114 Jia Shan's Origin
Jia Shan noticed Xu Miao's odd expression, "What's wrong?"
Xu Miao averted his eyes from his system menu. Curious, he wiped the blood on his forehead and gazed at his new master, "It's nothing. I just heard a weird noise."
"What noise?" Jia Shan looked around. He noticed that mysterious wind was still circling around them, and the sunlight was breathtaking. However, he couldn't hear anything.
Xu Miao glanced at the system messages.
\u003c\u003cThe Sword God, Kunwu, is watching you.\u003e\u003e
\u003c\u003cThe Sword God has acknowledged your master-disciple relationship with his vessel, Jia Shan.\u003e\u003e
\u003c\u003cThe Sword God has begged your System Sponsor for a favor.\u003e\u003e
\u003c\u003cThe System Sponsor has accepted Kunwu's request.\u003e\u003e
\u003c\u003cThe System Sponsor has updated the system shop.\u003e\u003e
\u003c\u003cA new quest has been created.\u003e\u003e
The system spammed messages and gave enough info to guess whose dao Jia Shan was using. Xu Miao closed the quest menus for now as he was too busy to examine how he could clear the quest.
Still, Xu Miao was interested in the god's existence, "Master, do you know someone with the name [Kunwu]?"
Jia Shan narrowed his eyes and furrowed his brows. It was the name that only a few people knew, "Where did you hear that name?"
"It was the wind whisper."
Jia Shan raised his eyebrows and stared at Xu Miao for a few seconds. He sighed and shook his head, "Don't tell anyone about the name of my benefactor. He's the sword god that gave me the sword dao."
"I see. Is Kunwu a good guy?"
"He is benevolent. He even warned me when I requested to learn his dao that I can't reach the immortal realm if I take this shortcut."
Jia Shan bragged about the god he worshiped. He told Xu Miao the story when he was young.
.
Jia Shan used to live with his master on another continent, across the Blood Sea, where natural Qi was more abundant. His master was one of Kunwu's apostles, who taught him swordsmanship ever since he was six.
Jia Shan was one of the geniuses in his generation. His strength reached the peak of the 4th-stage when he was 15. Yet, he got stuck in that realm for years while his peers gained enlightenment and obtained dao, advancing to the 6th-realm and began constructing their cores.
Jia Shan got bullied by other geniuses a lot. Yet, Luo Cheng was there with him, protecting him from other bullies.
But one day, Jia Shan's colleagues were fed up with the duo. They ambushed him and severed his tendons.
Luo Cheng was enraged. He slaughtered one of the ambushers in retaliation.
Later on, Luo Cheng was arrested. The surviving ambushers were also apprehended by Kunwu's apostles.
Jia Shan protested the verdict that it wasn't fair. However, the apostles couldn't help him since it involved politics and prominent powerhouses.
Frustrated by the unfair treatment, Jia Shan prayed to the Sword God, Kunwu, whom his mentor worshiped. He asked for power, so he could right the wrong and save his best friend.
Despite the odd, Kunwu answered Jia Shan's prayer. However, he warned Jia Shan that his cultivation growth would be limited under the immortal realm.
Jia Shan didn't care. As he was crippled, he wanted to be able to move again and save his best friend. He accepted the price.
Kunwu shared Jia Shan the knowledge of sword dao and a unique cultivation style, directly transferring a portion of memory to him.
After receiving the memory, Kunwu healed Jia Shan's tendons. As a price, Jia Shan's soul would be linked to Kunwu's soul for the rest of the eternity, and the former couldn't ascend to the immortal realm. If Kunwu were to suffer a fatal injury, Jia Shan would die in his stead. However, Jia Shan gained support from the sword god. Kunwu could supply his soul energy, Qi, and Essence to Jia Shan's soul, which would accelerate Jia Shan's cultivation progress.
With Kunwu's support, Jia Shan's strength reached the peak of 6th-realm within a week. Then, he broke into the prison and rescued Luo Cheng.
Kunwu's apostles didn't stop Jia Shan. Instead, they helped him since Kunwu ordered everyone to protect their new colleague.
However, the powerhouse families and parents of Jia Shan's enemies weren't happy with the rescue. They sent assassins after Luo Cheng and Jia Shan. Some of them even begged the continent guardian, an immortal, to hunt down both men.
Realizing that their lives were unsafe, Luo Cheng, and Jia Shan migrated to the Aves Continent, where Jia Shan's father had participated in the Great Purge.
Jia Shan established the Mountain Goose Sect and settled down. As for Luo Cheng, he fell in love with a local lady. He got married and had a daughter.
Luo Cheng joined Jia Shan's sect later on. Everything afterward was history.
.
Listening to Jia Shan's story, Xu Miao was relieved. Although he didn't trust Kunwu, the latter's action showed that he might be a good god, judging that he cared for his vessels.
"So, the reason that you can still keep your nascent soul is…"
"Kunwu has always been protecting his apostles. Even when my dantian was destroyed, he saved my nascent soul and sealed its energy from leaking. I can't replenish its energy, though. If he doesn't supply me with essence and my soul runs out of energy, I'll truly be commoner for real. Now that you've brought this up, I have to warn you. I probably won't use the sword domain again unless it's an emergency. It wastes my precious nascent soul's energy."
Xu Miao understood a bit of Jia Shan's source of strength. At first, he doubted how Jia Shan still maintained his nascent soul after his dantian and cultivation base was destroyed. In novels, when one's cultivation base was gone, all Qi and Essence would leak out of their bodies. But in Jia Shan's case, someone with a higher power was maintaining it for him.
'That's why Jia Shan mentioned something about [Borrowing]. Well, I should search for my own dao, so I won't have to rely on somebody else.'
Xu Miao stopped asking about this "Kunwu" or how Jia Shan's nascent soul still existed, "I see. Let's talk later. We should loot the bodies and get out of here before more pursuers arrive." He turned to Wei Yuan, "I'll also need a thorough explanation of how this happened. Let's hear it after we get out of here."
Wei Yuan pouted as it wasn't her fault.
…
The landscape around the Rooster Port was 70% rain forest. In the radius of 50 kilometers, trees, bushes, swamps, and grasses were the only things travelers could see, unless ones walked toward the Crimson River.
Moreover, wild beasts and mutated monsters lived nearby. No sane commoners or cultivators would enter the rain forest without adequate preparation. Most travelers relied on the main roads to get through this forest, or they might die.
An hour later, 100 soldiers from the Rooster Port arrived at the battle site, one kilometer east of the port. Their two captains, whose strength was 4th-stage, led the battalion to the scene.
When they saw the corpses, the two captains inspected the wounds and the blood, checking how long they had died.
"They shouldn't have gone far," One of the captains followed a trail of footprints on the ground. They went southwest, going into the rain forest, "8… 10… 12, about 12 to 15 people."
"Should we pursue?"
"Go ahead if you wanna die."
"What? Why!?"
"Look at the wounds and the footprints."
The captain compared the wounds and the footprint. At first, he was confused about why his friend wanted him to recheck it. But after a further examination, he found something odd.
"The wounds are too clean. And … no trace of Qi or Essence skills!?"
When cultivators fought, they always threw Qi attacks, pseudo-aura, and various secret techniques, which would damage the terrain and its surroundings. Traces of explosion, damaged trees, or craters were usually left behind in the aftermath.
However, no such thing happened here. The corpses were too clean. From the clues, this was a one-sided slaughter, not a battle.
"Their group has a master. I guess it's someone stronger than the 5th-stage."
"Yeah. The enemies must have mastered some kind of sword intent. Only 5th-stage masters can use weaponry intent in combat without using a strand of Qi."
"Let's retreat and report to Lord Yu. We shouldn't risk ourselves chasing the unknown master."
"… Okay."
The two captains ordered their men to bring the corpses back to their families. They stopped chasing Xu Miao's party in fear of the mysterious master.
…
After the slaughter, Xu Miao's party looted the corpses and fled southwest. Xu Miao carried Jia Shan on his back and ran 5 kilometers away from the battle site. Wei Yuan carried the sleeping mental prisoner and followed after him along with the yin slaves.
Despite having a nascent soul, Jia Shan refused to run or use any lightweight techniques. He was conserving his strength.
The party secured an open area in the middle of the forest and rested, so they could ask the three girls what had happened.
"Explain, Wei Yuan. What the fuck happened? Why did those soldiers chase after you?"
Wei Yuan sighed and retold the story of how they ran into drunk gate guards, who tried to rob and ravish them. Jiang Lan and Kang Yan also told the same story as they were the eye-witnesses.
Hearing the entire deed, Xu Miao scratched his head. His mouth corner curved upward into a wry smile, "Eh, I should have seen this coming. Those cliché villains like this are everywhere in novels."
"Cliché villains?"
"Never mind that. It's not your fault. It's my fault for not taking this into consideration. Well, we got the soldiers' spatial rings and some of their belongings, so we solve some minor issues. Let's gather and distribute the spatial rings, so everyone can have their personal items sorted."
"Oh? Okay."
The slave girls gave the rings of the dead soldiers to Xu Miao. These spatial rings were cheap rings that didn't have a security lock, such as the spatial boxes on Xu Xiuying's 20th floor. Xu Miao and the girls could examine and take out the items inside the ring without trouble.
20 Soldiers came with 25 spatial rings. 20 of them contained some food supplies, water, spare clothes, backup weapons, medical pills, and personal technique books. The other four rings were dummy rings, which had nothing but lumbers and bricks.
As for the last one, it was somewhat special. The space size of this ring was 100 cubic meters, which was larger than 10 cubic-meter rings of other soldiers. Xu Miao found a stash of gold coins, raw spirit stones, and local products, such as chicken fishes, dried fishes, and boats inside this ring.
Also, Xu Miao found a jade token at the corner of this space ring. It was written [Yu].
When Xu Miao saw the token, he tilted his head. He sensed a déjà vu.
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