Encountering an Evil Spirit

Run! Run! Run!

Wang Chen truly unleashed his Primordial Power, kicking up dust beneath his wind-swift feet as he pushed the Jia Ma Talisman's effect to its limit.

He bolted headlong in a blur, keeping his body as low as possible.

In one breath, he ran twenty or thirty li!

Only when the power of the Talisman Empowering him faded did Wang Chen stop.

The Jia Ma Talisman was an extremely practical low-grade Talisman. Once activated and Empowered upon oneself, it allowed one to run as fast as a galloping horse, no weaker than several common Qi Condensation rank Evasion Techniques.

Most cultivators carried several with them; should danger arise, they could improve their chances of escape.

Only then did Wang Chen realize that he had fled into an unfamiliar area.

Paddy fields stretched all around him.

Several small farmhouses stood in the distance.

But every light had gone out.

Wang Chen let out a long breath and tried to determine the direction of Guard Post Yi-10.

After something this serious had happened, he could not possibly run back to his own home.

It would be far too unjust to be branded a deserter!

Then Wang Chen saw clusters of fiery blossoms exploding one after another in the night sky, illuminating the Sky Dome with startling clarity.

They were Flying Flame distress signals!

Wang Chen still had a Flying Flame Talisman in his Storage Bag.

The situation just now had been far too tense and dangerous, so he had not used it.

There was no need to now.

Flying Flames rose from different places.

Clearly, the Fourth Night Patrol Team was not the only one under attack.

Right after that, Wang Chen saw beam after brilliant beam pierce the night sky.

The Yunyang Sect outer sect had actually suffered a full-scale enemy invasion!

In Wang Chen's memories, something like this had happened only once.

Three years ago, when the Gray-Eyed Bandits harassed the Yunyang Sect, more than ten Guard Posts had activated their Radiant Pillars simultaneously to call for aid from the Main Hall. The sight of beams shooting into the sky that night had been clearly visible even a hundred li away.

The memories left behind by the original owner were exceptionally vivid!

Could the Gray-Eyed Bandits have returned?

The thought made Wang Chen's heart jolt. He hurriedly took the Storage Bag he had snatched from his sleeve pocket.

A vertical-eye insignia was clearly branded upon it!

Although Wang Chen did not know whether this vertical-eye insignia represented the Gray-Eyed Bandits, he immediately suppressed the urge to open the Storage Bag and inspect its contents.

The Gray-Eyed Bandits had once belonged to the Three-Eyed Cult.

The Three-Eyed Cult had been a sect of Evil Cultivators once active in Dongcang Continent. Its abduction of vast numbers of cultivators for blood sacrifices had sparked public outrage, and the Yunyang Sect had joined forces with several allies to raze its mountain and destroy its temples, forcibly suppressing it.

It was said that two-digit numbers of Golden Core True Persons and over a hundred Magic Treasure Flying Ships had been deployed in that battle.

The fighting had been exceptionally brutal.

After the Three-Eyed Cult was wiped out, its followers scattered in all directions and became bandits.

That was how the Gray-Eyed Bandits came to be!

As the force that had led the suppression of the Three-Eyed Cult, the Yunyang Sect and the Gray-Eyed Bandits shared a blood feud to the death.

It was entirely possible that they had ambushed the night patrol team!

As for this Storage Bag—cultivators knew that the possessions of Evil Cultivators and demonic cultivators were not to be touched lightly.

Wang Chen had no idea what was inside, or whether it had been set with restrictions or curses.

But for safety's sake, he decided to bring it back to the Guard Post first.

The beams emitted by the Radiant Pillars had already clearly shown Wang Chen the way.

"Hehe!"

Just as he was preparing to leave, the laughter of children suddenly reached his ears.

Wang Chen instinctively looked toward the source of the sound and saw several children of four or five playing and roughhousing in a Spirit Field a hundred paces away.

Their cheerful laughter rang out without pause!

Children playing was a common sight in the countryside, but it was deep in the middle of the night. Those children's figures flickered in and out of sight, hazy and shifting.

They floated above the Spirit Field, their legs sunk into the rice stalks, yet they ran back and forth without the slightest obstruction.

Child Demon, a Grey-tier Evil Spirit!

A passage from On Malevolent Spirits instantly surfaced in Wang Chen's mind.

It was said that some children who died young, their departed souls lingering over their homeland and unwilling to return to the cycle of reincarnation, would gradually transform into malevolent spirits over time.

Wandering, Resentful, Fiendish, Vengeful—the Wandering tier was the lowest rank of malevolent spirits.

And within the same tier, they were further divided into grey, white, and black.

These were used to distinguish their degree of danger.

Grey-tier Child Demons were considered the most harmless of malevolent spirits.

Under normal circumstances.

As long as ordinary people did not deliberately provoke them, they would at most only frighten people.

But the appearance of Child Demons was by no means a good omen!

And several Child Demons, laughing and tussling, were running toward where he stood.

An Exorcism Talisman quietly appeared in Wang Chen's hand.

At the same time, he slowly backed away.

Malevolent spirits were not beings one could reason with.

When it was time to make a move, he had to make a move!

Dong—

As the Child Demons drew ever closer, a deep, far-reaching toll of a bell spread across the countryside.

It was the Yin hour!

The Child Demons abruptly paused, then vanished soundlessly into the Spirit Field.

Only a few peals of "hee-hee" laughter continued to linger beside Wang Chen's ears.

It took a moment before they faded away completely.

Wang Chen could not help but let out a breath of relief.

This was his first time facing a true malevolent spirit. It would have been impossible to say he felt no unease or fear at all.

Yet in the very next instant, every hair on Wang Chen's body stood on end.

A Yin Evil chill silently struck him, and the robe he wore immediately glimmered with faint Spiritual Light.

As a low-grade Rank One Magic Tool, the Cloud Light Robe's defensive power was low—only slightly better than ordinary robes.

Its purpose was not to withstand an enemy's attacks.

Rather, whenever a malevolent spirit came close, it would automatically trigger its cloud light as a warning.

The danger was behind Wang Chen!

Wang Chen felt as though he had fallen into an ice pit, chilled to the bone from head to toe.

Yet his mind remained clear and calm, his Divine Soul not seized by fear.

Without a moment's hesitation, Wang Chen spun around and thrust out his right palm.

The Exorcism Talisman in his hand suddenly burst apart, transforming into a dense aura of pure Yang that, driven by Mana, blasted forward!

It struck a scarecrow!

This scarecrow had appeared behind Wang Chen at some unknown moment, with only three steps separating them.

Tentacle-like straw ropes sprouted from the scarecrow's body, winding toward Wang Chen like venomous snakes.

Only to be struck squarely in the chest by the Exorcism Pure Yang energy!

"Yah!"

The scarecrow immediately let out an extraordinarily strange shriek, and all the straw ropes reaching for Wang Chen recoiled.

It flew backward at once, wisps of white smoke rising from its chest as it sizzled and charred!

Though the scarecrow had no facial features such as eyes, nose, or mouth, Wang Chen could clearly feel an incomparably venomous resentment locking onto him.

It was angry.

Very, very angry!

Wang Chen suddenly changed his palm into a finger and thrust his Geng Metal Sword Finger at the retreating scarecrow.

Finger Force tore through the air and instantly struck the scarecrow's head.

This attack did not do much damage to the scarecrow.

But it made its movements stall for an instant.

Wang Chen lunged forward and slapped out another Exorcism Talisman.

His intuition told him that if he did not get rid of it now, it would become an endless future threat!

The second update is here.