Unparalleled Wealth

Willow Creek Town.

The once smoke-wreathed Jiangnan waterside village now lay as silent as a ghost realm.

The century-old willow at the town's entrance had withered entirely, its ashen-black branches twisting toward the sky like ghostly claws.

The air was thick with an oppressive stench—a foul blend of waterborne rot, decay, and yin sha—so dense that each breath brought nausea, dizziness, and a choking urge to vomit.

Lu Chen led ten pale-faced Warriors, pushing several carts loaded with Fire Oil, Sulfur, and firewood, and slowly halted before the stone bridge at the town's entrance.

The stream beneath the bridge was no longer clear; instead, it had taken on a sinister, unsettling murky green, its surface coated with a greasy, nameless filth.

"L-Lu... Brother Lu... this... this place is cursed!" a young Warrior stammered, his teeth chattering as he stared at the dead town, terror flooding his eyes. "Are we... are we really going in?"

"Nonsense! The Captain's orders—you want to disobey?" another, more seasoned Warrior snapped, though his own skin crawled as he forced out the rebuke.

Lu Chen said nothing. He pulled a Calming Talisman from his bosom, pressed it to his chest, then took out several cloth strips soaked in medicinal liquid and handed them to the group.

"Cover your mouths and noses. If Killing Intent enters your body, even the gods can't save you." His voice was hoarse and calm, as if the scene before him did not faze him.

The men hurried to comply. The pungent medicinal smell steadied their rattled nerves, if only slightly.

Lu Chen stepped onto the stone bridge first, a lit torch in hand.

The Hundred Refinements Saber was strapped to his back, wrapped in thick oilcloth—he had no intention of revealing that weapon too soon.

Once inside the town, the dreadful silence grew even more intense.

On both sides of the street, doors hung open. Every household remained as it had been before the disaster—some tables still held half-eaten meals, now crawling with green mold.

On the ground, by the river, inside the houses... corpses lay everywhere.

Every single one of them was frozen in an eerie pose.

It was as if, at the same moment, some invisible force had drained all life from them in an instant. Their faces still held the blank confusion and shock of their final moments.

Their skin was bloated and bruised, like bodies long soaked in water, with faint, slimy green patterns like algae visible on the surface.

"Gulp..."

One Warrior swallowed hard as he stared at a corpse slumped by a water vat.

Suddenly, the corpse's finger twitched—barely perceptibly.

"It... it moved! It moved!" The Warrior let out a terrified shriek, pointing at the corpse as he stumbled backward. That finger...

Like a pebble dropped into a stagnant pond, it sent shockwaves rippling through every Warrior's heart.

"Ah—!"

The Warrior, scared out of his wits, scrambled backward, falling flat on his rear. He pointed at the corpse, his teeth chattering uncontrollably, unable to form a single coherent word.

Panic, like a plague, spread instantly through the group.

"All of you, shut the hell up!"

Lu Chen stepped forward, thrusting the burning torch before him.

The orange firelight illuminated his face, twisted with fear, but in his deep, unfathomable eyes lay a cold, steely calm.

"If you don't want to die, gather around! Move the Fire Oil and Sulfur over here!"

His roar carried a note of well-timed panic and bluster—not revealing his true strength, but painting him as an ordinary man cornered, fighting for his life.

That very image made the lost Warriors instinctively rally around him.

They scrambled to form a crude semicircular barricade with the carts, trembling as they unloaded barrels of Fire Oil and bundles of Sulfur.

The moment they finished...

"Crack... crack..."

A sickening sound of grinding bones came from the corpse by the water vat.

Its stiff neck twisted at an angle that defied physics—a full one hundred and eighty degrees.

What a horrifying face it was!

The skin was bloated, a drowned man's livid purple. Where its eyes should have been were only two hollow black pits, with something slimy writhing inside.

Its mouth snapped open, and a murky green water jet, thick with Corpse Sha Qi, shot out like venom!

"Watch out!"

Lu Chen's pupils contracted. He shoved the nearest Warrior aside.

The water jet struck the wall behind them with a hiss, corroding the hard blue brick into a smoking, sizzling pit!

"Roar!"

The miss didn't stop it.

The corpse—or rather, the Water Sha—dropped to all fours like a hunting beast, then launched itself from the ground like a green arrow, hurtling toward the group!

Its speed was beyond anything they could imagine!

"Fire! Use fire!" Lu Chen roared again. He grabbed a bundle of Sulfur and, without a second thought, hurled it at the charging Water Sha.

One Warrior, jolted by his shout, instinctively threw his torch as well.

"Boom!"

The sulfur powder met the flames midair, instantly erupting into a deadly inferno!

The Water Sha was engulfed entirely, letting out a piercing shriek that was utterly inhuman. It crashed heavily to the ground, its body ablaze with green corpse fire, writhing and thrashing wildly before finally turning into a charred, blackened skeleton.

"Huff... huff..."

Seeing the Water Sha destroyed, all the Warriors breathed a sigh of relief, collapsing to the ground on their backs, drenched in cold sweat.

Yet Lu Chen's heart sank to the bottom.

That one just now was only the weakest.

And in this town, there were over three hundred more such "powder kegs"!

[Slain Water Sha (unranked). Gained 1 year of Demon Devil Lifespan.]

The system's prompt rang in his mind, making Lu Chen's eyes narrow slightly.

One year!

A single, lowest-tier creature gave one year of lifespan!

Over three hundred of them...

What a terrifying fortune that would be!

At that thought, the last trace of worry in Lu Chen's heart vanished without a trace.

"All of you, get the hell up!" Lu Chen kicked the nearest Warrior in the ass, his voice filled with the raw aggression of a near-death escape. "If you want to live, do exactly as I say!"

He pointed at the tallest and most conspicuous building at the town's center—the Liu Clan Ancestral Hall.

"That's the highest ground, and the most open space! Move every single corpse over there! Burn them all to ash with one fire!"

"What?!" a Warrior gasped in shock. "Brother Chen, move... move corpses? What if they..."

"What if?"

Lu Chen's gaze turned icy cold in an instant. He grabbed that Warrior by the collar, yanking him close, and lowered his voice to a hoarse growl, spitting out each word. "Do you even have a choice now? You want to be trapped here by over three hundred monsters and torn apart alive, or do you want to take a gamble and fight for a way out?"

The Warrior trembled at the mad ferocity in Lu Chen's eyes, shaking his head frantically.

"I... I'll do it! I'll do it!"

Lu Chen released him, sweeping his gaze over the rest. His voice was frigid.

"Work in pairs. One holds a torch and sulfur to stay on guard, the other carries. Remember, only move the corpses on the main road—don't touch the ones in the houses yet. Move fast. It has to be done before dark."

"Yes!"

Under the threat of death, these Warriors, who usually lived a life of ease, unleashed an unprecedented level of efficiency.

Working in pairs, they cautiously began the most horrifying job of their lives.

Lu Chen moved alone, torch in hand, ranging ahead of the group as a scout and lookout.

He showed no sign of anything unusual, relying solely on his luck, which far surpassed ordinary men.

Every time, just before a Water Sha was about to awaken, he would happen to spot the anomaly and direct the Warriors to snuff it out in its cradle with sulfur and fire.

"The third house on the left—the corpse at the door! Something's wrong! Burn it!"

"Under the bridge! There's something under the bridge! Pour the fire oil!"

Once, twice...

By the time Lu Chen had accurately predicted danger for the tenth time, the Warriors' looks had shifted from initial doubt to near-blind trust and worship.

In their eyes, this Brother Chen was practically a lucky star descended from heaven, always able to anticipate the enemy!

Little did they know that Lu Chen's mastered Ten Thousand Year Black Tortoise Art had already merged his aura seamlessly with the surrounding environment.

In this dead, silent town, any abnormal fluctuation of Killing Intent was as clear as a beacon in the dark night to his keen, web-like perception!

The System Panel, like a radar, clearly marked the lifespan value contained in each corpse.

Those with violent Killing Intent fluctuations and bright red lifespan numbers were the high-risk targets on the verge of Corpse Transformation.

The moving work proceeded in a bizarre yet efficient atmosphere.

One by one, the bloated, stiff corpses were dragged by the gritting teeth of the Warriors, piled like cargo onto the vast square before the Liu Clan Ancestral Hall.

The mountain of corpses grew higher, bit by bit.

The Corpse Sha Qi in the air thickened and grew cloying with the gathering bodies, almost solidifying into a tangible substance.