sects and the martial world customers sitting on the Meditation Stone were already used to such sights. Situations like this were occurring almost every moment. Here, only the strongest or the most cunning could stand out.
Whoosh!
A streak of blue shadow unexpectedly crossed the crowd. Dodging the flashes of swords and axes in an unpredictable manner, it settled on the previously occupied Meditation Stone.
"Kid, you’re asking for death!"
Everyone stopped, and they all stared, fuming with anger, at Shi Xiaole who just sat down. This guy actually took advantage of their intense fight and got benefits without any effort.
"Little brother, this old man is known as Old Man Zhongtian. How about you give me some face and let me have that spot."
A voice, as thin as a thread, reached Shi Xiaole’s ears.
Shi Xiaole looked over to see an old man with half black, half white hair, smiling kindly at him. During the previous fight, this man had stood amongst the three masters of the Fifth Tier in the Xuanqi Realm.
"Brat, you’d better step off willingly. Otherwise, when I catch you later, I will make sure you pay."
Compared to Old Man Zhongtian, another large man with a sword was not so polite. His cultivation was in the Fourth Tier of the Xuanqi Realm.
Many more voices reached Shi Xiaole’s ears, either threatening or enticing him to go back to the grassland by the lake.
How could they be appeased when a boy who relied on tricks and whose cultivation was only in the Ninth Tier of Qi Absorption had cheated his way to the top?
Shi Xiaole paid no attention to these voices and, in the end, simply closed his eyes, ignoring them completely.
"Hehe, seems like he has quite the backing."
"Those top-tier sect disciples wouldn’t come all the way here. Even if this kid has some background, he doesn’t necessarily have strong support."
Several people sneered quietly, thinking how they would deal with Shi Xiaole once they climbed onto the Meditation Stone.
"Young Hero, you’ve stirred up trouble."
Hu Hao looked at Shi Xiaole sitting next to him and wondered if this calm kid’s master or elder relatives were hiding amongst the crowd.
"Not afraid."
Shi Xiaole smiled, further reinforcing Hu Hao’s guess.
Everyone who came to the Mysterious Bamboo Forest would buy an hourglass to measure the time. Shi Xiaole was no exception. Around fifteen minutes in, Hu Hao, who was sitting beside him, noticed that the Meditation Stone in front had emptied. So, Hu Hao leapt over first.
This set off another brawl amongst the crowd by the lake.
Due to the masters in the Fifth Tier of Xuanqi Realm keeping each other in check, finally a practitioner from Fourth Tier of Xuanqi Realm won the race and stood on the right Meditation Stone. Coincidentally, he was the same man who had threatened Shi Xiaole beforehand.
"Little devil, let the elders of your sect come out and speak."
The burly man with the sword wasn’t stupid. He guessed that Shi Xiaole had some backing and demanded them to come forward.
"You’re not worthy."
Shi Xiaole replied.
The man fell silent, unsure of Shi Xiaole’s true strength.
"Lin Laosan, don’t let this kid bluff you. I saw it clearly earlier, this kid came here alone."
Suddenly someone from the lakeside shouted, full of malice.
The man was doing his best to hide, but with Shi Xiaole’s astonishing sense of perception, he located him immediately — a sharp-mouthed and skinny middle-aged man.
"Hahaha, so he was just putting on an act. Then what do I need to worry about?"
The sword-wielding man laughed savagely. Drawing his sword, he attacked Shi Xiaole with all his might.
No matter if the sharp-mouthed man’s claims were true or false, the sword-wielding man realized that even if Shi Xiaole did have a master, the fact that he hadn’t appeared for so long meant he wasn’t a tough challenger.
Empowered by the Fourth Tier of Xuanqi Realm, the sword-wielding man’s attack was unbelievably powerful. It seemed as if his sword was no longer a mere weapon, but a painfully bright light.
With the right hand holding the sword, Shi Xiaole drew it back swiftly and stabbed forward. In the blink of an eye, his Qingyang Sword clashed with the man’s blade. An invisible ripple spread around, making the lake surfaces undulate visibly.
"What?"
The sword-wielding man was startled. His attack was blocked.
Hu Hao was stunned.
So were the martial world travelers on the lakeside, as well as the order-maintaining sect masters. To them, it seemed unimaginable that someone in the Ninth Tier of Qi Absorption could block a blow from a Fourth Tier practitioner of Xuanqi Realm.
"With such attire and such strength, could this person be..."
Some people’s eyes began to sparkle.
"Wind-Breaking Kill Slash!"
Feeling humiliated, the sword-wielding man’s eyebrows inverted. He waved his heavy sword with all his might, creating an impressive churning of sword radiance that split the air in its path.
The sword brilliance had not arrived yet, but its power already blew Shi Xiaole’s hair backward.
The Xuanqi Realm had significant differences in power across each tier. Even if two individuals were in the same realm, a Fourth Tier practitioner could easily defeat a Third Tier one.
The power of the sword-wielding man was impressive, at least it already put some pressure on Shi Xiaole.
With a swing of his right arm, a blazing Qingyang Sword Qi erupted and shattered into thousands of pieces in an instant, rushing towards the sword-wielding man in a dense fashion. From the perspective of others, it was as if a fan of green light was shielding him.
"Exploding Shadow!"
Countless shadows of knives erupted, shattering the cyan light fan. The broadsword-wielding man’s face darkened without giving him a chance to blink, he swung his heavy knife in a flat arc, the blade light seemed like silken threads forcibly twirled together bursting out like a storm, giving a feeling of an imminent explosion.
"Sunset Light."
Shi Xiaole’s figure was elongated by the sunlight. As the sword light spun, it covered the reflection in the water too. Countless blade lights struck the sword light, rebounding in different directions, causing the lake surface to spray numerous droplets. Due to the rapid and fierce momentum, a faint fog of water appeared around both men.
Shh!
Behind Shi Xiaole, the water surface was torn open by a sword light, creating a ten-meter-long deep scar. Water curtains poured down from the sky. The broadsword-wielding man had taken the offensive while Shi Xiaole was drawing his sword.
But to the broadsword-wielding man’s surprise, Shi Xiaole seemed to have anticipated it. As he dodged, he pushed his power to the limit and swiftly slashed out a sword faster than the falling of the mist.
Eclipse Eight Forms, the eight form: Fire Scale Eclipse.
An impenetrable sword net suddenly appeared, covering the body of the broadsword-wielding man. Even the sunlight seemed to be shattered by the Sword Qi. Regardless of how the broadsword-wielding man attacked, he would find it hard to break through in a short period.
"How could this be?"
The broadsword-wielding man hadn’t realized that under the erosion of Sword Qi and darkness, his inner self was wobbling; the power of despair was eating away at his fighting spirit.
The Fire Scale Eclipse is inherently an ’inward destroyer’. Only those like Bu Jingyun who are already in despair, or those with a will as solid as steel, can remain indifferent to this attack.
Thud! Thud! Thud!...
Countless holes appeared in the clothes of the broadsword-wielding man. At the crucial moment, he guarded himself with the internal power of the fourth tier of Xuan Qi, to ward off injuries.
"Kid, you’re ruthless."
Retreating back to his meditation stone, the broadsword-wielding man said in a fierce yet weak voice. He had been a bit overconfident and underestimated his opponent, which is why he lost so quickly. But even if he had gone all out, he didn’t have the confidence to defeat Shi Xiaole.
"So, just because you lost to me, you think you can just drop the matter?"
His eyes flashed with a dangerous light, Shi Xiaole thrusted his sword out. Before his voice fell, the Sword Qi had already reached in front of the man.
With a step wrong, the broadsword-wielding man quickly found himself on the back foot. The most terrifying thing was that every step he took seemed to be anticipated by Shi Xiaole, so soon he was only defending passively.
"Kid, we should leave a line when we do things, so that we can meet each other in the future. I, Lin Laosan, have many friends in the Martial World, if you...
Bang!
With a single sword, Shi Xiaole toppled Lin Laosan from the meditation platform.
The sound of wind and clashes immediately rose, and people on the shore saw an empty seat and began to fight for it again.
Shi Xiaole then returned to his own place.
He temporarily had no solutions for that provocative, sharp-mouthed middle-aged man. He hoped the man was wise enough because once he gets out of the peculiar bamboo forest, he would let him taste some consequences.
The ripples surged, and a head emerged from the lake. Lin Laosan was coughing up blood. He was badly injured, and he didn’t dare to look at Shi XiaoLe again. He quickly swam back to the shore and fled hastily.
Shi Xiaole noticed that some people in the crowd quietly followed Lin Laosan.
In the struggle for power, jealousy was easily attracted, and with Lin Laosan’s arrogance, he had probably offended people quite a bit. Beating a drowning dog was the favorite thing for people of the martial world to do.
"Young hero, is your surname Shi?"
After some contention, the old man from the Central Sky successfully took his place on the Meditation Stone, and asked Shi Xiaole with a smile.
This is a smiling tiger.
Shi Xiaole clearly saw the strange gaze in the eyes of the old man from Central Sky. His face remained unchanged as he nodded.
"I can’t believe that I am so lucky to meet Qingxue State’s top genius, Young Hero Shi in person. Your charisma is even beyond the rumours."
The old man from Central Sky exclaimed loudly, drawing the attention of countless people on the shore, including those high-ranking sect members maintaining order.
"The senior is flattering."
Shi Xiaole looked at the man and replied indifferently.
Even though Lin Laosan was weaker, he had already used his full strength in the fight. If not, they could not have decided the victor so quickly. And Shi Xiaole felt instinctively alert in the presence of the old man from Central Sky.
Not only was it a mental alert but also a fear of his powerful strength.
Shi Xiaole was not so arrogant as to believe that he could contend with a Fifth Tier Xuan Qi expert.
The man hadn’t made a move, perhaps he thought Shi Xiaole wasn’t worth it, or maybe he was afraid of Shi Xiaole’s high profile, and felt it was inconvenient in public. In any case, Shi Xiaole instinctively felt that the old man from Central Sky was up to no good.
"Young Hero Shi has come here to enhance your swordsmanship realm too, right? Hehe, not long ago, I heard that Guan Fei, a young expert of the Guan family, one of the four great families, has broken through the third stone statue formation."
There are five stone statue formations in the mysterious bamboo forest. It is said that only those who have fully mastered the Sword Heart can pass smoothly. To break through the third part indicates he has touched the realm of Sword Heart.
"This Guan Fei, who is only thirty-five years old this year, has reached the fifth tier of Xuan Qi realm, and it is said that he has also mastered seventy percent of Sword Heart. Now everyone says that he is the young sword practitioner with the most hope of mastering Sword Heart in Qingxue State in recent years."
The old man from Central Sky said with a smile.
Shi Xiaole had mastered eighty percent of Sword Heart and could release it at will. Therefore, at the time of his fight with Xue Changqing, only the other party could feel his Sword Heart Realm. As for Lin Laosan, he hadn’t even understood the unison of man and sword, and Shi Xiaole was deeply hidden, so it was impossible for him to detect it.
"It seems that this Guan Fei is very talented."
Shi Xiaole praised.
Being able to touch seventy percent of Sword Heart at thirty-five years old, he indeed deserved to be called a talent.
"I wonder if you have realized Sword Heart?"
The old man from Central Sky asked abruptly.
Shi Xiaole shook his head: "I just have some ideas at the moment."
"I believe that with Young Hero Shi’s talent, within the next ten years, you will surely have the opportunity to reach the realm of Sword Heart."
The old man from Central Sky laughed. His previous question was just a casual one. Understanding Sword Heart has to do with talent, but it’s not an absolute relationship.
For example, Guan Fei, his talent was not very top-notch when he was in his twenties, but ever since he accidentally touched Sword Heart, he has left his peers far behind.
Although Shi Xiaole is extremely famous now, if he cannot comprehend Sword Heart, his glory will inevitably fade away.
