Chapter 28 — Perseverance

Tian Lingsu smiled. "Surely you haven't forgotten so quickly. In the daytime you fought Peng Chang of Fenghui Peak, and when you came back you fainted clean away and gave everyone a terrible fright. Thankfully it's nothing serious."

Zhang Qingyue stirred his body; sure enough, apart from some weariness, only his chest hurt a little, and everywhere else was fine. He could not help exclaiming in surprise: "How can that be? I was clearly covered all over—"

Tian Buhui cut him off: "Those scorch marks were only flesh wounds. A rub with the secret elixir of our Canglan Sect and they heal. Right now you have only one thing to worry about—a heavy blow to the chest—but the bones and meridians are neither displaced nor shaken. A few days' rest will set you right."

Su Wan, sitting to one side, smiled and said: "Xiaofan, aren't you going to thank your master? If not for him treating you himself, those flesh wounds alone would have kept you abed half a year at least."

Zhang Qingyue was startled, greatly astonished at heart, yet gratitude was plain in his words as he said softly: "This disciple is useless, and has burdened Master again."

Tian Buhui gave a cold snort, his face turning stern. "Useless? There's no one on Dazhu Peak more capable than you now!"

Zhang Qingyue was startled again, unable to fathom what Tian Buhui meant by that, and could only say: "Master, I—no, compared to Senior Sister—ah, and Senior Brother and the other senior brothers, they all far surpass me, I wouldn't dare—" Yet as he spoke his voice trailed off, for he saw that the faces of the senior brothers standing before him and of Tian Lingsu were all somewhat strange; above all the eldest senior brother, standing at the head of them all, looked especially pale today, utterly unlike his usual vigorous self—he looked, in fact, as though he might topple at any moment.

Su Wan sighed. "Daxin, bring a chair for your eldest senior brother to sit on."

Lü Daxin hurried to comply, fetching a chair from one side and setting it beside Song Dayi. Song Dayi meant to refuse, but his body swayed several times, and in the end he sat down, gasping for breath.

Zhang Qingyue stared, dumbfounded. "Eldest Senior Brother, what's wrong?"

Song Dayi gave a bitter smile but said nothing. It was the fourth senior brother, He Dachuan, who spoke up from the side: "Young junior brother, the Seven Peak Tournament has reached the fourth round, and on all of Dazhu Peak only you are left." At this point he could not help glancing around him.

Zhang Qingyue was struck dumb for a moment; then something came to him, and he turned to Tian Lingsu, sitting at the head of the bed: "Senior Sister, then you also—"

Tian Lingsu's expression dimmed, and she said softly: "I lost too."

Zhang Qingyue looked at the disappointment written across her face, and his heart ached—but at this moment there was no room for his thoughts to wander.

Tian Buhui looked Zhang Qingyue up and down, his face darkening. "Old Seven."

Zhang Qingyue's heart leaped. He could hear a faint anger lurking in Tian Buhui's words, and seeing his master's expression so grim, he could not help feeling afraid. "Yes, Master. What—"

Before he could finish, Tian Buhui's gaze swept over every person in the room, one by one. The senior brothers who were usually so familiar and kindly kept silent now, and in the looks they turned on him there was doubt.

Small wonder. When a junior brother ordinarily so dull-witted suddenly startled the world, no one could accept it in a short time.

Beneath Tian Buhui's pressing stare, sweat trickled down Zhang Qingyue's forehead. For a moment he almost blurted out to his master that he had secretly been cultivating another sect's art—yet the words reached his lips, and in the end he held them back.

He was no longer the ignorant boy of five years ago who knew nothing of the world. From his senior brothers' talk in ordinary days, he had long since learned the great name of the Fanyin Temple, and learned the true identity of that gaunt old monk named Puzhao on that night. All these years he had practiced the "Great Brahma Prajna" art in secret, but deep in his heart his gratitude toward Puzhao had never diminished in the least.

"I—no, this disciple is dull, and in these years my cultivation has advanced but little," Zhang Qingyue bowed his head, not daring to meet Tian Buhui's gaze, choosing his words with care and speaking slowly. "Some days ago, this disciple suddenly found he could move certain things—but I could not believe it myself, so, so I dared not report it to Master and Mistress. I never thought—"

Tian Buhui gave a cold laugh. "You never thought that this time you would startle the world and cut a brilliant figure!"

Zhang Qingyue said hastily: "No, that's not it, Master—"

Tian Buhui was not so easily fooled. He said coldly: "You say you can move things—but that requires at least the fourth level of the Yuqing Realm. I have asked Daren: he passed on to you only the second level's formula. So perhaps you can tell me, your ignorant master, just how you bypassed the third level and cultivated your way to the fourth?" By the end his voice was ice-cold, carrying a murderous edge that made everyone change countenance.

Zhang Qingyue fell silent, and the room was utterly still.

After a long while—just as Tian Buhui's face grew uglier and uglier and everyone's anxiety heavier and heavier—Zhang Qingyue silently clambered up. One could see he was still terribly weak, yet he struggled out of bed, and there before everyone, beneath the gaze of Tian Lingsu's crystalline, flowing eyes, he knelt down before Tian Buhui.

Tian Buhui was not moved in the least. He said coldly: "Well?"

Zhang Qingyue bowed his head low, his eyes fixed only on the small patch of ground close beneath him, not glancing aside even once, and said in a low voice: "Master, I beg you to punish me."

Everyone was shaken; Tian Buhui's face contorted with rage. Su Wan frowned. "Xiaofan, if you have some scruple, just speak plainly to your master. Why must you do this?"

Zhang Qingyue knelt there without moving.

Tian Buhui laughed coldly twice—so angry he laughed instead. "Good, good, good! You've got a hard backbone after all. And I've taken a fine disciple!"

Zhang Qingyue's prostrate body trembled; what he felt or looked like at that moment, none could tell. In that room there seemed to be someone whose breathing suddenly grew rapid. In a low voice he said: "All of it is this disciple's fault. I beg Master to punish me!"

Tian Buhui sprang to his feet with a sharp crack—the chair beneath him had split into pieces and lay scattered on the floor. Everyone's face changed. He raged at Zhang Qingyue: "All your fault, heh heh! Do you know that stealing another's art behind your master's back is the greatest taboo of our Canglan Sect? At the least, decades of wall-facing meditation; at the worst, your cultivation stripped away and you cast out of Qingyun. Do you know that?"

Zhang Qingyue jerked his head up and looked at Tian Buhui. His master's face was full of fury, and there was not the slightest trace of exaggeration in it; his heart sank.

"How could it be like this?" he thought bitterly. When Tian Lingsu had secretly passed him the formula, she had not said so.

Yet in the end, he still did not turn his head to look back.

The room was still as death; no one said a word.

Only anxious breathing remained, now quick, now slow.

A heart, in that stillness, quietly and coldly grew chill, as though crazed yet so lucidly watching itself. Zhang Qingyue closed his eyes and bowed his head once more, like a desperate man slowly taking his final step:

"This unworthy disciple begs Master to punish me!"

"Bang!" A tremendous force surged like mountains and seas, and Zhang Qingyue was flung backward through the air, striking the wall hard; dust flew up, and he fell to the floor and spat out a great mouthful of blood with a retching cry.