Blood Night in Black Water City

The night wind sobbed, like countless dead souls weeping in low voices.

Black Water City, once a fairly prosperous town, was now shrouded in deathly silence and the stench of blood.

Yan Kui moved through the abandoned fields outside the city. He did not enter through the main gate. With his current strength, scaling the thirty-foot-high city wall was as easy as walking on level ground.

Yet when his feet landed lightly on the inner side of the wall, an overpowering, nearly congealed stench of blood rushed into his nostrils, making his stomach churn.

It was a foul odor mixed with humans, livestock, and some unknown chunks of rotting flesh—one hundred times thicker than the smell of the Graveyard.

"Looks like... the Corpse Fiend has already made its move."

Yan Kui swept his gaze across the inside of the city wall.

The wall, which should have been guarded with the utmost vigilance, was now completely deserted. The patrol watchtowers had been snapped in half, their scorched marks showing that immense force had destroyed them. Several mangled corpses lay scattered across the ground, their armor shattered and flesh blurred beyond recognition.

Yan Kui lowered his head and carefully examined one of the corpses.

It wore the uniform of a city guard. Its chest had caved in, as if some immense force had punched straight through it. More horrifying still, its face was covered in fine black veins like tree roots. Its pupils were unfocused, yet extreme terror still lingered within them.

"These injuries weren't caused by a physical attack..."

Yan Kui's heart sank.

The Yin Energy lingering on the corpse was extremely dense and carried a strange vitality, as though it was still slowly devouring the life essence around it.

"This is the Corpse Fiend's method of attack."

He did not linger there. His figure flashed like a phantom as he swiftly slipped into the city.

The scene inside the city was a thousand times more horrific than he had expected.

The doors of the shops along the streets stood wide open. Their goods had either been looted clean or wantonly smashed to pieces. The signboards of taverns had been torn down, and the tables and chairs of teahouses had been smashed apart. Dark red bloodstains covered the ground, reflecting a heart-chilling gleam beneath the moonlight.

"There was... a massacre here."

Yan Kui lightened his steps, every movement filled with the utmost vigilance.

He was like a lone wolf now, venturing deep into a tiger's den.

After walking for roughly a quarter of an hour, he finally saw the first group of survivors.

They were commoners hiding inside an abandoned rice shop.

The wooden door of the shop had been braced shut, and faint candlelight seeped through the cracks.

Yan Kui approached without a sound, sharpening his hearing to its limit and catching every word of the conversation inside.

"...Dazhu's parents, just like that, they're gone..." a woman sobbed softly. "The Corpse Fiend came out of the Old Lin Family Manor, headed east all the way, and charged straight into the Black Tiger Gang..."

"Yeah. I was hiding on a rooftop then, and I saw that monster with my own eyes. It was thirty feet tall, black from head to toe, and wrapped in iron chains... It swallowed a Black Tiger Gang steward in one bite!" another man said, his voice trembling. "Zhao Tianhu, that gang leader, had guts. He charged right at it with his broadsword, but... sigh, not even a whole corpse was left..."

"The Black Tiger Gang is finished. That monster slaughtered them clean. Those gang members who usually strutted around so proudly didn't even have the strength to resist before becoming that monster's blood food..."

"After eating the Black Tiger Gang, that monster still wasn't full. It started running rampant through the city again. So many people were taken away and turned into that monster's puppets, their faces black and their eyes green. They specialize in catching living people..."

"Luckily, the Zhao Family Ancestor acted in time and drove that monster back with a bolt of lightning. There are still Walking Corpses in the city controlled by the Corpse Fiend, but at least the Corpse Fiend's true body has been trapped."

"The Zhao Family? What good intentions could they possibly have? I'd say the matter of the Old Lin Family Manor is most likely inseparable from the Zhao Family!"

"Shh! You can't say things like that carelessly! The Zhao Family is the largest clan in the city, with an Ancestor of the Qi Refining Stage keeping watch. How could people like us discuss them? We only survived thanks to the shelter the Zhao Family set up in the north of the city. Too bad it only accepts the rich and powerful..."

As Yan Kui listened to the conversation inside the rice shop, his expression grew darker and darker.

His suspicions had been confirmed.

The Corpse Fiend had indeed emerged, and its first target had been the Black Tiger Gang. Zhao Tianhu had not died unjustly, and he had died quickly enough.

The Black Tiger Gang had been slaughtered... That did save him one target for revenge, but more importantly, it cost him a source of Origin Power.

"The Zhao Family Ancestor..."

A trace of gravity flashed through Yan Kui's eyes.

The Qi Refining Stage.

That was a realm he could not reach for now. A martial artist was still only a martial artist, after all.

And the Zhao Family was connected to the Corpse Fiend as well. For all he knew, the Zhao Family had been pulling the strings behind all this, and even the Black Tiger Gang had been sacrificed by them. The waters here ran far too deep.

He did not disturb the survivors in the rice shop. Those people lacked even the ability to protect themselves and would only become a burden. What he needed now was intelligence, not baggage.

If he ran into trouble, it was even possible that he would kill them for Origin Power. Following him would only be more dangerous.

Yan Kui continued deeper into the city.

The closer he got to the center, the worse the destruction became.

Many places had already been burned to bare ground, and the air was thick with the smell of scorched flesh.

He even saw shriveled corpses with their internal organs hollowed out, exactly like those in the Old Lin Family Manor. This showed that, aside from the Corpse Fiend's true body, the "Walking Corpses" under its control were also running rampant through the city.

"Puppets..."

Yan Kui clenched his fists. These Walking Corpses might become his new "source of Origin Power."

At last, he arrived at the former site of the Black Tiger Gang.

It had already become a field of ruins.

Broken walls and collapsed structures lay everywhere, while scorched earth covered the ground. The once-mighty Black Tiger Gang had been reduced to nothing but rubble.

He could faintly smell a trace of the Corpse Fiend's aura in the air, along with the resentment left behind by the dead Black Tiger Gang members.

"What a pity. If I'd arrived one step earlier..."

Yan Kui sighed.

If he had come sooner, perhaps he could have caught up to the Corpse Fiend's "feast" and snatched a few "food scraps."

But he had not come away empty-handed.

Within a pile of rubble, he sensed a faint fluctuation of Origin Power.

They came from several corpses of high-ranking Black Tiger Gang members who had died with eyes still open. Most of their Life Essence had been devoured by the Corpse Fiend, but some remnants remained.

Yan Kui stepped forward and unceremoniously absorbed the remaining Origin Power.

[Origin Power: +0.05]

[Origin Power: +0.08]

Even a mosquito's leg was still meat.

After a thorough sweep, he had actually gathered 0.5 Origin Power from the ruins. Added to the 0.5 he had left from before, he now had a full 1.0 Origin Power again.

"Zhao Family Shelter..."

Yan Kui looked toward the north of the city.

That was the most prosperous area of Black Water City, as well as the Zhao Family's stronghold.

Since the Zhao Family Ancestor could drive back the Corpse Fiend, it meant the Zhao Family at least possessed the strength to contend against it.

Moreover, according to the survivors, the Zhao Family Shelter accepted only the rich and powerful.

Yan Kui now held five hundred taels' worth of silver notes. While that was not enough to make him an honored guest, it was at least enough to knock on the Zhao Family's door and gather more information.

He had no intention of seeking refuge with the Zhao Family.

On the contrary.

The Zhao Family's entanglement with the Corpse Fiend, along with their use of living people's blood and vitality to sacrifice to it, meant that in his eyes, they would have to be purged sooner or later. Becoming his Origin Power was their destined end.

But for now, he needed a relatively safe environment to understand this world and obtain more resources.

"Black Water City has already become the Corpse Fiend's meal on a plate, and the Zhao Family is merely another piece of meat on that plate."

Standing atop the ruins, Yan Kui felt the dense Yin Energy and despair saturating Black Water City.

He knew very well that his goal was not to become this place's savior.

It was to use this chaotic situation to grow stronger without cease, until he finally leaped out of this mire.

At last, his gaze settled on the distance.

Those were... Walking Corpses.

"The prey has appeared."

A bloodthirsty smile curled across Yan Kui's lips.

Tonight, Black Water City was destined to be sleepless.

And he would be the apex predator of this bloody night.