Chapter 128: Tycen’s death.

Chapter 128: Tycen’s death."How is this possible!" Lee whispered and took a step back. His first thought was that he was hallucinating because of the loss of blood, but even though his vision periodically swam, he hadn’t lost his senses yet.

"What is it?" Xiao Lian asked, and stretched his neck to take a look, but Lee finally came to his senses and squatted, at the same time pulling Xiao Lian down.

"Careful!" He whispered.

"Aren’t those cultivators?" Xiao Lian asked. If someone eliminated the bandits they were obviously saved.

"They are." Lee nodded, still whispering, "But not all are friendly! Let’s wait out!"

There were seven people in total. Six were dressed in simpler clothing and were covered in blood, both – their own and from the killed bandits. Everyone was wounded, except for one person. She was sticking out like a sore thumb, with her fancy robe that didn’t have a single drop of blood on it, at least it seemed so to Lee.

But he could recognize her anywhere, her pale skin and the ugly red eyes. And the musical voice that commanded everyone to thoroughly search the place, looking for potential hidden threats.

"Fairy Victoria, is it really necessary? I doubt there is anyone left after you got the ones who tried to escape." One of the outer sect disciples said.

Apart from Edward, Deen and Tycen, there were three more guys here, all in their late teens.

"Did I ask for your opinion?" Victoria reprimanded, but the tone suggested she was saying a compliment, "This is a training mission, so train!"

Then she glanced around, and said in Sunwell’s dialect, "Edward, Deen, you two keep together. I feel there is still someone around! Tycen, you’re with me!"



While Lee tried to wrap his head around what exactly was going on, the people below began to check the half-destroyed buildings around the bonfire. Victoria led Tycen further away, though, along the route Lee and Xiao Lian took earlier.

But it didn’t make any sense. Besides the fact that it was clear no one was there, why would she choose the less likely place anyone would hide at?

Xiao Lian also curiously followed the owner of the beautiful voice with his eyes.

"What language was that?" He whispered.

"That’s Bitchian." Lee said, "Keep your head low!"

"Bitch ... what? I’ve never heard of ..." Xiao Lian’s sentence was cut when Victoria, after verifying no one was around, pulled an arrow from her sleeve and stabbed it through Tycen’s neck.

The guy fell to his knees first and then to the ground, while she watched him with cold eyes, and then shouted, "There’s an archer somewhere! Everyone! Watch out!"

"Fuck!" Lee cursed again, "Fuck, fuck, fuck ..."

He kept repeating it over and over, while looking around in panic. Victoria was already rushing towards the largest building, almost resembling a ball of fire.

Apparently she noticed the two on the platform, or guessed that the bandit chief was hiding here. Either way Lee and Xiao Lian had nowhere to retreat.

They could stay there, in hopes someone would believe they were outer disciples of the Nethermoon sect, but even Xiao Lian had to admit the woman in the fancy robe was more vicious than the bandits. They surely were dead if she found them.



They could also jump down and try to escape or hide in ruins, but it was a fools dream the six people with one of them being an elemental master wouldn’t find them.

And that left them only with one option. Realizing what Lee was about to do, Xiao Lian wanted to protest, but it was already too late. Lee pulled him along and jumped off the opposite side of the tower, away from the bonfire, below which the river was.

On the way down Lee only said, "Hold on to your staff, don’t lose it!"

Xiao Lian was already clenching it with both hands purely on instinct, in delusional hopes it could keep him safe.

Lee, on the other hand, wasn’t panicked. Back in Haonia, he survived a hundred yard fall into water. Now, the distance was less than a hundred feet, and he was mostly worried whether he had pushed himself far enough from the tower to not break his neck on the rocks directly below.

Victoria didn’t hear the splash. Edward’s shouts after he arrived at Tycen’s body drew everyone’s attention, but she knew the guy was beyond saving.

It was slightly annoying that the main objective of the mission was decapitated before their arrival. Victoria’s guess was that one of the bandits used the confusion and killed his own boss for the bounty, but there was a chance the thief was hiding somewhere nearby.

The group continued to search till the sunrise, but afterwards buried their fallen comrade. An unexpected bonus were bit more than thirty captives they freed, but before escorting them to the nearest town, everyone was ordered to wash in the river to get rid of the disgusting smell.

***

Lee didn’t force Xiao Lian to swim far. They climbed to the shore half a mile downstream and from exhaustion both passed out right on the bank.

Lee urgently had to heal his wound before it got infected, but Xiao Lian just experienced the most traumatic adventure of his lifetime. Well, probably the only adventure as well.



After the sunrise, the two properly washed themselves and once again were on the way to the Azuremist sect.

Xiao Lian had endless amount of questions to his mysterious friend, but in his head he realized that most of them could be answered by the fact that he came from a different world, theoretically. His skills, resourcefulness and attitude were something that didn’t fit his age, but Xiao Lian was ready to accept those.

What he couldn’t accept was what happened right before they jumped off the tower.

Lee, of course, noticed how silent his usually talkative companion was. Despite that he spent the first half of the day trying to figure out his own condition.

He was confused. Last night Xiao Lian stabbed him in the abdomen, through the spot where the sparks were located. Or so Lee thought.

Both sparks were in tact, and the elemental mist revolving around them was the same as usual. The wound was also real, passing through and painfully bleeding at that. It was almost as if the sparks were in another body, existing parallel to his physical one.

In the lectures that were held in the sect, this phenomenon was characterized as something only elemental masters and lords possessed, but an elemental warrior like him, who had absorbed a beast’s spark should have it present in it’s physical form.

Lee wasn’t sure whether it was because of something Tess did back in the day, or because the sparks ended up in his abdomen instead of being embedded in the chest. He also wasn’t clear whether it was good or bad, and there was no one really he could ask.

In the end, he decided the sparks required more investigation and the best way to do that would be trying out a few cultivation techniques. For that, in turn, he needed to resume his language lessons, although his current teacher’s expression was rather downcast.

"I’m sure you have questions." Lee said.

Xiao Lian nodded, but didn’t say anything for a while.

"What exactly happened?" He asked in the end.