Chapter 22: Cry Out for Justice

Gui thought she was going to die.

At the moment when the man in hemp garments was about to turn around.

A Demon Core trembled incessantly.

It was an instinct she inherited from her Fox Demon bloodline.

Her Spiritual Sense felt that somewhere in the darkness, a force had locked onto her, emanating from some terrifying existence.

Was she about to die? Would it be very painful, what a pity… She had not even held hands with the man yet...

To her surprise, at this moment her little mind did not cling to the things she had desperately wanted to protect, such as her Su family, or even her beloved great grandmother; at what might be the last moment of her life, she recalled a very ordinary event.

It was a sunny afternoon on Qiantang Mountain, back when she was just a little fox who had recently awakened her Enlightenment. She lazily lay on a sunlit bluestone slab, napping as the warm breeze blew, and the book she had found and never left behind was quietly flipping pages beside her. She drowsily woke up, stretched out her tiny paw to hold down the page, hugged the book, turned over, and continued to bask in the warm sunlight.

Her peers in the clan always called her silly for always carrying around a human book and keeping to herself, but only Su Xiaoxiao knew that in the narrow, enclosed little world of Qiantang Mountain, this book was the only splash of vibrant color in her monotonous life, revealing how marvelous the outside world was.

A sudden voice interrupted Gu Xiaoxiao's memories and also broke the tranquility on the deck.

"Stop!"

The man in hemp garments paused, then slowly turned around.

Everyone on deck looked in surprise toward the direction of the voice.

Su Xiaoxiao also foolishly turned her head.

In that grouped crowd, several passengers hurriedly moved aside, fearing being mistaken, and quickly only one person remained, standing there solidly and unmoved.

Is it him? He… isn't he a bad person? Su Xiaoxiao's little brain felt somewhat inadequate.

Zhao Rong didn't bother with the surrounding gazes, nor did he look at the "Su Dahuang" he intended to save. Instead, he took a few more steps forward, looked up at the person in the air, silently recited the Sword technique in his mind while tightly grasping the scholar sword his mother had left him at his waist.

Just as he was about to speak, Liu Sanbian had pressed his shoulder but was brushed off by his lifting hand.

Zhao Rong didn't know what the others on the scene thought, but he felt he needed to stand up.

Whether from his own perspective, or from that of a Confucian scholar now.

Because he wanted to ask one thing, "On what basis?"

The man in hemp garments turned his head back and noticed a Confucian Scholar. His lips twitched slightly; he coldly sized up Zhao Rong, his gaze pausing briefly at Zhao Rong's waist.

"You, do you challenge my authority?"

Only then did Zhao Rong realize that being stared at continuously by a Nascent Soul Realm Sword Cultivator could exert such immense pressure. He felt as though he was breathing sand, not air; each breath was tremendously difficult. Had it not been for the Sword techniques passed down by Gui and the scholar sword at his waist, he might have already suffocated under that man's gaze.

Heh, is this what it feels like to have one's life in another's hand?

The scholar sword within its sheath trembled incessantly.

Are you also not at peace?

Zhao Rong looked up and met eyes with the man in hemp garments, his expression fearless, his eyes burning bright.

"The young one challenges you, daring to ask why would you kill her?"

"Without the approval of the Punishment Mansion, a fox demon from the Su clan left Qiantang Mountain unauthorizedly."

"Boy, ignorant, do you not know what the prohibition by the Punishment Mansion on the Fox Clan of Qiantang Mountain entails? There must be a formal law, may I ask everyone here, is leaving the mountain without authorization really a capital crime?" Zhao Rong took a step back, bowed, and then, his gaze fixed on a group of people in the air.

Zhao Rong was gambling on a previous guess. He saw Su Xiaoxiao's shocked expression when she learned about the Su clan's prohibition, seemingly unaware before, which led him to theorize. If leaving the mountain unauthorized was explicitly a capital offense, the Fox Clan would have surely warned its members and strictly forbidden them from descending the mountain. Therefore, Su Xiaoxiao's ignorance could only mean two things.

One possibility is that the ban has been enforced for so long that it has gradually lost its enforcement, and the Fox Clan no longer cared about it.

The second is that the punishment for leaving the mountain unauthorized is not severe, or at least not severe for ordinary fox demons within the clan—only those with higher levels of cultivation must report to the Punishment Mansion before leaving the mountain, so the lower-level fox demons need not even be aware.

The first possibility was low because Zhao Rong observed that the Demon Race in the Xuanhuang Realm struggled to survive. The expressions of the onlookers, mocking or indifferent, seemed commonplace. Cultivators like the man in hemp, who were hostile toward the Demon Race, were likely not few, so how could the Demon Race neglect the prohibition in such harsh conditions?

That left only the second possibility.

Zhao Rong saw that no one from the Punishment Mansion responded and noticed some furrowed brows among them, which somewhat eased his mind.

"If the ordinance clearly stipulates that a small fox demon leaving the mountain unauthorized should be put to death, then this boy has nothing to say, obstructing law enforcement, willingly accepting to apologize and face your punishment."

The man in hemp narrowed his eyes but did not speak.

The cold-faced woman beside him looked at the composed scholar holding the sword below with surprise. Initially, she thought he was just a sensationalist, stepping forward to no avail. However, she didn't expect him to speak so clearly and directly hit the crucial points, proving to be a daring and insightful scholar.

She knew in her heart that Zhao Rong was right.

The Su clan branch at Qiantang Mountain once took part in a conflict they should not have, but the worst part was backing the wrong side. They were later sent to Qiantang Mountain in the southern part of Wangque as punishment under Emperor Xuan's Law, detained by the Tianya Sword Pavilion's Punishment Mansion. The decree stated that Fox Demons of Tong You Realm and above must not leave the mountain without authorization: a first violation was punished by tail-cutting, and a second by destroying their Nascent Soul.

However, the ordinance gave no detailed regulations for Fox Demons below the Tong You Realm—that is, below Human Clan's Heavenly Will Realm—merely mentioning "Other fox demons also must not leave the mountain" without specifying penalties, perhaps the law's creators cared little for those minor fox demons, or maybe it was... an oversight?

As to the specifics, the cold-faced woman was unsure because it had been too long ago, and she had learned some of these details from old archives at the Punishment Mansion.

What was certain was that the current pear blossom-teary, pitiful little fox demon was indeed not deserving of death, but who cared? The Punishment Mansion always acted severely and often wouldn't explain the crimes committed; after all, unknown punishment was a form of unguessable deterrence. What of wrongful cases? The authority of the Punishment Mansion on the mountain mattered more.

However, she hadn't expected an anomaly this time, someone actually daring to question the legitimacy of the Punishment Mansion's law enforcement?

The cold-faced woman thought this and glanced at the high-ranking official in front of her; what surprised her today was that this usually irritable official had not immediately killed the scholar speaking out but allowed him to continue.

"But, if the official does not heed the law and executes without explanation, then I will be the first to dissent. You can kill me, but I still must say..."

Zhao Rong's voice was clear, and his tone began to be aggressive.

All eyes were on him.

Su Xiaoxiao had already stopped crying, kneeling on the ground, looking up, staring blankly at him. She was slow to understand what he was saying, but she knew someone was fighting for a slim chance of survival for her.

"If today, before me were unbounded Wild Cultivators of the wilderness, I would never reason with them, for the survival of the fittest is their way."

"But today!"

"Before me stands a cultivator of the Punishment Mansion, empowered by the Xuan Emperor's Law, appointed by the great founder of the Human Clan, tasked with upholding justice most faithfully!"

"I dissent, and ask once more, sir, why kill her?"

The entire place fell into utter silence.

Gentlemen harbor vast righteousness, and cannot remain silent in the face of injustice.