Chapter 110 — Assassination

Sun Tu listened and translated: "He says: 'Our chief was killed while meeting with your people, and you say you cannot find the killer—it was plainly... plainly you who did it. We fish-men may not be a match for the likes of you, but we will fight to the death to avenge our chief!'"

Shangguan Lüe's brows drew tight, and a shadow of worry crossed his eyes. He was among the foremost figures of the Burning Cloud Valley, his cultivation unfathomable. A hundred years ago, in a secret fierce battle with the southern frontier savages, Shangguan Lüe had displayed his awesome might and overawed the savage tribes, and from that time his name had spread far among the sixty-three alien tribes of the southern barbarians. It was for this reason that Yun Yifeng, Valley Master of the Burning Cloud Valley, had called him forth now, after so long away from worldly affairs.

Moreover, Shangguan Lüe had long dwelled in the southern frontier, and his understanding of these savages of the Ten Thousand Savage Mountains far surpassed any other's. Of this fish-men tribe alone he knew that they were cruel and ferocious, and that the death of their chief was to them an unprecedented humiliation—truly, they might well throw away the lives of the whole tribe without a thought.

If it were only this one alien tribe, Shangguan Lüe would not have taken it to heart. But the southern savages, though they fought among themselves on the surface, were tangled in complex relations beneath; and moreover, in these hundred years a peerless figure had arisen among them, one of no small consequence. Should that person be alarmed, the century-long great design of the Burning Cloud Valley might well be ruined in a single day.

As these thoughts raced through his mind, Li Xun, seeing Shangguan Lüe bowed in thought, said softly to Sun Tu, "When I left, had I not already brought the situation under control? The two sides were at a standoff, and the fish-men had no mind to fight—they wanted our Valley Master to come out and speak. How did it come to fighting again?"

Sun Tu's face twisted bitterly, and he gave a bitter laugh. "We were wondering the same! Things were fine—tense, yes, but neither side meant to keep fighting. Then suddenly a miserable scream came from the fish-men, and a fish-man at the edge had somehow been killed. At that, the fish-men's eyes went red all at once, and they charged like madmen..."

Hearing this, Shangguan Lüe suddenly said in a deep voice, "Was it one of ours?"

Sun Tu was struck dumb for a moment. Beside him, Lü Shun said coldly, "It was chaos at the time. Who knows?"

Shangguan Lüe's face went cold. Suddenly raising his voice, he called to the Burning Cloud Valley disciples, "During the standoff just now, did any of you strike and kill a fish-man?"

A silence fell over the Burning Cloud Valley folk. The disciples looked at one another, and for a long while not one came forward to admit it.

In the distance, a commotion ran through the fish-men; plainly they were furious.

Shangguan Lüe's brows were locked. Suddenly he said to the fish-man standing at the front, "I will go and look at that man's corpse."

With that, not waiting for the fish-man's answer, he walked straight over.

The fish-man's face shifted, but seeing Shangguan Lüe's expression, he finally turned and led him to a corner beside the crowd. He looked about to make certain, then pointed at a fish-man's corpse and said a few words, "Ji ji."

By now Lü Shun, Li Xun, Sun Tu, and the others had followed behind Shangguan Lüe. Sun Tu said in a low voice, "This is the fish-man who died."

Shangguan Lüe stood beside the corpse and looked closely. His face gradually darkened, and after a moment he murmured to himself in a low voice, "Formidable, formidable."

Li Xun, standing behind him, also looked at the corpse and could not help frowning. The fish-man's body still gripped a great saber in its hand, but the head was gone from its neck; not far away lay a fish-man's head, which must be his.

The fish-man had been cleanly beheaded with a single stroke.

Li Xun's gaze fell unbidden upon the neck, where the wound was exceedingly smooth—plainly a single fatal blow from a blade of extreme sharpness.

"Oh!" Suddenly Lü Shun beside him gave a low cry, stepped forward, crouched down, and examined the fish-man's corpse closely.

Shangguan Lüe frowned. "What is it?"

Lü Shun stared for a long while, then slowly rose to his feet. His face had turned very grim indeed, and he said in a heavy voice, "This wound is exactly the same as the one the killer left when he sniped the fish-man chieftain. The cut is smooth, the muscle not twisted in the slightest, yet deep within the blood vessels there is, for some inexplicable reason, a faint tinge of purple."

The crowd was greatly alarmed and hurried to look closely, and sure enough, it was as Lü Shun had said.

Shangguan Lue was shaken to the core. He whipped his head around, a fierce light blazing in his eyes, and said, "The killer is right here!"

Shangguan Lue's gaze was like a blade, supremely sharp; this ordinarily plain old man now seemed suddenly to radiate an irresistible edge from his whole body. Slowly he looked at every person around him, and not one dared meet his eyes.

A sudden silence fell over the gathering, broken only by the night wind blowing from some unknown place, rustling through the tips of the branches.