Tang Wujun threw his head back and laughed wildly, "Hahahaha... Mo Chunfeng! Today, you shall die by my hand! Hahahaha..." He and Mo Ziru had no deep-seated enmity, but the jealousy and hatred he harbored for this man ran deep. Thus, seizing the upper hand filled him with ecstatic delight.
A shallow wound on Mo Ziru's cheek barely bled, yet his eyes burned with excruciating pain. His vision blurred as tears streamed uncontrollably—by now, he knew the poison he had been struck with was "Ghost Rain."
Where ghosts weep, their tears become rain.
The name was one he had given Tang Wujun years ago.
Back then, Tang Wujun had yet to perfect this toxin, and it was unclear whether an antidote even existed now.
Mo Ziru wiped away the bloody tears beneath his eyes. Seeing him poisoned, Song Xiaoyu was overjoyed. His shattered weapon, "Slaughter's Remnant," reformed into twin spiked clubs, aimed directly at Mo Ziru's eyes.
With a deafening clang, Mo Ziru closed his eyes and raised his sword. A surge of sword energy erupted violently. Before Song Xiaoyu could even get close, he felt as though he were suffocating. When "Long Robe Sword" met "Slaughter's Remnant," the blade cleaved straight into the weapon. With a flick of his wrist, Mo Ziru sent Song Xiaoyu's "Slaughter's Remnant" flying, clattering onto the blazing ruins.
Bloody tears continued to trickle slowly from Mo Ziru's eyes. The poison was ruthless and vicious, ravaging his organs but leaving his inner strength untouched. Unable to suppress "Ghost Rain" with his True Power, Mo Ziru knew the toxin might not kill him outright, but it would hinder his efforts to cover Shui Duopo and Liu Yan's retreat. His temper had been short even in his youth, and though his face remained composed, fury raged within him like an inferno.
Out of respect for an old acquaintance, he had shown mercy—only for that same acquaintance to repay him with a toast of "Ghost Rain."
Just as Mo Ziru closed his eyes and raised his sword, ready to end Tang Wujun's life, the courtyard wall suddenly collapsed. The deafening roar of crumbling bricks and stones momentarily overwhelmed his hearing. Dozens of Tang Wujun's men toppled the wall, forming ranks. Amid the chaos, another volley of crossbow bolts shot toward Mo Ziru.
At the same time, Song Xiaoyu, now disarmed, suddenly clawed at Mo Ziru's chest with his fingers. His much-boasted esoteric inner strength finally found its use—before his fingers could even graze Mo Ziru's robes, they were repelled by a gust of sleeve wind. The force not only deflected Song Xiaoyu's fingers but also the incoming bolts. Yet, a wisp of white mist-like True Power from his fingertips followed Mo Ziru's own surging energy, seeping into his dantian.
Mo Ziru felt a foreign strand of energy winding through his meridians—soft as silk, fragile as cotton, intermittently obstructing his own energy flow. It was neither wholly alien nor easily expelled. This energy bore an eerie resemblance to his own, neither merging nor separating, as though his meridians had been stuffed with cotton. The discomfort was unbearable.
Having delivered this strand of energy, Song Xiaoyu paled, his vitality severely drained. Years of arduous training had yielded only this faint trace of "Cotton Garment" True Power, designed specifically to counter peerless masters with profound inner strength. Over two decades, many had fallen victim to his schemes, perishing due to their own carelessness.
"You—" Mo Ziru glared at him, bloody tears streaking down his face. Both Tang Wujun and Song Xiaoyu were horrified by the sight. Mo Ziru roughly wiped away the blood and tears, smearing off half of his theatrical makeup to reveal the refined features of a scholar beneath.The face was covered in blood and grime. Mo Ziru still tightly gripped the Longyi Sword, his robes dotted with blood and tears like falling plum blossoms. "Twenty-eight years apart, and in the end, it was I—the frog at the bottom of the well," he murmured softly.
Mo Ziru raised his sword with a sweep of his sleeve. Flames and wind rushed forth, lifting his bloodstained robes and hair as he stood alone, holding the long sword level with one hand—a stance that seemed unlike any sword technique.
Yet Song Xiaoyu and Tang Wujun were slowly retreating.
That was the first sword technique that had shaken the martial world—Mo Chunfeng's "March"!
Mo Ziru's eyes brimmed with bloody tears, his body riddled with strange poison and internal injuries.
But back then, when Mo Chunfeng unleashed "March"—"The east wind brings spring to the eyes, yet the blooming city and shadowed willows bring sorrow to the soul"—who could witness its onset without trembling in fear?
The Longyi Sword swept through the air, its light scattering like the unchanging spring blossoms and autumn moon of decades past—the moon that first shone upon the riverside, the people first bathed in its glow.
It was the sleepless spring breeze of March.
It was Mo Chunfeng's youth.
Yet just as the sword technique "March" was unleashed, Mo Ziru suddenly turned his head—from within the secret passage behind him came a deafening explosion. Another surge of sword energy erupted, blasting the entire passage from bottom to top. Countless bricks and debris rained down amidst scattered, cold glimmers of light, as though a bright moon had exploded from the depths of the earth!
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