I heave a sigh and I ask him;
"So what do you want?"
"Well, why don’t we start with this." He says as he pulls out a little gourd from his storage ring.
Using Ki, he pulls out one of the contents of the gourd.
"What the... how did this fucker get his hands on these!?" I scream in my head.
This bastard pulled out a blood worm.
It is a level one Spiritual Beast.
It was a worm like organism which attaches to its host after ingestion.
It is bred by the blood and Ki of the owner in the gourd.
It would be completely harmless for an entire month after attaching to a host.
But at the end of the month, if the host does not receive the blood or the Ki of the owner, it would begin to suck dry its host painfully until the host dies.
Within the gourd there is always a Queen Worm.
This worm is either ingested by the owner or a pact is formed between them, letting the owner control all other worms within their hosts.
The blood worm and the owner are thereby connected through a link, so the owner can cause the worm to inflict intense pain on its host.
It is literally a slave branding.
How did he get something like that.
This was mostly used in the Heavenly Demon Cult.
Does he have contact with them?
I guess I’ll need to find that out.
"What is that?" I ask Ximen Jong, feigning ignorance.
"Hmmmm, well this is known as a blood worm, I cannot begin to explain how it works but, you will need to take this in." Ximen Jong says.
"What!? I should eat that?" I ask with a puzzled face.
"Not eat! Just swallow, consider it another form of insurance." Ximen Jong states.
There’s no way I’m taking in that stuff, I’ll literally become his slave for life.
If it was the poison centipede, similar to this blood worm but rather than sucking the blood and Ki of the host when not attended to, it secretes poison.
If it was that I might have taken it in, but this?
There’s no going back for me if I take that.
"I don’t think I want to take that." I say to Ximen Jong.
He looks at me and begins laughing.
He comes to a stop and looks back at me.
"You speak like you have a choice." He says as he snaps his fingers again.
As I heard him snap, I immediately began trying to figure out where the next arrow was going to come from.
I felt it, killing intent, behind Ximen Jong.
I dash before the children trying to catch the arrow.
I reach there in time but as soon as I caught the arrow I felt another killing intent behind me.
"Fuck! I’m too late." I thought to myself as I tried to turn.
As I turn I felt the arrow lodging itself into my thigh.
I was relieved the arrow wasn’t aimed at any of the children.
I pull out the arrow and throw it to the ground.
Ok, I really need to figure out what to do.
"I don’t want it to be Ximen Yeong, we are brothers, are we not? so why not just let us come together." He says to me.
I think I know what I have to do.
It’s risky but, I have to try every possible method to get this children out of here safely.
"Fine I’ll...ugh! what?" I exclaim as I drop to my knees.
"What did you do?" I ask him as I look up at him.
"Ohh, seems the poison is kicking in." He responds.
"Just take it as another insurance of mine." He says as he began walking towards me.
He stood before me, looking down at me.
Same kind of situation as his younger brother, Ximen Lao.
"I was waiting for the poison to kick in." He says.
He suddenly throws a kick at me.
He hits me and I fall to the ground.
Weak! but I had to act like I was in pain.
"This isn’t what you spoke about Ximen Jong." I say to him as if lamenting.
"Well, things happen, but do not worry, I’m not going to kill you." He says as he continued kicking me.
As he kicks me I observe and try to pinpoint the exact position of every single Early and Late Peaks up in the trees.
His kicks were too weak, compared to how my Master hits me, this is like patting my back.
As I thought about this, a memory of my Master fell in.
A little smile crept up my face.
Wait, this is not the time!
I then began looking over at the Martial Master and the huge spiritual beast.
A beast such as that would not easily let down it’s guard until it’s prey is truly down.
I was waiting for him to let his guard down a bit.
After a while of Ximen Jong kicking me I see it.
The Martial Master dude lowered his great sword from his shoulder and looked away for just a second.
But I had to take it.
Ximen Jong was about to land another hit.
I activated both the Heavenly Demon Technique and the Phantom Technique.
My eyes glowed red, my hair turned red from their tips, I became surrounded by dark fog, all in an instant.
With a left punch, I break the leg Ximen Jong was about to use to hit me and with my right hand I threw one of my daggers towards the Martial Master.
He catches it of course, but it was never meant to hit him.
Before catching it I was already dashing towards him.
As he caught it I slid by him slicing his side abdomen with my sword.
Fuck! I wanted to slice him deeper but at that moment he tilted his body.