Chapter 64
But the body’s burden becoming greater wasn’t only not a bad thing, it was instead a great thing. Although the [Bull Demon Strong Fist] bestowed strength, endurance, and defensive abilities that were out of the ordinary, he still often felt it was a little wasteful.
If your speed wasn’t fast enough, even a great strength would be in vain if you couldn’t land your hits. Hence he had to put his body in danger when facing Yang Anzhi.
Of course a powerful endurance could support you for longer, but what was important during fights to the death were the myriad of changes happening within an instant short like the fleeting flash of lightning sparks. If one strike didn’t land, evade a thousand miles away. How many opportunities for great wars of three days and three days would you get.
A tough defense could bully masters who used their fists, but if they used the sharp edges of treasured swords, then it would be the so called “needle piercing through a bull’s hide” and he wouldn’t be able to block then. It was always better to hit people than to be hit anyway.
The [Tiger Demon Bone Refining Fist] solved those problems in a fundamental way. It could let him burst out his power and physical strength in the space of an instant. It greatly increased his speed.
Apart of the “Tiger Demon Mountain Climb”, there were another two forceful movement techniques in the Tiger Demon Bone Refining Fist, “Tiger Demon Stream Leap” and “Tiger Demon Mountain Descent.” It included every style from jumps upward to leaps downward, from rushes forward to retreats backward. It was truly like a fierce tiger crossing through the forest, coming and going like the wind.
Li Qingshan stopped his steps and allowed his madly beating heart to slowly calm down. He closed his eyes to comprehend the sensations just now. At the same time, he was also waiting.
The two shadows’ movement techniques were actually decent, and they walked out of the woods after just a moment. They saw Li Qingshan on the mountain slope at one glance with the help from the reflection of the bright snow. They felt a violent and dangerous atmosphere at the same time.
Li Qingshan crossed his hands in greeting and stood up straight: “Two third-grade masters also dare to chase me. You really have brave guts. Since you came, leave your lives behind!” From stillness, he turned around in a flash without waiting for the two to answer, his whole person pouncing down.
“Tiger Demon Mountain Descent!’
“Tiger Descending the Mountains Li Qingshan.” Those two persons remembered Li Qingshan’s nickname at the same time. It wasn’t only Li Qingshan who thought this nickname didn’t sound great to the ears, even they had felt it was laughably crude the first time they’d heard it. But no one could laugh when the black shadow befell on them.
They only hated themselves for listening to the rumors and deluding themselves because of their greed. They hadn’t thought that a greenhorn kid like Li Qingshan would be unexpectedly so strong. Yang Anzhi spread out the matter about the spirit ginseng, but he’d never talk about the ugly affair of him being beaten. Meanwhile, Li Qingshan’s achievement of leveling the Black Wind Camp by himself was too excessively odd, so they hadn’t any faith in it. They only saw Li Qingshan return to the city together with two famous masters and several hundred men.
It was already too late to think about fleeing.
“Tiger Demon Heart Scoop!” Li Qingshan’s hands spread open like claws and thrust into the two men’s chests. With a grab and a pull, he scooped out two blood-red hearts. The hearts were still throbbing bang bang.
There were the three basic strength refining and strength handling moves “Tiger Demon Spine Shift,” “Tiger Demon Waist Stretch,” and “Tiger Demon Head Bump,” as well as the three forceful motion techniques “Tiger Demon Stream Jump,” “Tiger Demon Mountain Climb,” and “Tiger Demon Mountain Descent.” Apart from those, the [Tiger Demon Bone Refining Fist] also had three moves purely made to injure and kill, distinguished as “Tiger Demon Heart Scoop,” “Tiger Demon Sheep Tear,” and “Tiger Demon Wild Hiss.” It was many times more savage than the [Bull Demon Strong Fist].
“Little An, come!”
The porcelain jar opened and Little An flew out from within. The red color on his body had become fainter, and there was only a layer of pale red left. He’d almost recovered the appearance of a white skeleton. Li Qingshan used strength and squeezed. Fresh blood dripped down, dropped on the skeleton bones, and penetrated inside in the space of an instant.
This was the so-called heart blood of living men. Such a way of cultivating had reached an extreme level of evil and terror.
But Li Qingshan actually didn’t feel the slightest shred of discomfort, and not only because there was no wrong in killing those two men who wished to plot against his life. A merciless elation welled up from the bottom of his heart as he smelled the thick scent of blood. The red light in the depths of his eyes also shone more dazzlingly.
In the eyes of ordinary men, a bull had always been a comparatively honest and docile creature. Admittedly it also had its irascible moments, but it still couldn’t be compared to the tiger that killed as a way of life. It was the same when it came to fist techniques named after those two wild animals.
If the [Bull Demon Strong Fist] merely increased the body’s bravery, then the [Tiger Demon Bone Refining Fist] thoroughly aroused the vicious and murderous facets within his heart. Good fighters liked to fight and good killers liked to kill, nothing else would be more of a common sense in the world.
Li Qingshan rubbed Little An ‘s head with a hand still covered in fresh blood, saying gently: “Come out breathe some fresh air!” He didn’t know how a skeleton would really breathe fresh air, but Little An still climbed happily on Li Qingshan’s shoulders.
Li Qingshan rushed away, unaware of the two other persons that caught up not long after. They were the horse-faced man and the blue-clothed woman from the teahouse. The two were people who often traveled the rivers and lakes when all was said and done, and those pampered sons of the Dragon Gate Sect couldn’t compare to them. Even the blue-clothed woman only blanched slightly when she saw the scene.
“Hmph, the three killers of the Yao clan, even those three trashes dare to have ideas about the spirit ginseng. Brother, he went out of the city to break into the Dragon Gate Sect, this is a good opportunity for us. After both sided suffer from the fight, we’ll be like the oriole lurking behind 1. We’ll leave as soon as we take the spirit ginseng, no one will…”
“Shut your mouth!” The horse-faced man was crouched down and examining the corpses. He interrupted with an ashen face when he heard the woman’s stratagem. “Let’s leave, we’re leaving right now, the farther away we leave the better!”
The blue-clothed woman shouted: “What are you saying?”
“Although the three killers of the Yao clan can’t amount to any extraordinary figure, they still have some firm skills. Leaving aside the third killer who’s expert in poisons, the first killer and the second killer both have decent martial arts. Even I would need to exert some effort if the two of them joined hands. But now, while they were on their guards, they couldn’t even go through a single “Black Tiger Heart Scoop2” move and died with their hearts dug out. This Li Qingshan isn’t someone we can deal with. The rumors about the Black Wind Camp may be true.” The horse-faced man spoke calmly, but his voice was faintly shaking. He could imagine what would be the outcome be if he were to be instigated into acting.
“We’re originally hidden weapon stealth attackers, don’t tell me we’ll exchange moves with him face to face? There’s no obstacle as long as we can pull away with our movement techniques. Elder brother, your guts are really too small. There’s no fortune without danger, if we obtained that spirit ginseng…” The blue-clothed woman chattered on and on. Her eyes shone especially bright when mentioning the spirit ginseng.
“Pa.” A crisp and clear slap on the face. The blue-clothed woman covered her face with disbelief: “You actually dare to hit me?”
The horse-faced man said: “Go by yourself if you want to throw your life away, don’t drag this father along. Even if you tell master when we go back, we’ll see whether master punishes me or praises me!” He flung his arms after saying his words and went away.
The blue-clothed woman froze a moment, but still caught up to him: “Elder brother, how can you be like this!”
The Dragon Gate mountain towered unwavering on the earth. It had a steep topography, and was surrounded on three sides by precipices, especially the precipice of several thousand feet straight from top to bottom on the eastern side. It looked like the hack of a blade or the chop of an ax. Even apes or monkeys would have trouble climbing it.
But at this moment, a patch of darkness on the eastern cliff twinkled with a star-like fire light that flew up at high speed.
Watching carefully, it was unexpectedly a shadow climbing the cliff, its ten bent fingers fastened on the rocks like iron claws, sputtering spark after spark. It was precisely Li Qingshan.
1. The oriole lurking behind is part of the Chinese idiom “The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind,” meaning pursuing something while unaware of the greater danger lurking behind.
2. The Black Tiger Heart Scoop is a move of the Heihuquan, or “Black Tiger Fist,” a Chinese martial arts descended from northern Shaolin kung fu.