Kai g the clock, it read three in the m. He vaguely remembered that he started reading this at the stroke of midnight. Strange, he thought, it felt like three years have gone by yet only three hours have epsed. Maybe it was only a dream...

  Around Kai stood four strangers, their eyes locked onto him like hunters stalking prey.

  The two are named Liu Yu and Liu Yue, known as the Twin Willows of Jade and Moon. Liu Yue, the quieter and more sensitive of the two, while Liu Yu had a cheerful personality, carrying an air of pyful daheir dark flowing hair framed their sharp, ing eyes, and their robes, embroidered with silver and dark runes, hi something dangerous about them.

  The two men were dressed in blinding white robes, radiating an aura of power. The older of the two was Zhao Tianyang, who made a name for himself as the Righteous Bde—his presence alone exuded righteousness, though his gaze burned with hostility. His panion, Bai Fu, was younger and less experienced, yet still carried himself with fidence, his sharp eyes glinting with ambition.

  The older of the two men sneered.

  “Step aside, wretched demons. That book does not belong in the hands of filth like you.”

  The twins whirled around, their pyful demeanor repced by cold fury.

  “We found him first. The Manual chose him.”

  “That manual belongs to those who serve true righteousness!” The sean growled. “Give it to us, or we’ll take it by force.”

  Zhao Tianyang the Righteous Bde scoffed, his sword g against the barrier.“Foolish demonic witches, do you even know what you’re doing? Surrender now, and your deaths will be swift.”

  Liu Yu smirked.“Oh? A ‘righteous’ dog barking orders? How scary...” She mogly puts a hand on her chest. “Sister, do you hear that? This poor fool thinks he’s a hero!”

  Liu Yue calmly watched.“A hero? I only see a butcher who wears white.”

  Bai Fu chuckled darkly.“Why buing, senior brother? We take the manual and his head.”

  Liu Yu giggled.“His head? Oh, no, no. We want him alive!”

  Liu Yue spoke in a serious tone.“But if you insist, we carve you two up instead.”

  The two men gnced silently at each other and uowards Kai.

  Their figures blurred with impossible speed, moving toward him like phantoms of light.

  Kai froze.

  There was no time to react.

  At the st sed, the two girls moved.

  “Get back!”

  They intercepted the men, their bdes g with a violent explosion of force.

  Kai stumbled backward, barely keeping his bance. His heartbeat roared in his ears as a fierce battle unfolded around him.

  Steel cshed against steel. Dark energy met divine radiahe twins moved in perfect harmony, their movements like a deadly dance, fending off their attackers with swift, elegant strikes.

  The ground cracked uhe pressure of their blows. Shadows and light danced violently across the stone floor, sparks flying with every collision of ons.

  But it was clear.

  The girls were losing.

  Kai’s mind reeled. He wasn’t supposed to be here. He was just a damn librarian!

  Why were these people fighting around him—over him?

  One of the white-robed men—his shoulder-length long hair now wild with fury—struck past the defenses of the twin on the left.

  Liu Yue cried out as she was sent flying backward, crashing against a pilr.

  Her sister darted to defend her, but the other man had already closed the gap.

  With a brutal palm strike, he sent her sprawling to the floor.

  Kai’s breath caught.

  “They’re… losing?”

  The realization hit him like a punch to the gut. He was .

  And sure enough—

  One of the men turned his sharp, merciless gaze toward him.

  “Enough wasting time.”

  The man lunged, his sword radiating golden energy, surging forward in a vicious killing move.

  Kai’s world slowed.

  Time moved like thick honey.

  He could see every detail—the terrifying speed, the raw power aimed directly at him.

  And he felt a foreboding helplessness.

  He was going to die.

  But then—

  His body moved on its own.

  His arm shot up, palm intercepting the strike in an instant.

  Boom!

  The impact sent a shockwave through the air.

  The attacker’s eyes widened in disbelief.

  Kai didn’t just block the attaehow he had deflected it.

  His fiwisted instinctively, redireg the energy, defleg it with perfect teique.

  A lost teique.

  “Impossible…” Zhao Tianyang whispered. “That move—I have not seen anything like it. How could you have learned such a teique? It must be from the manual!”

  Kai’s mind reeled. The manual? What is he talking about?

  But he had no time to think.

  The two men came at him together.

  His instincts kicked in again.

  Kai’s feet shifted, his body moving on its own.

  A powerful strike shot forward, smming into the first man’s chest.

  A whirl of motion—he spun, dodging an ining bde, his leg kig upward in a fierce terstrike.

  Boom!

  Both men were sent skidding backward, their expressions twisting in shock.

  Kai stared down at his own hands.

  What… was that?

  That wasn’t him. That wasn’t anything he had ever learned.

  But his body kly what to do.

  The teiques, the movements—they were all inside him.

  His years of training uhe old man weren’t a dream.

  They were real.

  Zhao Tianyang recovered and leaped ba his feet almost instantly, using the momentum to unch a sed atta Kai. Panig, Kai attempted the same move but nothing happened.

  He stared at his palms helplessly and tried again.

  Zhao Tianyang instinctively ducked but it was just another empty palm.

  The man smiled.“So… you have no trol over your powers,” he said in mirth, realizing that Kai was just lucky earlier on. He could easily defeat Kai.

  Zhao Tianyang solidated his Qi into his sword arm and unched a powerful Qi-infused sword strike that could have easily cut a solid oak tree in half like a knife slig through butter.

  Kai winced.

  k!

  The screeetal g rang out.

  Liu Yu had reacted in time and used her sword to block the blow aimed at Kai.

  Her bde snapped upon impact with Zhao Tianyang's powerful blow, the broken part flew into a bookshelf embedding itself deep into the wood.

  Liu Yue grabbed Kai’s arm. “No more pying around—we o leave!”

  She raised her hand, trag rapid symbols in the air.

  A portal began f, swirling with shadowy mist.

  Kai hesitated.

  Should he go with them?

  These girls doly look like “good people,” but the men in white? They cimed to be good but they had attacked him with a killing move!

  He g the twins—they were rather cute. And holy?

  If he had to pick between dying at the hands of merciless cultivators or following two dangerous but beautiful women, the choice was obvious.

  “Screw it.”

  The portal shimmered, reag pletion.

  The two men recovered quickly and uhemselves at him.

  Too te.

  Liu Yu grabbed Kai’s wrist and yanked him forward.

  The world around him ed and colpsed.

  The st thing he saw was the furious expressions of the two men as they vanished into the mist.