Book 13 Chapter 11: Original Identity Fully Revealed
Book 13 Chapter 11: Original Identity Fully Revealed
Although the spectators were numerous, the entire Tingliu Pavilion was quiet.
Kou Zhong also quieted down.
The moment Shangguan Long stomped his staff on the ground just now, he knew that he had made a grave mistake in underestimating the enemy.
His original inference was based on Shangguan Long leading his men surrounding Duan Yucheng, four men, the other day, where they were able to capture only one man alive, and Duan Yucheng managed to break the siege and escape. So his martial art skill could not be too superior.
But by doing the demonstration just now, Shangguan Long has shown that his martial art skill was actually closer to Bian Bufu’s level.
And this moment, as the four eyes met, Kou Zhong found out that Shangguan Long’s eyes were gleaming with unusual flashes. Obviously the strange internal energy cultivation he practiced from the Devil Cult was absolutely not a mediocre skill.
But Kou Zhong was like riding a tiger, easy to get on, but hard to get off; he must forced Shangguan Long to reveal his demonic skill within ten moves. Otherwise, the fame for his fighting prowess that he had built up painstakingly would be lost tonight.
A peal of stimulating feeling circulated all over his body; he sensed that under this kind of dreadful pressure, his essence, qi and spirit rose up simultaneously to their peak condition.
Shangguan Long’s spine and shoulders suddenly straightened up, while holding the staff horizontally across his chest. “Kid, bring it on! [orig. release your horse and come over]” he shouted coldly, “Let me see, you who speak conceited nonsense, what kind of ability you really have.”
Kou Zhong’s expression was like an old monk in deep meditation, he did not seem to see Shangguan Long’s awe-inspiring prowess.
Nobody knew that at this instant his mind was entirely on the more than a hundred goldfish of every kind, which were swimming freely in the pond, as if they did not have any care of other people’s business in the world.
By the time he pushed all distracting thoughts from his mind, he entered the defense realm, where everything in his surrounding did not escape his attention, not even the slightest bit.
When he was fighting Bian Bufu earlier that day, he had already experienced this kind of grasping-the-overall-situation fantastic feeling, where he was able to look at, and had total awareness of, the entire battlefield like looking at a chessboard.
But this moment, the feeling was even clearer.
The thing that captured his attention the most was the fish, carefree and without worries, in the pond.
Each movement of the fishtail, whether the fish were frolicking with each other, or was simply cruising alone, or was hiding in the crevices of the fake mountain rock, was captured in his mind.
It was an unusually strange feeling.
Human and fish occupied two entirely different worlds, which coexist but did not interfere with each other.
But passing through Kou Zhong’s heart, these two different worlds connected.
In the pavilion the crow and peacock made no sound, even the breathing noise has stopped.
Not only the silent standoff between Kou Zhong and Shangguan Long has taken their breath away, each spectator had a strange feeling in their heart.
Kou Zhong appeared to blend in with the environment, becoming an integral whole, as if he was part of the nature itself. On the contrary, Shangguan Long seemed to be a hard addition to the garden, destroying the harmony of the entire pond and garden-scape.
It was some kind of indescribable subjective impression.
Shangguan Long shifted his right foot forward, creating a heavy footstep.
Nobody expected that he would grab the initiative to attack first; they all gasped in surprise.
Shangguan Long had his own predicament.
Because of the ten-move agreement, Shangguan Long was thinking of using defense-as-a-means-to-attack frame of mind.
Who would have thought that as they were facing each other, Kou Zhong did not appear to have any intention to make his move? Yet he was continuously amassing his momentum, so that it was expanding continuously at a wild rate.
The most terrifying thing was that Shangguan Long felt that the whole site was constantly increasing the momentum of the coalescing of Kou Zhong with the heaven and earth, so that he had no flaw that Shangguan Long could exploit.
Moreover, Shangguan Long was keenly aware that if this situation continued on, his own momentum would soon be overshadowed by Kou Zhong’s; if that happened, he had no confidence that he would not use the demonic skill before the ten moves were over.
Therefore, although he had decided to focus on the offensive, he was still adopting a passive stance.
In the room upstairs, Xu Ziling breathed a sigh of relief, and go back to his chair opposite Ba Fenghan’s. “This kid is indeed all right,” he praised.
Ba Fenghan also showed an amazed expression; he said, “This kid could really make people exclaim in admiration.”
By this time Shangguan Long had approached the fishpond, only about three zhang away from Kou Zhong.
He stepped onto the small bridge spanning across the creek nearest the pond. The water under the bridge was trickling slowly.
Kou Zhong held the Moon in the Well lightly in his right hand, the blade was following the approaching Shangguan Long from the distance.
His senses followed the water flowing out of the pond into the creek, passing underneath the small bridge Shangguan Long was standing on.
In no time at all he grasped the environment surrounding him, the subtle relationship between one object and the other, and between one empty space to another.
‘Using the man to play the sword, using the sword to play the enemy’.
Shangguan Long’s biggest weakness was that he did not dare to use his demonic skill; as long as Kou Zhong could make him feel that victory or defeat would be decided within two, three moves, and that if he did not make an all-out effort he would lose on the spot, then Kou Zhong would have succeeded.
Shangguan Long stepped down the small bridge onto the embankment on the other side of the fishpond, where he stood straight like a mountain, with his face as cold as ice.
Those with rather superior insight inwardly felt bad for Kou Zhong.
Because this kind of situation was more harmful than good to him.
Whether advancing to attack, or retreating to defend, there was a fishpond between them.
If Shangguan Long was able to exploit the pond, even if his skill was a bit inferior, holding up for more than ten moves should not be a problem.
Under the illumination of the flame, the saber and the staff were facing each other across the pond, each one amassing its power.
Murderous aura permeated the garden.
One side was hastening the release of his true qi, the other side was watching for the enemy to reveal a crack.
The two combatants stared at each other with eyes open wide, as if one blink of an eye would reveal the flaw that the enemy would immediately exploit.
The tension was so thick.
‘Splash! Splash!’
Suddenly the water splashed.
Two fish, which were frolicking with each other, jumped out of the water one after another.
Shangguan Long’s robe suddenly fluttered lightly, the dragonhead staff in his hand slowly swayed, immediately generating a burst of even stronger momentum, countering the murderous aura emanating from the blade of Kou Zhong’s saber.
The superior martial art masters all knew that in this duel of momentum, Shangguan Long has already lost, hence he had to use this movement to make up for it.
Still, nobody dared to put their money on Kou Zhong yet.
If this time were about life and death combat that went as far as one side would not stop until the other side lose his life, then the great majority of the spectators would bet that Kou Zhong would be the final victor.
But in today’s ten-move agreement, Kou Zhong’s chance of pouring tea to admit mistake appeared to be ten out of ten.
Kou Zhong was still standing erect holding the saber, as steady as the lofty mountain, his eyes flickered with strange rays.
Finally Shangguan Long was unable to hold back; with a violent roar he leaped up, crossing the fishpond, and the dragonhead staff came crashing down on Kou Zhong’s head.
A strong gust of wind incited the water of the pond, the water surface sank, billows whirled around, the fish were startled and leaped out of the water, and thus the hallow tranquility of the underwater world of the pond was disturbed.
A faint smile, brimming with confidence, escaped from the corner of Kou Zhongs mouth. The entire power in his body was concentrated on the Moon in the Well. A flash of lightning shot out.
‘Dang!’
The saber and the staff collided. Sparks flew in all directions, followed by an ear-splitting explosion.
Kou Zhong’s body swayed, but Shangguan Long’s entire body was jolted that it flew to the other side of the fishpond.
Although it was just one sharp and clear contact, everybody appeared to be dazzled by the fiery clash.
Nobody knew who did it, but someone shouted loudly, “The first move!” It was a female voice.
Ba Fenghan and Xu Ziling upstairs frowned, because they recognized Dugu Feng’s voice.
Obviously she wanted to see Kou Zhong lose his prestige, hence she spoke to increase the psychological pressure on him.
Shangguan Long landed back on the edge of the pond; immediately he spin his staff into a slab of staff shadow to guard against Kou Zhong seizing this opportunity to strike back.
The staff shadow suddenly vanished.
Once again Shangguan Long adopted a stance with the staff held across his chest, because he simply could not move the more than a hundred catty dragonhead staff like that indefinitely, otherwise eventually he would be dead of exhaustion.
In the pond, the water calmed down, but the fish still leaped out of the water continuously.
The instant Shangguan Long held the staff still, Kou Zhong finally made his move.
Against all expectation, he did not move like Shangguan Long earlier, where he leaped at an angle across the pond and then strike down from the air; rather, with his sole on the surface of the water, he slid across the pond, as if he was sliding on a flat land. The Moon in the Well suddenly gleamed with yellow light as it struck the enemy.
The crowd roared in shock.
According to physical law, only by leaping vertically into the air will one be able to attack while advancing, defend while retreating.
By doing what Kou Zhong did, dashing horizontally and attacking from the front, as long as Shangguan Long was able to hold his ground steadily at the edge of the pond, he might be able to force Kou Zhong to fall into the pond.
Shangguan Long knew that Kou Zhong was ‘deceitful in many ways’. Although was fully aware that it was a bit unconventional, in this tense moment, he did not have time to think too much. Focusing his power on his arms, he roared and brandished his staff to sweep at Kou Zhong.
The strangest thing happened.
When Kou Zhong was at the middle of the pond, suddenly he sprang up to the air, not only to evade Shangguan Long’s staff sweep, he also leaped above Shangguan Long’s head to send a full blow downward.
Upstairs, Xu Ziling and Ba Fenghan stared in awe; they both guessed that Kou Zhong had used the fish as a stepping-stone, borrowing the reaction force to bring about this totally unexpected change.
Immediately cheers and applause thundered throughout Tingliu Pavilion, increasing Kou Zhong’s prowess.
As soon Shangguan Long’s staff swept across an empty space, he knew the turn of events was far from good.
With the saber blade pressing down overhead, in order to save his own life, he had to unleash the skill stored deep at the bottom of his chest to deal with the attack.
With a wild roar he raised the staff with both hands to block the full power that Kou Zhong had been amassing for quite a while; the saber strike that could break the gold and shatter the rock.
‘Boom!”
The saber and the staff collided again. But unlike the previous time, the sound of clashing was a low, distant and stifled rumble.
Spiraling energy rolled the dragonhead staff in, and continued to invade Shangguan Long’s meridians via his two arms.
Of course Shangguan Long did not dare to be negligence; opening up his mouth wide, he spurted a mouthful of blackish violet rain of blood, while from the sleeves of his garment, the arms, which were raising the dragonhead staff high above his head, immediately turned blackish purple as well. It was extremely scary.
From all around the crowd cried and gasped in shock.
Although not many people have ever seen this kind of demonic martial art, but nobody doubted that what they were witnessing was a martial art technique that was definitely not from an orthodox school.
Borrowing the reaction force from the impact, Kou Zhong somersaulted toward Shangguan Long’s back. Before his feet touched the ground, he already sent out a backhanded saber strike toward Shangguan Long, whose eyes were gleaming with purple light, and was brandishing his staff into tens of thousands staff shadow in a furious attack.
Now, even if the ten-move limitation was no longer in effect, but as soon as there was the slightest chance to escape, Shangguan Long would definitely take the opportunity to flee.
Success or failure, it depended on whether the saber strike would be able to control Shangguan Long, who was rushing his demonic skill to show its full potential.
This saber strike was carrying the full power he had amassed a moment ago; it was swift and fierce without equal. Its area of coverage was quite vast, as he did not wish to let Shangguan Long to find a gap that he could exploit to run away.
The saber light passed through.
‘Qiang!’
Shangguan Long was hit that he nearly stumbled into the pond, in an extremely sorry situation.
Letting out a long laugh, Kou Zhong moved like a shadow-following-shadow, to pursue and attack.
Shangguan Long’s old face from purple turned black; clearly he was extremely frightened. Doing everything he could, he retreated by winding around the pond.
The sound of the saber clashing against the staff became more and more frequent, like the continuous ringing of bell or chime stones [ancient percussion instrument mad of stone or jade pieces hung in a row and struck as a xylophone], or the urgent beating of battle drum. The atmosphere was very intense.
Both sides were fighting speed with speed, like a rabbit zigzagging away from the falcon’s hunt, unfolding into an incomparably intense hand-to-hand combat.
All around the crowd was watching with bated breath.
Those with rather inferior martial art skill were dazzled.
Anybody with a rather keen insight ought to know that when a long-weapon wielder like Shangguan Long was forced to deal with an opponent like Kou Zhong in a close-range combat, he would fall into an absolutely disadvantageous situation.
Suddenly, amid a loud ringing, the shadows separated.
‘Qiang!’
The Moon in the Well returned to its scabbard.
Kou Zhong stood at the edge of the pond, staring ferociously at the dumb-as-a-wooden-chicken opponent.
Not even half a sound was heard throughout the whole audience.
Victory and defeat has been decided.
‘Splash!”
The dragonhead staff slipped off from Shangguan Long’s hands and fell into the pool.
The purplish black color from Shangguan Long’s skin subsided; it was replaced with a morbid pale color.
After a bout of shaking, Shangguan Long dropped down on his knees, while continuously gasping for breath.
Several human figures, coming from several different places, separately darted over toward the two.