Chapter 1: 1

Chapter 1

Coldblooded Red Azaleas

A great conflagration rising to the sky, raging flames burning midway up the mountain, spreading quickly on the wind and lighting up the night.

Coldblooded could see the fire from a long ways off. He ran over there immediately.

Coldblooded was one of the “Four Great Constables”, responsible of course for punishing evildoers in accordance with the law, eliminating brutal outlaws and bringing peace to the people. With regard to the local authorities, only when there was an extremely important, extremely thorny case would they call on Mr. Zhuge to dispatch his “Four Great Constables” to handle the case.

But for the “Four Great Constables” themselves, they felt dutybound whenever they could help preserve justice and assist with troublesome matters.

Coldblooded was the youngest of the “Four Great Constables”. His blood was just like that burning fire, and when he felt dutybound he would dash ahead heedless of his own safety.

He set off at a run, like a leopard, every muscle from head to toe not wasting a bit of energy, every muscle not involved with running was in a completely rested state.

That was how he was: when he was still it was like he was frozen over, but when he moved he was like a surging waterfall.

When he was on the other side of “Straddling Tiger River” he saw the flames reaching up to the sky, but by the time he wound around the bank and made it to the other side, the fire was no more than thick smoke and the crackling of toppling ashes and sparks. Coldblooded had just entered the village, hoping to do all he could to help a few people make it out of the sea of fire, when he stopped suddenly.

—No one was fighting the fire.

—And there were no survivors from the sea of fire.

The village only had about forty or fifty households, and by the look of its construction it seemed quite well-to-do, but all forty or fifty households had been burned up completely, everyone dead inside their homes.

A few people had run out of their homes and lay sprawled dead by the road, and some had been hacked to pieces. Still other scorched bodies had wound marks.

From the horizontal signboard that had not been completely burned down one could see that the village was called “Dan Family Village”. Dan was not a common surname, but in this area most were people with different surnames living together, and the Dans were mostly well-to-do, good builders, good carvers, and at the time that business was very profitable.

Coldblooded quickly determined what had happened here before him: pillaging, then murder and arson! Because aside from the bodies with wound marks on them, he could also see from some of the unburned furniture that chests and cabinets had been rummaged through, and of the forty or fifty households, half of them were not bordering each other, so even a big fire could not have burned them all up without a single one standing, nor without a single survivor.

—This was definitely the work of bandits.

But normally when bandits robbed they didn’t usually kill all the witnesses. Robbery was a serious crime, but it was not a capital offense, but murder was. Let alone murdering an entire village of people.

And as far as Coldblooded knew, this was now the fifth huge case of mass slaughter.

—Before this, “Chen Family Lane”, “Zhao Family Market, “Yan Family Bridge,” and “”Gong Family Village” had been exactly the same, first plundered, then massacred, without a single survivor!

And “Chen Family Lane” and “Gong Family Village” especially had no lack of martial world personages protecting it. With so many masterhands among them, such ruthless mass slaughter in the span of one night was not something ordinary bandits would be able to accomplish.

Because these cases involved so much death and were so complicated, with no clues to follow, Coldblooded had received orders to come to this area to investigate.

Now he had run into this. It was too bad he had arrived a step too late, and the murderers had already fled far away.

Coldblooded suddenly got down on the ground, supporting himself with his left palm, elbow bent as he pressed his left ear to the ground to listen carefully.

—About half a mile out, by a stand of trees and brush by the riverbank of the mountain pass, came the sound of an object moving lightly and rapidly.

Coldblooded with his ear to the ground could hear over half a mile away and detected the movement.

—About thirteen or fourteen people were in the midst of a rapid retreat, retreating as swiftly as leaping antelopes, but they emitted a sound so slight it was more like a barely perceptible grasshopper hopping in the grass. If they had not been carrying heaving objects, then even the sounds of their robe lapels scraping the brush and weeds would not be made.

What surprised Coldblooded is that he could definitely hear the footsteps of thirteen people, but also one or two of them were making faint sounds like chickens pecking kernels—but Coldblooded could not confirm if it was one person or two.

But what he was sure of was that one person or two, it was the leader of the group, and their martial arts, internal force, and lightness skill were strong.

Coldblooded was just by himself.

Unfortunately, when Coldblooded was on a case, he didn’t account for how many people there were. And how many people he had.

As Coldblooded was fast approaching the riverbank by the mountain pass, he suddenly realized they the people seemed to have vanished into thin air, no sound at all, and he was approaching a col full of cogongrass, brush, and wild azaleas.

For those people to suddenly stop making noise there was only one possibility, they were no longer moving.

The reason they suddenly stopped moving very well could be because they had detected him at the same time he had detected them.

After all he wasn’t Lifesnatcher (the third of the “Four Great Constables). His tracking skills were not as good as Lifesnatcher’s.

A breeze off the river gently came on.

The mountain azaleas shuddered lightly, the whole field of mountain azaleas swaying, red like bright blood. Coldblooded slowly stood up straight.

There were some scattered footprints on the ground that stopped here. They were clearly hiding in the cogongrass and among the azalea thicket.

Coldblooded stood there calmly, hand on his sword, his scabbardless sword. Wind whistled all around him, the air cool, no clouds in the low sky by the river.

Coldblooded said coldly, “Come out.”

A swift gust of wind swept by, rustling the mountain azaleas violently, and bright-red flower petals fell into the brush.

There was a sudden rustling in the azalea blossom thicket on the left. Coldblooded’s left ear picked it up at once, detecting any strange sound like a deer’s ear, and slightly pricking up.

Coldblooded’s eyes flashed a bladelike cold awn of light. He shouted a second time, “Come out!”

A rustling and four or five aquatic birds swept out from the flower thicket on the left.

In the blink of an eye two people pounced like lightning from the azalea thicket on the right, blade light flashing in a swift chop at Coldblooded!

Coldblooded’s eyes were watching the leftside mountain azalea thicket, but his right hand sent out his sword, and in a flash he had taken seven steps and the two ambushers let out a horrible scream.

Just half a scream.

Coldblooded’s sword had already stabbed them in the chest, but didn’t go through them and out the back, just stabbed their heart—and instantly the sword in Coldblooded’s right hand was not gripped in his left.

Because two people swept out from the leftside brush thicket.

The two of them flew up like a hawk and falcon, a hooksword coming straight for Coldblooded’s head while the other one’s iron tonfa sweeping Coldblooded’s shins, a groundsweeping sabreplay move!

They could only perform half a move.

Because their moves had just begun when their throats were stabbed through, and Coldblooded’s sword was switched back to his right hand.

He sent a sword stroke stabbing behind him.

Behind him was a dense thicket of mountain azaleas.

A tearing sound and Coldblooded pulled back his sword and blood spurted out from the azalea thicket and sprayed all over the bright-red azalea blossoms.

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In such a lightning short time Coldblooded had killed five ambushers.

Coldblooded put away his sword and stared at some thriving purple azaleas a hundred staves away. The purple azaleas were surrounded by a full hundred white azaleas like an army surrounding a queen. Coldblooded said deliberately, “I don’t want to kill you, don’t force me to.” Then he he took a deep breath. “Come out.”

Only now did the five ambushers from before fall to the ground.

Wind whistled low off the river.

The sky was gray and hazy, the air chilly. A few waterbirds patrolled over the river.

Still no one responded.

Coldblooded pursed his lips tightly, a firm, unswerving look in his eyes.

He brushed aside the cogongrass and headed for the purple azaleas. Every step more cautious than when he had in the blink of an eye killed those five men with five strokes of the sword.

The purple azaleas were seventy spans away.

Coldblooded’s left hand was pressed against the sword guard, the corners of his lips turned in an exceedingly cold and stern smile.

The purple azaleas were fifty spans away.

He stepped into the thicket of white mountain azaleas. This clump of white azaleas were pure white, and behind them and to the side were six or ten wile orange azaleas.

The purple azaleas were thirty spans away.

Suddenly, dozens of white azalea like dozens of white birds flew at Coldblooded!

They weren’t azaleas!

—They were incredibly devastating concealed projectiles!

Dozens of “flowers” bolted toward Coldblooded. If he retreated then he could only retreat into the orange azalea clump, but Coldblooded didn’t back up but instead quickly pressed forward.

Instantly he dove forward ten spans. As he lunged forward he quickly removed his robe, revealing his bare upper body and pounced among the cold wind and the “white flowers” were completely wrapped up in his robe!

At the same time, seven rays of sabre light rolled out of the white azalea thicket, some sweeping for Coldblooded’s head, others striking at his neck, still others chopping at his chest, others hacking at his belly, and some cutting at his feet.

Snowwhite flowers filled the sky and were gone in a flash, followed by snowwhite sabre light spreading through the sky.

Sword light smashed through the sabre light!

The sabre light abruptly stopped. Sword light flashed five times and the resplendently blooming white azaleas were sprayed with burning hot bright red blood and six people, hands pressed covering fatal wounds, fell into the clumps of flowers.

The killer whose sabre swept at Coldblooded’s head was struck in the head with his sword. The killer who had struck at Coldblooded’s neck were stabbed in the neck with his sword. The killer who had chopped at Coldblooded’s belly were stabbed in the belly. Only the man who had cut at Coldblooded’s legs was in a more difficult position to get to, so his stroke came a bit slower.

He struck just a bit slower, and just saw five rays of sword light, then he saw the six people who had launched an attack at the same time as him fall down at once.

If he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, if he had just been told it, he wouldn’t have believed it. He was stupefied, so his sabre cut was did not unfold. So he was still alive.

Another killer suddenly came out of the white azalea thicket.

His original assignment had been to cut off Coldblooded’s retreat route. But when he emerged he found that of the twelve brothers-in-arms who had all come out at once, only one remained. His eyes were now not looking to seal off someone else’s retreat route but were looking for a way out for himself.

Coldblooded didn’t even look at them.

His cold, lightning-like eyes were still fixed on the purple azaleas.

“Come out,” he shouted.

Wind swept over the brush, the cogongrass, and the mountain azaleas. No response.

Coldblooded said coldly, “You want me to drag you out of there—“ Before he was finished there was a sudden gust of wind coming from behind!

Coldblooded’s heart shivered and he pitched forward with all his might, his sword stabbing out behind.

The person behind him grunted, evidently struck by his sword. But he felt cold on his back. He’d been struck as well.

His forward momentum not exhausted, suddenly a person emerged from the purple azalea clump!

As soon as he appeared he struck with his sword! His sword was eleven spans long!

By the time Coldblooded noticed it with a start, he had already been stabbed in the chest!

If he continued forward he would surely be skewered by the long sword like a kebab!

But in the instant he was stabbed he bent down and rolled to the side and in a blur the man lost sight of Coldblooded. Suddenly his waist felt cold. Coldblooded’s sword had stabbed into his waist.

He cried out and fell, and the person who had wounded Coldblooded in the back pounced on him, along with two other killers, but the longsword man’s fallen body was blocked them and Coldblooded was nowhere to be seen.

Next to the azalea thicket were a few drops of blood.

Coldblooded rolled into the azalea thicket. The pain in his chest and back didn’t cause his steadfast, persevering self to collapse.

When he was seventeen he had once suffered twenty-three wounds before finally knocking down a master of the martial world whose martial arts was five times better than his, and in the five years since he had been in hundreds of fights large and small. Rarely was he not wounded, but he had never failed to accomplish his mission.

But the wound in his back was getting numb and the wound in his chest was prickling, and his vision was turning black—in other words, the weapon that had got him in the back had an anesthetic on it, and the one that had suddenly got him in the chest had poison on it.

If he was not mistaken, the poison and anesthetic came from a huge clan that was extremely powerful and influential in the jianghu.

Coldblooded was unable to dispel this signature anesthetic and deadly poison

He hated himself for his careless mistake.

He had already surveyed them when he had listened to the ground: his opponent was thirteen or fourteen strong, good martial arts, and though the others were nothing special, one or two among them had really strong martial arts, lightness skill, and internal force; when they walked he could almost not distinguish them.

In his first bout he had killed five people. In the second he had killed another six, leaving two killers, nothing fearsome. He could leave one alive for interrogation. He had focused his attention on the particularly skilled martial artist in the clump of purple azaleas.

But he hadn’t been aware that there was not just one who was particularly skilled. There really was someone in the purple azaleas, but there was also one in the orange azaleas behind him!

When the other one suddenly ambushed him, he pitched forward quickly, was hit by the sabre, and instantly he knew his mistake. He thought his greatest enemy was behind him and so was only focused on diving forward, forgetting that the other formidable enemy ahead in the purple azaleas was still there.

So he was wounded by that person’s unusually long sword.

Even though he had rolled forward in time to stab and kill that person, he had already in a beaten state. Even an ordinary person could come upon him and put him to death.

Let alone his three remaining opponents—two killers and a powerful wounded enemy!

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