"Ru Yujin! What the hell do you think you are doing?!"
Fen Kuang was almost steaming out of his ears with anger.
Too bad for him that the order was given already. However, that didn't mean I wasn't in trouble.
"Brother Kuang, we have lost this battle, but we are still fighting in a war! And I'm saving people who are doing it!"
"You—"
A ball of fire flew over the heads of our soldiers and hit Fen Kuang's shield with a sizzle, leaving behind a hole that Fen Kuang swiftly repaired.
"Fine! But the Great General will hear about it!"
Sadly, this was true even without Fen Kuang. Too many people saw me giving that order. I could be really digging my grave there. However, the prospect of death by Crystal Phoenix for now was still more present and terrifying than the prospect of death by Lin Deng.
I prayed to all gods that Lin Deng got badly wounded in a fight and was in no condition to order my execution.
In retrospect, that prayer might've done me more good than bad.
After that, Fen Kuang ran close to me. And soon the thing I was hoping for happened.
The signal of a general retreat sounded again, this time from the sky. When I lifted my head, I saw that Lin Chu himself was holding the horn, and exhaled with relief.
Lin Deng wasn't in sight, and neither was the enemy leader. Several smaller fights were still happening between Qi Condensation cultivators.
The officers became even more energetic. They began gathering the nearby soldiers to an organized retreat.
Ever so slowly, the entire army began to turn and fall back. The enemy crossbowmen started shooting at us again, now not afraid to hit their own, but my Clear Sphere protected against arrows well enough.
The horsemen, faster than our group of infantry, naturally began circling them in their hurry to get away. The group I and Fen Kuang were with got slightly ahead of the rest, and because of the soldiers in the way, was approaching the gate from the right side.
I looked with hope at the gate that was opening to meet us. But there was still a long stretch of ground between me and the blessed safety.
And then a blazing comet on a flying sword flew in front of us, cutting off our retreat. Behind her were several hundreds of horsemen in red, all fresh from reserve, rushing to get to the gate faster than the Lin army and cut off our retreat.
The comet sped up even more, leaving a trail of fire in her wake. The trail didn't disappear—it turned into a wall of fire that blocked our way.
That comet was the first cultivator I've seen who flew like that. She rode her sword faster than anyone else and stood on it like it was a beast's back and not a narrow but usually very stable flying platform.
For gods' sake, she was even leaving sparks in her wake!
The horses and men around me were beginning to panic, and the enemy cavalry was about to crush into us like a hammer. All the while, the safety was so tantalizingly close and so devastatingly far.
After blocking us with fire, the comet—calling her an ordinary jade-like beauty or a sword fairy didn't seem like giving her enough credit—flew up and slowed down enough that I could finally see her features.
She was a young woman, dressed in the red of the Tao clan and holding a wooden fan in each hand. Her cherry-red lips were curved into a pleased smile, and her striking blond hair flew freely on the wind. She was beautiful, in the way that hit a chord in my heart, but the knowledge that she was going to kill me soured the feeling.
Her Qi was fire-bright and eager, but without the impurity of Qi deviation.
Early Qi Condensation stage, I estimated. The only good thing about this was that the comet was alone.
From the comet, a terrifying feeling descended upon me. My heart sank, and not only because I was in imminent danger.
The woman's aura became a physically oppressive thing, inducing unnatural fear in me. That "aura" was something cultivators could use starting from the late Qi Foundation stage, at which they amassed enough Qi.
Then he could make it resonate with Qi in bodies of people nearby, forcing emotions on them. And even mortals had some Qi in them—an ambient amount.
However, an aura of someone like Fen Kuang could affect only people near him, and even then, it was weak. The comet's aura made even me twice as afraid of her as before, and she was over ten meters away from us. Ordinary soldiers near me were pissing their pants right now!
In that moment, my instincts, honed by fear, sharpened to the limit. All my being focused on surviving, no matter how many enemies I had to pass through to save my skin.
The gate was straight ahead, I just had to get past the comet.
"In Divine Dragon's forbidden name, that's… That's the Golden Phoenix!" Fen Kuang shouted. "She's the most unpredictable and beautiful warrior of the Tao clan, Tao Song!"
I glared at him.
"Don't gawk at her, just keep running!" I turned to the surrounding soldiers. "KEEP RUNNING! JUMP OVER THE FIRE! THE GATE IS NEAR!"
I charged ahead, dragging the corpse puppet with me by the arm. Next to me, Fen Kuang snapped out of it and turned on his own aura to counteract Tao Song's.
I was betting on my Clear Sphere to protect me, and I knew it would.
Her fire technique had a wide area of effect, but it only had as much strength as any other average Qi Condensation technique. Not enough to make this fire more powerful than normal fire, even if it was a meter tall!
I pushed through it, hearing my Clear Sphere sizzle, but it held. Fen Kuang was right after me, and our example and loud shouting broke the soldiers near me out of the panic induced by Tao Song's aura and fire.
"Jump! Jump over the fire!" an officer shouted. Other horsemen began to jump over the wall of fire, too, crying, "For the Purple Dragon Sect!"
The first horses whined from pain, and a few soldiers fell on the ground. Several horses refused to jump outright—but like I predicted, the fire wasn't too scary.
The energy in it was limited, and soon the mass of people passing through trampled it into the dirt.
But now the enemy horsemen almost caught up with us, and Tao Song took the place in the head of their charge.
"Kill them! FOR THE PHOENIX!"