Awakening the Divine Spark
Chapter 192: Shackles.

It was hard to imagine how Lee could’ve insulted an accomplished cultivator more, but he needed time to think. Arguing or throwing insults at each other was the perfect waste of time. Unexpectedly, turns out he was overreacting.

"Chill, Blackbird!" The elemental lord snickered, seeing Lee’s reaction, "Who do you think hired you to kill Thorne Evergale? Don’t you want the other half of the payment?"

"If you want pull that shit with me like you did with those useless fucks, I’ll gauge your damned eye out, you bastard!" Lee hissed back, pointing his sword at the bodies on the ground and making a short stabbing motion towards the elemental lord’s face.

According to the intelligence he had on the person he was supposed to play, he had to be as rude as possible, and even more vicious. A deadly assassin, but not known to many by name. But the elemental lord had recognized him – Lee was playing the role of the one who had delivered the deadly stab to the former sect master’s heart.

"I never knew Blackbird was a woman." One of the guys said, standing next to the elemental lord.

"I’ll cut off your dick and turn you into one!" Lee hissed, and began to slowly retreat.

Indeed, his task was to play a young woman, but currently he wasn’t worried about that. For some reason the three were standing around for too long. As escapees they had to run for their lives, so something wasn’t right.

"Don’t piss her off." The elemental lord said, "Blackbird, it’s your choice. We don’t need you, but if you don’t come there’s no way to pay you, you know."

"Fuck!" Lee pretended to struggle for a moment, and then said, "Fine! But watch it, shorty! I’m on the edge!"

"We all are!" The elemental lord said, and turned to the boats, "This is the stupidest jail-break plan I’ve ever heard of. I can’t believe he became an elemental lord. How can one comprehend a single elemental law being such a moron?"

His companions helped him to get the boat to the water. With their hands in shackles, it was inconvenient, but the three worked together well.

Meanwhile Lee tried to figure out how exactly these people managed to communicate under Elder Luo’s strict watch. It looked like they had made an alternate escape plan while in the prison, but the following conversation cleared up Lee’s confusion.

"Too bad Crimson didn’t make it." One of the three said.

"Yea, I couldn’t warn him before the first fight broke out." The elemental lord said, "It was kind of hard to organize everything on the fly."

’So they managed to plan this after they met up?’ Lee was surprised, almost shocked, ’The elder was right, they are excellent at scheming. But they got lucky. Too many factors had to fall in place for them to escape together.’

The next moment he was proven wrong. The elemental lord said, "Too many of ours died during the mission, but it is what it is. If it’s only three of us left, we can’t do anything about it. Let’s go home and then plan for the future. Blackbird, are you coming?"

"Sure." Lee instinctively said, but after taking a step towards the boat, stopped and jumped over to where Junior Elder Fan’s body lie.

He said, "Girl needs a motherfucking moral compensation!"

The elemental lord intended to say something about Lee’s share being sufficient, when his jaw dropped seeing Lee slashing off Fan’s hands. Lee tried to get the rings the guy had, but apparently they didn’t come off right away, and he ruthlessly cut off the guard’s palms.

Earlier, certain that everyone apart from them and Lee was dead, the three criminals were busy with the boat. That allowed Junior Elder Fan to deploy the items Elder Xiao prepared – the two fake palms which Lee could cut off, demonstrating his viciousness.

From the side he actually did resemble a monster, especially when he got into the boat, with his weapon clenched in his armpit, but in hands holding the two bloodied palms he supposedly just cut off. While the men guided the boat across the river, he was fully focused on getting the rings off the fingers, and after he did, he casually threw the two palms overboard.

Phase one of the plan was complete. Apparently Lee had successfully infiltrated the group, except nothing what happened went according to what he and elder Luo discussed during their meeting. More importantly, he had no idea why was he alive and why he was invited to follow them.

He was the only outsider as well as the only one without shackles. And everyone saw that he currently held them in one hand and the weapon in the other.

***

The moment the boat hit the bank on the opposite side, the elemental lord said, "Shade, you’re up!"

"Alright! Try to not fall behind!" The man gave a shallow laugh and disappeared in the thickest part of the forest.

Once again Lee found it unbelievable how lucky these guys were that the one who knew the area survived. Soon, though, he realized it was not the case.

The guy was an incredible scout, or maybe a hunter. He ran without slowing down when the sun rose and then till the noon. Neither he nor the rest stopped, but it was clear that on the way Shade was carefully observing the surroundings while picking the best route.

Several times they had to turn back or make a large detour, but at all times they managed to stay hidden. Not from the eyes of a regular onlooker, no – they kept hiding under the thickest foliage to increase their chances to escape Sect Master Wang’s incredible skill.

And then there was another thing about him. After the sunrise Lee finally got to see his face. It was the guy who threw the spear at Xiao Lian, almost killing him.

The tenacity of these three people was incredible and it was hard to believe they were this fit after a year in prison and while their hands were in elemental shackles. They couldn’t use elemental energy, thus everything they did was solely based on their physical prowess.

Lee could’ve still ran, but he felt that Blackbird couldn’t if she was here. From what Elder Luo told, she was one tough bitch, but not strong enough to compete with a decent male cultivator.

Lee began to fall behind, and at noon the group stopped at a small brook to take a rest. They were in the forest, somewhere west from the sect, at least as much as Lee could tell. And Shade was constantly guiding them in that direction.

After drinking his full, Lee used the sword to cut off his hair – the parts Elder Xiao attached, that is. He had faith in the elder’s expertise, but didn’t want to take any chances.

"I thought you were older ..." Lee barely suppressed a startled jump when Shade suddenly appeared next to him.

Instead of answering, Lee only snorted, but the elemental lord said, "It’s because Blackbird is a title, not a name. I don’t know whether it’s passed to a pupil or an heir, though. But I’d suggest to not molest her."

This part Lee heard from Elder Luo as well. Blackbird has been around for ages, completing the most difficult hits around the continent. Her services were incredibly expensive, and she was very picky regarding her targets. It didn’t mean she had any morals, at least not to Elder Luo’s knowledge.

She tend to pick challenging jobs, those who seemed impossible to complete for a non-cultivator. The tricky part was – using her status of a common person she infiltrated sects or clans and assassinated elemental masters and lords without raising suspicion. Somehow she turned the fact that she wasn’t a cultivator to her advantage, avoiding the experienced and vigilant eyes of people vastly stronger than her.

"Don’t worry, I won’t!" Shade said, remembering Knox’s terrible ending, "Why did you keep your shackles?"

Lee looked at him, then said, "These are motherfucking works of art. I spent half a month to learn how to remove the damned things!"

Shade’s eyes lit up, but the elemental lord stopped him, "Don’t even think about it. She’s not a cultivator – her shackles were different. If you try to take off yours, you’ll loose your hands, and that’s the best case scenario."

Lee could only curse to himself. All this time he kept the shackles in order to try to plant an idea in the heads of the three to take their shackles off, but failed.

Elder Luo told him what would happen if someone attempted it, and Lee’s initial plan was to attempt to fake-help, neutralizing one guy in the process without raising suspicion – two threats were less than three by a third after all.

Shade was the perfect candidate, but unfortunately he’ll have to wait.