Chapter 714: Red Dust Blows Upon My Face As I Walk The Road To The Capital Deathblade's Thoughts

A Will Eternal

Bai Xiaochun stood there, pompous and haughty, clasping his hands the way a truly consummate chosen would, as if he could crush the entire army camp if he wanted to.

The two squads of cultivators manning the main entrance were shocked, and didn’t even know how to respond. They weren’t particularly impressed with the first part of what he had said, but the last part left them gasping in astonishment. They actually didn’t know about Zhou Zimo’s relationship to the Giant Ghost King, but he was their king after all. To hear the person he had sent say something like this was a huge shock.

“The sergeant major is his fiancée?”

“Is this for real? This Bai Hao…. I remember hearing about him. He’s one of the top aides to his highness the king…. Could it be that the king is rewarding him by arranging this marriage?” The powerful experts who had been shocked by Duke Deathcrier’s sudden appearance earlier had also heard Bai Xiaochun’s shocking words, and as a result, their expressions flickered. They looked incredulously at Bai Xiaochun, and then examined his identity medallion to confirm who he was. Although strange expressions could be seen on their faces, they didn’t dare to delay, and quickly relayed the information up the chain of command to request orders about what to do next.

Bai Xiaochun was very pleased at the reaction to his words, and mused that his days as a major general had truly given him an imperious way with words that surpassed ordinary people. Feeling quite proud, he cleared his throat.

“Very well, I’m coming in now.” As he began to strut forward, the soul cultivators of the Giant Ghost Legion exchanged awkward glances, but didn't dare to get in his way. However, before he could take more than a few steps, a beam of light shot toward the entrance from somewhere in the middle of the camp, resolving into the shape of a young woman.

As soon as she arrived, all of the surrounding soldiers breathed sighs of relief.

She didn’t appear to be very old, and had a Core Formation cultivation base. She was very pretty, with snow-white skin, and eyes that sparkled brightly. There was something formidable about her, but at the same time she was extremely attractive. That was especially the case considering that she wore a suit of tight-fitting leather armor that perfectly accentuated her sensuous curves.

Bai Xiaochun immediately perked up a bit as he wondered if this was Zhou Zimo. However, considering the level of her cultivation base, it didn't seem likely…. After looking her up and down, he was just preparing to say something when she coolly said, “Come with me. The sergeant major wants to see you!”

There was little respect to be heard in her tone of voice, and after finishing speaking, she turned and headed back into the camp. As she walked away, Bai Xiaochun simply couldn’t help but once again marvel at her attractive figure.

“So, she’s not Zhou Zimo after all. Hmph. Quite the nerve she has!” He was definitely not very pleased at his reception so far. No matter what the situation was, he was still the famed majordomo of Giant Ghost City. However, Bai Xiaochun also reminded himself that he wasn’t the type to nitpick, so he simply snorted and followed the young woman.

As he walked along, he thought about what the Giant Ghost King’s mysterious daughter would be like. Considering what the king had said to him, she was even more incredible than Chen Manyao.

“If he was lying to me, then I’ll figure out some reason to leave Arch-Emperor City and get back to Giant Ghost City.” Having made up his mind, he swaggered after the young woman into the camp. As he looked around, he could see quite a few people looking over at him with quizzical expressions, occasionally leaning over to whisper to each other.

“Who's that? I can’t believe the sergeant major’s personal guard is escorting him….”

“I just heard some voices from outside. Supposedly this guy claims to be the sergeant major’s fiancé…”

“What!?!?”

As the whispered conversations reached his ears, Bai Xiaochun felt prouder of himself than ever. As he made his way through the army camp, he realized that it was quite large. Based on his estimates, there were probably around 1,000,000 troops garrisoned here. Tents stretched out in all directions, seemingly without end.

There was something stern and harsh to the camp that made Bai Xiaochun think about the Great Wall.

As the young woman hurried him through the camp, Bai Xiaochun got the strange sensation that some of the people around him seemed familiar. However, there was little time to ponder the situation as the female cultivator led him to a huge red tent in the middle of the camp!

It was fully 300 meters wide, and considering that evening was falling, it was already lit by flickering torches.

It was heavily guarded, and the entire area radiated a bleak and deadly air. All of the guards had completely expressionless faces. Even as Bai Xiaochun and the personal guard approached, their gazes remained completely icy, as if they didn’t care who Bai Xiaochun was. If he showed the slightest errant behavior, they would all attack him immediately!

It was at this point that his heart quivered a bit. Although he had been hurried through the camp, he could still sense that there were many powerful experts present. From what he could tell, some of them were even half a step into the Deva Realm. However, he couldn't sense any aura at all coming from inside the bright red command tent. Even as he approached, he heard a cold snort echo out from inside.

“You still haven’t found him?!” It was the voice of a woman, and it sounded like she was growling through clenched teeth. There was something incredibly shocking about her, as though she could surpass heaven and earth. The way the air vibrated sent a twinge of fear through Bai Xiaochun.

“That aura… it's from a deva!” There was even something about the aura that seemed familiar. Before he could spend any time thinking about it though, a rumbling sound could be heard as a statue flew out from inside the tent.

The statue depicted a person, and was already shattering to pieces as it flew out of the tent. However, most of the head remained intact, and it rolled across the ground until it came to a stop at Bai Xiaochun’s feet.

When he looked down at it, his eyes went wide, and all the hair on his body stood on end.

The portion of the head that remained intact revealed a fact that looked much like his own…. Not Bai Hao’s face, but his true appearance….

“This… this….” he muttered.

Before he could collect his thoughts, the woman’s voice could once again be heard inside the tent.

“Keep looking! I refuse to believe that we can’t find that damned Bai Xiaochun!”

Bai Xiaochun shivered, and a look of disbelief appeared on his face. Whether it was the aura he was sensing, or the voice, there was something so familiar with it that if he couldn't place who it was by this point, it would mean he had memory problems.

Although he was now sure of who this person was, he still couldn’t bring himself to believe it was true…. Even as he stood there shivering, the tent flap opened, and another female guard appeared. An unsightly expression could be seen on her face as she completely ignored Bai Xiaochun and began to clean up the shattered pieces of the statue.

However, because of the tent flap suddenly being opened, Bai Xiaochun could now see inside to a woman sitting there. When he saw her face, he felt like a million lightning bolts were striking his mind.

“Mistress Red-Dust!” His face turned as pale as a sheet, and his legs began to shake. Sitting there in the tent was the very same person he had cursed in his heart over and over again, the same person with whom he had fought in the necropolis… Mistress Red-Dust!!

Never could he possibly have imagined that the Giant Ghost King’s daughter would be Mistress Red-Dust…. Clearly, Zhou Zimo was her name, and Red-Dust was a Daoist name.

Shaken, he suddenly realized why so many people in the army had seemed familiar. These were the very same necromancers and soul cultivators who had participated in the war at the Great Wall….

He had even fought some of them personally, and many of them had cursed him to death because of his Soul Convergence Pills….

A few had even experienced incredible humiliation because of the enormous beasts that had consumed his enhanced Aphrodisiac Pills. These were people who hated Bai Xiaochun with an undying passion that defied description.

In fact, in all of the Wildlands, nobody hated him more… than this group of people!

Back when he had been at the Great Wall, information about the Wildlands had been very hard to come by for some reason. Even after becoming a major general, he hadn’t learned very much about the Wildlanders other than that they were all enemies. He’d never been given any information about the specific forces they faced, or where they came from.

“Heavens! The Giant Ghost Legion… Mistress Red-Dust… heavens! What am I doing here!?!? I've been dropped into the lion’s den!!” As he wailed in his heart, and as his mind reeled, he shivered and backed up a step. His first instinct was to flee from this place as quickly as possible.

The mere idea of what would happen if his identity were revealed filled him with intense anxiety….

However, before he could do anything, Mistress Red-Dust's cold voice echoed out, “Who’s sneaking around out there!?”

The surrounding guards’ gazes instantly locked onto Bai Xiaochun, and the killing air that rose up was readily apparent. Even the female guard who was cleaning up the shattered statue looked at him with cold eyes.

Bai Xiaochun really wanted to cry as he stood there, wilting inwardly as everyone looked at him.

“What do I do, what do I do…? I hate you, Giant Ghost King….”

There he stood, unsure of how to respond, heart pounding with fear. Then, Mistress Red-Dust’s cold voice again rang out from within the tent.

“Take him away and execute him!”

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Translator: Deathblade. (Follow me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, YouTube, Pinterest)

Editor: GNE. Memes and Meme archives: Logan. Chinese language consultant: ASI a.k.a. Beerblade. AWE Glossary. Xianxia-inspired T-shirts.

Click here for meme.

There is a play on words with Mistress Red-Dust’s Daoist name and her real name, Zhou Zimo. Zimo is a cool-sounding girl’s name that literally means “the road to the capital city.” The character “zi” is violet, and “mo” means path. If you combine the characters from her given name “zi mo” with the characters for “red dust” (hong chen), they make “zi mo hong chen 紫陌红尘” which is a line from an ancient Chinese poem. The line of the poem literally means “red dust violet road” with the meaning of the characters being: “red dust (blows upon my face as I walk) the road to the capital.” This is a pretty obscure reference. I’m not sure if any Chinese readers picked up on the clues ahead of time, but if you were really proficient in Chinese poetry, you might have made the connection between the two names a few chapters ago. The content of the poem as a whole doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the name. Although there is no explanation of why she picked that name, it’s pretty cool when you consider that she probably picked it when leaving her home and traveling to the capital city.

P.S. The next chapter will features some "official" artwork of Mistress Red-Dust, and a few chapters after that there will be some high-resolution wallpapers I commissioned depicting her. Stay tuned!

Here is the video explaining how to pronounce the name Zhou Zimo