Bai li yue opened her eyes and reoriented herself. She was far away from the ongoing battle. It was a massacre and the Undefeated blades were on the losing side. 

She had pretended to suffer a sprained ankle and had called a halt to heal up. They others had been impatient, but their orders were to keep her away from the mission. As long as she wasn't running back to the others, they considered their mission a success. 

Bai li yue had checked the array on her unwitting mole at the main camp in the morning. The company was making its way to the flood dragon's den. In the afternoon, when she checked in again, the scene shocked her. She witnessed only devastation. The undefeated blades had been defeated.

The fight was still ongoing but it was only a matter of time before the bell tolled for all those involved. Gu ding was fighting like a crazed man. The flood dragon's icy breath caught him in the arm. It was frozen solid in a single breath. Driven half mad by desperation and grief for his lost brother's he chopped off the arm at the elbow. 

'I won't give up until you give up! I won't die until you die! I refuse to die and render my brothers' sacrifice a waste!'

He hacked and slashed at the flood dragon with his remaining arm. Li yun wasn't faring any better than the bloodied flood dragon. All in all, the beast was in a better condition than both of them combined.

It roared again. 

'You will all die here!' 

The guttural voice hinting at the suffering to come.

Sitting on a flat rock, resting, Bai li yue didn't feel any sympathy for either Li yun or Gu ding. They had brought this catastrophe on themselves and their men. Underestimating the difficulty of the mission wasn't a crime, but they had overestimated their capabilities. Instead of retreating, they had sent their men to their deaths because of desperation. 

This is a cruel and unforgiving world. I'm sure they aren't the first or the last to be pushed to such lengths. Cultivators were also people in the end. And people were the same in all worlds. They were capable of all manner of deeds when faced with hardship. Li yun and Gu ding chose to face it with this hair brain idea. Fifteen people- no fourteen- no only twelve of them had gone to face off against the flood dragon because three men were posted at her side. Killing the savage beast with fifteen men had been an impossibility then. With twelve men, it was a fool's errand.  

Sigh.

The undefeated blades were still there fighting. They weren't her favorite people and here she was: watching their demise. Bai li yue glanced at the three men who had no idea that their friends were in peril. She couldn't pretend to preside over whether they deserved to live or die. But if she stayed silent and left those men to die when she could help in some way, then she'd never forgive herself. It was true that she'd almost killed the sect leader of the Purple wind sect. That act brought many questions to her mind. Her belief in her inherent goodness was a topic of debate. But she had her answer now. She still didn't know what happened with the attempted murder of the sect leader but she knew the kind of person she was. Her heart wasn't made of stone.

 

Her group were now about thirty miles away from the battle. If she could make it even halfway to them, there might be a way to save the remaining survivors. 

The present problem was convincing the guards to believe her so they could save the others. 

'No harm in trying. If they don't listen, i can always find another solution.'

She stood up a scant fifty breaths after sitting down to heal her ankle. The others followed suit ready to continue their journey. But she stopped them.

'We have to go back now.'

'Are you disobeying orders, adventurer?' 

Da mou, the leader questioned her.

'I don't know whether the bone cave or the fruit exists, but the farce is over. Right now i don't care. Your men are in danger.'

Swords appeared in the hands the minute she spoke about danger.

'Do you admit that you are a spy?'

'Are you listening to me? Your company is in danger. You grossly underestimated the flood dragon.'

'So you reveal your true face. How did you discover the real mission? Kill her to prevent the news from spreading.' 

Da mou ordered as they tightened the circle around her.

'Are you listening to me?'

Why was she even bothering reasoning with them? Every minute she spent on them was time she could put to good use. 

'I'm going to help. Follow me if you want.' With a swish of her sleeves she flew into the air and raced in the direction they came from. The three men gave chase. A dagger cut through the air aimed at her back. She deftly dodged to the side and activated her movement skill. The fact that they ran instead of flew meant that there was no actual chase. They fell behind after a few miles. 

Her movement skill was working to the fullest. She found herself returning to that period of her life when she had a prime objective: reach the Thousand bamboo immortal sect. She moved from tree to tree without rest until she reached the hilltop from the previous night. Barely an hour had passed since she left her guards. She took a quick peek at the array and turned grim. The long distance arrow was weak. If only she had the sun killing bow, she'd be more confident with her one chance. Was she going to attempt a shot from here and risk the possibility of failure or press forward? She decided to press on. 

Gu ding wasn't doing well, but he had entered into a berserk rage that made him almost impervious to damage. He could hold on until she got into position. She ignored a tribe of monkeys that chattered in anger at her intrusion on their territory. They had taken care to avoid the monkeys yesterday, but she didn't have the leisure of a detour in this time of crisis. The monkeys screamed like unhappy children when she ignored them and instead headed for a giant tree. The ash wood bow appeared in her hand and she selected one of the arrows. She had spent time casting different arrays on the shafts and arrow heads hoping to mimic the arrows of the sun killing bow; never knowing they would be of use. She drew back the bow string and focused the eyes further. Soon, the flood dragon became clear, but she needed to discern its form more clearly to land a shot that counted. 

I have to get closer. 

The next time she focused her eyes, she bit her lip in concentration. She drew back the bow string to the limit and let it fly. 

Li yun was in despair. His men were shattered pieces of frozen flesh strewn across the clearing. The few survivors had withdrawn to a safe distance; most of them too badly injured from the cold to be of any use.

'Gu ding, we have to leave! Now! Before it's too late!' 

He tried urging his friend to fall back. At least, if there was life, there was hope, but Gu ding was past caring. He had staked his life on the success of this mission. He was still fighting the savage beast like a crazed monster. The hand axe struck the flood dragon in the eye, blinding it. It let out a tremendous roar and focused its fury on the origin of its pain.

'Gu ding!' 

Gu ding stumbled back to catch his breath while the flood dragon roared and writhed in pain. The shout roused him briefly out of his bloodlust.

'This is the end for me, Li yun. You know this mission is all i have left now. I led my brothers to their deaths. If i can't win, then i'd rather die here like a brave man. You should leave. The men need you alive. I'll cover your retreat.'

'None shall leave here alive!' 

The flood dragon roared as it focused on Gu ding with its one good eye. It reared back and slammed into Gu ding. He was too slow in dodging the attack and tumbled backward leaving a bloody trench in his wake. It reared back to attack again with its jaws open when

Thwack!

An arrow flashed through the air. It flew into the flood dragon's open maw and embedded itself in the back of its throat. The pain was a negligible pinch in the grand scale of things, that is until the arrow drilled through flesh and muscle and exited out the back of the creature's neck. Bits of flesh and blood rained down on the ground as the flood dragon roared in pain. 

'Huh?'

Li yun didn't know who was lending them a hand. He was only glad his friend hadn't died crushed between the jaws of the cruel tyrant.

'Nooo!' 

Gu ding, more than half out of his mind, bellowed when another arrow struck the other eye. The new arrow crackled with blue lightning and sank deep into the eye. 

Boom!

The arrowhead exploded and the flood dragon's roar was cut short as it fell back halfway into the water, its massive body twitching as lightning streaked across it. A final arrow landed in the eye that had been destroyed by Gu ding's handaxe. It drilled through the eye and came out the back of the skull covered in pulverised brain matter. 

Blessed silence fell on the pond once more. Gu ding fell to his knees in desolation. Li yun felt all his strength disappear as relief swamped him. The few men left cheered weakly from the back. 

Thirty minutes later, Bai li yue landed on the frozen field. She was breathing heavily from exerting the bulk of her energy on the three shots. She walked past a shocked li yun to retrieve the two remaining arrows from the corpse. The drilling arrows were intact but no longer sharp. As for the lightning arrow, it had served its purpose and wonderfully too. This was her first time using a bow in a fight. The heady excitement felt foreign.

'I feel strange because this is my first time using a bow.'

The ash wood bow didn't play an important role. It could have been any bow. The kill could be attributed to the arrows. They were in truth makeshift imitation arrows. The real deal was the sun killing bow and the ten special arrows. Temptation hit her out of nowhere. She could abandon the sword and take up the bow. An image took shape in her mind. She was standing atop a mountain dressed in a red robe and holding the sun killing bow as she gazed at the city at the foot of the mountain. 

Bai li yue shook her head at the vivid imagery and stuck her hand into the flood dragon's head to retrieve an arrow. 

She suffered a bit before successfully prying one arrow loose from the flood dragon's head. She found the other lying at the other end of the pond and washed them in the cold water.