Chapter 245: Everyone Just Go Die

The landlady gracefully swayed her hips, spit out a mouthful of sunflower seed shells, and said nonchalantly, "Sui Song used to be a renowned lone wanderer in the martial arts world. Later, he got into trouble in Gusei Prefecture and was hunted down by young masters like Murong Jiangshen. Tao Qianzhi happened to save him, turning a wild dog into a house pet. I wonder if his fighting skills are worse now than they were back then."

This auntie was a restless chatterbox. Holding a sunflower seed between two fingers to her lips, she looked down and saw Sui Song blocking the doorway with his guards. She paused, then mumbled, "Has this old man lost his mind? Why would he just charge out with his men to face them head-on? Doesn't he know there's a mysterious white-robed swordsman upstairs? What if he's in league with Murong Jiangshen? Wouldn't that mother and child fall into grave danger?"

Xu Fengnian didn't respond, letting the landlady talk to herself. Of Beiman's eight prefectures, four administrative divisions, and two capitals, Xu Fengnian planned to tour the outer eight prefectures consecutively, avoiding the heavily guarded imperial regions. He would generally enter through Dragonwaist Prefecture and exit through Gusei Prefecture. During this journey, he would behead as many as he could, targeting five or six more Beiman military commanders similar to Tao Qianzhi. Although their current statuses were not prominent, they would all, without exception, become military pillars of Beiman in the next twenty years. Xu Fengnian hadn't originally intended to pay attention to royal descendants like Murong Zhangtai and Murong Jiangshen, but he was indeed quite surprised in this small Duck Head Tavern. Due to the Empress's usurpation, Beiman now had two imperial surnames: Yelu and Murong. The Yelu clan had lost its glory, now living under the shadow of others and trembling beneath the Emperor's skirt. The Murong clan, having gained power, were mostly arrogant and domineering, with terrible reputations. Xu Fengnian had initially judged them based on the ducal and marquis families of the Liyang Dynasty, which was clearly a huge mistake. If even one Murong Jiangshen possessed such martial prowess and spirit, then Beiman's inherent martial and combative nature was truly ingrained to the bone, capable of completely masking the effeminate air of pampered nobles.

Xu Fengnian frowned slightly, lost in thought. The door was quietly pushed open, and a burly man covered in blood entered, carrying a bronze axe. Seeing the barrel-waisted landlady, the man looked as if he'd seen his own mother. He closed the door, wiped his blood-stained face, then sat down, tore off a piece of lamb, and stuffed it into his mouth. With lingering fear, he mumbled, "Sister Fan, outside is blocked off by those pretty boys from the Murong family. All the horses in the stable have been killed too. You helped me hide from the danger, so I won't ever ask for credit again. That fellow, he wields a fifty or sixty-jin iron spear as if it were a needle. His strength is terrifying! That Lü Liang, the son of a bitch, lied to me, saying those young masters like Murong Jiangshen were good-for-nothings afraid of even seeing chicken blood. Ah, well, Lü Liang's dead anyway. The dead are dead, so I won't curse him anymore."

The landlady turned and gave the man a glare, then asked impatiently, "Where's my man? Drunk to death at that table?"

The man scratched his head and chuckled, "I was in such a hurry, I didn't notice Old Xie. Sister Fan, be careful, your man might be flirting with the girls you've trained. I know those young ladies are completely devoted to Old Xie, practically worshiping him. The way they look at him compared to how they look at us is like heaven and earth."

The landlady put her hands on her hips and said furiously, "Pah! That good-for-nothing can't even satisfy his own wife! What makes him think he can manage affairs elsewhere?"

The man, who had narrowly escaped death, with his thick-skinned and shameless nature, took the bait and immediately said, "Old Xie is quite sickly, eight feet tall but skinny as a monkey. It's questionable if he even weighs a hundred jin. Sister Fan, are you interested in a hundred rounds with me?"

The landlady glanced sideways at him, disdainfully saying, "My man isn't interested in women under two hundred jin, and I'm not interested in men over a hundred jin. That's what you call a perfect match. Why are you so eager to interfere? With your pathetic appearance, take off your pants and let me see. Is that little thing in your crotch even two ounces? If it is, I'll cut it off and have Qin Wuzu stir-fry a meaty dish for you. I'm just afraid you won't be full."

Even the thick-skinned man was immediately defeated, silently tearing at his roasted lamb leg.

The dark-skinned waiter happened to run to the door, finally finding his boss. With a face full of indignation, he said, "Landlady, I wash clothes, cook, feed horses, do odd jobs, and act as a pimp for this inn, working myself to death, and you only give me one guan a month! The boss promised to raise my wages this year, but nothing so far. You're so black-hearted and stingy! When will I ever be able to redeem Yingtao to be my wife? Watch out, I might quit! Without me, Duck Head Tavern will definitely close down. And you, poor kid with the saber, I almost lost my life for your terrible horse! I'm deducting ten taels of silver from your deposit, and it's mine. Landlady, if you try to stop me, I'll really get mad at you!"

The landlady threw a handful of sunflower seeds at him, laughing and scolding, "Big talk!"

Xu Fengnian nodded and said, "No problem, ten taels it is."

The waiter said with a bitter face, "Landlady, it's a bloody mess downstairs! Aren't you going to tell the boss to do something? If the inn is torn down, I'll still be doing all the hard labor. Oh, and that white-robed swordsman who looks like a master also came upstairs. He's probably after that mother and child. I feel quite sorry for them."

The landlady gave a sarcastic "Oh," then squinted and smiled, "Qin Wuzu, you've really come a long way! The scoundrel who used to steal girls' undergarments and poke holes in window paper to peek at them bathing now has a chivalrous heart? Amazing! If you feel sorry for him, go hit that swordsman with a stool! If I stop you, then I'm your biological mother!"

The waiter, his past exposed, his dark face turning crimson, grabbed a stool from the room and rushed out. Not long after, a "thump" sound echoed. The man who was eating roasted lamb stealthily slipped out, then returned with a bewildered look, his mouth twitching as he said, "Damn it, that kid really did knock down the swordsman with a stool! He's lying in the corridor, foaming at the mouth and convulsing. That kid picked up the sword and ran off."

The landlady wasn't surprised. She curled her lips and said, "That brat only knows one trick. My man taught him a move back when he was fed up with being pestered. It's easy to deal with useless softies like you."

The man gave a thumbs-up and flattered, "Duck Head Tavern is indeed a place where hidden dragons and crouching tigers reside."

As they spoke, the waiter Qin Wuzu was dragged into the room by his ear by a tall, thin, sickly man. The dark-skinned young man clutched the precious sword with its white scabbard wrapped in silver thread and stubbornly said, "I won't return it! Kill me, and I still won't return it! What kind of martial artist is that swordsman, to be knocked down by one of my ultimate moves? He deserves to lose his weapon."

The middle-aged man was very tall but weighed less than a hundred jin, appearing frailer than a delicate woman. His expression was wooden, his eyes cloudy, probably still drunk. He just looked at his wife, who glared at Qin Wuzu and said fiercely, "Do you just steal things on our own turf like that? If you're really greedy, why don't you get the hell away from Duck Head Tavern before you act? Who will dare to visit the inn after this? If you don't return that sword, I'll make sure Yingtao doesn't speak a single word to you for half a year. Let's see if that doesn't strangle you, you ungrateful wretch! I'm counting to three. If you're not out of my sight by then, you'll face the consequences. One!"

The charcoal-skinned young man dashed out of the room without hesitation, tossing the sword forcefully. It accurately struck the white-robed young master, who had just slowly regained consciousness, squarely on the forehead, knocking him tragically unconscious again.

The landlady burst into laughter, holding her stomach, then pointed at the young man standing defiantly in the doorway with a resentful look and cursed, "Tsk tsk, still a lovesick fool."

The tall, thin man, who looked taciturn, had gentle eyes and a faint smile. He nodded at Xu Fengnian in greeting. The landlady saw that the situation downstairs had settled; all who were meant to die were dead. Sui Song was holding his own against Murong Jiangshen, but among the ten cavalry, a master was hidden, killing people as easily as picking up weeds. In just a few charges back and forth, he annihilated Tao Qianzhi's former soldiers, all except Sui Song. Without exception, none of them died with their bodies intact; most had their arms torn off alive. Sui Song was held back by Murong Jiangshen, who held a spear from horseback, unable to come to their aid. The old man's eyes were bloodshot as he was surrounded by several cavalry a few zhang away, who bent their bows but did not shoot, toying with him like a monkey, letting him fight like a trapped beast. When Murong Jiangshen retracted his spear, he exposed a flaw. The old man was about to seize the leader to win, when suddenly, blood gushed from his seven orifices. He had been seized from behind by the military master, who held him with both hands. The two formed a strange, intertwined posture, and a horrifying crackling sound of breaking bones was heard. Sui Song, despite his considerable internal energy, had his entire chest cavity crushed and torn apart. Just before he died, the military master behind him slammed his head into Sui Song's occipital bone. With that blow, Sui Song's eyes, already as weak as a wisp of smoke, were knocked out of their sockets, a horrifying scene.

This god-of-slaughter-like Beiman military master turned his head and looked at the window where the landlady stood, about to leap up and rampage through the second-floor room.

Murong Jiangshen, riding his horse and holding his spear, signaled with his eyes to the Zhanrong Guard, who hailed from the Imperial Tent Attendant Bureau, not to act rashly. The Beiman Royal Court, Imperial Palace, and Imperial Tent each had a group of cold-blooded guards at the pinnacle of the dynasty's military power: the Secret Elimination Bureau, the Bell Messengers, and the Zhanrong Guards. All were one-in-ten-thousand cold-blooded butchers in the Beiman army, totaling only four hundred individuals. Murong Jiangshen was merely a peripheral member of the imperial family, far from qualified to have any of these three types of guards as his retainers. This first-class Zhanrong Guard was borrowed from his cousin, Murong Zhangtai. The Zhanrong Guards had been particularly distinguished in battle over the past twenty years; the Beiman Army God, Tuoba Pusa, was himself a former Zhanrong Guard.

Murong Jiangshen didn't mind the room full of people on the second floor looking down at him. He looked up and said with a smile, "Today I have disturbed Duck Head Tavern. Murong Jiangshen is deeply uneasy, and I will compensate for the inn's losses tenfold. May I ask where Shopkeeper Xie is? My cousin Murong Zhangtai and I have admired him for a long time."

The landlady turned to her man and asked, "Old ghost, you only fought a battle with the great devil Luo Yang and lost so miserably, yet how did your reputation become so huge that even the Murong brothers want to recruit you? So, did Sui Song and these people die unjustly because of you?"

The man who had recently flirted with the landlady was dumbfounded, a piece of lamb still hanging from the corner of his mouth, as he stared blankly at the tall, thin, sickly man. "Luo Yang, the number one in the demonic path, was invincible! Countless masters fought him, and only a handful survived, apart from when Tuoba Pusa finally stopped him outside the imperial city gates. I only heard that someone named Xie was among them, immediately becoming the tenth-ranked demonic master, right behind Old Dragon King. Landlady, Shopkeeper Xie, please don't scare me like this! Even if Old Fang is bold, I can't handle such torment!"

The landlady ignored the wild-eyed rough man, looked at her husband with a troubled expression, and asked, "Hey, old ghost, Murong Jiangshen is putting us on the spot. What should we do?"

The taciturn man calmly said, "You speak, I'll act."

The landlady sighed, then looked at Xu Fengnian, who had remained aloof throughout.

Knowing something was amiss, Xu Fengnian gave a wry smile and said, "Landlady, why are you looking at me? Can I really challenge Murong Jiangshen? Even if I wanted to, I'm powerless. I'm just a guest staying here; I paid all my money. You can't force me to be a chivalrous good guy, can you?"

The landlady nodded and said, "That's true."

Guests at Duck Head Tavern only knew Shopkeeper Xie as the perpetually drunk Xie Ling, a sickly man with a tigress for a wife. They didn't know he was the Xie Ling who could fight the demonic path's colossal figure Luo Yang, be gravely wounded, yet survive. This man stared at Xu Fengnian, his voice calm, and slowly said, "He sits like a corpse but appears as a dragon; he is silent as a deep abyss but thunders. Your cultivation is astonishing, Master, appearing frail yet guarding the Jade Gate Pass. Clearly, this is the great Taoist skill of reversing aging. If you weren't a top disciple of the National Preceptor, Qilin Zhenren, I can't imagine who else, at such a young age, could possess such divine abilities. However, Duck Head Tavern has always upheld its rules. If you, Master, are unwilling to act, I, Xie Ling, will have no choice but to force you to act, for the sake of the rules my wife has set. You don't need to be too troubled, Master; just ensure that mother and daughter die outside the inn. If those officials dare to cause trouble inside the inn afterward, I will take care of them all."

The landlady feigned guilt with little sincerity, then smiled and said, "Don't blame him, Master; my man isn't very reasonable. If he hadn't forced himself on me back then, I wouldn't have been willing to live this impoverished life with him. The white-robed swordsman lying in the corridor is most likely Murong Zhangtai. You can use him as a hostage, Master, to buy some time."

Xu Fengnian saw the dark-skinned youth appear like a ghost, slap the disoriented man on the head, killing him instantly, and curse, "I've disliked this Fang fellow for a long time! He never pays for food, always asking for credit! Go ask the King of Hell for credit!"

The landlady laughed, "Stop talking nonsense! You're just holding a grudge because he slept with your Sister Yingtao."

Xu Fengnian, feeling as if he had entered a den of thieves, said bitterly, "Landlady, Shopkeeper, it's not enough that you play good cop, bad cop, but you have to drag the young man into playing the villain to intimidate me? Running a business like this is truly elaborate!"

The landlady laughed, shaking like a flower branch, "If I were twenty years younger, I would definitely pursue you, Master."

The waiter glared and said, "You poor guy with the saber, stop talking nonsense, or I'll smash you dead with a stool! Then you'll lose both your life and your saber."

Xu Fengnian asked, "Let me weigh the pros and cons?"

"Master, you may be skilled, but you're not decisive."

The landlady laughed, "Alright, alright, our inn was in the wrong first anyway. Old ghost, go outside and block for this young master for a bit. Qin Wuzu, stop grandstanding and showing off; you're just a nobody. As for me, I'll go next door and have some private girl talk with that delicate young woman. Master, come with me."

Xu Fengnian followed the landlady to the next room. The mother and child huddled together, squatting in a corner. The young woman was weeping, her face tear-streaked like pear blossoms, her heart as dead as ash. The little girl, not understanding what was happening, only sobbed along with her mother.

The landlady tsk-tsked, "She really is a charming young woman, Master. Isn't she what you men call 'pitiable even to those who see her'? It would be worth fighting Murong Jiangshen and his men for such a beautiful young woman. A true hero values beauty over empire, isn't that right, no matter whose wife she is?"

Xu Fengnian remained silent.

The landlady looked at the terrified young woman, then pointed at Xu Fengnian beside her and smiled, "Don't be afraid, this Master has come to save you. However, the reward is for you to give yourself to him. If not, that's fine too. Anyway, General Tao Qianzhi's beloved son isn't here this time, so if you let me kill this troublesome little girl, your chastity will be preserved. You wouldn't want the Tao family's last lineage to lose both father and mother, would you? How tragic that would be."

The young woman was speechless with shock.

Even the bewildered child sensed the danger of the situation, crying heartbrokenly, calling out "Mama" repeatedly, her grief immense.

The landlady, with her extensive experience, saw a flicker of hesitation in the young woman's eyes. She put her hands on her hips and burst out laughing, then, after her laughter subsided, said grimly, "Even a tiger won't eat its cub, and a daughter is a piece of your own flesh and blood. How could you even consider it? I, for one, can't have children in this life, but I'm driven mad with jealousy by women like you who don't appreciate your blessings. Every time I see a woman with a family, I wish I could chop them up and feed them to the dogs."

The young woman, whose hidden ugliness had been exposed, instantly gained a resolute look in her eyes, without a trace of weakness. A woman, inherently an actress, stood up, pushed her daughter aside, and said to Xu Fengnian, "Please, Master, save me. I am willing to offer myself to you."

"How typical of Beiman, where sons are valued above all, and daughters are as worthless as dogs."

Xu Fengnian helped the little girl up. He didn't look at the young woman, who was indeed worthy of being a general's widow. Instead, he looked at the landlady and calmly asked, "Your man is gravely wounded. Even if he once reached the Zhixuan realm, without the support of a Vajra Body, he's just a showman now. What, does he really think he's invincible?"

The landlady paused, as if she had heard a huge joke. "Master, oh Master, even if it's as you say, and my man has fallen to the bottom of the first-rank realm, a starved camel is still bigger than a horse. It's true he's not invincible, but do you really think you're some mighty dragon crossing the river? I was kindly offering you a woman to warm your bed; don't mistake my kindness for weakness. Young man, if you had a Vajra Body, I'd willingly wash myself clean and offer myself to you. But do you? Without a Vajra Body, in my man's eyes, you're just an ant. I just complimented you a few times, and now you're floating, losing your way. I'll give you one last chance. If you try to save face by acting tough again, if you don't appreciate being given respect, I'll carve you up!"

Xu Fengnian smiled, "Except for this child, you can all die."