Looking at the polished axe in his hand, Du Chengfeng fell silent.
He hadn't expected that the axe would carry such memories. What surprised him even more was that the Armored Hu General he had beheaded had an even more formidable elder brother.
This had indeed fostered a mortal grudge. Given the brotherly bond between them, the Hu chief named He Xiqing would definitely seek revenge for his brother.
The most crucial point was that the man named He Xiqing was very strong.
As a child not even taller than a wheel, he dared to face a fearsome winter bear with an axe and even kill it on the spot... As Du Chengfeng experienced this memory, he couldn't help but doubt whether this man named He Xiqing was even human.
And after reaching adulthood, He Xiqing would only grow stronger.
Thus, whether to protect his own life or to face the impending vendetta, he needed power.
Fortunately, the memory embedded in the axe pointed him to a path.
Compared to the Yang clan, who avoided Evil Qi like a plague, He Xiqing had a different understanding of it—most people would lose their sanity if Evil Qi entered their bodies, it would be a disaster making them mad or even dead on the spot, but for a few individuals with firm will, if they could maintain their selves under the erosion of Evil Qi, it would instead be a gift from the heavens.
Du Chengfeng had personally experienced this.
As a peaceful man, he hardly ever fought, other than being somewhat physically robust, he was basically powerless when it came to bloody combat—yet even such a scholarly and gentle person, upon accepting the Evil Qi of that saber, managed to slash down over two hundred Hu cavalrymen.
Of course, many of them were likely blinded by bloodlust and failed to flee, but killing two hundred people, or even two hundred pigs, was beyond what an ordinary person could accomplish.
Accepting Evil Qi could make one tireless, immune to pain, transforming into a fearless general on the battlefield, unmatched.
Importantly, achieving this didn't require anything complicated.
One just needed to kill.
"Hiss..."
Upon understanding all this, Du Chengfeng couldn't help but take a sharp breath.
He might not understand if expressed as Evil Qi, but he quickly converted it into a more comprehensible concept—in simple terms, killing yielded experience points, the more one killed, the more experience gained, the levels would rise, and the strength would grow.
However, these levels and strength didn't accumulate within the individual.
They built up on the weapon.
"Crazy, truly crazy..."
Du Chengfeng couldn't help but shake his head repeatedly.
When he first arrived in this world, he thought he was to survive in the wild. Upon encountering civilization, he assumed he had to start from scratch. When Yang Family Fortress was besieged by Hu people, realizing it was a chaotic world where a life was worth less than grass, he accepted it grudgingly.
But now, he saw that this world was more insane and bloodthirsty than he had imagined.
The mere act of killing could make one stronger. This path to advancement was unheard of; just in that moment, he could think of five hundred ways to quickly become powerful—at the root of it all, it was only about killing, like in a game, treating living people as experience points to farm.
Who hasn't farmed in a game before?
First, kill all the Yang family members, then slaughter the entire Yang Family Fortress, add in the over two hundred Hu people he had killed before, and the total Evil Qi was about a thousand. With this power as his backing, he could find an opportunity to attack Ji Town. Although Ji Town was under the guard of a commander named Liu, which could be troublesome, if given the chance...
"Clang—"
Amidst his bloodthirsty red eyes, the heavy great saber leaning against his side fell onto his foot.
The pain caused Du Chengfeng to release the axe to pick up the saber, and it was only upon letting go that he realized something seemed off about his earlier state.
"What was I thinking?"
Reflecting on his thoughts of wiping out the entire Yang Family Fortress and even the friendly village carpenter Li's family, Du Chengfeng felt a chill.
This wasn't something he could do. It was as if he had been possessed, completely transforming into a different person.
This prompted Du Chengfeng to look down at the axe by his feet.
The freshly sharpened blade gleamed under the moonlight, with ancient and mysterious markings carved onto its surface, as though echoing a distant call from the Northern Desert Grassland, irresistibly urging one to pick it up for a closer look...
"Enough."
With a kick, he sent the axe tumbling aside without sparing it another glance.
Clearly, when he confidently believed his willpower protected him from the saber's Evil Qi, the axe had quietly ensnared him again.
"It seems the path of Evil Qi isn't as easy as it seems."
Picking up the great saber that had dropped, Du Chengfeng sighed.
It was no wonder; things that fall from the sky are never free. Such power, even crazier than the demonic cultivation techniques in martial arts novels, couldn't possibly be without risks.
So instead of indulging in such dangerous matters, he considered what he gained from sharpening the axe.
The gains were somewhat disappointing; he had hoped to learn some battle tactics from the axe, but who knew the people from the Northern Desert Grassland didn't practice that—those rugged men fought far more directly than he imagined. Their method of slaughter was not much different from butchering livestock.
Fortunately, both He Xiqing and He Xixuan were skilled horsemen, a craft Du Chengfeng, who couldn't ride, found useful. As for martial arts techniques… if sports could be considered, then Du Chengfeng did gain one skill.
It was Bok wrestling, popular on the Northern Desert Grassland, a sport in which only burly warriors could participate.
"Can this really be considered a martial art?"
Du Chengfeng frowned; it was quite different from the mystical Inner Power and True Qi techniques he envisioned that came with multifaceted applications.
"Moreover, doesn't this need two people to try out? Who should I test it with?"
Poof—
Just as Du Chengfeng pondered how to test his newly acquired skill, a spear was thrown from afar and embedded in the ground beside him.
This caused him to raise his head.
Outside the courtyard, Yang Sanlang stood at a distance, observing him with a bag of throwing spears slung over his shoulder.
They locked eyes.