The axe chopped at Chen Ai as though she were just another tree. She went to catch it on her horns, but something about the old weapon flared in her spiritual senses. Twisting away at the last moment, she sidestepped as the axe swung past close enough to cut her robes before it bit down into the forest floor.
From how deep the axe sank, she judged the warrior to be only 3rd Stage Qi Condensing realm.
Why was someone so weak in the Howling Blossom Valley?
Rags covered his mouth and nose, revealing only his pitiless black eyes. He growled as he wrenched the blade back from the ground. Dirt and shattered leaves stuck to the axe head as he raised it high like a wind-up toy.
With a burst of strength, Chen Ai swung her club into the man's torso, shattering his ribcage and sending him flying into a nearby tree trunk. His spine audibly snapped, and he slumped down amongst the exposed roots.
Miraculously, he didn't release the axe even in death. Chen Ai frowned at that and crouched down beside him, her club ready in case he was faking death. Though how anyone could move after having their spine shattered and their head cracked was beyond her imagination. The axe was crude, old, and bound to the man’s hand with a length of leather thong. The strapping was so tight it dug into his flesh. It must have been excruciating, though she supposed she’d put him out of his misery.
Ran Yaliu appeared beside her in a rush of wind.
“Are you alright?” she asked as she handed over Chen Ai’s sword.
“I'm fine, thanks.”
“He's definitely not. Good work, Chen Ai.
“No, I failed. This man simply threw himself in my way to help the woman escape.”
“What woman?”
“The swordswoman who infiltrated the camp. I sensed her outside my tent and attacked, but she fled that way…”
Wind tousled Chen Ai’s blonde hair as Ran Yaliu sped away in pursuit.
Ran Qin approached along with Song Shuai.
“Where’s Ran Yaliu?” Song Shuai asked.
“She went after the swordswoman,” Chen Ai said as she pointed.
Song Shuai pulled his spear from a storage ring.
“I’ll go help her.”
He leaped into one of the trees and vanished in a rumbling thunderclap as he built up speed.
Together, the three of them crouched to inspect the fallen warrior.
Ran Qin carefully examined the axe without touching or picking it up.
“Strange.”
“What?”
“There's poison on the axe.”
That must be what screamed danger to Chen Ai's senses. She touched the cut in her robes. That axe had come too close to touching her skin.
“Who poisons an axe?”
Ran Qin shrugged.
“Someone who cares more about killing than fighting, I’d imagine.”
“Can you identify the poison?”
“That was the young mater’s speciality,” she said with a sigh. “If he were here, he could identify it with a glance, but I’m not so certain. I suspect it would make you woozy, then sleepy, almost as though you were drunk, before you collapse with shallow breathing and terrible nightmares.”
Chen Ai whistled.
“That’s impressive deduction for someone who isn’t certain.”
“Not really, Shen Tongtong was hit by the same stuff. She’s currently unconscious back at the camp.”
“Is she alright?”
Ran Qin raised an eyebrow as though to say: really? After everything I just said, you’re asking if she’s alright?
“She’s alive, but she’s incapacitated. What’s important is that her wound wasn’t deep, so it doesn’t require a lot of poison, and a spear made the wound.”
“So there’s at least two more out there.”
“At least,” Ran Qing said with a nod. “Are they working with you and your senior brother?”
“No! Why would you even think that?”
“It’s hard to know what to think. We’ve only been here for a single day, and so much has gone wrong. I knew it would be dangerous, but I didn’t think it would be this messy.”
“You haven’t left the city much, have you?”
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“No, I haven’t,” Ran Qing said drily as she reached for the scarf around the man’s face. “Let’s see who this is.”
She pulled away the ragged cloth, and both women recoiled in disgust at what the moonlight revealed. Withered skin surrounded the raw, exposed flesh of his lipless mouth. Blackened teeth sat in a permanent smile. His bloodshot eyes rolled wetly in his head and locked onto Ran Qin.
A fetid, wintry gasp came from the man’s throat. Immense cold radiated as he sucked at the air so fast it whistled through his exposed teeth. Blood beaded on Ran Qin’s face, the droplets flying into the man’s open mouth.
His bones shifted with a crackling, crunching sound as his spine bent into shape.
With a shout, Chen Ai brought her club down in an overhead swing that splattered the axeman’s head across the bark of the tree behind him.
Ran Qin fell back, pale as a sheet and gasping for air.
Chen Ai slammed the warrior a few more times with her club until he was completely flattened. She even struck his axe until she warped the blade and broke the handle. Her breathing came heavily, despite the qi flowing through her body.
She leaned against the tree trunk.
“Are you alright?” she asked Ran Qin.
“No.”
The musician delicately dabbed the blood away from her face before disintegrating it from her fingertips with a burst of qi.
“That was terrifying. I couldn’t move, it was like…”
She surveyed Chen Ai’s gory handiwork. No part of the warrior remained intact.
“Are you sure he’s dead?” she asked sarcastically.
“No,” Chen Ai replied.
That wouldn’t kill senior brother, and this man healed with a similar technique. The only difference was that her senior brother didn’t drink blood to heal.
Ran Qin stood and brushed herself.
“Let’s return to camp. We’re too slow to help Ran Yaliu and --”
She gasped.
Three warriors floated down out of the canopy and landed softly on the leaves surrounding them.
Chen Ai readied her club.
“If you come at us, you will die.”
The warriors stood as still as training dummies, their long weapons held stiffly in their hands, strapped with leather like the last. They said nothing.
“What do you want?”
The warriors all had rags covering their mouths. As one, their eyes twinkled and their rags fell away. Their puckered and raw flesh exposed lipless mouths. They gasped and drained the air as though their throats were bottomless holes to a frozen hell.
Ran Qin fell to her knees, her pipa clutched in frozen fingers as she shuddered. Blood trickled from her face and the corners of her eyes and flowed toward the open mouths.
The technique staggered Chen Ai. Immense cold flayed her skin while blood streamed from her face and hands.
She cycled, and her strengthened meridians resisted the terrible suction as grass qi flowed through her legs. The cold suction increased, and her club stuck to the skin of her hand. With a shout, she kicked grass qi into the leaves, and they shot like a spray of blades towards the warriors.
The warriors lifted into the air as though yanked by wires, but Chen Ai redirected the qi-infused leaves and shredded the warriors from below.
They fell to the ground in mutilated clumps, and the howling suction became a wheeze. The cold bled away, and Chen Ai staggered forward as Ran Qin fell to the ground.
After a few steps, Chen Ai lifted her club waist high and slammed it into the first warrior's head. It splattered, and the suction from him stopped completely. Of the other warriors, one had a head in two pieces leaking into the ground between them, while the other was little more than a head, an arm, and a torso.
He rolled a pale eye towards Chen Ai.
Despite their terrifying group technique, the warriors were each at a far lower stage than Chen Ai.
She lifted her club, feeling her muscles warming up, and swung again and again and one more time for good measure. After that, she hobbled over to the first corpse.
“Good, it’s still flat.”
Ran Qin looked at her with wide eyes. Her exposed skin was cracked and dotted with bloody sores. She looked like she would fall over dead at any minute, and Chen Ai assumed she looked the same.
“Let’s go back to camp," Ran Qin said.
“Good idea.”
“Wait a moment, please.”
“What is it?”
Ran Qin bowed.
“Thank you for saving my life.”
Ran Qin produced a small pouch from her storage ring. Inside the pouch lay familiar pink pills. She swallowed one and cycled her qi. The energy from the pill repaired her cracked skin and erased any sign of the attack. Her tangled hair straightened, darkened, and shone with silkiness, and a gentle glow suffused her, as though she were freshly bathed and pampered.
“That makes me feel better,” she said with a smile. “Please, take one.”
She held out the pouch, and Chen Ai took a pill.
“Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it,” Ran Qin said as the pouch vanished into her storage ring.
Chen Ai cycled the beautification pill as they returned to the camp, her skin, hair, and horns all rejuvenating. Ran Qin blasted them both with a quick spinning wind that fluttered through their clothes, dispersing any residue from the beautification process.
Chen Ai raised an eyebrow as she sniffed herself.
Flowers?
“Did you really take the time to learn a qi technique that makes you smell better?”
“A performer must always be stunning.”
Chen Ai smirked, but had to admit she felt refreshed… though a little warm, and lightheaded. These beautification pills were a lot stronger than the ones she’d bought in the past.
They returned to the camp, keeping their eyes peeled and their spirit senses alert for more hidden enemies.
“What were those things?”
“Jiangshi,” Chen Ai said. “A hopping vampire. I didn’t realize it at first because they don’t use weapons, but someone tied it to the creature’s hand. The stiff movements, the cold, draining breath, that’s all textbook jiangshi.”
“What about the others?”
“They could be jiangshi, or they might be people commanding the creatures. We should hole up in camp and build the biggest fire we can.”
“But, won’t that attract more of them?”
“The heat and light will scare away the creatures of cold and dark.”
“You’ve dealt with them before?”
“Not directly, but you hear stories on the road. You see the aftermath in remote villages, where plague leaves corpses unburied, or when someone digs up the wrong grave. But they’re things that can be defeated. Cultivators destroy them all the time, and the heavens despise them.”
They reached the camp’s edge. Half the tents lay in shambles, and a small fire flickered at the center. Tongtong lay in Shen Botao’s care.
His breathing was heavy with emotion, and the bandages on his chest were dark with blood and fluid. They needed changing, but right now, everyone’s attention was fixed on Shen Tongtong.
“She won’t move,” Shen Botao said with a strained voice. “She’s barely breathing. What do we do?”
The old Shen swordsman put a hand on Shen Botao’s shoulder, and the young man controlled his breathing as he cycled, stabilizing earth qi.
“Please, what can you do to help her?”
“It’s not specific to whatever that poison is,” Chen Ai said as she rummaged in her pack. “But this will help her fight it off.”
She found a jade bottle with green Two Breathe Cleansing pills. Shen Botao helped her feed Shen Tongtong a pale blue pill. This would fight any toxic elements while boosting her qi levels to speed up recovery.
Shen Tongtong’s breathing evened as the pill broke down inside her, but she didn’t wake. It was definitely a bad sign, but the pill wasn’t finished, and they had nine more. Shen Tongtong would be alright. They would get everyone to the Myriad Tree.
Chen Ai let out a long breath and cycled her qi, the freshness of grass lifting her spirits as she looked around the destroyed camp. Slowly, a frown formed on her flawless forehead.
“Where is senior brother?”
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