Lim Haitao bent every last bit of his self-control on maintaining a calm expression, yet, the question rang in his ears like a death knell. And just what was your task? The man called Judgment’s Gale had asked the question in a neutral tone. Too neutral. It was the pause before the hammer of disaster fell to crush the unworthy beneath its uncaring might. From where he stood, Lim Haitao felt decidedly unworthy, and the Judgment’s Gale felt far too much like a hammer poised in the air, simply waiting for the signal to unleash doom. He had harbored the desperate hope that Sister Sua might intervene on their behalf. She had left the sect, true, but on cordial terms. She had witnessed the entire incident as well. He hadn’t issued any threats or insults, nor tried to use the name of the Thundering Sky Sect in an inappropriate way. Nor had Shao Anhe let foolishness slip from her lips.
However, it seemed that mere association with Sheung Tian Kuo had painted them with the same brush of guilt in Sua Xing Xing’s eyes. When he had dared to look at her, all he saw was cold fury burning in her eyes. That meant that their only hope of escaping from this unmitigated catastrophe rested in the hands of Judgment’s Gale. Except, that man had just asked a question to which Lim Haitao did not want to provide an honest answer. Not that he was prone to lying. Quite the contrary. The sect frowned mightily on dishonesty in all but the direst of circumstances. No, he contemplated lying because a true answer could only bring them closer to certain death. In any other circumstance, he wouldn’t have been the one trying to save their lives. He wouldn’t have spoken at all, except perhaps to introduce himself if things went smoothly.
Now, three lives hung on what he did next, and he had no idea what the right thing was to do. Curse you, Sheung Tian Kuo, thought Lim Haitoa. You and your stupid obsession with that woman has damned us. When a look of mild impatience passed over the face of Judgment’s Gale, Lim Haitao knew he had to make a decision. He resisted the urge to look back at Shao Anhe. She was no better prepared for this than he was. In the end, a lie was too risky, too easy to expose. It only took one slip of the tongue, one moment of carelessness, and whatever tiny shred of trust or credibility he and the sect might have with Judgment’s Gale would evaporate. The truth would have to do. He just wished that he hadn’t heard so many stories about the man who was staring at him. Stories that never seemed to end well for those who roused his ire. Gathering his courage, Lim Haitao spoke.
“We were sent to,” he swallowed again, “inspect this academy.”
The look of detached annoyance that Judgment’s Gale had worn disappeared as something implacable entered his eyes. The man’s lips compressed into a hard line, and it felt to Lim Haitao that the very air seemed to squeeze him in sympathy with the other cultivator’s anger.
“Inspect,” said Judgment’s Gale.
It was the same word, but it wasn’t. Lim Haitao had tried to make the word sound as mundane and innocuous as possible. Nothing that important. Just a boring little procedure that no one needed to concern themselves with at all. When Judgment’s Gale said it, it sounded like a filthy obscenity that had been dragged up from the depths of a cesspit. It sounded invasive. It sounded unclean. It sounded like another step on a very short road to a cliff’s edge.
“You came here expecting to simply walk into my academy and inspect things. You expected me to allow that?”
“Yes,” said Lim Haitao, his voice a rasp of fear.
Judgment’s Gale walked toward him until he loomed like a tower. The stories never said he was this tall, thought Lim Haitao, aware that fear was making him irrational but uncertain how to stop it.
“Tell me, Lim Haitao of the Thunderous Sky Sect, what would your elders do if I came to your sect and demanded to inspect it? Would they throw open their doors and divulge their secrets to me? Lavish me with gifts? Would they welcome my inspection with grace and provide me with a feast afterward?”
Part of Lim Haitao wanted to flee beneath that implacable gaze and those impossible questions. If it just meant leaving Sheung Tian Kuo behind, he might have even done it. But fleeing would also mean abandoning Shao Anhe, and she had done nothing to deserve being left to the mercies of this man. The problem was that he didn’t even need to consider what his sect would do. He knew. The Thundering Sky Sect would never tolerate such a thing. The insult alone would demand an immediate and deadly response. It made him wonder why they had been sent here to offer a similar insult to a man known for taking vengeance. It seemed… It seemed inconsistent with the temperance that the sect taught from the very first moment someone entered as an outer disciple.
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That realization begged an uncomfortable question. Had the sect sent them, or had Sheung Tian Kuo decided to come here for his own, rather obvious, reasons? Had the man somehow discovered the location of Sua Xing Xing and simply invented the inspection as an excuse to come find her? If so, why drag others down into the thousand hells with him? There was no way to know and no point in asking the fool who was still muttering about shame and honor.
“Well?” demanded Judgment’s Gale. “What would they do?”
“They would demand your immediate death,” said Lim Haitao in a hollow voice.
He never saw the man move. He only felt the hot spray of blood on his face. His heart stopped for a moment before he realized that the blood wasn’t his. Lim Haitao turned and watched as Sheung Tian Kuo’s lifeless body fell into several large pieces. Judgment’s Gale looked down at what was left of one of the Thunderous Sky’s most promising disciples, and then he looked at Lim Haitao. The man’s expression hadn’t changed at all, which sent Lim Haitao’s heart to pounding. Does he mean to kill us all? There was no fighting power like that. Even if Sheung Tian Kuo had been sensible, he doubted that the results would have been any different. Sheung Tian Kuo had been a peak core cultivator, had moved and fought like one, which had made him extraordinarily dangerous. But he would have stood no chance against that kind of speed. Lim Haitao tried to steel himself, to face death with the bravery expected from one of the Thunderous Sky Sect, but he couldn’t find that courage inside himself while facing down a man who found peak core cultivators easy prey. In the end, the best he could do was stop himself from visibly quaking in terror before the gaze of Judgment’s Gale.
“This academy is not open for inspection,” said the towering figure, who gestured toward the road with the still bloody blade in his hand. “Now go or I might decide to hold you all accountable for this insult.”
Lim Haitao had to fight the urge to kowtow in pure relief. He fell into a deep bow instead.
“This Lim Haitao thanks the honored cultivator for his forbearance.”
Shao Anhe copied him a moment later. He felt it as something in the air seemed to bleed away and a sense of impending death went with it. When Judgment’s Gale spoke again, he sounded weary.
“Just—” he hesitated. “Just leave.”
Shao Anhe fell into step beside him, and they did their best to maintain a shred of the dignity of the Thunderous Sky Sect as they walked away. At least, they did while Judgment’s Gale and Sua Xing Xing could physically see them. The moment they passed beyond direct line of sight, the pair exchanged a look and, by unspoken agreement, they activated their movement techniques and fled at speed. They didn’t speak or stop running for several hours, determined to put enough distance between them and Judgment’s Gale that he would decide it wasn’t worth chasing them down if he changed his mind. They eventually set up camp and started a small fire. Neither of them really needed the fire for warmth, but there was a deeper kind of chill inside Lim Haitao that the fire seemed to help stave off with its cheerful light.
Shao Anhe wore a troubled expression she asked, “What will we tell the elders?”
“The truth,” he said. “We’ll tell them the truth, and pray to the heavens that they don’t send us back there to die.”
It seemed that idea hadn’t crossed her mind, because Shao Anhe sat up straight and stared at him in horror.
“They wouldn’t do that, would they?”
“We insulted a very powerful cultivator. A cultivator that I imagine the elders would prefer to stay on good terms with. Arguably, we shamed the sect. Is it that hard to imagine that they might decide that the best way to deal with all of those problems is to give us to him? Let him take his vengeance on us and good relations may be restored.”
“We’re core cultivators,” she said in shock. “We’re not that… That—”
“Disposable?” asked Lim Haitao.
“Yes!” shouted Shao Anhe.
“Normally, no, but these aren’t normal circumstances. We’re talking about a man who could very well send The Living Spear to instruct our sect in what he sees as appropriate behavior. That instruction is likely to leave very little standing in its wake. Compared to a threat like that, what value is there in the lives of a couple of core cultivators?”
Shao Anhe didn’t say anything, but he saw her eyes drift out to the road. He sympathized with what she was thinking, having thought something very similar not that long ago.
“I won’t stop you,” he said. “If you want to go, I won’t stop you.”
Shao Anhe didn’t meet his gaze when she stood.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I won’t let myself be sacrificed to make up for a dead man’s stupidity.”
Lim Haitao watched her disappear into the darkness and part of him wished he had the courage to join her.