Chapter Nine: The Daoist Sage of Jiangcheng Sports Institute

Thus, though the truth was brutal, building several satellite towns near the major cities truly proved effective in distracting the attention of the fiendish spirits. Once the troublemakers who had stirred the crowd were dragged away by the soldiers, the remaining refugees could only gather near the infantry camp, wailing for a time as they watched the transport trucks carry away the corpses. In the end, they silently returned to their tents or lined up for water.

The dead were gone. But the living still had to press on.

As for those bodies being hauled away, the ones that could be identified would be laid out later for their families to claim. Those that were mangled beyond recognition would be cremated together. The soldiers of Yingzhou went to great lengths to recover the bodies, risking even their own safety—not only out of respect for the dead and to offer solace to their kin, but more importantly, out of fear that the fiendish spirits nearby might feed and grow stronger.

It was well-known that these spirits grew larger by devouring humans. Du Huaishan had not only heard Chang Suian mention this, but he’d also read about it in yesterday’s “A Plainspoken History.”

He washed his face, scrubbed his teeth with a boar-bristle brush. As soon as the bell rang, breakfast arrived. Everyone quickly brushed aside their grief and began to gather in line at the soldiers’ relief point.

Breakfast consisted of a bowl of coarse grain porridge and a single potato. Some began to grumble at the thin, watery gruel, unhappy with the fare. But Du Huaishan knew such days wouldn’t last long. Once the military government found somewhere in Fenghou City or another fortified town where the refugees could be settled, this tent camp would likely be shut down.

In a world crawling with fiendish spirits, farming was a perilous task. Most people cowered behind high walls for safety, but how much space was there inside the cities? That was why the food was always high-yield crops like potatoes and sweet potatoes. The military government could not afford to waste grain.

Du Huaishan gulped down the porridge and bit off half the potato, planning to save the rest for Tan Hai. After all, the man had helped borrow a book for him; it wouldn’t do to let his efforts go unrewarded. Potato in hand, he set off to find him.

As he rounded the corner of a tent, he heard Tan Hai’s glib, wheedling laughter.

“Come on, sirs, we’re all from the same village—have some mercy, let me off this once! At least leave me enough porridge to drink!”

“Hmph! Didn’t eat a bite last night, but you look pretty fresh-faced this morning!”

“So, Big Teapot, Brother Hao’s eating your food—that’s a compliment, remember how he took care of you back at Qingyuan House? Now get lost...”

“Brother Hao, the rations at the cavalry camp are a joke. One bowl of porridge, one potato—can’t even fill the cracks in your teeth! Here, take my potato too, Brother Hao!”

So Tan Hai hadn’t eaten last night.

Du Huaishan entered to see a tall, scrawny young man in a blue robe fawning over a stocky, broad-shouldered youth with a crew cut. To be precise, the burly youth couldn’t have been much older than them—seventeen or eighteen at most. Yet he looked hardened, his skin dark, his features sharp, confidence accentuated by the scar at the corner of his mouth.

“Huaishan?” Tan Hai spotted Du Huaishan and quickly fumbled inside his shirt. “I got you that book you wanted—hold on, it was right here...”

As he searched, the scrawny youth’s triangular eyes swept over Du Huaishan with hostility, then fixed on the half potato in his left hand.

Du Huaishan raised an eyebrow.

Perhaps used to getting his way, the scrawny youth caught sight of Du Huaishan’s expression and immediately launched into a string of curses. But before he could finish, a fist shot out like lightning, slamming into his face with astonishing force. The youth’s head snapped back like a roly-poly toy, blood spraying as a loose tooth flew out and clattered to the ground—a molar.

His left cheek was already swelling up, rising like a steamed bun.

A backhand punch.

Du Huaishan had spent four years training in sanda, fought a year of professional matches, thrown thousands of combinations every day—jab, cross, hook, all as natural as breathing, needing no thought. Pure instinct. Had he been fully adapted to this new body, with its muscles strengthened by the fiendish spirit’s power, that punch would have knocked the skinny youth out cold.

“You—” The blue-robed youth clutched his face, stunned for half a second before opening his mouth to curse.

Du Huaishan shot him a cold look. “I’ll show you whose whole family’s dead!”

No fighter ever made it into the ring without a bit of fire in the belly. Though his teacher had always warned them not to go looking for trouble, Du Huaishan had never been one to shy away from it.

That glare, fierce and dark with the demon’s red-black pupils, forced the words back down the scrawny youth’s throat. He stammered, “Brother Hao, his eyes! He’s got a fiendish spirit guardian!”

Beside him, Brother Hao’s sharp, predatory eyes locked onto Du Huaishan like a hawk sizing up its prey.

But the most shocked of all was Tan Hai.

He hadn’t expected Du Huaishan to be so skilled. That punch had landed so fast he hadn’t even seen it, and the monkey-faced youth’s tooth was already flying.

“Kid, you’ve picked the wrong head to mess with—mine!” The burly youth, Xing Zhenhao, spoke in a deep, resonant voice, steady and full of inner strength—a true martial artist, no wonder he bore such confidence and sharpness. “You’ve got a guardian spirit? I’ll give you time to summon it!”

“Enough talk!” With a roar, Du Huaishan rushed forward, hands raised in a double-grip, as savage as a starved tiger smelling blood.

Xing Zhenhao, trained in Eagle Claw wrestling, was no stranger to close combat. As Du Huaishan closed in, he responded instinctively, his large hand seizing Du Huaishan’s arm, ready to lock the joint.

But Du Huaishan reversed the hold, locking Xing Zhenhao’s eagle claw with both hands. With a slick sidestep, he pressed his back against Xing Zhenhao’s inner line, lifted a knee, twisted his hips, and spun.

In a flash, like a willow yanked from the ground, Xing Zhenhao’s feet left the earth. The moment he felt a sense of impending doom, his whole body was already airborne, spun halfway through the air.

At the last instant before hitting the ground, Du Huaishan arched forward, launching himself atop his opponent.

Leveraged force—plus Du Huaishan’s body weight—plus the increased pivot—sent them both crashing nearly two meters away. With a heavy thud, Du Huaishan firmly pinned Xing Zhenhao to the ground, the impact sending dust three inches high from the hard-packed earth.

Traditional Chinese wrestling: close-in throw with a cover step.

Using Xing Zhenhao’s body as a cushion, Du Huaishan bounced up, landing lightly on both feet.

“Brother Hao!” The scrawny youth stared wide-eyed, unable to comprehend that his senior, after three years of martial arts training, could lose.

Du Huaishan dusted himself off and turned to leave.

“Cough, cough...” Xing Zhenhao coughed twice, propping himself up on the ground. “Kid, if you’ve got the guts, tell me your name!”

Du Huaishan spun around, a blood-sated tiger, and roared, “Du Huaishan of Jiangcheng Sports Institute!”