Tô Mạc Tà spun sharply, fingers forming a blade-seal. With a flick, she struck toward Little Tathāgata's throat. Her chi surged forth, condensing into a radiant blade three feet long, veiled in drifting orchid petals.
As it flew, she called out:
"Bald cockroach! If you've got guts, don't cower behind the Inner or Outer Lion Seal! Dodge this, I dare you!"
Little Tathāgata snorted.
"Fine! I won't! As if I'd need it against—"
He never finished.
Tô Mạc Tà vanished in a blur.
Her chi-blade halted a hair's breadth from his neck.
Whoosh!
He blinked away, reappearing meters off, sandals skidding across packed earth.
"Are you insane?! You trying to kill me!?"
His fingers flashed into the "Formation" seal. Golden svastikas whirled around his legs, forming a circle, glowing with calm authority.
It was the "Formation Seal: Eightfold Heavenly Stride," one of the Nine Seals Zen.
And the swirling svastikas weren't just decoration, they were remnants of another sacred technique from the Pagoda of Inner Peace: Sacred Limbs, one of the famed "Six."
Tô Mạc Tà sneered. "Still pretending you're not a cockroach? Who else takes a deathblow and vanishes like mist?"
She cursed under her breath, fingers weaving faster. Ten threads of chi unraveled, fine as silk, sharp as swords, lancing toward him like living whips.
"Careful, Saintess," Little Tathāgata said calmly. A golden lotus bloomed on his brow. "One of the 'Six' is Mind Reading."
He vanished the moment her threads shredded through where he'd stood, cleaving the air with surgical precision.
"Crazy hag. That's two moves. My turn, right?"
He dropped into stance and formed the "Fighting" seal: Great Vajra Wheel seal. His fists lit with roaring chi as he punched, a blow like thunder ripping from the clouds.
Tô Mạc Tà twisted midair. Five threads caught the punch in a net of force. The remaining five snapped forward, whip-fast, aiming for his face.
He switched seamlessly from Fighting to Outer Lion Seal. A golden bell shield bloomed around him.
BOONG!
The collision blasted her backward. She spiraled through the air. He stumbled too, boots carving deep furrows into the earth.
She burst into a whirl of petals, then reformed above him. In one breath, her hand snapped into a blade-form. She slashed.
Her chi surged, this time forming a gleaming peach-blossom blade, elegant and deadly.
It was the same technique that once wounded the chief of Phù Trúc. Within Floral Valley, only the Ten Thousand Blooms Dreamstrike Heaven Splitter surpassed it. She'd held back her twin bells this time, but it was still fatal.
Little Tathāgata countered instantly with the Warrior's Seal. Chi gathered into a six-section monk's staff crowned by eighty-one golden rings.
Blade met staff.
Both shattered.
"Night's falling. That's enough."
The deaf blacksmith finally spoke.
The fight was over, a draw.
Tô Mạc Tà clicked her tongue, but jogged back to the fire and plopped beside Lạc Trần.
He tried to console her:"You didn't even use your Armour of the Awakened, or the bell artifacts. Or what's it called... eh... Floral Valley Bloomblaster?"
"It's Ten Thousand Blooms Dreamstrike Heaven Splitter!"
"Right, that. 'Heaven Splitter,' sure. 'Ten Thousand Blooms,' very poetic. But 'Dreamstrike'? You sect folks just mash words together for style points?"
"Oh? You figured it out? Little Tathāgata, are you secretly a Floral Valley spy sent to infiltrate the Pagoda of Inner Peace?"
"What!? No, wait, is that even real!?"
"Of course not! Bald cockroach, all that chanting's cooked your brain. Call me 'big breasts, small brain' again and I'll split your head like a melon!"
She stuck out her tongue and tilted her head with exaggerated sass.
"You...!"
The monk flushed bright red.
"Brother Lạc," he said, trying to sound measured, "not to be rude, but your perspective's skewed. I didn't use the Armour of the Awakened either, or any final seals from the Pagoda. I didn't even use an artifact. How can you say Saintess Tô had the upper hand?"
"Bald cockroach," Tô Mạc Tà chimed in, "are you asking for a rematch? This time, full arsenal?"
"You think I'm scared!?"
Watching the two square off again, Lạc Trần gave a weary cough.
"Wait. Little Tathāgata... you really broke through five hundred Chi Pearls?"
The monk looked away, coughing.
"Let's just say... fate plays strange games."
Tô Mạc Tà grinned like a cat catching a mouse:
"He got tangled in a gourd patch all night, and boom, five hundred Chi Pearls. Brother Lạc, I'm telling you: this monk's a full-blown masochist. Best stay a few arm-lengths away."
"You—!"
"Bald cockroach."
"Crazy hag."
"Bald dwarf."
"Big-chested dimwit—!"
...
The insults flew fast and furious.
Lạc Trần chuckled softly.
"You two bicker like an old married couple. Wait... don't tell me, you actually like each other?"
The silence that followed hit like a rock through glass.
They sprang apart as if burned.
"Brother Lạc!" the monk sputtered, hands raised in alarm. "I may have taken vows young, but I still have standards! Even if I did leave the order, I'd never stoop so low. She's yours if you want her! Heavens forbid!"
Tô Mạc Tà burst into giggles.
"Brother Lạc, I crossed the Dry Sea to find you, and you think I'm into that cockroach? Please. Besides... he's already taken."
"Taken!? I'm a monk!"
"Stop acting! Some poor girl crossed oceans and mountains from Uttarakurudvīpa just to chase you down."
And so the argument rolled on, bouncing between barbs and denials, rising in pitch as the stars came out.
Eventually, Lạc Trần gave up and stuffed his ears with cloth.
That night, the ruined temple slept peacefully.
---The separator line took a sick note---
By morning, the journey resumed.
The mountain path clawed upward, narrow, broken, flanked by blackened trees like bony fingers. Sunlight bled through thin clouds. White bones littered the trail, picked clean by time. The deaf blacksmith marched at the front, Lạc Trần on his back. The monk and the Saintess followed at a jog to keep up.
Two hours in...
A nightmare surfaced.
Dust veiled the horizon. A dozen armored riders cracked whips over a shuffling line of captives, over a hundred, bruised, bloodied, barely clothed. Some limped. Some crawled. Children shielded the elderly. Mothers carried silent infants, their eyes hollow.
Blood steamed in the sunlight. Each lash fell with a sickening crack.
These weren't prisoners.
They were Penitents.
The riders spotted the trio ahead. One murmured something, broke formation, and galloped toward them.
Crack!
His whip snapped through the air.
"White Elephant sacred kingdom is culling two-legged cattle! Outsiders, stay out of it, or bleed!"
Tô Mạc Tà narrowed her eyes. The Little Tathāgata stepped forward, frowning.
"The White Elephant kingdom is still rounding up Penitents out here? I thought they were at war with Crimson Tide kingdom by now."
Lạc Trần asked calmly, "Are you sure they're from the White Elephant kingdom?"
"Almost certain," the monk replied, gaze steady. "The armor's their standard make. Mass-produced. Crude. But distinct."
He didn't hesitate. His knowledge was precise, clearly gathered before leaving the Pagoda of Inner Peace.
Tô Mạc Tà murmured beside him:
"Brother Lạc... do we step in?"
His eyes never left the approaching rider.
"Quick and quiet. There may be adepts in the rear."
The Little Tathāgata pressed his palms together.
"Amitābha. Brother Lạc's compassion befits a true abbot. I am but a humble novice."
Even as the words left his lips, he was already moving.
In a flash, he appeared before the riders. One hand rose, chi surged forth, golden and deafening. A massive bell of light took shape and crashed down, trapping horses and men beneath its shimmering weight.
Chaos broke loose.
Screams, hooves, iron striking golden light, none of it made a dent.
The chi bell held firm, unshaken.
The monk allowed himself a small smile. With a twist of his waist, he coiled power into his fist, then let it fly.
BOONG!
The bell rang like a mountain splitting. Horses collapsed mid-scream. Riders flew backward like ragdolls, armor clattering across the rocks.
Elsewhere, the lone outrider never saw the strike that felled him—Tô Mạc Tà had moved like a whisper, and he dropped without a sound.
The world stilled.
The captives stood frozen, faces cracked by dirt and dried blood, eyes scorched by sun and disbelief.
Then one dropped to their knees.
Followed by another. And another.
"Please… spare the children."
"Let the little ones go… they don't deserve the life of a slave."
Tears fell, silent and salt-stained, vanishing into blood-soaked sand.