"Yes, Master." Shou Xin sheathed the blade and the horrible killing intent which almost formed a field around him evaporate.
"If not for your non-existent control over your killing intent, it would have been a trash slash, but instead, it's completely useless. But that alone is better than before." Vienna's cold voice was like a splash of water unto Shou Xin.
But he was not upset.
"Thank you, Master."
He was also not satisfied.
Despite working tirelessly for more than two months in total at this point, he was still incapable of decapitation in a single swing. He could, at most, get it in two swings.
With such improvement, he could not feel happy at all.
Vienna suddenly vanished just as he was thinking so to himself.
"Master-!"
As he was speaking, he cut himself off, voices were coming from the foot of the small hill.
"Boss, I'm telling you, this is the place! The Shou Clan brat is here, he's the one who killed your brother!"
Brother? Killed?
Shou Xin threw up question marks but then realized.
He was likely talking about someone he had executed for Lord Sea Spring!
Shouldn't they be taking that up with the lord then? But he immediately dismissed this thought whilst grumbling.
"They can't take on the lord, so they come for me, is it."
"Weak bastards are all the same and die the same."
Vienna's words echoed in his mind from a day he couldn't remember.
----
"What should one do against those stronger than themselves?" He once dared to ask his father, during a day when he was actually home.
His father, who had gone blind in one eye during an incident in his youth, had at that time turned to the young Shou Xin pulling at his sleeve and hit him with a dreadful scowl.
"The only use in groveling is for getting a better angle at their throats. So you grovel and wait."
His Father was no kind man, but he was no fool either.
Shou Xin took the lesson with the pain and used it to engrave it into his body.
He chuckled scaring those who had gotten deep into the every thickening fog.
---
"W, Who?!"
"Reveal yourself!"
"By order of the Tuli Pavilion, reveal yourself this instant!"
A few moments of silence rose the tension and the men drew their weapons.
A sinister voice came from the fog carried by the light breeze, like a breath down their backs.
"Tuli Pavilion? I've never heard of it? Could it be a worm that escaped from the extermination? An old stepping stone of my Shou Clan?" His voice sounded manic like a horrible criminal, "How tragic, terribly tragic! My poor self is being attacked by worms thinking I'm already a corpse!"
"Guuaack!!"
A terrible scream rang out, yet, as the men looked around at each other, they found none of them were dead, so who screamed?
Opposing them, Shou Xin, looked at Vienna who hid in his shadow with fear, he had just grabbed his ankle out of nowhere and started laughing quietly, "So it was an act. Here I thought you'd grown up a little."
Shou Xin's facial expression went through many phases and landed back onto dark.
"There he goes, back to fake Xin." Vienna mumbled as he sat back to watch.
He was determined to make him into a Master, but that did not mean he would not let him die, it just meant he would not let him quit, if death called him he would simply follow his soul into the Chaos and continue there.
"Quit these sad games. Come out and fight!" A deep voice echoed through the fog.
A deafening silence responded.
That is, until the scream of a blade unsheathing came alongside a torrent of killing intent.
Immediately they all felt as though they were surrounded by beasts of every kind with no route to escape.
The thugs who had always been hunter, did not have the mental strength as prey and many broke and ran.
Gaaa!
Uwck!
Screams rose in the fog like a symphony of death, the killing intent rising with each second.
With that, the score was settled.
The men all broke and ran, save for their boss who stood his ground.
"Mind games. A special of the Shou Clan." He casually said.
"So you are my subordinate!" Shou Xin said relaxedly.
"Die."
He swung viciously into the fog from where the killing intent was strongest, a sharp scream erupting!
The boss smiled, but instantly felt someone was wrong with the sensation on his blade, it did not feel like flesh.
It was then his eyes flashed with realization.
From where did the scream erupt?
From behind!
"I don't think so."
But it was too late.
A fork had stuck itself into his skull as though to pick at his brain through his ears.
The mans eyes rolled back as he died horribly, unable to show his true prowess until the end.
Shou Xin however did not stop there, taking the Sea Spring Executioner's Blade, he beheaded the man to be as certain as Vienna was uncaring.
"Well done. Now is a good time to teach you the method of gathering Primeval Qi." Vienna stepped out from the shadow towering over Shou Xin, "There are various types of Qi depending on the path one chooses to follow, the law you comprehend. But, Primeval Qi is the most basic and neutral. It is the very life blood of yours, other's might call it essence."
Vienna raised a finger and pointed it to the corpse of the man, in the next moment, he burst into a million pieces becoming a blood fog, only a few small droplets of blood left over.
"You can only steal the Primeval Qi of others with no Cultivation. Normally, you could do so to those even with it, though take too much and you explode, but due to your insignificant talent, it is impossible." Vienna engraved something onto the Primeval Qi as he tossed it over to Shou Xin, "Absorbing it is the easy part."
Shou Xin who had the Primeval Qi thrust to him in blood form didn't know how to receive it and opened his mouth.
Vienna rolled his eyes.
The blood droplets entered through the Sea Spring Executioner's Blade, bathed in the Killing intent it had stocked up on through the centuries of use the Primeval Qi was further lessened to only the purest.
Within that empty void where his talent shivered in silence, a tiny, almost useless droplet of Primeval Qi appeared and dripped towards the void beneath.
"This is important, Trash. Pick your foundation wisely. Now catch the Primeval Qi in it."
Shou Xin who was sweating at this point could sense Vienna's intentions to kill him if he failed.
Focusing hard, he tried to envision many foundations, things he'd seen and places he'd been to, he needed something concrete, and powerful!
Yet, as he was bringing it all together, the Primeval Qi was falling further.
Not able to debate any longer he chose to go with something simple, but proven.
"A mound?" Vienna's voice almost instantly made Shou Xin feel death, "You choose a mound… huh."
Shou Xin didn't have time to contemplate upon his Master's words, the Primeval Qi had been caught, but it was not innate to his body and did not wish to stay no matter what.
Quickly, Shou Xin manipulated the mound to surround and bury the Primeval Qi, his little bit of talent floating above shook slightly and came down trying to process it.
"Ah, I forgot, didn't I? Another word for talent, ah what was it? That's right, that's right, it... is soul. Do be careful." Vienna waved and returned to Shou Xin's shadow.
That is not something you casually just say! Didn't you almost shatter it?! Shou Xin wanted to scream but did not have the courage to.
He didn't want to die yet.
Quickly however, he calmed.
Focusing on keeping the Primeval Qi trapped, he could feel the boisterousness of it as it tried to escape by any means, yet it was fully trapped.
Once the little droplet of Primeval Qi was consumed completely, Shou Xin felt a great relief, only for his body to suddenly seize forcing him to drop to the ground.
"Ah, that's right… When you consume the Primeval Qi of another, especially a mortal, the Great Path doesn't like that."
Shou Xin wanted to choke him, but couldn't even look at him.
His body shivered in extreme pain for a long time. Within his body the mound he had built up was beset upon by enemies in the form of little bolts of lighting more akin to a small shock.
Hiding his soul within the centermost, deepest part of the mound, he managed to save himself.
"Normally it would be no problem. But your talent is so trash that you have to take it into consideration."
"You… don't have friends." Shou Xin managed to bark out as his legs kicked in pain, trying to stand up.
Vienna grinned as though it were a compliment, nodding.
He wanted to strangle him, but resisted the urge as it was a death sentence.
As the pain finally subsided, Shou Xin slowly got up, grabbing the Tuli Pavilion leaders head he began towards the city.