Black Marsh

Chapter 7: Black Marsh

After the East Side Courtyard had settled down, another half year passed.

The Warm Nest was running smoothly.

The newborn kittens had a place to stay, and the ordinary palace cats and Wild Cats were gradually gaining a little spiritual awareness.

Charcoal Ball handled the night patrols, Snowball and Little Flame continued guarding the bedchambers, A Ju spent every day mooching food outside, Swirl watched the gate, and Blue Tail tended the fire.

Lin Yan hadn't been idle, either.

With the help of Meow Wish Value, Soul Devour Moon, and Cat Resonance, his cultivation had finally and steadily crossed the thousand-year threshold.

If he had to face a powerful Soul Master head-on, he was still nowhere near strong enough.

But when it came to hiding his presence, running away, and dragging things out, there were very few people around Spirit City who could easily catch him now.

He had taught the cats in the Side Courtyard just about everything they needed to know.

At last, he began to think about going out.

"I can't really spend my whole life in the East Side Courtyard, can I?"

The Little White Cat lay on the roof eaves, gazing down at the cats below as he grumbled to himself.

"The cats are great, and the food is great, too."

"But I still need to get out there and see just how deep the waters of Douluo Continent are."

Besides, he knew the truth.

He could stay tucked away in Spirit Hall in peace because he currently had Bibi Dong backing him.

But if he wanted to go further, hiding away wouldn't be enough.

He needed to grow stronger.

He needed to seek out opportunities.

And he needed to meet people, little by little.

He couldn't expect a whole bunch of cats to face every problem for him forever, could he?

With that thought, Lin Yan stopped hesitating and called over the Side Courtyard's most trusted cats.

Charcoal Ball, Snowball, A Ju, Swirl, Blue Tail, and Little Flame.

The six cats quickly lined up.

Charcoal Ball was as steady as ever, Snowball was quiet, A Ju looked ready to rub against Lin Yan's legs, Swirl's ears stood straight up, and Blue Tail still looked half asleep. Little Flame was the most direct of all, already placing a paw on his foreleg.

"Meow."

The meaning was clear.

What are you up to now?

Lin Yan patted its head with his paw.

"I'm going out for a while."

At that, all six cats looked up at him.

Even A Ju stopped rubbing against him.

For a moment, the rooftop fell completely silent.

After a while, Charcoal Ball was the first to send a thought through Spark Resonance.

[How long will you be gone?]

"Not sure."

Lin Yan thought it over, then gave them a rough estimate.

"A few days at the shortest, half a month at the longest."

"I'll look around outside Spirit City first. I won't go too far."

Swirl immediately sent another thought.

[What about the courtyard?]

"We'll make do."

Lin Yan answered without thinking, then realized the cats might not understand the expression. He quickly got serious.

"The rules in the courtyard stay the same."

"Charcoal Ball, you watch over things at night. Swirl, keep an eye on the gate. A Ju, don't just focus on begging for food. Keep an eye out for anyone bringing things over or snooping around outside."

"Blue Tail, look after the Warm Nest and the Core Flame. Snowball and Little Flame, keep accompanying His Holiness the Pope as usual."

At this, Lin Yan lowered his head and gave Little Flame a pointed look.

"Especially you."

"You can't come with me."

Little Flame's ears drooped at once.

It clearly wanted to go with him.

It wasn't that Lin Yan didn't want to take it.

The trouble was that Bibi Dong really needed these two cats, who were best at calming her down.

Over the past few months, Bibi Dong had still been busy and cold, but she had been sleeping much better than before.

Especially over the past half month, she had rarely woken up in the middle of the night.

They hadn't come by that progress easily.

Lin Yan couldn't break up that source of comfort just because he wanted to go out and explore.

"You stay here."

"I'll bring you something nice when I get back."

Little Flame stared at him for a long while, then finally nodded, looking rather reluctant.

A Ju sent a thought over, too.

[Are there little fish outside?]

Lin Yan: "..."

"Is that all you ever think about?"

A Ju wasn't the least bit embarrassed. He even swished his tail.

Lin Yan almost laughed. The sadness of leaving eased a little, too.

But when his gaze passed over each of them, one by one, his heart still felt a little strange.

In his previous life, he'd been an orphan.

He'd never had anyone he could truly call family.

After arriving in Douluo, he'd spent all his time trying to survive, adapt, and figure things out. Forget feeling like he belonged; most of the time, he didn't even know where he'd be the next day.

Only now, surrounded by a bunch of cats peppering him with questions and reminders, did he clearly feel for the first time that he was no longer a cat on his own.

The thought softened his heart.

But only for a moment.

The next instant, he hurriedly pushed that feeling down.

"All right, I'm coming back."

"You're all acting like I'm going to the deepest part of the Star Dou Great Forest to die."

"Just look after the courtyard."

Charcoal Ball nodded.

Snowball gave a soft "meow," too.

A Ju thought for a moment, then sent a thought that left Lin Yan stunned.

[Be careful on the road. Don't shed too much fur.]

Lin Yan fell silent for two seconds.

Then he bopped A Ju on the head with his paw.

"Get lost."

"The first half was sweet. Why did the second half have to sound so irritating?"

A Ju didn't get mad after being bopped. Instead, he rubbed against Lin Yan's paw.

The other cats watching grew quiet, too.

In the end, Lin Yan was the first to get up, bringing the little meeting—which felt part handover, part send-off—to a close.

Before leaving, he went to look through the window of the study.

The light inside was still on.

Bibi Dong sat behind her desk, a stack of files beside her hand and her brow slightly furrowed, as if something was troubling her again.

Snowball and Little Flame lay quietly at either corner of the desk, keeping her company.

Seeing this, Lin Yan finally felt at ease.

"Good."

"With those two there, it'll be fine if I'm gone for a few days."

"As for His Holiness the Pope... she probably won't even notice she's missing a cat."

With that thought, he didn't delay any longer. He turned and disappeared into the night.

This time, he headed north of Spirit City.

More precisely, he was going to a stretch of Black Marsh beyond Death Canyon.

Ordinary Soul Masters didn't like going there.

First, the miasma was thick.

Second, the terrain was awful.

Third, there were plenty of Soul Beasts inside, but valuable medicinal herbs weren't easy to find. It was all too easy to make the trip for nothing.

But for Lin Yan, that place was just right.

There weren't many people.

The terrain was complicated.

It would be convenient for testing his current abilities and getting a feel for the world beyond Spirit City.

Besides, Black Marsh connected to the outskirts of Death Canyon. If anything went wrong, he'd at least have a way back.

"For my first trip far from home, I shouldn't get too carried away."

"Whether you're a person... no, a cat, it's best to play it safe."

And so, Lin Yan headed north.

He hid during the day.

At night, he traveled.

Now and then, he stopped to absorb some moonlight and scout the terrain.

But the farther he went, the more he realized something.

Douluo Continent really was huge when you had to travel across it.

On the map, the stretch north of Spirit City didn't look like much.

But covering it on four legs was an entirely different matter.

After running for three days straight, his legs nearly went numb, yet the mountains, forests, swamps, and rocks ahead seemed to have no end.

"Ridiculous."

"I always thought Douluo Continent looked small on the map."

"Now I know that even a tiny dot on the map can run a cat ragged."

He grumbled to himself, but Lin Yan didn't slow down.

It wasn't until dusk on the fourth day that he finally caught sight of Black Marsh.

From a distance, it looked like a vast stretch of black water and mud.

Crooked trees and withered reeds grew here and there.

In some spots, he could see pools of water bubbling up, over and over, as if something alive lay buried underneath.

The air was damp, with a faint, unpleasant smell.

Lin Yan stood on a half-dead branch and watched for a while, giving his tail a light flick.

"Right."

"This place definitely doesn't look safe."

"But it does look like a good place to hide things."

He'd only meant to explore the outskirts, see if there were any rare treasures, and test his Scent Tracking and Stealth.

But less than the time it took to burn an incense stick after he entered, he sensed something was wrong.

There was a surge of Soul Power ahead.

And it was moving fast.

It wasn't a Soul Beast.

It was a person.

Lin Yan's ears twitched. He immediately lowered his body and slipped silently into the shadows of a nearby tree.

The next moment, a white-clad figure darted out from deep within Black Marsh.

He was moving incredibly fast.

He was practically skimming across the water.

Lin Yan narrowed his eyes and finally got a clear look at him.

It was a White-Robed Youth.

He was good-looking, but his face was pale, as if he'd pushed himself too hard on the journey. His breathing was unsteady, too.

His hair was simply tied back, and his robes were already splattered with mud and water.

The strangest thing was that his right hand was clenched tightly around something.

It wasn't large.

From its outline, it looked like some kind of slender little object. He held it in his palm, guarding it closely.

"Who was that?"

A thought flashed through Lin Yan's mind.

"Since when has someone like him been around Spirit City?"

What bothered him even more was that, for a moment, he couldn't figure out how strong the other man was.

It wasn't that he couldn't sense him at all.

He could clearly feel the man's Soul Power, which was far from weak, but there was always something hazy about it, as if a layer of something stood between them.

That put Lin Yan on his guard.

If someone seemed indistinct even to his senses, then either they were truly powerful or they had something that concealed their presence.

Either way, it meant the White-Robed Youth was no ordinary person.

The instant the White-Robed Youth darted into view, he clearly noticed Lin Yan too.

His gaze shifted and landed on the white cat beneath the shadows of the trees. A flicker of surprise was plain in his eyes.

He probably hadn't expected to find a cat in a place like this.

And not just any cat, but a white one that looked spotless, hardly a speck of mud on him.

Still, he only spared Lin Yan an extra glance and didn't stop.

Because the next moment—

The Black Marsh behind them erupted.

Boom!

A vast sheet of black water surged into the air.

A heavy, foul stench hit them head-on.

Then a monster poked its head out of the marsh.

The moment it appeared, Lin Yan felt like his whole world had gone wrong.

Its head looked like a leech, but the rest of it seemed like some grotesque cross between a fish and a snake.

Fleshy wings sprouted from either side.

When it opened its mouth, rows of fine, needle-sharp teeth filled it.

Worst of all, a mass of tentacle-like appendages trailed from its lower body. They churned the black water, sending great waves of mud surging up.

"...A Marshwing Blood Leech."

"And at least fifty thousand years old."

Lin Yan's expression shifted.

Why was something like this lurking near the edge of the Black Marsh?

At its level, a Soul Beast should have been deeper in.

The White-Robed Youth's face darkened too as the monster emerged completely.

Clearly, the thing was even more troublesome than he'd expected.

"Damn it, damn it, damn it."

Cursing inwardly, Lin Yan quietly edged to the side.

He could have stayed out of this.

The problem was, the Marshwing Blood Leech had surfaced facing in a direction that put him in its sights too.

In other words—

Both he and the White-Robed Youth were now in the monster's line of sight.

"Well, this is just great."

"I only wanted to find somewhere to rest my paws, and now I've wandered right into a Soul Beast's den."

"This is what happens when you leave the house without checking your horoscope."

The White-Robed Youth had clearly realized that too.

He didn't slow down, but veered slightly, darting straight toward Lin Yan.

Lin Yan froze for a moment, then his face fell.

"Seriously?"

"You're the one who brought this thing here, and now you're leading it over to me?"

Before he could get out of the way, the White-Robed Youth flashed past him.

The two of them... no, one man and one cat, nearly side by side, shot out from beneath the trees.

The Marshwing Blood Leech let out a long shriek behind them, beat its fleshy wings, and gave chase.

It was absurdly fast.

The air above the Black Marsh filled with the sound of rushing wind.

Lin Yan no longer had time to pretend to be an ordinary cat.

He dropped Mimic Breath, his body flickered, and he immediately sped up to keep pace.

The White-Robed Youth caught sight of it from the corner of his eye and visibly froze.

He probably hadn't expected a white cat who looked like someone's pampered pet to move this fast.

Lin Yan couldn't be bothered to wonder what he was thinking.

The most important thing now was to stay alive.

The man and cat raced ahead one after the other. Neither spoke, but neither made any effort to split off.

They both understood that going alone wasn't necessarily safer than sticking together.

"Hiss—"

Another long shriek came from behind.

Then the black water deeper in the marsh began roiling in vast swathes, as if something had been roused.

Lin Yan's expression had already darkened.

Now he was ready to start cursing.

"Wait."

"There's more than one of them!"

The next instant, an aura deeper and heavier than that of the first Marshwing Blood Leech slowly rose from the depths of the Black Marsh.

Every hair on Lin Yan's body stood on end.

It wasn't the aura of an ordinary Ten-Thousand-Year Soul Beast.

It wasn't even the oppressive presence of a fifty-thousand-year-old Soul Beast.

It belonged to a monster that had... almost reached the threshold of a hundred thousand years.

"Shit."

"What kind of Black Marsh is this?"

"It's a breeding pit for monsters!"

If the only thing chasing him was that fifty-thousand-year-old Marshwing Blood Leech, Lin Yan could still buy time with Moon Mark Time Slow and keep running until he found a chance to shake it off.

But now there was something even worse hiding beneath the Black Marsh.

Once that thing surfaced completely, Lin Yan might not be able to escape at all.

The White-Robed Youth had clearly sensed that presence too.

For the first time, his stride faltered slightly.

It lasted only the briefest instant, but that was enough to say it all.

Still darting forward, Lin Yan glanced at him.

"Well."

"Looks like this guy isn't quite so composed after all."

"This isn't about one of us saving the other. We're both in trouble."

Just then, another strange cry rang out above the marsh behind them.

One black shape after another burst through the water.

Some had wings.

Some had long beaks.

And a few looked like skinny flying fish, their long tails trailing behind them as they flipped through the air.

They were all Soul Beasts roused from the Black Marsh.

There weren't many of them.

But if they got close, they'd be a real pain.

Lin Yan's expression grew even worse.

"Well, now we're in for it."

"The big one's on our tail, and the little ones are coming in from the sides."

"My luck today is beyond your ordinary kind of bad."

The White-Robed Youth finally spoke.

His voice was quiet, slightly hoarse from the effort of keeping his breathing in check.

"If this keeps up, we'll both get held up sooner or later."

Lin Yan glanced sideways at him and thought, Isn't that obvious?

But in the next moment, an idea suddenly struck him.

He realized that even though the White-Robed Youth had been running the whole time, his right hand had never let go of that little object.

In other words—

The guy probably had another trick up his sleeve.

Lin Yan didn't say anything, but he made a mental note of it.

Meanwhile, the Marshwing Blood Leech leading the chase was drawing closer and closer.

At this rate, things were bound to go wrong.

Just then, the even more terrifying presence deep in the Black Marsh finally stirred.

Lin Yan felt a chill run down his back.

He didn't even need to look behind him to know—

This time, they were in real trouble.