Sword drawn from the constellations, poison as its edge.

Chapter 71 Old Master Yue Unleashes His Power
Jiang Mingzhe felt that exchanging a baby for his own life was not feasible.

Trading a stranger like Mu Wanqing for his own life, he might grit his teeth and decide it wasn't out of the question.

To exchange his life for Zuo Zimu, who had besieged him, was not only feasible, but extremely feasible, a great feat.

He deliberately avoided mentioning the Four Evils, lest the old coward overthink things: "Oh dear, the Four Evils? That's only two. Where are the other two? The Four Evils sound so wicked. Maybe I should just surrender..."

The Black Wind Duo was different. When Lao Zuo heard this, he said, "They're just two nameless guys. I have seven or eight experts here. This is a sure thing!"

Zuo Zimu indeed fell for the trap.

The Eastern and Western sects of Wuliang Sword hold a competition every five years. The winner moves into Sword Lake Palace and has the right to watch the Wuliang Jade Wall Immortal dance with his sword.

Two days ago, Zuo Zimu led the Eastern Sect to successfully retain their title in the competition. Before they could even celebrate, the Shennong Gang attacked them with all sorts of sleeping pills and poisons. Fortunately, the Wuliang Sword Sect had more skilled fighters. Zuo Zimu and Xin Shuangqing, the leader of the Western Sect, joined forces and led their fellow disciples to fight back fiercely. They did not lose the battle.

At this moment, the thirteen envoys of Lingjiu Palace appeared. With only four or five people, they routed Wuliangjian. Zuo Zimu decisively surrendered and renamed the place Wuliangdong.

He then participated in the siege of Jiang Mingzhe, but was caught off guard again and swallowed a bellyful of poison. He had to use all sorts of sweet talk to finally get the antidote from Sikong Xuan.

Exhausted, Zuo Zimu returned to Jianhu Palace and saw Ye Erniang carrying her son as she jumped over the wall. He quickly called Xin Shuangqing and led two experts to chase after them. On the way, he thought about all the bad things that had happened in the past few days and was so angry that he felt like his lungs were about to explode.

With his son in enemy hands, he was naturally hesitant to act rashly, but unexpectedly, "Duan Family's worshipper Long Aotian" suddenly intervened and snatched his beloved son back in one fell swoop.

Zuo Zimu was overjoyed. After all, the Duan family was a prestigious and upright family. Even if Long Aotian had a grudge against him, he would never do anything to harm women and children. Besides, Long Aotian had already let him go once before.

"Black Wind Duo!" Zuo Zimu roared, his pent-up resentment exploding at once: "You dare to use children to refine medicine, you are utterly devoid of conscience! Today, I, the sect leader, will act on behalf of Heaven to uphold justice!"

After saying that, he rushed a few steps and used the move "Boundless Sunrise" to thrust and slash his longsword, which transformed into a ball of clear light that enveloped Ye Erniang.

Ye Erniang was both shocked and furious at being tricked by Jiang Mingzhe. Seeing Zuo Zimu coming at her, she neither dodged nor yielded. With a wave of her hand, a cold light flashed, and with a clang, she deflected Zuo Zimu's longsword. Then, she swept it up and slashed towards Zuo Zimu's chest.

The attack was both fast and cunning. Zuo Zimu was shocked and quickly retreated, tearing his clothes across his chest with a ripping sound, leaving a long wound, which fortunately wasn't deep.

Zuo Zimu never expected his opponent to be so ruthless. He looked over in shock and saw that Ye Erniang was holding a strange-looking single-edged sword.

The knife was over three feet long and two palms wide. It was rectangular from beginning to end, as thin as paper, and sharp on all four sides. The handle was extremely short. When she held it in her hand, only a section of the rectangular blade trembled incessantly, as if it were alive.

Zuo Zimu was an expert and knew that hard troops were easy to train, soft troops were difficult to master, and troops that combined both hard and soft tactics were the most difficult to master.

Just as a soft sword is ten times more difficult to wield than an ordinary longsword, the opponent's soft knife is sharpened on all four sides, making it twice as difficult to learn as an ordinary soft sword or knife. If one is not careful, one will injure oneself. Those who can use such weapons are definitely not ordinary masters.

In an instant, all his raging anger vanished from Java, and he asked in a trembling voice, "Black Wind Duo, I have never offended you, my beloved wife. Why did you storm Mount Wuliang and abduct my son?"

The Crocodile God of the South Sea shouted, "What Black Wind Duo? You old fool, you believe whatever that brat says? You've been in the martial world for half your life, and you've been fooled by a brat. Aren't you ashamed? And what is that salty roasted grain?" Ye Erniang sneered, "A husband and wife are husband and wife. He says you are my husband and I am your wife."

The Crocodile God of the South Sea glared angrily and roared, "Bullshit! Bullshit! She kills a child every day, how could I marry a woman like that? You dare to say we're husband and wife, or rather, a fucking 'salty' couple? If I don't twist your head off, I'm not the Crocodile God of the South Sea!"

The Crocodile God of the South China Sea! One of the Four Great Evils of the World!
Zuo Zimu was terrified. The Four Evils rarely came to the Central Plains and were not well-known in the martial arts world of the Central Plains, but they were extremely famous in the martial arts world of Dali, Western Xia, Khitan and other countries. As soon as Zuo Zimu heard the words "South Sea Crocodile God", he knew that he had fallen into Long Aotian's trap again. The one who kidnapped his son must be the wicked Ye Erniang!
But he had no time to argue. The Crocodile God of the South Sea was extremely agile. He said he would twist his head and immediately grabbed it.

Although Zuo Zimu was afraid, he refused to let him turn his head. He swept his long sword upwards, the sword light trembling wildly to protect his upper body. Behind him, the experts from the Eastern and Western sects cheered in unison: "What a wonderful move, 'A Thousand Flowers in Full Bloom'!"

Seeing his swift sword strikes and skillful moves, the Crocodile God of the South Sea shouted, "Good!" and withdrew his hand. Taking advantage of the situation, Zuo Zimu launched a counterattack, "going with the flow," and slashed his sword towards the Crocodile God's throat.

The Crocodile God of the South Sea suddenly lowered his body, spun around like a top, and rushed into Zuo Zimu's arms. He punched Zuo Zimu in the lower abdomen, and Zuo Zimu let out a muffled howl as his internal energy was immediately interrupted. The Crocodile God of the South Sea was not letting up. He pushed off the ground and straightened up, then unleashed a powerful shot that sent Zuo Zimu's feet off the ground, his chin pointing to the sky, and his neck stretched out, making him look like a turtle waiting to be slaughtered.

Just as the Crocodile God of the South Sea was about to twist his neck, suddenly there was a whooshing sound from both sides. It was the Western Sect Leader Xin Shuangqing and her junior sister, along with her two junior brothers, Zuo Zimu, who all thrust their swords at the same time, forcing the Crocodile God of the South Sea to leap backward.

Xin Shuangqing rescued Zuo Zimu and immediately said, "It's a misunderstanding..."

Before he could finish speaking, the Crocodile God of the South Sea, his face filled with murderous intent, swiftly tore off the bundle on his back, took out two weapons, and roared, "You think you can bully me because I don't have weapons? Come on!"

His two weapons were even stranger than Ye Erniang's long, soft knife. His right hand was a pair of short-handled, long-bladed scissors with densely serrated edges, resembling the mouth of a crocodile. His left hand was a serrated soft whip, like the tail of a crocodile.

With his weapon in hand, the Evil God of the South Sea strode forward and crouched down, his entire being resembling an ancient crocodile that hadn't eaten for days, exuding a murderous aura. He sneered, "Misunderstanding my ass! Wait until I cut off your heads, then we'll talk about whether there's a misunderstanding or not!"

With that, he roared and leaped forward, his crocodile tail whip sweeping across, the air crackling and exploding. His crocodile mouth scissors slashed and hacked, a mix of iron whip, single-edged sword, longsword, and wolf-tooth club techniques. Xin Shuangqing and the others were terrified and shouted, "Attack together! Attack together!"

The remaining skilled fighters immediately charged in. Zuo Zimu lowered his head and spat out a mouthful of blood, then drew his sword and joined the attack.

The Crocodile God of the South Sea remained fearless and roared, "Come together, die together!"

With a whip in the left and scissors in the right, the fighting was intense. The crocodile-mouth scissors opened and closed with a snapping sound, and he also added the Ruyi hook, short halberd, and hook sickle techniques. If the two Wuliang sword masters were a little slow, their long swords would be cut into scrap metal in an instant.

Seeing the Crocodile God of the South Sea display his power, Ye Erniang chuckled, sheathed her knife, and said, "Third brother, your skills have indeed improved greatly. Then I'll leave this place to you. As for me, I'll go and take my good son back!"

Having said that, he used his lightness skill to dash away into the distance like a ghost. Zuo Zimu secretly groaned, but he had no courage to go and intercept Ye Erniang. He could only pray in his heart that Long Aotian would not send his son back to Jianhu Palace, but would take him directly back to the Duan family, so that he would be safe.

Unfortunately, Jiang Mingzhe wasn't a mind reader. Instead, he followed the direction they came from, found Jianhu Palace, put Mu Wanqing down, handed Shanshan over to the disciples of Wuliang Sword, and instructed them: "A demon who specializes in harming children has come to your mountain. It's best to take the children to the town down the mountain to hide."

Upon leaving Jianhu Palace, Jiang Mingzhe asked Mu Wanqing, "What do you say, young lady? Are you going by yourself, or will you come with me?"

(End of this chapter)