Chapter 38: Trust No One

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Chapter 38: Trust No One

“Do you know what people outside are saying about you?”

Qin Yuan poured him some wine as he spoke with a smile.

“What are they saying?”

Shao Pingping looked at Qin Yuan expectantly.

He had risked his life to stand up for everyone. Naturally, he hoped to earn their approval.

“Broad shoulders bearing righteousness, a ruthless hand wielding the pen.”

Qin Yuan recited the line with dramatic emphasis.

Shao Pingping’s face immediately flushed crimson, rather like a lobster roasted red.

He had become this excited over a single sentence. Young people really were something else.

Qin Yuan was speechless.

“Uncle Qin, let’s drink.” Shao Pingping boldly lifted his wine cup.

“You’re young. Why drink from a cup?”

Qin Yuan took out a bowl instead and filled it to the brim.

“Come on.”

“All right.”

Shao Pingping raised the bowl and tipped it back, only to choke and cough violently.

His tolerance was even worse than his father’s.

Come to think of it, what was his father’s name again?

Qin Yuan paused for several seconds before remembering that Shao Pingping’s father was called Shao Guilin.

In another few centuries, Qin Yuan had no doubt he would forget the man entirely.

Seven days later, the sky was clear, the air crisp, and a gentle breeze was blowing—a rare day of fine weather.

The Execution Grounds.

There were not many spectators today. After all, only one person was to be executed, and he was hardly an important figure.

Nor were there particularly few. The man had possessed a courage greater than the heavens themselves. Not only had he dared to write articles condemning Duan Hu and Feng Gou, he had even gone to the gates of the governing office to curse them. It was a deed that had delighted the people.

On the execution platform, supervising officer Yang Huchan was thoroughly displeased. He truly did not want to handle such filthy work.

But he had no way to refuse Duan Hu and Feng Gou’s demands.

As for whether Qin Yuan would come to rescue the prisoner, Yang Huchan was not worried in the slightest.

Qin Yuan was a notorious old tortoise who had kept his head down for twenty years. Nothing ever stuck to him.

He was more afraid of the commoners below.

Each one looked at him as though they wanted to eat him alive.

There was no telling whether some formidable martial artist might be hiding among them.

Even if they did not kill him today, someone might catch him off guard and strike when he least expected it.

His own martial arts were nothing special. If that happened, he would certainly be doomed.

Yang Huchan shook his head, driving away his distracting thoughts. He glanced up at the sun hanging directly overhead, then raised the execution token with a hand slick with sweat.

“The hour has arrived. Execute him!”

As he watched the token fly from the platform, Shao Pingping closed his eyes.

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Images of the past flashed endlessly through his mind.

Most of them involved Qin Yuan. Without realizing it, Qin Yuan had taken his father’s place.

Suddenly, the commoners gathered below erupted into an uproar.

Many began pressing forward.

Some of the bolder ones had already thrown stones.

“Anyone who takes another step will be killed without mercy!”

Yang Huchan stood up and shouted a threat.

Inside, he was terrified.

Duan Hu and Feng Gou, those two bastards, had truly dragged him into the mud.

He cursed them furiously in his heart.

The commoners below grew even more agitated upon hearing Yang Huchan’s threat. Several looked ready to charge onto the platform.

Yang Huchan, whose heart was in utter panic, shouted at the stunned executioner, “Hurry! Strike!”

At that moment, an immensely imposing figure descended from the sky.

His beard and hair were snow-white, and he carried a great saber in his hand.

His presence was as awe-inspiring as that of a war god.

Everyone at the scene froze.

Even after more than twenty years, there was hardly an older person in the capital who would not recognize that face.

The Saber King, Wang Wu.

A former legend of the capital.

Calling him the embodiment of justice would be somewhat excessive, but there was no exaggeration in saying that he had once been one of the most renowned heroes of the righteous path.

Yang Huchan stared in disbelief.

“Big Brother Wang Wu?”

As Tan Zhuangfei’s fellow townsman and close friend, Yang Huchan not only knew Wang Wu but had once been very familiar with him.

Qin Yuan, disguised as Wang Wu, did not even spare him a glance. He seized Shao Pingping, who had been waiting with his neck extended for death, and prepared to leave.

Suddenly, more than a dozen monstrous birds appeared overhead, blotting out the sky like a vast bank of dark clouds.

Dozens of people burst from the surrounding houses and the crowd. In an instant, they transformed into enormous bears three zhang tall with gaping maws, grotesque deer with deathly pale hides and razor-sharp teeth, and black tigers with two tusks protruding from their mouths and claws of extraordinary sharpness.

The scene was almost as spectacular as the attack that had slain Song Yufu all those years ago.

Qin Yuan stood motionless. With the ease of chopping melons and vegetables, he slaughtered half the demons that rushed toward him.

The demons behind them turned and fled in terror. When facing the weak, they became more and more savage; when faced with the strong, they always managed to regain their senses in time.

Qin Yuan then took Shao Pingping into the air. With a single casual slash, a fifty-meter arc of saber energy tore through the sky and shattered every one of the monstrous birds blocking their path.

In almost the blink of an eye, the demons, Qin Yuan, and Shao Pingping had all vanished from the scene.

It was as though everything that had just happened had been nothing more than an illusion.

Yang Huchan collapsed into his chair, limp as though his bones had been pulled from his body. His eyes were vacant as he murmured, “Big Brother Wang Wu has actually become this powerful...”

His martial arts were mediocre, but he knew many experts.

Those few techniques Wang Wu had displayed just now were beyond the abilities of even an ordinary Grandmaster.

He had once heard that someone from the Saber King lineage had managed to take that final step.

Could Wang Wu have done the same?

“The Saber King, Wang Wu!”

“The Saber King, Wang Wu!”

...

The people’s cheers rose into the heavens.

After years of oppression, they had desperately needed a hero who could serve as a beacon of light on the righteous path.

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Yang Huchan gazed fearfully at the densely packed crowd.

There was no one to protect him now.

Fortunately, Wang Wu’s appearance had left the people surging with excitement, and they had no attention to spare for him.

Otherwise, a savage beating would have been unavoidable.

There were two places in the world whose people did not fear the government: Jiangnan, and the capital.

The Burial Hills northeast of the capital were shrouded in the colors of autumn, lending the place a desolate, bleak, and sinister air.

“Thank you, Senior Wang.”

Shao Pingping clasped his hands in gratitude.

As a native of the capital, he had heard countless stories of Wang Wu’s deeds in suppressing violence and defending the innocent since childhood.

Wang Wu had always been one of the people he admired most.

He had never imagined that he would one day meet the man—and be saved by him.

“It was nothing. There is no need for such courtesy.”

Qin Yuan spoke in a different voice, his tone calm.

Shao Pingping asked in confusion, “Senior Wang, you are so powerful. Why not simply kill Duan Hu and Feng Gou?”

“Duan Hu and Feng Gou are nothing. The one truly plaguing the world is the Five Beasts Immortal.”

Several years earlier, Qin Yuan had followed various clues and discovered that the mastermind behind everything was a person known as the Five Beasts Immortal.

“The Five Beasts Immortal?”

Shao Pingping furrowed his brows.

The name alone sounded formidable.

“Forget about these matters. I have already sent your family to Minzhou in the south. Here is the address.”

Qin Yuan handed him a note and a bank draft worth one thousand taels of silver.

With this capital—and considering that Shao Pingping was not without ability—he should be able to live a decent life from now on.

Shao Pingping glanced at the note and put it away.

“I do not want to go to Minzhou. Ever since I was young, I have heard people say that the Hun Dynasty was founded with the aid of the ancestral ginseng from Changbai Mountain. I want to go there and seek my own opportunity.”

Qin Yuan nodded.

“Your path is yours to choose.”

Shao Pingping knelt and struck his head against the ground three times.

“All right. Get up.”

Qin Yuan helped him to his feet, then glanced toward the capital.

“Demons are pursuing us. I will escort you a little farther.”

That little farther turned out to be several hundred miles.

When Shao Pingping’s figure had disappeared from sight, Qin Yuan’s face rippled and twisted, returning to its original appearance.

What does it mean to be a man of the survivalist path?

It means trusting no one.

What does it mean to act as a man of the survivalist path?

It means remaining as still and steady as an old tortoise when doing nothing, and leaving no trace when finally making a move.

End of Chapter