Chapter 77: The Hun (1/2)
t [Volume 2 - Bloom of the Other Shore Flower]
A girl suddenly burrowed out from a shrub. Her features were ordinary, but her figure was slim and graceful, and she had two twisted braids draped over her chest. The moment she lifted her head, she saw Qianye and was momentarily startled into jumping. However, after she saw Qianye clearly, color returned to her face, and she called out, “Qianye!”
“Mimi!” The name instantly sprung from Qianye’s heart.
At this point, Qianye was holding a simple and crude dagger that had an incredibly sharp edge. The grooves of the blade were decorated, but it was the only usable weapon he had. He was a youth, in the midst of a life-and-death examination. The rules were simple but cruel, one had to kill one of the other examinees to pass the test.
Mimi hesitated, and then walked towards Qianye. There was fog all around them, coming from an unknown place. As Mimi’s footsteps headed toward him under the cool light of the moon, they created ripples in the fog as if it were water.
She spoke softly, “I’m very scared! Will you kill me?”
“Never!” Qianye was resolute.
After hearing Qianye’s reply, Mimi let go of a breath, and quickly walked over to Qianye and spoke quietly, “Let’s deal with the others together, then our chances of passing will be greater.”
Qianye was still hesitating, when he suddenly felt a flash of coldness at his hip! Many years of brutal combat training caused him to immediately fall forward, and roll away a few times, creating distance from the secret assailant. Qianye turned around to look, but only saw that the girl’s hand and dagger were stained with fresh blood!
Qianye was angry and confused, and as he grasped at the wound by his waist, he called out to her, “Why!?”
The girl’s face was expressionless, and her voice mechanical. “Because I want to pass the exam, because I want to get rewarded!”
Facing the girl who was pursuing him closely, Qianye could only rapidly retreat. Blood rapidly hemorrhaged from between his fingers as he was unable to keep it down with pressure.
Mimi viciously pounced at him, mercilessly stabbing away with her dagger, going so fast that her strikes left afterimages. Every single slash aimed at his vitals. Qianye’s heart cooled and he grasped his dagger tightly. He suddenly ignored all of the knife thrusts aimed at him, and wholly focused on stabbing Mimi’s heart!
This one stab struck air, and then all the fog was suddenly violently blown away. Qianye found himself on top of a lonely cliff that stretched all the way up into the sky. A few thousand fathoms below him, he could see little black lines snaking along in a large valley. From those lines that looked like little rows of ants, he could clearly make out instructors Long Hai, Zhang Jing, Yin Yin, Shen Tu and the others.
There was another man on top of the high cliff. He was dressed in scholar’s clothing with broad sleeves, the traditional dress code of the upper echelon aristocrats of the Empire. He stood one step away from the very edge of the cliff, his clothes flapping in a breeze as if he was about to ride the winds.
Song Zining turned around, and his smile was still warm like jade. “Qianye, you see, that is my great way.”
At this time, all of the images suddenly twisted, and the entire world followed suit, cracking, and shattering into infinite pieces. Qianye was jolted away, but the image of the dream was still deeply imprinted on his mind. It was incomprehensible.
From outside the cave came the extremely faint sounds of movement, almost indiscernible against the howling of the night winds of the wasteland. It was this that had woken Qianye. The resonator underneath him, which had been covered with a cloth, had vibrated with the passing of some living thing. However, the sound was a little distant, and there was still some distance to go before they arrived.
Qianye quietly walked out of the cave, and climbed up the slope, heading toward the skeletal remains of the top of a crashed airship, carefully peering into the distance. Nights in the wasteland were both quiet and disquiet. A small blip in the corner of his sight aroused his attention. It was a slow-moving body that looked like some sort of strange, little creature as it relentlessly made use of the topography to close in.
Qianye immediately recognized it as a hunter, and on top of that, a hunter whose skills in camouflage were remarkable. He had practically melded into the environment surrounding him. If there was one thing could be considered a failings, it was that this particular hunter was still a little anxious. Because it was now in the deepest of night, just before dawn, most of the wildlife would be incredibly exhausted. In contrary, he was moving a little fast. Hence, with Qianye’s night vision, it was as if he were advancing very obviously.
In the wasteland, meeting a stranger was always fraught with danger. Even the hunters themselves were divided over whether they should be cautious of the legitimacy of another hunter’s identity. The vast majority of hunters liked to move independently. Not only for the sake of personal freedom, but also because they were all afraid of being stabbed in the back. Even if there was a mission that necessitated a large group, there would be very few hunters who would let a complete stranger join in. A captain like Yu Yingnan was considered a rare find.
This was why Qianye was actually on high alert after determining that this was a hunter. Looking at the other party’s trail as they headed forward, killing intent emerged on Qianye’s face.
The movements of that hunter followed an incomparably familiar route. In fact, it was the exact route where Qianye had left markings the night before. Originally, it was supposed to be for Fei Niao. But as it seemed now, this solo hunter was clearly also pursuing Qianye.
Qianye quietly climbed up the skeleton of the airship, and snuck toward the appointed position.
A while later, that single hunter had already found to the cave where Qianye had previously sheltered himself. It would seem that his tracking skills were incredibly good. The hunter’s movements became even more careful as he quietly moved into the cave, not making a single sound.
At this instant, a rock that lay by the hunter’s leg suddenly let out a crisp “pa” noise. He immediately stopped.
This was a little trap meant for early warning, and with Qianye’s expert camouflaging skills, he had even managed to fool this experienced hunter. However, he hadn’t exactly lost out, either. If he could see through all of the setups, he would have discovered that a semi-circular web of information protected the center of the cave, and that there was only a three or four meter distance between each trap.
From the cave came Qianye’s voice, “Who goes there?”
The hunter’s body trembled once, and he then made a snap decision to stand up, speaking out with a very normal voice, “It’s me, Li Lunzhe. We once went on a mission together. Is that you, Qianye?”
The voice of Qianye inside of the cave relaxed a little. “Oh, it’s you. What brings you here?”
“I was out on a mission, and just happened to come by. I spotted some of the markings you left behind, so I came to take a look. Right, Qianye, I could use your help on this mission, and we could discuss how to split the reward…” As Li Lunzhe spoke, he put down the barrel of the origin gun that he was holding, and walked lightly into the cave.