For some reason, all the students of the Martial Arts Academy trembled when they saw the kind and handsome monk, a sense of fear rising within them. They all knew a little about Buddhism and had heard of its claim that the West was a paradise. But this was the Sui Dynasty, the capital Chang'an, the Sui people's paradise, not the Buddhist paradise.
"A Buddhist?" Liu Shuang asked in surprise, instinctively taking a step back, then gripping his sword tightly. These students of the Martial Arts Academy were not naive; they quickly calmed down and gathered together. They even consciously shielded Marilyn at the innermost part, warily watching the seemingly harmless young monk.
"Thank you, everyone."
Chen Ya bowed slightly and said sincerely. Liu Shuang didn't want to be at the front, but when he tried to retreat, he found his companions already in formation. If he forced his way in, he'd surely give the enemy an opening. He couldn't understand why he'd encountered Buddhist people outside the capital of the Sui Dynasty. Logically, even the most powerful Buddhists wouldn't dare set foot on Sui territory so easily. Especially not in the capital. Unless the Buddhists were suicidal, why would they take such a risk?
He took a deep breath, trying to calm himself.
"Thank us? Thank us for what?" he asked.
Chen Ya straightened up and smiled, replying, "Thank you for coming to cook the fish."
Liu Shuang didn't immediately understand. He only realized what was going on after glancing at Fang Henshui. Anger gradually replaced his fear. Even though he wasn't exactly a saint, the deep-seated pride of the Sui people made him puff out his chest.
"Who's the fish? Are you sure?" he asked Chen Ya.
Chen Ya nodded, pointing at them all, and said, "You are all fish."
He then pointed at Fang Henshui and said, "He is also a Sui person, but now he is bait."
Then he pointed to his own nose gently and said, "I am the fishing net."
Liu Shuang glanced back at his companions, quickly exchanging glances. Then he looked at Chen Ya again and said, word by word, "I know that since you dare to appear here, you must have something to rely on. Perhaps your cultivation is high enough that you don't take us seriously, but there's a saying you should have heard."
"What?"
"To the death, the fish and the net break!"
After saying this, Liu Shuang leaped high and slashed at Chen Ya's head with his sword. The battle came suddenly, without much conversation. Because they all knew that the Buddhist sect was the enemy of the Great Sui. And even if this person wasn't from the Buddhist sect, appearing in the capital Chang'an was a violation of the laws of the Great Sui. Therefore, they were irreconcilable enemies.
Liu Shuang's knife was swift. The instant he struck, he shouted, "Marilyn, retreat and get backup! Everyone else, cover her!"
When he finished speaking, his knife was less than an inch from Chen Ya's head.
Then, Liu Shuang died.
Chen Ya seemingly raised his hand slowly, but when his finger pointed at Liu Shuang's forehead, it was still a fraction faster than Liu Shuang's knife. Then, in mid-air, Liu Shuang's body suddenly jolted, his head snapped back, and a spurt of blood shot from the back of his head. This proud student of the Martial Arts Academy didn't even know who his enemy was before he died at his feet.
His body crashed heavily to the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust.
Liu Shuang was disliked by the other students, but at this moment, when they saw him lying motionless, when they saw the bloody hole in his forehead, everyone's eyes turned red.
"Kill!"
A student, brandishing a horizontal sword, charged forward. A few steps away from Chen Ya, he slashed down. His cultivation wasn't high, but he could barely control the sword's energy. The sword energy, extending less than a meter beyond the blade, was sharper than the sword itself, yet when it struck Chen Ya, it didn't even tear his clothes. In reality, it was just an illusion; the sword energy was deflected an inch away from Chen Ya.
Chen Ya smiled and pointed at him, then he too died.
In Chen Ya's eyes, these people who charged forward were a bunch of idiots who knew they were doomed but still rushed in. He thought all the Sui people were such idiots, and relatively speaking, that guy named Fang Henshui was much smarter. He liked Fang Henshui more than all the Sui people. Because he had never liked the Sui people, only hated them.
Three more people died in succession under Chen Ya's flicking finger; the last one to fall was still twitching.
Marilyn ran five or six steps, then turned back and gasped in horror at the sight before her. She tripped over something and fell heavily to the ground. Struggling to her feet, she tried to draw her sword and fight alongside her companions, but then she heard their roar.
"Get out! Go find the Master!"
Marilyn began to regret not bringing her signal flares.
...
...
She stumbled down the mountain, her foot slipping and tumbling down the slope. Her body slammed against tree roots and rocks, but she felt no pain. She was the daughter of General Guide, and from childhood she had always loved pestering her father to tell her stories of battlefield carnage. But stories were just stories; she had never seen a dead person, nor had she ever realized how terrifying killing could be.
She watched helplessly as her companions died one after another at the hands of that young monk, their familiar figures falling so helplessly.
But they were also fearless.
They already knew the vast difference in cultivation between themselves and the young monk, yet they chose to stay and try to hold off the enemy so that Marilyn could escape. Most of them were young masters from aristocratic families, their pampered lives instilling in them a certain arrogance. But at this moment, not one of them clung to life.
Besides Liu Shuang, the first to fall were the military candidates, for their fear of the enemy was the lowest among them all. As soldiers, they were prepared to die for their country. The two students who died after Liu Shuang were both soldiers. They advanced in a staggered formation, one feinting while the other launched a sneak attack. Well-trained, they unleashed their full strength, but they still couldn't outrun Chen Ya's fingers.
Liu Shuang was dead. Two soldiers were dead.
Six people remained, blocking Chen Ya's path.
The six of them formed a circle, refraining from a rash attack and slowly moving downhill back to back. But the terrain made their circle extremely vulnerable; it wasn't flat ground, but a hillside. Even if they didn't move, they couldn't guarantee the stability of the circular formation.
Chen Ya didn't seem in a hurry to stop the girl who had escaped to report the news; he was more interested in the students' clothing.
Uniform academy uniforms, uniform swords.
"You're not soldiers, but your clothes are the same, your swords are the same, even your backpacks are the same…and the style of your clothes is very special, let me guess…"
Chen Ya slowly pressed forward, his brows furrowed in thought. After a moment, a happy smile appeared on his lips: "I guessed it, you're all students of the Martial Arts Academy, aren't you?"
Upon hearing this, Fang Henshui's mind went blank, as if struck by lightning. He collapsed to the ground, staring at the three corpses, their heads pierced, his expression one of extreme anguish. He hadn't expected that those he had harmed were all students of the Martial Arts Academy.
A huge and heavy sense of guilt rose in his heart, suffocating him.
"Guilt?"
Just then, the bewitching old monk appeared behind him. The old monk sat cross-legged on the large, protruding rock, pointed at the three corpses, and said to Fang Henshui, "Regardless of anything, from this moment on, you are an enemy of the Great Sui. Wherever you go in this country, if people find out you betrayed the students of the Martial Arts Academy, you will only have one fate…to be torn to pieces by the enraged Sui people."
"Collect all the food from their bodies. If you can bring yourself to do it, use their knives to cut flesh from the thighs and buttocks of the corpses. You know we have a very, very long way to go to leave the Great Sui; if we run out of food, it will be incredibly painful for you. Of course…you have to do it even if you can't bring yourself to do it!"
"I won't!"
Fang Henshui cried out, then knelt down and frantically kowtowed to the old monk. "I beg you, I beg you, please spare them! I'm willing to be your slave, I'd even offer my own flesh for you to eat, but please don't kill anymore, please? I beg you..."
"What's the use of begging me?"
The old monk smiled slightly. "I wasn't the one who killed them."
He looked at Fang Henshui and said calmly, "You lured them here; you were the bait, and they were the fish. Without you, they wouldn't have died. So you can consider yourself the culprit who killed them; that's perfectly reasonable. If you feel guilty, you can commit suicide to atone for your sins. Look, the knife is not far from you; it's very sharp. If you're quick enough, you can slit your own throat and die without even feeling the pain."
"Want to try?"
He asked.
Fang Henshui's body trembled violently, but he ultimately didn't reach for the horizontal sword lying not far from him.
...
...
Chen Ya slowly raised his hand, pointing to a student from the Martial Arts Academy. But at that moment, his expression suddenly changed. Because he saw that the female student who had escaped earlier had returned.
"Marilyn, why didn't you run away!"
A student shouted, his voice trembling.
Marilyn gripped the knife; her uniform was filthy, and her face bore cuts from tree branches, but her hand holding the knife remained steady.
"I can't go back. You can't stop him, and if I go back, he can track me down to Yuan Chengshi and the others."
Her expression was exceptionally resolute as she spoke. The remaining martial arts students hesitated for a moment, then opened a crack in the circular formation: "Come in!"
"No!"
Marilyn bit her lip and said, "Three of my companions have already died because of me. We might all die, but I don't want you to die because of me. If we die… we will die together to defend the dignity of the Great Sui!"
"Die for the Great Sui!"
A student roared, seemingly unwilling to retreat any longer, and charged forward, slashing at Chenya with his knife, only to have it easily blocked by that finger. "Look how weak you are. And I, with a rotting, stinking bait, have caught so many fresh and delicious fish!"
As he finished speaking, a bloody hole suddenly appeared on the forehead of the student who had rushed to his side. Then his body went limp and he collapsed, the horizontal sword still tightly gripped in his hand.
Chen Ya sighed softly and slowly pointed his finger at Marilyn.
"Aren't you afraid of death?"
He asked.
Marilyn shook her head, her eyes seemingly dripping blood.
"Then you're next."
A burst of energy erupted from Chen Ya's hand, about to pierce Marilyn's forehead, when suddenly a dark figure appeared in front of her, holding a broken, short sword that perfectly blocked the energy. With a clang, the hand holding the sword trembled, but the person didn't retreat a step, and the broken sword wasn't pierced by the finger.
"They are not fish, nor are they bait."
The person who appeared before Marilyn was also dressed in the martial arts academy's uniform, and was equally young. He slowly straightened up, looking at Chen Ya and saying, word by word, "They are just a bunch of unlucky fools. I am the fish you want, and also the bait for others."
"Fang Jie!"
Marilyn exclaimed, her voice tinged with an unusual joy.
"Get lost!"
Fang Jie didn't turn around and cursed, "Get as far away as you can, don't die in front of me!"
After saying this, he slowly pulled the signal firework from his pocket, then pulled the pin. A cloud of smoke rose up and exploded very, very high.
At this moment, Fang Jie was furious.