Someone in the Divine Martial Army immediately proposed that even someone with excellent talent like Gu Jinghou had never reached the transformation realm, so Chu Dingjiang’s cultivation level was highly suspicious. To avoid disaster, his martial arts should be crippled as soon as possible.
This echoed the saying: When a person hits a streak of bad luck, even the heavens won’t let them catch a break.
Chu Dingjiang hadn’t choked on the peanuts, but he silently took the blame. Not only was he demoted, but he was also to be confined in the Supervisory Court for a month.
An Jiu slept deeply and woke as dawn was breaking.
Her head throbbed with pain as she recalled the previous events. Anger immediately surged up again.
The door creaked open and closed as Lou Mingyue slipped in. “Mei Fourteen.”
Perhaps out of sympathy for their shared circumstances, she always took extra care of An Jiu. “Whatever happened, don’t reveal your spiritual power. Commander Chu said he would handle it. Don’t waste his good intentions.”
“What’s going on?” An Jiu propped herself up.
Sensing someone approaching, Lou Mingyue said, “I’ll tell you later. When people ask you about it, try to push the blame for the building collapse onto Commander Chu. These are his instructions, passed through me.”
An Jiu’s heart sank. Although she didn’t know exactly what had happened, her instinct told her that her loss of control over her spiritual power had caused trouble, and Chu Dingjiang was covering for her.
Knock knock!
“Come in,” Lou Mingyue answered on An Jiu’s behalf.
Several black-clad men entered. The one in front wore a ghost mask, followed by the four instructors and Storehouse Keeper Sheng.
“Xuan Ren.” The masked man sat down and began questioning. “The training hall collapsed the day before yesterday. Only you and Chu Dingjiang were inside. Do you know what happened?”
An Jiu didn’t want to expose herself, but she also didn’t want to push everything onto Chu Dingjiang without knowing the full situation. “I don’t know.”
The masked man’s gaze fell on her injured hands. “Where did these injuries come from?”
An Jiu remained silent.
Lou Mingyue interjected, “Mei Fourteen’s internal power was destroyed when the Mei family was attacked. Now she can only train externally. To have a chance at revenge someday, she can only train harder. She’s often like this.”
It was understandable that she wouldn’t want to talk about what was essentially the annihilation of her family.
The masked man reached out and grasped An Jiu’s wrist.
The touch was cold. An Jiu resisted the urge to pull away.
The man probed for a moment, then nodded, seemingly accepting Lou Mingyue’s explanation. A person without internal power couldn’t possibly cause such massive destruction, so it must have been Chu Dingjiang…
Having obtained a satisfactory result, the masked man didn’t linger and immediately left to report back.
“Well, well, little shorty, your backer has fallen!” the Earth Instructor laughed maliciously.
An Jiu silently retorted: Being short might change with time, but a cut-off little JJ won’t grow back!
Among girls her age, An Jiu wasn’t considered short. However, most people in the Crane Control Courtyard were men, and the only two women were older and slightly taller than her. So when they lined up, she was the shortest.
The Dark Instructor said coldly, “You think I’m dead?”
Teaching his subordinate a lesson right in front of him was disrespectful!
The Earth Instructor rolled his eyes, swaying his hips as he left while saying, “She’s young and strong. No matter how much you try to please her, old man, a young girl won’t go for you.”
Having his intentions so misinterpreted, the Dark Instructor’s beard quivered with anger. He spat, “Eunuch!”
An Jiu had no interest in listening to their bickering. Once everyone had left, she immediately asked Lou Mingyue, “What happened to Chu Dingjiang?”
Lou Mingyue explained the day’s events, concluding with a sneer, “These Crane Control Bureau people – you never see them this efficient during missions, but they’re experts at suppressing their own!”
An Jiu felt quite uneasy.
Her spiritual power had gone out of control again. She couldn’t remember everything clearly, but she knew that Chu Dingjiang had held her tightly, whispering something in her ear. His internal power had exploded, destroying the entire room, and she had been knocked unconscious.
He must have done this to hide her spiritual power, which showed signs of demonic possession!
An Jiu pressed her lips together, lowering her eyes to stare at her hands wrapped in thick white bandages.
Chu Dingjiang would turn back for her. When she felt troubled about killing, he didn’t curse or fear her like ordinary people, nor did he constantly instigate her to continue killing like some others. Instead, he smiled and said, “It’s a good sign, it shows you still have feelings.”
An Jiu didn’t know what purpose Chu Dingjiang had in protecting her like this, but it evoked complex emotions in her.
Seeing her pale face, Lou Mingyue said, “You should rest a bit more.”
An Jiu nodded.
She thought she wouldn’t be able to sleep, but after lying down, she unexpectedly fell into a deep slumber again.
Her dreams were chaotic. At times she was in mountains of corpses and seas of blood, with the Mei family head stuffing a jade pendant into her hand, saying “Loyal and Righteous Building”; sometimes it was Mei Yanran smiling and saying “Don’t be afraid, mother is here”; then it was Mei Jiu crying on his deathbed saying “Live well”; finally, there was rolling dust, deafening sounds all around, accompanied by Chu Dingjiang’s deep voice saying “Fourteen, calm down. No matter what, aren’t I still here with you?”
Right, Chu Dingjiang had said – aren’t I still here with you?
“Chu Dingjiang!” An Jiu suddenly sat up, her forehead covered in sweat.
Never before had she felt such an urgent need to improve her strength.
An Jiu got up to drink a glass of water, tidied up a bit, and went to the library despite her injuries. She didn’t reject Chu Dingjiang’s protection, but she refused to become a weak woman who always relied on others for protection! She couldn’t become a burden to Chu Dingjiang.
The library was built in the center of the Crane Control Courtyard, right where An Jiu had reported on her first day. It housed tens of thousands of books, also under the management of Storehouse Keeper Sheng.
The books were arranged in different rooms according to their level. Because the children in the Crane Control Courtyard who studied the basics had specialized teachers to instruct them in martial arts, almost no one entered the room with basic martial arts manuals.
An Jiu was looking for interesting techniques to practice in the external cultivation basics section.
She was so engrossed in her search that when she sensed someone enter, she assumed it was Storehouse Keeper Sheng and didn’t remain on guard.
“Practice this one.” The voice was as clear as a mountain stream flowing over stones.
An Jiu looked up to see a clean, slender hand, unlike Chu Dingjiang’s, which was always gloved.
“Gu Jinghou.” An Jiu looked coldly at the clear eyes behind the ghost mask.
Gu Jinghou noticed her hostility but didn’t take it to heart. “According to the original rules, I would be the master of the Mei family disciples. No matter what, I won’t harm you in martial arts training.”
“So you’ll harm me in other ways,” An Jiu said.
“Perhaps. Over the years, I’ve done many harmful things.” Gu Jinghou placed the book on the table, smiled enigmatically, and turned to leave.
An Jiu glanced at the table. It was a thin, tattered yellow book with “Meridian-Breaking Palm” written on the cover.
Opening the cover, the title page had a line: “Meridian-breaking means breaking others’ meridians.”
An Jiu flipped through it briefly, unsure whether to trust Gu Jinghou.
She tucked the book into her pocket and looked up to see Storehouse Keeper Sheng working at his desk in the opposite room. She got up, left the room, crossed the courtyard through the corridor, and knocked on the door of the main hall.
“Come in,” Storehouse Keeper Sheng said.
An Jiu entered.
He looked her over for a moment. “Xuan Ren, what is it?”
“I have something to ask you,” An Jiu said.
“Please sit.” Storehouse Keeper Sheng put down his brush, the corner of his mouth lifting in an attentive expression.
“Do you know about the Meridian-Breaking Palm?” An Jiu asked.
Storehouse Keeper Sheng’s expression changed slightly. “Why do you suddenly ask about this?”
“I heard it’s an external martial art,” An Jiu said.
Storehouse Keeper Sheng nodded. “It’s a rather vicious external martial art. Its power makes even many experts with deep internal energy pale at its mention.”
“However, very few people have truly mastered it to this day, which is one reason this technique hasn’t been destroyed.”