Chapter 4:
A journey of half a month, Jiang Buyu covered in twelve days.
Not because his horse was fast, but because he barely stopped. He traveled by day and practiced swordsmanship by night — if it could even be called practice. It was more like learning, all over again, how to use this broken body of his. Every night, out in the wilderness, he swung his sword again and again. From twenty swings before collapse, to fifty, to a hundred. The searing, tearing pain in his arms dulled to a deep ache, and the deep ache dulled into a numb, grinding endurance.
By the tenth day, he could swing a hundred and fifty times without falling.
In his former life, this would have meant nothing. But for the Jiang Buyu of now, it was something bought with sweat, with blood, with countless sleepless nights.
On the twelfth day, at dusk, he reached Falling Phoenix Slope.
Falling Phoenix Slope was not a single slope but a stretch of red hills that extended for dozens of miles. Legend said a divine bird had fallen here in ancient times, its blood staining the earth, rendering it barren ever since. The locals gave this land a wide berth. Only outlaws and the desperate dared hide in this crimson wasteland.
And this was where Blood Eagle was hiding.
The intelligence Shen Qingci had given him was sparse: Blood Eagle, one of Wangchuan Tower's "Seven Killers," had defected three years ago. He was said to possess a glowing bone fragment, suspected to be a fragment of the Sword Seal, and was hiding somewhere in Falling Phoenix Slope.
But "somewhere" meant Jiang Buyu had to find a man who did not want to be found — across a crimson wilderness dozens of miles wide.
He stood at the edge of Falling Phoenix Slope, looking out at the rolling red hills. The setting sun painted the land the color of dried blood.
"You here for Blood Eagle too?"
The voice came from behind him.
Jiang Buyu turned.
A young hunter with a bow slung over his shoulder was walking up the mountain path. His skin was tanned dark by the sun, his eyes bright. He sized up Jiang Buyu, his gaze lingering for a moment on the plain iron sword at Jiang Buyu's waist.
"You too?" Jiang Buyu asked.
"'You too'?" The hunter laughed. "Looks like you're not the only one. In the past half month, you're the fourth person to come looking for Blood Eagle at Falling Phoenix Slope. The first three…" He shrugged, leaving the sentence unfinished.
But the meaning was clear enough.
The first three had not walked out alive.
"Where is Blood Eagle?" Jiang Buyu asked.
The hunter hesitated, then jutted his chin toward the depths of the hills. "Ten miles west, there's an abandoned mine shaft. People have seen signs of activity there. But I wouldn't go if I were you — that place is cursed."
"Thank you."
Jiang Buyu turned and walked away.
"Hey!" the hunter called after him. "I said it's cursed! Didn't you hear me?"
Jiang Buyu did not look back.
Of course he had heard.
But the word "cursed" meant nothing to a man who did not even know his own name. A man who had lost himself feared nothing.
The ten-mile journey west was not easy. The red earth was soft as ash, each foot sinking half an inch into the ground. The sky darkened. The wind across Falling Phoenix Slope was fierce, whipping up red dust that stung the face like shards of glass.
When the moon rose, Jiang Buyu saw the mine shaft.
The shaft was cut into the base of a red hill. The entrance had been roughly sealed with wooden stakes and planks, but one side had been pried open, leaving a gap just wide enough for a person to squeeze through. Near the entrance were the cold remains of a campfire — not from the past day or two; the ash had already scattered in the wind.
Jiang Buyu crouched and examined the distribution of the ash.
Three piles. Similar in size. Evenly spaced.
Not one person.
Three or four. And they had camped in an organized manner — not a temporary stop.
He straightened, rested his hand on his sword hilt, and ducked into the shaft.
The mine was deeper than he had expected. After walking for the span of about a quarter of an incense stick, the tunnel began to widen. Natural cracks in the ceiling let in slivers of moonlight, just enough to see by. The air was thick with the smell of damp rot, mingled with something else — something metallic that he could not quite name.
*Blood.*
Jiang Buyu stopped.
He smelled fresh blood. Not far ahead.
He took another few dozen steps, and the tunnel suddenly opened into a natural underground chamber, about the size of two or three rooms. Moonlight poured down through a massive crack in the ceiling, illuminating the center of the cavern.
Jiang Buyu froze.
Three bodies lay on the floor of the cavern.
Two men, one woman. Dressed in various martial world attires. Different causes of death — one pierced through the chest by a sharp weapon, one with a twisted neck, one whose entire body had turned black, as if from a potent poison.
They had been dead no more than two days.
Jiang Buyu crouched and examined the wounds on one of the bodies. Clean cut. One thrust, instant death — the blade had entered the heart with surgical precision. He had seen this killing technique before — no, not seen. His *body* remembered.
Wangchuan Tower's killing technique.
He stood and swept his gaze across the entire cavern.
And then he saw it.
On the stone wall at the deepest part of the cavern, someone had carved a line of characters with a sword. The handwriting was sloppy, but the strokes were deep — each character etched into the hard rock with tremendous force:
**"COME FIND ME."**
Jiang Buyu stared at those three characters. His pupils contracted slightly.
This was not hiding.
This was an invitation.
"You're here. Come out, then."
A rasping voice came from the darkness above the cavern.
Jiang Buyu looked up.
A figure dropped down from the rock fissures in the ceiling, landing silently beside the three bodies. It was a man in his early thirties, wiry and lean, with a knife scar running from the corner of his eye down to his jaw. He wore a dark crimson robe. A curved blade hung at his waist, a dark red gem set into its hilt.
But what drew the eye most was his right hand.
In his right hand, he held a bone fragment — about half the size of a palm, pure white, emitting a faint, phosphorescent glow. In the dim cavern, that glow was like a beacon — the only source of light in the darkness.
*Sword Seal fragment.*
Jiang Buyu's heartbeat quickened.
"Blood Eagle?" he asked.
The scarred man tilted his head and studied Jiang Buyu. A slow grin spread across his face. It was not a pleasant grin. It looked like a knife cutting a gash across his face.
"Wangchuan Tower?" Blood Eagle shot back.
"No."
"Then what are you here for?"
Jiang Buyu did not answer. His gaze was fixed on the glowing bone fragment.
Blood Eagle followed his line of sight and laughed. This time, he laughed out loud — a rasping, grating sound that echoed off the cavern walls like something scraping against stone.
"For this?" He held up the bone fragment. "Do you know what this is?"
"A fragment of the Sword Seal."
"Right. A fragment of the Sword Seal." Blood Eagle tossed the fragment lightly in his hand, casual and unconcerned. "But do you know whose Sword Seal it is?"
Jiang Buyu said nothing.
Blood Eagle stared at him for a few seconds. Then his grin vanished.
"Your own, Buyu."
The air in the cavern suddenly turned solid.
"You don't recognize me," Blood Eagle said, "but I recognize you. Three years ago, Wangchuan Tower's top assassin. Code name: 'Buyu.' Before you defected, you shattered your own Sword Seal into seven fragments and scattered them across the martial world. You were afraid Wangchuan Tower would use your power — so you destroyed it yourself."
Jiang Buyu's hand pressed against his sword hilt. His knuckles went white.
"What you say may be true," he said. "I don't remember. But that doesn't matter. Give me the fragment."
"Give it to you?" Blood Eagle gave a cold laugh. "You think I'm here to return your things?"
He clapped his hands.
The sound echoed through the cavern.
And then, from the rock fissures in the ceiling, six more figures dropped down.
Six people. Six weapons. Six pairs of eyes, all fixed on Jiang Buyu.
"Three years ago, when you defected, the Tower Lord put a bounty on your head." Blood Eagle tucked the bone fragment into his robes and drew his curved blade. The steel gleamed cold in the moonlight. "One Sword Seal fragment, plus your head — do you know how much that's worth?"
Jiang Buyu looked around. He counted.
Seven, including Blood Eagle.
He had a three-catty iron sword and a body that had recovered less than ten percent of its former strength.
"You know," Jiang Buyu said, his voice calm, "before I came here, someone told me the first three people who came looking for you all died."
Blood Eagle narrowed his eyes.
"But I'm not here looking for you." Jiang Buyu slowly drew his iron sword. "I'm here to take back what's mine."
Before the last word left his lips, Blood Eagle moved.
He was terrifyingly fast. His curved blade traced an arc through the air, aimed straight for Jiang Buyu's throat. The angle was viciously unorthodox, and combined with his forward momentum, it left almost no room for evasion.
But Jiang Buyu did not evade.
His body shifted half an inch to the left — no more, no less — just enough for the blade to graze past his neck. In that split second, he could feel the cold of the steel sliding against his skin.
And then he struck.
The iron sword slashed upward from below. His target was not Blood Eagle, but the second man behind him. That man had been charging forward with a pair of short halberds, not expecting Jiang Buyu to bypass Blood Eagle and attack him directly. Caught off guard, he could only raise his halberds to block.
*Clang—*
Iron sword met short halberds. Sparks flew.
A wave of numbness shot up Jiang Buyu's arm. His palm stung where the impact had jarred it. His strength was far from sufficient. Though the strike had disrupted his opponent's rhythm, it had done no real damage.
And the cost was that his right arm could barely lift anymore.
"That's all you've got?" Blood Eagle sneered. "The great Buyu — now you can't even kill a common thug?"
He lunged again, his curved blade chopping three times in rapid succession. Jiang Buyu sidestepped the first. The second sheared off his sleeve. The third — Jiang Buyu had no time to dodge. He had to block it with his sword.
*Clang!*
The iron sword was knocked from his hand. It clattered against the stone wall with a sharp, ringing sound.
Jiang Buyu's hands were empty.
Blood Eagle's curved blade was now pressed against his neck. The edge rested against his skin. One light pull would slit his throat.
"It seems the legendary Buyu truly has become a cripple." Blood Eagle leaned close to his face, lowering his voice. "You can't even hold a sword steady. What are you going to use to take back what's yours?"
Jiang Buyu looked into Blood Eagle's eyes and said nothing.
His right hand was trembling — not from fear, but from exhaustion. Twelve straight days of travel. Late nights of practice until his body gave out. And now this exchange of blows. This broken body had reached its limit.
But he did not close his eyes.
He stared at the slight bulge in Blood Eagle's robes — the bone fragment was hidden there.
And then he did something no one expected.
His right hand shot up and grabbed the blade of the curved sword.
The edge cut into his palm. Blood dripped between his fingers. But he did not let go. He clamped down on the blade with his flesh and blood, locking it in place so Blood Eagle could not pull it back for another strike.
Blood Eagle froze for a fraction of a second.
In that instant, Jiang Buyu's left hand plunged into Blood Eagle's robes, found the warm bone fragment, and yanked it out.
The moment the fragment touched his palm —
A cataclysmic surge of power erupted from the fragment, flooding up his arm and crashing into his body like a thunderbolt detonating inside his meridians. The bone fragment, which had only been emitting a faint glow, suddenly exploded with blinding white light. The entire cavern lit up as bright as day.
Blood Eagle screamed. The light blasted him backward, sending him crashing hard against the stone wall.
The other six all covered their eyes at once.
Jiang Buyu gripped the bone fragment, feeling something drastic happening inside his body. The power rampaged through his meridians like a dragon that had been caged too long and had finally found its escape.
A flash of an image shot through his mind —
*Himself, standing atop a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood, his sword dripping. Before him stood a woman in white. She was crying, begging him: "Stop killing, please? Let's go. Let's leave this place."*
Then the image shattered.
Jiang Buyu opened his eyes.
His right hand was still bleeding. But it no longer trembled.
Something had ignited inside him. Not internal energy. Not physical strength. Something more fundamental than either.
*Sword Intent.*
True Sword Intent.
He bent down and picked up the iron sword from the ground.
This time, the feeling of holding the sword was completely different. This blade was no longer a three-catty piece of scrap iron. It was an extension of his arm. A part of his will.
Blood Eagle picked himself up from the ground, blood seeping from the corner of his mouth. For the first time, fear showed on his face.
"You —"
Jiang Buyu did not give him the chance to speak.
One strike.
Just one simple strike.
No flashy techniques. No fierce gust of sword wind. No sound at all. From the tip of the iron sword, a faint white light extended — barely visible — and passed through the air. It cut across Blood Eagle's robes and left a shallow bloody line across his chest.
It was not that Jiang Buyu could not kill him.
He had deliberately aimed half an inch off.
Blood Eagle looked down at the bloody line on his chest. His legs gave way, and he fell to his knees.
"You could kill me," Blood Eagle said, his voice shaking. "But killing me won't change the truth."
"What truth?"
Blood Eagle raised his head. There was a strange light in his eyes — not fear, but a kind of frantic excitement.
"The truth of the Blood Moon Night," he said. "You think you were framed? You think you were the victim? No, Buyu. *You're* the one who truly deserved to die."
"Lin Xiyin's death — was your fault."
Jiang Buyu's hand, still holding the sword, went rigid.
"Say that again."
"Why did Lin Xiyin die?" Blood Eagle laughed — a bloody, ugly laugh. "Because she was trying to save *you.* Because you walked into a trap. Because she took that sword for you. That sword was meant to pierce *your* heart — but she stood in front of you."
"Do you know who thrust that sword?"
Blood Eagle stared into Jiang Buyu's eyes and spoke, one word at a time:
"*You did.*"
The cavern was so quiet he could hear the sound of blood dripping onto the stone floor.
Jiang Buyu stood there, sword in hand, his entire body frozen.
The Sword Seal fragment in his palm burned hot — as if reminding him of something. Reminding him that among the sealed memories, hidden deep within, was a truth he least wanted to face.