Chapter 1 The Swordsman

"You can't convince me," said the Sword Saint.

"I didn't intend to. I'm just wondering if my shop will still be open tomorrow."

"I'll take a look for you."

The Sword Saint walked outside and reattached the door plank he had removed.

"Aren't you going to finish your soup?" the old man asked from inside.

"I'll drink it when I get back."

After the Sword Saint finished speaking, he turned and left, leaving the old man sighing alone in the shop:

"What a pity for all those chopped scallions."

The entire Jinggi area was now in complete chaos. Those who had been routed soldiers a month ago had become routed soldiers again, and those who had been imperial guards before had also become routed soldiers.

In everyone's eyes, there seemed to be Yan people everywhere, and they could see Yan people anywhere. Damn it, how many Yan people had come after all!

Without the support of established units, most people couldn't muster any thought of resistance. They just instinctively began to hide everywhere. Occasionally, a few squad leaders gathered a group of soldiers, but before they could snowball, they were attacked by a team of Yan cavalry. After being scattered, this small group that had been painstakingly assembled dissolved.

The funny thing was, the Yan people were divided into many units, but even the smallest unit hadn't encountered any real resistance. The development of events was far too smooth.

At this moment,

The Great Bell of the Jin Palace was rung.

Sixty years ago, when the imperial palace was still used for court sessions, this bell would ring every morning, representing the beginning of an orderly new day in the land of the Three Jins.

But in recent years, the bell hadn't been rung much except for祭祀 (jì sì, sacrifices) or birthdays.

Now that the Jinggi area was under attack, the ringing of the bell was a signal to gather troops.

Yu Huacheng, wearing a cloak, stood on the palace wall, the Great Bell booming behind him. It could be said that he was the one among the Jin people in this chaos who had the clearest picture of the situation.

First of all, he knew that the Yan people's troops couldn't be that numerous.

But knowing this wasn't of much use, because the troops he could mobilize now would only be fewer.

The personal guards he had brought into the imperial palace, plus the imperial palace guards who had been controlled and were now released and given back their weapons, as well as the soldiers who had come upon hearing the bell, all added up to about two thousand people.

Yu Huacheng knew that there weren't many among these two thousand who had the will to fight.

During the day, he had personally let the Jingnan Marquis go. He thought that since the other party had come, what harm was there in taking a step back and sacrificing his own reputation to give him a boost in prestige?

He simply regarded it as his own sacrifice for the sake of the overall situation.

Who would have thought that the Jingnan Marquis would directly give him a lesson.

And only now did Yu Huacheng understand that war sometimes had to be looked at in terms of the direction of the imperial court, but sometimes, it had nothing to do with the imperial court.

He had too many distracting thoughts, too many worries.

Looking at the Jingnan Marquis again,

A person who could even wipe out his entire family,

This decisiveness and ruthlessness,

He really couldn't catch up, no matter how hard he tried.

He was faced with two choices: one was to lead these people against the tide, block the Yan people, and recall and gather the scattered troops in the Jinggi area, thereby stabilizing the situation;

The other was to take these troops and take the Empress Dowager directly away from here, going east to rely on the Situ family.

But if he really chose the latter, what would be the difference between him and the Jin Emperor?

After all the tossing and turning, if he ended up losing the last bit of foundation of the Yu family, what would be the point of all this tossing and turning?

A white light rose from the western night sky.

Yu Huacheng took a deep breath. He recognized that white light. It was his elder brother's sword intent.

His elder brother had already made his choice.

Yu Huacheng silently descended the palace wall, mounted his warhorse, drew his saber, pointed the blade westward,

And shouted:

"For the homeland!"

………

In a chaotic situation, many coincidences were bound to occur, but most coincidences, in hindsight, could often be deduced as a kind of inevitability.

Yu Huacheng led two thousand soldiers against the tide, intending to prop up a piece of the sky again in the Jinggi area, and just happened to miss Zheng Fan's three hundred men who were rushing over.

Yes, they missed each other, by just a hair, just a little bit.

Even Yu Huacheng and his Jin army had noticed that a small-scale Yan cavalry force had "brushed past" them not far away, but they couldn't care about it anymore, because a cavalry force personally led by Liang Cheng, combined with many nearby Yan cavalry teams, began to follow the Jingnan Marquis's instructions, rushing toward this great whale like a group of sharks smelling blood.

This made Zheng Fan's long drive directly in become a truly long drive directly in. If he encountered a few routed soldiers or people who didn't know whether they were routed soldiers or Jin people, he would just run them over.

In the end,

The Jin imperial palace, which had been stripped of almost all its defensive forces,

Was placed in front of Zheng City Defender in this way.

Everything was so wonderfully lucky that it felt a little unreal.

The palace gate was closed, but throughout history, when foreign enemies had killed their way here, even the most magnificent palace city had hardly ever truly stopped the swords of foreign enemies.

Outside the palace gate, Zheng Fan reined in his horse, and the knights behind him also slowed down.

Zheng Fan was observing where it would be suitable to climb the city wall and attack, because there didn't seem to be any guards on the city wall.

Just then,

The palace gate was pushed open from the inside,

A group of eunuchs opened the palace gate and ran out, kneeling down in front of Zheng Fan's horse hooves, begging loudly to show their merits.

Zheng Fan remembered that in later generations, people would often count those eunuchs in history who had bloodiness and ability. The fundamental reason for doing this kind of statistics was that most of the people without *luan zi* were really without *luan zi*.

Zheng Fan whipped the few eunuchs kneeling in front of him over with a horsewhip, then waved his hand, and the Jingnan Army's iron cavalry closely followed behind him, directly entering the palace!

The moment the hooves of his warhorse stepped over the palace gate,

Zheng Fan suddenly felt like he was a creator of history.

He believed that

If later generations were to compile the "History of Jin," the last section would definitely have a record of him.

For example, he (Zheng City Defender, Marquis Zheng, Prince Zheng, Demon King) led his army into the Jin imperial palace, marking the formal demise of the Jin state.

A sense of pride, a feeling of pointing out the situation from the top of a mountain, arose spontaneously.

At the same time,

Zheng Fan even felt with some surprise that,

Seemingly affected by the excitement of his inner emotions,

His eighth-rank realm, which had been stuck,

Had actually shown signs of loosening at this time!

This actually,

Could also work?

………

The Sword Saint held his sword, walking between Jinggi, he could sense Tian Wujing's position, because every once in a while, that *pixiu* would let out a roar, as if it were extremely bored.

This was intentional. The Yan South Marquis was waiting for him.

The old man at the Tangbing (a type of soup) shop said, why bother with all this?

What if the emperor didn't act like an emperor and the Jin state didn't act like the Jin state?

At least in the Jinggi area of the Jin state, there hadn't been any military chaos for hundreds of years.

Life was actually still decent.

Why bother so much? What would it all lead to in the end?

Sword Saint felt that it was difficult for him to answer the old man's questioning. It was he who had forced his younger brother to betray the Jin Emperor and drive the Jin Emperor off the dragon throne.

Since he had done this, he couldn't just kill and not bury. Otherwise, this matter would be done improperly.

To take ten thousand steps back,

The last piece of reserved land of the Yu family was about to be lost.

The Sword Saint didn't really like this feeling. He didn't like being forced to do anything. He liked freedom, but now, what was forcing him was himself.

Along the way, he had killed three Yan cavalrymen, and before the Yan people could encircle him, he had jumped out ahead of them and arrived in the western suburbs of Jinggi.

There,

A man wearing golden armor was leaning against the *pixiu*, as if he had been waiting for him for too long and had fallen asleep.

The *pixiu* bared its teeth at him when it noticed him approaching, but it didn't dare to roar as it had done before.

Tian Wujing woke up. He opened his eyes and slowly sat up straight.

"I still remember the Marquis saying in person during the day that he looked down on the so-called Jianghu (martial world), but he didn't expect that by night, he would take the initiative to become a member of Jianghu."

The Jingnan Marquis slowly stood up,

Looking at the Sword Saint in front of him,

He said:

"Do you know why this Marquis doesn't like Jianghu?"

The Sword Saint drew his sword and began to gather momentum, while saying:

"I'm willing to listen."

"Those who always boast that they are in the Jianghu like to be involuntarily."

"Interesting."

The Sword Saint began to step toward the Jingnan Marquis.

Tian Wujing stood in place, not moving, and continued:

"You say you've practiced swordsmanship your whole life, so just practice swordsmanship, why bother with these things? Do you really think that because you're good at swordsmanship, you're good at everything?"

"I also feel like I seem to have done something wrong. I don't seem to be good at these things."

Sword Saint directly admitted it, and at the same time, continued:

"So, I'm now trying to change things into a way that I'm good at solving."

The next moment,

The long sword was like a rainbow, a white light soared up, and it seemed that even this dark night had been split open by the sword energy at this time.

A black barrier appeared around Tian Wujing. A loud noise came, and the barrier and the sword energy dissipated together.

The Sword Saint stepped forward again, his momentum rising again, and at the same time, he said:

"Tian Wujing, there's something I've always wanted to ask you."

Every confrontation between the two was a real head-on collision. The world's top-ranked sharp sword and the martial artist's physique, which was touted as the most powerful in many cultivation paths, were conducting a contest between spear and shield.

"Ask."

"Do you, Tian Wujing, ever regret it?"

Regret what?

Of course, he regretted that night at Tianzhai.

"I do."

Tian Wujing replied.

"Have you ever thought about how you will face your relatives in the underworld in the future?"

Tian Wujing nodded slightly,

His expression was still calm,

And he said:

"Then I'll have to trouble the Jin Sword Saint to help this Marquis go down and ask first!"