Chapter 318 - Truths and Lies (IV)

Dai Xiu stepped out onto the stage rather leisurely, glancing over toward the other end where her opponent was.

It was a girl--or, well, a woman from the looks of it, who seemed to be in her thirties. She donned long, almost flaming red robes, tight against her skin, with scarlet hair let loose to freely swarm around her face.

She was rather beautiful, Dai Xiu thought, though had a venom to her eyes that the former found rather displeasing. A faint smirk hung on her lips and, in combination with the look of derision, it was clear that the woman was looking down on her.

Dai Xiu didn't mind, putting on the gauntlets.

"You're a rather pretty little thing~" the woman said, cackling rather strangely. "I'd feel bad to hurt such a pretty face. Little sister, don't you know? If a girl gets a scar on her face, she'll never be pretty ever again. You don't want to become ugly, do you?"

"What do you mean?" Dai Xiu said. "Ugly like you? I don't think you're that ugly, big sister."

The woman's eyes widened and her eyebrows twitched, and Dai Xiu felt a tinge of pride swell in her heart. She had been watching her Master all this while, and was carefully learning his mysterious ways--his Master's ability to stun others into utter silence was marvelous, and she yearned she could do the same. And now, she'd done it--she used mere words to stun someone, just like her Master did!

"... naughty girl," the woman said, her grin turning into a wide sneer that cut the corners of her lips until they bled. "I should cut that filthy tongue of yours and feed it to the fishes."

"My tongue's not filthy," Dai Xiu said. "Master taught us to wash it twice a day!"

"Heh, somebody you call a Master? You--"

"--careful," Dai Xiu's tone dropped as Qi began to flutter around her. "Right now, all I plan on doing is giving you a few bruises. But if you say one bad thing about my Master," she grinned. "I'll wring your head off your neck and shatter your skull into thousands of pieces."

"Ho ho, scary, so scary please, please little sister, don't do that; girls ought to be proper and nice and sweet, not so barbaric. This big sister should teach you since it's clear your Master never did, he he"

"Aah," Dai Xiu sighed. "You went and did it anyway."

"I sure did. That means you'll have to wring my neck. Can you do it, though, sweet little thing?"

"I'm just worried."

"Worried about what?"

"If I can do it without spilling any blood."

"What do you--"

"BEGIN!"

Dai Xiu was like a bolt of lightning, shooting forward as soon as the voice cleared out. Her expression distorted slightly with anger, she poured Qi into her fist and struck forward; the woman, though slightly surprised, took out a lengthy and slithery whip, lashing out as she took a step backward, dodging Dai Xiu's strike.

The whip wrangled around her arm, heating up as though trying to sear into her skin, while she paused. Glancing at the whip and then at the woman, she used her free arm, grabbed the whip, and yanked forward.

The woman flew, her expression that of a faint surprise as she let go of the whip, vaulting over Dai Xiu and dodging her strike.

"You really are all kinds of special," the woman said, taking out yet another, identical whip. "Sweet, cute, young, talented... the kind I despise the most. He he~ little sister, who told you to be so impressive in front of me?! Kneel down, you bitch!"

She lashed out, the sound of the whip like that of thunder as the Qi surrounding it kindled into a roaring fire; Dai Xiu frowned slightly, using the Shadow Steps to rapidly dodge it, crossing the distance between her and the woman. The latter exclaimed softly yet again, her feet wrapped in the flames as she soared back, dodging yet another one of Dai Xiu's strikes, all while the recoil of the lashed whip turned toward the latter.

Dai Xiu ducked, just barely dodging the lash of the whip that whizzed a few inches above her, looking up at the woman who gently glided back down to the ground.

... something was off, she realized.

"He he, you're such an entertaining cutie. But... it seems you aren't as strong as that boy? He he, lucky me~"

"... you yap too much," Dai Xiu said as Qi began to roar through her. She realized that the woman wasn't really fighting her--she was dancing around her.

It was likely with the express purpose of humiliation, to make it seem as though she was struggling like a little fledgling, all so to fail.

She didn't care about being humiliated--she knew well enough there were countless people her age that could beat her, starting with Senior Brother Tao himself, but it wasn't just her that would suffer the humiliation: it was also her Master. And though he'd advised them to take it easy and simply enjoy the fights... she couldn't, not anymore.

Taking a deep breath, her body rippled, Qi manifesting into a faint haze above her skin. Her body was the furnace, and her will was the ignition.

She kicked off with her right leg, tearing open a hole in the array-reinforced ground the size of a small crater, appearing right in front of the woman before the latter could even blink. Unlike before, when the expressions of surprise bore a shade of mockery, this one was... genuine.

Rather than punching, Dai Xiu grabbed the woman's shoulder and wrangled under her armpit, coiling her into a lock.

During her spars with Senior Brother Tao, he taught her many things--namely that her unique body constitution was well suited not just for direct fighting, but also locking down her opponents. Unlike most people, who had to draw Qi from their dantian to whatever singular point they needed it at, Dai Xiu's entire body was a dantian, every inch of it always roaring with Qi.

As she forged a lock, rolling by the woman's side and grappling both of them to the ground, where Dai Xiu lay underneath the woman, one of her arms tangled with the woman's while the other slithered around the latter's neck.

She pressed, hard, despite the roaring recoil of Qi--the woman had far more Qi than she did, but it was nowhere near of the same quality. It was akin to drinking the water at the source of the river, and then ten miles downstream from it.

It was incomparable, really.

"Y-y-you, you--" Dai Xiu pressed harder, cutting off the woman's words.

"I warned you," she whispered, her voice a bedeviled scourge. "One bad word about my Master, and I would wring your head off your neck."

"T-they, will... kill... you..."

"Maybe," Dai Xiu said. "But then I will get to torture you for all eternity, as we'll both be dead."

"That's enough, Xiu'er. You've won." a gentle voice swept through her as all her anger and hate washed away. Her arms loosened immediately as she shot up to her feet, looking over to the stands where she saw her Master smiling at her. There was a halo of gold about him, as though the world itself was singing endless hymns about his greatness.

She bowed, ignoring the woman coughing and spitting blood on the ground behind her, before heading over to her seat. She also realized she was the first to finish... as none of the other ones have even started fighting, as though they were waiting for hers to end.

---

Sorry, only one chapter today; simply just one of 'those' days.
As an extra, here's a few of the scrapped plans I had for the story that were removed/rewritten at some point:

-- Light was originally gonna be the 'main villain' of the 1st book, but I scrapped the idea partially because the readers seemed to like her, and partially because I couldn't quite get the story to work (this would have become the initial incident that would introduce Demon God/Cult as the main threat, but I wanted to do something slightly different with that storyline, too)

-- Sect Master of the Spirit Sword Sect was originally going to be one of the Sages (hence his title) as it would create a 'distantly-related' connection of MC to the Sages, but I scrapped it as he was simply too weak and slightly underdeveloped as a character for that

-- The projection Long Tao saw in the tomb within Spiritwood Grove was originally actually a person; but as I've just recently introduced a new member of the group (+ quite a few characters of the Holy Lands), it felt too stuffy. I decided to scrap it when I wasn't really able to figure out what I would even do with her long-term.

-- Shamans were originally going to just be called 'Wizards' and be far more like a classical image of a wizard (so, spellcasters), but I scrapped it as I couldn't really 'balance' them against the world, eventually coming up with the idea that they can be nukes, but only with due preparation

-- Silvercrest City arc was initially only going to be a few chapters long as a stopgap between the Eternal Range arc & the Sunless Forest arc, but when I got the idea for Lao Shun, I expanded it into its own story just to have him join the group

They don't make up for a chapter, of course, but I do hope they offer you some insight into how often I change the original drafts for the ideas (& even how much impact your reactions to things have ^^)