The Ashes of Fate - Chapter 3: Farewell

Translator – SynthSoon

When An ShenShi saw An Jing return to the shack with a whole box of food and herbs, she understood everything and burst into tears.

She was more experienced than An Jing, and after seeing the caravan and the white-robed scribe who came to observe her, she had already felt an ill omen in her heart, and roughly guessed their intentions.

Now that An Jing had returned with a box full of herbs and food, how could she deny the fact that her own child had gained the recognition of those lords and had sold himself to buy her life?

“Jing’er.” She wanted to sit up, seeing this An Jing hurriedly put down the box and hugged his mother, slowly helping her to sit up straight, An ShenShi said in tears, “It’s me who has doomed your fate …… It’s me who has doomed you ……”

“My son was supposed to be a son from a first class family of the Northern Territories, you have inherited generations of martial arts and literature, if you sell your body to them, it would be impossible to achieve any martial or scholarly imperial achievement, I …… I would rather die instead!”

“Mother.” Rarely, An Jing’s tone also softened, he sighed: “Without you, how could I have gotten through the wilderness safe and sound?”

“If it were not for you, I would’ve died months ago, on the banks of the Huai River, in the ruins of Anmin Province, or by the blades of the horse bandits in the wilderness!”

“If I can save my mother’s life, why would I spare my body? What’s more, although this group of people claim they’re buying slaves, I don’t think that’s the case …… there might be a chance for me.”

“Look, in this box are all the herbs to nourish your lungs and smooth your qi, there are also blood pills, lung healing elixir …… you should take them now. By tonight, you will be able to regain your Internal Breath and return to the realm of Martial Arts!”

While pacifying his worried mother with warm words, An Jing took out a small porcelain bottle from the supplies and looked at her expectantly. No matter how sad An ShenShi was, she had to swallow one of those lightly gold-colored pills in front of her child.

Seeing his mother take the medicine, An Jing smiled faintly and urged “Mother, with these medicines and foodstuffs, you’ll regain your energy soon, after that, go all the way south, go through the pass, and don’t stop.”

“The Frost Scourge is really bad this time, its much stronger compared to the past, so the north of the Broken Blade Mountain is no longer safe, and I’m afraid that Bright Mountain City …… will also be finished.”
“It’ll be too late to go if you wait till then, the millions of people living in Bright Mountain City will all become refugees, the entire Hanbei Road states aren’t safe, so you must continue south, reach the Broken Edge Mountain near the river …… with your strength, you can definitely do it. ”

“I know.” An ShenShi also slightly nodded, her child had always been intuitive and sharp since his childhood, his father had also listened to his many suggestions, and even the An Family’s business partly originated from An Jing’s advice, so she naturally didn’t take it lightly.

“But what about you?” But as a mother, An ShenShi was not only thinking about her future, she looked towards her child with worry: “Jing’er, what about yourself?”

“Me? There’s need to worry.”

An Jing had long anticipated his mother’s worries, and he replied smoothly, “No matter who this group of people are, whether they really are a large and powerful family purchasing slaves, or an official sect training warriors, they need these people alive.”

“The fact they are willing to give these herbs as the money to buy their lives is clear proof, proving that they are looking for some “important value” within these people, that’s why the children will all have a chance to live.”

At this point, An Jing suddenly looked stunned.

Important values that they themselves didn’t know? What value did a child in this camp have? Did their value lie in being eaten as meat in the pots of the other vagrants, or because they were a burden on the family?

He had some skills to his name, but other than being persevering, what other merits did the children have?

Persevering…

That’s it, persevering… that’s the merit!

An Jing was shocked.

From this earth to the Dachen Realm, everything is destined by fate, this was deemed by the stars that descended.

Seeing An Jing’s intuitive intelligence, his parents believed he was blessed by the Star of Wisdom, thus they treasured him greatly. Seeing how the Dachen Realm was founded with Martial Arts and ruled with law and order, they taught An Jing literature and Martial Arts, cultivating him into a skilled young man.

And [Fate], is the core of [Martial Arts].

Martial Arts flourished in the DaChen Realm, even the sheep herders in the remote areas of the frontier knew a couple of techniques, but most of these techniques were only used by villagers.

Even if there were occasional folk Martial Artists, they wandered outside of the [Martial Daos] with incomplete “Mind and Body Skills”, they still had ways to go from mastering [Internal Breath] and becoming a true Martial Artist.

On the other hand, Anjing’s mother was a true Martial Artist, since she had entered the ‘Silklike Internal Breath’’ realm. His father was even more powerful, he had instead reached the peak of the Internal Breath realm ‘Riverlike Internal Breath’, giving him the ability to release his Internal Breath and induce bone-wounding injuries.

As for the one-eyed leader and the white-robed scribe whom An Jing could not see through, they were at the peak of the Internal Breath realm, ‘Tidal Internal Breath’, giving them complete mastery and making it difficult for others to figure out their true level.

And that was the end of Martial Arts for mortals.

If one couldn’t awaken and use [Fate] to quench their blood energy, they wouldn’t be able to break the limit of the [Internal Breath of Three Nourishments] and achieve the transformation of the mortal’s body. This barred them from the realm of [Five Scenes of Internal Strength], let alone further realms.

An Jing was born from a Martial Arts family, so he understood all this, dispelling the doubts in his mind “Perhaps these people are trying to sift through the disaster to find children who might awaken their ‘Fate’ and cultivate them?”

Thinking about this, An Jing’s expression suddenly became serious, holding his mother’s hand: “Mother, you must survive.”

“When the Northern Barbarians invaded, father disappeared in the Qingyu Pass, but his death was never confirmed. Since I sold my body, I may not be unable to step outside in the future.”

“Live. No matter what happens, live.”

“You can only have a future if you live, then we can meet again!”

With these words, Anjing and his mother hugged each other tightly.

After relaxing, the young man got up, searched for rice in the box, and said with a smile, “The leader allowed me to return just to have one last meal with you… guess he wasn’t that inhumane after all.”
“Mother, let’s have a proper meal.”

An ShenShi gazed at the child in front of her, who had already begun to make preparations to build a fire and cook the rice. Her heart was unspeakably sad, but a trace of pride also rose within her.

–This is the son of Shen Mubai who was given to me by the heavens!

The emotions in her heart were stirring, and the pills that she had swallowed into her stomach had taken effect, her blood energy was rushing out. An ShenShi suddenly spat out a mouthful of black blood – it was the bruised blood in her damaged pulmonary veins, proving her lung injuries had already healed.

This wasn’t some kind of incurable disease, but for a vagrant without medicine or food, a small injury or sickness is enough to kill.

Seeing this scene, An Jing was also very pleased – his mother’s strength was actually stronger than his own, now that her lungs and veins have been opened, her Internal Breath restored, ordinary robbers can’t get close to her anymore!

However, it takes time to recover….

An Jing narrowed his eyes and looked around, sensing many prying eyes.

The smell of rice had attracted the peeping eyes of many hungry migrants around the area.

Bright Mountain City had long been blocked to the vagrants, even the relief porridge sheds had long been closed. The only reason the vagrant camp still existed was because the Huaihe River Crossings had been blocked by barriers, with no place to go, the vagrants could only stay here and slowly starve to death.

This may be the result the Bright Mountain City’s governors and Hanbei Road officials wanted after all.

But life will always find a way, even if some of the ways are destined to be a dead end.

Among the peeping stragglers, there were a few who got too bold or went mad from hunger, some already lifted their wooden spears and were approaching An Jing’s shack.

They had boiled a pot of ‘meat soup’ before, which was supposed to fill their stomachs, but the group of riders trampled and crushed the pot, and the mush that spilled out was quickly stolen by other vagrants.

Instead, this woman with a lung injury and the skinny boy got so much food from the riders. Their hearts were filled with anger, jealousy and hunger.

–It was theirs! It was supposed to be theirs!

But before they could attack, An Jing rose to his feet.

–Jackals.

Anjing gazed indifferently at the approaching, green-eyed stragglers.

In his eyes, these figures with wooden spears were like the jackals and wolves that were gradually encircling him. Their foul-smelling saliva, mad eyes, and uncontrollable malice rushed to him like the cold and cutting wind of a winter’s day.

But he was never afraid.

An Jing drew out the blade taken from the horse bandit at his waist, darted out, and without hesitation, aimed at the nearest vagrant and slashed him down!

“Ahhhhhh!!!”

Accompanied by a fierce scream, the greedy vagrant’s shoulder bursted into a mass of blood, he staggered backward, the wooden spear falling down to the ground – but Anjing didn’t have any mercy, he stepped forward and kicked the vagrant’s chest, trampling him to the ground. Reversing his grip on the blade, he slashed at his chest and abdomen!

The sound of cutting flesh, blood, and organs rang out, and a large plume of blood and foul-smelling dirty liquid flowed out, quickly solidifying under the frost of the Frost Scourge.

And An Jing, finishing off the vagrant, lopped his head off with a single slash, grabbed his opponent’s hair and lifted the head. Amidst the screams of the other greedy vagrants scattering in different directions, he hung the head on the side of the shack with his own wooden spear.

“This head will buy enough time for you to regain your energy, Mother.”

Back at the shack, the rice was already cooked. An Jing locked eyes with a relieved-looking An ShenShi, unconcerned about the blood left on his face and clothes.

“At least I won’t have to worry about you suffering.” An Shen gazed at her son tenderly and somewhat sadly, reaching out her hand to wipe away the blood on An Jing’s face, “Sit down and eat this last meal with me.”

“Mhm.”

With the fearful gazes of others and the smell of blood, An Jing and his mother slowly finished their last meal in this camp.

Then, it was time to part.