A Joke Taken Too Far

When Lin Yi returned to Brown Bear Cave, the sun had already climbed overhead.

With practiced efficiency, he tied the brown bear, the spider, and the ground pig’s three Corpse bodies into a bundle with vines. He carried the fruit tree in his other hand, roots and soil still attached. Its branches had been stripped bare of fruit, but its root system was relatively intact. Well, relatively intact—he had yanked it out by force, so he could not ask for too much.

"Off we go."

Carrying the tree, Lin Yi set off for Bluestone Tribe.

He did not dare let down his guard on the way back. His Spirit Eyes remained active at low power the entire time.

A faint platinum glow flickered deep within his pupils as his spiritual-energy vision swept over the shrubs on either side and the shadows between the trees, confirming that no Ferocious Beasts were lurking nearby.

He walked on like that until the familiar outline of the tribe slowly emerged beyond the distant treeline—the wooden fence, the Eye of Zheng atop the tall wooden pillar. Everything was safe and sound.

Only then did Lin Yi finally relax.

Then a mischievous thought sprang to mind.

"Hehe..."

He slowed his pace and rapidly ran through the script in his head.

The old village chief had always treated him with complete sincerity. From cultivation methods to sacrificial offerings, the old man had never hidden anything from him. He was clearly the sort who worried himself sick. Every time he saw Lin Yi, his face seemed to say, "Kid, don't let anything happen to you."

So what if... the old man saw him crawling back covered in blood?

The more Lin Yi thought about it, the more amusing it seemed. He activated the Breath-Concealing Art, suppressing his Blood-Qi fluctuations layer by layer, all the way from the Mountain-Sinking Realm down to the faint level of the First Cry Realm.

Then he wiped some half-dried dark-red blood from the prey he was dragging behind him and casually smeared it across his chest, shoulders, and forearms. He even rubbed some along the edge of his collar, making it look as though it had soaked through.

Finally, he mussed up his hair a little, took a deep breath, and forced out a weak, feeble air.

"Not bad, not bad."

Lin Yi looked himself over and nodded in satisfaction. He looked exactly like someone who had narrowly escaped a Ferocious Beast's jaws, wounded all over and barely managing to crawl back. The key was realism.

He bent down, gripped the vine dragging the prey once more, staggered beneath his feet, and headed toward the tribe gate.

Then he heard commotion at the entrance.

Still twenty or thirty zhang away, the village chief stood at the very front of a crowd, with over a dozen members of the Hunting Team behind him.

Biao was absent, still recovering from his injuries, but Mang and the other members were all there. Something felt wrong. With his back turned toward Lin Yi, the village chief's deep voice drifted over in broken fragments.

"Whether he is alive or dead, we have to go look for him."

Lin Yi froze for a moment.

Before he could react, Mang's old hunter's eyes spotted him first.

Mang suddenly raised an arm and pointed. His rough voice exploded like thunder. "He's back! The Lin kid is back!"

Everyone spun around at once.

Lin Yi was covered in blood, dragging the massive Corpse bodies of three Ferocious Beasts as he staggered toward them.

The sight hit too hard. The village chief was the first to change expression, striding forward in great steps as the rest of the Hunting Team followed close behind, swarming over in a rush.

"Lin kid!"

"Lin Yi!"

"You brat, you're alive!"

People crowded around from every direction, voices overlapping. Before Lin Yi could find an opening to speak, the village chief had already rushed before him.

The old man's rough hands, weathered by years of tending to tribal affairs, grabbed Lin Yi's arm. His gaze swept from the glaring bloodstains on Lin Yi's chest down to the prey Corpse bodies at his feet.

"You little bastard, what happened?" The village chief's fingers had already begun to tremble. "So much blood—"

Lin Yi bit down, suppressing the upward curl of his lips. He cooperatively bent at the waist, deliberately lowering his voice.

"I ran into... a very terrifying Ferocious Beast. I only made it back after suffering serious injuries."

"Where are you hurt? Let me see." The village chief grabbed his wrist and moved to pull up his sleeve.

"My chest and back, both..."

"Quick! Get him back inside!" The village chief turned and roared at those behind him, his voice two pitches higher than usual. "Mang! Carry him in!"

Before Lin Yi could wave him off and say there was no need, Mang had already scooped him up in one motion.

Mang's Tidal Surge Realm Blood-Qi erupted at full force. Carrying a person was as easy as carrying a rabbit, and he charged toward the tribe with rapid strides.

Several members of the Hunting Team behind them hurriedly took over the prey Lin Yi had been dragging.

Lin Yi only felt the wind howling past his ears. Within a few breaths, Mang had carried him all the way into the village chief's stone house and dropped him onto the stone bed with a smack.

The village chief rushed in right after him, panting heavily, arms full of herbs and several clean bandages.

Without another word, the old man crouched beside the bed and reached for Lin Yi's clothes, intending to tear them open and inspect his wounds.

"Don't—"

Lin Yi finally could not hold it in anymore. He hurriedly rolled upright from the stone bed and shouted repeatedly, "I was pretending! I was pretending! I'm not hurt!"

Everyone froze.

Lin Yi hurriedly released the Breath-Concealing Art. The dense, powerful Blood-Qi aura of the Mountain-Sinking Realm instantly burst from his body, shattering the weakness he had deliberately feigned. It was as though the air within the entire stone house had been swept through by that surge of blood energy.

The glaring bloodstains on his chest were real, but the skin beneath was completely unscathed—not even a scratch.

The room fell silent for roughly two breaths.

Then the village chief was the first to react.

Smack.

A rough palm landed neither heavily nor lightly on the back of Lin Yi's head.

"You little bastard!"

The village chief's voice squeezed out through clenched teeth, full of anger, yet the hand that had smacked the back of Lin Yi's head came down onto his shoulder and gave it a firm squeeze.

The old man stood there for several breaths, his chest rising and falling a few times. At last, he let out a long breath, like a taut bowstring finally loosening.

"Whew... It's good that you're all right."

The other members of the Hunting Team gradually came to their senses as well. Mang scratched the back of his head and grinned, while several members beside him began grumbling and complaining.

"Lin kid, you scared us to death."

"I really thought something had happened to you."

"That blood all over you looked way too real!"

Lin Yi looked around at the people before him. The village chief's gray hair at his temples was stuck to his forehead with sweat. Mang's breathing had not yet fully settled. The others wore both annoyance and relief on their faces, yet no one was truly blaming him.

That lingering fear still hung between everyone's brows, impossible to suppress.

Something suddenly pricked a place deep in Lin Yi's heart, and the roguish smile at the corner of his lips slowly faded.

"I'm sorry, everyone." Lin Yi jumped down from the stone bed, stood straight, and said earnestly, "I shouldn't have made that kind of joke."

The village chief waved a hand and did not pursue the matter further.

Lin Yi took a breath, then grinned again. "I brought everyone some gifts. That brown bear, spider, and boar-like Ferocious Beast I dragged back—divide them up. We'll have an extra feast tonight."

Everyone instinctively tried to refuse. Mang was the first to speak. "You traded your life for those. How could we possibly—"

"I brought back several of them," Lin Yi interrupted, his tone especially frank. "We're family. Between family, there is no need to speak like strangers."

The words "we're family" stopped everyone in their tracks.

Mang opened his mouth, but did not refuse again. He nodded hard. The others agreed as well, and the atmosphere lightened once more.

Lin Yi raised his chin toward Mang. "Brother Mang, I'll trouble you to help distribute them. I have something else to ask the village chief."

Mang gave a hearty wave of his hand and led everyone out of the stone house to deal with the prey outside. Their footsteps and laughter gradually faded away, leaving only Lin Yi and the village chief in the quiet stone house.

Lin Yi took out nine bright-red fruits, spread them across his palm, and handed them to the village chief.

"Village chief, do you know what kind of fruit this is?"

The village chief accepted one and examined it for a moment. A trace of surprise flashed through his cloudy old eyes. "...Blood Essence Fruit. Where did you get this?"

"It grew on the tree I carried back."

"What a pity." The village chief held the fruit up to the window light and turned it, shaking his head. "It has not fully ripened yet.

"But if it had ripened completely, the Ferocious Beasts guarding it would have swallowed it on the spot. It would never have been your turn to pick it. These fruits of yours are only seventy or eighty percent grown. Their medicinal effect is probably only around seventy percent of that of normal Blood Essence Fruit."

"Blood Essence Fruit... What does it do when eaten?"

"It increases Blood-Qi." The village chief handed the fruit back to him and added seriously, "It has an extremely good effect on those in the Blood-Qi Realm."