Don't Pursue a Cornered Foe

Outside the ruined temple.

Crunch... crunch...

A sound of chewing came abruptly from deep within the mist, eerily sharp and grating in the night.

Inside the temple, the Imperial Guardsmen gripping their sabers began to tremble violently, their breaths turning rapid and ragged.

Thud! Thud!

Several dark shapes burst through the fog and slammed heavily onto the dusty floor at the center of the shrine.

They were corpses—the very guardsmen who had rushed out to scout moments ago, now unrecognizable.

Their armor was intact, but their flesh seemed drained of essence by something, shriveled and clinging to bone. Their eye sockets were sunken, their deathly expressions twisted and horrifying.

"Ah—!"

A young guardsman, whose mental defenses had already been stretched to the breaking point, finally snapped. His long saber clattered to the ground with a clang as he curled up in a corner, hugging his head and trembling.

"It's... the Hundred Ghosts Banner..."

A voice, frail to the point of breaking, sounded.

Ye Muqing leaned against the offering table, her face pale as paper, a trail of fresh blood still at the corner of her mouth.

She forced herself to speak, her words rapid and urgent:

"These are low-tier vengeful spirits refined by an Evil Cultivator. They have no physical form, but they crave the life essence of the living. Ordinary blades can't harm them. Only... only the blazing yang vitality of a martial artist can barely hold them at bay."

As her words fell, the remaining guardsmen and servants in the temple instinctively turned their gazes to Chen Ping.

Among them all, this newly minted Imperial Military Examination Tanhua was the martial artist with the most vigorous blood energy.

Chen Ping stood by the window, his expression dark.

He said nothing, only silently tightened his grip on the Steel Saber.

He had originally taken this escort mission only to make contact with the powerful figures of the Capital City, hoping to find a path into the immortal arts. He never expected to run into such deadly Evil Spirits right out of the starting gate.

Whoosh—

A chill wind suddenly swept through, shattering the temple's already crumbling window frames with a sharp crack.

Several gray-white ghostly figures let out piercing shrieks, charging into the temple like wolves descending on prey, heading straight for Chen Ping, whose living aura was the strongest.

The bone-piercing cold that rushed at him made Chen Ping feel as if he'd fallen into an ice cellar, even the flow of his blood slowing.

"Looking for death!"

A fierce glint flashed in Chen Ping's eyes. Instead of retreating, he stepped forward.

The Longevity of Pine and Crane within him surged wildly, a scalding heat flooding through his limbs and bones.

He wiped his left index finger across the blade, cutting the tip, and smeared his vital blood onto the edge.

"Kill!"

With a thunderous shout, Chen Ping's Steel Saber, now infused with blazing blood energy, traced a dark red arc through the air.

Sssss—!

The foremost ghostly figure was struck by the blade's arc, letting out a scream like oil splashed on snow. Its once-solid misty form instantly collapsed, dissolving into a wisp of smoke that vanished into the air.

It worked!

Chen Ping's heart steadied. A martial artist's blood energy was indeed the bane of these vengeful spirits.

But before anyone could breathe easy, a mocking laugh like a night owl's cackle echoed from the mist outside the temple.

"Hehehe... A mere mortal martial art dares to show off before This Seat? You're just an ant with slightly stronger blood energy!"

With that voice, dripping with contempt and greed, the fog churned violently. Three Evil Ghosts, far more condensed than the previous ones, their twisted features faintly visible, tore through the mist.

They didn't charge mindlessly. Instead, they spread out in a triangular formation, moving with coordinated precision to encircle Chen Ping.

This Evil Cultivator actually understood battle formations!

Chen Ping's heart sank. The three Evil Ghosts were fast, their claws stirring up gusts of foul wind as they swung.

Clang! Clang!

Chen Ping parried with his saber. The blade meeting ghostly claws produced the sound of metal striking metal.

The immense recoil numbed his tiger's mouth, but worse, each contact sent a stream of insidious cold creeping along the blade into his body.

Sss—

Dodging too slowly, a ghost claw raked across Chen Ping's left arm.

Though the Longevity of Pine and Crane protected him from tearing flesh, the cold drilled into his marrow like a clinging curse. Half the feeling in his left arm vanished, and his movements faltered.

Despair spread through the temple. Even Ye Muqing's eyes dimmed. A mortal warrior against a cultivator—was it truly a mantis trying to stop a chariot?

Yet Chen Ping, trapped in the encirclement, wore a gaze as cold as ice.

Amid his dodging and weaving, he didn't focus entirely on the Evil Ghosts before him. He listened. He watched. He sensed.

The Longevity of Pine and Crane granted him senses far beyond ordinary men. He shut out the howling and wailing at his ears, stretched his hearing to its limit, and pierced through the thick fog.

Wind, rain, and the howls of ghosts...

And... one extremely faint, yet unmistakably real, breath!

Chen Ping's gaze appeared fixed on the Evil Ghost before him, but his peripheral vision had long since locked onto the massive Withered Locust Tree thirty paces outside the temple.

Behind the tree, a faint, obscure fluctuation of Spiritual Power pulsed in rhythm with the attacks of the three Evil Ghosts.

To catch the ringleader, first catch the gang!

Chen Ping knew that if he kept fighting inside the temple, his blood and qi would eventually be drained dry, leaving him like a fish on a chopping block.

His only path to survival was to break out and kill that pretentious Evil Cultivator!

In a flash of thought, Chen Ping's footwork suddenly turned erratic.

He feigned exhaustion, staggering backward after blocking a ghostly claw, his back slamming heavily into the offering table with a dull thud.

His chest heaved violently as he gasped for air, the arm gripping his saber trembling faintly, his face a mask of terror and despair.

He pushed his "acting" to the limit.

But beneath his sleeve, unseen by anyone, every muscle in his body was coiled like a spring compressed to its limit, every sinew and bone storing power, waiting for the moment of release.

"Hehehe, spent already? Mortals are just mortals."

The eerie laughter from outside the temple grew more smug and arrogant.

Seeing Chen Ping at the end of his rope, the Evil Cultivator lurking in the shadows finally let down his guard.

To a cultivator, the blood and essence of a mortal martial artist was a supreme tonic, best consumed while still hot.

The mist slowly parted, and a hunched figure emerged from behind the tree.

It was an old Daoist in tattered robes, gaunt as a skeleton, his face covered in corpse spots. In his hand, he clutched a small black banner, and his murky eyes gleamed with a greedy green light as he shuffled step by step toward the broken temple.

Now!

Just as the old Daoist crossed the temple threshold, his mind at its most relaxed, Chen Ping—who had seemed "spent" and limp—exploded with a terrifying gleam in his eyes.

"Die!"

A thunderous roar shattered the air.

Chen Ping didn't swing his saber at the Evil Ghost before him. Instead, he twisted his waist, his arm muscles bulging, and hurled the bloodstained Steel Saber like a throwing weapon!

"Whoosh—"

The saber sliced through the air with a sharp shriek, turning into a streak of blood-red lightning, aimed straight at the old Daoist's face.

At the same time, Chen Ping launched himself like a hunting leopard.

Light Body Movement Technique Perfected!

He left a blur in the air, following close behind the thrown saber, bare-handed, carrying an unyielding, death-defying killing intent as he burst out of the temple!

The old Daoist hadn't expected this "lamb to the slaughter" to possess such terrifying counterattack power. His pupils contracted.

But as a cultivator, his reflexes were sharp.

Just as the saber was about to pierce his brow, a earthen-yellow light shield flickered to life around him.

"Clang!"

The saber slammed into the light shield, sparks flying, before bouncing off harmlessly.

A protective talisman!

Chen Ping's killing blow had failed.

He stood bare-handed, only three paces from the old Daoist's twisted, snarling face, while the earthen-yellow shield remained steadfast.