"Jing Ke!"

Natsuki lifted her arms to her sides, in more of a taunting shrug than a defensive stance.

"You must be a thousand or so years old, correct? If so, then I am your senior by far. Come, I will permit you to attack first, as you permitted Bai Chunxue."

"Impertinent fool! If you offer me your head, then I will take it!"

Jing Ke raised his arm and pointed it at Natuski's chest, his hand tilted ever-so-slightly downward and one finger extended forward. A soundless explosion shot through the air, producing a blast of wind that sent me sliding several feet back on my feet. The explosion bore in on Natsuki, but she did not move. It would certainly open a hole right through her torso, but she did not move.

Instead, she placed her palm in front of her chest and caught the explosion. As if it were no more than a ball that a child had thrown to her, she caught it between her fingers—

and only then did I see the blue magic circling within her hand—

She pointed her arm back towards Jing Ke, angled ever-so-slightly upwards at his head, and the explosion was redirected! It blasted a hole through his skull so large that only an outline of it remained, then sheared the roofs off several buildings on the other side of the street, and finally blazed off beyond the horizon!

But, in no more than two breaths' time, Jing Ke's head was reconstituted, as if its fragments had been pulled from a minute's time past directly into the now.

"You fool!" Jing Ke shouted through the slightest of smirks, spreading his arms out wide. "You would challenge me without even knowing my abilities?! Your power is strong but your mind is lacking! Even Mount Tai will one day crumble to dust, but I—"

"I know very well about your tricks, Jing Ke. They are not that different from mine own."

With a flash of gold at her feet, she lunged forward—

and slammed her front foot into the ground right in front of Jing Ke with such force that the sound of thunder echoed across the courtyard! This was the truest essence of the golden lightning magic she had showed me, though I had not been able to master it so. Her movement was so fast that Jing Ke's eyes were still pointed several dozen meters away when she appeared right in front of him!

"Jing Ke, I would not normally grant you this honor, but because of your trickery, I have no choice but to kill you with the most powerful magic known under the heavens, the very apex of the study of the Seven Trigrams—"

With an ear-splitting sneer, she clasped her hands on Jing Ke's shoulders.

"Closure, Mountain Form: Amputation."

For just a moment, a flash of orange lightning seemed to pass from Natsuki's left arm, into Jing Ke's body, and— back into Natsuki's right arm. Jing Ke opened his mouth in horrific pain, and a great plume of copper-colored magic in the shape of an angel's wings burst from his back. He began to scream, and at that very moment the wing-plume turned back and pierced its feathers into his body like stakes, crucifying him in midair. His entire body spasmed and then froze, a silent cry affixed to his face. I could not tell just what had happened to him.

Natsuki thrust a hand into the center of his chest, then drew it back out. In her hand was—

—an elixir. It was circular, vaguely shaped like a soul, but it was clearly not a soul. Clearly, Jing Ke had taken some extra measures to avoid being killed by such an attack, even though I did not know of any cultivation technique that could reproduce what Natsuki was doing.

"A maze...? You've hidden your soul in a maze...?"

Frowning, Natsuki stepped back and raised a hand over her mouth.

"You'll... never... find it..." Jing Ke groaned through a thawing jaw, thawed enough for his mouth to curl upwards in what seemed to be a smile. Whatever suppression technique Natsuki had used on him would clearly not last much longer.

Natsuki raised her hand to the sky, fingers splayed wide, and the courtyard seemed to fall into shadow.

"One devours the sun, yielding two to blacken the sky, four to rend the earth, and eight to seal the heavens."

The invocation sounded vaguely familiar to me. I was certain that I had felt, seen, heard those very word come out of Natsuki's mouth before. When had it been? Where had I heard it before?

With a shrieking caw that rattled the very earth, a great three-legged crow dove down from the sun, its plumage darker than a moonless night. As it descended, its body shrunk and split, first into eight, then into sixty-four, then into five hundred twelve, then into numbers so great that I could see nothing but a vast sheet of pure darkness falling over the courtyard, like the great locust plagues that in the span of days destroy tens of thousands of human lives.

—No, I could not have heard it before. After all, other than that one short scuffle with Xiaolong, Natsuki had never shown her power before my eyes. Never. It had not happened, and it could not have happened, because she had not had the right to kill. Not until now.

The sheet of darkness folded in upon itself, taking the shape of a great obsidian spear of a size so large that not even a heavenly deva could possibly wield it. With a piercing boom, the spear plunged at a steep angle through Jing Ke's chest. But, just like Natsuki's hand, it did not interact physically with his body. The spear entered his chest, and thought it was hundreds of times longer than his body, it did not pass out of his back. It simply vanished into the spirit maze where Jing Ke had hidden his soul.

Jing Ke, grimacing, began to curl his fingers, though he could not yet free himself from the stakes pinning his joints into the air. Jiang Sheng stood several meters behind him. Natsuki stood before him, unmoving, and I stood behind her, not sure what to think.

"The greatest power in this world is the might of numbers," Natsuki intoned. "One cloud is nothing more than a puff of water in the air. Yet a million clouds in tandem can flood the earths and silence the heavens. If one crow can plunder a corpse, then how many would suffice to kill a false immortal?"

A creaking laugh leaked from Jing Ke's throat, but he did not respond.

"Grand Elder!" Jiang Sheng cried out, his voice shuddering. "Let me—"

"Do not interfere, Jiang Sheng!" Jing Ke roared as he began to force back the stakes running through his arms. "How many times do you think the heavens have tried to smite me?! I will revive, and then I kill everyone who stands in my way! That is how I have lived, and that is—"

Suddenly, Jing Ke's flesh began to swell with blackened bubbles like those of the bubonic plague, from which burst jet-black crows soaked in crimson ichor, carrying pills and spirit-stones and hearts and lungs and various other things in the shape of souls. His flesh was ulcerated and annihilated, but it healed just as quickly, and as soon as it was healed it swelled up and burst again! Scores upon scores of crows burst out of his body like newborn parasitoid wasps, casting his flesh and bone to the ground, which they snapped up in their beaks and devoured along with the treasures they had stolen from him. Soon the courtyard was blanketed in thousands of crows, and the air was once again filled only with their incessant shrieking. There were so many of them that the first to have emerged had to fly up into the sky to make space on ground for those yet climbing out from his flesh. Thus the sky, too, was blanketed in the plumage of crows, dripping Jing Ke's flesh and blood back down to the earth. Red rain fell from black clouds.

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And yet, Jing Ke only grimaced and clenched his teeth. This would not kill him. Unless—

One of the crows burrowing out of his flesh did not leap down to the ground, but rather fluttered over to Natsuki. Latching onto her shoulder with all three legs, it held a colorless blob out before her mouth. She turned her head down to smell it, then immediately scrunched up her face with disgust.

Flicking her head up and to the side, she sighed, "These are so unappetizing when I collect them myself."

Screeching with excitement, the crow tossed the blob up into the air like a worm and let it fall back down into its gullet—

crCaccRcrCACCKakRArRcakCAckKCK

—As it chewed through the blob, I could not help but recognize the sound! It was the sound of—

ccrCCarcRRAaAcCkkCKK CRCRcrCACKcRAracACKCakcKk

a soul being crushed to pieces! And yet— and yet hearing that sound, I could feel no guilt! As I looked upon Jing Ke, his body shriveling and desiccating, his life fleeing from his disbelieving eyes, his muscles losing what little control they had over his bones, as I looked upon his death, I felt no guilt! I felt no guilt!

CcraRckACK cCRAracCkK

The crow, having consumed Jing Ke's soul entire, beamed up into the sky in a flash of violet sparks, and the other crows followed it, creating a screaming pillar of death that, in only a few moments, vanished back into the sun.

Jing Ke was dead.

Natsuki stepped forward, then thrust her hand once again into Jing Ke's chest, and this time, I head the crushing of bone and the gurgling of blood as she pulled out his heart, no longer beating. For a moment his body hung there in the air, held up only by the stakes of orange magic, and then Natsuki kicked his corpse to the feet of Jiang Sheng, who was standing, terrorized, several meters back. Jing Ke's corpse seemed as though it would crumble to dust if the glowing amber-colored stakes did not hold his limbs in place, yet crucified in the air!

"Jiang Sheng!" she shouted. "Here is your immortal friend. His corpse will hold for a few hours, until those stakes disappear. Take him back to your sect and tell them to never again interfere in matters of the Bai family. Otherwise, even if you bring the Buddha before me, I shall slay the Buddha, for in the heavens above and upon the earth below, I alone am supreme!"

Jiang Sheng fell to his knees, trembling. He had not spoken before because he was giving face to Jing Ke, but now he could not speak because he instinctively knew that Natsuki was someone he could not afford to offend. With a mere touch she had bestowed death upon the deathless, she had done what the Buddha himself could not, and though she had declared herself superior to the heavens, the black stormclouds above only fled from her words, as if even the heavens feared her wrath.

Yes. This was the only way to find peace among cultivators. It was to bear a power so great that nobody would even dare try to contest it. Only under that power could I find safety. Only under Natsuki's protection could I find happiness.

I smiled. My revenge was complete. I no longer had any need for it. It was over. No sorrow, no guilt, no fear— and now, no more hatred.

I would live.

I ripped my sect token from my neck and threw it at Jiang Sheng, but now without the qi I had learned to manipulate so well, my throw landed a good meter and a half short of him. But it didn't matter. Even if I myself didn't have enough power, it didn't matter.

"Take it and begone," Natsuki ordered.

On wobbly knees Jiang Sheng crawled over to the sect token and took it in hand, then disappeared in a beam of light along with Jing Ke's corpse.

Not a moment later— nay, perhaps at the very same moment— there was a knock on one of the side doors. If it had come ten seconds later I would not have bothered to pay it any attention, but beset by the curiosity of the coincidence I walked over and peered through a little slit, through which I saw someone who appeared to be a messenger, making a confused face at a piece of paper, counting under her breath:

"..nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen."

Then, straightening her back and making a solemn expression, she loudly stated— in front of the yet-closed door—

"I bring a message from the Magistrate that must be delivered in person. Is the head of the Bai family here?"

I put a hand to my head. I could not not open the door after that.

With an awkward grimace, I opened the door and looked at the messenger. "Good afternoon. Are you looking for Clan Chief Bai Qiu?"

"Bai Qiu? Wait..." The messenger frowned, and took another look at her papers. Then, scratching her head, she turned her gaze back up to me. "Actually, I thought it was Bai Qiu too, but the Magistrate addressed this to Bai Clan Chief Bai Chunxue. Not sure who that is, though. Is this Bai Chunxue from the Imperial Capital? Or Zhaoqing, maybe?"

I inhaled so sharply that I could hear the drops of water in the air flitting past my teeth. Of course. They were all dead. I was the only one left. As of the time of Jing Ke's death but a few minutes ago, the head of the Bai family could be nobody else but—

"That's me."

The messenger cast a glance at my whitened hair, yet scattered messily over my face, at my grayish robes with only dull green accoutrements, then put her hand over her own head and tried to guess at my height.

"Oh, you do fit the description. Here's the message. The Magistrate has requested a meeting with you."

I put a hand to my temple. It really didn't make any sense. How could the message have been addressed to Bai Clan Chief Bai Chunxue when I could only be said to be as much as of three minutes ago? And the Magistrate wanted to meet with me, of all people? It was difficult to make sense of.

"...When?"

"If you leave now and take a carriage, you'll have five minutes to spare."

But, at the same time, I was not going to turn down the Magistrate. It was not because I had any particular respect for the rule of law in Kangtian. It was simply because she had never wronged me, and so I could not justify wronging her.

"Is there... something in particular that the Magistrate wants to talk to me me about?"

"If you have to ask, it's about whatever just happened that is prompting you to ask instead of assume. Don't you know? The Magistrate can see eighty-one minutes into the future. That's what everyone says."

"Eighty-one minutes...?" I hadn't heard this rumor before, but it was a bit oddly specific. "Just eighty-one minutes?"

"Just enough time to get a summons delivered to any noble house in the city center. And that's all I have time to say." She thrust a scroll into my spare hand, then bowed and left.

I turned back to Natsuki, who was weighing Jing Ke's heart in her hand.

"Xia-jie, do you want to come with me to City Hall?"

She shook her head.

"I have to study the structure of his heart before it crumbles. I do not have time to attend a meeting with the Magistrate. But..." She smiled brilliantly, and in that smile I felt only a sense of safety. "If you have need of me, whenever or wherever it may be, I will be by your side."

I nodded.

Feeling no fear and no doubt, I stepped through a different side door out onto a street.

Whatever happened, I was free.