The Blackwind Mountains stretched on for tens of thousands of miles, their end impossible to see.
From a distance, the entire mountain range looked like an ancient black dragon lying across the earth. Layer upon layer of heavy black clouds hung over the mountains year-round. The gale howled through the valleys, giving off a whimper like the wails of vengeful ghosts. This was no ordinary wind, but the “black fiend wind,” laced with the fiendish miasma left behind by a great demon from a thousand years ago. A single breath would dissolve a mortal’s flesh and blood. Even a Qi Condensation cultivator would suffer damaged meridians after staying in it too long.
Three hundred outsider servants from the Gu Yue Estate’s outer estate, escorted by thirty elite disciples from the inner estate, slowly disappeared beneath the weak moonlight into the pitch-black forest, its gaping maw resembling that of a giant beast.
At the very rear of the group, Fang Cunsheng felt the temperature plummet the instant he stepped into the mountain range. A bone-piercing chill drilled straight into the cracks between his bones.
“Brother Cunsheng, this place… it’s too sinister.”
Beside him, A-Xing clutched a rusty fine-iron short sword with both hands. His face was deathly pale, and his legs trembled uncontrollably. Even the inner-estate disciples who usually bullied them in the outer estate had reined in their arrogance. Each held a flying sword, their wary gazes sweeping across the surroundings.
Fang Cunsheng said nothing. He merely patted A-Xing’s shoulder lightly, signaling him to stay calm.
At that moment, the scant spiritual power within Fang Cunsheng’s body had been pushed to its limit, all of it pouring into the stone fragment in his sea of consciousness. In his sight, the world before him was no longer a simple forest. It had become a bizarre spiderweb woven from countless interlocking lines.
The black lines represented death and demonic aura—the fiend lines. The gray lines represented bad luck and danger—the calamity lines.
Above the heads of the entire three-hundred-person group, a massive cloud of black-gray mist, as dark as ink, was tightly coiled. It meant disaster was imminent. Even more bizarrely, the threads of cause and effect around the few inner-estate disciples leading the group glimmered with a faint scarlet light.
“Borrowing a knife to kill…”
Fang Cunsheng sneered inwardly. That scarlet glow represented “bloodshed and slaughter,” and it was slaughter deliberately incited.
The inner-estate stewards and disciples had never intended to bring these three hundred people back. They planned to use the blood of these lowly servants to lure away the demon beasts around the mountain’s outskirts, clearing a “safe passage” to the cold pool for the true experts of the inner estate.
“Move your asses! Dragging your feet like that—do you want to stay behind and feed the demon beasts?!”
At the front of the group, an inner-estate core disciple in a silver Daoist robe shouted harshly. His cultivation had reached the eighth level of Qi Condensation. His name was Gu Yue Gang, and he was the outer-estate steward Li Da’s nephew. He was also the leader of this escort party. In his hand was a crimson flying sword that shimmered with radiant light. Every so often, he swung it and sent sword energy slicing through the obstructing thorns, the sharp gusts leaving the servants’ cheeks stinging.
Under Gu Yue Gang’s urging, the group ventured deeper and deeper. The ancient trees around them grew increasingly enormous and grotesque. Some trunks still bore enormous claw marks and dried, dark-red bloodstains.
Suddenly, the stone fragment in Fang Cunsheng’s sea of consciousness shuddered violently!
Roughly a hundred zhang to the left ahead of him, dozens of black fiend lines as thick as arms came charging toward the group like landslides and tidal waves. Behind that dense mass of fiend lines, the vague shadows of more than a dozen giant wolves began to take shape. Their bodies were covered in bone spikes, and their eyes burned scarlet.
【Cause-and-Effect Prompt: One hundred zhang to the left ahead. A pack of low-grade ancient beasts, “Bone-Spike Nether Wolves,” seventeen in total. They will encounter the group head-on in three breaths.】
“They’re here.” Fang Cunsheng’s gaze sharpened.
Without the slightest hesitation, he grabbed A-Xing. Taking advantage of the cover provided by their companions, he deliberately slowed his steps by half a beat. They had originally been at the very rear of the group, but this instantly left them at the absolute back, several zhang behind the others.
“Brother Cunsheng, what’s wrong?” A-Xing asked, confused.
“Shut up. Hold your breath and crouch against this tree!” Fang Cunsheng barked in a low voice, leaving no room for argument.
A-Xing had blind faith in him. At once, he clamped his mouth shut and curled up like a frightened quail at the base of a black ancient tree so wide that several people would have needed to join hands to encircle its trunk.
“Roar—!”
Almost the instant the two crouched down, a deafening wolf howl exploded without warning at the front of the group!
The dense forest immediately erupted with the incessant crack of breaking branches. Seventeen black afterimages, like bolts of black lightning, lunged out of the undergrowth to the left ahead. They were Bone-Spike Nether Wolves, each the size of a calf. Every one radiated a terrifying aura comparable to that of a fourth-level Qi Condensation cultivator, while the wolf king leading them had faintly reached the sixth level!
Demon beasts of the Great Wilderness had thick hides and sturdy bones. At the same level, ordinary low-ranking cultivators were no match for them.
“Demon beast attack! Meet them! Fight back!”
“Ah—my leg! Help me!”
In an instant, shrill screams and wolf howls intertwined.
The battle became white-hot from the very first second of contact. The dozen or so outer-estate servants at the front, whose cultivation was only at the first or second level of Qi Condensation, did not even have time to scream before enormous wolf claws smashed their heads apart or razor-sharp bone spikes pierced straight through their waists. Blood gushed like fountains, turning the black earth into a muddy mire.
“Bastards! You filthy beasts are begging to die!”
Gu Yue Gang shouted furiously. The crimson flying sword in his hand transformed into a blinding stream of fire and instantly cleaved a lunging Nether Wolf in two. Yet the scent of blood only drove the pack into greater frenzy. More Nether Wolves surged forward one after another.
The elites from the drill grounds had no time to care whether the servants lived or died. They formed defensive formations to protect themselves, even deliberately shoving nearby servants forward to use their bodies as shields against the wolves’ pouncing attacks.
“Young Master Gang, the servants are suffering too many casualties! We need to retreat!” an inner-estate disciple shouted.
Gu Yue Gang forced the wolf king back with a sword strike, his eyes cold and merciless. “What are you panicking for? They’re just lowly slaves. We can recruit more after they die! Use their blood to hold the pack back. The rest of you, follow me and charge through to the right, toward Wild Dog Ridge!”
With that, Gu Yue Gang did not spare a glance for the servants struggling and screaming amid the wolves. He led the remaining inner-estate disciples, stepping onto their flying swords and forcing a breakthrough to the right.
“Follow! Hurry and follow Young Master Gang!”
Seeing this, the remaining outer-estate servants were scared out of their wits. They wept and screamed as they tried to follow the inner-estate disciples. But without the protection of high-level cultivators, they were nothing more than a group of exquisite moving snacks in the eyes of the Bone-Spike Nether Wolves.
A brutal human hell unfolded in the dense forest.
Meanwhile, Fang Cunsheng and A-Xing, hiding at the base of the ancient tree at the rear of the group, had fallen behind early. With the black fiend wind interfering and the pack’s attention drawn to the main force ahead, they miraculously escaped every wolf’s notice.
A-Xing stared at the former companions nearby who had been disemboweled, blood spraying everywhere, and nearly vomited. He dug his hands into the bark so hard that blood seeped from beneath his fingernails. If Fang Cunsheng had not pulled him back just now, one of those white skeletons lying there would certainly have been his!
“Brother Cunsheng… you—you saved my life…” A-Xing’s voice trembled so badly that he was barely intelligible.
Fang Cunsheng kept his eyes fixed on the battlefield. His brain throbbed with tearing pain from overdriving the stone fragment, but he clenched his teeth and forcibly endured it.
Because at that moment, a silent change was taking place on the battlefield ahead, within his field of vision.
As cultivators fell in great numbers, countless streams of dense blood qi and scattered spiritual power drifted through the air. Above the corpses of the dead Bone-Spike Nether Wolves and cultivators, wisps of “death cause and effect,” invisible to ordinary people, began to gather madly.
Suddenly, Fang Cunsheng saw a pitch-black fiend line above the wolf king, which was savagely tearing into a corpse, connect tightly with a point of empty space on the ground.
Following that line with his eyes, he saw that it led to the place where Gu Yue Gang had just killed a Nether Wolf with his fiery flying sword. The intense heat had burned the ground within a radius of several zhang into scorched earth. Beneath that scorched earth, a faint glimmer of emerald spiritual light was quietly blooming under the cover of death qi.
【Cause-and-Effect Prompt: The blood of an ancient beast has activated the earth vein. Three feet beneath the scorched earth lies a hundred-year-old “Rotten Blood Spirit Mushroom.” This mushroom was nurtured by Blackwind fiendish miasma and ancient beast essence blood. It is extremely yin and poisonous, but when consumed alongside the stone fragment’s energy, it can transform into the purest spiritual power—enough to let a third-level Qi Condensation cultivator instantly break through the bottleneck and advance to the fourth level of Qi Condensation!】
A hundred-year-old Rotten Blood Spirit Mushroom!
A sharp glint burst from Fang Cunsheng’s eyes.
It was a rule of web fiction: the greater the danger, the greater the opportunity! He had only just entered the mountain range’s outskirts, yet he had already encountered a spirit herb capable of helping him break through. The third and fourth levels of Qi Condensation were only one level apart, but that single level marked the gulf between the early and middle stages of Qi Condensation. Once he crossed it, the density of spiritual power in his body would double, and the time he could activate the stone fragment would increase dramatically!
“Fortune is found in danger.” Fang Cunsheng gritted his teeth.
The main force ahead was already forcing its way toward the right under Gu Yue Gang’s leadership, dying as they went. Most of the wolf pack’s strength had been drawn away in pursuit. Only three ordinary Nether Wolves remained behind, gnawing on corpses, along with the wolf king that was still feeding.
“A-Xing, do you see that burning dead tree over there?” Fang Cunsheng asked in a low voice, pointing toward a withered tree not far from the scorched earth.
A-Xing nodded blankly.
“Listen carefully. I’m going over to retrieve something. If those three lone Nether Wolves notice me, use the iron sword in your hand to beat on this broken copper pot from the outer estate—the camp equipment they issued us. Make as much noise as possible. Understand?”
“What? Brother Cunsheng, those are wolves! If they pounce…” A-Xing’s face turned green with terror.
“They’re full now, and they’re suspicious by nature. A sudden, enormous noise will make them suspect an ambush. Their first reaction will be to stay alert, not attack. Trust me. I only need three breaths to get the thing, and then we leave immediately!” Fang Cunsheng’s voice was cold and brimming with control.
A-Xing looked at Fang Cunsheng’s eyes, which emitted a faint violet glow in the darkness. He steeled himself and gritted his teeth. “All right! Brother, my life is yours. I trust you!”
“Move!”
Before his voice had even faded, Fang Cunsheng became like a night owl. Using the forest’s shadows and the cover of the black fiend wind, he flew silently toward the scorched earth.
His third-level Qi Condensation spiritual power was meager, but at full speed, a distance of a hundred zhang took only a few breaths.
“Rustle…”
The faint sound of his footsteps still alerted the strongest Bone-Spike Nether Wolf—the wolf king. It abruptly raised its blood-covered head. Its scarlet beast eyes locked onto Fang Cunsheng as he charged, and a low, dangerous growl rumbled from its throat.
“Clang—! Clang—! Clang—!”
Suddenly, an extremely sharp and thunderous metallic pounding exploded without warning in the silent forest behind them! A-Xing was using every ounce of strength he had, frantically smashing the short sword against the copper pot.
The sound produced wave after wave of echoes across the open Blackwind Mountains, like countless cultivators charging together from the rear.
As expected, the wolf king and the three ordinary Nether Wolves shuddered at the sudden boom. They instinctively turned to look behind them, uncertainty and suspicion flashing through their eyes.
“Now!”
Fang Cunsheng had already charged onto the scorched earth. Without the slightest hesitation, he gathered all the spiritual power in his body into his right palm, forming a faint spiritual-power shovel, and slammed it into the spot indicated by the Cause-and-Effect Prompt!
“Boom!”
Scorched earth flew, and the soil split open.
A strange mushroom with a dark-red body covered in countless green spots, radiating a dense bloody stench and a sinister chill, was instantly exposed to the air. It was the hundred-year-old Rotten Blood Spirit Mushroom!
Fang Cunsheng yanked the mushroom out by the roots. He did not even bother to wipe away the clinging black soil before stuffing it straight into his robes.
“Roar—!”
At the same time, the wolf king under the command of that Core Formation Black Bear Demon finally realized it had been tricked. This tiny human had actually stolen the treasure nurtured by the earth vein right under its nose!
The wolf king let out a furious roar. Its massive body transformed into a gust of foul black wind as it opened its bloody maw and viciously bit down toward Fang Cunsheng’s neck!
The terrifying stench nearly knocked Fang Cunsheng unconscious.
Yet there was not the slightest panic on Fang Cunsheng’s face. The instant the wolf king pounced, the violet light in his eyes surged. He stared fixedly at an extremely faint, death-gray thread of cause and effect near the wolf king’s chest.
It was the old wound where Gu Yue Gang’s fiery flying sword had struck the wolf king earlier. Blood was still slowly seeping from it!
“Cause and effect turns, shatter!”
Fang Cunsheng advanced instead of retreating. His body dropped strangely low, sliding along the ground. At the instant he passed the wolf king, he exhausted the last thread of spiritual power in his body, formed his finger into a sword, and struck the old wound in the wolf king’s chest with pinpoint accuracy!
A wisp of ancient energy from the stone fragment within Fang Cunsheng’s body surged crazily into the wolf king’s wound along his finger.
“Awoo—!”
The once-majestic wolf king was struck, and the violent demonic aura throughout its body abruptly began to flow backward. Guided by the aura of cause and effect, the old wound instantly lost control and exploded into a bloody hole. Fragments of internal organs mixed with blood and sprayed wildly into the air.
The Eye of Cause and Effect could do more than seek fortune and avoid disaster. It could also detonate the “cause of death” already present within an enemy!
The wolf king’s massive body slammed heavily into the ground, throwing dust into the air. Though it was not dead, the pain left it unable to stand for the moment.
“Go!”
Having landed his strike, Fang Cunsheng did not even look at the result. He used the recoil to spring from the ground, grabbed the dumbfounded A-Xing, and plunged without looking back into the depths of the forest, following another thread of cause and effect glowing with a faint cyan light—the color representing safety.
Behind them, the enraged wolves looked at their severely wounded king and ultimately abandoned the pursuit. All they could do was send unwilling, furious howls into the dark night sky.
Half an incense stick later, behind a concealed pile of wild stones.
Fang Cunsheng leaned against the cold rocks, panting heavily. His face was as pale as paper, and the spiritual power within his body had been completely exhausted. But as he touched the hundred-year-old Rotten Blood Spirit Mushroom radiating faint warmth inside his robes, burning ambition leaped in his eyes.
“Li Da, Gu Yue Gang… just wait. Whose burial ground these Blackwind Mountains will become—that’s still far too early to say!”
Fang Cunsheng took a deep breath, pulled out the mushroom, and, under A-Xing’s stunned gaze, bit straight into it!
A frenzied counterattack breakthrough quietly began amid the deathly silence of the Blackwind Mountains.