Chapter 10: First Clash with the Confucian Dao—Cut Down All the Same!
The sky stretched high and clear, clouds thin and scattered, a wild goose flying south vanishing into the distance.
Bidding farewell to the two courtesans, Gu Lin set off to investigate Li Township’s Wutong Village firsthand.
Before leaving, he purchased a finely crafted human-skin mask from the general goods shop, and the moment he stepped outside, he’d transformed into a coarse-featured burly man.
It wasn’t that he had some strange fondness for disguises—he simply had no real backing of his own. If his true identity ever got exposed and the county office latched onto him, that would mean serious trouble.
The same principle applied as always: regardless of whether the target truly was some irredeemable evildoer, a mere commoner had absolutely no right or authority to carry out an execution on his own. At best, it counted as unlawful use of force; at worst, it was outright disrespect toward the imperial dynasty’s laws—punishable by death.
By the time he reached the end of the Hour of the Monkey, the sun hanging low in the west, he’d made his way, asking directions along the road, to Wutong Village.
A centuries-old tung tree stood at the village entrance, and from somewhere in the distance came the clear, ringing sound of children reciting their lessons.
Gu Lin kept up his usual routine, disguising himself as a traveling peddler carrying goods on a shoulder pole—this time selling dragon-pearl fruit and crane-crown vermillion orbs, or in plainer terms, longan and red bayberries.
Resting in the shade beneath the great tree, the village women and elderly grandmothers, naturally reluctant to spend actual coin, proposed trading eggs for fruit instead, and Gu Lin happily agreed.
He casually steered the conversation toward his real interest:
“I’ve traveled through countless villages and towns, but I never expected to find such a sizable private school in a place like this. Judging by all that recitation, there must be quite a few children here.”
The moment the topic came up, the old grandmother perked right up, chuckling warmly:
“Our village schoolmaster is a man of remarkable virtue and teaching skill, and he doesn’t even charge for it—children from several neighboring villages all come here to Wutong Village just to study under him. Forty-six children in total, and the schoolmaster pays for their meals entirely out of his own pocket. He’s truly a living sage among us.”
Gu Lin smiled and nodded along:
“A teacher of such noble character and reputation deserves a commemorative arch from the county office itself.”
The old woman kept singing his praises:
“The schoolmaster never sought fame or recognition—he only wants to raise these children well. Ever since he came to teach in our village, the children have shed all their unruly, mischievous ways, every one of them growing more disciplined and resolute in character.”
Gu Lin put on an expression of genuine admiration, grabbed a handful of dragon-pearl fruit and handed it to the old grandmother, then bent down, shouldered his pole, and continued on into the village to sell his wares.
The wanted criminal’s dying words echoed in his mind—
“There’s five hundred taels hidden at the private school in Wutong Village. Consider it my atonement for my sins.”
Had the criminal truly had a change of heart right before dying?
Gu Lin didn’t believe that for a second.
He was certain the man had mistaken him for some greedy bounty hunter who lived and died purely for money, using a massive sum of silver as bait to lure Gu Lin into an early grave alongside him.
That village schoolmaster was almost certainly an accomplice!
As for all this talk of educating the poor, noble character, sterling reputation—Gu Lin refused to be fooled by mere surface appearances.
He made his way to the private school, standing beneath a window, scanning the classroom within.
Inside sat forty or fifty children, the oldest around ten, the youngest five or six, and beside a wooden lectern sat a refined, dignified middle-aged man, his blue-gray scholar’s robe covered in patches, currently explaining passages from the Classic of Poetry.
The children’s attention drifted toward the peddler outside the window.
Seeing this, the village schoolmaster stepped outside with an unhurried, measured gait.
It was the most textbook-perfect scholar’s walk imaginable—refined, composed, carrying an extraordinary air of dignity.
The schoolmaster held out a few copper coins, his expression stern as he waved him off:
“Move along. Don’t disturb the children’s studies.”
Gu Lin set down his shoulder pole and stated his purpose directly:
“Someone asked me to come collect five hundred taels of silver.”
For a fleeting instant, the schoolmaster’s pupils trembled ever so slightly, though his expression otherwise remained entirely unchanged.
Yet Gu Lin caught it precisely—that flash of shock buried deep within the man’s eyes.
The schoolmaster’s expression settled back into calm, and he nodded, leading the way:
“Follow me.”
Gu Lin fell into step behind him.
The two of them walked in silence, one leading, one following.
Gu Lin’s thoughts churned. In truth, he was fully aware this whole venture was reckless—acting without knowing the other party’s true strength beforehand had placed him directly beneath a looming wall, vulnerable to collapse.
But with the selection trials bearing down on him, he had no choice but to fight through it.
Even a loach in a drainage ditch might dream of leaping into the ocean—but only in the boundless, vast sea could it ever have a chance of becoming a fierce, roaring leviathan.
They arrived at a private residential courtyard, and the schoolmaster gestured for him to enter.
Suddenly, the bronze ring on the gate’s door dropped loose!
The schoolmaster’s gaze turned cold, a faint purple aura rising up between his brows.
Screech—
The once-rusted bronze ring shattered instantly into hundreds of tiny fragments, each one wrapped in a thread of stern, righteous Confucian Energy, hurtling straight toward every inch of Gu Lin’s body.
All of this happened in the span of a single flashing instant.
A gathered strike from a Confucian Dao cultivator at Energy Cultivation, Fourth Layer—delivered, no less, as a sneak attack!
Confucian Righteous Energy could easily discern the wicked from the righteous—he’d seen straight through the peddler’s disguised mask from the very start, spotting the young face concealed beneath.
Definitely no older than twenty.
His old friend had spoken the code phrase before dying, which meant he’d surely died at this young man’s hands.
Which meant this boy’s true cultivation exceeded Energy Condensation, Third Layer.
But it absolutely couldn’t be higher than Energy Condensation, Sixth Layer—otherwise, his old friend wouldn’t have needed to use a coded signal to have this boy’s life taken.
In that instant, a chill shot down Gu Lin’s spine, his mind momentarily reeling.
This was the true power of Confucian Righteous Energy—it disrupted one’s mental focus and thoughts, and anyone with even slightly weaker willpower would find their reactions lagging behind by several crucial beats.
The fragments were now only two cun from his body, and combined with his own sluggish reaction time, this should have been an absolutely certain death.
And yet, Gu Lin had a trump card.
This was precisely the confidence that had let him act so recklessly in the first place.
The Wave-Treading Steps!
Every acupoint thrown wide open at once, he unleashed his lightness technique.
Even trapped in a desperate situation with delayed reaction, relying on his max-level movement art, he calmly twisted and turned, dodging every single lethal fragment with effortless grace!
Before the schoolmaster’s utterly stunned gaze, Gu Lin’s body darted through the air like a swift wild duck, gliding like a dragon in flight, precisely evading every fragment hurtling toward him.
“How is this possible?!”
The schoolmaster could barely contain his shock, the Righteous Energy between his brows surging forth entirely, slowly coalescing into a massive character: “Kill.”
The character “Kill” trembled, not yet fully formed.
Abruptly, the surrounding air turned scorching hot.
The schoolmaster’s eyes went wide, disbelief written plainly across his face.
A blazing, crimson, ghostly handprint materialized before him without the slightest warning, hurtling straight for his chest.
No flow of internal Qi preceding it.
No visible casting motion whatsoever.
What kind of world-shattering martial art was this?
It completely shattered every boundary of what he’d thought possible!!
Bang—
The handprint slammed hard into his chest, and as if he’d been thrown straight into molten lava, the schoolmaster let out a hysterical, agonized scream, the skin at the point of impact splitting open instantly, revealing charred, seared flesh beneath, the cracks spreading rapidly from his chest all the way to his back and abdomen.
“Did I say I wouldn’t sneak-attack you too?”
Gu Lin unleashed his movement art, throwing a punch heavy with overwhelming force straight at the half-formed character “Kill.”
Though it didn’t shatter entirely, it dissolved a good portion of the killing intent bound within the character.
There was still a genuine gap in cultivation between them, no denying that.
But seeing the schoolmaster now grievously wounded, Gu Lin used the Wave-Treading Steps to close the distance behind him, gathering every last bit of his internal Qi for another strike of the Three Yang Bloodline-Severing Mark.
The schoolmaster had no way to dodge, utter despair flooding through him.
‘A mere Energy Condensation, Third Layer warrior, and yet he wields two world-shattering martial arts? Could this possibly be some unpassed, forbidden technique from one of the dynasty’s top noble houses?’
‘Hahaha… an insignificant ant like myself, dying at the hands of some top noble house’s hidden heir.’
The schoolmaster watched, helpless, as his own body split open and burned, watching the righteous character “Kill” slowly dim and fade, the vital life force within him steadily draining away.
When another fist came crashing down toward his head at close range, the right side of the schoolmaster’s skull caved in entirely, and he died instantly, beyond any doubt.
Seeing this, Gu Lin leaned back against the gate, his very bones aching with sharp, searing pain, every last drop of strength drained from his body, gasping for breath in ragged, heaving gulps.
Purely in terms of raw cultivation, he’d been nowhere near a match for this schoolmaster—and Confucian Dao cultivators, as a rule, could generally take down opponents two full realms above their own cultivation level.
Fortunately, the Wave-Treading Steps had let him dodge the initial assault, and following up with a sneak-attack Three Yang Bloodline-Severing Mark had struck directly at the common weakness shared by all Confucian Dao cultivators—their physical bodies and acupoints simply weren’t as strong or resilient as those of true martial artists.
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