Good and Evil Ultimately Have Leopards

The mountain path was rugged, so he decisively abandoned his horse and followed the bloodstains along the road.

The prey was a lame rock goat; it appeared briefly on the mountainside before vanishing into the dense jungle.

Sunlight could not pierce the thick canopy, leaving heavy shadows everywhere. Though it was high noon, the myrtle berries were still beaded with last night's dew, and the ground was carpeted with a variety of leaves, beneath which gnarled old roots lay in wait to trip the unwary.

Tracking was difficult in such an environment, yet he still discovered a few drops of blood on the leaves and a small tuft of fur snagged on a tree trunk.

Yes, this was the direction.

Rock goats did indeed have a habit of climbing higher when threatened.

He scrambled upward quickly, oblivious to the fact that in the jungle shadows thirty feet ahead, a pair of eyes was locked onto him.

Those eyes were filled with astonishing fury and hatred.

After cresting the large rock on the ridge, he saw the rock goat again, bowing its head to lick the wound on its leg. Just as he reached for the bow and arrow on his back, his peripheral vision caught a shadow sprinting toward him, moving as fast as light.

That was...?

Before the thought could finish, the creature had pounced on him.

It was a massive leopard, its size comparable to a tiger, its front paws larger than his head, its fur washed out to the color of gravel.

The giant leopard opened its jaws, a foul stench washing over him. He instinctively raised his arm to shield his vitals, and with a crisp "crack," his armored forearm was bitten clean through; he couldn't tell if the bone had snapped. The force of the impact was so great he couldn't even stand, and he tumbled straight down the ridge.

The leopard tangled with him, biting frantically. He couldn't help but scream, but that didn't stop his other hand from drawing a short blade from his waist and stabbing a dozen bloody holes into his opponent!

The weapon was sharp enough to slice through iron like mud; not to mention the deep wounds to the leopard's internal organs, even the two stabs to its chest sent blood spraying, splattering his face and head.

All living things have an instinct for survival; even the most ferocious beast should have abandoned its enemy and fled by now.

But this one simply wouldn't!

It dragged him along as it charged forward with all its might, leaving a trail of blood in its wake.

He looked into the leopard's blood-red eyes and realized it had gone mad.

A Sand Leopard had no business being here—where did this cursed thing even come from? It even roared a human sentence at him:

"The Divine Bone shall never be yours!"

"Let go, let go, damn you!" Terrified out of his wits, he stabbed the leopard's neck three more times, using every ounce of strength he had to break free.

There was no way out below!

Yet, no matter how severe the injuries, they could not stop the leopard's pace. The next second, they both felt the ground vanish beneath them.

Man and leopard, locked in a death grip, plummeted into the hundred-foot abyss.

The leopard even played one last trick before it died, biting down hard on his neck.

With a soft "pop," the protective pendant hanging from his neck burst with red light and shattered.

In that instant, the final frame frozen in his vision was four blood-stained fangs!

"Ah—!"

He Lingchuan sat up with a shout, scaring the group of people around him half to death.

The maidservant closest to him retreated three steps in shock, and a nondescript man appeared from nowhere, standing by his side to survey the surroundings: "Young Master?"

Before him was an exquisite small hall with two screens painted with strange mountains and flowing water. In the center was a stage where the performers were dressed in full regalia, while the audience below cracked melon seeds, sipped tea, and chatted. There were over two hundred people in total, all looking up toward him now.

Right, he was in a second-floor private box, the faint, sweet scent of Pear Tent Incense burning in the corner; in the silver tray beside him, the grapes and melons were still beaded with water.

This was an opera house called the Immortal Picking Pavilion, not the edge of a hundred-foot cliff. He Lingchuan collected himself and instinctively pressed his neck: "I'm fine."

There had originally been four deep fang marks here, only half an inch from his carotid artery, but they had already healed, leaving behind tender, red new skin. He had at least a dozen such new scars all over his body.

The necklace still hung around his neck.

He remembered clearly that the round jade protective pendant had shattered into eight pieces under the leopard's immense strength. Somehow, after waking up, it was hanging perfectly intact around his neck again.

He didn't know when he had developed the habit, but he wanted to touch it whenever he had nothing to do, as if it had some indescribable connection to him.

There was another young master of a wealthy family in the box named Liu Baobao, who snapped his fingers at his attendant upon seeing this. The latter immediately moved to the railing and sang out to the floor below: "The Young Master is awake, continue!"

The operas popular in the Yuan Kingdom were short and fast-paced, favoring novelty and getting straight to the point without long, drawn-out arias, so young people enjoyed them as stories. The Immortal Picking Pavilion had prepared two new plays today with famous actors headlining, but no one expected Young Master He to fall asleep shortly after the performance began. The following act was an intense martial arts scene, and Liu Baobao, fearing it would disturb his dream, had ordered a pause.

They had waited for nearly an hour, and the audience below was beginning to grumble, but fortunately, the guest of honor had finally woken up.

The sound of strings and bamboo instruments rose from below, and a clear, cold male voice sang: "It is said that the Golden Bull, the guardian beast released by the Xiluo Kingdom, was invincible—"

He Lingchuan frowned.

This play again?

He had fallen asleep listening to this very play just now, and now it was back?

Liu Baobao caught his expression and immediately smiled: "Brother Chuan doesn't like it?"

He Lingchuan said slowly: "It's too bland."

In truth, this was a private show Liu Baobao had commissioned; he was the one paying, and he had personally selected the actors over two months ago. The Immortal Picking Pavilion had spent a fortune to invite this entire troupe from the interior to the godforsaken Blackwater City.

But the real boss of the house was this sleepy-eyed man, who added: "Next time, change to a different opera house. Don't call it 'Immortal Picking Pavilion.' Are immortals peaches that can be picked at will?"

Liu Baobao laughed. "This place was originally called 'Star-Plucking Terrace,' but the owner later decided that adding the word 'immortal' would be better for business. I suppose you only name things after what you lack."

He Lingchuan narrowed his eyes slightly. "Oh? Does Blackwater City lack immortals?"

"Not at all, not at all! Blackwater City has Lord He, and that is more than enough!" Liu Baobao quickly added. "Immortals are just some ethereal, legendary nonsense that only belongs in storybooks. Who could possibly need them?"

He swiftly changed the subject. "So, shall we switch to Lord He's Blade-Fixing Mountain?"

"Fine." With his own father's reputation being invoked, how could He Lingchuan say no?

He leaned back, reclining on the soft couch with his eyes half-closed. The middle-aged man waved away the surrounding attendants before asking in a low voice, "Those nightmares again?"

"Pfft." He scoffed in denial. "No!"

"How could that be!" He Lingchuan emphasized, leaving no room for argument. "Uncle Hao, just watch the play."

It was a redundant remark, but it fit his personality. Uncle Hao, the middle-aged man, did not argue; he simply shut his mouth and stood to the side.

The famous actor's skill was remarkable, drawing cheers from the audience below. He Lingchuan watched for a while, but his gaze soon drifted to the curling smoke rising from the incense burner, and he found himself lost in thought again.

In truth, he was not He Lingchuan.

The real He Lingchuan was likely already gone.

He was merely a nobody from another world, an inexplicable replacement.

His daily life had consisted of working a mediocre job at a mediocre company for a mediocre salary. As a hot-blooded youth, he often felt a sense of injustice, but no matter how impassioned or critical he was in private, he had to maintain a facade of peace and harmony the moment he stepped out in public.

The beatings of society always managed to turn a person into the exact screw it wanted.

With the economy in a downturn, his company had been withholding pay for three months, but he couldn't just heroically declare, "I'm done, you guys can go to hell," and walk away.

How did he end up here?

It was hard to say. He only remembered pacing back and forth in front of a restaurant that day, eventually deciding to be kind and patronize a street corner stall. After all, in the dead of winter, business was hard for everyone out in the cold.

"Boss, one pancake, extra green onions, extra sauce... no egg or meat... right, none of that."

The moment the words left his lips, he saw a car swerving toward a little girl on the side of the road. The driver panicked, and the car accelerated.

The tragedy was unfolding right before his eyes. Without a second thought, he did the bravest thing he had ever done in his life:

He lunged forward and scooped up the girl...

Did he think he was hit by the car? No, not at all.

He was completely unharmed. He returned the child to the couple who rushed over, scolded the kid for a moment, telling her to "remember to watch the road" in the future, and then turned around.

He hadn't even taken two steps when a flowerpot fell from the sky, striking him squarely on the head with pinpoint accuracy.

And so, he was sent here.

When he opened his eyes again, he was lying in bed, his whole body aching. The room was antique, the people around him were wearing expressions of surprise, and a handsome middle-aged man with tears in his eyes said with great emotion, "Lingchuan, you're finally awake!"

He touched his head and discovered he had become He Lingchuan, the eldest son of He Chunhua, the Prefect of Qiansong Prefecture in the Jin Province of the Yuan Kingdom.

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