I voiced my suspicions to Yuan Chongxi and Lin Feng, both of whom agreed that what I said might be true. "If this is indeed true, then we are in for a hell of trouble," said Yuan Chongxi, "Including Bai Chuanwei, there would at least be four of them while there's only the three of us." He paused and swallowed another mouthful of noodles.
"Chongxi's right," Lin Feng remarked, rubbing his chin, "Bai Chuanwei would undoubted has strengths of his own, otherwise he would never have earned a moniker of "the Invisible Hand". But with the help of another three men... They addressed themselves as 'the Thirteen Apostles' in the letter of challenge, I think this means that all four of them are part of the Thirteen. We know that Bai Chuanwei is the Sixth Apostles, but we still know nothing of the other three..." "Indeed," I quipped, nodding too, "Of the remaining Thirteen, save for Bai Chuanwei who is the Sixth, the Second, Tenth, Eleventh, Twelfth Apostles are still unaccounted f
The Tenth Apostle seemed awfully sure that his Twelfth counterpart would emerge victorious. They knew enough about us to know that Yuan Chongxi is the weakest in both combat and magic of us three, hence they intend to first defeat him to gain the momentum. I looked back into the ring. The Twelfth Apostle was clad in a buttoned traditional Chinese garb and bell-bottom styled pants with Chinese slip-ons. He was even wearing a pair of wristbands that fully completed the set! He wielded a rope which has a steel dart attached to one of its end, a weapon commonly known as a rope-dart. Most rope-darts these days, including those used during wushu performances, were required by law to have no sharp tips. Sharp-tipped rope darts that could be dangerous were viewed as controlled items that require the permission of the police to be used. It was clear that the Twelfth Apostle was using his illegally; he wanted only to kill his opponent! Unlike Lin Feng's darts which were throwing
I extracted my Spirit Gourd from my pocket and muttered some incantations, sucking the souls of the dead Apostles into my calabash gourd. The Tenth Apostle beheld the sight of his dead comrades with grief and hatred. "May the blessings of the Sages be upon us!" He cried at the top of his voice, "How dare you commit the sacrilege of slaughtering innocent lives! I'll never forgive you!" I step forward and waved him off. "Cut your blather," I cut him off dismissively, "You lot have done nothing but desecrate the good name of Taoism! There no need for fake Taoists like you who abduct children and butcher them for the sake of your diabolical rituals! True Taoists have suffered persecution since the Qing Dynasty, all thanks to you lot, that they were nearly on the brink of extinction! After so many years, you returned from your slumber and continue your witchery and harming the innocent! How dare you invoke the name of the Taoist Sages! How ignorant you are, that you do not
The person was just blabbing about it! So I was impatient after a while and said, "Do you have any enemies?" He replied. "No!" "Do you have any athletics, competitions, etc.?" He still answered no, in a very thorough way! I thought about it and asked. "Do you have a girlfriend?" He replied: "Now I don't!" Then I asked. "I mean before it happened?" He replied. "Yes! But we broke up because of it!" I nodded and asked. "So, can you be sure that if anyone had pursued her before it?" He replied. "Yes! Someone has been pursuing her, but her family does not agree! So she was not very determined about our relationship either. But she got together with this man after the thing!" I said to him again, "Recall carefully, within 24 hours before the occurrence of this incident, do you have any opportunities of contact with that person? For example, seeing each other, or in a teahouse, cafe, barbecue booth, restaurant, etc. where you met him by accident?" He said, "I happened to see
On the mountain were some houses made from rocks. I had no idea what purposes did they serve. Seeing that there was no road ahead of us, we got off the carriage. I told the other two to get their weapons ready and retrieved the spirit eagle. We then started climbing up the mountain. The mountain was not high. On one side of it was an abandoned quarry. There weren't many trees and the weeds were short as well, the mountain seemed to be quite barren. It wasn't too steep to climb, and slowly we approached the fences surrounding the houses. They were all built on flat ground near the top, which was just a short distance ahead. I fastened my pace and entered the yard within those fences. The yard was covered with weeds as well. At that moment, my sword started vibrating vigorously. I waved towards the back as a signal to start searching every room while not making any sound. There was no door nor window in all the rooms, only the skeleton of them built with ro
Lin Feng was hit by a poison needle! Despite being careful, still he was struck and he was now losing his consciousness! The Taoist priest's attack released a handful of needles that fanned out in a wide area. But it was fortunate that Lin Feng was able to parry away the rest of the needles and only one hit in the arm. He quickly gulped some antidote and began to feel better, although that did little to quell his rage! His right hand was injured, but he could still throw poison darts with his left hand, all thanks to his long hours of training! But Hong Tianhua was also lucky himself; he was reaching into his clothing to retrieve something when Lin Feng's dart struck him and injured his hand. He immediately detected a pungent, fetid stench emitting from his wound and knew, due to his experiences of dealing with poison, that he needed to act quickly! Biting hard, he cleaved off his left arm to save himself and collapsed to the ground, grimacing with pain!
My eyes reopened to see the infernal priest clutching at his right hand, screaming at the top of his voice in agony! The hand which barely seized me was now grotesquely bent as if it was broken! I jerked my head back to look at my companions, my eyes relaying my question. But both of whom were also watching me with amazement themselves. There was no time to ask about what happened. I yelled at the evil priest, "How do you like a taste of that, you old weasel?" Filled with anger at my taunt, the wicked priest began squawking strangely with fury and charged at me again like a frenzied bull! I began regretting goading him; even in his injured state, the evil priest was still many times as powerful as I am! There was no way I could ever dream of defeating him! In my panic, I began thinking of my father, Master Six, and the founder of my father's order whose picture I saw not long ago. I was in desperate need of help! Suddenly, I remembered, Master Six! Yes! M
I scratched my head bleakly, still feeling sores all over me. I opened my mouth to speak but Master Six beat me to it. "What a sound sleep you had, boy," he said, "You've slept for one whole day." I scratched my head again sheepishly. "But... Why are you here, Master Six?" I asked. "You've caused quite a ruckus, boy," he said again, "Can you blame me for coming unannounced? More so, if you had indeed perished. All the years of my tough labor would have been for naught..." His voice trailed off as if he had suddenly realized he had spoken a little too much. But I was hardly perturbed nor annoyed; Father too usually spoke on such vague terms as if he was avoiding from revealing too much, a trait which I had grown too used to. The Sash of the Stretching Rainbow came to my mind suddenly and I scratched at my head again. "Urm... Master Six," I said meekly, "The Sash of the Stretching Rainbow... I'm afraid it's..." "I know," he said curtly, cutting me off, "The
I felt as if a hole was bored deep into me. For over twenty years I had lived here, and suddenly it was my house no more, and the parents whom I loved and respected for more than two decades suddenly became strangers? Tears trickled down Mother's face uncontrollably as Father shook his head wearily, sighing hard as he pressed again, "Make your choice." I rubbed my face, swinging my legs out of the bed and walked to Father. "Would you still be delayed if I choose to remain?" I asked. Father shook his head, although Master Six's nodding head told me that he was lying. The fact that Father was lying again made it all the more unbearable for me. "Father, Mother," I said quickly without much thought, "You've done enough for me... I..." I could not finish what I wanted to say. Tears streamed down my cheeks. Father was chewing on a cigarette, and he said dejectedly, "Make no mistake, the delay of my ascension from the Human Realm is not because of this. I have m