Three men were crouching inside the forest at the eastern edge of the hilly region, looking into the distance at Huyan Jin’s camp. Under the sunlight, one side of the camp facing the sun was dyed red with the rose-tinted color of sunset, while the other side was casting lines of long shadow on the prairie. There was some kind of hard-to-describe poignant beauty, yet it also appeared particularly tender. Only it’s a pity that the owners of this camp regarded killing and looting as nothing out of the ordinary [orig. simple home-style meal], horse thieves who obliterated humanity.

Kou Zhong’s mood was cheerful due to Ba Fenghan had died but came back to life, his power exhausted but was recovered; moreover, he recovered his self confidence. Smiling, he said, “The camp only had four, five hundred men. The rest must be toiling-the-army, moving-the-crowd, treading around the grassland – looking for us. Really ridiculous to the extreme.”

Sidestepping the issue, Ba Fenghan spoke indifferently, “I lost! Ha! I finally tasted real defeat.”

Xu Ziling smiled and said, “Without this defeat, you will never beat Bi Xuan. This man’s martial art skill is really high, it already reaches snatching-the-heaven-and-the-earth, ascending-to-the-great-heights realm. Although each of the three of us has the power to stake it all, ultimately we will undoubtedly lose, and that is the final conclusion. Remember that time Qu Ao nearly seized your life, but that was precisely the turning point where you were able to defeat Qu Ao. Qu Ao’s mistake made him unable to kill you. Bi Xuan will make the same mistake.”

Ba Fenghan sighed and said, “The taste of dying and coming back to life is profoundly unforgettable. Now I can put life and death outside the Way, because I have seen death’s true identity. Because of Huan Ri Da Fa, now my old martial art foundation has evolved into a new gongfa, which I call ‘Tou Tian Da Fa’ [Great Method of Stealing the Heaven]. Henceforth the Beheading Mystery Sword is also changed to ‘Tou Tian Jian’ [Stealing the Heaven Sword], representing the brand new me.”

Kou Zhong happily said, “Stealing the Heaven is definitely much better than Beheading Mystery. After grabbing the horses back, we must see a couple of moves from you, to see how stealing–the–heaven-and-exchanging–the–sun your sword technique really is.”

Letting out a cold humph, Ba Fenghan said, “Why wait until we retrieved the steeds? When I, Ba Fenghan chop Huyan Jin’s stinky head, you will see for yourself Xiaodi’s new changes.”

Grabbing Ba Fenghan’s shoulders tightly, Kou Zhong excitedly said, “Just by looking at how after suffering a crushing defeat your confidence unexpectedly surpasses your former confidence, I know that LaoGe’s Stealing the Heaven Sword Technique is definitely not a small matter. However, confidence comes back to confidence; if you are eager to excel and force entrance into the camp, you still have to think thrice.”

Smiling, Ba Fenghan said, “Ling Shao, what do you think?”

Shrugging his shoulders, Xu Ziling said, “If we can’t win by force, we must win by wits, transforming the impossibility into possibility; it’s all in the head.”

Kou Zhong cheerfully said, “Since Ling Shao is also in favor of slaughtering the camp, how could Xiaodi not keep you company? In this battle Old Ba is in charge, the two of us will be his lackeys [orig. the foot soldier running before a carriage].”

Ba Fenghan suddenly changed the subject, saying, “When Bi Xuan knows I am not dead, I wonder what kind of blow will his confidence take?”

They were waiting for the night to come in order to raise their chance of success in evading the night guards. They were hiding near the enemy camp; hence they were in an extremely fine mood and had free time to talk about whatever they were interested in.

Xu Ziling said, “Not only he won’t be able to grasp, as well as understand, why you did not die and your power is doubled, potentially you are planting the seed of defeat in his heart. Just like Shi Zhixuan’s Bu Si Yin Fa, which is no longer without any flaw.”

Full of admiration, Kou Zhong said, “Such a penetrating thought. Therefore, we absolutely must keep Old Ba mastering the Tou Tian Da Fa in secret; we can’t let the fourth person know.”

Ba Fenghan said, “Give me a year, I will wipe away this hatred.”

And then, sweeping the camp with his gaze, he said, “Huyan Jin is no longer an ordinary horse thief; rather, because his looting continues to grow, he has turned into armed tribe able to play a critical role in the prairie. Taking advantage of this golden opportunity, we could casually wipe them out, to rid of one big trouble. As long as we can kill Huyan Jin, the men under him will not submit to anybody else, they will definitely be all split up and in pieces. Once they stumble, they will lose the vitality. Other tribes who have suffered enough from their oppression and humiliation might flock together and attack them.”

Kou Zhong’s tiger-eyes flashed with refined light, he asked, “How are we going to make our move?”

Ba Fenghan replied, “If we can find the three horses, Huyan Jin’s commander tent will be nearby. Huyan Jin’s natural disposition is crafty and paranoid; unlike Xieli, he won’t let people find out his tent position in just one glance.”

Xu Ziling felt a headache, “There are more than two hundred tents in here,” he said, “Approximately twenty tents forming one cluster, each cluster is separated by more than a thousand paces of distance, arranged in serpentine battle array, in deep conformance with the art of war. How are we going to find the three horses like panning for gold from the sand, and scout the location of Huyan Jin’s tent at the same time?”

Ba Fenghan smiled and said, “Watch me!” Sucking in some air, he let out an owl hoot-like cry, which spread far into the distance, scaring the two boys that they jumped in fright.

In response, they heard a horse neigh. Looking at the direction of the sound, they saw at the third cluster on the left end, Ba Fenghan’s beloved horse Taklamakan was raising its head high and neighing wildly. Since it was tied among a big flock of warhorses by the camp, if it did not raise its head and neigh, it would be very difficult to find its location.

Very scared and on edge, the two boys looked around. After seeing that the enemy did not care at all, Kou Zhong said, “This move is really formidable. Perhaps even when Huyan Jin arrived at the netherworld, he still did not know how we could find him.”

Xu Ziling nodded in agreement. If they could not find the location of the command tent, relying on their three men’s strength, it was indeed impossible to make their move. But now the entire situation immediately became another matter altogether.

Suddenly Kou Zhong frowned and said, “Huyan Jin hates us to the bone, can he not make the move to leave the camp to personally search for us?”

Ba Fenghan said, “Precisely because he hates us that he must stay here to preserve and nurture his spirit, to give the horses and the men a chance to have a good rest. When his men discover our track, they will send information back using either rocket or homing pigeon, and then he will immediately rush over at full speed. If we rely on our two legs to cross the mountain area without stopping to rest, by the time we reached this side, we ought to be too tired to even move!”

Kou Zhong spoke heavily, “Then let us, three brothers give him an unexpected nice surprise, I guarantee that he will never forget it for the rest of his life.”

The sun finally set, the night enveloped the earth, campfire sprang up everywhere across the camp, the aroma of roasted mutton floated to this side.

Ba Fenghan said, “Taking advantage of the time the enemy is busy eating and drinking, we will use arrow first to eliminate a few small thieves on sentry duty in the surrounding area. But each arrow must take one life, don’t let him make any noise. And then we’ll set the serpentine camp on fire; we’ll throw the burning-red bonfire wood onto the tents, to create chaos as much as possible. We then fish in troubled water by getting rid of Huyan Jin.”

Kou Zhong laughed and said, “Are you thinking of repeating old tactic?”

Ba Fenghan cheerfully said, “Using penetrating tactic to strike and scatter, using speed to control the slow, only then will the few win. Remember not to be greedy, as long as we snatch the horses back and behead Huyan Jin, then the goal of this battle is accomplished.”

Kou Zhong laughed and said, “And you don’t consider that greedy? Let’s go!”

‘Swish!’

The bowstring twanged lightly. Two powerful arrows shot out of the Extinguished Sun and Perished Moon bows, across the grassland, and pierced two enemies’ throat. Without making any noise the two men fell backward in the dark, outside the reach of the campfire.

The three men darted out; unleashing their shenfa, like a phantom they swiftly headed toward the group of tents where Huyan Jin’s tent was located.

Huyan Jin’s horse thieves’ attention was focused on plains’ side, their precaution toward this side was only perfunctory. Furthermore, who could have thought that the three were able to figure out what is true and what is false! And with their guts reaching to the sky, the three even dared to shake their nearly a thousand-man army.

Suddenly Ba Fenghan flitted forward swiftly. By the time the more than twenty horse thieves eating roast lamb by the campfire detected something unusual was happening, the Stealing the Heaven Sword already arrived. Nearly half of the men did not have time to fetch their weapon, tragically they were beheaded by Ba Fenghan, while the rest were attacked by Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling tailing closely behind Ba Fenghan so that their breathing stopped and their bodies perished.

The horse thieves in the camp were beginning to realize that they were under attack; hastily they met the enemy head-on.

Without stopping at all Kou Zhong and Ba Fenghan stormed into the camp. Xu Ziling fetched the glowing-red firewood from the campfire, and then, using the flower-rain-filling-the-sky technique he sprinkled it over the enemy camp.

Both Ba Fenghan and Kou Zhong, because Huyan Jin snatched their horses away, were having a bellyful of anger; seeing the horse thieves were flocking to meet the enemy, how could they show mercy? They swiftly pounced on them, killing everybody on their way.

“Where’s Huyan Jin?” Kou Zhong shouted sternly, “Get out and receive your death!”

His saber slashed out, fierce and severe without equal, no need to be mentioned, but the most frightening thing was the fully concentrated spiraling energy. The little leader of the bunch, who was first to arrive, was hacked that the person and the saber were lifted up from the ground and were thrown backward, his life perished on the spot.

Ba Fenghan was even more unstoppable than before, the Stealing the Heaven Sword simply swiped the enemy’s shield from below, and conveniently entered the enemy’s chest. On top of that, his leg flew, he kicked the enemy’s dead body to knock down the enemies swarming in from the rear. The enemies coming to help were thrown to the east and fumbling to the west, their troop disposition was in big chaos.

But all of a sudden the front and back, left and right, were ferocious horse thieves, their battle cry shook the heavens, swords and axes met and waited upon them, everybody’s eyes were bloodshot, they would do everything to put these two to death.

Yet Kou Zhong and Ba Fenghan remained calm and were unafraid; one saber and one sword, everywhere they went dead bodies filled the ground, dyeing the tender green spring grass red with their blood.

The chain of tents constantly caught fire. Xu Ziling launched another set of tactics; relying on lifting-up technique, one moment he leaped up the top of the tent, and the moment he bounced down, he landed on another bonfire, and kicked the burning wood onto another tent; the next moment he already soared into the air again. The moment chaos started to ensue, he set on the fire everywhere to create more disturbance. He did everything he could to make the enemy could not figure out where he was going to attack, and thus they did not know where to defend.

The flame on the tents that were set on fire earlier were blazing high, emitting great amount of thick smoke, which was carried by the wind, pervading the wide expanse of the prairie where the camp was standing, giving Xu Ziling maximum advantage as he carried out his operation. The destruction he created spread from one end of the long-snake-shaped camp to the other end. Momentarily the people shouting and the horse neighing, the horse thieves some distance away from the command tent thought a large number of enemies were coming to carry out night raids; they rushed about in panic, battered and exhausted.

Although there was a group of men chasing Xu Ziling, but there was no way to stop him.

‘Bang! Bang!’ Two enemies met his fists, spurted blood and fell to the ground.

Xu Ziling flashed toward another campfire. The ember splashed into the night sky like fireworks, and landed on top of the tents all around.

Sometimes the smoke and fire debris were thick, another time were thin, enemy and us difficult to tell. Their entire body blood-soaked, Kou Zhong and Ba Fenghan killed their way toward the command tent. Although they looked terrifying, most of the blood dyeing their body was actually from the enemies; on themselves, they only had a few skin and flesh wound. Their power was extremely high, plus they knew how to avoid the important and dwell on the trivial; even if the enemy’s blade was just about to touch their body, it would not cause any serious injury.

There was a roar ahead, Huyan Jin’s voice shouted sternly, “You are actually tired of living!”

Ba Fenghan and Kou Zhong were greatly delighted. The former shouted, “Shaoshuai go get the horses!”

The man and the sword became one, he swiftly charged ahead, totally ignoring the enemy troops coming to attack him. Everywhere he went the horse thieves fell to the east and tumbled to the west. Suddenly there was a group of men coming straight toward him. One of them had long hair, which was draped over his shoulders, his body was wrapped in jujube-red combat robe, with battle armor inside it; his waist was tied in steel rope, his facial features fierce. This was precisely Huyan Jin, the most notorious chief of Qidan horse thieves. But they did not see Liang Shidou’s son Liang Shunming.

‘Bang!

The thief blocking the way, using hard technique, met Ba Fenghan’s slashing sword head-on, but he only fell back two steps, showing his extraordinary skill.

Attacking to this point, this was the first time that someone was able to meet force with force, and yet did not sustain injuries.

Two axes and one spear attacked from left and right, so that he was unable to unleash his killer move on the hard-to-defeat enemy in front of him. Beh