Volume 3, Chapter 451 – Chi Xiyan, Open Your Eyes and Look at Me

“How could this happen…”

Chi Xiyan reached out, her trembling hands cradling the shattered pill.

“Why did this happen!”

She felt as though her chest had been sealed shut.

Every breath tore at her painfully.

As the shattered fragments of the pill slipped from between her fingers, she felt her heart tremble along with them.

“No. Don’t.”

She pressed her ten fingers together, wrapping the pill in what little spiritual energy remained within her.

She wanted to use alchemical flame to melt the shell back together.

She wanted to mend the pill and restore what had broken.

But it was all in vain.

A pill that had failed to form could never be repaired.

No matter how much spiritual energy Chi Xiyan poured into it, she could not stop its potency from bleeding away.

All she could do now was watch helplessly as the pill’s properties slowly dissolved from her palm.

That precious pill, forged from treasures of the five elements, was slowly turning into a useless pile of dregs.

“Don’t do this.”

Spiritual energy was useless now. Chi Xiyan closed her palm, gripping the remains of the pill tightly in her hand.

The shattered pill crunched and cracked in her grip.

“Hss.”

This pill had been her hope of advancing to the Fifth Realm within half a year.

If she could not advance to the Fifth Realm, she stood little chance against Song Shixuan, a sword cultivator already at the Fifth Realm.

Chi Xiyan was not arrogant enough to believe she could defeat, across realms, a sword cultivator who specialized in exactly that kind of combat.

What was shattering now was not only Chi Xiyan’s chance at advancement, but also her hope of pulling Muxue out of the fire pit she was trapped in.

Drip. Drip.

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Bright red liquid fell from Chi Xiyan’s fingertips onto the floor.

“Haha, that woman surnamed Chen was right. You really were hiding here.” A one eyed warrior at the Fifth Realm slowly stepped into the alchemy chamber.

He looked at Chi Xiyan’s fragile back, a savage light rising in his eyes.

“Little girl, did you really think you could escape the Chi family’s pursuit?”

“Come along quietly and accept judgment from the Chi family’s Punishment Hall.”

“Hah.” Chi Xiyan drew in a deep breath.

The air flowing into her lungs carried a faint, grief stricken tremor.

Chi Xiyan pressed the shattered pill to her chest and let out a low, hoarse growl.

“So close. It was so close.”

“You bastard! Do you even know what you’ve done!”

“Hah?” The one eyed warrior sneered. “The final moments of pill formation are when an alchemist is at their most vulnerable. Isn’t that common knowledge?”

“If it weren’t for that, how else could I enjoy a scene like this one.”

“Heh heh. So close to success, only to fall apart in the very last step. How does that feel, Chi Xiyan?”

“…” Chi Xiyan closed her eyes.

Her shoulders trembled faintly.

Anger nearly burst through her chest.

Her condition right now was dire.

Gravely wounded, her spiritual energy exhausted, she had almost no means left to resist.

She refused to accept it. She could not understand it either.

Why had things come to this.

A faint crunching sound followed.

The shattered pill in her palm finally crumbled to dust.

The warrior’s sneering voice came from behind her. “Let’s go, Chi Xiyan. You have no strength left to resist now. Come with me, and you might live a little longer.”

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Chi Xiyan let her hand fall open, powerless.

The dull, lusterless fragments of the pill trickled slowly through her fingers like fine sand.

“I wasn’t planning on using this.”

Chi Xiyan said quietly.

“But you’ve made me angry.”

The one eyed warrior’s expression shifted slightly. Something in Chi Xiyan’s tone stirred a sense of danger in him.

Holding nothing back now, he struck out with the full force of his palm toward Chi Xiyan.

A crisp crunch sounded.

A pill, glowing molten red like lava, shattered between Chi Xiyan’s teeth.

An overwhelming pressure surged through her withered meridians all at once, like a tide crashing over her.

A blistering wave of heat swept through the alchemy chamber like a storm.

The scorching wind collided with the warrior’s palm force in an instant, nearly tearing the entire chamber apart.

The one eyed warrior stumbled back several steps under the force of it, his single eye wide with shock.

“That’s, the Crimson Firmament Blood Burning Pill!”

“How could you possibly have a pill like that!”

Chi Xiyan rose to her feet, fingers curling slightly as she felt the searing potency surge through her body.

“I didn’t expect you to actually recognize this pill.”

“Then you must know what it does.”

“This was meant for Song Shixuan. I didn’t want to waste it on someone like you.”

The one eyed warrior’s brow twitched.

Chi Xiyan’s contempt lit a fire of rage across his face.

“Such arrogance!”

“So what if you’ve squeezed out extra spiritual energy from that pill!”

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“You’re still only at the Fourth Realm. The gap between the Fourth Realm and the Fifth Realm is absolute!”

“I could capture you with a single hand!”

With that, the warrior formed both hands into claws and lunged straight for Chi Xiyan.

What met him instead was a small jade sword.

A Fifth Realm warrior had abundant vital energy and a formidable body.

But even that formidable body could not withstand the natal sword of a Sixth Realm sword cultivator.

Like a knife slicing through tofu, the warrior’s fingers and palm were severed clean at the root.

Before the pain could even reach his mind, an unmatched flash of sword light had already engulfed his vision.

“Lingxiao Exiled Sword Art. Piercing Sun.”

Chi Xiyan murmured the name of the technique.

A secret sword art passed down within the Lingxiao Sword Sect, effortlessly wielded by someone from outside the sect.

The one eyed warrior let out a scream of agony.

Instincts honed over years of life and death combat let him dodge that killing blow at the very last instant.

But even so, his right shoulder was shattered to pieces beneath that flash of sword light.

“Damn it! How do you know a sword art like this?!”

“Who taught you?! Was it Chi Muxue?!”

“What is the Shadow Hall even doing, letting information this critical slip through without a word?!”

Cursing all the while, the one eyed warrior fled toward the distance.

Gravely wounded, he had already lost any will to keep fighting Chi Xiyan.

Chi Xiyan glanced at the small sword in her hand and murmured to herself.

“A single move from a secret sword technique is enough to gravely wound a Fifth Realm warrior with one strike.”

“The Lingxiao Sword Sect truly is terrifying.”

“Then what kind of combat strength must Song Shixuan, the young sect master of the Lingxiao Sword Sect, actually possess.”

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“Heh.”

Chi Xiyan let out a self mocking laugh.

She looked toward the fleeing warrior’s back and gave chase.

The effects of the Crimson Firmament Blood Burning Pill would not last forever.

Right now, she was only forcing out hidden potential through the pill.

Once the effect wore off, the backlash of the Blood Burning would leave her gravely wounded in an instant.

A few breaths later, Chi Xiyan caught up to the one eyed warrior.

The warrior’s face twisted with terror. “Your movement technique. How much has Chi Muxue taught you! Is she not afraid of being held accountable by the Lingxiao Sword Sect!”

“Noisy.” Chi Xiyan snapped coldly.

Three strikes of her sword cut the warrior into four pieces.

She then turned her head toward the collapsed hall ahead, where a female sword cultivator stood staring at her, face full of shock.

“Chen Axi!” Chi Xiyan snarled. “You deserve to die!”

“It wasn’t me! I didn’t do anything!” Chen Axi cried out in terror. “The Chi family forced me to say it!”

Chi Xiyan had no interest in her excuses. She struck her down with a single blow of her sword.

The woman did not even have time to make a sound before she was consumed by the flash of the blade.

By the time a cup of tea had cooled, every warrior the Chi family had sent had fallen beneath Chi Xiyan’s sword.

Chi Xiyan stood there holding her sword, her mind growing hazy.

The backlash of the Blood Burning Pill had already left her soul aching with a dull pain.

Then, she lost all sense of the world around her.

***

“Xiyan! Wake up!”

A familiar voice reached her ears.

“Xiyan! Open your eyes and look at me!”