Chapter 67 — Crimson Flame

Standing to one side, Su Wan frowned slightly. She had heard every word these youngsters had said; the speakers meant nothing by it, but the listener had taken note. After a moment she quietly glanced at Daoist Cangyan. He stood with his head raised, watching the sky, his face expressionless, but his eyes were bright and shifting, fixed all the while on Tian Buhui's figure. Who knew what he was thinking?

Just then, with the gale howling, flames scattering through the sky and blood-light surging upward, it was plain that the two men's duel had reached its most critical moment. Daoist Cangyan suddenly said coldly, "I never thought the Vampire Fiend would be so bold as to come here and provoke us. Qi Hao!"

Qi Hao stood right beside him. He stepped forward. "Master, what are your orders?"

Daoist Cangyan glanced at the sky. "Your Uncle Tian's victory is certain. That old devil cannot hold out much longer. Take men and set a perimeter—this time we must not let the fiend escape."

Qi Hao acknowledged the order, beckoned, and called Lin Jinghong back as well, then turned to inform the others of the great sects—Fa Cheng, Li Xun, and the rest—and they began their deliberations.

Su Wan walked slowly to Daoist Cangyan's side and said with a smile, "Brother Cangsong, how can you tell that Buhui is sure to win?"

Daoist Cangyan glanced at her, and a faint smile appeared on his usually expressionless face. "Junior Sister Su, are you going to make sport of your worthless senior brother again?"

Su Wan shook her head, laughing. "I wouldn't dare tease you if I had ten times the courage. I am asking in all sincerity!"

Daoist Cangyan smiled. "Junior Sister Su, you have always been clever, your natural gifts far above your worthless senior brother's—why be so modest? The Vampire Fiend's cultivation is indeed high, and with the 'Blood Skull' in his grasp he looks as though blood-light surges to the heavens and he is fierce beyond compare. But I observe that though his momentum is fierce, at the point three parts to the upper right of where his true treasure lies, the blood-red light seems impure—the Blood Skull appears to have a small flaw. In ordinary times this would be nothing; with his cultivation, a little refining at home would set it right. But today, before Brother Tian, it is his greatest weakness."

Here he paused. Deep in his eyes something like a cold gleam flashed, but his voice remained calm. "Look instead at Brother Tian—composed and unhurried, wielding the Crimson Flame immortal sword with the Qingyun arts. He can already manifest the 'True Dragon of Crimson Fire.' Fierce as the Blood Skull's red light is, it retreats at a single touch with the crimson dragon—it is no longer a match. Moreover, Brother Tian's eyes are sharp; every strike aims straight at the point three parts to the upper right of the Blood Skull. The Vampire Fiend looks arrogant, but in truth he is hard-pressed on every side and certain to be defeated. Tell me, Junior Sister Su—am I right?"

Su Wan smiled. "Your eyes are keen, Senior Brother. I only knew after hearing you say it."

Daoist Cangyan smiled faintly, turned away, and gazed up at the sky. Suddenly he lowered his voice, yet kept his tone even and unhurried. "Junior Sister Su."

Su Wan said, "What is it, Brother Cangsong?"

His eyes still fixed on the two men locked in fierce combat in midair, Daoist Cangyan said distinctly and clearly, "Ever since Brother Tian broke through to the 'Shangqing' realm of the Taiji Profound Clarity Way a hundred years ago, it seems his Daoist arts have advanced by leaps and bounds in these years!"

Su Wan's heart gave a jolt, but she betrayed nothing on her face. She smiled. "Brother Cangsong, you flatter him too much. How could Buhui compare with the talents of our sect master and yourself..."

Daoist Cangyan shook his head slowly, a faint smile at the corner of his mouth. "A hundred years ago, when we orthodox cultivators crushed the demon cult in one blow, I and Brother Tian, Brother Zeng of Fenghui Peak, Brother Shang of Chaoyang Peak, and Wan of the elder generation..."

Su Wan suddenly called in a low voice, "Brother Cangsong."

Daoist Cangyan started, as if recalling something, and nodded. "…The several of us pursued a few of the demon cult's devils deep into the wild lands. It was then that Brother Tian had already broken through to the Shangqing realm. Brother Wan… that man said to us, 'Brother Tian may look dull, but within he is clever, and above all his will is firm and unshakable—a rare thing. In the cultivation of the Dao hereafter, his prospects must be boundless.'"

Here he smiled. "Junior Sister Su, you knew that man as well. Surely you would not doubt his words, or his insight?"

Su Wan smiled faintly and said nothing, only turned her head and gazed up at the sky.

The Vampire Fiend hung in midair, shrieking again and again, his manner savage in the extreme—but within, he grew more and more alarmed. A hundred years ago he had crossed blades with Tian Buhui. The man's cultivation had been high even then, yet with the Vampire ** he had still been confident of victory.

He had never expected that after a hundred years, in this second encounter, the man's cultivation should have advanced so astonishingly. The fire dragon conjured from the Crimson Flame immortal sword clashed head-on each time with the "Baleful Blood Radiance" he sent forth through the Blood Skull by means of the Vampire **—and not only did it fail to fall behind, it was gradually gaining the upper hand.

And the most galling thing was not even that. When he had fought Zhang Qingyue earlier, seeing the boy was but a young disciple of Qingyun, he had been careless for a moment—and his "Five Ghosts Commanding the Spirits" formation had, for some unfathomable reason, had one of its life-ghosts destroyed by the boy.

In truth, no one could blame the Vampire Fiend for failing to understand. His Blood Skull was a thing of the netherworld's fierce essences; against certain peerless divine weapons of orthodox legend—Lu Xueling's "Tianya Divine Sword," say—there would naturally be some mutual overcoming, and with his cultivation and experience he would of course be doubly cautious.

But Zhang Qingyue's treasure, the Dark Iron Staff, was simply too strange. From top to bottom it had not the least breath of a divine weapon about it. If anything, because its baleful aura was so heavy, it rather resembled the Vampire Fiend's own heretical treasures, and after one look the Vampire Fiend had paid it no mind.

What he had not expected was this: the "Blood-Devouring Pearl" on Zhang Qingyue's Dark Iron Staff could drain the essence and blood of living things, yet it was helpless against the Vampire Fiend's ghostly creatures. But the other half of the staff—"Soul-Reaver"—was, by legend, a peerless evil thing forged through thousands of years of refining the spirits of the underworld and the fierce shades of the dead; it was the very ancestor of all ghostly, baleful things in this world. In the fight just past, driven by Zhang Qingyue's own essence and blood, it had been thrust into the body of the life-ghost and instantly dissolved it utterly—more cleanly than any orthodox divine weapon could have done.

At any other time, the Vampire Fiend would at most have been startled, for Zhang Qingyue's cultivation was after all far below his own; once the Vampire Fiend brought out his true skills, the boy could not stand against him. But when he faced Tian Buhui, whose cultivation was not only no lower than his own but seemed faintly to surpass it, this small hidden peril came to light.

Both the Five Ghosts Commanding the Spirits formation and the Vampire ** were driven through the Blood Skull. With one life-ghost suddenly destroyed, the Blood Skull itself had at once suffered a slight flaw—and now that flaw had become the Vampire Fiend's greatest danger.