It was no ordinary punch. The few years of training in the ancient times had seen to that. My fist sank right into the center of the priest’s face and sent him careening backward for several meters before he crashed to the ground, his face confused and perplexed even though I did not know which. Was he rattled by my strength, or was he puzzled at my sudden burst of anger, I did not know which.

Edelweiss came up and stamped a foot on the priest’s chest to force him down on the ground, but to no avail. The Taoist priest let loose a snarl and he somersaulted back up to his feet again, tossing an unsteady Edelweiss to the ground. “Very good,” he commented dryly as he aimed an opened palm at me and he began muttering a string of incantations!

Edelweiss flipped herself to her feet and was about to charge at him but I stopped her, pivoting her around so that I could shield her with my back being to the priest. A thunderclap ensued, followed by a flash of bright light that poured from over my shoulders and a bolt of lightning fired from the opened palm, coming at me from behind. Fortunately, Big Sister had not been idle. With her sword telekinesis magic and her cloning sorcery, several copies of her sword lanced through the air, smiting at the bolt of lightning with all their fury.

“Lightning Palm?!” I gasped vociferously with shock, even though my voice was drowned by the thunderous explosion that resulted when the Qinglan’s Edges met the lightning missile and the shock that arose from it nearly knocked me off my feet.

First the Talisman of the Celestial Master, and now the Lightning Palm… If these two were not enough to convince me that this thickheaded priest belonged to Mount Longhu (literally, the Dragon Tiger Mountain), the storied mountain abode of Zhengyi Dao, I did not know what would. These two sorcery techniques were known to be high magic in the circles of mages and the supernatural and they were the trademark techniques belonging to students of Mount Longhu.

Mount Longhu, the site where the Taoist branch the Way of the Five Pecks of Rice that was founded by Zhang Daoling first came to prominence. The Mount Longhu today was but a mere shadow of its formerly-glorious yesteryears but visages of its greatness when Zhang Daoling reigned supreme still endured even in the slightest with the hereditary titles of Celestial Master, titles given to the heir to the leadership of this Taoist branch. The Way of the Five Pecks of Rice might already be in its twilight, but the line of Celestial Master Zhang still persisted and this stiff-necked priest must be one of his kin, otherwise, he would never have been able to use these two high magic techniques!

Back to the present, as my eyes recovered from the fleeting blindness caused by the explosion, I saw the Taoist priest sitting on the ground, heaving with exhaustion. Sweat poured down his brows. Big Sister stormed at him, eager to continue the fight, but I stopped her. “Wait, Big Sister. Wait. You saw it too, the magic he’s been using. He’s one of the priests of Mount Longhu.” She nodded, albeit reluctantly. “Let me deal with him. It’s time I put to test some of the tricks I’ve been working on during my quest of pilgrimage. We’ll see which is stronger, the sword telekinesis magic of our Murong Family or the Taoist magecraft of the Zhengyi Dao!” Big Sister’s eyes sparkled with anticipation and she nodded, smiling.

Grinning, my fingers, in the shape of the Seal of the Sword, flicked and up into the air rose my ordinary sword and it landed snugly into my grasp. The Taoist priest wiped the sweat off his forehead brusquely and scrambled back up, holding his one-meter-long sword while staring at me warily.

I did not attack. At least not yet. “Master Priest,” I called out to him, “I’ve just learned something recently. Absolute evil or pure goodness are mere fantasies, while the concept of right and wrong is only a matter of perspective and angles. You might see it as right and just to attack me only because I am ‘fraternizing with demons’, but we have our reasons and our justifications. Don’t you think that your brashness to judge us is also wrong too?”

The intransigence of the priest reared its head once again as he snorted derisively. “Humph. Say no more. Demons like you only cause destruction and carnage!” I smiled and raised a finger to point at the three peach trees guarding the old house. “Yet have you ever thought to ask them if they had ever harmed anyone before?”

“Deliberately causing panic and inconvenience to others and injuring the building team workers here. These sound like enough trouble to me,” he countered. I smiled again and said, “Be that as it may, why did you not find out their reasons? Why were they stopping the building team from demolishing the house? What are their reasons?” The priest scoffed again, saying, “Demons and monsters are different from the likes of us humans. They do not understand compassion and kindness like us. It is only right that we slay them. Why should we even negotiate with them! You are in league with them. That makes you one of them! Enough talking!” And he lifted his weapon, the tip of his sword aiming dangerously at me.

Wearing a moue of annoyance, I asked loudly, “That magic of yours… You’re from Mount Longhu, are you not?” The priest seemed surprised to see himself recognized, but he swiftly retorted, saying, “What’s that to you!?” I tilted my head and said flatly, “I just need a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ from you, Master Priest.” “So what if it’s a ‘yes’?” the old priest said honestly.

I sighed. With a bowing gesture at the sky, I shouted loudly, “I hereby convey my apologies, Celestial Master Zhang. I mean no disrespect to you and your kin!” I panned my gaze back unto the Taoist priest and aimed my sword at him. All the training during my quest of pilgrimage had allowed me to fully control the use of my mana and inner strength with the greatest efficiency. Even without my Shiyan Blade, I could still become one with my present weapon freely in addition to using a plethora of magecraft techniques that I had never tried before in actual combat.

“So be it then, Master Priest,” I said with a thin smile, “Let the duel begin.” My sword erupted with flames licking down its blade with the Fire Charm and I slowly released my grasp, allowing it to fly away and it circled over my head like a bird. The true becoming one with my sword, I mused. Finally, I can control my sword only with my mind without any incantation or hand seals!

The flying sword shimmered and separated into two identical siblings, then from the pair came four and four turned into eight. Eight flying swords, each blazing proudly with flames, hung over my head. I lifted my hand and snapped my fingers gently. At my signal, all eight of my swords dove at the Taoist priest. The silvery blades of steel glinting with cold deadliness in the sun sliced through the air, raining down on him in unison. From his view, it seemed as if the swords each had consciousness of their own, each coming at him at its own pace and speed, portending the impending doom that now awaited him.

His hands dug quickly into his sleeves before he flung out his arm again, conjuring the Talisman of the Celestial Master once more. Giant red runic scripts once again appeared in thin air like before, with the same wall of bright golden rays which blinding radiance engulfed everyone nearby and stopped the flight of my flying swords, all of them deflected off-course as if they had hit stone.

I waved my hand and summoned all eight of my flying swords back to me. With the brief respite, the Taoist priest realized his chance to wrestle for the upper hand; he lifted high his hand and bright sparks crackled in his opened palm. Casually, I yelled with a smile, “The Talisman of the Celestial Master! No surprise there, I know how to use it too!” My finger drew in the air quickly some runic scripts and a set of runes no larger than a hand materialized in the space between us, ablaze defiantly with conflagration. An impromptu Talisman of the Celestial Master!

The Talisman of the Celestial Master of Mount Longhu. It was one of the signature magecraft techniques invented by the first Celestial Master Zhang Daoling. A magical technique that could tame evil and destroy anything foul. It was also one of the earliest spells I learned as a child and I had been trained to use it without the prerequisite runic seal on a talismanic strip. I could conjure it freely just as long as I had enough mana. Father told me that his teacher was a maven in employing magical charms and seals and the Talisman of the Celestial Master technique was but child’s play to anyone under his tutelage and Father’s too as well.

The priest could hardly believe his eyes when he realized what I was doing. The sparks in his palm ebbed briefly before he cast out his arm, throwing forth a long bolt of lethal electricity from his hand. I gave the mirage-like runes hanging in mid-air a little push and the same golden inundation of light poured and swallowed everything in its path even in the brightness of the sunlight as the runic scripts glided to meet the lightning bolt. The runic scripts held the bolt of deadly energy at bay, both caught up in a short-lived standoff before the lightning bolt dissipated into nothing. My rendition of the Talisman of the Celestial Master had triumphed.

The radiance from the Talisman abated finally and the priest crumbled to the ground, his face pale as cream. Using the Lightning Palm technique twice had utterly exhausted his mana. His conjuration of the Talisman just now must have been one which was stored using a talismanic strip by somebody else; with his power, his own rendition was supposed to be stronger than that.

Yet, despite his fatigue, the Taoist priest showed no signs of surrendering. He raised his sword defiantly and stomped towards me. With a lazy flick of my wrist, one of my flying swords heeded my call and landed snugly in my grasp, allowing me to carelessly deflect his last-ditch attempt to defeat me. That made the priest staggered unsteadily backward and nearly fell. I could feel how feeble he was now and how hurried and impatient was his stroke. He was at his limits. “That’s enough, Master Priest,” I warned and said, “You are no match for me. You’ve lost this duel and would have been dead if I really wanted you to.” But the priest, in his bullheaded and misguided zeal, charged again, screaming, “I’ll stay no blade for any demons and their kind! Evil and Good are like oil and water, either you die or I!”

I sighed wearily. With another lazy blow, I slapped the sword out of his hand and directed the rest of the seven flying swords to surround him in a ring of steel. “Everything changes, Master Priest,” I urged and said, “The Way is the Way, yet is also not the Way, as it is thus said in the very first verse of the Daodejing. Everything that can be named, is never eternal or everlasting.” The priest might be a student in the teachings of Taoism, but clearly, he had yet fully understood and embodied one of the earliest lessons in his tutelage.

Instead of heeding my advice, the priest snuck his hand into his sleeve again. I shook my head, feeling sorry for the fatal stroke I was about to unleash, when a boyish voice rang from the midst of the crowd, “Please, Master Shiyan. Wait.”