Fatigue

He grabbed violently—and pulled out a woman.

Li Qi froze, staring blankly for a moment.

But the Black Mist immediately tried to snatch her back, charging over regardless of the damage!

Li Qi instantly flung the woman behind him, then threw three punches to scatter the rushing Black Mist. Yet unlike before, the Black Mist did not collapse. Instead, it swallowed him whole!

As if it were fighting for its life.

"Damn it!" Li Qi's heart jolted, and he immediately began to chant loudly!

"Radiant Seven Luminaries, shining bright above!"

"Valiant warriors, how mighty, how grand!"

The blood and qi within him immediately boiled like an oil barrel set ablaze!

Brilliant as sunlight, roaring as blazing flames!

With the Ox-Strength Technique empowering his body, Yang Energy erupted from him. His imposing aura directly forced back the surrounding Black Mist.

The Black Mist still tried to press forward, but by then the other merchants had arrived. They shouted loudly, murderous intent surging around them, while the chopping knives they struck together carried the martial clamor of a battlefield, startling the Black Mist into retreat.

The Black Mist seemed to hesitate for a moment before swiftly withdrawing, no longer blocking the road.

"It worked. That dog bastard has gone, so let's get moving too!" Seeing this, Li Qi caught his breath and immediately called out to the others behind him.

Though his tone sounded somewhat commanding, no one had any objection at a time like this. Everyone hurriedly packed their things, hung up their chopping knives, slung on their baskets, picked up their torches, and bolted away in a flash.

No one even bothered with the woman.

Watching them run off without even caring about a person, Li Qi did not know what expression he ought to make...

Still, a life was a life. That woman seemed to have lost consciousness?

She had probably been abducted by that monster too, right?

Li Qi looked at the people who had already fled, uncertain what to do. But when he looked closer, the woman's clothes were torn to shreds. They had originally been white cloth and gauze, clearly the sort of garments that cost a great deal.

Yet though they had once been expensive, they were now stained with mud and ash, tattered and ragged. There were wounds on her body too, blood seeping from them and staining her white skirt red.

She had no hairpin, her hair hanging loose and disheveled. She looked utterly bedraggled.

She looked like... a young lady from a great household who had been captured?

Would there be a reward for saving her?

He hesitated for two or three seconds. When he turned his head again, that group had already run more than twenty meters away.

And who knew whether that Black Mist would come back.

"No way. Could a monster capable of Form Transformation really have been dragged out by me?" Li Qi muttered to himself. Then he hoisted the unconscious woman over his shoulder and hurried after them.

There was no helping it. He could not just stand by and watch someone die, could he? She was suspicious, yes, but if she was a monster, daylight would reveal her true form naturally.

And if she was the kind of monster that feared no sunlight and could flawlessly transform into a human, would saving her or not saving her even make a difference?

Either way, he would be dead.

Whether one lived after encountering something like that depended entirely on its mood. Maybe saving its life would make the monster happy, and there might even be some benefit in it, right?

After all, Li Qi still had a bit of conscience. Leaving a woman who looked too weak to truss a chicken lying by the roadside to die would leave him feeling somewhat guilty.

Feng County was only a day's journey away. He could carry her there.

With that thought, he no longer hesitated. Carrying the woman, he relied on his physical strength to rapidly catch up.

The group ran the instant they decided to run, charging for more than two hours. Even with cultivation techniques supporting them, such a mad dash along mountain paths, on top of the exhaustion from the middle of the night, left every one of them tired as dead dogs.

What surprised Li Qi even more was that after two hours of running, if a living person had been slung over someone's shoulder, they should have been jolted to death—or at least jolted awake if they were half-dead. Yet the woman on his back was still unconscious.

But considering this was a world filled with monsters and spirits, he could not really say much. He would carry her into the city first. If no one claimed her then, he would deal with it then.

More than two hours later, a faint glow had appeared at the edge of the sky. Only then did the group stop. They collapsed on the mountain road like dead dogs, leaning against rocks, utterly exhausted. A few had even vomited from fatigue.

"None of you drink any water. Wait until you've rested enough first!" the burly man instructed the merchants, then leaned against a tree himself, exhausted to the bone.

Li Qi was having an even harder time. He had not carried the merchants' baskets, but he had still been moving under a load. The woman weighed eighty or ninety jin. Carrying her for a little while had not seemed like much, but carrying her while running for two hours was truly murderous. He randomly found a spot, laid the woman down, and without caring whether the ground was filthy, decisively dropped down himself and panted heavily.

Tired. He was truly, unbearably tired.

That two-hour sprint had probably covered nearly eighty li, and it had been cross-country travel under a load. It had practically taken Li Qi's life. Since he began cultivating, he had never been this exhausted. Even hauling boats, he could not possibly haul one for two straight hours!

Though the pile of dead dogs were all still gasping for breath, the burly man was the first to recover.

After regaining some strength, he walked over to Li Qi and plopped down beside him. "You don't look all that brawny, but I didn't expect you to be so fierce. I'm Ba Kui. What's your name?"

"Li Qi..." Li Qi answered weakly. He had not recovered yet.

"Li Qi, sorry about what happened during the day. I've got a bit of a hot temper. Whenever I hear someone wagging their tongue, I can't hold myself back. But I didn't expect that beneath your skinny, short appearance was a real man. We'll reach Feng County today. Once we get there, it's settled—I absolutely have to treat you to a round of wine! We'll celebrate!" Ba Kui slapped Li Qi's shoulder and laughed heartily.

"Definitely, definitely..." Li Qi was still limp and weak. After that slap, he simply toppled over.

For some reason, he felt exceptionally tired.

He had often done physical labor in the past, and he did not think his endurance was particularly poor. Even if he got tired, he should have recovered quickly.

Yet at this moment, he felt incredibly, incredibly exhausted, as though no amount of rest could possibly restore him.

It felt like... recovering from a serious illness, like his body had been drained dry?

But he did not seem to have done anything that could have weakened his body?

"Right, Li Qi, what were you planning by carrying this woman back? She still hasn't woken up. That monster probably sucked away her Essence and qi. She's just deadweight, and she'll make the road difficult. Did you take a fancy to her?" Ba Kui glanced at the unconscious woman.

"I just didn't want to stand by and watch her die. I couldn't exactly leave her there, could I?" Li Qi wiped away his sweat, then took a small sip of water.

"Here, this'll help you recover faster." Ba Kui extended a hand, holding out a paper packet.

Li Qi took it and opened it, finding dark brown granules inside.

"Salt. When you're tired, take a sip of water, then a pinch of salt. Before long, you'll have strength again," Ba Kui said.

"Thanks." Li Qi pinched a little up and put it into his mouth.

Oddly, the first thing he tasted was not saltiness, but bitterness.

Still, that was normal. With this sort of coarse salt, there might not have been more salt in it than sand. It was already quite good if it could replenish his strength.