Chapter 500: Cold Water

It was not three or five bags, nor just ten or eight, but hundreds of them, surrounding them above and below. Seeing Pei Ye suspected they had stuffed the entire intermediate layer of the ship with this uncontrollable, destructive substance.

Suddenly, the world spun. The plane they stood upon—which relied on a flexible carrier to be traversed—lost all support in that instant. The false stability of the flat ground was torn away entirely; no matter how he swung his arms or kicked his legs, he could not touch a solid surface.

Seeing Pei Ye was the first to be flipped and thrown, but his Chi Fire erupted in the nick of time, condensing into two vermilion jade cages that isolated the waves of fire. However, the immense impact could not be absorbed in an instant. Seeing Pei Ye did his best to exhale his Qi toward Zhang Piaoxu, while his eyes and hands were quick to grab an overturned iron vat to shield himself. The next moment, his spine slammed heavily against the iron wall.

Seeing Pei Ye had never expected the Fengshui Dock to rig their own ship with explosives. With over seventy people on board, were they not all their own men?

But this was certainly not aimed directly at him. Such a large-scale, violent explosion was dispersed throughout the entire hull, rather than piled up around him.

To deal with him, they clearly had another plan.

After the most ferocious impact, Seeing Pei Ye managed to steady his body amidst the violent swaying. His hand had already gripped his sword hilt a moment earlier, and he raised his eyes to look ahead.

A sturdy figure stood firmly opposite him, the saber almost as tall as the man himself. He had fallen from above the moment before the explosion; Seeing Pei Ye had not missed the sound of that landing.

The next moment, he realized what he was facing. Heavy, rushing water crowded in through the torn fissures, and the entire secret cabin drifted in chaos. Ahead, that figure had already slowly begun to wield his saber.

As Seeing Pei Ye drew his sword, he turned to look at Zhang Piaoxu, only to see the youth had already climbed with extreme agility to the hole melted into the wall and scrambled out with all his might. He breathed a slight sigh of relief, his gaze sweeping past the fissure to lock onto the man before him.

Without a word, Seeing Pei Ye crouched to lower his center of gravity. The moment his sword left its sheath, he lunged forward.

The blade hooked through the rushing water, trailing several sharp droplets behind it, while Seeing Pei Ye and his sword arrived a step faster, descending upon Chen Renzhong. The cabin swayed, and Seeing Pei Ye moved with his sword. Under the 【Drifting Return Wind】, a cold, clear sword light pointed toward Chen Renzhong's throat, like the chill of a full room condensed into a single beam.

If a saber is wide and heavy, it is difficult to be light and agile. No matter what ultimate realm one attains, this is a fundamental principle of Wu Gong. The youth had turned the swaying of the four directions into his own assistance in an instant; amidst the turmoil, a gap had emerged!

Yet, the next moment, the sword strike seemed to slam into an iron wall. The saber body moved horizontally, sealing the path of the strike. The man's saber technique absolutely exceeded Seeing Pei Ye's expectations. Even more unbelievable was that he remained completely unaffected by the turbulence, like a true mountain.

His steady stance was not achieved through brute force, but by handling weight as if it were light.

"When the Dock Master brought me onto the ship all those years ago, he told me that fighting for one's life on a ship's deck is all about the footwork." As saber and sword met for an instant, two tight-lipped faces drew close. "The Fengshui Dock's 【Solid Rock】 stance—does it still catch the eye of a genius from the Jian Academy?"

Seeing Pei Ye did not say a word. He twisted his wrist, and a strange force adhered to the sword. Since he had first started, the gaps between weapons had always been vast spaces for the youth.

The saber momentum suddenly cracked, but Chen Renzhong had already stepped back to let it pass, sealing the path again. The man stared calmly at the youth before him. Neither of the two exchanges had relied on an explosive burst of Eighth Life Qi. Perhaps he had long ago studied this enemy he was to face, and he did not stint on his respect now.

One advance, one retreat, two exchanges—neither man's expression changed, but Chen Renzhong had already shown that he could handle weight as if it were light in this environment. After Seeing Pei Ye executed a 【Flute Cold】 and turned, a thunderous vibration swept through the entire cabin in that very instant.

It was the broken, water-logged ship continuing to sink. The support frame above the secret cabin finally could not hold on; as it fractured and disintegrated, the heavy hull slammed onto the iron cabin.

It was impossible to describe that impact. Seeing Pei Ye had absolutely no experience in such an environment, and Chen Renzhong's "Solid Rock" stance was also scattered for an instant by this tremor.

But the youth handled this turn of events with stunning brilliance in that instant.

His sword momentum collapsed entirely along with his loss of control over his body, but the next moment he had yielded to that momentum. His sword momentum flowed like water; he stumbled a few steps on the slanted cabin wall and pointed his sword at Chen Renzhong's heavy saber.

And the man simply readjusted back into his Solid Rock stance.

The extreme environment caused the gap in their upper limits to manifest even faster. 【Numbering White Dew】, carrying a final, exhausted attack, slammed into the heavy saber, pressing it down against Chen Renzhong's chest and tearing open his stance.

But Seeing Pei Ye did not seize the opportunity to attack. He knew very well that this was not the moment to cut a throat, and he knew better than anyone his own limitations in this environment. The moment the sword struck the saber body, he had already swept out diagonally, confirming that the saber, which needed to be readjusted, would be too slow to intercept him.

By the time Chen Renzhong dissipated the force of that sword strike, the retreating youth had already swept to the fissure.

Seeing Pei Ye's choice at this moment was precise and calm. He had never expected the ship to sink, and this was certainly not an environment he was familiar with. Every subsequent sudden change could leave one with no time to regret, so he naturally had to escape this place first.

In fact, it was only a matter of a few breaths before the black cat had forced open the surging water pouring in behind him.

Chen Renzhong's dark eyes lifted, and Eighth Life's surging Qi erupted beneath his feet. A gap of one-fold Qi meant a gap of one-fold speed. In the blink of an eye, the man's heavy saber was closing in, but the retreating youth looked at him and held up a finger.

The several water droplets brought along at the start were now being slammed into head-on by Chen Renzhong. The sharpness was so obvious. The 【Sword Washing Water】 that had pierced a throat on a rainy night had returned. Chen Renzhong clearly recognized this move; his pupils shrank violently as he held his saber horizontally, stopping temporarily. These water droplets struck the saber body, emitting a clear sound like gold and iron.

Seeing Pei Ye fell from the fissure into the lake.

The explosive speed suddenly slowed; everything became slow motion, and the sounds vanished abruptly.

At the same time, an inexplicable chill suddenly invaded the youth's heart and lungs.

Seeing Pei Ye's pupils shrank suddenly—the black cat's emerald eyes only had time to meet his for an instant before a massive black shadow swept over it.

This scene was definitely not a dream. In that instant, Seeing Pei Ye must have seen some massive, astonishing scaled python body. It had no supernatural power or pressure, just like some giant creature that grew in this river. However, it only wound for an instant, like some sudden phantom, and even took the black cat away with it.

Not even the water ripples were disturbed.

Seeing Pei Ye called out in his belly at the first opportunity, and after a long silence, a response came: "I cannot return for the time being, Seeing Pei Ye."

And when he looked toward the cabin, Seeing Pei Ye slowly pursed his lips tightly once more. Only now did he understand the true chopping block they had prepared for him.

The ship sinking above his head was like the sky collapsing. Fragments fell slowly toward the bottom of the lake, and he was left alone in the dark, icy water.

The sword in his hand made him feel so uncomfortable and strange for the first time, and his body maintained its posture clumsily in the water. And swimming out from the cabin ahead like a fish was Chen Renzhong, dragging his heavy saber. His indifferent eyes looked over, and faint scales had already emerged on his exposed skin.

A desperate counter-ambush was indeed not just an iron cabin and an Eighth Life saber-wielder. The opponent no longer chose to go head-to-head with this genius swordsman; taking away his sword technique was perhaps a path that would catch him even more off guard.

At this moment, Seeing Pei Ye inexplicably thought of the dried chili peppers Zhang Piaoxu had wanted to give him.

Water was truly cold. ===== CHAPTER 501 =====