The Smiling, Proud Wanderer: From the Moment He Picked Up Qu Feiyan

No warning, no nonsense.

Shen An unleashed all his inner strength, pushed off the ground with his feet, raising a small cloud of dust, and shot forward like a taut bowstring. He gripped the middle of the shovel's long handle with both hands, treating it like an extra-long heavy sword, and with a simple and direct upward "slash," the shovel head whistled through the air as it aimed straight for Zhao Da Kui's chest and abdomen!

A dragon among men for all time!

This was extremely sudden and swift, completely unexpected by Zhao Da Kui.

He never expected that his usually mild-mannered senior brother Shen would suddenly try to kill him, and with such strange weapons and techniques.

In his haste, Zhao Da Kui only had time to retreat quickly while reaching for the broadsword beside the bed. He was a skilled fighter among the outer disciples, with considerable proficiency in both fist and sword techniques.

But while he retreated quickly, Shen An advanced even faster! That upward shovel move seemed old-fashioned, but Shen An used the upward momentum of the shovel to twist his waist sharply, his arm drawing an arc in the air. The heavy shovel head drew a fierce trajectory in mid-air, accompanied by an even stronger gust of wind, and smashed down on Zhao Da Kui's head!

Although the teasing turned into smashing, he is still a legendary figure throughout history!

This is precisely the essence that Shen Anqing realized in the early morning—not to deliberately pursue the perfect connection of moves, but to follow the inertia of the weapon and cleverly guide and superimpose the power and speed of the previous strike into the next strike, forming a continuous and increasingly heavy blow!

The moment Zhao Da Kui grabbed his knife, the heavy, dark shovel head loomed before him like a mountain crashing down! He frantically raised his knife to parry, but—

"Bang!"

The broadsword was knocked out of Shen An's hand by the shovel!

The lingering power still made Zhao Da Kui's hands go numb, and he was terrified. He couldn't understand how Shen An, who was only twenty years old, could have such powerful moves. Could it be that he had been practicing martial arts since he was in the womb?

In his shock, an even deeper fear suddenly gripped him—this kid really wants to kill me!

How dare he?! Zhao Da Kui was terrified; faced with death, all his ferocity transformed into the most primal instinct for survival. His voice was distorted, almost a wail:

"You killed me without cause! How will your sect explain this?!"

Only the legendary heroes of the ages could answer him.

Looking at the overwhelming barrage of shovels, Zhao Da Kui had nowhere to retreat. He could only cross his arms and desperately block the attack while frantically circulating his internal energy, trying to withstand the blow head-on.

"Snap! Pfft!"

First came the crisp sound of a broken arm bone, followed by the dull thud of a skull being smashed by a heavy object.

The shovel head slammed solidly into Zhao Da Kui's crossed arms, easily breaking his bones. Then, with its momentum undiminished, it slammed into the top of his head! Zhao Da Kui didn't even have time to scream. He was like a watermelon hit by a hammer, instantly shrinking in size. Red and white blood splattered from his shattered skull. His body swayed and then collapsed limply to the ground.

All of this happened in the blink of an eye.

The two men who had surrounded the girl did not recover from their extreme shock until Zhao Da Kui's body fell to the ground.

The two shivered almost simultaneously, exchanged a glance, and saw the same thought in each other's eyes—run!

Brotherhood and revenge for Master Zhao—all of that becomes a joke in the face of life and death. Even a master like Master Zhao couldn't withstand a single blow; for them to go up there would be suicide!

"Split up and run!" one of them shouted hoarsely. Without daring to hesitate for a moment, and without even bothering to pick up the short knife that had fallen to the ground, he turned around and rushed towards the nearest back door of the courtyard!

The other man reacted a beat slower, but he immediately ran towards the window in the opposite direction! They both used every ounce of strength they had, wishing their parents had two more legs, just to get as far away from this scourge as possible.

After Shen An smashed Zhao Da Kui to death with his shovel, he used the enormous recoil to spin around, the shovel handle whistling through the air, and lashed out in a half-circle like an iron whip at Zhao Da Kui who was trying to run away.

The man hurriedly raised a bench to block the attack.

"Bang!"

The wooden stool shattered with a crack, and the shovel handle struck him hard in the ribs. A clear sound of bones breaking rang out, the man's eyes bulged out, blood gushed from his mouth, and he was sent flying by a tremendous force, crashing into the earthen wall before slowly sliding down, clearly beyond saving.

Shen An turned to look at the man rushing towards the window. In his desperation, the man didn't care about the tattered paper and thin wooden bars pasted on the window, and he rammed into it!

Just as his shoulder was about to slam into the window frame, Shen An moved. With a flick of his wrist and a surge of power from his waist, he hurled the heavy shovel forward like a javelin! Not thrown, but using the handle as a pivot, the shovel head drew a straight, fierce line, carrying the full force of his body and the residual momentum from killing Zhao Da Kui, like a cannonball fired, aimed straight for the man's back!

"Pfft—!"

Although the sharp edge of the shovel wasn't as sharp as a spearhead, under Shen An's terrifying force, which he channeled with his last remaining strength, it still easily tore through the man's clothes and flesh like a hot knife through butter, slamming into his vest! The enormous impact carried his body, along with the shattered window frame, out of the window!

"Ugh—!" A short, painful scream came from outside the window, followed by a dull thud as something heavy fell to the ground, and then silence.

The room fell silent instantly. Only the nauseating stench of blood remained, along with the suppressed, intermittent sobs of the young girl on the earthen bed.

Shen An stood there, holding the blood-dripping shovel, slightly out of breath. He looked at Zhao Da Kui's disfigured face on the ground, a faint trace of shock remaining.

The funeral arrangements are indeed a bit troublesome, but it doesn't matter.

No one will stand up for a dead person.

He dropped the shovel and walked to the edge of the kang (a heated brick bed). The girl was terrified; she was curled up, trembling all over, with empty eyes.

"It's alright now." Shen An tried to soften his voice, pulled a thin quilt that was still intact from the kang (heated brick bed), and covered her with it. "The villain is dead. Do you... have any other relatives?"

The girl's gaze slowly focused, looking at Shen An's young and calm face, then at the corpses of Zhao Da Kui and the other two on the ground. Tears welled up again, and she struggled to kneel down and kowtow: "Benefactor...benefactor...I am willing to be your slave..."

"There's no need to be a slave," Shen An said, supporting her and interrupting her. "I only have one request, and you must agree to it."

The girl nodded quickly, looking at Shen An with teary eyes, and then heard something that left her stunned.

"No matter what, don't try to kill yourself. Even if I were to blame for your parents' deaths, it would never be your fault."

It's not that if he had arrived earlier, the tragedy wouldn't have happened; rather, Zhao Da Kui was practically his subordinate.

Seeing her silent expression, Shen An sighed, stood up, picked up the two corpses, and said without turning back before leaving, "Pack your things, I'll wait for you at the door."

The sky outside was gloomy, and the wind carried a rusty, metallic smell. He casually tossed the two thugs' corpses into the woodpile in the corner of the yard, then turned and went into the main room, found a tattered straw mat, and covered the two old people's bodies with it.

After doing all this, he leaned against the cold earthen wall and exhaled a long breath.

Although he had never smoked in his previous life, Shen An really wanted one at this moment.

This was the first time I had ever witnessed someone die a horrific death.

The first time I killed someone with my own hands.

Shen An felt no regret or resentment; killing those three beasts brought him only satisfaction. However, he realized that in this world, the abuse of martial arts to oppress and trample on human life was probably the norm, and he felt a sense of powerlessness and melancholy about it.

But this fatigue was only momentary; Shen An quickly understood.

If I had backed down back then, would I still be the one standing here now?

Therefore, his killing was less about chivalry and more about upholding his moral principles as a human being and as a transmigrator with a modern education.

Next, with just a fraction of his strength, he will kill one person.

Putting aside his disappointment, Shen An turned to reviewing his previous shovel strikes. To be honest, not only Zhao Da Kui, but even he himself was shocked by the power of those shovel strikes.

How could my improved swordsmanship be so powerful?

No, it's not because of the sword technique. The moves I used were exactly the same as the last time I practiced swordsmanship by the stream, but the effect back then was far inferior to what I'm seeing now.

It is momentum.

It's not the momentum of the sword, nor the so-called inertia, but one's own momentum.

He had been building up his strength ever since he opened the door and saw the two corpses, and it reached its peak when he made his move.

It seems that the martial arts in the world of Swordsman are somewhat idealistic.

Indeed, in the book, even when Linghu Chong had lost all his internal energy, he was still able to blind more than a dozen Songshan masters with a single sword strike at the Medicine King Temple. When I read it, I thought it was somewhat illogical, but now that I think about it, besides internal energy, his swordsmanship is probably not that simple.

The key to Songshan swordsmanship may lie in this word "momentum".

Did Master Zuo Lengchan know? Shen An felt that he should know. His undisguised ambition and his position at the forefront of the fight against the Demonic Sect were probably also a way of building up his power.

Just then, the door to the house creaked open, revealing the girl who had changed into more complete clothes, with a bundle tied to her back and the blood-stained shovel tightly clutched in her arms.

"We don't need to bring the shovel, right?"

The girl remained silent, but hugged him even tighter.