The night grew darker, and the old locust tree stood in silence.
Suddenly, a figure appeared on the wall of the courtyard. Faintly visible, he wore a black daoist robe and had a thin, bamboo-like figure. He held two corpses in his hands.
With a casual throw, the two corpses fell to the ground, followed by a leap that brought the daoist into the courtyard.
"Hmm, Qing Wan, someone is living in this courtyard?"
Due to the darkness, the daoist could now see that the abandoned courtyard, once overgrown with weeds, had been cleaned and restored.
"Wu Ruoqiu, you've finally come," answered Su Yi with his indifferent voice.
He had risen from the bamboo chair, casually holding the peach wood sword in his right hand, standing in the darkness, silently observing the other person.
This Wu Ruoqiu appeared to be around forty years old, fair-skinned, with a flowing beard. He carried a sword on his back and had a yellow gourd hanging from his waist, giving him an ethereal aura.
"Who are you? How do you know my name?"
Wu Ruoqiu was surprised and showed a vigilant expression.
Just as he finished speaking, a strange and piercing howl came from his mouth.
But after waiting for a long time, nothing happened as he had anticipated.
Wu Ruoqiu's heart sank, becoming somewhat anxious. What was going on?
"I've already killed all those corpse-eating insects. Shouting won't help you now," Su Yi said nonchalantly, taking a leisurely stroll towards Wu Ruoqiu.
"Who are you?" Wu Ruoqiu sternly asked, his eyes gleaming with determination, his entire being brimming with aura.
"Don't be nervous. Before we start fighting, I have a few questions for you," Su Yi replied, coming to a stop about ten feet away from Wu Ruoqiu.
Only now did Wu Ruoqiu clearly see that the person before him was a young teenager in his early teens, dressed in a green cloth robe, holding a wooden sword. He had a slender figure and emitted an aura that was only at the level of Blood Refinement stage.
Wu Ruoqiu immediately relaxed and self-mockingly thought, "I'm becoming more and more timid. I was almost scared by a fledgling Blood Refinement stage youngster."
He put his hands behind his back and coldly said, "Young man, you are not qualified to have a conversation with Wu. Go and call your master. I want to ask him how he taught his disciples without any manners!"
The connection with the corpse-eating insects in the well was severed, and even Qing Wan was hiding and not showing herself. This made Wu Ruoqiu suspect that there was another expert behind Su Yi.
Su Yi sneered and shook his head. "If there really is someone who can be my master, I might be delighted. Unfortunately... I have yet to encounter such a person."
Wu Ruoqiu sneered, "You still have the audacity to speak like this when you haven't even grown your hair! If you don't bring out your master, don't blame me for being impolite!"
His eyes flickered with sharpness, and his aura suddenly changed. As his qi circulated, a rumbling sound faintly echoed, like the roaring of waves.
This was the power that only a practitioner in the Qi Gathering stage could master.
Once a martial artist activated their inner energy, their blood would gather and boil, burning within them.
With the guidance of their qi, every movement in battle would be as precise as if measured with a ruler, without the slightest deviation. It was the epitome of control over one's strength.
Wu Ruoqiu was at the Qi Gathering stage, at the level of the Tongqiao phase. With his tough skin and sturdy muscles, ordinary blades and spears could hardly harm him.
A faint sneer appeared on Su Yi's lips as he said, "Then let me see how an insignificant character like you at the Tongqiao phase can be impolite."
"Wu has traveled the world for many years and has seen the arrogant, but never someone as arrogant as you!" Wu Ruoqiu said, chuckling with anger.
An insignificant character at the Tongqiao phase?
Listen to this! Is this what people say?
Suddenly, Wu Ruoqiu leaped forward, his sleeves billowing as he reached out to grab Su Yi's neck.
Boom!
A Qi Gathering stage expert made a sudden move, with a power as swift as thunder, overbearing and fierce. Just the aura alone could frighten a Blood Refinement stage practitioner!
Wu Ruoqiu's plan was simple: first capture Su Yi, and then force the expert behind him to reveal themselves. This way, he could establish an unbeatable position.
It seemed like he was about to grab Su Yi.
But at that moment—
A glimmer of a sword shadow appeared in the depths of Su Yi's pupils, accompanied by a cold and terrifying aura.
Boom!
Wu Ruoqiu felt as if his mind had been struck by lightning, his soul trembled, and everything went black before him. In a daze, he seemed to have fallen into an endless purgatory. A mysterious immortal sword descended from beyond the heavens, shattering the eternal darkness and pressing down upon him.
In that instant, terrifying sword intent surrounded him from all directions, above and below, with the sword's roar echoing in his ears and heart, as if countless gods were bellowing in fury.
A feeling of minuteness, helplessness, and despair surged within him, stimulating his state of mind to the point of collapse.
This sensation lasted only a moment.
However, under this impact, Wu Ruoqiu's charging figure froze, stopping exactly five steps away from Su Yi.
Five steps, the standard distance for life and death battles among martial artists.
It was said that within five steps, blood would splatter, and even an emperor would struggle to defend themselves. It was as if the enemy was within arm's reach, a situation where the entire world became an enemy!
And that was precisely the case now.
Right within this five-step range, Su Yi made his move.
With a simple and straightforward thrust of his sword.
Fast, precise, and ruthless!
It was as if it was an instinctive reaction honed through countless sword exercises, reaching the pinnacle of precision, speed, and ruthlessness.
Plop!
The blunt wooden sword pierced through the flesh and shattered the ribcage in Wu Ruoqiu's chest, carrying a devastating force as it passed through his body.
Hot blood spurted out from his back together with the tip of the sword!
Due to the tremendous force of the strike, Wu Ruoqiu's body bent forward like a cooked and curled shrimp.
His eyes widened in disbelief, his face filled with confusion. He could hardly believe it as he hoarsely said, "You... Are you really at the Blood Refinement stage?"
"Absolutely true," Su Yi casually withdrew the wooden sword and took three steps back.
Wu Ruoqiu's body trembled violently, and a gush of blood erupted from the hole in his chest like a spring. If Su Yi hadn't evaded in time, he would have been drenched in it.
Plop!
Wu Ruoqiu fell to the ground, gasping in pain.
His injuries were too severe, and he could feel his vitality rapidly slipping away.
"You... You said you had something to ask... Why... Why did you strike so ruthlessly? If I die, you won't know anything," Wu Ruoqiu intermittently spoke, filled with confusion.
Su Yi casually replied, "Oh, I'm not interested in knowing now."
Wu Ruoqiu: "..."
He was so enraged that he spat out a mouthful of blood.
Gritting his teeth, Wu Ruoqiu screamed with resentment, "You've ruined a major event for my sect, so get ready for retaliation!"
With those words, Wu Ruoqiu lay on the ground, devoid of any breath, and died just like that.
His wide-open eyes were filled with unwillingness.
Perhaps he hadn't expected that a single mistake would cost him his life at the hands of someone at the Blood Refinement stage.
"Even a trace of the branded aura couldn't withstand it. The spiritual souls of the warriors in the Great Zhou Dynasty are truly weak..." Su Yi shook his head inwardly.
Previously, he had used a trace of the aura from the "Nine Purgatory Sword" in his mind.
Although this trace of aura was extremely faint and weak, it was still something that a Qi Condensation stage cultivator like Wu Ruoqiu couldn't contend with, causing his spiritual soul to suffer the impact.
It was precisely because of this opportunity that Su Yi was able to pierce through his chest with a single sword strike.
"If I had known earlier, I should have confronted him head-on. Although it would have caused some trouble, with my current cultivation and proficiency in swordsmanship, I would have been able to kill him."
Previously, Su Yi had thought that Wu Ruoqiu was a demonic cultivator who possessed many vicious methods. That's why he didn't plan to directly confront him and instead used a bit of his trump card by depleting his own cultivation base.
Who would have expected that the other party would be foolish enough to only rely on their cultivation base to fight, without using any wicked techniques or powers?
"It seems I have taken these worldly demonic cultivators too seriously," Su Yi self-mockingly thought.
Now, in retrospect, Wu Ruoqiu wasn't stupid. It was he, a Qi Condensation stage cultivator, who had underestimated himself because he possessed the Blood Refinement cultivation base.
From this, it could be seen that having weaker cultivation had its advantages—it made the opponent underestimate and become careless.
"Do you know which sect Wu Ruoqiu belongs to?" Su Yi's gaze turned towards an old locust tree not far away.
"Reporting to Master, I... I'm not aware of this matter," a red figure appeared flustered and anxious on one of the branches.
She nervously twisted the corner of her clothes, lowering her head, and her slightly chubby and beautiful face was filled with a sense of weakness, helplessness, and pitifulness.
She had witnessed the scene where Wu Ruoqiu was killed with a single sword strike, and if she hadn't tightly covered her mouth in advance, she would have almost screamed in horror at the bloody sight.
Su Yi didn't ask any further and squatted down to search for Wu Ruoqiu's belongings.
There was a sheathed longsword, a yellow gourd, three silver bills with a face value of one thousand liang each, a pouch containing about twenty liang of broken silver, and a yellowed book with only a few pages left.
Apart from these, there was nothing else worth noting.
Su Yi put away the silver bills and silver, then picked up the yellowed book.
The book was tattered, with only a few remaining pages containing some vicious techniques for sacrificing and nurturing ghost corpses and worms, filled with dark and evil content.
After hastily skimming through it, Su Yi couldn't help but feel disappointed. Even in the hands of those involved in crooked paths, the techniques in the book were crude and laughable.
However, Su Yi did notice a line of words at the end of the last page of the book:
"Yin Sha Sect, bestowed upon my disciple Wu Ruoqiu by Weng Yunqi."
Su Yi immediately understood.
The sect behind Wu Ruoqiu was the "Yin Sha Sect," and his master's name was Weng Yunqi.
"When he said I ruined a major event for his sect before he died, it seems that Wu Ruoqiu's involvement in nurturing ghost corpses and worms was instigated by the Yin Sha Sect."
Su Yi's eyebrows slightly raised.
He had a hunch that there must be more places in Guangling City where the Yin Sha Sect nurtured these ghost corpses and worms.
In other words, there should be similar "nurturing grounds" for these creatures in other parts of the city.
As he pondered, Su Yi had already torn the book into pieces. Such evil techniques, if obtained by others, could cause great harm.
Next, he picked up the sheathed longsword.
The scabbard was made of ink iron, and as he unsheathed the sword, a pungent stench of blood and decay assailed his senses.
Su Yi's brow furrowed, revealing a look of disgust.
This sword was forged from Songwen wood, with a layer of dark red blood coating the blade and a faint green sheen on the edge. Its aura was extremely foul.
"To think that this sword was nurtured with the blood of an unmarried woman's Tiankui. What kind of demonic cultivator is he? Simply disgraceful!"
Su Yi shook his head in disgust, feeling nauseous.
Crack!
Su Yi exerted force with his palm, causing the wooden sword to shatter into splinters, which he then completely incinerated with a burst of fire.
"Hmm, this gourd is somewhat interesting."
As Su Yi picked up the lone yellow gourd, he finally became somewhat interested.