"Until Lin Zhenglun appears before me, not a single Lin may step through this gate or cross this line. If you do, it will be counted as a challenge to me! And I will cripple the man!"
Jiang Chen stood his sword crosswise before the Lin clan estate, his face cold and severe, not a trace of jest in him.
Lin Zhengli was struck with astonishment. There was no fear in it, only pure surprise, even absurdity.
Three men, and they dared to blockade the gates of the Lin clan. Where did this lad's courage come from? What gave him such boldness!
Lin Zhengli was about to act when another voice rang out before him, still far off, yet trembling into the ear."Jiang, what a big mouth you have! Do you think I would not kill?"
That was the voice of Lin Zhengren, the Lin clan's mightiest combat strength!
For all his profound bearing and deep, unfathomable reserve, even he could not suppress the fury in his voice.
It truly was a clown strutting in broad daylight. Did any stray cat or mongrel dare come and make mischief at the Lin estate?
On Jiang Chen's back hung a long wooden box, carried all the way from Maple City to Riverview City. At the sound of Lin Zhengren's voice, he showed neither alarm nor fear.
He merely took down the long box, opened it, and drew out that ancient, plain long spear.
The Candle-Burning Spear's appearance was not in the least striking. The chill gleaming at its tip lay sheathed, and its shaft was not even smooth — the marks left by thirty years of burning in a kitchen stove.
Yet now it was the most famed weapon in all of Clear River County.
Jiang Chen reversed the spear and thrust it into the earth at his feet, sinking it several inches deep.
"Senior Brother Zhu has said," Jiang Chen announced, "that I am but a Roaming Meridian realm cultivator, and have come to Riverview City for a reason. Any Roaming Meridian cultivator in this city may come out and fight me. Even if he kills me, Senior Brother Zhu will not interfere. But if any cultivator above that realm were to crush the weak with the strong — once he enters the county Dao Academy, Senior Brother Zhu will fix his eyes upon you, Lin Zhengren. See you once, beat you once!"
These words, driven by all his Dao essence, shook the Lin clan estate.
And Lin Zhengren's voice did not rise again, nor did he show any sign of appearing.
As if that earlier outburst had been but a collective hallucination.
The Candle-Burning Spear stood here, and it represented Zhu Weiwo. Before the spear had pressed Riverview City, Zhu Weiwo would never have carried such power to awe; now his mere name was enough to overawe an entire region.
For every breath the silence endured, the face of the Lin family swelled one shade redder. And so the silence was soon broken. An old man with hair all white, leaning on a wooden staff, was helped slowly out by his underlings.
"In that case, Zhengli," the old man said, his voice low but filled with the gravity of one who had seen killing, "go out and have a try. Let us see whether he is, truly, peerless within the Roaming Meridian realm!"
"Yes, Grandfather." Lin Zhengli bowed to the old master, cast back his long sleeves, and strode out through the memorial archway!
Sword light burst up like lightning! Jiang Chen had come riding the blade.
Billows rolled up as Lin Zhengli wheeled in mid-air. He was no reckless fool — before stepping out through the archway, he had already been forming his seals.
His opening move was the Three-Fold Rising Tide, the dao art that had made his name at the Three-City Trial, securing him an unassailable position.
But Jiang Chen, though airborne, turned in empty air out of nowhere — the powerful fruit of the Four-Spirit Body Refining Art, granting him a mid-air agility far beyond cultivators of his level.
The sword aimed for his throat! Lin Zhengli's expression did not change; forming seals as he moved, he calmly drove out the second fold of the Three-Fold Rising Tide.
Jiang Chen could not yet, as Li Yun could, give three body-turns mid-air with no purchase. But neither did he need to. Even as he fell, his long sword shifted, and a golden light arrow shot from the blade at Lin Zhengli, who had just shifted position.
That was a dao art embedded in his standard-issue artifact long sword, arriving as the third strike!
Lin Zhengli's billows surged again, completing the last transformation of the Three-Fold Rising Tide. Meanwhile his seal-dao art was complete, and he was about to strike — when his face changed violently, and he hurled that raging wave before him!
Turning offense to defense, his reaction could not be called slow.
But before the surging, roaring purple qi, the raging wave was so fragile as to be beneath contempt!
Purple Qi from the East — the feudal lords gaze westward!
The instant his toe touched the ground, Jiang Chen unleashed his mightiest killing move. Driving the roaring purple qi, he broke the billows apart in one stroke.
The gleaming sword tip halted before Lin Zhengli's brow.
Drip... drop! A drop of water slipped from the blade onto the tip of Lin Zhengli's nose.
And he dared not move a hair.
After the Three-City Trial, he had harbored countless grievances: that Jiang Chen had snatched the first-year champion honor that should have been his, and at his own carelessness. Had he not been careless, how could he have lost to that mountain savage?
But the wood was already carved, the thing settled. However much he raged, it availed nothing. Thank heaven Jiang Chen had come to Riverview City, handing him a chance to prove himself. In truth, the moment the three entered the city, he had learned of it. Lin Zhenglun's widow truly had killed herself — nor, of course, was it wholly unconnected to him. When he traced the letter the woman sent before her death and found it had reached Jiang Chen, only then did he piece together their relationship.
Every disciple of a Dao Academy was a future pillar of the State of Zhuang — none disposed to swallow an affront in silence.
And the means by which he had taken over Lin Zhenglun's business were hardly clean. Part had been the dowry that woman brought — bearing procedures in compliance with Zhuang law, to be sure, but not able to withstand a discerning man's scrutiny.
So at the first sign, he had Lin Zhenglun hide within the clan estate. So long as they held the gate and kept Jiang Chen out, the great matter could be made small, the small matter, nothing. He had thought everything within his grasp.
But that Jiang Chen should be this brazen, barring the gate with a single sword — that was the first thing he had never expected. And even less had he expected his all-out battle to end in crushing defeat! He had not proven his own strength, but had instead become a footnote to another's.
At that moment he recalled what his elder brother Lin Zhengren had told him at the Three-City Trial — "If you are not wholly certain of victory, then do not give the enemy a chance to complete you."
"Go back." The hand gripping Jiang Chen's sword did not tremble.
He had not in truth crippled Lin Zhengli, as threatened. The awe he borrowed from Zhu Weiwo's name had its limits. Zhu Weiwo could not kill Lin Zhengren without cause; at most he would beat him at every sight, making life in the county Dao Academy unbearable.
Such a consequence was enough to bestow on Lin Zhengren an extraordinary tolerance. But crippling Lin Zhengli lay beyond its bounds.
Lin Zhengli stared directly at the gleaming sword tip and retreated step by step, back behind the archway. Only then, with a start, did he realize his entire back was soaked through with cold sweat.
"You may fetch any Roaming Meridian cultivator in Riverview City. I alone, with this sword, will take on all of them. If I die, it is my own fault. The two sworn brothers with me will collect my corpse."
Lowering his sword, Jiang Chen stood firm, and said to the Lin Patriarch: "My only request is reasonable. The biological mother of my younger sister died here in Riverview City. Someone must step forward and take responsibility."
"She killed herself." Lin Zhengli forced the words out.
"Very well." Jiang Chen stared at the Lin clansmen gathering ever more thickly beyond the archway. With a cold smile, his blade sang long.
"Today, then, let us see — within the bounds of Riverview City, in the Roaming Meridian realm, whether I am worthy to claim the crown!"