Molting the Mortal Coil

Individually, the boy didn’t seem like much. All of those gathered were only rank 2, but their stages varied. The arrogant one was level 21, while the opposing party had two level 24s and a 25. It was a shame that all the arrogant boy’s goons were level 24. The older boy of the trio was stronger than anyone here, but he was vastly outnumbered. If the 24s on either side matched up, the one boy at level 25 would be up against four level 24s.

“We’ll never give in to you, Ding Bo! Just take your stupid thugs and get out of here. I heard about what you and your six ‘brothers’ like to do together at night!”

The younger boy of the trio spoke, only to get pushed back and hidden behind the girl, “Quiet, Ren Fen! Don’t provoke him! The Ding Family are not people we should be antagonizing. Just let Big Brother Du Hou handle it.”

Ding Bo sneered at the chatter of the boy, Ren Fen, and opened his mouth to respond to the criticism only to be interrupted by the older one, who Sage assumed was called Du Hou.

“Please forgive my Junior, Ding Bo. He’s a hot blooded youth that hasn’t learned how to have proper manners yet. We cannot give you the Lamp of Passion, but we will happily sell it to you. It was our reward after braving dangers in an ancient ruin. We will offer you a very fair price of five thousand spirit stones. Surely, an important person in the prestigious Ding Family can easily pay this much.”

Sage chuckled inwardly, this Do Hou seemed to be quite smart. He praised the Ding Family and insulted Ding Bo at the same time. Ding Bo was not happy, his face scrunched up like he’d just entered an outhouse, “Sell!? I just told you the conditions and you still didn’t obey this Grandfather obediently! You just won’t learn your lesson. Now you have to hand over the Lamp, your Spirit Stones, kneel down to apologize and also hand over that girl, Su Ru!”

Things just seemed to keep escalating. Sage sent out his Spirit Sense and searched the nearby area, finding nobody else around except for these ten in front of him. So these teens weren’t part of an expedition group like he’d been chaperoning earlier? This seems like a pretty remote place for them to have such an encounter.

Just as Sage was wondering what brought them all out here, they near about answered his question. Su Ru looked terrified, Ren Fen looked furious, and Du Hou put his hand over Ren Fen’s mouth and held him back. After a minute to calm down, Du Hou turned back around and smiled at Ding Bo, “I’m very sorry that my Junior Brother has said such silly things and offended you, but do you wish to be the cause of conflict between your Ding Family and our Earthdawn Sect? The Sect would not allow one of their Disciples to be sullied by anyone, even a member of the Ding Family.”

Next, there was a staring match at both sides glared and glowered. Then there was clenched fists and gritted teeth. Sage could even swear he saw someone conjure up a gust of wind to make their uniform billow in the wind on purpose. Sage was actually impressed at how many ways these guys were finding to make themselves seem tougher only to find them outdo themselves. Both sides suddenly released their aura, which Sage had learned was a pretty basic technique. Non-Cultivators couldn’t control their energy so their natural Qi would slowly leak out of their body and form an aura. Cultivators would harness their energy and use it to transform their bodies and gain power. Once they did, they would learn to stop the energy from leaking out. If you were trying to fill a pool with water, why would you leave holes in the side for it to leak from?

What they were doing now was the opposite of this, opening up a bunch of holes and letting their energy spill out. Then they use a bit of Spirit Power to puff it up and spread it out. The clouds of energy would smash into each other and for some reason this became a way for people to try to intimidate each other. Comparing the volume and quality of the energy they could leak out all over the place.

Sage thought it was silly… why not use that energy to attack instead of just spilling it all over the place to try and intimidate someone? Why would you show your hand and let your enemy know exactly how powerful you are? Revealing your secrets and wasting your energy. People just can’t help themselves from posing and thrusting their chests at each other.

Sage didn’t know who the Earthdawn Sect was, nor the Ding Family. He didn’t really pay attention to the activities of the world at large, concerning himself only with his own slow improvements and before that he was on the run across so many cities and provinces that he only listened to news about the dangers of the next road he was going to travel. He also hadn’t seen either name while looking through the ancient maps, but they might exist on his more recent ones. With no powerful elders or bodyguards behind either group his assumption was that neither party was all that great individually, and their backers must be similar in stature. If one’s group or background were vastly stronger than the other, one of the two parties would most likely give way immediately or plan a secret killing with no witnesses instead of this loud and vulgar confrontation.

From the sounds of things it was just an arrogant kid with a decent background using his gang to pick on the side with smaller numbers that just found some treasure. His spirit sense told him there was no other people around within a couple miles, so his only real question was how Ding Bo knew that the three would be here?

The girl moved from behind Du Hou’s back and retreated further to hide behind Ren Fen, cowering with fear at Ding Bo’s threats. Du Hou saw this and his face lost its calm, looking as if he wished to rip Ding Bo into pieces. The only problem was that they were outnumbered. After a bit more arguing, Ding Bo’s demands got even more ridiculous, each time making more savage claims, “... you two will kneel down naked and kowtow to me as your ancestor and I will take all your possessions along with the girl! Now hurry up and thank me for being merciful.”

Sage was thinking about stepping in, but he had no relation to any of these people, nor were the benefits all that astounding. They were battling over only thousands of spirit stones, which he would be helping them to not lose, and there was seven people to deal with. If he exposed himself he’d be taken as a monster and some of them might escape. Even if things went perfect, those three from the Earthdawn Sect might plot against him later. While he was thinking things over, the conflict finally broke out.

Du Hou made his move, drawing a sword and rushing towards Ding Bo. At rank 2, a Qi Condensation Cultivator was able to push their Qi out of their bodies. Instead of only enhancing them internally it could now move outside and cover their skin. The energy sheathed Du Hou like armor and coated his weapon to make it more powerful. He struck down hard from above aiming at Ding Bo’s forehead. At the same time, Ding Bo sneered and three of his goons intercepted the strike. The other three moved to surround Du Hou, but Du Hou’s free hand moved suddenly.

Something flashed out and one of the goons fell backwards, a small silver handle protruding from his throat. Blood dripped down his fingers as he fell to the ground. Du Hou had used a hidden weapon, a small dagger concealed in his palm and thrown without warning while he was making a blatant strike towards Ding Bo. Sage actually cheered inwardly at such a good move being performed!