The True Oriole

Meng Guo was even more shocked, his normally beady eyes going wide.

Not only had his sword been blocked, his opponent didn't even use a weapon!

Now, Meng Guo wasn't just someone who used a sword; he was a sword cultivator, who prided themselves on their offensive ability.

It was said that those who walked far enough along the way of the Sword Dao could cut the very fabric of space, itself.

And yet this Qi Gathering whelp had blocked the sword of a Golden Core sword cultivator with his bare arms?

"Haha, sorry, but I'm a bit tougher than I look," Ryker said in response to Meng Guo's shocked expression, as he dealt him a swift front kick straight to his gut.

Meng Guo flew back from the force of the kick, managing to stay on his feet, but clutching at his stomach from the pain.

'How is this brat so powerful?!' he thought with a bit of panic, coughing up some blood. The spot where he was kicked was still stinging, but it was a sharp pain, like his flesh was being corroded.

He also noticed his qi circulation around that area was being hindered, somehow. Was it not just a regular kick?

"More where that came from!"

Ryker leapt forward and threw a punch at him, which Meng Guo had no choice but to block, fist clashing against sword with another spray of sparks.

His legs were too weak to move from that kick to his gut, and he was having trouble circulating his qi to try and recover. He gritted his teeth, willing his arms to hold out.

Not giving him time to rest, Ryker lashed out with a series of punches and kicks, Meng Guo struggling to defend himself.

The pain in his stomach was getting worse, and he couldn't help but let a few strikes get through his defenses.

And with each blow, he could feel himself getting more sluggish, the pain coursing through his body almost unbearable, now. His qi was also flowing slower and slower as more of that strange energy invaded his body.

[I'm pretty sure of it now,] Mini C said as Ryker beat Meng Guo to a pulp.

[The more qi a person has, the more mana will interfere with it. I suppose it makes sense, since qi seems to just be mana refined within the body.]

{Hm, is that why Ryker does that mana thing when he fights?} Bestie wondered.

[Mana can also strengthen the body, but the way Ryker uses it is to cause a pain reaction when infused directly into the opponent's flesh,] Mini C explained.

[But I've noticed an even more adverse reaction than usual from lifeforms, here. The effect is even more pronounced with this Golden Core expert, and I can see his qi manipulation speed slowing down significantly.]

At this point, Meng Guo was a wheezing mess, almost unable to use his qi, at all.

He had settled for pushing his qi to the limit and trying to protect his whole body with it, but eventually, he collapsed from both the strain and the pain.

"...Yeah, guess I'd feel bad about kicking an old man, when he's down," Ryker said, finally stopping his barrage.

Cheng Hui just walked up to them, stunned at the sight of a Golden Core expert laying miserably on the floor, in front of him.

"Sir Ryker, you really are..."

"What? Amazing? Stupendous?" Ryker asked, flexing his biceps jokingly.

"Crazy," Cheng Hui finished, a wide grin on his face. This was a mid stage Golden Core expert they were talking about!

And just like that, he was beaten down, oppressively.

"Haha. That, too, I guess."

Ryker just let out a cheerful laugh, rubbing his bleeding knuckles.

"Ah, are you injured?" Cheng Hui asked, noticing the bleeding. He took some bandages with healing poultice soaked into them from out of his storage space, taking Ryker's hands and wrapping them.

"Yeah, his sword was pretty sharp," Ryker said, "If he didn't let me get that hit on him in the beginning, I probably would have lost to him in speed."

He was also surprised by how fast Meng Guo had been in his initial attack, just barely being able to get his block up in time. If he hadn't let his guard down and allowed Ryker to nail him with a kick, the fight might have ended much differently.

"But still, to be able to take down a Golden Core expert is an amazing feat," Cheng Hui praised.

"Your strength would put you up there with some of the more high ranking elders of a sect or powerful family."

"What's a sect?" Ryker asked, unfamiliar with the word.

"Ah, right."

Captain Cheng smiled ruefully, still unsure how genuine Ryker's ignorance was. Surely this was too much to be playing stupid, right?

"A sect is usually founded by a strong cultivator, who takes in other cultivators as disciples. As time goes one and the disciples take in more disciples, and so on, it eventually grows to become a sect."

"We don't really have any strong sects around the Zhou Empire," Cheng Hui went on, "Most of the bigger ones are on the other side of the Red Viper Mountains."

"I see..."

Ryker nodded and flexed his hands, feeling the healing poultice instantly starting to heal his cut up knuckles.

"Well, what do we do with this guy?"

He turned to look at the old man laying curled up on the ground, groaning pathetically as he clutched at his abdomen.

"Just finish him off, looks like he's just some wandering cultivator acting as a dog for hire," Cheng Hui said, a cold look in his eyes.

"He shouldn't have any backing that will care for his passing."

"Wait!" Meng Guo cried out, struggling to crawl away from them and holding a hand out, pleadingly.

"P-please, I have treasures... I can give them to you..."

"Hmph, we can just get them off your corpse!" Cheng Hui spat in response, "You really think we'd let you off after you tried to kill us?"

"Please... I'll give you anything..."

"Hmm..."

Ryker rubbed his chin thoughtfully, before walking up to the old man and crouching down, in front of him. Meng Guo shook violently, fear creeping into his eyes.

He'd never been so helpless before in his life! The mana invading his body was almost fully preventing him from using his qi; it was like he was back to being a mortal.

The moments passed in tense silence, the two staring each other down, one in fear, the other inscrutably. Finally however, Ryker just gave him a gentle smile, opening his mouth to speak.

"Well, you know, no harm, no foul, right? What's your name?"

"M... Meng Guo," the old man replied, confused with how things were turning out. Was he actually going to let him off?

"Cool, my name's Ryker. Ryker Hartavia."

Ryker helped him up to his feet, holding him steady. Meng Guo looked at Ryker in even more shock than when he had blocked his sword. This wasn't some sort of sick joke, was it?

"Well, Meng Guo, I'm a proponent of being kind to the elderly, so I'll let you off this one time," Ryker said, nodding sagely.

"But if we catch you trying anything funny, again, I won't let you off so easy, you hear?"

"Y... Yes! Yes!"

Meng Guo nodded his head vigorously, turning to hurriedly limp away before Ryker changed his mind.

Just because he was at the end of his life, that didn't mean he wanted to die, right now!

Cheng Hui walked up to Ryker and watched as Meng Guo hurried off, a pensive expression on his face.

"Are you sure this was wise, Sir Ryker?" he asked, "I'm not sure how these things worked out, back where you're from, but in the cultivation world, letting an enemy live is usually just increasing the amount of people who want to kill you."

"Eh, well, you said it yourself that he had no backing, right?" Ryker answered, smiling and shrugging his shoulders, "And if he tries to take revenge by himself, we'll just let him have it, again,"

"...We could have at least taken some of his stuff," Cheng Hui grumbled, thinking again to himself how strange Ryker was compared to most others he knew.

Ryker just lifted his arm to check his holoscreen, smile growing wider when he saw the notification he was expecting. Of course, he couldn't have been sure of Meng Guo's reaction, but it seems like it was worth the try.

| Relationship with Meng Guo became: Acquaintance |

| Received: Life-Severing Sword Arts x 1 |

| Relationship with Meng Guo became: Favorable |

| Received: Manual on Sword Intent x 1 |

| Meng Guo is very grateful towards you for sparing his life! |

| Received: Protection Talisman (Golden Core realm) x 1 |

"Well, hey, we've got a saying back home," he continued, turning to Cheng Hui with a cheeky grin.

"A good deed is its own reward!"

--

Meng Guo hurried out on the forest path, looking back over his shoulder every now and then as he scrambled like a wild animal.

Eventually, he couldn't go any further, and he leaned his back on a tree, slowly falling to the ground. He had to deal with whatever was preventing him from using his qi, or he might not even make it out of this forest, alive.

The first thought he had as he fell into meditation was how thankful he was to be alive. As a cultivator, he'd encountered many life-and-death situations in the past, of course, but this was the first time there was so little he could do to change the outcome.

Ryker had his life in his hands, and had generously let him go. Meng Guo shook his head, thinking of how rarely such a thing happened.

He was... grateful, he supposed. Perhaps if it were in his younger years, he would feel humiliated, and might possibly seek revenge, but right now, he was just glad to be alive.

The solution to his lifespan problems would just have to be found elsewhere.

The forest mist billowed around him as he slowly exhaled. Now that he was calm and could feel out what was happening inside his body, Meng Guo was able to gradually expel the mana that was causing havoc with his qi flow.

As he felt out this foreign energy, he noticed it was actually a very similar energy to qi... no, it was more akin to spiritual energy, before it was taken in and refined into qi in the process of cultivation.

But to directly manipulate the spiritual energy surrounding them and even forcefully inject it into your opponent... What kind of technique even was that? And why was it so effective?

Before he could go further down this train of thought, however, he noticed a presence walking out from behind him. Or, rather, the presence allowed him to notice.

He hurriedly got to his feet, turning to face the newcomer, but almost fell back on his butt when he saw their face.

"R-Ryker!" he shouted in fear. But it only took a moment for him to notice that this was actually someone different.

"No, wait, you're..."

Luo Shuchang smiled mysteriously, the mist slowly parting as he casually strode up to the old man.

"Hello. Shall we talk?"