Saying good morning to the girl who I kept up all night, but she seemed to be happy about me accompanying here, she hearing my sobbing started to pat me on the head, normally I would have sort of frowned at that, but when she was the one who did it, I actually felt some relief clad my heart and mending the crack it have .
I still need to be strong for what I'm entitled to do next, Master's last letter was obscured to me and his last wishes too, but I will just do my best to find out what needed to be done to honor my master, no matter how difficult it was, this should at least put him to rest, I sensed that the situation outside has finally calmed down and was about to head out to check on them .
Her body shined brightly all of a sudden as if she wanted to tell me something, as I looked at her the light became dim instantly and stayed like that for some time, then a few characters began to materialize around the sphere covering her, she was sending me a message, it seem that she can now control the energy around here to write messages .
Your senior brothers are right you know, it isn't your fault, your Master Chen Fan is a guy known for his temper, it was said that his master has exiled him to this city because he did some grave things in the capital, people called him Demon Hand Chen Fan, he has quite the reputation for being short-tempered, so him going to ask for an explanation on your behalf was out of his own accord, so don't beat yourself over it .
Tell you what, how about after I wake up, we will vanquish this City Lord from the city, this should make your Master's soul rest peacefully .
She said this with the characters she wrote, I know that she was trying to comfort me, but her logic only made me feel bad about myself, she seemed to have understood that and she tried to poke some fun at me with her suggestion, about teaming to deal with that City Lord, I almost forgot about him and his so-called Guards .
Gu Yi was still out there as well and both of them were on my kill list, both of them will fall in my hands, my hands alone that's a promise I'm willing to promise myself and Heaven above .
I still responded to her with a nod and a more happy smile, seeing me nodded, she started writing the words ' giggling embarrassingly ', seeing her like this, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry, the person who I'm actually liking and able to interact with, was again responding like a girl in a dating simulator ..
A certain page of my past was being recalled by me and I almost coughed blood at being reminded of that part in my past, I was about to head outside after bidding her farewell, but one last time she said that she had two things that she wanted to ask me .
She first wanted to know if there was something that I could do to help her brother recover from his injuries and regain the limb he lost, I shook my head and she seemed to have misunderstood the reason I did so .
She started to show crying emojis and writing words like ' tears falling ', I was shocked at her being aware of emojis and how to use them, but before she started to type things like ' lost hope ' and weird things like these, I said :
" Without you telling me so, I would have already tried to help, after all he might end up being my brother in law, but what is the second thing you wanted to tell me ? .
I saw that she stayed silent for a while, then she wrote ' giggling shyly ', then proceed to say :
I wanted to tell you that no matter what your response was, I hope you know that I...., I....., I love you .
After some time seemed to pass after I read those words, I was unable to react or understand how or when did that happen, I still in the stage of liking to be around here, but she was already confessing her love, my bad experience from my previous world was the reason to why I was hesitant to respond .
For a second there, I saw the familiar first girl that I had confessed my love to and the end of what that led to also appeared in front of me which made me hesitant, it seem that I still held something for that woman in my heart, some sort of trauma, it was already quite difficult for me to deal with women, not to mention getting confessed to all of a sudden .
Sensing that she truly meant it and that her feelings might be weird but genuine, I wanted to say that I too loved her, but then I would be lying after all for how long did we know each other for, two weeks more than half of that period both of us were in some sort of a coma and in the time where we both were awake, we barely spoke to one another .
I wouldn't be arrogant and think that my looks was enough to charm her and make her fell in love with me from the first glance, we did danced at the edge between life and death together in that short period of time, so I was finding more and more difficulty in responding to her confession .
In the end I stopped thinking about it logically and decided to see what my heart was telling me, as I searched in my heart, I surprisingly found a bud like feelings of love starting to sprout in my heart towards here, then as if those feelings took over my rationality, I found myself saying :
" I'm starting to love you too .
The second those words escaped my mouth, a green energy blade attack materialized and directly kicked me out of the tent,that attack was fully charged, it was enough to actually kill me, I wonder what made her so angry with me, had I made a mistake with how I responded or something .
I was intrigued to head inside and ask directly about what had gotten into her, but then I recalled how powerful the attack just now was and thought that she might actually have some more attacks to unleash at me and couldn't help but shudder and instantly forgot about it .
I was kicked out, so I should give her some time to cool down before I try to talk to her again, my mood had become slightly better and lighter, if compared to before at least, I stood up and dusted off my clothes and looked around me and saw that even though I had caused quite the commotion here, not many people seem to react at all .
It was more accurate to say that there wasn't a room for them to do so, they were all waking up from their hangover, all holding their heads and they seem to have partied all night, morning was up and some of those guys were still laying down on the floor and sleeping as if the world didn't matter to him in the slightest, actually I believe that if I were to wake him up and ask him, this was indeed be his answer .
There was no sign of Lu Jian being here, that was a problem and not at the same time, this whole place in front of me still in the Howling Wolf City, but where exactly I have no clue, to get back myself was something, but if I wanted to take those guys with me then I will be asking for trouble .
I myself was a wanted man now in the whole city, not to mention them who had bounties on their heads, it wasn't a problem because with the bottle of Blood Qi Recovery Pills, I will be able to deal with anyone stupid enough to try and get in my way, so I can at least secure their safety .
As I kept searching around for him, I had finished scouting the whole place, but there was still no sign of him, so all I could do is to sigh and drop the topic, I saw that Chu Jian was sitting by the well next to the fountain, he was leaning on the well and was actually still drinking, he wasn't sleepy, so either he was drinking all that time, or he woke up briefly and started to throw himself at drinks again .
Either way the two possibilities were bad, I headed towards him and saw that the first possibility was the most likely to have happened, bottles of drinks laying beside him, his smell was like a dead animal, one that had stayed days under the merciless sun .
He had spent the whole night drinking and just looking at his dispirited face and powerless body, I was able to discern that he currently wasn't drinking to celebrate no more, he was currently drinking to push his sorrows away, he kept on looking at the empty left arm of his and take another sip of whatever he was currently drinking .
Before he take another sip, I pushed the bottle from his hand, he was angry at first and reached with his left hand to the sword on his right, out of habit or drunkenness, I have no clue and no desire to find out and it seem that he too didn't .
After he found himself unable to reach his sword, he seemed to have recalled what had happened and what sorrows was he trying to drown, he laughed bitterly to himself then he managed to open his almost closed shut eyes and saw who the person who pushed the bottle off his hand just now, seeing who was in front of him .
His first expression was to laugh, a soft laugh, full of pain and suffering., his pain and suffering and mixed with taints of helplessness and then he shamefully lowered his head to the ground and his smirk vanished from his face, instead his face now carried a hint of self loathing, solemnity and finally resignation .
The guy in front of me had fallen into an abyss of despair, not only was he finding difficulty in getting out of it, he was unable to muster any spirit to find even the slightest bit of struggle in hope of getting out of this abyss .
He was now sinking more and more into it, seeing him like this, I too began to lose hope in saving him, even if I did manage to heal him completely, I can't take his depression away, his strong heart seemed to have already started to shake, that was the first thing I need to deal with .
I sat next to him and start to say after some time passed in silence between us two :
" I wanted to tell you something about me, you see, I myself once suffered from the same insufferable depression that you are currently dealing with, even though it was for a few hours at most, but look at me now, I'm radiant and hopefully looking at what the future had still stored to me .
Unintentionally, I started boasting about how I manage to fight depression, I thought that he might lash out at me any second now, but surprisingly he didn't, actually all that he did was to raise his head and with hollowed emotionless eyes he said :
Why were you depressed in the first place ? .
Seeing that his interest was still piqued, I smiled slightly and said :
" Believe it or not, I was and still suffering from Blood Vitality deficiency, I was told by Master that my journey of practicing Martial Arts will sooner or later come to an end, without able to achieve anymore breakthroughs at one point in the future .
As I told him this, I saw that in his hollowed of emotions eyes, a spark of light seem to appear for a second, before it being swarmed again by the blackness, but he still said :
How did you heal something like that in such a remote place ? .
I shook my head and said :
" I didn't, I'm still suffering from the deficiency, but Master had said that I had strong enough comprehension to make up for some of my losses, only some, but look at where I'm, I had already managed to breakthrough to the First Layer of Organs Quenching Realm .
He looked at as if looking at someone who was trying to fool him, but I had already anticipated much, I stretched my hand to him and told him that he can check for himself, he was hesitant at first, but he still went on and did it after some time, the second he did check my pulse .
He was startled by what he found and his drunken state worn off instantly, he had a beyond shocked look on his face, his body started to shake and I was starting to believe that I might end up being the straw that broke the camel's back, that was how intense his shudder was .
After some time, he seemed to have finally calmed down enough to talk, the first sentence that came from his mouth was :
How was this even possible ? .
" Well, I had gotten some fortunate encounters here and there and my own special circumstances fueled my passion towards pursuing Martial Arts .
As I said this, I couldn't help but look at his current expression, I saw that he was currently lowering his head and looking at his remaining right hand while contemplating on something, seeing him like this, I was starting to feel some hope in him recovering and surviving this crisis .
" I'm not as skilled as you in swordsmanship, but I believe that by now, your current situation should still be better than mine by far, after all you still have what you need to refine your swordsmanship, don't you ? .
As if my words rang like thunder in his ears, he managed to suddenly stand up and he brought his sword with him and start to make some distance between us, then once again he started to execute the moves of his Sword Technique that I had seen him failing to execute yesterday, but this time he was no longer dancing with the sword .
The postures he strike was still the exact same as yesterday, but his movements no longer looked strained nor obscured, they were now clear like the sun of the day, his stabs, thrusts, cuts, no longer looked artistic, they now looked sharp, deadly and quite straightforward, the extra moves that made his technique look fluid in the eyes of other were all removed .
The only moves that stayed were the killing moves, his hand was still shaky at first, but with each attack, he seem to be getting better at how to handle his sword, as I watched him go at it, I couldn't help but notice that he seemed to be engrossed in his own thoughts .
He was executing the said moves with what seemed to be a new realization, a word suddenly came to my mind, Epiphany, he was currently having an Epiphany and his Swordsmanship seemed to have starting to improve again .
I wonder if he himself was aware of this, or was he shutting all of his other senses down, I truly wonder how much will he improve, one strike after another, the sounds that the air being pierced by each strike of his sword make started to get stronger and louder by the second, then I saw it with my own eyes, blue arcs of light began to appear around his sword, then sounds as if the world started cheering on him with fireworks started to sound .
Then I saw that he seemed to have finally finished his Enlightenment as he directly sat on the floor and with naked eyes, people looking at him now could actually be able to see that the same arcs of blue light seem to now clad his body like a second skin kind of armor, then that armor sunk into his body again and instantly his aura started to rise up .
7th Layer of Organs Quenching Realm, he actually manged to reach it in such a short period of time, I couldn't help but look at him suspiciously wondering what exactly did he manage to comprehend that allowed his strength to increase like this, the energy that he released was enough to send chills running down my spine .
After a few minutes more of him consolidating his realm, as to not let the progress he achieve gone to waste, he finally opened his eyes, sensing my gaze on him, he directly stood up and bowed his head to me, looking as energetic as before, but this time he wasn't feigning it anymore, he was saying :
Once again brother Tian came to my rescue, I don't know if I will ever be able to repay you back for your favors .
" It's all your hard work, I didn't do anything, like Lu Jian had said yesterday, there's no need for thanks among brothers, congratulations on your breakthrough .
I would have never gotten rid of my depressed heart and mind, if it weren't for you, again thank you brother Tian .
Seeing that he was still headstrong about thanking me in such a fashion, I couldn't do anything but finally accept it, after we talked for some time more about how he might have found his path forward from here on out, I couldn't help but say :
" Well, now that you had recovered some of your valor, how about I help you recover your lost arm .