I woke up feeling a little chilly, I noticed shimmer was nowhere to be found and looked over to Jia to see the little fox snuggled in her arms.
I woke up Jia, and she and Ji joined me for some early morning stretches. Even shimmer did some stretches while we were. We worked out the sleepiness from the night and joined the caravan in their morning routine. We left the village with great cheer and thanks from the villagers and made our way back on the road to Liusha city.
Just like when we made the first leg of our trip, we sometimes ran into various demon beasts and wild animals. We didn’t see any sign of the bandits that had attacked the village, but taking a detour to break up a new outcropping of bandits wasn’t something we felt we could do.
One day, a few days outside Liusha city while we were passing under the taiga below the Liusha mountain range I was cultivating like normal when a qi blast launched up from the front of the caravan.
I stopped cultivating and brought out my swords of the halcyonic sea, grasping two within my hands and leaving the third hovering over my shoulder. I used the qi within my body to enhance myself. I sped up and made it to the front of the caravan within half a minute. When I reached the front of the caravan it was a scene of mayhem. Multiple guards from the mercenaries were now bleeding on the ground from arrows taken into various parts of their bodies.
Jia was holding off three men at once and doing her best to dodge any arrows launched at her. Ji had joined her at this point and was holding off a few men on his own. The attackers looked like stereotypical bandits and acted like them too.
“Hand over the goods and I'll promise we’ll kill you quickly after we have some fun with you girl.” One of the bandits yelled at Jia.
“How about I cut you where the sun doesn’t shine instead, ugly.” Jia snarled back, unleashing blades of razor thin snowflakes into the air around her. Each blade acted like a sword she could manipulate at will. She launched them at the men surrounding her and struck out with her sword at the same time. She struck down one of the bandits with her sword and another with the bladed snowflakes surrounding her. The last bandit ran away, and I joined the fight. Ji was still having trouble with the men he was fighting and a group of five additional bandits led by a much tougher looking gruff man came running out of the forest. I sent my one flying sword over to help Ji fight off his assailants and joined Jia, back to back to fight the remaining men.
One of the men launched himself at me, palms extended and coated with qi. I parried his blows with my swords and pushed hum back, kicking him strongly in the stomach causing him to roll on the ground. I felt Jia behind me, the air getting colder as we fought. I heard her strike out and another man scream in pain. The leader bandit seemed to read the situation correctly and yelled at us before running.
“You’ll regret fighting back, you wenches. C’mon boys, let’s head back to base!” He said before running back into the woods. The remaining bandits left in the clearing ran away as well and we were left in silence. None of us put away our weapons though and waited for a minute to ensure they had run away.
“Oh thank you all for fighting so well and driving those bandits off!” One of the merchants said as he came up to us.
“It’s no problem, I’m only sorry we couldn’t get here in time to prevent the mercenaries from being injured.” I said.
“Worry not.” The merchant said.
“We’ll take care of the wounded; you all just focus on protecting us.” He said.
We all nodded and began cultivating as the caravan took care of the wounded. We were all breathing somewhat heavily but it was a successful fight in the end. We talked about the fight, what we could have done better and what we should improve on. We all agreed that in the future we should shoot the qi blast into the air earlier than we did this time. It took us too long to make it to the front of the caravan. We agreed that we would send up a qi blast at the first sign of any bandits in the future.
The caravan began moving again and we made our way back on the road to Liusha city.
A few days later another attack occurred. This time at the middle section of the caravan. The qi blast went up quicker this time and both Jia and I arrived well before any of the mercenaries were injured. We again beat back the bandits and they escaped back into the forest. The remaining days of the caravan we spent on high alert, but nothing happened.
We were only one day out from Liusha city when the unthinkable happened. I was cultivating on top of one of the wagons when Shimmer yowled at me. I rolled out of the way, used to the warning sign that I was about to be attacked. A pair of arrows landed in the wagon where I had just been sitting. I summoned my swords and infused my whole body with qi from within. I saw where the attack had come from and sent up a qi blast into the air. To my astonishment, another qi blast came from out in the forest and intercepted mine before it could fly high enough to alert the others.
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I was beset upon by multiple bandits. I sent another qi blast up into the air and this time, when the offending blast came out from the woods, I sent my remaining flying sword out and intercepted the qi. The explosion from the impact dissipated the qi sword and I was left with only the two in my hands. Luckily my qi blast made it up into the air and exploded in a shower of sound and sights. The caravan stopped and I knew my friends would be on their way now.
I threw both my swords up to block the down swing of a gigantic waraxe held by a larger bandit. I was forced to abandon my swords as a pair of swords attacked me on each flank. I jumped backwards as a gout of flame launched at me. Unfortunately, the fire and water sword was the one that was dissipated. As the bandits approached me, I used my connection with the swords now on the ground to call them to my side. They flew to my sides, and I took a combat stance, flooding my body with qi.
The man with the waraxe attacked again with a large downward swing. I moved into melee range ducking under his swing and delivering a combo of punches into his solar plexus. He doubled over, dropping his axe in the process and falling to the ground. I backed up and did a backflip to dodge the two swords aiming to take off my head. At this point additional men showed up from the forest and multiple arrows flew in my direction. I dodged them by running behind one of the wagons. The additional bandits made the most of this opportunity by charging at me during my dodging.
Before they could reach me, Ji dropped down from the wagon above and engaged the three men. He punched out with both fists coated in his silvery steel qi, but he seemed to move more fluidly than before. The three men went down, and we rushed back to the main fight at the back of the caravan with the mercenaries doing their best to fight off the rogue cultivators. Gouts of flame and streams of water flew towards us in addition to arrows from the woods. We dodged out of the way but the scene unfolding before us was demoralizing.
A veritable platoon of bandits was flooding out from the woods, using the opportunity presented by us being distracted to swarm the mercenaries. We jumped into action, me using the soft steps on the halcyonic sea technique to teleport from group to group of bandits, taking out as many as I could to relieve the pressure on the mercenaries. I heard Shimmer yowl at me and dodged out of the way. Two swords swung through where my body had just been, and I struck out at their wielders with my two remaining qi swords while using my fists to parry blows from two other men.
I was close to being overwhelmed by the throng of bandits when I felt the temperature near me drop and Jia appeared behind a nearby bandit, cutting him down. She was coated in a swarm of bladed snowflakes, making deep gashes in anything they touched. She flowed from bandit to bandit, an icy dance of death and blades. We all fought near each other, providing any assistance to the others that we could. We were steadily taking out the bandits despite their endless number of reinforcements. We had been fighting nonstop for a few minutes and we were all running low on qi when a booming voice cried out over the sound of fighting.
“I’m Yuan Qei, the Bloodletter, sub-leader of the black fang gang. Surrender all your treasures and women and we may let you live bwahahahaha!” He called out from his spot at the edge of the forest. He wasn’t hiding his strength, and we could all feel it. He was at the middle stage of the core formation realm. We stood almost no chance of beating him in our current condition. The situation was turning bad, but another voice that was familiar to me sounded out over the cacophony of fighting.
“How about you leave your head instead?” Cassandra called out from her place at the opposite edge of the forest from his location. Cassandra was flanked by seven other disciples proudly showing off their robes as members of the Blooming Violet sect.
“Get ‘em guys!” She called out and the disciples around her all joined the fray. Within a minute they had all defeated the remaining bandits we weren’t fighting.
Faster than I could track, Cassandra appeared next to Yuan Qei and slashed out at him with her sword. He dodged her attack, and they began trading blows in earnest. The other disciples flowed around us and into the forest behind. We all finished our fights and fell to the ground in exhaustion. We watched in awe as Cassandra fought with the core formation realm cultivator and they traded blows and techniques. Cassandra flowed like a river dodging his attacks like rocks in a stream. She parried an attack from his sword and used her sword snaking it around his like a snake coiling up to attack its prey. With a flick of her wrist, she took off his head and the fight was over.
Cassandra looked every bit the war maiden she was at this moment for us and we all looked at her in awe as she walked over to us.
“Hi cuties! Looks like you invited a new cutie to your party. Sorry to interrupt your sect mission but we accepted the mission to eradicate the Black Fang Gang. Hope you guys aren’t hurt anywhere.” She said as she fussed over each of us, even Ji.
“No, we were almost overrun by those bandits. We wouldn’t have been able to fight that core formation cultivator if you hadn’t come to help us, Cassandra. Thanks again for the save.” I told her.
She smiled warmly at us.
“That guy was a pushover; he probably got his cultivation by using pills instead of training the long way. You three would have easily handled him together considering your cultivation levels.” She said as she studied us some more.
“I see you roped Ji here into your weird cultivation thing you guys have been up to behind everyone’s back. I’ll have to have you explain it to me when we get back to the sect!” She told us.
I froze in place and put my best confused look on my face I could muster.
“I have no clue what you mean Cassandra.” I told her.
She rolled her eyes and smiled at me knowingly.
“Oh, you know what I mean for sure, you may be cute, but you’re an awful liar Astra. We’ll talk back at the sect, for now we have a mission to go complete, bye cuties!” She said blowing each of us a kiss as she left.
“Who was that?” Ji said, an awestruck look on his face. I looked at Jia and she looked back at me, and we both shook our heads, smiling.
“We’ll tell you about her later buddy.” We said to the smitten Ji.
The rest of the trip for the caravan to Liusha city was uneventful. A few demon beasts attacked the caravan, but we were able to kill them. As we crested a hill situated between two mountains, we saw the sprawling expanse of Liusha city nestled in a valley.