Book 1: Winds Begin to Blow in Tai Yuan

Chapter 11 - Storm's Fury

It was raining.

The downpour in the middle of the night suddenly came

furiously, like a tear in the heavens poured down an ocean. With a "hua la

la" sound it pounded down, and in a short while thousands and thousands of

thin streams began to flow on the ground.

Pei Yuan came out from the front hall holding a oil-paper

umbrella, and under the waiting of a maidservant she tread on water puddles to

return to her "Orchid Pavilion". Another maidservant was carrying a paper

lantern to light the way. The wind and rain was fierce and the lantern swayed

side to side, and despite the maid using her own rain cloak to protect the light

the whole way, the lantern was still quickly extinguished by a surging gust of

tempestuous wind and rain.

Before the maidservant had time to apologize, Pei Yuan had

already backhandedly slapped her. Sharp fingernails sliced a couple bright red

streaks on the maid's face and fresh blood began to drip down. The child didn't

dare to cry, only hugging the extinguished lantern and shrinking back a little

in the rain.

"Useless idiot! Can't even take care of one

lantern!" Pei Yuan raised her eyes to glance at the turbulent currents of

wind and rain in the deep night sky, and a feeling of irritation washed over

her without reason. She furrowed her brows and covered herself better with the

rain cloak, speeding up her steps to enter her secluded courtyard.

"You are not allowed to enter the courtyard, don't

dirty my grounds." Pei Yuan hated people intruding and was obsessed with

cleanliness - even her chosen residence was the most spotless and elegant

"Orchid Pavilion". These habits everyone in the sect knew, and so the

maidservants lowly concurred and retreated far from the entrance.

Outside the doors was the furious storm that hit the ground

like a deity's whip, inside the doors was a deep, silent darkness without any

movement.

Pei Yuan went to push the doors.

With a creaking sound, the doors slowly opened, and Pei

Yuan's eyes casually lowered. In that moment, she spotted on the wooden

floorboards some light wet stains.

Her heart shook, and Pei Yuan's reactions were extremely

quick, immediately shooting backwards in retreat.

However it was already late.

"Cha!"

In the inky dimness a white glow flashed, and faintly a dark

shadow materialized with a sharp blade piercing forwards. The attack was silent

and traceless, fast like flowing light or flying lightning - in only a split

second, it had already reached in front of Pei Yuan's face!

"Chi."

The thin, vague sound of skin and flesh being sliced open

shockingly sounded in Pei Yuan's ear, and she only felt on her left temple a coldness

then a pain. Following her left eye became an expanse of blood red.

Scarlet red covered her left vision, causing Pei Yuan to be unable

to discern clearly the person who used the cover of darkness to sneak attack

her. The only thing she knew was that at this moment, only she could save

herself. Biting her teeth and bearing the pain, Pei Yuan drew her sword with a

ringing noise. The sword tip vibrated with the light of the heaven's stars, the

resplendent radiance drawing one's eyes. In this emergency situation, she even

used the clan inheritance her master had secretly pa.s.sed down to her, the

treasured sword technique "Vast Sky Sword".

The opponent seemed to realize the power of the sword art, and

didn't confront it head-on but twisted their body, already flitting over to the

side of her body like a swimming fish. In the instant the figure pa.s.sed by her

side, it flipped its hand and fiercely sliced upwards. Pei Yuan's right

forehead felt another pain, and more fresh blood splashed down like a red

spring. A waterfall of blood appeared across the horizon, completely obscuring

her last bit of clear vision.

The powerful strike of the blade, was swift like sprinting

thunder; the barely contained fury in the attack, was sharp like shocking

lightning.

In that moment, the opposing side had already ruthlessly

drawn an "X" on Pei Yuan's face.

With her two eyes soaked in red blood and unable to see anything,

Pei Yuan no longer used any special techniques in her sword attacks - the

splitting pain on her face had already caused her to be deeply panic-stricken

and apoplectic. She didn't know how serious the wounds on her face were, but

from the amount of flowing blood it could be inferred that her face had already

been ruined. The opponent's actions were malicious and ruthlessly planned-out,

as if they had some deep-rooted vengeance with her.

Beautiful woman have always valued their appearance over

their lives; right now, Pei Yuan was in so much excruciating pain that she

didn't want to live, with her only thought being to not stop until she killed

the other person. Ignoring her two cut wounds, she swiped her hand horizontally

over her sword and smeared the fresh blood on her palm onto the sword body. The

sword instantly flashed scarlet - in the darkness the b.l.o.o.d.y glow began to

wriggle and flow, and inside the flowing blood gradually arose bubbles as big

as crab eyes. They were vividly multicolored like countless poisonous spiders,

and started crawling erratically on the sword body causing one to feel nauseated

just looking at the scene.

If there were any descendents of the Tai Yuan royal family

present, they surely would yell in shock at the use of "Blood Sacrifice

Magic", the royal family's secret magic skill. Now that Pei Yuan had displayed

it, it signified that she felt it was a life or death struggle.

However, even if her intention was to fight to the death, the

opposite side was not willing to. Once the intruder saw the mysterious red

light s.h.i.+ne, they immediately and silently leapt away with large steps. Their

foot tip kicked on the doorframe, and with a roll they had already escaped the

red light's area of encirclement. Amidst the howling downpour the black shadow

was like a large bird of prey, in an instant flying out three zhang and vanis.h.i.+ng within the almost

solid sheets of rain.

Pei Yuan brought her sword and chased after, her magic skill

ready. As fast as lightning, she raised her foot in the initial position of the

skill, while in her palm the long sword's glow brightened. It seemed like she

only needed a lift of her hand to immediately reach the shadow's back with her

weapon.

However, before she could slice upwards, she suddenly felt

something slippery shoot past her side with a small whistle of air, then

following that a pain in her finger, causing the long sword in her hand to

clatter to the ground.

In astonishment, Pei Yuan thought there was still another

enemy inside the pavilion and desperately opened her eyes wide. Within her

blood red vision she could only make out a round shadowy ball, disappearing in

an instant.

Then she felt something soft underneath her foot, as if she

had been tripped by something, and Pei Yuan stumbled forward.

The two slice wounds started to numbly itch at this time,

feeling like there were an innumerable number of small insects crawling inside

the cuts. In shock, Pei Yuan couldn't focus on fighting to the death anymore, and

hurriedly went to scratch her injuries. However, the more she touched the stronger

the itching, and in that expanse of red she couldn't see anything at all. Panicked,

she started to loudly scream. "SOMEONE COME! Come! Get water for me! Call

the doctor, call the doctor!!!"

There was nothing but stillness.

Those maidservants who she had just exiled to the outside

rain in fear of dirtying her floor, were still hugging the extinguished

lantern, stiffly and indifferently staring at her.

They stood like wooden statues in the rain, looking at the

usually n.o.ble and overbearing woman whose long hair was scattered in the pouring

rainstorm, and her whole face full of fresh blood. The woman who stretched her

two arms out in the middle of the luxurious wooden courtyard while mournfully

crying, with two streaks of slice wounds intersecting in the middle of her face

in a hideous "X". The woman whose fresh blood dripped from those

brushstrokes, dripping onto the courtyard she never allowed anyone to enter,

staining the s.h.i.+ning clean floor surface with a region of turbid red color.

"Someone come ... ah ... someone come ..."

No one moved, and no one spoke. Those low-status maidservants

who had personally witnessed the previous brutal mutilation, stood callously

nearby in the storm.

The howling rains were gusted by the wind into layers and

layers of crystalline walls, curtaining their eyes that, because of long

periods of abuse, held hatred inside them.

"Some ... one ... ah ..."

Pei Yuan's miserable cries were drowned by the ferocious

storm, gradually fading into nothingness. She madly scrambled around the

courtyard, yet because she kept colliding with the columns and worsening her

wounds, the itching on her face became even more severe, and her strength

finally depleted.

Rain fell into the courtyard from the deep red over-hangings

above, staining the cloth into a b.l.o.o.d.y color. Inside the rain the red-clothed

and blood-stained Pei Yuan fumbled around, sorrowfully moaning, and sank down to

the ground slowly in despair.

Her body landed on the stairs, and her black hair spread

across the wet ground underneath, meandering across the puddles on the floor

like snakes. Her hand desperately reached forwards, as if she wanted to grab a

hold of a hope to escape from this nightmare.

Unfortunately, she never was able to grasp anything.

The night had not yet reached its end, with the storm

continuing to rage.

A low mumble, full of hurt resulting from incomprehension, was

barely audible in between the rumbles of thunder.

"You ... why ... won't you help me ..."