Don't Look Back

He Lingchuan certainly heard it too. He held his breath, eyes fixed on his nose, nose fixed on his heart. No matter what he heard, he remained as still as an old monk in meditation, refusing to pay it any mind.

Seeing he didn't react, the voice changed, sounding like a soft, sweet, and coquettish sixteen or seventeen-year-old girl pouring out her heart. As He Lingchuan listened, he felt more and more that she sounded like a girl he had a crush on when he was young.

He secretly scoffed. That sweet girl hadn't even finished her schooling before she ran off with a local rich kid, and within three years, she'd birthed two more rich kids. Every time he saw those two kids with their long, runny noses, he felt how incredibly stupid he had been back then. This Three-Corpse Insect hadn't done its homework; it didn't know that the days that have abandoned me cannot be kept.

Just then, the ship suddenly jolted, as if some heavy monster had climbed aboard. Immediately after, cries of alarm and screams from the soldiers erupted from the rear, followed by the curses of sand bandits and the symphony of swords being drawn.

They were engaged in battle behind him, the fighting intense.

The closest scream rang out right behind He Lingchuan. He seemed to have spoken to this soldier earlier.

Then the monster charged straight toward him, its heavy footsteps sounding as if they were stomping directly on his heart.

Was this a trick used by the Three-Corpse Insect to lure him into turning his head?

But if it were real, and he stayed put like this, he would most likely become the monster's snack. This was the Coiling Dragon Desert, a place where numerous exotic beasts roamed; who could guarantee that one or two hadn't taken the opportunity to climb onto the ship to eat people?

It was getting closer! This heavy sense of oppression made the hair on the back of He Lingchuan's neck stand on end.

He hurriedly looked at He Chunhua. His father was facing him, so he should be able to see what was happening behind him.

He Chunhua's facial muscles twitched, his expression even appearing somewhat ferocious, yet his eyes were hollow. He Lingchuan found this expression on his father very unfamiliar; he didn't know what his father was hearing.

How could they convey their intentions relying solely on eye contact?

But with the Three-Corpse Insect right in front of them, no one dared to open their mouth.

Fortunately, He Chunhua suddenly snapped back to his senses. He stared straight at his eldest son, as if he had heard his inner thoughts, and suddenly winked his right eye at him.

This gesture was rare for a dignified Prefect, yet it instantly shattered the heavy, terrifying atmosphere. He Lingchuan let out a secret sigh of relief, his heart settling.

It was fake!

His father was trying to tell him that no matter what he heard, it was all fake!

Sure enough, the monster's footsteps rushed to the back of his head, and he could even hear the creature's heavy panting, but the next second, it vanished.

Only the whistling wind remained in his ears.

The wisps of ethereal smoke beside him also lost interest in him, shaking their heads as they drifted elsewhere.

He Lingchuan had passed the test, and he also winked at his father.

The small red pills everyone had taken earlier were the Soul-Suppressing Powder, specially refined by State Preceptor Sun for this trip, with the main ingredient being Rot-Heart Grass that grew in places of extreme yin. After taking it, humans could not only see "unclean things" for a short time, but it could also temporarily mask the scent of the living with their Life Fire. As long as the Three-Corpse Insect didn't crawl into a person's nine orifices, it would simply treat them as dead objects.

However, the biggest weakness of this method was that one could not easily turn their head!

There were three Life Fires around a person's upper body that could protect the heart and mind, warding off external evil. But if you turned your head while being targeted by a Three-Corpse Insect, the Life Fire would immediately weaken, and you would no longer be able to hide from it.

This wasn't Sun Fuping's exclusive invention, but a method recorded in the notes of a sorcerer from the Xianyou Kingdom. The ones who know you best are often your opponents; the Xianyou Kingdom and Coiling Dragon City had been at war for over thirty years, so they must have spent every day pondering ways to deal with the Three-Corpse Insect.

In fact, such things often happened in the wild forests or fields at night; a traveler would hear someone calling them from behind, turn their head inadvertently, weaken their Life Lamp, and thus allow evil spirits to invade.

When He Lingchuan first received the small pill, his heart had stirred. The Xianyou Kingdom had been destroyed for a hundred years; the sorcerer's notes from that time must have been hard to come by. Furthermore, Rot-Heart Grass was a rare item with harsh growth conditions that couldn't be cultivated or mass-produced. Just collecting the raw materials to refine three hundred doses of Soul-Suppressing Powder—how much effort would that take?

Had the Grand Marshal and State Preceptor Sun truly only begun preparing to explore the Coiling Dragon Ruins half a year ago?

Of course, this thought only flashed by, and He Lingchuan didn't dwell on it.

He saw that He Chunhua's expression had returned to its usual composure, and the Three-Corpse Insects around him had scattered, showing that his father had also passed the test.

But as his gaze swept over the personal guards behind He Chunhua, he was suddenly startled: "Hey, don't..."

This man actually had red-rimmed eyes, brimming with tears?

The moment the words left his mouth, the personal guard turned his head.

He Lingchuan watched helplessly as the Life Fire on the man's left shoulder went "poof" and extinguished.

The light of the other two flames dimmed instantly.

The Three-Corpse Insect hovering nearby, like a shark that had caught the scent of blood, whipped its tail and burrowed into his ears and nose!

The personal guard's gaze instantly went vacant.

Seeing his eldest son staring behind him with a drastically changed expression, the veins on He Chunhua's neck bulged; clearly, he was using all his strength to resist the instinct to turn around.

He didn't turn back, but instead lunged forward two steps.

This was a textbook example of self-rescue, because the personal guard suddenly drew the long saber at his waist and aimed a strike at the back of He Chunhua's head with the force of a mountain-cleaving blow!

The two had been only four feet apart, and the guard's movement was fast, intending to treat his leader's head like a watermelon.

When the blade fell, it was less than two inches from He Chunhua's skull.

He Lingchuan brushed past his father, lunging forward to slam into the guard's embrace, blade and all.

The guard's movements stopped instantly, a tip of a blade protruding from his back.

He Chunhua had escaped death by a hair's breadth. After gasping for air, he stared ahead and said, "Chuan'er, turn slowly. I will go deal with these puppets."

He Lingchuan pushed the corpse away and saw a wisp of ethereal shadow emerge from the dead man's seven orifices, slipping back into the air and swimming away at a leisurely pace.

With the person dead, the Three-Corpse Insect could no longer stay and had to come out.

He kept his neck rigid, using his waist and legs to slowly turn around. This way, the Life Fires on his shoulders wouldn't flicker or be blown out by his own movement.

The ship, however, was already in total chaos.

The personal guards were not an isolated case. Despite repeated warnings and strict instructions beforehand, seven or eight of them were still bewitched by the voices in their ears, blowing out their own Life Lamps and falling prey to the Three-Corpse Insects.

Once possessed, they recognized no kin and hacked at anyone in sight.

In just these few breaths, chaos erupted on the ship; four or five men were wounded, and one unlucky soul had half his head sliced clean off.

He Chunhua charged straight for the killer. It was a desert bandit who remained agile even after being possessed by a Three-Corpse Insect. He didn't engage head-on, instead playing hide-and-seek among the crowd, slashing at one or two people every now and then.

When a person constantly reminds themselves not to turn their head, their agility is bound to be severely hampered. He Chunhua felt as stiff as a zombie, his movements three beats slower than they should have been, unable to catch that Sun.

Just as he was about to unleash a spell, a dagger flew from behind, whistling through the air to pin itself into the killer's right eye.

It entered the front and exited the back, blooming into a spray of blood.