Chapter 74: Fierce Battle
Jian Chen was able to fight against his enemies alone. The battlefield around him was filled with desolate screams, and blood splashed everywhere. To Jian Chen, this was already a common sight, so it didn’t disturbed him in the slightest.
Jian Chen continued to stab out with his sword, after every attack another Boundless Bandit would fall. With his lightning fast speed, enemies of equal strength weren’t able to keep up with Jian Chen’s flow for more than three moves, and even more of them were instantly killed with only a single blow to the throat.
In terms of strength, Jian Chen was lower ranked when compared to the bandits. However, when it came to killing bandits, no one could compare to Jian Chen. In the span of a few minutes, over a few dozen bandits had been killed by him, drenching his Light Wind Sword with blood. Jian Chen’s clothes on the other hand, still maintained their pure, cottony, white and brown, as not a single splash of blood landed on them.
Unknowingly, Jian Chen had penetrated into the core of the bandits. Boundless Bandits surrounded him for 20 meters in every direction with no fellow mercenary in sight. The closest few were fighting in small groups of three to five on the outskirts of the bandit’s vanguard.
“Kill!” Three of the Boundless Bandits cried as they charged at Jian Chen with a bloodthirsty roar. With a lift of their Saint Weapons, they slashed down in hopes of chopping Jian Chen in half.
Jian Chen immediately flew forward like a speed demon towards one of the incoming bandits. His Light Wind Sword flashed with a blood red color as it shot towards the bandit’s throat.
Jian Chen was an expert with the sword, when he made his move he did it fast, the bandit’s had no time to react. He could only see the bloody flash come towards his neck, then the next thing he knew, he couldn’t breathe. It was almost as if something was blocking his throat, so he couldn’t yell either. Immediately, a trickle of blood came flowing from his neck as the bandit fell to the ground without making another sound.
Even in his final moments, the bandit didn’t realize that he was dying; perhaps he didn’t even know his throat had been pierced by Jian Chen’s sword. Because Jian Chen’s swordplay was so fast, the bandit didn’t have time to react. Moreover, the blade was so thin that he did not even feel pain from the stab.
Even after the Light Wind Sword had pierced the bandit’s throat, Jian Chen didn’t stop moving. The other two bandits had already gotten close, readying their weapons to slash down towards him.
Facing the two bandits who were preparing their weapons, Jian Chen did not look panicked at all. With a calm face, he grabbed his sword and used the Profound Steps to approach the two bandits at rapid speeds. At the same time, the blood red sword in his hand lashed out and stabbed one of the two bandits in the throat.
The Light Wind Sword met no resistance as the stabbed bandit didn’t react at all. It pierced deeply through his throat, and with a fluid motion, Jian Chen pulled it out and stabbed the third bandit as well.
Every single stab from Jian Chen had been extremely fast, the naked eye wouldn’t be able to keep up. No one would be able to avoid his strokes, and so the third bandit would definitely not be able to survive a blow to his throat either.
To Jian Chen, killing people was already as common as breathing. Seeing the life escaping from people was nothing uncommon, and he never hesitated over taking a bandit’s life. And so the Light Wind Sword continued to fly out towards the bandits.
Amongst the fierce clash, no one was safe from this battle. Even the caravan drivers who weren’t Saints were grouped together with a few mercenaries fending off the bandits.
The battle was causing both sides to rapidly lose numbers; both the bandits and the mercenaries suffered from disastrous casualties. Aside from Jian Chen, who was still completely clean of blood, everyone else was drenched in it; some were covered head to toe in both blood and wounds.
Although the bandits had a higher number of people than the mercenaries, their strength and teamwork were lacking in discipline in comparison to the mercenaries, who had spent a good portion of their time with each other. So when the two fought, despite having superior numbers, the bandits were fighting on equal grounds with the mercenaries.
Jian Chen continued to travel back and forth as he dodged attacks from all directions, while stabbing out with his bloody Light Wind Sword towards each bandit’s heart and throat. Almost each move was a fatal blow, and for those who did not get hit in one of those two areas, Jian Chen’s sword still left severe injuries deep enough to see bone. None of the bandits around him had any way of fighting back against Jian Chen; most of them couldn’t even see his sword move. Whenever the bandits slashed with their weapons, at the most crucial point, Jian Chen would evade the swing. Before they could understand what had just happened, they would all fall to the floor dead.
The amount of bandits killed at Jian Chen’s hands was growing in number. Gradually, all of the bandits were starting to recognize Jian Chen’s strength, and began to distance themselves from him. After all, in such a tense situation like this, no one was willing to send themselves to die that foolishly.
“Your grace has such amazing skill, allow me to test it out.” At that moment, a deep voice growled out before a cyan colored ray of light shot towards Jian Chen rapidly.
Feeling the energy leak away from the cyan streak of light, Jian Chen’s face changed suddenly as he realized this newcomer was very strong. The enemy was so strong, in fact, that Jian Chen did not dare to go head on against him; otherwise he would take on serious injuries.
The cyan streak of light traveled quickly through the air. In a flash, it had already reached Jian Chen. At that moment, Jian Chen’s face hardened, as he immediately focused his body to the extreme and leapt to the side to dodge it.
The attack had brushed against Jian Chen’s shoulder before slamming into the ground with a loud “Bang!”, leaving behind a huge hole.
Jian Chen immediately retreated 15 meters away from his enemy, before stopping to take a look at the hole in the ground, then lifting his head back up. In the night, Jian Chen could make out the figure of the one that had attacked him so fiercely.
Seeing his attacker to be around 30 or 40 years old male, Jian Chen didn’t think the man was sturdy looking at all. His plain looking clothes caused the man to appear extremely ordinary. If the man didn’t have his right hand raised up to its full height with a cyan colored Guan Dao in his hand, he would not look threatening at all. Nothing about him was remarkable enough to draw a person’s attention towards him.
Translation Note: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guandao
While Jian Chen was measuring the male in front of him, the man was calmly staring back at Jian Chen while saying, “You’re quite strong, so your opponent has to be me!” He looked at Jian Chen with an even stare. It seemed as if Jian Chen was the only one in his eyes right now; the man seemed to completely ignore the screams and shouts ringing out around them.
Jian Chen’s vision slowly swept his surroundings. The man stood in a position amongst the bandits that clearly stated his status wasn’t low. Although there were still plenty of bandits around Jian Chen, once they had seen the man fight against Jian Chen, they had all started to drift towards other mercenaries to fight.
Jian Chen’s face changed as he realized that this would be the first life or death battle he would be involved in ever since his arrival in this new world. Despite being a veteran of over a hundred battles, and having confidence that he was unrivalled in the ways of the sword, Jian Chen was not at all sure that he would be able to land a killing blow on this new person. Based on the man’s previous attack, the man’s strength was stronger than his own, and since the man’s attribute was wind, his movements wouldn’t be any slower either.
The middle aged man looked at Jian Chen and slowly brought his Guan Dao higher into the air. The blade of the Guan Dao enwrapped itself in a cyan glow as the wind slowly revolved around the man.
Taking note of the man’s movement, Jian Chen’s focus reached its peak as he prepared himself. Even if he were to use the Profound Steps, his enemy’s strength was far too strong, and with his wind attribute Saint Force that made him specialized in speed, he didn’t dare find out what the outcome would be.
“Ha!”
Suddenly, the man shouted loudly and dashed forward at a mighty speed towards Jian Chen. The middle aged man’s speed was almost terrifying, and in the blink of an eye, the Guan Dao was almost invisible as it swung down onto Jian Chen’s neck.
Jian Chen’s head tilted to the side as the Guan Dao swept past his head. As the blade came downwards, a few strands of hair were cut from Jian Chen’s head.
As Jian Chen’s head bent to one side, he leaned his body forward and immediately strided out. Rapidly closing in onto the man, his Light Wind Sword flashed with a bloody red as it lashed out like lightning towards the man’s heart.
Against the stronger male, Jian Chen was pulling out all of the stops without hesitation. Jian Chen’s speed was so fast that it was his current physical limit; in the blink of an eye, the Light Wind Sword had already hit the middle aged man’s stomach. The tip of the sword immediately became wrapped in Sword Qi as it pierced through the man’s body.
Seeing the tip of the sword pierced his body, the middle aged man’s expression suddenly changed to one of shock. However, the middle aged man reacted soon afterwards, and the strong Saint Force from within him had been drained. The ultimate form of a weapon being to able to fiercely attack and defend at close range was important. Although, the Saint Force surrounding his body was just as thin as he thought it was initially.