“Quickly! Protect Young Master!” The Nightwatcher shouted out, his old voice sounded pubescent, cracking twice in a near cry.

  Hao was stunned by the man’s awareness of the battlefield. As he stared down at the unconscious form of the thing called Mo Bangcai, wanting to end it with a simple strike.

  Instead, he found himself jumping back. Not once but twice, he had to make bounding steps backwards, his focus on Bangcai fading as a fifth blade on the day came quickly for his legs.

  He never forgot about the other man he sent tumbling, stabbed by his own young master—but another joining so soon was unexpected. It was inevitable as the number of the Blue Moon Mountains Sect’s Disciples fell or retreated, heartbeats and tears stopping, some escaping in the distance beyond golden-orange leafed trees.

  The sword that flashed at his waist was swiftly pulled back. Its wielder, turning gray himself but youthful in his face and eyes, put a slight bend in one of his knees in stance as the blade rose above his head.

  Another joined him, but he was nobody new. It was the one recently battered by Hao and stabbed by his young master, still somehow loyal—or mindless—as he rose to his feet to charge in from the side. His eyes were bloodshot as he strained to ignore his pain. Yet, how much of it he could ignore with both his arms hanging loose like they were pulled from a burlap rag doll…

  Damn ghost. Hao thought easily, dodging the charge as the technique had long left with the man’s sanity.

  The charge worked; it gave his friend an opening, which drove Hao back further as the swords swung, coming with a sound like storm winds and lightning falls. The swordsman kept his blade forward, not letting up pressure. Performing a stab, nearly beautiful in a strange manner as it cut towards Hao’s throat.

  It drew more of Hao’s attention. He crinkled his nose, his expression getting tighter with every step back he had to take. Mo Bangcai was right there, but he was being pinched. If he didn’t back up, he would lose any advantage he made for himself in injuring them one at a time.

  The tip of the sword was already close to his chest. The metal shaped at a cultivator’s forge cut a slice in his robe, nearly ripping through his skin.

  Hao lost sight of everything but the sword tip. Stepping, not back again, but to the side, and in towards the man, the thrust tore his robe under his arm. A cold sting followed the sound of tearing cloth.

  He forced the injury just to get close, sacrificing his stance to be in the one-on-one close position, his feet awkward, but he was face to face with the only one near him who held a sword. It was not an unfamiliar tactic to him. He had done it many times to many beasts, but this would be the first person he did such a thing to. His hand was already high, ready to strike.

  Hao swung him up and wide, pushing it forward with sudden violence into the side of the man’s head.

  Blood dripped from the man’s ear. He teetered, his legs shaking, eyes already rolled back when he lost balance.

  Hao had to step back again to find a proper stance. He felt close to death being in such an awkward position with only one arm to use, but looking up, he found there was no one close enough to take advantage of his plight.

  Mo Bangcai was on the back of another. Unconscious with nothing more than a broken nose, blood dripping from his parted lips, the man who was lying upon stopped leaning against a tree. “Eldest Brother…”

  “Go, I said!” The Nightwatcher was sword to sword with Meng Hongyu, shouting at the people behind him. “Go, or do you want to be the one to answer the Elder!?”

  The man readjusted Bangcai as he side-stepped the tree. “I will see you at the camp, Eldest Brother!” With those simple words, he danced between trees in a sprint.

  A retreat started. Even though the remaining people from Mo Bangcai’s group had the white-cloaked disciples of the Blue Moons Mountain Sect massively outnumbered, they still fell back.

  There was no pursuit either. A few white cloaks fell back as well and took the chance to extricate themselves from the fight.

  Hao tried to push forward. Uninterested in chasing far, even if it led to all the things they had found in the Secret Realm, right now, he simply wanted to end Mo Bangcai and Hongyu before he bled out himself.

  The Nightwatcher showed his skill again. “You won’t get far!” He shouted, blocking off Hao’s path and forcing Hao into the battle between him and Hongyu.

  A single group of bodies moved now. There was no longer a battle, simply a brawl of five people, four waiting for one of the others to make a mistake, while others at the side of the field that didn’t retreat licked their wounds, their whispered words hidden under grunts and cries.

  Noon had passed. The day grew old, scents of sweat and blood soaked the air, and red mud made the ground.

  Most were ready to collapse.

  Hao, too, beyond exhaustion, one armed, blocking any attacks that came his way, the other arm stabbed through, bleeding until his fingers were cold and numb, that feeling crept higher until sight beyond his arms’ reach was gone.

  The world seemed almost silent except for heavy breathing and pounding hearts.

  Hao took notice that Sun-touched, Hongyu had yet to make a single noise, and his heart, too, was quiet compared to the pulse of others.

  The sides of the field shuffled. Two men in white cloaks pressed against the ground, their faces swapped from pain to rage, their allies lay in puddles of their blood with wounds in their backs. The same person—Mo Bangcai dealt most of them. Rested and tended, they got up together and chased in the direction they had all seen the man with Bangcai on his back flee, along with other members of the Drifting Stream.

  Hao tried to step out and follow them, but a sword was ready to block his movements. Locked in an attrition he had no chance of winning without taking something out of the Spirit-Holding bag. His goal was to make quick work of Bangcai—but that was no longer an option. What good would it be to expose secrets he needed just to guarantee his survival now?

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  As the two slipped by, dashing into the trees, successfully avoiding anyone still fighting, a member of the Drifting Stream stepped up, crawling from the ground with his arms hanging like flags.

  “Eldest Brother, you’ve got to stop them. I’ll stall here!” He shouted, rejoining the battle.

  “But…” The Nightwatch rotated away, another taking his place after blocking one of Hongyu’s attacks, the light from his sword scattering.

  “It’s fine, Eldest Brother. If nothing else, I can retreat with brother Yi. If you do not come back. We will follow behind! Once we finish these two off.” The man who had been stalling Hongyu with the old man completely took his place, his sword knocking Hongyu’s blade back, but the Sun-Touched Swordsmen didn’t move. Hongyu, Sun-touched, mottled and ugly, turned the parry into another strike of his own.

  The Nightwatch kicked Hongyu in the stomach, slowing his sword before it crushed the man blocking it. “Go, this one is not all there, and the traitor is nothing compared to him.” He said, glancing at Hao with hateful, battle-crazed eyes. A droplet of water fell, running down his forehead.

  Hao was stunned by the other man, not the swordsman. He was no threat, another scout and nothing more. But, seeing that the man with two broken arms could stand and more. “Don’t worry about me, I am well rested,” He shouted. It was astonishing. He was like a Jiangshi, a demon, it was…

  Inspiring.

  The Nightwatcher nodded his head, slipping backwards out of the battle as the broken man charged in.

  Hao could not stop him alone. The man who charged at him seemed to move with one goal in mind: to get revenge and cut him down. Worse, it was hard to keep track of everything around him. Everything was undulating, even the man charging was swimming in his vision as he got closer.

  However, no sword swings were coming towards him. A simple charge would be easy to dodge, unnecessary even—that momentary lack of threat gave him time to breathe. The warm, wet breath impacted his lungs, making every wound he received flare with sudden pain. The cold touch of new rain was refreshing. Yet it has intensified his urgency, mixing with the blood running from his abdomen and arm in oily slick waterfalls, boiling his chest with desperation to end this.

  Meng Hongyu whined when the rain touched his bubbled skin. His movements were less erratic and more robotic in the rain. The fight went on too long for Hao, and Hongyu had been in it longer, since the beginning.

  With the Nightwatcher chasing men down in the woods, Hao was less constrained by the sharp eyes and strategies of the old man.

  Hao dashed around the man who charged. He locked himself back into the battle for just a while longer. Just a little more… he moved his lips, dry and cracked, slowly rejuvenated in the cleansing rain, but no words came from him. “Hongyu…”

  He turned his back to them so no one could see his intent or actions.

  When he spun back, a spear appeared in his hand, positioned perfectly for the neck of Hongyu; everyone was stunned to say the least. Even Hongyu managed an expression.

  Where his sharp eyebrows used to be tightened, his forehead creased as he raised his sword in a flash of light, splitting raindrops and wind, making the air roar. He caught the spear’s shaft in the backswing.

  The metal handle split, cracked, exploded in two, but the man in front of Hongyu didn’t stop, something Hao was relying on.

  Tall and proud in clean blue robes, ready to parry another strike. He pushed his sword forward, unaware of why Hongyu pulled his blade away. The tip of the threatless blade burrowed deep into the soft, puffy flesh underneath that pristine white cloak.

  There was silence for a moment, a freeze in time. It ended when Hao grabbed the collar of Hongyu’s robe and drove the handle of the spear into the side of his head. The spear’s head crashed into a tree nearby.

  Hongyu stood still, not a drop of blood spilling from his wounds.

  Hao got a bad feeling watching the man dissolve into the light under rain and sun. Hongyu turned to dust. Nothing more than flickering lights glittering in the wind.

  The Holding bag on his waist fell, which brought relief to Hao’s heart, but the man himself disappeared like a ghost. A small, round ball, pill-like, split in two, fell to the ground.

  Everyone was truly frozen now, but not for long.

  “Retreat, the Drifting Stream has Lord Meng!” The last two white-cloaked disciples, licking their wounds from the battle that lingered, pushed against each other as they ran in the opposite direction from their allies. Away from Hao, not towards Mo Bangcai.

  Hao, only half-conscious, didn’t notice his disguise being washed away. They saw the dark blue of his robes in full, and his hair of two tones.

  “You are,” the man who stabbed Hongyu in the stomach spoke. “An Islander, isn’t he the one… An Islander in our sect robes…”

  Hao tried to ignore the two of them, his head buzzing as he reached for the holding bag of Hongyu, but he noticed the moment his finger touched it.

  “Empty…” His voice was hoarse and weak. What did I do all this for? Bangcai’s nose is broken, and there is no polarity flower here… What for?

  “Quickly,”

  Hao heard the voice of the man with broken arms. His voice was an annoying grinding grit, stone on stone, bone on bone; it made his numb ears itch.

  “We need to tell the Young Master and Eldest Brother, Hongyu is dead! That is all that matters.”

  The words made Hao’s heart beat again for a moment like thunder. He used the spear shaft in his hand to climb up to his feet, turning just in time to see the two of them run into the trees.

  Hao threw the spear shaft aside and started the chase he wanted to avoid. He had no energy, but little he could muster in the hazy reality he found himself wandering in, he could use it for a Shoddy replication of Seven Colored Steps.

  Broken, battered, and bleeding, Hao passed the one with broken arms. He went straight for the faster one, pushing off trees and leaving imprints in the ground at the lightest touch of his foot. The chase reached a stalemate once he was within arm’s reach, throwing something, a spear, knife…

  Hao made a final leap, throwing a pot lid at the man’s back. As he stumbled, he took out the saber, which cast a shadow over the man he pursued—from high, he split the man in two.

  He had to stop, catch his breath. He took the holding bag and sword, shaking his head and moving his limbs around. An intense sleepiness was chasing him, but he could take it, just a little longer, a little while longer.

  The man with broken arms came to him on his own. He stood still before Hao and repeated the word “Ghost, Ghost, Ghost.”

  Hao looked at the man, “I could say the same as you… I failed today, because I held back… I think that’s what it was, I thought I was clever! Haha, I thought I had a good plan.” Hao was surprised he could speak, but the voice hardly seemed his. “I won’t hold back the next time I see your young master.”

  The man charged at Hao, “You won’t see—”

  Hao waited for the man to come to him, and let him charge by; he had lost as much blood as Hao, but was in more pain.

  “I admire you,” Hao said. He threw out a palm, a plain and boring one, in a water style, the technique he knew the best, Water Breaking Fist. His fingers rested on the man’s chest as he went limp. He felt the last beat of his heart.

  Hao walked back slowly to the place where bodies piled in red puddles, and silver weapons lay strewn. He took what he could. It seemed all was over, all he could have wasted on what he did. He stumbled and tied quick, makeshift bandages around his wounds. His only wrappings are the bits of cloth once again. He found the cleanest he had and tied them as tight as he could.

  His vision was nothing but near black before he made his way far, far from that place. The warmth of the sun on his head. As rain fell to moisten his lips and eyes.

  To a tree, he pinched its bark as he clambered. There, he closed his eyes. A desperate meditation gave way to a deep sleep.