Chapter 13: This Young Master Swung His Sword

The tree was huge. At least the size of a small building. It only made the Tree Sitting Python seem larger wrapped around it. Chen Haoran was confident it only needed one bite to swallow him and Lan Fen.

“Can we lead it away?” he said.

“Tree Sitting Pythons do not leave their home tree once bonded unless the tree itself dies,” Lan Fen replied.

“What if I cut the tree then? I have enough range on the Canyon Carving Sword that I can still run away after. How fast is it?”

Lan Fen shook her head. “The beast can attack further than you think. This clearing was full of trees when I last came here.” If it doesn’t leave its tree once bonded but simultaneously cleared out all the trees here then that meant the whole circle was within its range.

“Poison?” Lan Fen had called it a python but he didn’t think it was a bad idea to assume the superpower snake was venomous.

“No, purely physical,” she said.

“Would it attack us as soon as we stepped in?” he said.

“It would probably wait until we got closer, easier to cut off our escape that way.”

“What’s even up with this bullshit luck?” Chen Haoran grumbled.

“It might have sensed the treasures I buried here when searching for a new home tree.” Lan Fen said, looking more frustrated than he’d ever seen her.

“So what’s the plan?” he said. No matter what it seemed like this snake would be a pain in the ass to deal with.

“We leave and come back when I’m stronger.” Lan Fen said with disgust.

“Just like that? Didn’t you want to use this money from here to clear out the auction?” Lan Fen was always so confident that he never expected her to just back off like this.

“That was hyperbole,” Lan Fen said shaking her head. “The gold taels you have will be plenty for my needs. Trying to get my savings is not worth the risk.”

Or maybe he was the one too confident in Lan Fen. He had been dazzled by her skill and competence these last few days but it was a fact she still had no cultivation base.

There were some things even she couldn’t do by herself.

“What if I used the Canyon Carving Sword?” While he was tired it was only mental exhaustion, he still had more than enough qi to spare. The snake looked to be four layers of cultivation above him but didn’t Lan Fen say his Third Layer was equal to an average Fifth Layer? Now he was at the Fifth Layer himself, he’d be roughly equal to a Seventh Layer Cultivator. Could the Canyon Carving Sword make up the difference? He looked down at his blade.

Yeah. He could do it.

“No,” Lan Fen said. “You cannot do it.” Despite saying that she had hesitated before answering.

That hesitation spoke volumes. “So there’s a chance?” he pressed.

“A chance to die yes.”

“Doesn’t matter, you want to grab that stuff and I want that core.” Since the snake was at the peak of the Qi realm then there were good odds that he’d get a Liquid Meridian level core if he gave it to Lan Fen.

Lan Fen bit her lip and looked between him and the Tree Sitting Python. He could see the calculations flying through her head. “Fine, but you will only have one chance. The timing of this must be perfect.” She finally relented.

“I got this.”

Chen Haoran drew his sword and Lan Fen came up behind him and placed a hand on his back. “I will tell you when to strike. If this fails I will pull us out of danger.” She warned him.

The knowledge that Lan Fen could still save their lives bolstered his courage as they slowly advanced into the clearing. The snake gave no indication it noticed them but through qi strained eyes Chen Haoran could see that it was subtly angling itself towards them. As they got closer he could finally feel the energy of the monster. Much larger than anything he had ever sensed before.

Sweat beaded on his brow.

Breathe.

The sword is a river, Chen Haoran recited to himself. Water flows from high to low and reaches its destination through the path of least resistance.

The snake hissed at them and began to coil.

Through stone, through earth, through mountains.

The snake lunged at them, the top half of its body unnaturally elongating while the rest remained wrapped around the tree. Lan Fen held the fabric of his robes in a tight fist at his back.

The enemy is the path of least resistance.

The snake’s fangs were bearing down above them at full force. Lan Fen still hadn’t given the signal. He watched the cavernous mouth close in on them.

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“Now!” she shouted.

Carve through.

He wanted that core.

Canyon Carving Sword

Chen Haoran’s qi roared like a raging current and flowed through his body to the Mysterious Watersteel Sword. The sword flashed blue and its ripples seemed to move like a pool of water disturbed. He swung and his sword became a river of energy that raced into the dark maw of the Tree Sitting Python. Its head burst and what remained was split down the middle leaving the front end of the python looking like a bloody macabre flower. Naturally, he and Lan Fen were showered with blood and Lan Fen pulled him away as the snake’s corpse crashed in front of them.

Chen Haoran slumped to the ground breathing heavily. He had put his all into the blow and while he had never been so depleted of qi before it was circulating through his body faster than ever. It seemed he had knocked loosed the bottleneck he had been stuck when he knocked loose the snake’s head.

Covered in blood and exhausted Chen Haoran started laughing.

He could be strong too.

———————

Lan Fen had gone over to dig out her buried treasure after directing him to where the Tree Sitting Python’s core was. Chen Haoran climbed the tree carefully, remembering his earlier disaster, and jumped onto the body of the snake. Death had done nothing to loosen the vice grip it had on the trunk and it held fast despite his added weight. Using his sword to cut open its torso he steeled himself before plunging his arm into its body.

Sure he blew its head off but some things just felt weird.

Thankfully it didn’t take long for Chen Haoran to pull out a palm-sized core, green like the snake’s eyes. He dropped down with his prize just as Lan Fen pulled out what looked like a sackcloth bag from the dirt.

“I thought you said you stashed your savings here. Did the snake eat it?” The way Lan Fen was talking about it before he was expecting more than just a sack.

In lieu of a response, Lan Fen shoved the entire length of her arm down the sack. A sack that could not possibly fit it.

“It’s bigger on the inside!”For all that Chen Haoran had literal superpowers, there was still something magical about seeing the impossible before his very eyes.

“It is a storage bag,” she said. Lan Fen rooted around a bit before pulling out what looked like a glowing golden green topaz. The crystal must have been important because he could see Lan Fen’s vicious smile as her face shined under the light. Satisfied she put the crystal away. “It is something I came across by luck-” She paused. “…and violence.”

“It’s so cool!” He couldn’t contain his excitement, while his Gifting power also stored things in what he assumed was its own space he could only take them out, not put them back. What would the inside of folded space even look like?

Lan Fen held her hand beneath the storage back and upended it. Chen Haoran caught glimpses of silver and pills before they disappeared into Lan Fen’s hand. How could he forget? Lan Fen already had an inventory space that was way better than the bag. She shook the storage bag a few more times and presented it to him. “For you,” she said.

“Thank you!” It was useless to her anyway so why wouldn’t he accept? He opened the bag and found the inside lined with soft fur and much deeper than it had any right to be. He stuck his hand in and marveled. While he played around with the bag Chen Haoran couldn’t help but feel the irony of Lan Fen giving him a gift.

“A gift for a gift then, here,” he said and handed her the snake core.

“It is the spoils of your victory,” she said. “Keep it.”

Chen Haoran shrugged. “I got it for you, please accept it.”

Lan Fen narrowed her eyes at him but relented and took the snake core.

Received Hundred-Fold: Ninth Layer Qi Realm Dragon-Blooded Tree Sitting Python Core

Chen Haoran frowned as he read the notification. Dragon blood didn’t sound bad but it wasn’t what he was hoping for. Was the difference between the Qi realm and Liquid Meridian greater than a hundred times or was it some restriction of the power?

“Lan Fen if the snake was at the Liquid Meridian realm would we have still had a chance?” he said.

Lan Fen looked deadly serious as she answered. “None whatsoever. Do not be fooled by how easily you have been crossing layers to fight, what separates the realms of cultivation is not a step but a chasm. The strongest of one realm is only fit to be slaughtered by the weakest of the next.”

If that was the case then it made sense that an upgrade a hundred times better wasn’t enough to improve a realm. But there was another issue with what Lan Fen said…

“Doesn’t the Lan family have Liquid Meridian realms?” If so how the hell was she expecting to get revenge?

“The Patriarch, my grandfather, sits at the Ninth Layer of the Liquid Meridian realm. Beneath the City Lord, he is the strongest in Clearsprings City.” Lan Fen sounded bitter as she told him. As the leader, her grandfather probably allowed everything that happened to her so he wasn’t surprised.

“So what? Are you planning to cultivate to the Liquid Meridian realm and beat the shit out of him?” he said.

Lan Fen laughed but her amusement was dark and she looked as if she were signing a death warrant with her next words.

“His fate is sealed. What we have done here today is retrieve the first nail.”

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