Chapter 276: One Sip Refreshes the Mind, Two Sips Banishes Fatigue

The sky had only just begun to pale into a faint, misty gray over the central square of the city.

"This kid—!" Every disciple of the Nanhua Sect, who but a moment ago had been eagerly whispering about the Radiance of Nanhua and various magic treasures, was instantly driven into a towering rage. "He wants to raise the difficulty?!"

He certainly possessed a reckless tongue!

It was a miracle they hadn't beaten him to within an inch of his life already, yet he still had the audacity to pick and choose treasures?!

"Senior Sister Liu!" a female disciple cried out, stepping forward. "If we do not teach this fellow a lesson today, I fear he will never learn the true vastness of heaven and earth!"

"This man is utterly detestable! He must be given a harsh lesson!"

"Give him an inch and he takes a mile—downright shameless!"

It was not just the cultivators of the Black Flood Dragon Mansion and the Nanhua Sect who erupted into a chorus of curses; even Huangfu Tao could no longer bear to watch. "Sir, are you not being a bit too insatiable?!"

"What do you mean, insatiable?" Fang Qi retorted. "Do not slander me. This is what you call a fair wager. How about this: if I lose, I shall hand over the Flying Sword Technique I used just now?"

"What?!" This time, even Huangfu Tao was stunned. One had to understand that the Flying Sword Technique Fang Qi had displayed moments ago was something even a high-cultivator of his profound cultivation could not keep pace with. Such a supreme art was something even he coveted intensely!

He actually dared to stake such a prize on a gamble?!

The woman in white was shaking by now, her shoulders trembling with fury. The Nanhua Sect was one of the largest sects in the Morning Star Sea, and she had spent a century studying its various secret techniques and orthodox spells since her youth. Her cultivation and mastery far surpassed those of her peers; her title as the Heavenly Maiden of Nanhua was by no means an empty boast!

The young man before her had clearly not been cultivating for very long, yet he dared to be so arrogant. It was an absolute insult!

"Fine!" she spat, her voice trembling slightly with anger. "As long as you have the skill to claim it!"

She extended her slender fingers into the empty air, and several threads as white and pure as ice crystals shot from her sleeves. These delicate, exquisite silken strands drifted through the air, yet they moved like swimming dragons, coiling and intertwining until they gradually formed a faint, ethereal cage of ice and snow, trapping Fang Qi at its center!

"...I was kind enough to offer a fair duel, so why the temper?" Fang Qi muttered, feeling rather exasperated.

"What treasure is this? How remarkably formidable!" Seeing this, a cultivator from the Black Flood Dragon Mansion gasped in slight admiration. "If the cultivators of our mansion do not deploy the Heaven-Earth Dragon-Locking Formation, the power of our Black Dragon Locks alone could not compare to even half of this treasure's might!"

"This is the very first magic treasure bestowed by the Grand Patriarch—the Snow-Jade Ice-Silkworm Silk! This artifact is fashioned from a base of precious three-thousand-year-old ice-silkworm silk unearthed from ancient ruins, infused with the essence of snow-jade. The Grand Patriarch spent three whole years refining it before it reached completion." Beside them, a male disciple of the Nanhua Sect explained with immense pride. "This silk is not only incredibly resilient, impervious to both fire and water, but the powerful chill it emits can also stagnate a person’s spiritual essence, rendering them unable to circulate it. Once ensnared by this item, one can only surrender and await captivity!"

"Where is your magic treasure?!" the woman in white demanded frostily, her delicate hands manipulating the ice-silkworm silk.

Fang Qi pointed to the flying sword at his side. "One person, one sword. That is enough."

"Arrogant!" The woman’s expression turned utterly cold. Under the impulse of her vast spiritual energy, the ground surrounding Fang Qi froze instantly into a thick layer of frost!

Even the very air was gradually congealing!

"Retreat! Quick, retreat!" Amidst several panicked cries, the surrounding crowd of onlookers fell back repeatedly!

Looking at the spot where they had just been standing, frost had frozen solid; had they been a step slower, they would likely have been turned into popsicles by now!

An immense chill condensed around those few threads as solid as icy jade, and the air around them continuously turned to frost, resembling several dragons of black ice roaming the perimeter!

The cage was gradually tightening!

"This kid is finished!" The Nanhua Sect disciples were overjoyed. Now that the Snow-Jade Ice-Silkworm Silk had been deployed to this extent, it was entirely impossible for any miracle to occur!

"Why don't you obediently admit defeat already? Do you wish to freeze to death inside Senior Sister Liu's magic treasure?!" a Nanhua Sect disciple shouted aloud.

"And here I thought he was strong, but he turns out to be nothing but a hollow shell!"

"Still not surrendering?" The woman in white approached the almost completely frozen ice cage, her phoenix eyes peering at the figure entirely trapped within, a look of displeasure flashing through them.

Just then, her phoenix eyes suddenly widened slightly in surprise.

From within the ice cage, which was almost entirely sealed off from the outside world, she suddenly caught a booming shout: "Sword, come!"

She wondered if she had misheard.

Her face filled with slight astonishment, she suddenly heard the collective gasps of the surrounding crowd, everyone pointing toward the heavens!

Lifting her head, she saw that the sky had, at some unknown moment, become densely packed with a myriad of flying swords! These swords blotted out the sun and the sky, descending in a vast, surging torrent!

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

Countless flying swords rained down like falling meteors, and the massive ice cage was instantaneously reduced to a floor of shattered ice splinters; even those crystal-like silken strands were pinned ruthlessly to the ground!

Everyone stared blankly at the scene. In the center of the ten thousand swords stood a young man, his fingers casually holding half a cigarette—the very one he had pinched out earlier without finishing.

A chill struck the hearts of the onlookers, and they retreated a dozen paces in unison!

If those terrifying flying swords had pierced through their own bodies, they would have died a many deaths by now!

The strands of Snow-Jade Ice-Silkworm Silk were pinned firmly to the ground; the woman yanked at them several times but could not retrieve them, forcing her to hastily abandon them!

Noticing that her expression was growing colder by the second, Fang Qi became worried that she might back out of the wager out of sheer anger.

He quickly offered a bit of commercial flattery to smooth things over: "To think you forced me to deploy my trump card to break through! Miss, that... your..."

He suddenly realized he had no idea what the thing was called. He stammered for a long moment, which was incredibly awkward, but since he was halfway through the sentence, he couldn't just stop. Ultimately, he blurted: "That... whatever-silk of yours is truly remarkable!"

"It is the Snow-Jade Ice-Silkworm Silk!" Her silver teeth nearly ground to dust!

What did he mean by "whatever-silk"?!

With a darkened face, she produced her second magic treasure, which revealed itself to be a small fan of green jade.

The small fan flew from her storage artifact and instantly swelled to the size of half a man, with a different mythical beast depicted on either side of the jade surface.

She gave the jade fan two sharp waves, and in an instant, a furious gale howled, its roar like the thunderous drums of heaven!

"What sort of renown does this fan possess?"

"The... the Wind-Howl Fan...!" Several Nanhua Sect disciples broke into a cold sweat. "The wind-blades destroy the flesh, and the wind-howl suppresses the soul! This kid is done for! Senior Sister Liu is holding nothing back!"

In the next heartbeat, a torrent of swords surged grandly across the square...

Under the bewildered and terrified gazes of everyone present, the Wind-Howl Fan was actually struck and sent flying through the air!

"You... how are you unharmed after being struck by the Wind-Howl?!" In the white-clothed woman's phoenix eyes lay an expression of utter horror. One had to know that the Wind-Howl Fan was capable of fanning a person’s soul clean out of their body!

"Oh, you mean this?" Fang Qi flicked the ash from his cigarette. "Just now, I did feel a bit dizzy, but a puff of smoke cleared my head right up."

Fang Qi offered her the remaining short stub. "Want a puff? One puff refreshes the mind, two puffs banish fatigue."

"!!??"

What the actual hell!!

The Heavenly Maiden of Nanhua now pinched her fingers into a spell gesture, her lips chanting a long and sonorous incantation. Her entire being was lifted by an inscrutable power as the celestial winds howled around her, making her appear at this moment like a child of heaven and earth. Astral gales swirled about her body to escort her, the space between heaven and earth grew bleak and dark, and snakes of lightning and thunder roamed the sky, transforming into a curtain of electricity that swept past her!

The Nanhua Sect disciples were ecstatic. "The Radiance of Nanhua! Senior Sister Liu has actually unleashed the Radiance of Nanhua!"

"To think that today I would witness the contemporary Heavenly Maiden perform the Art of the Celestial Radiance with my own eyes!" Even Huangfu Tao looked up at the sky with profound astonishment, uttering a sigh of pure wonder.