Chapter 61: Before the Drought Bone Abyss, No Borrowing of the Sword Master

After Jiang Che arrived, the morale of the Western Desert disaster relief team soared.

Yet Jiang Che did not take command.

He merely ordered the camp to be set up, the water array established, and the disaster victims protected.

The specific grain routes were the responsibility of the Wan Tong Merchant Association.

The Medical Camp was under Qin Su's charge.

Slaying the Drought Demon fell to the Green Blade Camp and the Sword Pavilion.

Xiao Cheng'an was tasked with comforting the disaster victims and tracking the distribution of the Old Imperial Family's former assets for relief.

Everyone was initially somewhat unaccustomed to this.

In their impression, wherever Jiang Che appeared, he should draw his sword and resolve everything.

But Jiang Che merely stood on the sand dune, watching them work busily.

Xie Tingxue asked, "Can you hold back?"

Jiang Che replied, "Even if I can't, I must hold back."

He saw a Sword Cultivator of the Green Blade Camp get scratched by a Drought Demon.

He saw a female doctor from the Medical Camp faint and then rise again.

He saw Xiao Cheng'an be wrongly cursed by disaster victims as "a Royal Family dog," yet he only bowed his head to apologize before continuing to distribute grain.

Of course, he wanted to draw his sword.

But he knew even better that if he sliced through all the Drought Demons with a single strike, these people would forever stand in his shadow.

On the second day, the Drought Demon King dispatched the Red Sand Envoy.

It was a half-human, half-corpse monster, draped in an Old Dynasty priest's robe, its voice dry and cracked.

"Jiang Che."

"The Drought Demon King has an order."

"If you sever your own Sword Vein, rain can fall upon the Western Desert."

Xiao Cheng'an roared, "Nonsense!"

The Red Sand Envoy looked at him and sneered, "Xiao Clan pup, do you even deserve to speak? If your Xiao Clan had not neglected the seal, how could the Drought Bone Abyss have opened?"

Xiao Cheng'an's face went pale.

Those words struck his pain point.

The Red Sand Envoy continued, "Your so-called atonement is merely self-indulgence. Of those who died in the Western Desert, your Xiao Clan bears a share of the guilt."

Xiao Cheng'an clenched his fists, his whole body trembling.

Jiang Che glanced at him but did not speak for him.

Because some hurdles must be crossed alone.

Xiao Cheng'an raised his head, his voice hoarse:

"Yes."

Everyone was stunned.

Xiao Cheng'an looked at the Red Sand Envoy: "The Xiao Clan is guilty; I do not deny it."

"That is why I have come."

"You using these words to humiliate me is useless."

"What I owe, I will repay."

"Those who must die, you must also die."

The Red Sand Envoy's eyes darkened.

Xiao Cheng'an drew that Short Dagger and pointed it toward the Drought Bone Abyss.

"The people who died of drought in the Western Desert are a debt owed by the Old Dynasty."

"But you used the disaster victims as pawns; the Upper Realm owes lives."

"Today I cannot slay the Drought Demon King."

"But I will record the name of every single deceased."

"Wait until I have mastered the blade, and I will repay it slowly."

Jiang Che smiled.

The Red Sand Envoy, furious, transformed into a Red Wind and lunged.

A streak of snow-white sword light flashed.

Xie Tingxue severed its head with a single strike.

"Too much nonsense."

The Red Sand Envoy's corpse hit the ground, turning into a pool of hot sand.

That night, the Green Blade Camp and the Sword Pavilion formulated a plan to attack the Drought Bone Abyss.

The Drought Demon King was rooted at the bottom of the abyss, surrounded by a hundred li of Red Earth, with all moisture utterly cut off.

If they attacked directly, the army would die of dehydration before even reaching the abyss entrance.

Qin Su proposed using Medicine Mist to protect the body.

Shen Wanjin requisitioned Western Region Crystal Jars to store water.

The Sword Pavilion elders deployed the "Cold Spring Sword Array."

Xiao Cheng'an dug out the old map of the Drought Bone Abyss Seal from the Old Imperial Family archives.

The map recorded that the Drought Bone Abyss had three Sealing Nails.

If the seal were reactivated, it could suppress the Drought Demon King for half an hour.

An hour was enough for the Green Blade Camp to cut their way to the bottom of the abyss.

Jiang Che listened in throughout, offering only two reminders at critical moments.

Someone could not help but ask, "Sword Master, will you truly not strike?"

Jiang Che said, "I will guard the final line."

Everyone understood.

Unless it was a desperate situation, Jiang Che would not draw his sword.

On the third day at dawn, the assault on the abyss began.

The Cold Spring Sword Array led the way, the Medical Camp's Medicine Mist protected their bodies, and the Green Blade Camp split into three routes to sever the Sealing Nails.

Xiao Cheng'an accompanied the central route, carrying the old map for guidance.

He possessed no cultivation, yet he was the only one who could understand the Imperial Clan Seal Text.

The wind and sand were like knives.

The Drought Demons were like a tide.

Many fell.

But the three routes continued to advance.

Jiang Che stood on a distant sand dune, his hand resting on the Green Bamboo Sword, his gaze calm.

He saw his own sword from the Human Realm slowly extending toward the Drought Bone Abyss.

Not fast.

Not perfect.

Even somewhat ragged.

Yet that was not his shadow.

That was their own light.