A warm, radiant smile blossomed across Xing Shufen's delicate features, her almond-shaped eyes crinkling at the corners as rosy hues blossomed on her porcelain cheeks.
Even the thin, gauzy veil obscuring the lower half of her face could not fully conceal the unbridled joy sparkling in her gaze. "Ah," she murmured, her soft voice barely audible as her warm breath whispered through the silk fabric.
"I can hardly believe it—that one day, a man as handsome as you would willingly ask me..." Her words drifted off, her eyes drinking in Ji Wuye's tall form from head to toe before settling on his chiseled visage and cupped palms extended in a ceremonial greeting.
Pride swelled in her chest as Xing Shufen straightened her posture, hands clasped before her as she formally responded, "I am Xing Shufen, disciple of the Emei Sect. I accept your invitation and am willing to exchange our knowledge."
Her crisp white martial robe, adorned with vibrant purple stripes accentuating her svelte figure, cascaded down to her ankles yet clung enticingly to the gentle curves of her body. Her bare arms and exposed legs glistened like polished ivory under the warm caress of the late morning sun.
However...
Abruptly, her demeanor shifted with the fluidity of a coiled viper. The playful sparkle in her upturned eyes hardened to glinting steel, the radiant smile wilting from her lips as her palms flashed in a blinding arc. Her movements blazed with the speed and lethality of a striking serpent as she reacted to the shadowy figure materializing at her side.
CLANG!
The piercing cry of metal striking metal rang out like a thunderclap across the Central Courtyard. Fiery sparks exploded outward as Xing Shufen's lacquered fingernails, ornately decorated yet razor-sharp, clashed violently against Ji Wuye's bare fist mere chun from her chest. He had appeared in the blink of an eye, his extended strike intercepted by her trembling hands as her nails screeched across his knuckles.
No swirling Qi enveloped Ji Wuye's body to reinforce his skin, nor did any hidden weapon serve as a feint — it was the unadulterated force of his physical prowess alone. The realization washed over the stunned onlookers in waves of disbelief, and even Xing Shufen's hardened mask cracked as her widened eyes betrayed her shock at deflecting such overwhelming might with her bare hands.
She could feel the sheer power of his bare-handed physical attack—so overwhelming that it began pushing her back, despite her best efforts to hold her ground.
The unrelenting force caused the wooden floor tiles beneath her feet to crack and splinter as she slid backward, her heels digging futile trenches into the polished stone.
'He's fast!' she thought in awe, her gaze darting behind Ji Wuye. There, faint imprints of his footsteps crisscrossed the courtyard like the ruts of a wagon wheel from where he had originally stood before appearing at her side in the span of a single breath.
Yet this staggering display of speed wasn't what troubled Xing Shufen most deeply. Instead, her heart began to race within her chest, the rapid drumming echoing in her ears as her breaths grew labored.
"How cruel you are, Big Brother Ji," she said, her melodic voice trembling ever so slightly as she fought against his inexorable force. "Not only do you sneak around like those disgusting orthodox, but you also disregard an opponent's privacy."
Her narrowed eyes locked onto his striking crimson pupils, their crimson intensity seeming to bore straight through her as an unbidden shiver traced her spine.
Despite the precarious predicament she found herself in, pinned and straining with every fiber of her being, some deeper instinct told her he was still well within her range of attack. She could track his subtle movements with clarity.
'Let me turn you into my slave, my dear,' she thought inwardly, a sly, predatory smile tugging at the corners of her lips as a dangerous glint flickered in her upturned eyes.
Her pink tongue flicked across her full lips in an unconscious gesture as she prepared to unleash a devastating counterattack.
But then...she felt it. A fleeting caress, the ghostly graze of calloused skin against the nape of her neck that made every hair stand on end. The slightest whisper of contact that lingered for only the briefest instant, yet sent an inexplicable shudder cascading through her body.
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Before Xing Shufen could even process what had occurred or finish shifting her stance, her expression froze.
The faint, confident smile contorting her lips gave way to stunned disbelief as her narrowed eyes flew wide, all traces of the predatory gleam extinguished in an instant.
Strength bled from her trembling legs and hips in a rush, robbing her of the deep, rooted stability that had held firm against Ji Wuye's overwhelming offensive thus far.
Like a puppet with its strings abruptly severed, she collapsed, unable to resist the relentless force bearing down on her any longer.
"In a fight, those who talk too much are the ones who are losing," Ji Wuye declared coldly, his voice laced with light disdain. By now, the fist that had been blocked by Xing Shufen's nails had already slipped past her defenses.
STAB!
Two of Ji Wuye's fingers, now extended from his previously clenched fist, struck with surgical precision at the base of her throat. The impact was devastating despite its pinpoint accuracy, causing Xing Shufen to choke violently as her body convulsed.
Her eyes rolled back momentarily before she regained consciousness, hacking and wheezing as she fought to draw breath.
With her defenses shattered and rage burning in her tear-blurred gaze, she swung her long lacquered nails in a desperate, flailing arc aimed at Ji Wuye's face.
The ornately decorated tips sliced through the air with a faint whistle, promising to rake bloody furrows across his features.
But before her retaliatory attack could connect, a strangled, pained groan escaped Xing Shufen's open mouth.
Tears streamed from the corners of her tightly shut eyes as her playful, confident expression vanished entirely, replaced by a rictus of pure agony.
For reasons she could not begin to comprehend, her voice refused to emerge no matter how she strained. Only hoarse, ragged wheezes and wordless cries passed her trembling lips.
Ji Wuye's long white locks swayed with his movements, temporarily obscuring her vision as he forced her head back at an agonizing angle to gaze helplessly at the sky above.
His grip was utterly unyielding—both of her wrists were trapped in his iron grasp, rendering her slender arms immobile at her sides.
Slowly, she felt the warmth of fresh blood trickle down her forearms, the delicate skin tearing under the relentless pressure of his restraining hands.
The searing pain blossomed outward from her wrists in fiery lances with every futile twitch and struggle against his dominance.
Desperately, she tried to call upon Qi, but it was as if an impassable impediment smothered her meridians, refusing to allow even a trickle of energy to flow and be wielded against this overwhelming opponent.
Not only that, her finely 7th realm physical prowess, was now as useless as a newborn babe's before Ji Wuye's presence.
His cold, crimson pupils gazed down at her face flush with exertion and creased in a soundless rictus, their eerie glow reflecting a chilling indifference to her suffering.
Even her legs, the very foundation and wellspring of a martial artist's ability to dodge, strike, and execute the most devastating techniques, had turned to lead weights, growing number and more unresponsive with every passing moment.
It was only then, after the entire scene had unfolded with terrifying, blinding swiftness, that the stunned crowd watching from the edges of the courtyard finally seemed to stir from their collective trance of disbelief.
They had barely blinked, yet Ji Wuye had already subjugated Xing Shufen. It was then...
"How dare you!" The first enraged shout rang out from the elevated guest area, shattering the pall of shocked silence. Like hornets erupting from a kicked nest, countless figures garbed in flowing white robes instantly descended in a flurry of motion, their billowing sleeves encircling Ji Wuye from all sides.
Like Xing Shufen, their martial robe left much of their figures tantalizing exposed, their lithe forms a stark contrast.
But when they landed and took in the scene before them, the sight nearly drove the blood from their faces. Their revered Elder Sister, their beloved Xing Shufen, lay sprawled on the vast wooden platform floor in a twisted, broken heap.
Her delicate jaw hung askew, dislocated by the brutal force, while her swollen eyelids were crushed tightly shut, the tender flesh already purpling with blossoming bruises.
Her once lithe arms and legs trembled helplessly, the pallid skin flensed from her limbs to expose ribbons of raw, oozing muscle beneath — it was a sight ripped straight from their darkest nightmares. Xing Shufen's shallow, gurgling breaths were the only sign she still clung to life, yet the demon responsible remained shockingly calm, his hands still cupped in a courtly gesture of gratitude toward her decimated form.
"Thank you for the guidance, Miss Xing," Ji Wuye said politely, his tone as maddeningly courteous as when he had first requested her instruction. The faint, almost beatific smile gracing his handsome features, framed by flowing white hair, presented a disturbing counterpoint to the savagery he had just unleashed. His graceful, poised manner seemed stripped from another world entirely as he looked on with cold indifference.
A demon cloaked in immortal beauty — that was the silent, sickened consensus rippling through the horrified crowd. They could only gape in stunned silence, throats constricted too tightly to give voice to their shock and revulsion as they bore witness.
Then, like the first pebbles preceding an avalanche, the stillness shattered. "Elder Sister Xing!" The piercing cry came from one of the Emei disciples who had encircled Ji Wuye mere moments before. She stumbled forward, trembling hands rising to cover her mouth as if to stifle the wail that threatened to tear free. "How...how could you do this to her?!"
"You monster!" Another disciple's scream lashed out, her voice already hoarse and thick with unshed tears. "She showed the rest of you mercy! She was—" But her words broke like a wrecked dam, choked off by the anguished sobs that burst free as she took in the vibrant pool of blood steadily spreading beneath her beloved Elder Sister's broken body.
All semblance of restraint or coherent thought abandoned the Emei disciples in that moment. Those who had initially descended to subdue Ji Wuye rushed past him instead, crowding around Xing Shufen's ravaged form with keening cries of anguish and denial.
One of them in her tender youth crumpled bonelessly to her knees beside the unmoving Xing, her fingers clawing frantically at her own pristine robes as if she could rip the waking nightmare from her eyes. "Her bones..." she whimpered in a quavering voice. "I can see her bones..."
"Elder Sister...please hold on," another disciple, even younger, pleaded in a whisper choked by shock and disbelief. She reached out with a trembling hand, as if her plaintive words could somehow reverse the unfolding tragedy. "This can't be real...this can't be happening..."
"Get the physician! NOW!" The command cracked through the wailing chaos like a thunderbolt, silencing the despairing cries in an instant. All eyes turned toward the source — Yao Zhi, her face ashen but her bearing ramrod straight.
Her eyes glared with darkened fury, the black irises seeming to blaze from within as her expression hardened into a rictus of unbridled rage. Yao Zhi's entire body was enveloped in a shroud of swirling Qi, the invisible energy manifesting as shimmering distortions in the air around her trembling form. Wave after wave of scorching murderous intent radiated outward.
Her hatred-filled gaze bored into Ji Wuye like twin lances of searing flame as she fixed upon the culprit responsible for Xing Shufen's broken state.
"I will KILL YOU!" Yao Zhi roared, her voice a deafening cry of vengeance that lashed across the space between them with physical force.
But then, a series of flickering shadows descended abruptly. In a blur of motion, they encircled not just the grieving Emei disciples clustered protectively around Xing Shufen's broken body, but Ji Wuye as well.