Da Tang Shuang Long Zhuan Volume 10 Chapter 4 part1

Book 10 Chapter 4 - Display of Prowess

Xu Ziling leaped onto the beam and hid himself in the little space between the beam and the roof, suppressing the refined qi within his body, while activating his inner breathing, and quietly waiting for what would happen below him.

The noise from the collapsing wall was still continuing. Xu Ziling saw eight people came out of the tunnel in single file.

‘Bang!'

He knew that the building outside was completely gone. But naturally the bandits outside could not find anybody inside, because Shang Xiuxun had moved her troops over here.

The Third Manager Tao Shusheng's voice was heard below, "I wonder what is Liu Zhishi doing? How come he has not arrived to lend us a hand?”

"Shut up!” Shang Xiuxun coldly snapped, "Liu Zhishi and his troops must avoid the enemy's main force to come here according to our plan. This ruse to mislead the enemy is not working. Who told us to miscalculate the enemy's strength? Now we have no room to advance or to retreat.”

"Someone's coming!” Big Sister Fu's voice was heard.

Everybody hastily held their breath and calmed their qi.

Outside, the sound of broken doors and shattered windows was still resounding. Xu Ziling peeked down, and saw the eight people have divided themselves into four groups, with each group looking out from one window on each side of the building.

Shang Xiuxun and Big Sister Fu were standing behind one window, Tao Shusheng occupied one window alone, the other five people appeared to be Shang Xiuxun's personal guards.

Xu Ziling could imagine that Shang Xiuxun's troops must have fallen into an ambush, and this group of people must have fought their way out of the siege while protecting Shang Xiuxun, and reached this small village, which was designed by Lu Miaozi, from which they sent out a signal to Liu Zongdao to lead his troops over here to rescue them. Who would have thought that for some unknown reason, the Four Big Bandits had clear information of their whereabouts and personally pursued them? And now they were trapped in this predicament.

Tao Shusheng suddenly turned his head around to look at the other people. After making sure that everybody's eyes were focused on the outside, his right hand swiftly reached into his pocket and took out something. When he started to move his hand to throw that thing outside, Xu Ziling no longer care about anything, he shouted in low voice, "Stop it!”

The eight people inside the shed were greatly shaken; they all looked up to the beam. Tao Shusheng hastily put that thing back inside his pocket without anybody noticing.

Shang Xiuxun and the others knew very well that there was someone up there, but they did not dare to make any noise.

Xu Ziling stuck out his head and called out softly, "I am absolutely not with the thieves, and I don't have any ill-intention. I am coming down now!”

Shang Xiuxun was indeed a capable Commander-in-Chief. She knew this mysterious person's power was definitely not inferior to hers; even more, his internal energy was incomparably strange, if she had to fight with him, they would only alarm the bandits. Thereupon she waved her people to make some room to show him her good faith.

Xu Ziling slid down along the pillar. But before his feet touched the ground, Tao Shusheng rushed one step forward and stretched out his finger to jab on his chest.

The finger created a loud swishing noise.

Shang Xiuxun wanted to stop him, but it was too late.

Xu Ziling knew that Tao Shusheng was afraid he might expose him as the traitor; letting out a cold laugh, unexpectedly he let Tao Shusheng's fingertips jabbing on his chest, but fast as lightning his right palm shot out.

Tao Shusheng was greatly delighted, thinking that even if you have your true qi protecting your body, it would be hard to resist my fierce finger power. Who would have thought that as soon as his finger touched Xu Ziling's skin and he was about to send out his power, a burst of strange and incomparably hot true qi had already penetrated his own body via his fingertip, straight toward the meridians in his hand? Not only it neutralized and scattered his own true qi, it still had enough power to burst into his channels.

Tao Shusheng's entire body shook; while his soul flew away and scattered, Xu Ziling's right palm changed from slapping to sweeping, it swept his lower abdomen.

Tao Shusheng slumped down immediately, but Xu Ziling quickly grabbed his belt and gently set him down on the ground.

Originally, he thought that at least he would have to use eight to ten moves, but had never expected that there was such a strange powerful qi in the world that he would succeed as soon as he and the enemy met face-to-face.

Including Shang Xiuxun, everybody was dumbstruck. Nobody expected that based on Tao Shusheng's power, he would be this easy to be subdued by the opponent. Fortunately, this man did not seem to bear any evil intention and only sealed Tao Shusheng's acupoint to make him temporarily lose consciousness.

Shang Xiuxun raised her sword and pointed to this majestic looking man, brimming with wild and free charms. "Who the hell are you?” she shouted coldly.

Focusing his power in his ears, Xu Ziling listened carefully for any activity near and far; he knew that the bandits have temporarily moved their troops elsewhere to search, hence he heaved a sigh of relief.

Looking deep into Shang Xiuxun's beautiful eyes, he assumed a heroic, uninhibited manners as he said nonchalantly, "Just now your humble servant blindly spoke out and alarmed everybody. Does Changzhu know the reason?”

Shang Xiuxun coldly sized him up and down several times; she also looked at Tao Shusheng who was lying on his back under his feet. She spoke indifferently, "If friend won't state your identity clearly first, we can forget about having a civil conversation.”

Xu Ziling stepped back to where Tao Shusheng was originally standing. He said, "As soon as Changzhu sends someone to search your respected subordinate's pocket, you will understand what I am talking about!”

Startled, Shang Xiuxun stared at him for a moment. Her pretty eyes shooting sharp gleams, she said in heavy voice, "Is friend saying that he is the traitor?”

Just by hearing this, Xu Ziling knew that she has already had doubt, but she merely did not dare to affirm that he was indeed the traitor! Because this month happened to be the month where it was Tao Shusheng's turn to assume the heavy responsibility of intelligence gathering.

Xu Ziling replied indifferently, "Just now I saw him about to throw something like fireworks or flares out of the window. Huh! Someone's coming!”

The sound of something splitting the air suddenly arose in all directions.

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Open country by the pasture at the mouth of the gorge.

Kou Zhong was hiding on a tree, focusing his attention on Li Tianfan, Shen Luoyan, and the others, a total of fifteen people's activities. Looking at those wearing the Ranch's uniform, he saw one whose body shape, as well as appearance, looked a lot like the old man Shang Zhen. He even dressed like Shang Zhen, so that unless one was very familiar with Shang Zhen and was scrutinizing him at close distance, one would not be able to tell that this old man was a fake. Otherwise it would be very easy to pass off fish eyes for pearls [i.e. fake from the genuine].

This moment the man was lifting up his tobacco pipe and puffing smoke like swallowing clouds and blowing out fog; even Kou Zhong was very impressed.

The other people were dressed as Shang Zhen's personal guards. To Li Xiuning and those outsiders, especially with Yuan'er covering up on the side, it would be strange indeed if they were not deceived.

The most formidable part of this scheme was that Li Xiuning was lured away from the Castle, plus although Li Xiuning had the power, she could not bring a large number of her men to go to a meeting. If the fake Shang Zhen plus Li Tianfan, Shen Luoyan and their numerous martial art masters rose together in rebellion, their chance of success would be quite high.

The one posing as Shang Zhen was actually the one they called ‘Teacher Chen'. In terms of martial art skill, he was second only to Li Tianfan and Shen Luoyan. In addition, there was also a thirty-something man surnamed Bai and a thin man called Ma Fang, who seemed to be the martial art experts within this group. The former had double axes on his back, while the latter had a sword hanging from his waist. The other dozen or so men appeared to be between twenty and twenty-five years old, and all of them had protruding taiyang acupoint [on the temples]. Just by looking at their skill in climbing the mountain and scaling the ridges while they stole into the pasture, it was clear that these people were not ordinary fighters.

Shen Luoyan looked cold and detached; it looked like she lost a bit of weight, but was still very beautiful. She wore a hat to conceal her long hair, and was dressed in a man's clothes, which increased her attractiveness.

From time to time there was the sound of horse neighing breaking the tranquility of the pasture.

Right now all the Ranch people were concentrated on both entrances to the gorge and in the Castle, the pasture was left with only about a dozen guards, which was akin to leaving it unguarded at all. Plus this place was part of sparse forest near the eastern gorge, and it was very late at night with only the hazy moon and dim stars providing illumination. If anything should happen here, nobody would know.

The entire plot was so perfect [orig. seamless heavenly clothes].

The only flaw was Kou Zhong.

Shen Luoyan was still briefing her men on the timing and the method of their operation when Li Xiuning arrived.

Kou Zhong applied more power to his eyes and looked at the direction of the Green Ring Courtyard. He saw seven [sic] figures appeared at the edge of the sparse forest. Li Gang and Dou Wei took the lead, followed by Li Xiuning and Yuan'er in the middle, and Chai Shao and another young martial art master closing the rear; they quickly came near.

Kou Zhong had a thought; he quietly slid down the tree.

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Chapter end