Maiden Of The Splitting Moon

Chapter 33 – Darksun Marauders

Within the Purple Vine Forest, a girl dressed in light blue robes hid among the trees watching intently as a rabbit dashed through. Suddenly, the rabbit felt something grab its leg before it was flung into the air, dangling with a rope tied to its ankle.

The girl jumped down revealing herself, it was Ming Yue approaching the poor creature..

She grabbed the rabbit by its ears and cut off the rope.

"It's rabbit meat today," she thought.

Ming Yue walked back to her small camp and proceeded to kill and skin the rabbit. She set up her campfire and waited for the flame to gain strength. She had been traveling for several days now, fighting beasts, cultivating and collecting herbs. Interestingly, she had yet to bump into another person and generally found company in Xiao Yin, her pet owl.

The rabbit meat was put into skewers and placed by the flame, slowly cooking. As she tended to her meal, Ming Yue took out a book from her spatial ring, placing it by her. She silently waited for the meat to cook before finally grabbing a stick and started taking bites.

Xiao Yin rested on her shoulder taking some small mouthfuls as well. She wasn't very focused on enjoying her meal as she read the book that she took out previously. It was the Flowing Wind Manual given to her by Owner Su. She read it intensely only stopping to take another bite of rabbit meat. After what he had told her, she decided to read this book first before going onto the Falling Blade or Sonic Edge manuals.

It was an enlightening manual to her and introduced a way of using her sword and body different from what she knew. Her rigidness came from the using her body's strength at its utmost to deal a powerful blow. However, the Flowing Wind Manual described that relaxing the body will allow you to change the orientation of the strike mid-air. Although the strike would not be as powerful as before, this can be fixed by concentrating your inner force into the arms and torso. The sections of the manual that talked about inner force was extremely helpful to her.

Before, she would just push it into her arms or other body parts without directing it into specific areas. Doing so would juts exhaust her even quicker.

Ming Yue finished her meal and Xiao Yin had already left her shoulder and perched on a tree branch going to sleep. She then proceeded to put what she had learned into practice, bringing out her sword and attacking the empty space in front of her. Her progress was slow but it was quite steady. She was not a genius but her comprehension was decent and the effort she exerted. It was well into the night before she stopped training, the fire had already burned out and she spent the past hour training in the dark.

She wiped her sweat and climbed up a tree resting in the same branch as Xiao Yin and slowly falling asleep.

As the night carried on, several shadows approached where she slept but they weren't focused on her. Instead they stared at another figure who found their back pressed against the tree.

A weak voice came from the them, it was the voice of a young man,"Please let me go. I have given everything I have to you already. What more do you want?"

"Heh, did you think we were only after your valuables? Did you think that we took this time to protect you only to rob? We are from the Darksun Marauders and our boss wants someone to warm his bed tonight," one of the shadows spoke he approached her revealing a nasty grin.

"But I am a man!" he exclaimed.

"It doesn't really matter to him, if anything you look more like a woman than a man. Besides, he doesn't mind if we take a turn first," he continued, holding his arms out ready to grab the man's clothes.

Unfortunately, the marauder could not do so, for his hands had been cut off. He looked at his arms in surprise before screaming in pain.

"AHHHH, IT HURTS. IT HURTS!" he wailed incessantly.

"Third Brother!" one of the marauders exclaimed.

Everyone brandished their weapons and stared into the darkness. They looked around furiously trying to find the one who had attacked their third brother but it was in vain for the one they were looking for was above them. Silently they died one by one as Ming Yue cut their throats with her dagger. The remaining people left was her and the young man.

The young man was shocked by this display, although he could not see clearly, he knew that he had been saved. He finally saw who his savior was and felt surprised that it was a young girl holding a dagger. He could not move and only stared at her as she grabbed her sword and put back her dagger. She started taking the possessions of the dead bodies, placing them within her spatial ring.

He woke himself from the shock and quickly ran up to her.

"Wait, please help me save my younger sister! We were separated when these men revealed their true intentions. I tried to run with her but she was caught before I could escape," he said.

Ming Yue turned around, looking at the young man. What the marauder said was true, this person really did look like more like a woman than a man. She thought about his request. She still had four months before the Youth Dragon Tournament started and it would only take her two months to reach Five Element City from where she was. In any case, she could take this as more combat training.

The young man was afraid that she would decline. After all, they knew nothing about each other. She had no reason to agree to his request. He looked at her waiting patiently and after giving it some thought, Ming Yue nodded, silently agreeing to his pleas.

The young man was grateful, quickly introducing himself.

"Thank you! I am Yu Fengtian. May I have the pleasure of knowing your name?"

Ming Yue said nothing. After all, she rarely spoke to others even with the people at Luan City. However, Yu Fengtian wasn't bothered by this, he knew that there many kinds of people out there with eccentric behavior. He was just happy that this savior of his was one of more benevolent ones.

Afterwards, Ming Yue jumped into a tree and rested on a branch. Xiao Yin followed her, this time landing next to her, going back to sleep. Yu Fengtian laid his back against the tree Ming Yue was on, exhaustion overtook him and he soon fell asleep as well.

Night turned to day, Yu Fengtian woke up to Ming Yue training. He watched before getting up and waited for her to finish. With the sun out, both of them had a much better look at each other. Yu Fengtian was definitely a man, but he looked incredibly feminine. His petite body and girlish face would cause some to mistake him as a woman. He wore light yellow robes which were somewhat dirty from last night's ordeal.

Ming Yue walked up to him, it was most likely that his sister was brought back to their hideout. The most important thing is to find their location.

"What can you tell me about the Darksun Marauders?"