Hou Jingshu threw her hair pin the moment Wu Yong and Zheng Yawen dropped from their perches. She expected her hair pin to pierce her target’s neck, but the man she aimed for must have had an incredible sense for danger. He swung his cutlass and knocked her projectile out of the sky.

Wu Yong and Zheng Yawen were both similarly blocked.

Wu Yong had swung his sash and tried to wrap it around his opponent’s throat. His sash was a low-grade profound spirit weapon. By channeling chi through the weapon, he could make it harder than diamonds, and yet it remained as flexible as if it were cloth. Unfortunately, the pirate knocked the weapon aside with a blast of chi from his fist.

Zheng Yawen flew toward her opponent, her dagger aimed at his skull, but the pirate stepped aside and avoided her. She had crouched low to lessen the impact on her knees. Her foe used that moment to swing his sword at her, forcing the woman on the defensive.

“There are you are, girly!” The man she had attempted to kill grinned up at her. “My, my. Here we were going to tell our boss about you so he could kidnap you, but lo and behold, you’ve come to us. Do you want to be taken by our merry little band that badly?”

“Hmph! Don’t delude yourself!”

Hou Jingshu stood up. The bun on her head had come undone, allowing her long hair to descend to her lower back. She held out a hand and summoned another weapon into it.

The weapon in her hand was long and gleamed by liquid silver. Attached to one end was a sharp spear. The other side ended in a simple pommel. Seven lines divided the weapon into seven parts, and a roaring dragon danced from one end to the other. She spun the spear in her grip before launching herself at the man.

“Looks like you’ve got quite the treasure on you! I’ll be taking that for myself--after I’ve claimed you!” The man laughed as he blocked her attack with his cutlass. Sparks flew as she threw herself backward. She landed on the ground and skipped backward several times as the man swung at her. “You’re quite quick to run away! Are you scared?!”

Hou Jingshu ignored the man’s taunts as she analyzed his strength.

He’s only at the fourth subrealm of the Anima Realm. That means he is weaker than me. But he also has a lot more experience.

While power was important, experience held just as much importance in battle. An experienced warrior could fend off someone stronger than themselves if the person they were fighting was inexperienced.

Hou Jingshu had not been in battle for a long time. She had sparred with subordinates and trained hard, but she had not fought for her life in several years. This pirate, on the other hand, likely spent every day on the razer’s edge. He lived alongside death like it was an old comrade. That experience gave him a slight edge over her.

“Hmph! Stop acting so arrogant!” Hou Jingshu shouted as she gathered chi into the tip of her spear. She thrust the spear forward, releasing a bright blue projectile of energy. It had no shape at first, but it soon take the shape of a roaring dragon.

“What in the seven hells?!” The pirate shouted as he threw himself to the ground.

Her attack continued past him. It slammed into a tree, broke through the tree, then struck a boulder and exploded, sending rock fragments everywhere.

Hou Jingshu pushed off the ground and rushed forward, unwilling to let this opportunity escape. The pirate scrambled to his feet and raised his cutlass to block her swing. The clanging of blades echoed through the forest as Hou Jingshu flowed into several spear forms that pushed her foe back.

“D-dammit! How are you! So strong?!” The pirate asked with a snarl.

Hou Jingshu’s glare was cold. “You don’t need to know that. You’re about to die soon.”

“Fuck!”

The pirate screamed when, after blocking her latest attack, Hou Jingshu channeled chi into her spear. The seven segments detached, revealing they were connected with a long chain. Like a whip, the spear struck fast and hard. While the pirate was able to avoid having his trachea cut--her target--he could not escape uninjured. He cursed and wiped off the blood on his cheek.

“You little bitch! I’m going to make you pay for that! Since you have decided to court death, I will gladly grant your wish!”

Hou Jingshu snorted. “You do not have the power to kill me.”

Even though she was standing outside of her attack range, Hou Jingshu thrust her spears forward. The segments once against came undone. Hou Jingshu used her chi to control the chains, extending her reach to attack the pirate, who swore like a beached sailor as he defended her assault with his cutlass.

While the man was defending himself against her, Hou Jingshu sought out her hair pins, which lay on the ground not far from their battle. She swung her spear again. The segments attacked like a snake, forcing the pirate back. They also forced his attention away from the hair pins, which suddenly rose from the ground, surrounded by chi.

Splitting her attention two ways was a hard task, but Hou Jingshu had practiced this until it became second nature. She directed the hair pin behind the man. Then she waited. Only when the man was so fully focused on her spear did she direct the hair pin to shoot for the man’s back.

“Don’t think you can trick me!!”

Hou Jingshu clicked her tongue when the man spun around and slashed her hair pin out of the air, but she didn’t let her surprise stop her. She burst forward far faster than she had before. The ground beneath her feet cracked as the spear segments reattached. Before the man could defend himself, she thrust her spear out.

“Gurk!!!”

The pirate glanced down at the spear now buried in his chest. It had just missed his heart, but it was still a fatal wound. That attack had sliced through his ribcage and one of his arteries.

Blood spilled from the man’s mouth as he reached for the spear, but Hou Jingshu yanked it out. She looked coldly at the man as he fell backward. He was still alive, digging his fingers into the ground as he used what strength he had left to try and get up. It was no use, however. She remained there until the man’s entire body slackened and the light went out of his eyes.

She took a deep breath.

That was close. I’m clearly out of practice if I let a man like that survive for so long.

Hou Jingshu would have to increase her training, and she would have to see about getting more real-life combat experience. She could not allow herself to be weak. She had to be strong.

With her own battle won, she turned toward the other three battles taking place.

Wu Yong had already won. His opponent lay on the ground, and he was stepping on them with a smug grin as he twirled his sash. The person he fought must have been weaker than her own opponent.

Yin Wuhan was in the process of beating his enemy. He did not have a weapon, per say, unless you counted his fists. He wore a pair of gauntlets, which he used to increase the power of his punches. His foe wielded a cutlass like her opponent, but it was clear he was sloppier than the one she had fought. As he swung his weapon down, Yin Wuhan sidestepped, raised an arm to block the weapon with his gauntlet, then punched it.

The sword shattered.

The pirate was too surprised to fight back as Yin Wuhan slammed a fist into his throat, crushing his lungs in one go. It was a death blow. The pirate fell to the ground in a heap and raised his hands to his throat as rasping sounds erupted from his mouth. He tried to breath but couldn’t. He would suffocate to death before long.

Both Wu Yong and Yin Wuhan were very straightforward fighters. They relied on their physical strength to deal their enemies damage.

Zheng Yawen alone was different.

Hou Jingshu turned in time to see the woman dance out of her opponent’s attack range, dart back in, and swing her blade with unerring accuracy. Her attack sliced through the flesh on his arm with ease. The man screamed, but he didn’t stop attacking. He swung again. Again, Zheng Yawen dodged and struck her enemy in the same place as last time.

Zheng Yawen did not have the physical strength of Yin Wuhan or Wu Yong, but she was much faster and had better accuracy. Her fighting style relied on attacking the same place over and over again to accumulate damage.

It wasn’t long before her attack had cut through so much flesh that the man’s femur was visible. Once it was, Zheng Yawen grabbed the offending limb, reversed the grip on her dagger, and impaled it into the man’s bone. A loud cracking sound echoed around them as the bone shattered. The forearm had already been cut through to the bone, and without the bone keeping it in place, it fell to the ground.

“Ahhh?! Ahhhhhhh!”

The pirate screamed and stumbled back, gripping his arm. Zheng Yawen darted forward, swung her dagger, and opened a cut in his throat. Blood flowed like a river. It splattered against the ground. The pirate fell onto his knees, one hand and one stump reaching out to his throat, then pitched forward.

“It looks like that’s the last of them,” Yin Wuhan said, clapping his hands.

Hou Jingshu frowned. “No. There should have been five pirates, but I only see four bodies.”

Wu Yong, Yin Wuhan, and Zheng Yawen looked around to see that she was correct. There should have been one more person, but he wasn’t here.

“Shit,” muttered Wu Yong.

“Let’s see if we can find him. We might still be able to catch up if we hurry,” said Zheng Yawen.

They raced through the forest and eventually burst onto the beach. However, the man they had been chasing after was already gone. Hou Jingshu could just barely make out his rowboat in the distance, and it was getting smaller the longer she stared.

“It looks like… we were too late,” she said with a sigh.

“He’s no doubt going to inform his captain about what happened. We’ll be in for a battle at sea,” Zheng Yawen added.

“What should we do now, your highness?” asked Yin Wuhan.

Hou Jingshu thought for a moment, but it wasn’t like thinking for long would help. There was really only one thing they could do.

“We cannot afford to retreat, which means all we can do is press on. If possible, I would like to get some information on the pirates before we head out to sea. It would be good if we could get an idea as to their numbers, at the very least. If not that, then I would at least like to know how powerful their captain is. Even just knowing what type of ship they sail in would let us get a rough estimate of their forces.”

The number of forces at a pirate’s disposal could vary greatly depending on the type of craft they used. A galley would carry less than a junk, and even among junks, they varied in size. Large ships could carry between five hundred and six hundred men, while second class ships could carry two to three hundred. But what if they only had a quanzhou? Those could only carry between fifty and a hundred.

Zheng Yawen nodded. “Let’s return to the inn. It’s late, and we need to get some rest if we’re going to be ready for battle. We’ll go visit the captain we booked passage with tomorrow and see if he knows anything.”

Hou Jingshu agreed, and the four of them returned to their inn several hours before the sun began to rise.