Chapter 6: Hearing Thunder Through Pain

Cui Wangshu had a wound on her shoulder, and Jiang Chenbi supported her as they ran forward desperately. After running over a hundred meters, Jiang Chenbi finally stopped.

She hurriedly pulled out an antidote pill from her bosom and tried to stuff it into Cui Wangshu’s mouth, but Cui Wangshu’s lips had turned purple, blood faintly seeped from her seven orifices, and she had already lost consciousness.

Jiang Chenbi grabbed her wrist to check her pulse and cursed under her breath. She carefully tore open Cui Wangshu’s clothes. The arrow wound pierced straight through her entire shoulder. She had wanted to reach for the short knife at Cui Wangshu’s waist, but it was gone.

If the arrowhead wasn’t removed soon, Cui Wangshu would likely suffer lifelong aftereffects.

Since the person in front of her was already unconscious, Jiang Chenbi didn’t hesitate. She used the Profound Iron Chain to snap off the arrow shaft and pressed the snow frog leather clothing against the wound.

She pried open her mouth and forced the medicine in, cursing softly, “Cui Wangshu, you haven’t climbed to the top yet. Don’t die on me first.”

Carrying her on her back, Jiang Chenbi limped forward. Her leg had also been injured in the earlier explosion, but she couldn’t tend to it now. The corpse demon behind them wouldn’t be trapped for long.

Before it found them, they had to hide in a safe place—or perhaps an even more dangerous one. In any case, they couldn’t stay here.

She didn’t know how long they walked before Jiang Chenbi felt like she was about to collapse. Then a hoarse voice came from her back:

“Keep going forward, and we’ll both die… cough cough… put me down.”

Cui Wangshu leaned against the stone wall. Before she could say anything else, she spat out a mouthful of poison blood. Jiang Chenbi instinctively dodged a step, afraid that Cui Wangshu’s blood would splatter on her.

Cui Wangshu caught her movement and casually wiped the blood from her mouth, teasing, “Looks like using your blood to paint will have to be repaid.”

Jiang Chenbi’s lips moved a few times, and for once, embarrassment showed on her face. “You just came back from the gates of hell and already have the mood for jokes.”

Cui Wangshu chuckled lightly, but it tugged at her wound. She sucked in a breath of cold air and said, “Didn’t you say I lack romance?”

Jiang Chenbi pursed her lips and said nothing. After a moment, she added, “That antidote pill and snow frog leather clothing are my last ones. You have to pay me back.”

Cui Wangshu glanced at the snow frog leather on her wound. She didn’t ask why her clothes were torn to shreds and simply said, “You saved my life. Naturally, whatever you want, it’s yours.”

Jiang Chenbi snorted coldly. “Easy to say now. Don’t go back on your word later.”

Cui Wangshu looked at Jiang Chenbi, her ink-black pupils filled with seriousness. She said solemnly, “Cui Wangshu keeps her word and never goes back on it.”

Jiang Chenbi touched the tip of her nose, her gaze drifting. “Your knife is gone. I have nothing to help extract the arrowhead.”

Cui Wangshu let out an almost imperceptible sigh. “No matter. Worst case, I’ll chop off this arm.”

Jiang Chenbi said nothing. She checked Cui Wangshu’s condition again. Most of the arrow poison had been forced out of her body.

But because of the delay, some toxins remained inside. If they could get out alive, she could slowly expel the rest…

Cui Wangshu stood up, pretending to be relaxed. “Since we’re not dead yet, let’s keep going.”

Jiang Chenbi stared at Cui Wangshu’s back, complex emotions swirling in her eyes—admiration, excitement, and a trace of… heartache.

Cui Wangshu hadn’t said it, but she knew the path ahead was almost a dead end. Her hearing was exceptional; from childhood, she could detect sounds others couldn’t. So she knew the dangers hidden in this stone chamber.

Looking around, the octagonal stone chamber had bronze mirrors embedded on the walls and ceiling, except for the floor. Staying inside too long made one easily lose oneself, feeling oppressive.

Shifting her gaze upward, she saw bianzhong of various sizes hanging from the dome. They produced sounds of different wavelengths based on air currents and subtle vibrations from the ground.

It seemed safer than the Human-Faced Passageway, but only on the surface.

Cui Wangshu had said that going further would kill them because the sounds resonated with their internal organs. These resonances were invisible and intangible, yet painfully real.

They stood still. Cui Wangshu looked at their disheveled reflections in the bronze mirrors and smiled lightly. “Miss Jiang, do you think we’ll die in this stone chamber or at the hands of that corpse demon?”

Jiang Chenbi didn’t speak. She looked at Cui Wangshu, her gaze carefully scanning her face.

Cui Wangshu was extremely beautiful—ink-black brows and starry eyes, slender shoulders and soft waist. Her thick black hair contrasted sharply with her fair complexion, creating a striking visual impact. She had a natural aura of clear skies after rain, aloof and distant.

Like a snow lotus on a high peak—admirable from afar, untouchable. She was the most beautiful woman Jiang Chenbi had ever seen.

Jiang Chenbi’s gaze was so focused, as if etching Cui Wangshu’s face deep into her mind. That look stirred all sorts of feelings in Cui Wangshu’s heart.

It carried a heavy sense of farewell mixed with reckless determination. Cui Wangshu’s heart trembled for no reason, like an electric current surging through her body. A distant, fine impulse welled up, accompanied by faint pain in her heart.

Jiang Chenbi’s brows suddenly furrowed, and she subconsciously clutched her chest.

Realizing what it was, she pursed her lips and looked away from Cui Wangshu, saying darkly, “Minister Cui learned painting from childhood. Drawing a sonar map shouldn’t be a problem, right?”

Cui Wangshu frowned. “What are you planning? These bianzhong sounds shake the five viscera and six bowels. Do you want your organs to rupture and die?”

A wicked smile tugged at Jiang Chenbi’s lips. She looked up at the bianzhong. “You’re thinking too highly of me. I’m not that saintly to sacrifice myself for you.”

No matter how sharp one’s hearing, distinguishing blind spots in sound waves from subtle differences was impossible.

But…

As if resolved, Jiang Chenbi said, “You’re right. I do have hemoptysis, but thanks to it, my pain perception has become much sharper than others’ over the years. I can pinpoint sound wave blind spots just from the slightest disturbances through pain.”

With that, she took a small step forward. The bianzhong swayed gently, not producing a loud sound, but Jiang Chenbi curled up and squatted down.

After a long while, she looked up, her face pale, sweat as big as beans sliding down her nose bridge.

A wicked grin pulled at her lips. “Zi hour direction, three zhang away. Sound waves intersect—blind spot.”

Heartache flashed in Cui Wangshu’s eyes, buried under shock. She said incredulously, “You…”

The shocks Jiang Chenbi had given her in these past few days were already plenty.

Cui Wangshu had thought her mad act in the Cold Palace was to evade surveillance, but now it seemed Jiang Chenbi was far crazier than she let on.

Ruthless and unscrupulous for her goals, even to herself. Anything she could use became a stepping stone to the pinnacle of power—even her own body and life were expendable.

Jiang Chenbi stood and tore a strip from her hem, sprinkling hemostatic powder on it. She rolled it into a small ball and stuffed it into her ears to dampen the bianzhong’s interference.

She raised a brow at Cui Wangshu and grinned. “Little Minister Cui, can’t hear it? No problem. Feeling it is enough.”

Though Cui Wangshu disapproved, she had no better idea. She tore a piece of cloth too, bit her finger, and prepared to record the information Jiang Chenbi traded her life for.

All she could do now was not waste any intel and quickly draw the sonar map, perhaps sparing Jiang Chenbi some pain.

Jiang Chenbi had said she knew no martial arts—she lied.

Her skills weren’t as good as Cui Wangshu’s. Due to childhood malnutrition and long-term hemoptysis, her body was frail. She couldn’t wield a sword for long or leap across rooftops with much strength.

To cultivate poison blood, her meridians were already damaged. Too much force would trigger her hemoptysis. But she did know lightness skill, and it was decent.

For short bursts, she could immerse herself in that world of weightless flight, pretending her body wasn’t so pathetic.

Jiang Chenbi kicked off the wall and leaped. Her skull throbbed as if splitting. She nearly collapsed but steadied herself. Just as she opened her mouth, she spat out a large mouthful of blood.

Ignoring the pain in her skull, she stared intently at the blood’s trajectory. Once clear, she said, “Northwest direction—echo decays three times. Three intersecting blind spots to land on.”

Cui Wangshu rapidly sketched frequency wave patterns on the cloth. Blind spots emerged at intersections. She called out, “Hai hour position—advance three meters!”

For each pain sensation perceived, Jiang Chenbi reported coordinates and pain level. Cui Wangshu’s partial sonar maps allowed safe passage over segments.

One wrong step, and acid that dissolved bones would drip from the bells. Dodging forcefully would create more noise, worsening organ damage.

Once all organ pains were mapped, Cui Wangshu could use wave patterns and sound sources to complete the sonar map, predicting all safe landing spots thereafter.

Exhausted, Jiang Chenbi left blood spatters on floor and walls. Soaked in sweat like she’d been pulled from water, her body had reached its limit.

But mapping each organ once wasn’t enough. As time dragged, pains blurred. She had to probe some organs three or four times for accuracy.

At one safe spot, Jiang Chenbi lay on the cold floor, regulating her breathing briefly.

Gazing at her reflection in the bronze mirrors on walls and ceiling—clothes corroded by acid, bloodstained, like a ragged doll—she hated this weak version of herself.

Her organs felt torn and inflated, chest and back crushed by massive stone slabs. Each breath tugged painful innards; her throat tasted sweetly metallic.

She knew her organs were bleeding to varying degrees.

One liver spot left. Jiang Chenbi wanted rest, but she faintly heard the corpse demon’s roar from the Human-Faced Passageway.

By her calculation, it should have escaped and was likely hunting them. Glancing at the dome’s bianzhong, she sneered, wondering if the corpse demon could withstand this sonar assault.

She recalled corpse demons, unless becoming earth immortals, didn’t form golden cores. Pluck the heart, and they ended.

Jiang Chenbi pulled out a gold needle. Cui Wangshu noticed and urgently whispered, “What are you doing? You’re already at your limit.”

Piercing her Hegu acupoint with the needle, her temples bulged with veins. Gritting through pain, she exhaled in two sharp bursts. “No time. That monster’s coming.”

Forcing herself up, she grinned. “Little Minister Cui, remember it well.”

She rolled forward, feeling torn apart alive, blood seeping from ears and nose.

In the second before blacking out, she transmitted the most precise—and final—information: “Si hour position. Liver pain pauses alternately twice. Also a blind…”

Before finishing, Jiang Chenbi fainted. Cui Wangshu completed the final piece. The full sonar map was drawn, the corpse demon’s roar echoing nearby.

Ignoring her arrow wound, Cui Wangshu pushed her lightness skill. Even if the last step was unavoidable error, she reached Jiang Chenbi’s side.

Following safe zones on the map, she carried Jiang Chenbi the final twenty meters out of the stone chamber.