Destiny in Cinders

"I didn't look down on him. It's just that I can't figure out his trump card at all. The vice apothecary died from some kind of flying-sword-like hidden weapon. What I want to know is where he got something like that," Instructor Li said, head shaking. "All in all, we shouldn't have let him linger in this little manor. Sending him to headquarters would've saved us a lot of trouble."

He laughed and continued, "Then again, we might not have had this unexpected chance to render some extra merit if that were the case."

Even though they had lost all trace of An Jing after receiving the threat, neither Scribe Xu nor Instructor Li was worried. They didn't know how powerful he truly was, but they were confident that he was alone at the end of the day. No amount of personal strength would matter in the grand scheme of things.

Not to mention, he was trying to escape in the wilderness on foot. There was no way he could be faster than an airship. Even if he was able to hide his presence for a couple of days and evade detection from the tracking ability, it didn't matter. The cult could simply spread out their search parties in a methodical manner to cover more and more area, closing off avenues for An Jing to escape.

Then again, it wasn't that they didn't have any concerns. The cult's actions would also raise the alert level of Grand Chen's troops and the sects nearby. If An Jing really made it to a city and fell under the protection of the officials of Grand Chen, the cult would accept their loss and give up.

However, the closest city near the border that was in the custody of a powerful adept from Grand Chen was four thousand li away. The cult also had people lying in wait nearby. Not to mention, the adept there was also a secret member of the cult! It was practically impossible for An Jing to escape even if he made it thousands of li away.

"Let's retreat for now." Scribe Xu put away the Mountain-River Registry with great care. "An Jing's stealth technique is rather advanced. It might have something to do with his lifearc. There's no way for us to find him in the next few days. Let us rest at a nearby village and await further orders. We don't have to worry about catching up as long as we have the airship."

"Sure. Let's go." Instructor Li also passed down the orders to the rest of the search party.

***

Meanwhile in the foreign world, An Jing rapidly traveled toward a town from the wilderness. He no longer had any choice and had to obtain more resources within the next three days to strengthen himself. He either needed to take out the airship that could laser in on him or be able to travel fast enough to break out of the cult's encirclement. Any kind of tool that could help him shake off pursuers would also be helpful.

This seemed like it should be an impossible task. An Jing initially wanted to give it a go anyway and cross bridges when he came to it, but when he arrived at the town, he realized that he might've overestimated the difficulty. First, the people of this foreign world spoke the same language as that of Void Embrace.

If the sun rose from the east in this world, the location An Jing found himself in was near the southwest. The city where the warship had landed, on the other hand, was situated near the northern area. There was a large, empty wilderness with pockets of ink-green forests, split by a large corrosive river and ashen, gray land between the northern city and where he was located.

There were a few derelict human settlements near the banks of the river, all surrounded by a few metallic towers. Within one of the towns were large tents, workshops, residential areas and even factory furnaces. The town center had a massive furnace that stood two hundred meters tall like a small hill. White smoke poured out of it incessantly into the gray sky above.

Using the furnace as his guide, An Jing didn't have to worry about losing his way at all. However, the sparse forests didn't provide good cover for him to approach undetected, so he slowed down when he was near the town.

It was the evening twilight of the Wu hour.[1] In both his current and previous lives, it was the time when he would be nestling down and preparing to go to bed. Though there was a chance that some shops were still open, it was more likely for small towns in the wilderness like these to have a curfew in effect.

An Jing had planned to wait near the town for some time and rest while Yvelbane kept watch before finding a chance to sneak into town the next day and learn the local language. But right as he was in the vicinity of the town, he heard a gunshot and fell flat to the ground. That was an instinct he had retained from his previous life and it had saved him. It didn't take long before a shower of pellets rained down all around him.

"Die, Flameclaw bastards!"

"Kill them! Use those ballless fools as target practice! We'll drive them out of our territory!"

An Jing snuck behind a large boulder and looked in the distance. He saw two groups of townsfolk engaged in a firefight, shouting out the slogans of their respective gangs in a language An Jing understood, a fact that didn't shock him too much. Instead, he muttered, "So this must be the local hospitality of this foreign world..." 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

He watched as the projectiles of spirit qi flew through the streets. The muzzle flashes from the guns almost lit up the night entirely. Quite a number of those stray projectiles had come in An Jing's direction and would've put bloody holes in him had he not evaded.

The two gangs exchanged fire until they moved outside of town. Then, they got into a wild chase with many ridiculously modified vehicles that sent sparks flying and glowed with mystical spirit patterns. These vehicles also had armaments and semi-translucent shields. Some of them could even fly into the air and rain bombs down from above! But that didn't last long as people concentrated their fire on the sole target in the sky and turned it into a live fireworks show.

Eventually, the groups left town and approached the wilderness. The people who remained kept on cursing at each other but no longer fought and destroyed the surrounding buildings. It seemed like there was some order among all the chaos.

"They're all actually sword cultivators!" Yvelbane said with surprise. "They're speaking Daoese too!"

"They don't seem like traditional sword cultivators to me," An Jing said with a puzzled look. He scratched his head at having just had to avoid bullets. "What is Daoese?"

"Daoese is the language that the Dao Court spread. According to ancient legend, some true immortals used the heaven and earth as their craft and the starscape as their sails to bring five cities with them, containing a hundred and eight thousand people in total, before arriving in the wild new frontier. That is the origin of humans in Void Embrace.

"The words 'Void Embrace' are said to be the dao title of that esteemed true immortal. The legacies this immortal left behind were later called the Dao Court or Dao Sect. Everything from the speech to words used by the humans of Void Embrace was standardized by the Dao Court.

"Eventually, for reasons unknown to me, this great immortal left the world of Void Embrace. The Dao Sect also fractured as a result, giving rise to the ten continents of Void Embrace that are named after the five colors and directions.

"But no matter how the split happened, the language spoken by the people of Void Embrace has remained Daoese. Since a shard of mine is in this world and the people here also speak Daoese, I believe the Dao Court might be deeply involved in this world. I wonder if the great immortal has also passed down his legacy in this world, or whether this world has split off from Void Embrace and became its own world...

"Either way, they have a similar culture as Void Embrace. They must have also inherited the same techniques from the same legacy, which would make things far more convenient for you and me!"

An Jing loved Yvelbane for its optimistic attitude. However, he had some doubts. "With how hospitable these people seem to be, I have a feeling they can't wait to 'gift' me a sword or gun in no time. Our attire is different and we have different accents. How can I blend in?"

That wasn't Yvelbane's expertise, but it drew a suggestion from its vast experience. "I think it's time for a makeover. The people there seem to have fought pretty harshly. You could pick the clothes off one of the fallen and see where things go."

"Good call." An Jing turned to look at the two groups of people in the wilderness.

1. 戌时 One of the twelve dual-hours of traditional Chinese timekeeping. Starts at 19:00 and ends at 21:00. See more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_Chinese_timekeeping#Dual_hour:_sh%C3%AD ☜