Have you ever seen soil devour a person?
In that instant, Gu Xianwang felt exactly that. The ground beneath Long Li’s feet seemed to shift abruptly from solid to fluid, sucking her down faster than any quagmire. Fortunately, Long Li grabbed an overhanging branch just in time and hoisted herself up, avoiding being swallowed completely.
Long Li clung to the slender twig, switched hands to climb onto a thicker vine nearby, and peered downward. The soil that had churned moments ago now appeared utterly normal once more.
But she was certain it hadn’t been an illusion. In that split second, the earth under her feet had softened, the gaps between the grains of sand widening like the ball pit in an amusement park.
Why?
She glanced toward Gu Xianwang. Sara and Ye Chan stood close by, but the soil beneath them showed no sign of softening.
Gu Xianwang’s heart was still pounding. She hurriedly stepped onto an exposed tree root. “There’s something wrong with the soil under our feet.”
Sara and Ye Chan quickly followed her example, each finding a secure perch. Still haunted by the earlier poisonous ant bites, they hugged the tree trunks loosely, keeping just enough distance to feel safe.
But with everyone off the ground, the soil went still again.
“Miss Gu.” Long Li called out to her.
Gu Xianwang looked over to see her pointing at the ground below. “Observe.”
With that, Long Li released her grip and leaped straight down. For the first two or three seconds after her feet touched earth, nothing happened. Gu Xianwang watched without blinking. Abruptly, countless thin threads writhed in the cracks of the soil, parting like fish through waves. The momentum yanked Long Li downward, and the ground swallowed her once more.
This time, Long Li didn’t struggle to escape right away. The undulating soil pulled her in up to her waist, submerging half her body. She and Gu Xianwang both realized it wasn’t the soil itself doing the devouring, but countless slender worms burrowing through it.
These worms were exceedingly thin, resembling horsehair worms, their bodies nearly transparent—which made them nearly invisible amid the dirt. In just this small patch around Long Li, thousands of them writhed through the soil simultaneously. From her vantage, the top layer rippled like waves across a lake’s surface.
Gu Xianwang’s scalp prickled, an itch crawling into her lungs. She scanned frantically for a path to rush over. “Long Li, can you get out?”
“Don’t come any closer.”
Long Li replied, surveying the surrounding earth. The black soil stretched far and wide, underlying nearly the entire forest.
No solid footing nearby, but she’d deliberately landed close to the vine roots on her descent. Long Li reached out, gripped the vine lengthwise with both arms, and yanked backward. Her body arched upward like a carp flipping in the mud, her powerful core muscles hauling her free from the pit.
She hooked her toes skyward, flipped her torso into the air, and landed amid the branches. Stepping along them, she rejoined the other three overhead.
Gu Xianwang looked up at her. “Are you all right?”
Long Li’s clothes and pants remained intact, without a trace of moisture. It seemed the transparent worms had churned the soil to a depth of at least a meter below, leaving it dry and evenly loosened.
Long Li inclined her head slightly and pointed at the ground. “This is Living Soil, teeming with threadworms known as Earth Threads. They form a symbiosis with the earth, creating this living medium. Any large creature that steps into it gets dragged underground.”
She paused, then went on. “These threadworms are scavengers by nature. They parasitize a host’s digestive tract and secrete a hormone. Once the creature suffocates and dies in the soil, the hormone accelerates decomposition—even in winter, it takes only half a day to sprout giant fungi.”
Ye Chan gaped, pointing at Long Li’s pants. “Th-then you…”
Sara rolled her eyes. “What are you imagining? Would a dragon capsize in a mere gutter like this?”
Gu Xianwang had harbored the same concern, but Sara’s words made it awkward to voice. Instead, she said, “Why did the Living Soil under you activate earlier, but not under the three of us?”
That was precisely Long Li’s point. “Because of weight.”
Ye Chan blinked in surprise. “So these worms prefer someone with a fuller figure?”
Logically speaking, if they were going to feed, they’d target the larger prey first. There was no reason to single out Long Li ahead of the group.
Gu Xianwang ventured a guess. “Are there fewer Earth Threads in the soil beneath us than it seems?”
“Yes,” Long Li said, lowering her head to gaze at her. “All social animals, including insects, possess a clear sense of territory. So the layer of soil beneath our feet isn’t entirely Living Soil.”
Ye Chan got it now. It was as if the ground under them wasn’t solid earth but water, with Earth Threads swimming through it like crocodiles stalking prey. Once they caught up, they’d transform that patch into Living Soil and swallow the victim whole. But since the number of Earth Threads in each territory was limited, they wouldn’t chase down quarry too large for them to digest.
“So as long as we hold hands and walk together, we’ll be fine?”
Sara curled her lip in disdain.
Gu Xianwang shot Long Li a glance. She didn’t deny it, which seemed like confirmation. Walking side by side on this Living Soil meant their formation mattered a great deal. Ideally, Sara should lead with Long Li in the middle—that would keep Sara from causing mischief, and Long Li could step in if trouble arose.
Even as these thoughts crossed her mind, Gu Xianwang grew wary of the dependency taking root within her. Long Li was the captain of the rival organization, after all—no family ties, not even friends. How could she keep relying on her abilities?
Gu Xianwang pressed her lips together. Suddenly, Long Li leaped down from the tree, pressing close to the trunk and landing on the same protruding root as her. She braced one hand against the tree—whether by design or accident, it looked for all the world like she had encircled Gu Xianwang in her arm.
By the time Gu Xianwang looked up, Long Li had withdrawn her hand. She stood rock-steady, eyes fixed on the distance, apparently oblivious to Gu Xianwang’s expression during that fleeting embrace.
“Don’t you think the hunting habits of this Living Soil carry some symbolic meaning?”
Her voice was soft, pitched for Gu Xianwang alone.
“Symbolic meaning?”
“Yes,” Long Li murmured. “In Go, when stones surround an opponent’s piece in a capturing formation, pulling that single lifeless stone off the board is called ‘ko.'”
Gu Xianwang knew only the basics of Go. Back in the day, whenever her master craved a game, he’d never turn to her—always her senior brother instead. Still, she found herself largely agreeing with Long Li’s theory that this sinkhole was a giant Go board.
The real sticking point was: “Do you truly believe that for over a millennium, they’ve been appeasing the gods this way?”
“Or do they even exist anymore? Maybe the altar vanished long ago, the Witch Clan with it, leaving only those mountain folk from Yelang to guard the gold mine.”
Long Li met her gaze, her expression already spelling out the answer. She was as calm and resolute as ever. Gu Xianwang understood: this was a ‘yes.’
Only then did she voice the question burning inside her. “So who exactly is the enemy they’ve schemed so elaborately with this sinkhole to thwart?”
She had resisted acknowledging it, even wishing the so-called Witch Clan Altar lay abandoned for ages—because she dreaded being the very foe they sought to bar.
How had the Forbidden Witch Bone ended up in her body? Retribution? Punishment for invaders? She had toyed with such notions countless times, yet shrank from the crushing weight of that karma.
“Maybe it’s me,” Long Li said.
Gu Xianwang looked up in astonishment, but Sara was already snapping impatiently from the side. “Hey, what are you two muttering about? Endless guessing isn’t getting us anywhere. Let’s head down and test it ourselves.”
The words had barely left her mouth when she yanked Ye Chan off the root. Ye Chan hadn’t even registered what was happening before Sara dragged her, arm locked in a vise grip, straight toward Gu Xianwang.
Sara’s hold was ferocious, as if hell-bent on dragging them all down together. Ye Chan stared at the soil starting to bubble sluggishly beneath her feet, panic surging as she nearly leaped away. “Damn it, why drag me? I’m short and light—what if I hit the sweet spot for those worms’ digestion limit?”
It was true: of the four, she and Sara were the shortest, slimmest-framed, and unequipped with any gear to add weight. As the Living Soil gaped open, Long Li vaulted down, seizing their wrists left and right to link the three into a ring.
It worked. The moment Long Li’s weight joined them, the soil layer fell still. Gu Xianwang watched the earth lines around them rise and subside like the dorsal fins of sharks prowling just below the waves.
Long Li reached out to her. Gu Xianwang leaped into the Living Soil’s domain, slipping into the circle.
Ye Chan muttered, “If anyone’s watching us from the sidelines right now, we must look utterly ridiculous—like we’re performing some kind of ritual.”
The four shuffled forward in a sideways crab-walk, inching along. Flat ground was scarce around them; a single misstep could send anyone tumbling. What they feared most now was getting separated.
Sara cursed, “You want some dignity, huh? Then march out there all dignified and die a nice, proper death.”
“Pfft!” Ye Chan glared at her furiously. “Why do you always pick on me?”
As she spoke, she stomped her foot. It felt like she had stepped on the end of a stick, which levered up the other end right in front of Gu Xianwang’s toes.
It was a length of white bone.
More precisely, an arm bone protruding from the frayed cuff of a sleeve.
Ye Chan: “Holy shit?!”
Gu Xianwang recognized the uniform. “This is the same as the one the Japanese soldiers were wearing in the white cocoon in the karst cave.”
Sara had been smirking in schadenfreude, but the moment she heard “Japanese soldiers,” her face fell.
Gu Xianwang frowned in confusion. “Why is it buried so shallow?”
Given how many years had passed, even if the earth threads had churned the soil, the surface humus layer should have built up some thickness. How could one stomp expose the bone like that?
Long Li prodded around nearby with her foot. “Not just one. We’re probably standing right on top of a mass grave.”
Ye Chan swallowed hard. “You mean there’s at least a whole squad of those Japs buried down here?”
“Mm, could be.”
“…” Ye Chan inwardly cursed her rotten luck. Then another thought struck her: “So those two in the karst cave weren’t there on some side job?”
An entire squad of Japanese soldiers. Long Li slowly furrowed her brow and suddenly barked, “Run!”
With that, she grabbed Gu Xianwang’s hand with her right and yanked Sara along with her left, accelerating into a sprint.
The instant her heel left the ground, that white bone sank straight into the soil. At the same time, waves of black earth surged and boiled furiously—far more violent than before, by orders of magnitude.
Gu Xianwang snapped to her senses. Right—a whole squad of Japanese soldiers buried here. How massive must the appetite of the earth threads in this living soil be? The four of them wouldn’t even fill the gaps between its teeth.
Pushing off with two quick steps, she steadied herself and matched Long Li’s pace. The three of them were just aiming for some tree branches when the trees at both ends of the narrow path suddenly tilted sideways. Roots burst from the earth, thick with those translucent strands of earth threads.
Gu Xianwang’s scalp prickled. The ground beneath her feet was already starting to give way.
This time it wasn’t that the living soil was swallowing too slowly. There were simply too many earth threads in this patch of earth. As they burrowed and vied for prey, they actually slowed the rate at which it engulfed people.
The four of them were forced to scatter. Long Li glanced back and shouted, “If you don’t want to die, run! Don’t let yourself sink!”
In other words, even she had no solution. If they wanted to live, they’d have to save themselves.
Gu Xianwang gritted her teeth and unbuckled her belt. This nylon hiking strap was tough—stronger than leather. She flung it upward, looping it over a vine clasp, then pulled with both hands to haul herself free of the sinking living soil.
She saw Ye Chan and Sara veering off to the side. That area seemed to belong to a different cluster of earth threads—not quite as frenzied. In fact, she was the one in the worst spot.
Long Li looked ready to double back for her. Gu Xianwang yelled, “Don’t worry about me—go!”
She hated the feeling of being dead weight. She hated relying on others. Gu Xianwang drew a deep breath. If Long Li could make it through, she sure as hell could too.
The old adage rang in her mind: In all the martial arts under heaven, only speed cannot be broken. She’d endured grueling training and hardship since childhood. No way was she folding here.
With her resolve hardened, Gu Xianwang ground her sole into the earth and exploded into a sprint.
