Volume 2, Chapter 39 – Tiger Guard

The two men were a mismatched pair, one burly and one thin. Both wore sunglasses, and after getting out of the car, they each took their own sword from the back seat.

The thin man had deep nasolabial folds and a bulging forehead. His features were seedy, and he held a short scepter-sword in his hand.

The burly man had a tiger’s back and a bear’s waist, with a square face like a marble sculpture carved by a craftsman, every line sharp and defined. In his hand was a broad-bladed greatsword as wide as a palm.

“Ouch, sounds like we made a bit too much noise coming in…”

The seedy old man walked to the headlights and glanced down, then shook his head in fake regret. “Tsk tsk, this was just freshly repaired by someone else… How could I treat the fruits of labor so carelessly? A sin~ a sin~”

“Uncle Li.” The burly man addressed him. “This place isn’t that big. They should’ve heard that sound.”

“Right!” The old man nodded. “We gotta talk efficiency here… the shorter the time, the fewer the variables. Handle it early, go back for our reward. Your uncle planned this all along~”

The burly man hesitated, then still chose to explain to Uncle Li. “I can’t see through that woman. I’m not confident I can take her down quickly.”

Bai Xiang’s appearance was far too distinctive.

If this were abroad, it’d be one thing. But under the influence of traditional thought in Great Yu, hardly anyone even tried dyeing their hair. Her white hair was practically a banner—one glance from far away and you knew it was her.

So of course the burly man knew who Bai Xiang was. For the past month he’d been watching the recording of her fight with Liu Mengqing.

If the other party only had the level she’d shown in the arena, then he really wouldn’t be afraid. But what he and those experts and scholars couldn’t understand was why Dao Lord Liu had paused for a moment during his final bout of mad laughter.

The Demon Pool ‘Willow-Blade Ant’ hadn’t performed the way it should have. Its final offensive had been, frankly, a complete fizzle.

Dao Lord Liu had gone so far as to self-destruct his sword to release the Demon Pool, clearly intending to use the blast to cancel out Bai Xiang’s outer Aspect.

In that instant, once ‘Willow-Blade Ant’ regained its freedom, it should have attacked everyone on the stage in its most primitive Demon Pool form. Bai Xiang, who was standing closest at the time, should have been the first to be hit by its phantom-god.

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But judging from the footage, that never happened.

‘Willow-Blade Ant’ didn’t make any effective move at all. It didn’t even put up token resistance before it was shredded by the cicada-demon phantom.

The unknown method made the burly man wary, and it was precisely because of this that he didn’t agree with the assumption Uncle Li had made on the way here.

Uncle Li had assumed those two would have their strength and stamina heavily drained by the ‘Shadow.’ But if Bai Xiang really was as they suspected, her sword arts already honed to the point she could contend with a phantom-god, then that assumption didn’t hold.

It would also indirectly mean she’d been hiding her true strength.

She should at least be at the level of Purple Qi.

“If we can’t be fast, then we’ll just be slow~” Uncle Li said carelessly. “See? That’s exactly why I came early. If that’s not long-sighted, what is?”

As he spoke, he circled to the back of the car, opened the trunk, and lifted out a leather-wrapped briefcase.

“Mm~” Setting the briefcase on the rear of the car, Uncle Li clamped a cigarette between his teeth and keyed in the code. With a click, the case sprang open.

“Hm?” His voice jumped, his body suddenly stiffening.

“What is it?” The burly man stepped forward quickly and, seeing what was in the case, his face changed too.

Inside there should have been the containment vessel for the ‘Shadow’—a puppet dummy burned into a lump of charcoal.

But now there was only a pile of black ash. Which meant the ‘Shadow’ was gone.

At the same time, footsteps sounded behind them.

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Both men instantly dropped into ready stances and saw Yu He and Bai Xiang coming out from the doorway, loosely facing off against them.

Aside from the old beggar being a bit dusty and disheveled, Bai Xiang was completely unscathed.

“Who are you people?” Yu He frowned and demanded. “What was in that case?”

The Demon-Suppressing Bureau was a specialist agency for hunting demons, with rich experience dealing with Demon Pools. He found these two men’s posture painfully familiar—identical to people who hauled containment vessels around to reclaim Demon Pools!

That association was explosive. Yu He immediately realized the ghost-shadow Demon Pool might not have formed naturally at all, but be man-made, just like ‘Shenli’!

And pushing that further—didn’t that mean someone was secretly researching Demon Pools and releasing them to hurt people as experiments?

A textbook stress reaction… The old beggar is from the Demon-Suppressing Bureau?

Uncle Li’s face also changed slightly.

How long had it been since the last demon incident was quelled?

Was it really necessary to pay this much attention to some little white-haired girl?

“We…” He opened his mouth, still intending to bluff.

But he saw Bai Xiang already stepping forward toward them.

She held the scabbard in her left hand and laid her right palm over the hilt. Her white hair swung aside to bare her forehead, and a pair of eerie golden eyes locked onto him.

Well, so much for that.

“Little Tiger?”

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“Uncle Li.” The burly man answered.

“She’s yours.”

“I understand.”

Screech—

The burly man drew his broad-bladed greatsword and tossed the scabbard aside, then strode toward Bai Xiang like it was the most natural thing in the world.

If you only watched the rhythm of their steps, you’d think they were just two ordinary pedestrians passing each other on the street.

Halfway there, that rhythm changed in an instant.

Bang!

The burly man’s body exploded forward, his step kicking up a spray of yellow dirt.

He was already tall, close to two meters, and his arm span was nothing to sneeze at either.

That meant all he had to do was speed up and take one big step, swing his arm in a full arc and extend it to its limit—long legs, long arms, plus the length of the greatsword. It was as if he’d devoured seven or eight meters of distance in a blink, bringing the blade straight down toward Bai Xiang’s head.

And that wasn’t all.

As the blade descended, a deep, purplish-red Demonic Aura suddenly burst from the edge. As it ground against the air, it created the illusion of a plunging waterfall. The spreading mist in midair actually formed the phantom of a raging tiger!

“Roar!”

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“Purple Qi?”

The tiger’s roar.

Yu He’s cry of shock.

Neither was as intense as the chill rising from the depths of the burly man’s heart after the resounding “clang!” that followed.

Even if he hadn’t gone all out with that strike, it was close.

So how…

His breathing grew heavy. The man brought his other hand down onto the hilt, throwing most of his body weight into it. With every bit of strength he had, sword and brute force alike, he pressed down in one massive shove.

But it was useless.

In stark contrast to his trembling body, Bai Xiang held her sword with just one hand.

The blade of ‘Feixiang Heaven’ looked slender, yet it was like that thin, bright barrier of sky and earth at the end of your sight—something that simply could not be crossed.

The man narrowed his eyes and saw that her wrist didn’t budge.

She only met his gaze with those golden irises and parted her lips slightly. “I have a question.”

“The people you serve—are they of Great Yu?”