Chinese animation: Starting with Bad Guys

He remembered that this was the sentence his father recited when he first taught him to write. At that time, his father's hand was warm and strong as he held his little hand and wrote these ten characters stroke by stroke.

But what does this have to do with treasure?

He glanced at Qin Chuan, who had returned to his aloof demeanor.

"We'll rest in Chengdu for a few days before heading to Jieliang."

Qin Chuan suddenly spoke, his voice calm and undisturbed.

After saying that, he turned and walked towards the inn in the distance, his green robe fluttering slightly in the wind.

The ten-day rest in Chengdu was surprisingly peaceful.

Qin Chuan stayed indoors all day, and strange airflow sounds could be heard from inside the room from time to time, as if something was constantly being compressed and expanded.

On the morning of the seventh day, a group of Raojiang people dressed in exotic clothing silently took away the holy child without uttering a single word.

The real and fake Li Xingyun guessed that they were from the Twelve Caves, so they did not stop them.

On the day we finally arrived at Jieliang, the sky was a sickly leaden gray.

The three stood at the edge of the salt marsh, facing a blindingly white wasteland.

The salt crystals sparkled in the sunlight, like countless tiny mirrors pieced together to form a giant magic mirror, reflecting the blurry sky and cloud shadows.

"A dragon hangs on the horizon..." The fake Li Xingyun squinted, gazing at the low mountains in the distance. "Could it be referring to that mountain?"

Li Xingyun remained silent.

He stared at the murky puddle at his feet and suddenly noticed that the sky reflected in the water was clearer than the real sky.

A thought flashed through his mind like lightning—"Nothing in this world is constant; only a mirror can straighten one's clothes!"

The salt marsh is like a giant mirror, and the "dragon in the sky" they are searching for is in the mirror, underground!

He suddenly looked up at Qin Chuan, who was gazing into the distance with a faint smile on his lips.

Li Xingyun swallowed the discovery that was about to slip out.

He didn't know why Qin Chuan was stalling for time, but for his junior sister's sake, he was willing to cooperate.

Actually, his search for the Longquan Treasure wasn't entirely about stopping that imposter from becoming emperor.

After days of deliberation, he decided to give the Longquan Treasure to Qin Chuan and persuade Yuan Tiangang to let Qin Chuan become emperor.

Although he and Qin Chuan had never gotten along.

But after knowing each other for so long, he realized that Qin Chuan was the one who could win the hearts of the people and unite all under heaven.

Unlike that imposter, Qin Chuan will definitely be a good emperor.

As time went by, the fake Li Xingyun became increasingly anxious.

On the morning of the thirtieth day, as the first rays of sunlight pierced through the clouds, Qin Chuan's door finally opened.

The man who emerged exuded a completely different aura—every step seemed to be treading on the rhythm of heaven and earth, his breath synchronized with the sound of the wind.

"It's time," Qin Chuan said, uttering only one sentence.

When the three stood once more in the center of the salt marsh, the fake Li Xingyun finally couldn't help but ask, "Where exactly is the Dragon Spring Treasure?"

Qin Chuan did not answer.

He gently lifted his right foot, then gently lowered it back down.

In an instant, spiderweb-like cracks radiated outwards from him.

The earth groaned, and salt crystals rose into the air like snowflakes, refracting a rainbow of colors in the sunlight.

When the dust settled, a huge crater appeared in front of the three of them.

At the bottom of the pit was a golden coffin, the lid of which was carved with an ancient battlefield scene—the Yellow Emperor stood holding a sword, Chi You glared angrily, and thousands of troops fought behind them.

"The Battle for Supremacy..."

Qin Chuan murmured softly, his fingertips brushing against the blurry face of the Yellow Emperor on the relief.

In the legends of the Bad Guys world, after Chi You was defeated by the Yellow Emperor in the Battle of Zhuolu, he was tortured with wooden instruments and forced to walk for nearly two thousand miles before he died. The blood that seeped from his bruised hands and feet turned into a maple forest as red as blood and as fiery as fire.

Afterwards, the Chi You clan fled to the area around the Ten Thousand Mountains, which became the present-day Raojiang.

It can be said that all the people of Raojiang are descendants of the Chiyou clan, and the Twelve Caves are the most powerful branch among these descendants.

All the designs for the Longquan Treasure were created by Yuan Tiangang.

Was his inscription of the Battle of Zhuolu on the giant golden coffin a casual gesture or a deliberate act? Could there be some unknown secret about the Battle of Zhuolu?

Li Xingyun suddenly noticed that the Yellow Emperor in the painting appeared unusually dull compared to the other parts: "Is it lacking color?"

"It's not that it lacks color," Qin Chuan withdrew his finger, "it lacks soul, it lacks blood."

He turned to the empty space behind him, Yanze: "Am I right, Commander?"

The air seemed to freeze for a moment.

The next moment, Yuan Tiangang appeared beside the golden coffin like a ghost, his Longquan sword gleaming coldly in the sunlight.

At the same time, a dense sound of footsteps came from all directions—various lords appeared from all parts of the salt flat with their personal guards, surrounding the three of them.

Just as Li Xingyun was about to bite his finger, Yuan Tiangang suddenly made his move.

A black shadow flashed, and the fake Li Xingyun was pressed heavily onto the coffin, blood seeping from the wound on his cheek dripping onto the face of the Yellow Emperor relief sculpture.

With the clicking sound of the machinery, the coffin lid slowly sank in, forming a sword-shaped groove.

Yuan Tiangang flung the fake Li Xingyun away like a rag doll, and the Longquan sword landed precisely in the groove.

The earth began to tremble, and the golden coffin slowly opened, revealing a deep underground passage.

But everyone's eyes were focused on the fake Li Xingyun who was staggering backward—his blood could actually unlock the Dragon Spring Treasure!

"Why? Why? Why?" The fake Li Xingyun clutched his blood-stained face, his voice hoarse and inhuman, "Who am I...?"

Yuan Tiangang knelt on one knee before Li Xingyun, presenting the Longquan sword with both hands: "Your Highness, the Longquan sword has appeared in the world."

"Who exactly is he?" Li Xingyun didn't take the sword, but stared intently at Yuan Tiangang.

Yuan Tiangang remained silent. Suddenly, he flicked his wrist, and the Longquan sword thrust backward—

The fake Li Xingyun charged forward, his face contorted with madness, despair, and a terrifying realization: "I too am of the Li Tang bloodline! Why should I only be his shadow?!"

The moment the sword tip pierced through his clothes, Qin Chuan sighed.

He raised his hand, and the atmosphere in the world seemed to freeze.

This is his first, and possibly last, time facing Yuan Tiangang directly!

Chapter 102 Respectfully Sending Off the Commander

The leaden clouds were suddenly torn apart by an invisible force, and a blinding beam of sunlight cleaved the sky like a sword, illuminating the salt marsh with a dazzling white light.

The light was so sharp that it seemed to split the heavens and earth in two, casting a sharp shadow on the cracked, saline-alkali land.

The rising salty and alkaline odors twisted and distorted in the heat wave, and the faint crackling sound of salt crystals bursting came from afar, like millions of ants gnawing on bones.

The air was filled with a bitter, salty smell, and every breath felt like swallowing a handful of sharp salt grains.

Qin Chuan's blue robe fluttered without wind, as if lifted by an invisible current.

The salt crystals beneath his feet cracked inch by inch, emitting fine popping sounds, and the cracks spread outwards from him like a spider web.

The moment he turned his palm to meet the sword's edge, the surrounding air suddenly froze as if glued, and visible ripples violently vibrated three inches in front of his palm, freezing the Longquan sword aimed at the fake Li Xingyun in mid-air.

The sword tip trembled and emitted a mournful cry, as if resisting some force that transcended the common sense of martial arts.

"Considering the nearly twenty years we've spent together day and night."

Qin Chuan's voice was soft, yet every word was clearly heard by everyone, as if the heavens and earth were conveying his message.

He caught a glimpse of the frozen, horrified expression on the fake Li Xingyun's face out of the corner of his eye, and recalled the scene when he first met this boy in the Hidden Soldier Valley:

"Please, General, spare his life; do not kill him outright."

Yuan Tiangang's pupils contracted slightly beneath his mask.

What he felt was not just resistance, but a kind of unprecedented power—not a head-on clash of internal forces, but as if the entire world was helping to deflect the force from the other side.

The salt marshland suddenly fell into an eerie silence.

Even the wind seemed to have stopped blowing, and the salt particles suspended in the air shimmered like tiny specks of light in the sunlight.

Even the sound of breathing disappeared.

The princes' personal guards maintained their encirclement, but they seemed to be frozen in place, unable to even move their eyes.

On the fake Li Xingyun's face, a drop of blood, about to fall, hung on his chin, reflecting an eerie purple light in the sunlight.

The blood droplet reflected his shattered ambition and the dream that could never be realized, the dream that Yuan Tiangang had approved of.

Li Xingyun's astonished expression froze into a silhouette, not even his eyelashes trembled.

Only two forces clashed in the stillness of time and space:

A piece of ancient, cold iron, carrying three hundred years of obsession, each strand imbued with countless lonely autumns and springs;

A sprout, resembling a new bud in early spring, yet containing an astonishing force to break through the soil, as if it were about to uproot the entire decaying old world.

Seasons change, stars shift, and autumns come and go...

Yuan Tiangang suddenly chuckled, his laughter carrying an indescribable complexity.

With his well-defined fingers gently stroking the blade, the Longquan sword responded with a clear, melodious dragon's roar and returned to its sheath.

He recalled that three hundred years ago, when he was playing chess with Li Chunfeng, the plum tree outside the window was just like that, suddenly blooming with flowers out of season in the cold winter.

"Following my dear friend Li Chunfeng, finally someone has stood shoulder to shoulder with me! And this person is none other than my disciple!"

His laughter contained relief, and a hint of joy that he himself was unaware of, like a traveler who, after walking alone for three hundred years, suddenly encounters a fellow traveler:

"Let's have a big drink today, as you say."

"I..." The fake Li Xingyun was about to question him, but his voice was hoarse and out of tune.

Li Xingyun reacted swiftly, and three Huayang needles, gleaming with cold light, shot into his major acupoints.

The moment the needle pierced his skin, the fake Li Xingyun lost consciousness and collapsed to the ground in a deep sleep.