Subtle

After leaving the Blood Pool Underground Palace, Li Xiao wandered aimlessly along a deep, shadowy passage.

As he walked, he tried to circulate his True Qi to purge the corpse poison from his calf, but that icy aura seemed to have taken root, entrenched deep within his flesh and blood. No matter how he scoured it, it would not budge.

He stopped, hardened his heart, and carved away a large chunk of flesh infected by the corpse poison with Sword Qi.

Agonizing pain exploded from the wound. Li Xiao broke out in a cold sweat, his teeth clenched tight as veins bulged across his forehead.

A Fifth Turn Martial Master possessed formidable vitality; even severed limbs could regrow. But the pain would not lessen by so much as a fraction.

The chunk of flesh he had cut away fell to the ground and rapidly turned black and withered, as though every trace of life had been drained from it.

Li Xiao lowered his head and watched the flesh around the wound slowly heal, only just beginning to relax.

Then he discovered that the icy corpse aura still lurked deep within the wound, clinging to the bone like gangrene, impossible to shake off.

He fell silent for a moment, then muttered under his breath, "This corpse aura... is actually this terrifying?"

He truly had no way to deal with it. He could neither dispel it nor strip it away, as though an invisible shackle had been cinched tightly around his neck.

He had never experienced such a feeling of being at another's mercy, and his heart sank slightly.

He did not believe that Zombie would truly keep its promise. Once it found the other half of its body, it was entirely possible that it would turn its back on its word.