Chapter Ninety-Three: The Battle Between Yang Shengtian and Huang Xianlin, Part Two

In war, victory and defeat are common enough! And besides, you were the ones who came looking for trouble with us first! If we had been slain by you, we would have had no complaint. Huang Xianlin said this while dodging the golden halberd Yang Shengtian was striking at him with.

All of my men and soldiers who were slain by you were people I spent years carefully training. I raised them into men so loyal to me, each one utterly obedient to my will! I liked them very much as well! If not for the trap you laid, if you had fought us openly and honorably, they would not have been defeated so miserably. No matter what, I lost more than twenty thousand men, and I cannot bear it! So today, I must kill all of you, and only then can I vent the hatred in my heart! As Yang Shengtian spoke, his tone grew ever more vicious, and in his mind the figures of his dead officers and soldiers kept flashing before him. The more he thought, the angrier he became; the angrier he became, the fiercer his strikes grew.

You did not even issue a challenge before secretly marching your troops, trying to ambush us. We set a trap before your soldiers arrived. What is wrong with that? One side ambushed, the other side laid a trap; it is only fair. In truth, we did not want to see so many of your soldiers die either. But the soldiers you trained were too upright and refused to surrender, so we had no choice but to steel ourselves and kill so many of them. If we had not killed them, they would have killed us! Leaving more than a thousand of them alive to return to you was already more than fair. And it was you who invaded us first! Huang Xianlin explained while blocking Yang Shengtian’s attacks.

At that moment, the old voice in Yang Shengtian’s mind rose again: Yang Shengtian, have you gone mad? You are fighting and talking to the enemy at the same time! Is he your friend or your relative? On the battlefield there are no fathers and sons; in the arena of love there are no brothers! If you soften your heart on the battlefield, the other side will kill you. Do you not understand this? If you do not quickly kill the enemy who slew your soldiers, you will betray their sacrifice, and be disloyal to the king as well! Hurry and use your ultimate technique to kill your enemies, and avenge those faithful soldiers who died! Hurry!

With the old voice echoing in his mind, Yang Shengtian’s head throbbed more and more, and his consciousness grew increasingly dazed. His eyes widened further and further, turning redder and redder.

Suddenly, Yang Shengtian shook his head in fury several times. Then, with a pair of eyes blazing with dark red rage, he glared at Huang Xianlin and shouted, Huang General, spare me the nonsense! Take my life if you can!

With that, he raised the golden halberd in both hands and attacked Huang Xianlin like a bolt of lightning. Every move he unleashed was filled with fierce loathing, and the transitions between each strike happened in the blink of an eye. For example, after thrusting the halberd at Huang Xianlin and seeing him evade, if he wanted to change into a sweeping strike, he would not first withdraw the halberd and strike again. Instead, he would simply continue the motion of the thrust and, with a press of his hands, drive the halberd directly into a sweeping attack.

Normally, a sweeping strike from such a distance would lose its momentum if executed at close range, and without inertia, even if it struck the enemy, it would be hard to injure them. But Yang Shengtian’s golden halberd was a divine weapon, and it could transform according to his will into whatever form and force he desired. Thus, when his halberd swept toward Huang Xianlin, even at such close range, the power behind it was exactly as strong as Yang Shengtian intended, as fierce as he wished.

When Yang Shengtian suddenly launched his all-out assault, the little black mount beneath him also began roaring.

Because the two sides were now fighting at close quarters, Little Black and Big Yellow stopped spewing fire at each other. Both mounts understood that if they continued firing at such close range, they might easily hurt their masters, so the two steeds switched to biting and tearing at one another instead.

When Huang Xianlin and Yang Shengtian first began fighting, Yang Shengtian had still been speaking with him, and in the force and speed of their exchanges, it even seemed as though the other side was holding back a little.

Now, however, Huang Xianlin saw Yang Shengtian suddenly shake his head with all his strength. In the next instant, his eyes turned bloodshot red, his face filled with murderous fury, and the speed with which he wielded the golden halberd was more than ten times faster than before. In less than a quarter of an hour, Huang Xianlin had already been struck several times by the halberd. Fortunately, his armor had been forged from a special kind of iron; otherwise, he would already have been injured.

Even so, though Huang Xianlin was not wounded by those blows, the force behind Yang Shengtian’s strikes was so overwhelming that several times he was almost shaken from his mount.

Since Yang Shengtian showed me no mercy at all, Huang Xianlin thought, then I need not spare him simply because he treats his soldiers well and resembles our general. Besides, he even injured General Wei Xiaoping so badly while the general had not lifted a hand to retaliate!

Thus, Huang Xianlin clenched his teeth. The veins on the hands gripping his wolf-fang spear bulged fiercely, and with a speed ten times greater than before, he whirled the spear toward Yang Shengtian.

Huang Xianlin’s master, Daoist Mystic Enlightenment, and Wei Xiaoping’s master, Daoist Mystic Wisdom, were both disciples of Supreme Harmony True Person. Supreme Harmony True Person had cultivated in the immortal path and the martial arts for more than a thousand years. It could be said that throughout the cultivation world of the Savage Lands Continent, his attainments in both dao cultivation and martial cultivation ranked among the very highest. Whether in immortal arts, techniques, or martial skill, he possessed exceptionally profound mastery. Daoist Mystic Enlightenment and Daoist Mystic Wisdom were among his most capable disciples, and naturally they inherited much of their master’s true teachings in both immortal arts and martial arts.

Huang Xianlin was Daoist Mystic Enlightenment’s most prized disciple. Among all of Mystic Enlightenment’s pupils, he was also the one whose origins were most tragic and whose mind was the most astute. For that reason, he was naturally dearly favored by his master. Moreover, when Huang Xianlin had first been brought back, the auspicious qilin divine beast, which had already felt deep gratitude toward Daoist Mystic Enlightenment, took an extraordinary liking to Huang Xianlin the moment it saw him. At the time, seeing this, Daoist Mystic Enlightenment recalled what his own master, Supreme Harmony True Person, had once said: wherever the qilin divine beast appeared, peace would soon follow. Thus Daoist Mystic Enlightenment believed that a new kingdom destined to rule the Savage Lands Continent was about to arise, and that the qilin, so affectionate toward Huang Xianlin, might have come in anticipation of Huang Xianlin’s arrival, just as the divine beast came to aid the coming enlightened ruler.

Therefore, Daoist Mystic Enlightenment held this disciple in especially high regard, teaching him everything he had learned in immortal arts, martial arts, health preservation, and self-defense. Among all of Daoist Mystic Enlightenment’s disciples, Huang Xianlin stood out the most. Every year he represented the disciples in the Qingfeng Flower Empress Immortal Arts Competition held at the abbey. Though he had never taken first or second place, he had always firmly held third. First and second place were won by Wei Xiaoping and another disciple of a different senior uncle.

Thus, whether in immortal arts or martial arts, Huang Xianlin’s skill was considered above average on the Savage Lands Continent. Later, his master Daoist Mystic Enlightenment accidentally obtained a treasured divine weapon, the wolf-fang spear, and gave it to Huang Xianlin.

This spear was forged from special metallic materials by an ancient godly being, who had refined it in immortal fire for over a hundred years before casting it. It was incomparably sharp and hard, and because it had been tempered in immortal fire by an immortal, it was imbued with immortal aura and possessed spiritual intelligence. As a result, it could unleash limitless power according to the will of the master capable of controlling it, greatly enhancing Huang Xianlin’s combat prowess and making him all the more formidable.

But because the spear’s power was far too great, Huang Xianlin seldom used his will to control it. Only when facing an especially formidable opponent would he direct the wolf-fang spear with his mind so as to help him defeat the enemy quickly.

Huang Xianlin suddenly changed his attack pattern. His strikes came like lightning, and in the blink of an eye he launched more than ten attacks at Yang Shengtian. Each time Yang Shengtian blocked with the golden halberd, he felt a tremendous shock, and even he was taken aback.