Chapter Ninety-Seven: The Challenge Begins

The two ghostly companions looked blankly at him.

When they saw his pupils tremble as he stared past them, they followed his gaze and turned their heads.

With a sharp gasp, one of them dissolved at once into a black blur and vanished into the darkness, no one knew where, leaving the other to shiver in place.

Why were they so afraid? It was only because on that night, those dense iron thorns and several enormous purple serpents had injured them far too deeply.

At the thought of it, the remaining ghost turned into a wisp of blue smoke and fled toward the distant woods. As it shot across the training grounds, even the dim yellow lamps flickered and swayed.

When Lone Cold saw White Victory Cloud, he gave a faint smile. “I thought you would not come.”

By the time he spoke, White Victory Cloud was not far from the arena. His whole figure stood exposed beneath the wavering lights, his shadow swaying lightly with several other wandering spirits.

“I merely came slowly and was delayed a little,” White Victory Cloud said coldly.

As soon as the words fell, he flashed forward and was suddenly on the arena, standing steady before Lone Cold with his hands behind his back.

The two met each other’s eyes. There was no further speech, no tentative testing blow. They opened their respective domains at once.

One was a chill so bleak it seemed to come from the farthest depths of the underworld. The other unleashed roaring flames with a sweep of his hand, like a land of volcanoes.

The two forces collided, yet neither could overcome the other.

The ghosts farther away were still all right, but those who stood near, or directly in the middle, found the strange mingling of ice and fire deeply unsettling.

In the exchange, White Victory Cloud also discovered that in just a few days, Lone Cold’s strength had grown considerably. Fighting him now was almost like facing another version of Heaven-Leaning Hou.

Even so, Lone Cold still found some strain in opposing White Victory Cloud, for the clash of their techniques and the innate hostility of their spiritual roots put him at a disadvantage.

His eyes narrowed slightly. Then a red long whip slowly appeared in his hand. The moment it came forth, the surrounding spiritual energy seemed to ripple, and the yin force and cold grew even heavier, as though merging with his domain.

White Victory Cloud stood motionless. At some point, a Clear Wind Fan had appeared in his hand.

When Lone Cold saw that fan, his eyes darkened, and anger flared in them.

“You did that on purpose!”

White Victory Cloud answered by giving the fan a light shake, a mocking cold smile on his face. “How was that on purpose? I simply brought only the Clear Wind Fan when I came out.”

Hearing this, Lone Cold’s fury only deepened, and he charged forward with the whip.

With a turn of his wrist, the red whip coiled like a long snake, then lashed down upon the ground, kicking up layers of dust and grit.

White Victory Cloud lifted a brow, then gave the fan in his hand a forceful sweep.

In an instant, the gale howled, blowing all the dust back toward Lone Cold.

Lone Cold instantly raised a barrier of spiritual power. He heard the sharp crackle of grit striking it, and his speed was forced to slow.

His expression darkened as he glared at White Victory Cloud through clenched teeth.

Within that storm were wind blades. If he had been even a few seconds slower, those blades would have sliced every piece of flesh from his body.

His eyes narrowed, his features twisting slightly with rage.

He had only lost himself for an instant because the dust had stung his eyes, yet White Victory Cloud’s figure vanished from where he had stood.

His gaze sharpened. Catching a fleeting shadow in the corner of his eye, Lone Cold snapped his head around and saw White Victory Cloud already directly before him.

With a sweep of the fan, a violent storm came surging in, while the ferocious fire, whipped on by the gale, burned hotter and wilder. Lone Cold also sensed a surge of powerful spiritual force, which had forcibly sharpened the fan’s edge into a blade of iron and shattered his protective barrier outright.

At once, the wind made him squint. White Victory Cloud saw it and curved his lips faintly.

Lone Cold caught that expression at close range and was startled, quickly opening his eyes again and erecting another barrier of spiritual power.

White Victory Cloud swept the fan once more. The iron blade was sharp, and this strike broke the barrier again with a crisp crack.

Then he swept again, fast as lightning.

Seeing the cold gleam flash by, Lone Cold’s eyes widened. He slipped aside at once, his heart still pounding with lingering fear.

Had he been a heartbeat slower, if he had not closed his eyes and evaded in time, the Clear Wind Fan would have torn a deep gash across his throat. At best, his windpipe would have been severed, and he would have died on the spot.

By then the flames were searing hot. He stood amid the fire, his whole body coated in a chill yin force to keep himself from being burned to death. Then he lashed out at White Victory Cloud with the red whip, seeming not to fear the towering blaze before him at all, intent only on defeating him.

White Victory Cloud saw the red whip strike like a swimming serpent and sidestepped it, but to his surprise it twisted as if possessed of its own will and coiled around his ankle.

Frowning, he yanked hard backward, yet there was nothing he could do.

Lone Cold smiled with disdain and moved to drag him down in a single pull.

Sensing it, White Victory Cloud gathered flames in his hand and struck down at once.

An even more domineering, searing heat began to scorch the red whip. After all, the whip was a yin-and-cold artifact; if it were truly burned by such a pure and forceful blaze, Lone Cold’s weapon would be ruined.

Seeing this, Lone Cold had no choice but to retract the whip, changing it instead into a rigid, unnaturally tough serpent bone.

At the sight, White Victory Cloud also remembered its name. “Serpent Bone Whip?”

“Hmph.”

White Victory Cloud now could not help but grow serious as well.

The Serpent Bone Whip was nearly as old as the Purple Gold Bell, but the material used to forge it was even more formidable.

Why say so? Because it was made from the spine of a giant serpent on the verge of becoming a dragon, and its master was a cultivator of the path of slaughter, one who had killed countless people over the years. Yin energy and resentment clung to him in abundance. On that point alone, the Purple Gold Bell could not compare at all.

Most important of all... at the moment of its forging, the artifact spirit was born. It was said that heaven and earth had shown strange signs then, and one could hear the low, intimidating cry of a great dragon. No one knew how magnificent it had been.

A weapon with an artifact spirit not only aided its wielder in greatly increasing their strength, but also possessed its own battle instincts, having inherited part of its former master’s cultivation. Naturally, it was formidable.

So White Victory Cloud had no choice but to put away the Clear Wind Fan, which had originally been little more than an insult to Lone Cold, and instead draw the sword he had worn for many years.

The moment his sword emerged, it rang out with clear cries. Its desire for battle was unabashed, eager beyond measure to fight that Serpent Bone Whip!

White Victory Cloud naturally granted it its wish. The instant he revealed it, he raised the long sword. When the tip pointed at Lone Cold, the blade’s excited singing became almost piercing.

“Noisy,” Lone Cold said coldly.

He flicked his wrist, and the Serpent Bone Whip lashed out, only to be blocked by White Victory Cloud’s sword.

Yet the whip immediately coiled around the blade, pinning it immobile.

White Victory Cloud sent spiritual power into the sword with one hand and at the same time expanded the reach of his blazing fire.

The yin chill cloaking Lone Cold’s body began to lose ground, and he reinforced it here and now.

The two forces remained evenly matched, and White Victory Cloud’s stray sense of awareness in the Joyful Union Palace suddenly sent him an image: Xie Yingying’s fever had flared again. Foolishly, she had even rolled out of bed and fallen to the floor. Her clothes over her chest were soaked in blood, and her breathing had turned ragged; she could only gasp for air in great gulps, brows furrowed, yet she would not wake no matter what.

What a troublesome woman, he thought.

White Victory Cloud had no choice but to take up the Clear Wind Fan again, feeding the roaring fire until it burned even fiercer, while with his other hand he barely managed a sword thrust that forced Lone Cold back several steps.

“I’m done fighting!” he said with a frown.

“You’re admitting defeat?” Lone Cold’s voice was cold, and there was a thread of satisfaction in it.

White Victory Cloud clasped his hands behind his back and said indifferently, “Look at your own hand.”

Lone Cold did not understand, but he still looked down, only to see that his palms had somehow been mangled into a bloody mess.

He looked back at White Victory Cloud’s hands. Not a trace of injury.

Seeing this, he lowered his eyes slightly.

If they continued, the one who might lose would be him.