Half a Monstrous Corpse

It was another new day.

Today was overcast, and unusually humid. The temperature had yet to drop.

Wearing the thick clothes used for corpse burial, Wei Ming had broken into a sweat before even reaching the Corpse Burial Wasteland. It would not dry, leaving him sticky and clammy, terribly uncomfortable.

And that was only a minor problem.

As they made their way toward the Corpse Burial Wasteland along the dim forest path, carrion animals would normally have gathered at this hour, sharing the various scraps of corpses left behind along the way while bodies were transported.

But now, there was not a trace of them anywhere!

The mountain forest was deathly silent, seeming especially gloomy and terrifying!

"Wei Ming, be careful today."

After Du En's reminder, Wei Ming felt uneasy.

"Boss, careful of what?"

He asked nervously.

Du En led the way, his pace as steady as ever, his voice just as even. "The Yin Evil in the wasteland soil needs to be directly scorched by sunlight to disperse quickly. Today, however, the sun is hidden behind the clouds."

"That's all? The carrion birds and beasts ran away because of that?"

"The abnormality in the wasteland is just more obvious than usual. You don't need to worry about it. As long as we finish the work before nightfall, there won't be any major problems."

"What about the minor problems?"

Wei Ming grew worried at that and pressed him on the matter.

Du En paused for a moment, making Wei Ming's scalp prickle even more.

Then Ning Caize smacked him on the shoulder, startling him badly.

"P—Predecessor Ning, d—don't scare me!"

"Cough, cough, cough... Little Wei, you really are a bit short in the common-sense department. Why keep asking about minor problems? The minor problem is the Yin Evil Black Soil. It disperses easily but is hard to eliminate today, and it can make people sick and weak."

Ning Caize was somewhat speechless.

Du En continued onward and did not need to explain further.

"Haha, so that's what it was."

Wei Ming immediately felt a little embarrassed.

By then, the Corpse Burial Wasteland was already visible in the distance.

"Hm?"

Du En's brows lifted slightly, and he quickened his pace.

The others noticed something was wrong as well. Their hearts jolted, and they hurried after him.

Wei Ming's heart, which had only just calmed down, rose into his throat again.

When they drew closer and saw inside the wasteland, they immediately looked away. They could not bear to look, and nausea churned in their stomachs.

Even Ning Caize and the other three changed expressions, their brows knitting tightly as their gazes instinctively shifted aside.

They saw that corpses had been laid out all over the wasteland.

There were fifty-eight in total—not a particularly large number. Most had died from exhaustion, a few had been killed, and a handful had committed suicide.

After seeing enough of them, one eventually became numb.

But one of them looked especially evil and bizarre!

It could not be called a complete corpse. It was only half a corpse, split vertically from the head to the crotch. Its organs remained inside, and they were unnaturally fresh. The incision seemed to be covered by an invisible sealing membrane that kept it shut, preventing any bleeding or decay.

If that had been all, it would not have frightened these veteran corpse buriers.

The crucial point was that this half-corpse had been stripped completely naked, its hands and feet bound together. Oil had been smeared over its skin, giving it a strange waxen yellow color. It did not look like a human corpse at all, but more like a white-cut chicken or duck sliced in half. An invisible eeriness clung to it!

"An Evil Cultivator's work?"

That possibility seemed the most likely.

Because only those people would turn a corpse into something so sinister after killing someone!

At the same time, this half-corpse was the most sinister one Du En had ever seen since entering the profession.

"Follow the usual rules."

He gave the instruction calmly.

The usual rule was that whenever they encountered a corpse this strange and wicked, they would work together to dig a pit nearby, dig it a little deeper, and bury it first.

The sooner it entered the earth, the sooner everyone could rest easy!

After all, the methods of those Evil Cultivators were, as the name suggested, extremely wicked and evil!

The others had no objections. Under Du En's lead, they began digging right beside the outer side of the half-corpse.

Wei Ming kept his head lowered, not daring to look. He buried himself in digging.

The shovel rose and fell. Every scoop of earth contained Yin Evil Black Soil. Once flung aside, it dispersed into black vapor that did not fade for a while.

Unlike when it was scorched beneath the sun and gave off a foul stench, the gathering Yin Evil vapor made the corpse buriers start trembling uncontrollably.

They clearly felt unbearably hot. Sweat still poured from them, and the sticky, humid heat clinging to their bodies had not lessened in the slightest. Yet they inexplicably felt cold—a chill that whistled through the gaps between their bones!

This state of two heavens of heat and cold, layered atop each other and attacking them from within and without, was the minor problem Du En had mentioned earlier, only greatly intensified.

"Cough, cough, cough..."

The others circulated their magical power to protect themselves and could still endure it, but Ning Caize had an old ailment. It did not take long before he could no longer hold out.

"Old Ning, go wait over at the originally designated section."

Du En spoke up.

He was in the best condition among them. He had mastered his cultivation method more deeply than the others, and his cultivation could also be said to be the highest. Although the Yin Evil vapor attempted to seep inside, his circulating magical power held it at the surface, preventing it from penetrating any deeper.

Hearing his vigorous, steady voice, Ning Caize did not insist. Leaning on his shovel, he left.

The remaining people bent their heads and worked harder. Soon, they had dug a pit four feet deep.

"All right. Spread out first."

The others had little strength left. If anything went wrong, they would not be able to dodge in time. Hearing this, they inwardly cheered for their mighty boss, then hurriedly scattered and watched Du En from far away, tense with anxiety.

He walked behind the half-corpse and brought his shovel down. After scooping up soil, he suddenly flung it upward with force, levering the corpse into the air and sending it tumbling into the pit.

He himself had already retreated several steps, staring fixedly at the corpse. Only when it entered the pit safely without anything happening did he wave to the others.

They all breathed sighs of relief. One after another, they shoveled up the soil they had just dug out and flung it back over from a distance. Before long, they had buried the sinister half-corpse in this equally strange wasteland.

If there were any problems or hidden dangers, let the evil things bite each other. As long as they did not bring trouble down on them, that was enough.

Wei Ming breathed a sigh of relief. Watching the Yin Evil vapor disperse at last, unwillingly fading because it had no Rootless Wood, he asked with concern, "Why is there so much Yin Evil here?"

The moment the words left his mouth, he realized that his voice was hoarse and weak, so unfamiliar that it startled him.

Du En merely answered calmly, "As you just saw, the corpses buried around where those bodies were laid out are basically all Monstrous Corpses and Evil Corpses that had to be buried nearby in an emergency."

Since the buried corpses were all such evil and strange things, it was only natural that they left behind far more Yin Evil than other corpses.

"We just had bad luck today. There's both a Monstrous Corpse and overcast weather. The two have compounded each other. Of course, this still isn't the worst-case scenario."

"What? This isn't the worst?"

"Mm. If you're curious and concerned, ask Old Ning when you have time. He's been doing this longer and has seen more."

Du En did not waste time on this. There was still plenty of work to do today, and only by finishing early would he have time for his own affairs.

Seeing this, Wei Ming did not ask any further.

Turning his head toward Ning Caize, he saw that the latter had not actually been idle. After recovering, he had begun shoveling here and digging there across the section where they would bury corpses today. He had already dug fifty-seven shallow pits, arranged in a rotating pattern.

Even Wei Ming could see the purpose behind it.

It was simple. Since the Yin Evil vapor was difficult to disperse quickly, all they had to do was prevent the lingering vapor from directly affecting them!

For weather like overcast or rainy days, corpse buriers had long since developed their own method. They would first move around and dig the pits in rotation, then bury the corpses all together once every pit had been dug.

That way, they could reduce the harm caused by the Yin Evil vapor.

Otherwise, whether they buried corpses as they had just done or used their usual method, aside from Du En being able to withstand it unharmed, none of the others could manage. They might even collapse on the spot and be buried together.

The usual burial method was actually meant to deal with corpse stench.

With dozens of corpses that had died in different ways, some long dead and some recent, exposing them all to the sun before concentrating on burying them after the pits were dug would stink so badly it could make a person question their entire existence.

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