688 Saber Technique (2/2)

Someone said a few words in a language that Gu Shenwei didn't understand, but all the soldiers present understood that the man was questioning whether this guard of King Riyao was a man of the Norland or not.

The guard obviously didn't understand because he was also from the west of the Yellow River like Dhuta Kingkong. Although he had talked with people of the Norland before, he had never seriously learned the local language.

”I'm loyal to the Norland. No one can doubt that…”

No one doubted him. The crowd rushed toward the foreigner like a whirlpool of water and when the whirlpool dissipated, a corpse had appeared on their raised arms.

The corpse drifted forward like a canoe and was finally heavily thrown into the duelling field, bruised and battered, its clothes torn into pieces.

Old Man Mu quietly disappeared and reappeared. Except for the few people in the Dragon King's tent, no one else had noticed his whereabouts.

Old Man Mu winked at Shangguan Ru, indicating that the corpse outside should not be counted as his fault.

There were thousands of ways to kill people, and the saber was just one of them.

Shangguan Ru softly sighed.

Old Man Mu had uncovered the spy but in the end still failed to wash the Dragon King's image clean. The soldiers of the Court Attendants Army still regarded the Dragon King as a devil.

Silver Condor took a step forward and believed that this was the best time to make a move.

Gu Shenwei had the same idea so he made the first attack.

Thousands of people witnessed the duel.

The audience was actually larger during the first kung fu competition between the Dragon King and Silver Condor, but that had been more of a melee brawl with more than twenty people taking part. Most of that fight had been the Dragon King evading confrontation until he found an opportunity and ended the flight so suddenly that most people didn't even see the ending clearly.

This time, though it was at night, was a one-on-one duel. After the first stroke of the Dragon King, the soldiers began to light torches and hurl them into the field, not to disturb either side but just to make it a little brighter and easier to see.

Soon, the Dragon King and Silver Condor were circled by scattered torches, forming an irregular fighting area. In the firelight, the two's each movement could be clearly seen.

Old Man Mu was the first to discover the change in the Dragon King's sabersmanship. He watched for a while, frowning. ”Has the Dragon King decided to renounce being a killer?”

Very few people understood what he meant except for Shangguan Ru and Shangguan Fei.

The golden roc sabersmanship focused speedy and surprise attacks. The practitioner would always tried to land a blow on the back and flanks, and would retreate after one attack regardless of if they hit their target or not. Although the Dragon King had modified his saber technique a lot to better fit the Death Sutra Sabersmanship, he still adhered to the killer's mindset.

But now he abandoned his strong point and was entangled in a close combat fight with Silver Condor. They had exchanged thirty moves in succession but the distance between them had always remained within five paces.

In the eyes of the thousands of soldiers, this duel was very eye-catching. A top-notch expert of the Norland and the Dragon King of the Western Regions were engaged in close combat. The two moved as swiftly as two wisps of drifting smoke clouds, and the shrill clashing sounds between the narrow saber and the scimitar lingered in the air. Each cut seemed to have the power to break iron.

No one knew it was intentional or not, but a torch eventually flew over the heads of the crowd and fell directly between the two's fierce fight.

The two of them were like a tight string that had been plucked by a magical hand, and no external forces or even specks of dust could stick to the string.

Neither one had time to deal with the torch but it refused to land naturally as if an invisible juggler were incessantly throwing it back up into the air.

After a few bounces, the torch splintered apart, and the remnant of its spark leaped up like a firefly before disappearing into the darkness.

Very few people could see how the torch had been shattered by the two sabers. Silver Condor had deliberately slowed down, and Gu Shenwei was no longer focusing on his attack speed. But their saber moves were still beyond the eyesight of the ordinary soldiers.

Old Man Mu's face turned ashy pale, and he kept muttering, ”Grand Enlightenment Sword Sutra, Death Sutra…” The Dragon King's saber technique was beyond his imagination, and he couldn't help but feel envious.

Shangguan Fei admired the blade work but also had many doubts, ”Is this the Grand Enlightenment Sword Sutra? It doesn't look like it. Besides, the Dragon King is not using his sword. What kind of sabersmanship is this?”

”It's the sabersmanship of the Gu family,” Shangguan Ru replied in a low voice. A few years ago, she had seen an old man perform this set of saber technique at the gate of the castle. Although she did not finish watching the performance, it had been deeply imprinted in her mind.

What Gu Shenwei was using was not only a new Gu family's sabremanship modified to fit with the Death Sutra, but also with the newly learned Formless Prajna Palm. Although he hadn't practiced this saber technique for long, he still remembered it clearly and didn't feel rusty at all.

Before the age of fourteen, he had practiced it once almost every day, even to the point of being bored to tears. The result was that he would never forget this set of moves for the rest of his life.

The Gu family was famous for its two superb movesets of saber and spear, but Gu Shenwei hadn't thought his family was worthy of such a title. It was not until after he had obtained both the yin and yang energy, used them to simulate the Balanced Power, and learned Lianqing's secret method of directing internal Qi that he had finally understood the true essence of the Gu family's sabermanship.

It wasn't a saber technique for killers because it was a sabersmanship that competed fair and square.

Sometimes even the best killer might be forced out of the dark shadows and lose the advantage of a surprise attack. And in these cases, the golden roc sabersmanship would fall short.

Gu Shenwei had immersed himself in a killer's environment for too long and he had to experience many lessons before he could understand this truth; he could not and did not want to hide in the darkness forever.