The Nine Cauldrons

“Qingshan, it is usually very difficult to locate where natural treasures grow, so we should not panic,” Ji Hong said. “Hmm, Guan Lu and her men have already returned.” They could just make out the elite core disciples that were still tens of Zhang away.

“The Commander and his men are back, go prepare dinner!”

A wide variety of prepared food was brought out by the ten servants. The eighty odd men gathered and began to devour the food dished out on the brand new tables that had been made that afternoon. The elites from Gui Yuan Sect were able to enjoy good food that was comparable to food from top quality restaurants.

Thank goodness that there was good wine!

“The chef Yang Ta sent did a pretty good job with the dishes,” Ji Hong praised.

Teng Qingshan held a big bowl of wine and took a sip as he smiled and said, “Commander, the warriors around us are all green with envy.” Ji Hong also took a glance at the warriors a distance away and laughed.

Some of these warriors were eating plain buns and drinking cold water, while others hunted and roasted some food for themselves.

No matter what they ate, how could it ever compare to what the people from the Gui Yuan Sect ate?

To be able to enjoy dinner prepared by specialised chefs and many servants, was it even possible for the other warriors to not be envious? However, no matter how jealous they were, it was useless.

......

After having their fill of wine and food, some of the warriors of the Gui Yuan Sect went into their tent to train their internal strength, while the rest sat outside and started to chat in small groups.

“Qingshan!” Ji Hong and Qingshan took a walk at the foot of the mountain. “Did any warriors challenge you this afternoon?”

“Yes there were.” Teng Qingshan felt helpless as he said, “And there were three of them, but I didn’t pay them any heed as their capabilities were mediocre!”

As if he had expected it, Ji Hong said, “This isn’t unusual! You are only 17 years old now. In the eyes of many warriors, you can’t possible be that strong. Even if you defeated Meng Tian, they would also think that you employed treacherous methods, such as using poison!”

Teng Qingshan was stunned.

“Anyway, there will definitely be quite a number of people who do not feel that you are that strong and would want to use you as a stepping stone to spread their fame.” Ji Hong turned back and looked at Qingshan. “Qingshan, I am ordering you, if there are any more people who challenge you, you’ll have to take up those challenges! Furthermore, you will need to be vicious, to the extent of even killing them.”

“Qingshan, you do not only represent yourself now. You are also representing the younger generation of our Gui Yuan Sect! In the eyes of outsiders, you, who defeated Meng Tian, is the top warrior amongst the younger generation of the Gui Yuan Sect! Therefore, you can’t back down. You will have to be vicious, to kill! After killing a few of the challengers, the rest of them will start to be fearful. From that point on, there will be less people who would dare to challenge you.” Ji Hong said.

Teng Qingshan said, “No need to kill them, but I will make it unforgettable for them!”

“Don’t go easy on them.” Ji Hong laughed. “Among the innate masters today, there was one elder of Northwest Yongzhou’s Ying Clan, one of the eight biggest sects, by the name of ‘Ying Rufan’ who is quite strong. He was listed in the 《Hidden Dragon Ranking》 when he was young and there were many who went to challenge him. He always tried not to overdo it and barely injured anyone, let alone killing them! In the end? Many people took advantage of his kindness and purposely looked for opportunity to challenge him in a bid to test out their skills with their swords and blades......In the end, only when Ying Rufan could not take it and became ruthless did he get peace of mind!”

One who’s kind would always get bullied. There lay some truth in these words.

“Brother, this wild rabbit doesn’t taste bad, let your brother try some.” A voice came from not far away.

“Hmm?” Ji Hong looked over in surprised.

Ji Hong’s look of surprised intrigued Teng Qingshan and made him turn his head as well. He saw a man, who was full of stubble, sitting there as he roasted a wild rabbit as a nice smell spread out. Beside him stood three sturdy looking warriors, one of whom was already reaching out to grab the roasted wild rabbit.

“Hmm? One-armed?” Teng Qingshan could tell with one glance that the man in the cloth robe was obviously one-armed since the space where his left arm was supposed to be was empty.

“You guys had better scram further away.” The man spoke out with a cold voice.

“Hmm?” The face of the three warriors turned solemn, and one of them shouted, “Don’t try to be smug when we are still being nice. (Has a literal meaning of don’t be be mean to people that give you face when you don’t want face). We brothers are giving you face by eating one of your wild rabbits. If you want to start a fight, we wouldn’t mind sending you to the King of Hell.”

With a ‘clang’, the one-armed man pulled out the saber at his waist.

The three warriors couldn’t help but take a step back.

But the one-armed man sliced off a piece of the rabbit’s meat with his saber and ate it, nodding his head, before he sliced off another piece.

“Making a fool out of us” The faces of the three warriors sank, and one of them hollered, “Brothers, let’s teach this crip—-”

Before he could say the word ‘cripple’, a flash of green light appeared!

Boom!

A vigorous whistle sounded in the air, followed by a loud scream.

The three warriors looked at the one-armed man in horror, the face of one of them paled as the man grabbed his right arm. There were traces of blood on the wrist of his right arm, the tendons of his arm were cut.

From the start to end, the three of them did not even see the other party brandishing his saber!

On the other hand, the one-armed man slowly returned his saber to its scabbard as he coldly said, “Scram!”

The three of them exchanged glances, and knowing that the other party had let them off lightly, they quickly escaped.

“How fast. Such a terrifying saber.” Teng Qingshan was astonished.

This slash was definitely not slower than Meng Tian’s Blood Moon Blade. Furthermore, the one-armed man had remained seated on the floor when he attacked with his saber. The posture was awkward, but the prowess displayed was still tremendous.

“I didn’t think that he would be here as well.” The eyes of Ji Hong gleamed. “Let’s head off first. He doesn’t like people bothering him.” The one-armed man shot a glance at Ji Hong before lowering his head to continue feasting on the wild rabbit.

Teng Qingshan was increasing confused.

Accompanying Ji Hong on their way back, he asked, “Commander, who is he?”

“Thunder God Blade ‘Wu Yue’!” Ji Hong solemnly replied.

“Thunder God Blade?” Teng Qingshan was stunned.

“The 9th ranked person on the 《Earth Ranking》!” Ji Hong added. Teng Qingshan was astonished. “9th? Meng Tian was only ranked 61st, how strong is this Wu Yue?” Teng Qingshan could of course guess the difference in strength between the 61st and 9th. Only when the rankings were close was the difference in strength relatively small.

But, to be able to be placed amongst the top ten of the 《Earth Ranking》, while Meng Tian was lowly ranked amongst the last few.

This Wu Yue was definitely stronger than Meng Tian, and by a lot.

“When Wu Yue was young, he was already listed on the 《Hidden Dragon Ranking》at the age of eighteen, and was also once listed among the top ten in the 《Hidden Dragon Ranking》. Many people had thought that he had a glorious future waiting for him!” Ji Hong exclaimed. Even people like Zhuge Yun and Yue Song were not qualified to be listed in the 《Hidden Dragon Ranking》, it went to show how difficult it was to be on this list.

“But when he was twenty-six, he led the men from his sect out to battle and lost one of his arms. There was no news of him since then for nearly twenty years, but in these two years, his fame suddenly increased with him defeating three warriors from the 《Earth Ranking》. The skills of his blade were named after speed. Once his skills are displayed, it would be as if a green flash of thunder, therefore his blade was named ‘Thunder God Blade’.” Ji Hong was full of praise as he continued, “This art of the Thunder God Blade was non-existent previously, so it was obviously created by him. He is now ranked 9th on the 《Earth Ranking》, but he has not suffered a single loss since. There is still a possibility for his rank to increase!”

After hearing this, Teng Qingshan also started to feel a sense of respect for this one-armed man.

To be able to be ranked amongst the top ten in the 《Earth Ranking》despite being crippled, his talent and determination was one to be fearful of.

“A young warrior is challenging Tie Yi Hall’s top warrior among the youngest generation, ‘Feng Wuxue’. Brothers, let’s go quickly.” An excited shout came from a distance away.

Teng Qingshan turned to look, and saw a large number of warriors running west.

“Feng Wuxue?” Back in Gui Yuan Sect, Teng Qingshan had long checked out the lists of the 《Hidden Dragon Ranking》, the 《Young Phoenix Ranking》, as well as the 《Earth Ranking》. That Feng Wuxue was the young warrior ranked 68th on the 《Hidden Dragon Ranking》

“Let’s go. Feng Wuxue? Qingshan, Let’s go and take a look.” Ji Hong smiled as he said.

Teng Qingshan and Ji Hong also hurried over.

Close to a thousand men gathered in a circle, leaving a space of a distance of tens of Zhang in the center. It was likely that most of the warriors in the vicinity had gathered over.

The sound of the clashing of metal sounded out.

“Hu!” “Boom!”

A deep hole appeared on the surface of the land, and two figures were criss-crossing at great speeds.

This was the scene that they saw when Teng Qingshan and Ji Hong arrived.

“That challenger is also an expert.” Ji Hong’s eyes gleamed when he saw this. Teng Qingshan asked, “Commander, which of them is Feng Wuxue?”

“The one in silvery white. The challenger is the young man in short sleeves.” Ji Hong said.

“Clang!”“Clang!”“Clang!”......

Ten consecutive clashes rang as more than ten slashes of the blade cut across the night sky.

“Pu!” A splash of blood flew, as the young man dressed in silvery white was tossed onto the ground. There was a blade wound on his chest and blood was slowly streaming from it. In an instant, a large number of warriors from the Tie Yi Hall quickly gathered up to check on his wounds and stop the blood.

“Wuxue, how are you feeling?” An elder from the Tie Yi Hall asked worriedly.

“Elder, the wound is not fatal.” A middle aged man spoke out.

Chaos boiled amongst the almost thousand warriors that had gathered. No one had expected that a nameless young man would be able to defeat ‘Feng Wuxue’, the top warrior amongst the younger generation in the Tie Yi Hall. Feng Wuxue sat on the floor and shot a cold stare at the young man dressed in short sleeves as he bellowed, “What is your name!”

“Listen carefully, my name is Yan Tie!” The young man in short sleeves replied cheerfully.

It was then Teng Qingshan realised, the young man was bare-footed!

......

“Yan Tie, this guy by the name of Yan Tie is quite powerful. To think that he defeated Feng Wuxue!”

“It was such a pity for Feng Wuxue. If that slash of his sword had been a bit faster, he would have pierced Yan Tie, but the ten odd slashes from Yan Tie were really intense, each stronger than the last. Feng Wuxue was not able to hold out against it.”

“Look at that Yan Tie, he is pretty young. There will probably be a change in the names on the 《Hidden Dragon Ranking》 again.

......

Many young warriors looked at Yan Tie in envy. After this battle, Yan Tie’s name would quickly spread across the world. Whoever that was able to defeat Yan Tie at that point would be able to step over him, but looking at the terrifying display of prowess by Yan Tie and Feng Wuxue, none of them dared to step up for the challenge.

“Hey, look, the young man beside Commander Ji Hong is Teng Qingshan! He defeated Meng Tian!”

“He didn’t just defeated Meng Tian, he killed him! This Teng Qingshan will probably be listed in the next 《Earth Ranking》.

There were many people present, and it did not take long for them to identify Teng Qingshan.

“The person who is able defeat Teng Qingshan hands down, in front of so many people, may be able to replace him on the 《Earth Ranking》.”

At that moment —

“Teng Qingshan! I am the head of Zhong Jian Sect, ‘Si Maseng’. I have heard of your skills in the art of the spear and would like to exchange some blows with you.” A loud bellow rang out in the sky, and the almost thousand warriors around got excited. The earlier exchange was between warriors at the level of 《Hidden Dragon Ranking》. Now, it was actually between warriors of the 《Earth Ranking》 level.

Teng Qingshan frowned.

“Qingshan. It’s just nice that there are many people here. Be more vicious and intimidate them!” Ji Hong was a bit excited as he threw a complacent glance at the Elder of Tie Yi Hall, ‘Wei Canglong’.