Li Qingshan stood up and shrugged. He lifted his right foot, about to step down on the bald head.
“Please give me a moment, my king,” said Tie Xiong.
“A moment for what?”
“The Suffering Subduing monk has spent a life preaching benevolence. He’s not just a renowned senior of the martial arts community. He also holds a supreme status in the hearts of all buddhist disciples. If you kill him here, it’ll probably make even more enemies for the World’s society.”
“Are you saying that he can kill me, but I can’t kill him?”
Li Qingshan’s face sank slightly, which covered Tie Xiong in cold sweat.
Tie Xiong said reluctantly, “Who can stop the king in his domination? However, killing him brings no benefit, so why kill him at all? I can try and persuade the master again. He might change his mind after a few days.”
“Alright, in consideration of the fact that he’s spent a life preaching benevolence, I’ll give you four days. By then, if he still refuses to change his mind, I’ll kill him even if all the buddhist disciples in the world are standing in front of me!”
Li Qingshan pulled back his foot, and Tie Xiong eased up. He helped up the Suffering Subduing abbot in a hurry and channelled true qi into him to heal him. The Suffering Subduing abbot nodded his head in thanks.
Li Qingshan let them be. It was impossible for him to recover from his wounds in a few days. Since the monk still wanted to live, it was not impossible for him to change his mind. Then he turned to the leader of the Abstruse temple. “Your turn.”
The leader of the Abstruse temple was quite injured and reeked of a charred smell. The backlash from the lightning had not been light on him. Before he came, he was already aware that this battle would end in defeat, but he never expected to lose in such a horrible manner.
Li Qingshan asked Hu Xian’er, “What’s the beauty of the Abstruse temple called?”
“Yang Miaozhen, but she’s also known as fairy Miaozhen. Aren’t I enough?” Hu Xian’er lowered her head and grumbled in a flirtatious manner.
“Heh, save it. We haven’t even known each other for an hour, so what’re you acting smitten for? Of course, you aren’t enough. I’m trying to gather all ten beauties of the world. Speaking of which, you’re not even one of the Ten Great Beauties of the World yet, so just stay out of my way!”
Li Qingshan did not sound like he was going after beauties. Instead, he was more like a child stubbornly trying to collect a set of cards, and he was not attached at all to Hu Xian’er who never belonged to the set in the first place.
Hu Xian’er pouted. What a strange person!
Li Qingshan said to the leader of the Abstruse temple, “Ox nose, offer up Yang Miaozhen in exchange for your life!”
“Demon, keep dreaming!” the leader of the Abstruse temple said. Li Qingshan immediately lifted his foot and pointed at Tie Xiong. “You shut up!”
Tie Xiong was about to speak up to try and convince him otherwise. Now, he could only remain silent.
“Look at how clever the master beside you was, saying nothing at all. All those who drown are people who know how to swim, while all those who are beaten to death are mouthy and defiant! Time for you to die!”
“Hero king, I’m right here, so please spare him!”
A female daoist priest with a special head ornament walked in from outside. She was completely calm with a tall and slender stature. She wore no makeup at all, and her footsteps were graceful like those of a crane’s. She seemed extremely elegant.
“Oh, another one!”
Li Qingshan smiled. In less than two days, he had already obtained three of the ten beauties. He had been making rapid progress.
Yang Miaozhen climbed up the stairs step by step in a completely composed manner. She bowed towards Li Qingshan and the leader of the Abstruse temple individually as if she could not see the leader of the Abstruse temple’s horrible state at all.
“Alright, so you’ve come in exchange for the ox nose’s life!” Li Qingshan questioned.
“Miaozhen, you must not! I’d rather die than that!” the leader of the Abstruse temple said.
Yang Miaozhen shook her head gently. “I haven’t!”
“Then you’ve come to collect his corpse!”
“Not that either. I want to play a match with the king.”
“Chess?”
“The Myriad Flower pavilion is a place of graceful interests. Lady Hu Xian’er and I often compete in zither, chess, calligraphy, and painting here. It would be difficult to determine who is better when it comes to zither, chess, and calligraphy, so all we can do is clash on the chessboard. If I am victorious, please release him immediately. If I am defeated, then I will belong to you from here on out, without any regrets.”
Yang Miaozhen remained calm and indifferent regardless of what she mentioned, even when it was her own fate.
Li Qingshan said, “As long as I reach out, do you think you can still escape? Why should I play chess?”
“It’s easy to overwhelm people by force, but it’s difficult to win people over by virtue. I heard the king go on about his great cause outside earlier, which filled me with admiration, almost tempted to join you. However, all of my cultivation comes from the Abstruse temple, so how can I just leave like that? I have to do something for the temple at the very least. I’m sure you are a man of virtue, and you won’t disappoint me. If you aren’t familiar with chess, you’re welcome to have lady Hu Xian’er take your place. She possesses renown when it comes to chess.” Yang Miaozhen explained patiently in a confident and humble manner. However, her behaviour only aroused a greater masculine desire to conquer her.
Li Qingshan smiled. “You sure know how to talk. If I win against you, I probably won’t kill anyone because I’ll be in a good mood, so you save this ox nose’s life regardless of the outcome, and you’ve even earned yourself a chance at victory.”
“Your wit far surpasses mine. Your ability with chess must be beyond mine as well.”
Hu Xian’er said softly, “Be careful, my king. My ability with ches…”
Li Qingshan finished off all the alcohol in his jug first before sweeping aside everything on the table. “Bring a chess board!”
A while later, the maidservant in green carried a chessboard over. She threw herself into Hu Xian’er’s arms. “Big sister!”
“This is your younger sister?” Li Qingshan asked.
“Yes, my king.”
“What’s her name?”
“Hu Ling’er.”
“Take good care of her. If I accidentally kill a beauty, at least I have a backup.”
Yang Miaozhen’s eyes rippled, and Li Qingshan sneered inside. She was not as composed as she seemed on the surface!
The two of them sat before each other. Originally, they were supposed to guess the colour of the piece to determine who went first. Yang Miaozhen said, “Your ability with chess must be absolutely exceptional, so could I be permitted to move first and take black?”
“Whatever you want! I haven’t played a lot before, but it’s more than enough to win against you.”
The leader of the Abstruse temple lay on the ground and sneered inside. What bold words, demon! You have no idea just how great Miaozhen is at chess!
Chess was different from martial arts. It placed an extremely great emphasis on talent and disposition. Yang Miaozhen naturally preferred being alone. She had no interest in martial arts. The only thing she had apart from cultivation was playing chess, which she was almost obsessed with. When she was thirteen, she defeated the leader of the Abstruse temple. By the time she was fifteen, she had never lost again.
At this moment, a great gust of wind rushed into the parlour. A young lady arrived, directly entering the second floor through a window. She clasped her hands. “Hero king, big sister Yang, could I take part in this wager too?”
“You are?” Li Qingshan asked.
“I am Zhang Xuanfeng of the Divine Wind sect, and I also happen to be one of the ten great beauties.”
Zhang Xuanfeng had changed into a set of man’s clothes, so she radiated with a sense of valiance. However, she felt extremely wry inside. She had not come willingly.
A moment earlier, she had tried to flee from the city, to get as far from Li Qingshan as possible, only to be caught in the act by Zhang Yuntian. Afterwards, she was sent here as the wager.
“Oh? What do you want in exchange then?”
Li Qingshan smiled. Everything was as easy as it could get.
“I want you to put your blade up as a wager!”
Zhang Yuntian stood on the inner city walls in the distance and gazed in the direction of the Myriad Flower parlour. From the information he had received, Li Qingshan did not possess such great power before he obtained the blade. It took him a bloody battle before he managed to take Pegasus city.
“Xuanfeng, you cannot blame me for my heartlessness. This has to do with the fate of the entire martial arts alliance. Since Li Qingshan wants to collect the Ten Great Beauties of the World, staying alive definitely won’t be too difficult with how clever you are.”
Master, I curse you to a horrible death! With a smile on her face, Zhang Xuanfeng cursed Zhang Yuntian a thousand times.
