The next day, Yang Kai was startled awake by a knocking at the door.
After scrambling up and opening it, he found no one outside. However, in the distance, a familiar figure was quickly running away.
Li Yuntian's silhouette!
What was this guy up to? Yang Kai was bewildered. Just as he was puzzling over it, he noticed a letter lying on the ground by the doorstep. He bent down, picked it up, and opened it. The moment he read it, Yang Kai didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
There were words on the letter, written in blood.
"Dear Senior Brother, it has been many days since we last met, and this Junior Brother misses you greatly. I cordially invite you to the Black Wind Forest for a chat — I hope you won't be so unkind as to refuse! Written by hand, Su Mu."
The characters were a vivid crimson, unmistakably penned in blood. Though whether it was chicken blood or something else, Yang Kai had no idea. He doubted Su Mu would go so far as to harm himself.
Below that was another line, and unlike the flowery language above, these words were crude and direct.
"If you've got the guts, come!"
These four characters were written with tremendous force, the brushstrokes carrying a bone-deep resentment and brimming with provocation.
Yang Kai figured that Su Mu was afraid his invitation would be ignored, so he'd tacked on that little addendum. Young men were most susceptible to goading — Su Mu had experienced that firsthand countless times. Having been through it so often, he'd practically become an expert.
Clutching this blood-written challenge letter in his hand, Yang Kai slowly shook his head.
He didn't take Su Mu's provocation to heart. Perhaps Su Mu truly harbored a grudge, but Yang Kai wouldn't stoop to that level. They were different in temperament, different in perspective. This sort of petty squabble — Yang Kai would treat it as a whetstone to test the fruits of his training.
Though his first encounter with Su Mu had been unpleasant, and the man had come looking for trouble several times since, these days of contact had shown Yang Kai that Su Mu wasn't fundamentally a bad person. He was just a spoiled brat.
If you befriended someone like that, he'd treat you well in return. But if you crossed him, he'd cling to you like a tick burrowed in bone, pestering you until you couldn't stand it.
Su Mu and his bunch hadn't been seen for days — they'd clearly been hiding from him. Now, for some reason, they'd regained their confidence that they could beat him, so they'd shown up with a challenge letter.
Yang Kai had initially had no intention of bothering with Su Mu. But while sweeping the floor, he thought it over carefully and decided to go.
Su Mu was undeniably a petty schemer. Rather than challenge him through proper sect channels, he'd sent a personal challenge letter. He was almost certainly planning to gang up on him.
The chosen location said it all. The Black Wind Forest sat at the base of Black Wind Mountain — a pine grove, the perfect place for dirty tricks and ambushes.
Their group, while not small in number, only had Su Mu himself at Body Tempering Stage Nine. Li Yuntian was at Stage Seven, and the rest were all at Stage Five or Six. Yang Kai wasn't sure whether he could handle such opponents, but he needed a real fight — not some friendly sparring match — to put his training to the test.
Right now, Su Mu and his crew were waiting along the only path from Lingxiao Pavilion to the Black Wind Forest. The group wasn't hiding in ambush — they were just standing there, chests puffed out, looking bold and defiant.
Su Mu's face darkened as he recalled the humiliating incident a few nights ago when they'd been ambushed in the dark and left sprawled unconscious. He still had no idea what had happened that night. The brothers who'd gone to Yang Kai's hut had simply dropped unconscious, all of it happening so inexplicably.
They hadn't woken until the next morning. Though it was summer and sleeping outdoors wouldn't normally leave you cold, the mosquitoes were another matter entirely. When they came to, every single one of them had hundreds of bloated welts on their bodies, having lost who knew how much blood to the insects.
For days afterward, Su Mu and his group had been bedridden, weakened beyond measure.