The words had barely left Jiang Chen's mouth when he drew his sword and struck — without a heartbeat of hesitation.
"Wh-what!?"
Cold light flashed. Fang Heng scrambled aside on all fours, dodging the stroke in the most wretched, furious disarray.
Apart from him, not a soul present reacted in time. Nearly everyone had assumed the next scene would be a brotherly reconciliation — a touching tale of loyalty, perhaps one for the ages.
No one had imagined that in front of the whole crowd, with the bonds of brotherhood pressing in from every side, Jiang Chen would truly swing his sword!
"Fang Heng." Jiang Chen watched him with a smile that was pure ice. "You promised to stretch out your neck and die. Why did you dodge?"
Fang Heng's handsome face cycled between green and white. He simply climbed to his feet and glared back through gritted teeth. "Third Brother, do you truly care nothing for our brotherhood?"
"You shameless son of a bitch!" By now Du Hu's fury had boiled over. "I must have been blind to call you a brother!"
He started forward, but Jiang Chen stopped him with a raised hand.
"Second Brother. Let me handle this myself."
Fang Heng glared. "Du Hu! What business is this of yours!?"
"Fang Heng — you have disappointed me beyond words!" Even the ever-forbearing Ling Chuan could no longer hold back his anger. He stepped forward, drew the sword at his waist, cut a corner from his own robe, and threw it hard to the ground. "From this day on — the robe is cut, the bond is severed!"
"Big Brother!" Fang Heng gave a miserable laugh. "Second Brother is impulsive, fine — but even you refuse to understand me? To prove my innocence I was willing to die — but my parents have only one son! I am their sole heir, their one hope that outlasts even death! My life is not my own; how could I throw it away here? Jiang Chen believes slander, refuses every explanation, and wants nothing but my death! Is there any brotherly love left in his heart?"
"Fourth Brother — that is the last time I will call you that." Zhao Yan, the youngest of the Five Heroes, finally spoke. His face still carried a trace of youth but was already strikingly handsome, and his words fell like striking metal and jade, ringing with force. "Fang Decai bore the surname Fang! His family served yours for generations! What could a pack of broken bandits possibly offer to buy a man like that? Are you insulting your Fang family's wealth — or our intelligence? And how did a gang of defeated strays slip into Maple City and lay an ambush, bold as brass, inside the Moon-Gazing Tower? And finally: if you never had the resolve to die, who was that whole performance for? I, Zhao Yan, am ashamed to stand in your company!"
Of the five, Ling Chuan and Jiang Chen came from poor homes; Du Hu's was neither rich nor poor. Fang Heng and Zhao Yan were both sons of wealthy houses. The Fang clan went without saying — and though the Zhao family had only moved to Maple City in the last decade, the depth of its coffers was unfathomable.
"Little Five, you've always been close with Third — fine, you favor him. But am I not your Fourth Brother too? You have no proof, only guesses, and yet you hurl these heart-piercing accusations — can your conscience truly rest easy?"
Fang Heng's face was the picture of a man in agony, wounded to the core.
"Your tongue is as silver as ever, Fang Heng." Jiang Chen cut off Zhao Yan and the others. "But have you ever wondered: after I escaped with grievous wounds, why didn't I secretly send word to Big Brother, Second Brother, or Little Five? Why did I wait until today to come for you?"
His eyelids lowered slightly. "Because I never wanted to force a choice on them. I didn't want them suspicious, didn't want them torn. What lies between you and me stays between you and me — we settle it ourselves. If I had died, so be it. Since I'm alive — what you owe me, you will pay back."
Fang Heng watched him coldly. "Are you suffering from a persecution delusion? I owe you nothing — what is there to repay? Why do you refuse to wake up?"
But Jiang Chen was no longer speaking to him. He turned toward the towering statue of the Dao Sovereign inside the Academy grounds and bowed down to it from afar.
"Disciple Jiang Chen was plotted against by the villain Fang Heng and nearly lost his life. This hatred admits no solution; this grievance admits no end. I beg the right to fight him — to the death!"
The crowd erupted.
A Dao-Witnessed Deathmatch!
Killing a fellow disciple was a crime. But when a blood feud truly ran too deep to dissolve, the Daoist sect did not forbid duels.
And among all duels, the one witnessed by the Dao Sovereign was the most irrevocable of all.
The sect taught that the Dao Sovereign reclines above the Nine Heavens, seeing into every corner of the cosmos. Speak his name, and he knows. Bow before his image, and he feels. Any oath that invokes the Dao Sovereign cannot be taken back.
A Dao-Witnessed Deathmatch does not end until someone dies.
The words had barely fallen when a middle-aged Daoist in black robes appeared before the statue.
His face was stern, his beard trimmed short. On the right breast of his black Daoist robe was embroidered a small azure dragon — so lifelike it seemed ready to move. Only powerhouses of the middle three ranks were permitted to wear the Soaring-Dragon Robe.
The secular cultivation world was broadly divided into nine ranks. The schools gave them different names and different marks of the extraordinary, but all could be mapped onto the Nine-Rank system: ranks nine through seven were the initial stage, six through four the middle, three through one the high. Amusingly, this corresponded to the official ranks of the various states.
Of course, in a small state like Zhuang, even a first-rank chancellor might not truly possess first-rank strength.
The moment the black-robed, short-bearded Daoist appeared, every disciple present bowed. "Dean!"
Only a handful of Daoists in all of Maple City could wear the Soaring-Dragon Robe, and among them was the Dean of the Maple City Academy — Dean Dong. Legend said he had once cultivated in Xin'an, the capital of Zhuang, until his upright, by-the-book nature offended the powerful, and he was posted out to Maple City in Clear River County.
Ling Chuan's face was sorrowful, but he said nothing. He knew Jiang Chen's swordsmanship well: before one formally began cultivating Dao arts, no one in the Outer Academy was his match — and Fang Heng was no exception.
But by demanding a Dao-Witnessed duel, Jiang Chen was declaring the injustice could not be resolved. With the Dean here in person, Fang Heng could either fight for his life — or stand by while the Academy investigated Jiang Chen's ambush.
And an Academy investigation was the one thing Fang Heng could not survive.
Which meant, in truth, he had no choice at all.
Under countless gazes — suspicious, mocking, outraged — Fang Heng's face showed no panic. "Third Brother, must we truly raise swords against each other?"
Jiang Chen said evenly, "The one who brought us to this place is you. Not me."
"What would it take for you to believe me?"
"I already paid for my belief with a life. Now — words are useless. The Fang Heng I remember was no coward who dared not answer a challenge."
Fang Heng was unmoved. "Are you so certain you can kill me?"
Jiang Chen looked at him calmly. "Why don't we find out?"
Fang Heng stared at him for a long moment, then burst out laughing. "What a pity — you can't kill me, because our duel cannot be established. Just the day before yesterday, my Dao meridian manifested. I am, for all intents, already a disciple of the Inner Academy! You and I stand on different levels now — how can we duel?"
As he spoke he straightened his back and drove his meridian with full force. Everyone present could feel it: a surge of presence rising from the great dragon of his spine, his spirit swelling with vigor. It proved his meridian was revealed — his flesh could feed back Dao essence; he formally held extraordinary power.
The Academy's rules on duels were clear, and one clause mattered above all: when a challenge crossed levels, anyone could refuse unconditionally. It existed to protect low-ranked cultivators from being crushed by their betters under the guise of honor. Now it became Fang Heng's excuse.
His meridian had opened, yes — but only days ago, and he had not begun learning Dao arts. His strength had not fundamentally grown. He still had no confidence against Jiang Chen's sword.
Jiang Chen went silent.
He looked at Fang Heng in silence, his emotions tangled.
Then he spoke, slowly: "For that Meridian-Opening Pill, I charged into West Mountain with one sword and fought through a bath of blood before I broke their nest. In that battle I took thirteen wounds. Two of them were mortal."
"To get the pill's fullest effect, I planned to wait until my body returned to its peak before taking it. I understand the crime of carrying a treasure, so I never breathed a word of it. Everyone believed I swallowed it that very day — everyone except you. Except the five of us, brothers through life and death. Because there was nothing in this world I needed to hide from you."
"From the age of five, when I first touched the world of cultivation, I was chasing that pill. My meridian was not born revealed; the only road to the extraordinary for me was medicine. It was my path of cultivation, my hope, my light. You knew my family's situation. You knew how hard I worked. I rose before dawn every day to practice the sword and didn't rest until the moon stood at midheaven. I never set foot in the pleasure houses. I never indulged in anything. In the whole Maple City Academy, I dare say no outer disciple worked harder than I did. For that Meridian-Opening Pill, I struggled for eleven years!"
As he spoke, Jiang Chen's eyes locked onto Fang Heng and would not let go. "My sweat, my blood, my tears — dissolved into that pill of mine. Tell me... did it go down smoothly?"
The grounds fell utterly silent.
Ling Chuan's lips pressed into a line. Zhao Yan gritted his teeth without a word. Even a man like Du Hu had tears rolling down his face.
Yes — which of them didn't know Jiang Chen's obsession, Jiang Chen's exhaustion, Jiang Chen's suffering?
And Fang Heng had actually been able to harden his heart and do it!
"I don't know what nonsense you're spouting!" A flicker of unease crossed Fang Heng's face, quickly crushed. "Last month my uncle's caravan passed through the State of Yun, and he happened to buy a Meridian-Opening Pill from a cultivator short on coin. That is how my meridian opened — what does it have to do with you? Don't imagine everyone is like you — born in the gutter, willing to do anything to climb! My Fang family has wealth beyond counting. Could we not afford a single pill?"
Zhao Yan's hatred had peaked; he no longer bothered to blunt his edge. "Oh, the Fang family is rich indeed. What a pity your parents died early — and that you are not the clan's sole direct heir, so the family resources allotted to you are rather limited. Otherwise, how do you explain going all this time without a Meridian-Opening Pill — and then, by such a remarkable coincidence, obtaining one right after my Third Brother was ambushed?"
"A coincidence, yes. All I can say is — quite a coincidence!" Cold light flickered in Fang Heng's eyes. "Say no more about things you cannot prove. For the sake of our past brotherhood, I won't hold it against you. Next time — as a disciple of the Inner Academy, I will teach you what hierarchy means!"
"You—!" Zhao Yan was incandescent.
Du Hu ground his teeth loud enough to hear. If the Dean weren't present, he would have loved nothing more than to smash that pretty face in with one punch.
Only Jiang Chen remained calm. "Fang Heng, I told you long ago. You are too arrogant — too convinced of your own cleverness — and it always blinds you to the truth. I taught you that. Why can't you ever learn?"
"Why don't you think it through: if a Dao-Witnessed Deathmatch couldn't be established... then why would Dean Dong be standing here?"
He took one step forward and drove his own meridian. In the great dragon of his spine, the little earthworm thrashed violently upstream — and his whole being turned sharp as a sword, straight as a sword!
"Because I, too, have manifested my Dao meridian. I, too, formally hold the possibility of the extraordinary!"
"We stand on the same level. And you dare not let the Dean investigate. Therefore — the duel stands!"
Even as Fang Heng's face drained of color, Dean Dong spread his wide sleeve.
Right there at the Academy gate, right beneath the feet of Jiang Chen and Fang Heng, a sapling burst out of the earth. In a few breaths it grew madly into a colossal wooden pillar, hoisting the two of them into the air and shutting every outer disciple outside.
The top of the pillar was flat as if sliced by a blade, ten paces square. From a distance it looked like a round wooden dueling platform — except that around its edges, branches swayed.
Fang Heng did not doubt for a moment: if he turned and ran, those harmless-looking branches would become devouring beasts.
And Jiang Chen's hand was already resting on his sword hilt, coiled and ready.
Dean Dong beckoned casually. A branch twisted down, wrapped around the sword Fang Heng had thrown aside earlier, and flung it up onto the platform.
Fang Heng caught it.
Before the statue of the Dao Sovereign — whose face no one could ever make out — Dean Dong, powerhouse of the fifth rank, Daoist of the Inner Sanctum, announced in a voice without warmth:
"The Dao-Witnessed Deathmatch — begin!"