Questioning Heaven, Desiring the Way

Nan Xingyuan instinctively turned her head away so that she didn’t have to see Gu Suihan’s irritating face. She had always thought that Gu Suihan had suddenly decided to erase himself from his clan’s history because he didn’t want to implicate them. Otherwise, why would he do such a thing at such a coincidental time?

“How did you know about these pieces of gold?” Gu Suihan suddenly asked her a different question and withdrew his hand from her neck.

“Do you think…I’d tell you…and…give you a chance…to silence…that person?” Nan Xingyuan doubled over and panted heavily to catch her breath as she answered Gu Suihan.

“It’s someone from the Gu family, isn’t it?”

“No.”

“That means it is.”

“I just said it wasn’t them! Why are you so certain?” asked Nan Xingyuan in a dejected voice.

Gu Suihan turned to look towards Nan Yuntian in the distance, and said quietly, “It doesn’t matter exactly who it is. Only a few of them know about the gold anyway. I just wanted to confirm if the person who did this was a Gu.”

Nan Xingyuan was just a young lady after all. She was considered a bright girl among her peers, but she was no match for a centuries old monster like Gu Suihan.

To Gu Suihan, the exact person who betrayed him didn’t matter. Since there were only a few suspects, he just had to kill them all. There was no need to go through the trouble of finding out exactly who it was.

Many of those standing near Gu Suihan and Nan Xingyuan had noticed their conflict, but none of them tried to talk them out of it or separate them. In fact, they slowly inched away from them as inconspicuously as possible, as if the two of them carried a contagious disease of sorts.

“Do you seriously think the Seven Kill Sect will be able to protect you?” Nan Xingyuan rubbed her sore neck and felt a little fearful as she took two steps away from Gu Suihan.

Gu Suihan didn’t speak anymore and just glanced at her quietly with a distant look in his eyes.

Nan Xingyuan finally realized that this fellow had never been afraid of such things. Or rather, he had never worried for his own safety. He wasn’t going to take a meaningless threat to heart at all.

“That’s the end of this matter, let’s go.” Disciplinarian Zhang flew over and raised his hand to make a small boat appear from nowhere. The boat was covered with a dizzying number of inscriptions and the boat itself glowed faintly. The bottom of the boat exuded terror inducing Yin Qi as frightening looking ghosts and spirits floated about, howling and shrieking. But all of them were trapped under the boat by those inscriptions and they could only thrash their translucent sharp claws about futilely.

When Disciplinarian Zhang saw how the sect’s disciples seemed afraid, he couldn’t help but let out a scoff as he boarded the boat first. Then he turned to the new batch of disciples and said flatly, “This is going to take several hours, so hurry up and get on the boat.”

“Humph!” Nan Xingyuan glared fiercely at Gu Suihan, then hopped onto the boat with an unfriendly look on her face.

“Find a chance to kill all those people from the Gu family. Don’t leave anybody behind,” Gu Suihan calmly turned to say to Li Rong. “I know you’re capable of getting this done. I’ll owe you one for this.”

With that, he picked up his robe and leaped into the boat.

Li Rong narrowed his eyes for a short while, then hopped into the boat with a calm expression on his face before saying to Disciplinarian Zhang, “Senior Uncle Zhang, Uncle Li has another matter to attend to since he’s here, so he’ll return to the sect by himself later.”

Disciplinarian Zhang seemed to have guessed what was going on, so he glanced thoughtfully at Gu Suihan, then turned back to reply to Li Rong quietly, “Sure. Tell him to be cautious.”

Li Rong bowed in response, then quietly motioned to Li Xingwen to carry out Gu Suihan’s request. After Li Xingwen disappeared out of sight, a smile reappeared on Li Rong’s face as he stood next to Disciplinarian Zhang. He would occasionally glance at Gu Suihan, but his gaze now carried some wariness and shock.

A few moments later, Disciplinarian Zhang suddenly seemed to have recalled something and turned to look very solemnly at everyone in the boat. “Nobody is to talk about what happened today. I don’t want any rumors that might hurt the sect’s reputation to roam around. Anyone caught talking to someone else about today will be handled in accordance with the sect’s disciplinary rules.”

Nan Xingyuan suddenly felt an uneasiness in her heart, but she couldn’t place a finger on it as she looked a little suspiciously at Disciplinarian Zhang.

After everyone had gotten onto the boat, a bright light shot out from the Ruyi Scepter¹ in Disciplinarian Zhang’s hand that enveloped the entire boat. He waved his sleeve gently and everyone felt like they were floating. By the time they snapped out of their surprise, they realized that the city they were in earlier was now only as large as their hands.

A large majority of them had never flown before, but they had heard about it on the streets as well as from wandering martial artists who didn’t belong to any sect and had even dreamed of being able to fly after listening to the stories of others. However, they weren’t really mentally prepared for what it was like, and the experience really shocked them. Most of them looked terrified and even those who were bolder were still pale faced. Those who were more on the timid side were already crouching next to the wall of the boat and didn’t dare to look down at all.

Besides the Seven Kill Sect disciples, Nan Xingyuan and the other new disciples also felt equally uncomfortable. The thought of all those vengeful spirits trapped under the boat sent a chill down their spines as well.

It was only natural for anybody in such circumstances to feel nauseous. Except for a centuries old monster like Gu Suihan, that is.

Disciplinarian Zhang and the rest who were more accustomed to flying were also surprised by Gu Suihan’s reaction. Li Rong remembered the first time he took this boat. Everyone on the boat felt some discomfort to a certain extent.

After thinking about it for some time, all of them could only conclude that Gu Suihan was truly an audacious character, and they began to feel some admiration towards him.

Little did they know that actually, Gu Suihan was still thinking about the conversation that transpired between Nan Yuntian and the others earlier and had arrived at some preliminary guesses about this world.

Interesting, thought Gu Suihan as he looked into the distant sky. In that case, cultivators of Truth are still the leaders of this world, but there are also who have inherited an ancient method of cultivating physically. Could the Way of Martial Arts have something to do with the Barbaric Race? Or the long-lost Wiccans?

“I don’t know what you took from that ship besides the gold that makes that old fart² in that palace so fixated upon it, but it can’t be anything ordinary,” Disciplinarian Zhang’s voice suddenly rang in Gu Suihan’s head. “I’m not after that thing, but you must remember that you must not let anybody else know about this matter, or else great disaster will befall you.”

Gu Suihan nodded almost unnoticeably as he looked gratefully at Disciplinarian Zhang.

But he was actually snorting in disdain on the inside. Disciplinarian Zhang sounded like he was giving him kindly advise, but it was really as good as a threat. If Gu Suihan had been any other ordinary person, he would probably have secretly surrendered the item in fear to Disciplinarian Zhang to save his own skin.

However, in Gu Suihan’s opinion, Disciplinarian Zhang had handled this matter rather poorly.

More importantly, there was no way Gu Suihan was handing it over to Disciplinarian Zhang or the sect itself. If he gave it to the former, he would get a few words of encouragement and be able to do what he wanted under Disciplinarian Zhang’s name, so he would have an added layer of protection.

If he gave it to the latter, he would probably receive a huge number of resources as a reward. In comparison, doing this was much more worth it than the former.

But the main point was that Gu Suihan needed this item for something else that was much more important, and he wasn’t going to give it up for such little benefit.

Disciplinarian Zhang, on the other hand, was a little pleased when he saw Gu Suihan’s expression and felt that Gu Suihan was a boy who knew how to do the right thing at the right time. Looks like the thing that made Nan Yuntian nearly start a fight and fall out with all the sects is going to fall into my pocket real soon, he thought merrily to himself. This thought made Disciplinarian Zhang’s expression soften.

Several hours later, the flying boat began to slow down, and Disciplinarian Zhang said, “We’re almost at our destination, so all of you, get yourselves ready and make sure you don’t embarrass me.”

His words clearly gave the bored and listless people in the boat an energy boost. Even though they weren’t sure what he meant by not embarrassing him, everyone got rather excited anyway.

“Oh my god!”

“How is that possible?!”

“That couldn’t have been done by a human!”

Several exclamations suddenly filled the air.

Gu Suihan looked out and saw a huge mountain ahead of them that looked about a thousand meters high or so. But what made everyone exclaim was that the three words “Seven Kill Sect” were carved into the smooth side of the mountain that faced them. The strokes were thick and magnanimous, yet aggressive at the same time. It was as if the strokes could stab your eyes if you stared at it for too long.

After taking a quick look at it, admiration flickered in Gu Suihan’s eyes as he thought, the person who wrote these words has a level of cultivation in the Way of the Sword that is above most people. It’s just three words, but one can see more than ten ways in which he had understood the Way of the Sword. The blade was thick and steady, with a fierce and murderous aura and covers such a large area. This is not something someone can achieve in a short time. In fact, it’s almost a miracle.

“These words were inscribed here by one of the first disciples of the Seven Kill Sect several centuries ago. He could split a mountain in half, write such words and kill with just one swing of his sword. Definitely a legendary figure from those days,” one of the disciples explained smugly to the new disciples. “It took him ten years to reach the Foundation Establishment stage and a century to reach the Origin Core stage. There was nobody before him who could achieve this, and none after. There’s still nobody who can surpass him today.”

“What happened in the end?” asked several of the newbies curiously with looks of admiration on their faces.

“In the end?” The disciple’s expression fell as he sighed sadly, “In order to save a person, he was willing to be trapped for centuries.”

“He was doing that for a fellow disciple he loved, I suppose?” said one of the young ladies in a besotted voice as she stared admiringly at the mountain.

“Psh!” Li Rong couldn’t help but scoff. “A disciple he loved, my foot.”

“You mean the person wasn’t?” She looked rather disappointed.

“He did it for his Master, Xuran zhenren,” said a tired voice from behind. Everyone turned and realized that it was actually Disciplinarian Zhang, who had been silent all this while. There was a conflicted look in his eyes as he stared at the mountain before them.

“Xuran zhenren was one of the seven leaders of the Seven Kill Sect, but it was found out by accident that he had deep ties with the Vast Sky Sect, and he had leaked several of our secrets to the Vast Sky Sect, so our sect suffered great damage. The sect leader then was furious when he found out about the leak and ordered a thorough investigation, almost going as far as casting a Soul-Searching Spell on everyone. But in the end, this man took the rap and agreed to guard the Demon Abyss for 300 years as his punishment. This was just so that Xuran would be able to go through the reincarnation cycle without having his soul torn apart.”

The Clacker’s Seaweed Fanclub

Today’s snack recommendation: Tao Kae Noi. It’s so full of seaweed tasty you totally forget the salt. Also extremely addictive, regardless of which flavor or form you prefer. Okay, except their weird attempt at tempura. MSG: ****

1. Ruyi Scepter
2. Old fart. The original Chinese text uses a colloquial term, 老不死 which literally means old but not dead. Used to refer (with much annoyance) to an older person you wish were dead/gone but isn’t, e.g. an irritating college professor who refuses to retire, a finicky manager whom you wished would quit etc.