The corpse of another immortal—the true “God Corpse.”
Its four limbs and torso were no different from a human’s, clad in garments that were neither cloth nor armor. Towering even in death, it lay several times the height of a man.
Its head had vanished without a trace, and thick streams of Black Water gushed from the neck. The other wounds across its body sprayed black liquid like fountains.
“The Immortal Lord said she fought another immortal on Clear Seclusion Mountain,” Su Paopao said, wiping away cold sweat. “But she never mentioned killing the other one…”
Immortals were nearly impossible to kill.
The caveat being that no other immortal was gunning for them.
“Does that mean,” Black Peach said with a frown, “the immortal of Bottle Pure Heaven might have fallen in that same battle?”
Mutual destruction. It seemed a perfectly reasonable conclusion.
“Speculating like this won’t help the mission,” Xian Yuan said gravely. “We need to find the Divine Stele, fast.”
The group had already reached the mountaintop. Here, the black blood was as thick and sticky as a swamp. Every step demanded effort, and they had to watch that none of it splashed onto their bodies.
Searching separately would have been far more efficient, but the thought of tripping and tumbling into reincarnation kept everyone clustered together.
Yin Luan and the others stuck close, scouring the area around the immortal’s corpse for the Divine Stele.
“Since it’s something left behind by an immortal, there should be traces of immortal power lingering on it,” Yin Luan said. “Any way to detect those remnants?”
A thorough search of an ordinary peak would have been simple enough, but this treacherous terrain made every moment a slog. Who knew how long it would take?
Hearing her words, Xian Yuan pulled out the detection tool they had used in the Cave-Heaven. After studying it for a moment, she frowned.
“It’s all chaotic energy remnants here,” she said. “Probably from the immortals’ battle.”
When immortals clashed, it was mortals who suffered.
In the heat of battle, they likely gave no thought to the devastation they wrought on the surroundings.
The air had turned foul and turbid, the blood lethally toxic. This mountain would remain a forbidden zone for life for centuries to come.
They searched for a while longer until the sky began to dim and eerie whooshing sounds echoed from all directions.
“It’s getting dark. Should we keep going?”
Yin Luan asked.
Xian Yuan pondered for a moment before slowly shaking her head.
“Too dangerous. We’ll wait for dawn.”
Darkness blanketed everything. The nights in the Barbaric Wastes offered no moonlight for guidance, and even torches barely pierced the gloom ahead.
A single slip could spell disaster.
The group hadn’t strayed far, however. They found a slightly elevated spot untouched by the black blood and settled in for a brief rest. From there, they could still make out the Headless God Corpse nearby.
“Is it safe to rest this close to an immortal’s corpse?” Su Paopao asked nervously. “My scalp’s still tingling.”
Whenever she caught sight of the God Corpse, an overwhelming pressure bore down on her—like something heavy had been forced into her chest, urging her to flee.
“Descending in the dark would be even riskier,” Xian Yuan replied. “Just bear with it.”
“Eat if you’re hungry, drink if you’re thirsty,” Black Peach added with a snort. “If anything goes wrong, we’ve got your back. What’s there to fear?”
Su Paopao fell silent.
After a full day of hard travel and the shocks atop the mountain, even Xian Yuan—the one with the highest cultivation—felt the strain of fatigue.
At her level, sleep was optional. But when mental exhaustion set in, nothing restored her like a good night’s rest or deep meditation.
“I’ll take the first watch,” Xian Yuan said. “Get some rest while you can.”
“Let me do it,” Yin Luan volunteered. “You need it more.”
“I’m worried you’d nod off midway. Wasn’t that what happened on the grassland yesterday…?”
Eyes shut, head down, out like a light—and somehow still packing away extra food. No wonder her figure was turning out so well.
Exhausted from a day of constant tension, Yin Luan ate a quick meal and curled up by the campfire, closing her eyes.
“She can sleep that soundly in a place like this?”
“Senior did say she can doze off anywhere…”
Black Peach and Su Paopao grumbled a bit before turning in themselves.
The whooshing winds and the crackle of firewood blended into a soothing lullaby, lulling them to sleep.
Deep into the night.
“zZZZZZ……”
The Little Snake Demon rolled over, patted her belly, and slept on with a look of perfect contentment.
Suddenly, she felt someone nudging her shoulder.
“Mmm… easier… um… I’m up…”
After two or three prods, Yin Luan blinked awake in a daze. She let out a massive yawn and sat up.
The surroundings fell into utter silence, the eerie whooshing sounds seemingly vanished. Black Peach and Su Paopao lay on the other side, sleeping just as soundly as she was.
“Is it my turn?” Little Snake Demon rubbed her eyes, mumbling drowsily. “You rest. I’ll take over…”
Her words trailed off midway as a slender jade finger pressed gently against her lips.
“Come with me,” Xian Yuan whispered. “Don’t wake them.”
Little Snake Demon snapped awake at her words.
Something was wrong!
She looked up at Xian Yuan, arching an eyebrow slightly.
From this angle, the iron-faced beauty actually seemed to have a decent chest…
Yin Luan nodded and quietly climbed to her feet, following the other away from the campfire.
Without the firelight, visibility dimmed sharply, but Little Snake Demon’s eyes were far from ordinary. Even in these conditions, she could just barely make things out.
“What’s going on?”
Once they reached a spot far enough not to disturb the others, Little Snake Demon spoke up.
“I’ve found the Divine Stele,” Xian Yuan replied. “And nearby, there are some treasures we can still use.”
“Treasures?”
Yin Luan blinked in surprise.
“They must have been left behind from the battle between those two Immortals,” the other explained. “Let’s go take a look first and collect them.”
“Something this important, and you didn’t call the others?”
She frowned in confusion.
“Treasures are valuable. They could spark conflict,” Xian Yuan said flatly. “I only trust you.”
“Uh…”
Little Snake Demon ducked her head at those words.
Could it be that “suck” from before had changed things between them? The way she put it was downright embarrassing…
With words like that, how could she possibly refuse to go?
Xian Yuan led her onward through the darkness.
After a moment, a half-person-high stele came into view in the distance—within Yin Luan’s vision.
“We just need to bring this back, right?” Little Snake Demon said. “I’ll go grab it.”
“Wait,” Xian Yuan stopped her. “Didn’t you notice? It’s shrouded in an invisible barrier. Very dangerous—not easy to take at all. Let me show you the treasures first.”
Fair enough. If it were that simple, Xian Yuan would’ve snatched it up already. After all, she was the one who wanted a reward from Jing the most.
They skirted around the Divine Stele, and Xian Yuan led her into the viscous black blood. Their pace slowed dramatically.
“Be careful,” Xian Yuan cautioned.
“How did you find the Divine Stele?” Yin Luan asked. “We didn’t spot a single trace during the day.”
“The energy saturating the mountaintop changes at night,” Xian Yuan paused before explaining. “The stele’s traces stand out more. While you were resting, I scouted this way and found it.”
“Oh…”
Their steps grew slower and slower, the ground beneath their feet turning ever stickier—like wading through glue.
Yin Luan halted abruptly midway.
“What’s wrong?” Xian Yuan asked.
“Where are these treasures?”
She scanned their surroundings. Nothing but darkness everywhere.
“Just a little farther,” Xian Yuan replied. “Not far now.”
“Not far…”
Yin Luan echoed, nodding slowly as she spoke.
“But once we get there, I won’t be able to move a muscle, will I?”
The night sky hung silent above them, the adhesive ground clinging to their feet, the two women regarding each other without a word.
“What are you talking about?”
Xian Yuan finally said.
“You know exactly what I mean,” Yin Luan replied, her expression turning deadly serious. “Where’s the real Xian Yuan?”
“…”
The “Xian Yuan” gazed at her in silence.
“How did you see through it?” she asked, her voice flat and devoid of inflection. “At your level, you shouldn’t have been able to tell.”
“I’d love to say you failed to capture even a tenth of Xian Yuan’s personality, so anyone could’ve spotted it,” Yin Luan said coolly. “But the truth is, you lack the scent of the living.”
No scent.
This thing carried neither Xian Yuan’s distinctive aroma nor even the basic smell of a living person.
Yin Luan had sensed something off from the very beginning.
She’d followed this far partly to gauge the situation and partly to keep it from harming their teammates.
“You can distinguish the scents of living creatures?” Xian Yuan said evenly. “That’s… unexpected. Then again, you carry the auras of three Immortals. A bit of fortune on your side makes sense.”
“What the hell are you?”
Little Snake Demon fixed her with a wary stare.
Xian Yuan gave no answer. Instead, she approached step by step, each footfall as light as a dragonfly touching the water’s surface—effortless and graceful.
Yin Luan didn’t dare hold back. She unleashed a punch, whipping up a howling gale that blasted toward her foe.
Smack!
The strike connected perfectly from a distance, yet Xian Yuan didn’t reel back. She erupted in an instant, dissolving into Black Water that sank into the ground.
“What?”
Yin Luan’s eyes widened in shock.
In the next moment, Xian Yuan burst up from the earth right before her, identical in every outward detail save for its scent—indistinguishable from the genuine article.
“You’re standing right on top of me, and you ask what I am?”
She removed her mask. Beneath it lay only inky blackness—no face at all.
“Eek—!!”
Late at night, with a faceless beauty standing right in front of her, the Little Snake Demon shook like a leaf in a storm.
What was this? Could none of them make a proper entrance for once? Did they have to keep trying to scare people half to death?
“Among the four of you, your ties to Jing run the deepest,” the faceless Xian Yuan said. “Deeper even than this one’s. Excellent. Devouring you should reveal plenty.”
She donned the mask once more. In the blink of an eye, she was upon Yin Luan, one hand resting on her shoulder.
“Wait, I’m not tasty at all. Everyone who’s tried says I get stuck in their teeth…”
The Little Snake Demon gulped nervously.
“Cease your resistance.”
Xian Yuan’s arm morphed into a coiling stream of water, swiftly wrapping around the Little Snake Demon’s body.
“Fine then…”
Yin Luan let out a sigh.
Then…
Bang!
She drove her fist into the enemy’s head. The horrifying force obliterated half of Xian Yuan’s form, reducing it once more to Black Water.
“In that case, let’s throw down!”
~~~
