Ghost Beast

Yu Ci turned his head and saw a giant ape-like skull rising from the edge of the slope, followed by a massive, elephantine body. The ground shook again as the two-zhang-tall giant ape leaped onto the slope, crouching low with its furry arms supporting it. Its bell-like eyes gleamed with ferocity.

Ye Tu cried out in alarm, but Yu Ci felt a sense of relief. He had seen similar giant apes in the Zhaoshen Map several times. "It's okay," he reassured Ye Tu. "This thing looks strong, but it's just brute force..."

He stopped abruptly, his words cut short.

A grayish-green claw, covered in fine, long fur but tipped with sharp, knife-like nails, suddenly appeared on the giant ape's head.

The nails were truly "knife-like." The giant ape's head was already substantial, but the five long claws easily enclosed it. With a single motion, the head was torn apart. Blood and gore splattered everywhere, and the claw casually twisted, making the giant ape's neck and everything above it vanish. Only the blood and qi from its chest cavity gushed out, splashing into every corner of the slope.

Ye Tu's breathing hitched beside him. Yu Ci took a deep breath and pulled the boy behind him. Only then did he notice the unnerving silence surrounding the slope. The previous panic and chaos had vanished, or perhaps the situation had escalated to its most fatal extreme – a deadly stillness.

The latter seemed more likely.

The grayish-green claw moved, as if brushing aside a blade of grass, pushing the headless body of the giant ape into the ten-thousand-zhang abyss below. Then, another claw of similar size reached up and slammed onto the edge of the slope.

With a "crash," half of the slope seemed to collapse, sending large amounts of earth and rock tumbling down. But the two claws held firm. Then, with a visible effort, the creature began to pull itself up, its body still hidden beyond the slope's edge. The first thing to emerge was another massive head, clearly incomparable to the giant ape's.

Absurdly, at this moment, Yu Ci thought of an unrelated person – a "fellow cultivator" he had met months ago in a dilapidated temple miles away. Just as Ye Tu had said, some things buried deep in one's consciousness resurfaced vividly when triggered by reality:

"When that old Daoist killed it, its head alone was the size of a millstone, and its body was as large as the temple itself..."

The swindler named Xuanqing clearly hadn't expected his casual lies to become reality before Yu Ci's eyes. Visually, the beast's head was indeed comparable to a millstone, and its not-yet-fully-revealed body was likely not much less exaggerated than a house.

Yu Ci first noticed the three short, thick horns in the center of the beast's forehead. "Short and thick" was relative, as each horn was about half a foot long and arranged in a triangle. They didn't appear sharp, but their shallow blue color was extremely peculiar.

The beast's face resembled that of a fox and a wolf. Strictly speaking, it wasn't unattractive, but a giant face always exuded a strong sense of oppression. Its eyes were like burning coals, radiating intense heat with their fiery color, yet upon direct gaze, they felt chillingly cold within.

Besides that, Yu Ci sensed an indescribable frenzy within its eyes.

Whether by luck or misfortune, this not-yet-fully-manifested behemoth paid no attention to the two tiny insects on the slope. It simply pulled its massive body fully onto the slope, occupying a large area. Up close, the beast's body was indeed as tall and sturdy as a mountain.

Its physique was similar to a tiger or leopard, with a long body and four limbs touching the ground. It stood seven or eight feet taller than the upright giant ape, dragging a furry tail about ten feet long. What was striking was that a layer of light mist, or perhaps burning smoke, seemed to hover around its grayish-green fur, encircling its body and lingering. Even without considering its size, it was clearly distinct from ordinary fierce beasts.

The strong wind in the canyon carried the beast's scent. Being this close to it, she felt a familiar smell mixed with the gamey and fishy odors. More importantly, the scent was incredibly familiar.

Not long after, Yu Ci jolted awake: "Ghost beast!"

The words were out, and all his past memories returned. The behemoth before him was the ghost beast that the Poisonous Snake Monk and his cohorts had been desperately trying to deal with. A few days ago, Yu Ci had smelled its lingering scent in the distant pine forest, an impression that remained vivid.

Yu Ci felt a pang of annoyance. He had been careless. Although the mixed scents of the various birds and beasts in Sky Rift Valley had interfered with his sense of smell, and he had been engrossed in the cultivation knowledge Ye Tu was teaching him, allowing such a dangerous presence to approach so closely was an unforgivable mistake.

But regret was useless now, so Yu Ci decisively suppressed all unproductive thoughts and shielded Ye Tu as they retreated in tiny steps. He planned to seize an opportunity to jump off the cliff with Ye Tu, using the speed of the fall to escape the ghost beast's sight, and then rely on Ye Tu's floating magic robe to escape.

The plan was sound, but at this moment, the ghost beast finally moved, though Yu Ci didn't see how.

He only felt the fiery smoke-like mist around the ghost beast suddenly blur, and then his eyelids were struck by sharp pain. His reaction was top-notch. The moment the change occurred, he fell straight down, simultaneously wrapping his arm back to pull Ye Tu with him.

However, his hand grasped empty air!

The boy's pained groan rang out, accompanied by a crisp sound of bone breaking. Yu Ci's scalp tingled, and he couldn't help but recall the tragic state of the unlucky fellow named "Hu Ke," whose body had been almost completely smashed. He sprang up from the ground, and before he could even orient himself, he slammed into a wall – he had crashed into the ghost beast.

At some point, the ghost beast had lunged beside him. Its muscles were as hard as steel, and though covered in long fur, the impact was still painful. This creature was utterly bizarre. Its massive, mountain-like body moved with lightning speed and utter silence, shattering Yu Ci's common sense of over twenty years.

He now understood why those herb gatherers said the ghost beast seemed to be riding the clouds. With such speed, combined with the surrounding fiery smoke, Yu Ci felt the same.

Perhaps feeling an itch, it let out a "woo" sound as its ten-foot-long tail whipped over, like swatting away an annoying fly. Yu Ci didn't even have time to dodge. He only managed to raise the Nine Yang Talisman Sword before being directly struck by the tail.

The next moment, he felt as if he were riding the clouds, flying directly towards the cliff face at the end of the slope. He bounced off and landed, managing to stay on his feet, but his internal organs felt as if they had been turned inside out twice. He wanted to vomit but couldn't, feeling extremely unwell.

Fortunately, the Nine Yang Talisman Sword didn't slip from his grasp. His grip had been incredibly sensitive, allowing him to partially dissipate the impact. Even so, the tiger's mouth had split open, bleeding profusely.

He cursed under his breath, gritted his teeth, and lunged forward, swinging his sword at the ghost beast's forelimb joint. However, though the fiery line split the air, it didn't even scorch the ghost beast's fur.

"What kind of monster is this!"

Yu Ci couldn't help but think that in that pine forest, Hu Ke had set up such a potent trap, turning an acre of land into scorched earth, yet it hadn't harmed the ghost beast. This indicated that the behemoth before him far surpassed their current level, being a demon that should only be nurtured by the legendary Nether Prison Yellow Springs!

And the Poisonous Snake Monk and his two companions, how foolish could their minds be to actively provoke such a creature!

Despite his thoughts, before deeper negative emotions could surface, Yu Ci leaped up. In the brief moment he was airborne, the ghost beast's agile and resilient tail struck again. This time, Yu Ci had calculated the angle correctly and used a more skillful method to dissipate the force. Unlike last time, when he almost vomited his internal organs, he used the momentum to crash onto the ghost beast's back.

The ghost beast's back was quite broad, comfortably seating seven or eight people. But having someone jump onto its back clearly agitated the creature. Earlier, Yu Ci had let out a pained cry.

When this monster's long fur stiffened, it was comparable to steel needles. Even worse, the fire-smoke-like mist had a terrifyingly high temperature. The instant he collided, he was almost roasted. Yet, his clothes remained undamaged, which was incredibly strange.

Yu Ci didn't dare linger. He sprang up again, flipping towards the ghost beast's head. The ghost beast didn't swing its tail again but simply shook its body, as if shaking off lice. Yet, with this simple movement, the fire-smoke outside churned like waves, and the rising heat caused Yu Ci's hair to curl.

At this moment, Yu Ci had flipped over the ghost beast's head. Enduring the burning pain in his internal organs, he glanced down and saw that Ye Tu was indeed pinned to the ground by the ghost beast's massive claw, his fate unknown. Yu Ci pursed his lips, instantly casting aside all useless thoughts, and drew his sword again.

A crimson sword light slashed horizontally, aiming for the ghost beast's eyes.

Yu Ci was confident in his hand-eye coordination, but even with this strike, he missed. The sword light clearly passed the target, yet his hand felt empty, only a gradually blurring image facing him, filled with indescribable mockery.

His expression remained unchanged. He instantly shifted his strategy, relying solely on his sense of smell to locate the point where the ghost beast's pungent, gamey scent was strongest. Without any muscular force, his internal true qi surged, resonating with the shining true spirit in his mind's palace, achieving the state Ye Tu had described as the union of spirit and qi.

The Nine Yang Talisman Sword's light flashed, a fiery line streaking through the air, followed by a "clang" as the sword light struck something hard.

"That's... teeth!" Yu Ci's airborne momentum had run out, and his suspended body inevitably began to descend, but his eyes remained fixed on the blurring image ahead.

The state of spirit and qi union persisted. His deeply hidden primordial spirit became active in this state. Yu Ci suddenly felt that everything around him had changed. His divine consciousness and divine thoughts became extensions of his primordial spirit, dancing in the air, carving out a very limited yet extremely clear space in the boundless void.

At this moment, Yu Ci saw the ghost beast's burning coal-like pupils hidden behind the thin fire-smoke. He couldn't discern any emotion within them. It simply raised the forelimb pinning Ye Tu, intending to swat away the "stinking bug" before it.

To the ghost beast, Yu Ci, "flying" before it, was nothing more than a stinking bug.

Subsequently, the only clear space was infiltrated by the fire-smoke, becoming hazy and indistinct. The ghost beast's abilities could even block the probing of divine consciousness. All Yu Ci could rely on now was that fleeting memory and his still capable body.

Using the strength of his waist and abdomen, he arched his body, shifting his angle. Just as he completed this movement, the giant claw swept towards him. However, Yu Ci's coordination was exquisite. A sidestep caused this immense force to merely graze him, and the sweeping power instead became the source of his momentum, propelling him towards the ghost beast's massive face.