Gen and Lorel descended into the mountain range. The earth here had a distinct, milky hue, streaked with veins of pale stone. A large, ragged entrance yawned in the mountainside—the mine. A crude rail system led from it, where lines of weary people, including the elderly and children, pulled heavy carts laden with raw Milky Stone. A handful of cultivators lounged on makeshift benches nearby, drinking and talking loudly, their eyes occasionally sweeping over the laborers with indifferent authority.
Gen's face darkened. "How can they be so cruel?" he muttered, his fists clenching at his sides.
Lorel's gaze was icy. "They will regret coming to Chu."
They landed with effortless grace in a clearing before the mine entrance, their arrival alone enough to ripple the air. The lounging cultivators jolted to their feet, hands going to weapons. A vague, instinctive apprehension filled them as they looked at the pair. The young couple was extremely young, but their demeanor—calm, clean, radiating an unshakable poise—and their startling beauty spoke of a background that demanded caution. Signs of a powerful family or sect?
The leader of the group, a cultivator in worn grey robes, quickly walked forward. He wasn't particularly fit, but his eyes held the sharp, calculating gleam of many battles. "What are you young masters doing in the forgotten place of Chu?" he asked, a false, oily smile on his face. He glanced between them, making an assumption. "It's very beautiful for a… honeymoon mood."
*Honeymoon mood?* Lorel's face blanked for a second, and she couldn't help a fleeting, flustered peek at Gen.
But Gen wasn't interested in words. He wanted to beat the crap out of them. His eyes swept the area, assessing the two dozen cultivators. A smile, cold and without humor, appeared on his face.
Noticing their silence, the leader's face darkened slightly. "If you are here for Milky Stone for a sacred ruin, we could share. Just need to tell us how much you need, and you shall have it." He gestured broadly at the people straining at the carts. "All these people here work for us. Isn't it fantastic?" His expression held a mocking pride. In the faces of the workers, there was only anger and silent resentment. They were not subjects; they were property.
Gen then walked right past the man without looking at him. He approached an elderly woman struggling with a cart's handle and spoke gently. "You don't have to do this anymore. You're all free now."
"Huh?" The cultivators all looked at him, incredulous.
The workers slowed slightly, but fear was stark in their eyes. None dared to move.
It was then that a little boy, looking at Gen with wide eyes, threw down the spike he was carrying. "Can we really leave?" he turned to his mother. "We are free now!"
The cultivators all frowned, their Qi flaring out in a wave of threatening pressure. They still had the numbers.
The leader's smile vanished. "These kids, born with a golden spoon in their mouth, think everything belongs to them. Just because they come from a powerful family… Do you know how many arrogant fools like you we have killed here?" He raised a hand. "The formation is ready, you bastards! Now, kill them!"
The workers screamed, scrambling to the edges of the clearing. The group of twenty cultivators circled Gen and Lorel. A symbol of interlocking rings glowed to life beneath their feet—a crude but functional ensnarement and amplification formation they had pre-prepared for defense.
Gen and Lorel glanced at the symbol with a hint of shared amusement.
"Compared to the formations in the Forgotten Realm, or even the Star Oblivion," Gen said, his voice flat, "this is an insult to the art."
Lorel laughed softly. "Let's teach them a good lesson."
The bulky leader waved a hand. "They speak too much! Shut their mouths! And the lady… leave her for me. I haven't tasted noble bodies in a long time." He licked his lips.
At that, Lorel's face darkened in pure, cold annoyance.
Gen's smile grew. "You really shouldn't have angered her."
Then, their Qi poured out.
The **Supremacy Swords** coalesced from nothing behind Lorel's back, seven points of brilliant pink light fanning out in a lethal, humming array that caused the very air and the ground beneath to quiver. She rose slightly above the ground, looking down at the encircling men with a hint of disdain, as if they were ants to be crushed.
With a single, elegant wave of her hand, the Supremacy Swords fanned out. They moved with a speed that destroyed thought.
In the blink of an eye, seven heads flew into the air. The bodies remained standing for a moment, rooted to the spot, still unaware their lives were already gone. She had killed them before their formation could fully activate.
Gen scratched his head. "You're too slow. Let me show you a real formation."
He tapped his foot on the ground. A massive, intricate symbol—far more complex and profound than the bandits' crude rings—spread out in a perfect circle around him, etching itself into the earth with light. The remaining cultivators frowned, using threads of **Shidow** to leap slightly into the air, their Qi flaring as they summoned energy swords and reinforced their bodies with **Jingdao**. They shot forward, the majority aiming for Lorel, sensing she was the greater threat.
Gen, on the ground, frowned slightly. He clapped his hands.
Just as a sword descended towards Lorel from above, a beam of condensed light and annihilating intent poured out of *nowhere* from the edge of his formation. It pierced deep into the attacking cultivator's forehead. His **Jingdao**-reinforced skull might as well have been paper. He dropped like a stone.
Seeing this, the leader's face finally dropped all pretense. Panic gripped him. *This can't be true! This kid barely knows what it means to be grown up, and they've already surpassed all of us? No…* He had cultivated for over fifty years. How could he lose?
His Qi erupted, a dense golden aura of **Jingdao** flaring around him. Using **Shidow** to propel himself, he shot into the sky—not towards Gen or Lorel, but in a desperate attempt to run away. He would come back for them later. Not now.
Seeing that, Lorel simply stepped onto one of her floating Supremacy Swords and gave chase at lightning speed. Just as the cultivator was about to vanish from her field of vision, she pulled the sword into her hand and made a clean, horizontal swing.
A crescent of pink light severed the sky. Before the man could even scream in regret, his body was torn to shreds, raining down in a dark mist.
The remaining cultivators, seeing their leader obliterated and half their number dead in seconds, gave up. They fell to their knees, pleading.
"Please, young master, spare us! It was him! He forced us! The Revolutionaries' name was sowing havoc… if we used it here, we could scare everyone and become rich! It's not our fault!"
Gen walked to their level, a faint hint of disgust in his eyes. "Since you wanted to embody the name of the Revolutionaries," he said, his voice quiet, "you might as well embody their faith. Don't you think?"
Before they could answer, swords of light—manifestations of pure, boundless negation from his **Swords of Infinity** formation—burst from the ground beneath them. They sliced through the kneeling men one after the other, turning them into sieves of light. Blood sprayed, but strangely, none of it touched Gen's body, all falling to the side as if repelled by an invisible field. He looked serene, standing amidst the falling blood of his enemies. His hair had grown slightly over the months, brushing his shoulders, and a faint shadow of stubble marked his jaw.
Seeing this, Lorel felt no disturbance. After the mistake with Kirin long ago, and the losses since, she had grown considerably. She knew hesitation meant death for those she cared about—something she would never accept anymore. Ever.
She landed softly beside Gen as the last body thudded to the ground. Together, they turned to the shocked, huddled villagers.
The little boy managed to open his eyes after the carnage, looking at Gen and Lorel with awe. "They look like angels," he muttered.
His mother laughed weakly, pulling him close. "No, child. They are simply powerful cultivators."
"I want to be like them," the boy said, his voice firm.
Gen laughed, the sound cutting through the tension. "You can, if you were to train at the right place."
Lorel sighed. "It's a pity this place has no martial school. Otherwise, it would not be in such a predicament with such lowly bandits."
The mother of the boy bowed deeply. All the villagers followed, a wave of gratitude washing over the clearing. "Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts," the elder said. "What can we do to repay this kindness?"
Some of the younger men looked at Gen as if seeing a celestial being. "Young masters like you might need people to help with chores," one ventured, voice trembling with hope. "We are willing to follow you. To see what lies beyond Chu."
Gen was slightly shocked, taking a step back. He understood their intention clearly. It wasn't really about him; it was about escaping Chu by any means necessary. He wasn't tempted, but fell silent.
A silence which caused Lorel to frown. She quickly interjected, her voice firm. "We don't need aides where we are going. It is very dangerous, and we might not be able to protect you there. It is far safer for you to stay in Chu." She looked at Gen, her gaze stating a fact, not asking a question. "Is that right, Gen?"
"Of course, Madam. Of course," Gen laughed, playing along.
The old woman nodded. "If that is so… can we at least offer you some Milky Stone?"
Gen and Lorel accepted, taking a seat on a nearby flat rock while the villagers hurried to prepare a small pouch for them. While waiting, the little boy loitered constantly around them, asking questions about how it felt to fly and what it was like to fight.
An old lady sitting nearby shooed him gently. "Stop disturbing them." She then turned to Gen and Lorel, a wistful look in her eyes. "In the past… a couple of young cultivators like you also came here."
Lorel's face flushed slightly. *Were they really a 'couple' now?* Gen had never openly admitted anything other than their betrothal.
Gen, oblivious to Lorel's internal flutter as usual, stopped playing with the kid and looked at the old woman. "What happened back then?"
The old woman explained. "The man that came was very tall, with black, obsidian-like eyes."
At that description, Gen's skin tickled slightly. He didn't know why, but it felt vaguely familiar, though he couldn't place who exactly.
"His wife at that time was very sick," the woman continued. "He was looking for a way to treat her. He even went as far as to fight those who chased after him… killing someone he called 'uncle.' I don't know the details, but the two young ones must have been through a lot of hardship. Yet they still stayed in Chu for some time, just like you, and helped us quite a few times. But they never asked for anything in return, even after they left."
Listening to the story, Gen fell slightly silent. After what he had seen the Li Family do—conspiring with Juo Si, even getting rid of witnesses like their own blood, Li Chen—he wasn't very surprised by tales of betrayal. The old Gen would have thought betraying one's family was impossible, but the world had shown him otherwise.
Lorel then asked softly, "He must have loved her a lot, to go that far."
The old woman nodded. "Most cultivators I've seen pass by this place are very selfish. They think only about themselves. To see someone so devoted… it even felt like an obsession sometimes. He would tell us that one day, when the new sun set, things would change." She laughed softly, a dry, tired sound. "Alas, I am already old. Other than the four Damocles in the sky, not much has changed."
Gen, Lorel, and the villagers shared a quiet, commiserating laugh.
A few minutes later, the old woman handed them two small pouches of Milky Stone. They hadn't asked for a lot; that would have been extortion. Gen waved at the little boy and the others. "If one day it's possible," he said, his voice carrying a promise, "I will help Chu get its first martial school."
The little boy's smile grew even bigger. "I will be strong like you! Using my leg to beat the bad guys!"
With that, Gen and Lorel rose back into the sky with effortless grace, vanishing once more into the distance. Their destination: the Four Kingdoms.
It was time to see their friends.