Reunion

In the latter half of the night.

Chen Xuan returned to the ruined temple, exhausted from head to toe, dragging along a hibernating black bear that had been sheltering in a burrow beneath a tree.

The heavy snow had fallen for three days straight, frosting a thousand miles of land. By now, there were few animals still active in the mountains and forests.

Only after expending tremendous effort had he found such a large beast, weighing a good four or five hundred pounds.

"This cursed weather. It isn't easy finding a bite to eat out in the wild."

Chen Xuan muttered. His stomach had been growling with hunger, and with the sky so dark, he had let his guard down for a moment. The enraged black bear, jolted awake, had raked him with one claw, nearly tearing a huge chunk of flesh from his shoulder.

Enraged, he had first forcibly dragged it out of its burrow. Then he had raised his fists, each blow carrying more than two thousand pounds of force, and hammered it again and again, brutally splitting the black bear's entire skull open.

The scene was violent—and absurdly exaggerated. The ferocious black bear that would make ordinary people blanch had actually been beaten to death by Chen Xuan's bare fists.

Because he had used no sharp weapon, the black bear's thick fur had remained perfectly intact. Whether for warmth or for sale, it was highly valuable.

"Crackle, crackle!"

Inside the ruined temple, Chen Xuan began using his less-than-polished wilderness survival skills to process the black bear.

There was no way he could finish four or five hundred pounds of meat in one sitting. Some would be left over, and he planned to carry it with him and eat it on the way to Peach Town, or even farther into the Southern Wilderness Mountains.

Peach Town was only a hundred-odd miles away. He would reach it in two or three days, and this meat would be enough to sustain him on the road.

An hour later.

Chen Xuan had eaten his fill. He consumed the precious bear gallbladder, while the other organs that were inconvenient to process were thrown outside for the small animals that occasionally passed by.

There was still some time before dawn. After eating and drinking his fill, he dropped his head and fell asleep.

Suddenly.

Chen Xuan felt a violent pounding in his heart and woke from his dream. The sensation was terribly oppressive, as though a massive stone were pressing down on his chest, making him feel as if he might vomit.

"What happened?"

Chen Xuan's body tensed. He walked out of the ruined temple and looked around. Then he saw that dawn was about to break—the darkest moment between heaven and earth.

In the pitch-black darkness to the south, where one could not see one's own hand, two golden lanterns suddenly appeared. They were enormous and terrifying, almost suffocating to behold.

They were a pair of golden lanterns floating in the night sky more than a hundred miles away, like a colossal beast prowling through the deep sea. It passed high overhead, its astonishingly oppressive aura carrying all the way to Chen Xuan.

It was impossible to imagine how enormous a being with eyes of such size truly was.

"An ancient beast from the Southern Wilderness Mountains?"

Chen Xuan guessed that it might be a high-level lifeform with a pair of wings, blotting out the sky and sun as it flew overhead. But it might also have been an ancient, monstrous beast of unimaginable height, rising to its feet from the Southern Wilderness Mountains and stretching lazily.

"Is that a... king?"

Chen Xuan narrowed his eyes. Above those enormous eyes, where the forehead of a giant beast would be, a wrinkled character—"wang"—suddenly appeared, shimmering with golden light before vanishing in a flash.

Very soon, the Golden-Eyed Giant Beast seemed to be traveling through the night. It rapidly receded and disappeared into the darkness.

"I didn't see anything like this in three years, but in just a few short days, there's been a Qi Refiner, the Small Underworld, and a giant lifeform traveling through the night..."

Chen Xuan gazed southward, a layer of gloom settling over his heart.

He did not know what was happening in the Southern Wilderness Mountains, nor whether continuing south into the Southern Wilderness was the right choice.

But soon, his resolve hardened.

Wang Chan had gone there. How could he possibly lose his nerve?

Those who practiced martial arts had to live by one principle: repay kindness with kindness, and repay grudges with grudges!

Afterward, Chen Xuan returned to the ruined temple and dropped his head back onto the ground, continuing to sleep.

After daybreak.

Chen Xuan wrapped himself in the warm Black Bear Skin, packed up the remaining Black Bear Jerky, then tied two Black Bear Paws to his chest and set off southward.

The snowfall had lightened. Farther off, the sky was clearing, and several shafts of sunlight pierced through the clouds.

The snow on the road was knee-deep, making travel difficult. But Chen Xuan's physique was now far beyond that of ordinary people. He moved with the vigor of dragons and tigers, covering dozens of miles over the course of the day.

In the afternoon, Chen Xuan left the territory of Willow Town.

A tall boundary stele erected by the Ancient Chu Kingdom stood at the border between Willow Town and Peach Town. He rested beneath the stone monument for one night.

At dusk the next day, Chen Xuan arrived at the center of Peach Town, which had been abandoned for many years.

"Hm? What's that smell?"

He suddenly caught a faint scent of blood in the air. Gazing into the distance, he looked toward the town named after peaches.

Three years ago, when he had passed through this place, he had relied on the vigor of youth and the heat in his blood to boldly enter and spend the night there. Nothing strange had happened.

But today, it looked completely different.

More than a dozen wooden stakes, each over ten feet tall, had been driven into the open ground outside the town. Their pointed ends bore mutilated corpses—some dried by the wind, others still dripping blood.

"These people are all Qi Refiners from outside!"

Chen Xuan's heart jolted, and a chill rose within him. "I'd better take a detour."

He did not know what had happened here, but it was certainly terrifying. He had originally planned to spend the night in Peach Town, yet now it seemed much safer to keep sleeping in the snow.

But at that moment.

Chen Xuan's gaze suddenly sharpened. On those wooden stakes, he saw a familiar old man's figure.

"How could it be him?"

At the very center of the stakes hung a black-robed old man in his fifties or sixties. His hair was completely white, he had a goatee, and his body was small and thin.

It was none other than Chu Huo Gun, the old man he had encountered in the ruined temple two days earlier!

Chen Xuan's gaze darkened. After remaining silent for a long while, he raised his feet and circled Peach Town, inspecting it once... He found no abnormalities.

In the end, he cautiously began walking toward Peach Town.

"Old Chu, are you dead yet?"

Chen Xuan raised his head and called out.

Chu Huo Gun had been nailed to a ten-foot-high wooden stake, his face turned toward the sky. A thick chain bound his neck. His condition was ghastly: one arm had been torn away, both legs had been severed at the roots by a sharp weapon, and blood dripped steadily from the wounds. His only remaining hand clutched a wine gourd tightly... the same one that had once been in the hands of his strikingly beautiful granddaughter, Chu Qing Ling.

"Crack!"

Hearing the commotion, Chu Huo Gun's neck moved like a rusted machine, laboriously turning halfway around. His eye sockets were hollow and black, containing nothing at all.

"Brother Xiao Wang... I, I told you long ago, this road is difficult to travel. Turn back..."

Black beetles writhed and dropped from those hollow sockets.

He still wasn't completely dead?

His eyeballs were gone, yet he could still recognize people?

Chen Xuan smacked his lips, finding it inconceivable. As expected of a Qi Refiner—his vitality was frighteningly tenacious.

"Old Chu, what happened here?"

Chen Xuan had only just begun to ask when he suddenly turned his head, knitting his brows as he stared into the eerily silent Peach Town.

"Rumble..."

The sound of wheels rolling rose from within the town, and a great flock of startled wild birds erupted into the sky.

A mass of bright yellow fire gradually lit up inside the town.

Chu Huo Gun said anxiously, "That thing in the town was alerted by you."

Chen Xuan immediately asked in a low voice, "Old Chu, can I save you?"

Chu Huo Gun coughed several times, then said awkwardly, "Your strength is too weak. If you become trapped here trying to save me, I'll never rest easy..."

"All right, I'm leaving!"

Chen Xuan nodded hard, then spun around and ran without hesitation. He moved with incredible speed, racing away from the place like a violent gale.

An incomparably vast and eerie aura was rising from the small town.

Chu Huo Gun was stunned by Chen Xuan's decisiveness. Regret instantly flooded his heart, and he hurriedly shouted:

"Hey, Brother Xiao Wang, I was only being polite! Hurry back and carry me away with you, Xiao Wang! Wang Chan! Hey!"

But Chen Xuan had already fled more than a hundred meters away. Only when he suddenly heard the agitated shouting behind him did he look back in astonishment.

Polite?

Did this old man not realize he was about to lose his life? Why was he still putting on airs and being polite? Time was pressing—wouldn't it be better to speak plainly? Had he ever traveled the martial world before?

Chen Xuan had approached Peach Town of his own accord because he naturally intended to save him!

Chu Huo Gun regretted it so deeply that his guts turned green. Watching Chen Xuan disappear into the distance, he cried out, "Hey! Hey! Hey!"

But behind him, the firelight grew brighter and brighter, as though it were setting the entire town ablaze.

"Rumble..."

Amid that sky-devouring blaze, a bronze carriage flew out of the town. An incense burner burned atop it, its flames bright and its white smoke ethereal.

The driver wore Bronze Armor. His face looked neither human nor nonhuman—withered and iron-blue. He raised a Bronze Halberd, and divine light shone brilliantly from his Golden Four Eyes.

Behind him followed numerous short figures wearing masks. They carried banners, beat gongs and drums, and lurched across the snow in his wake, presenting a bizarre and otherworldly sight.

"What the hell are these things?" Chen Xuan stared in dumbfounded disbelief.

In the next instant, he saw the Four-Eyed Divine Being driving the carriage raise his Bronze Halberd and cleave Chu Huo Gun's head off in a single stroke.

A fiend!