The change came on the afternoon of the second day.
Iron Wall's nostrils suddenly flared violently, followed by a short, low growl.
It was not a warning.
It was resistance.
Su Chen opened his eyes and looked ahead, his pupils abruptly contracting.
The colors of the forest had changed.
Starting a hundred meters ahead, the leaves of every tree had turned a sickly purplish-black.
Grayish-white fungal threads crawled over the branches like spiderwebs, or shriveled blood vessels.
There was not a single living creature visible on the ground.
Not even an insect.
A thin layer of purple-green poisonous mist clung to the ground and rose soundlessly.
All ten Fearclaw Bears stopped almost at the same time.
Every strand of their tough dark-gold fur stood on end, while uneasy rumbles rose from deep within their chests.
Iron Wall shook its enormous head, clearly resisting Su Chen's order to advance for the first time.
Su Chen leaped down from Iron Wall's broad back.
He crouched and grabbed a handful of dirt from the ground.
The soil was black and damp, giving off an extremely faint sweet, bloody smell.
He held the dirt close to Iron Wall's scaled forepaw.
Sizzle—
Fine grayish-white patterns instantly emerged and spread across the surface of the dark-gold scales.
Erosion.
Su Chen tossed the dirt aside and stood.
"This isn't poison from a soul beast." His tone was utterly certain.
Mo Qianye jumped down from the shoulder of the third Fearclaw Bear, the Netherfire beneath his black robe instinctively surging higher.
"How do you know?"
"A soul beast releases poison by instinct. It only spreads indiscriminately; it has no boundaries."
Su Chen raised a hand and pointed to the sharply defined line ahead.
"Look over there."
Mo Qianye followed his finger.
The poisonous mist's range had been precisely confined by an invisible arc.
The plants beyond the arc were withered and yellow, but showed no signs of corrosion.
This was territory deliberately marked out by someone.
"Someone is using poison arts to carve out their own territory."
The moment Su Chen finished speaking, he stepped into the purple-green mist without the slightest hesitation.
"Hey—"
Mo Qianye's outstretched hand froze in midair.
He saw an extremely thin layer of dark-gold Soul Power naturally circulating across Su Chen's body, blocking all the poisonous mist outside.
Mo Qianye gritted his teeth. Purple Nether Phoenix Flame instantly wrapped around his entire body as he followed.
Iron Wall hesitated in place for two seconds, let out a deeply reluctant grunt, and finally led the other nine Fearclaw Bears into the poisonous mist.
The mist grew thicker and thicker.
After walking roughly three hundred steps, Su Chen suddenly stopped.
Twenty meters ahead, the concentration of poison abruptly increased tenfold.
The purple-green gas had gathered there into an almost lightproof wall, like a tightly shut door.
A voice came from behind that door.
"Take one more step, and that layer of Soul Power around you won't last three breaths."
It was a young girl's voice.
Cold and crisp, yet carrying a trace of hoarseness.
Su Chen stopped, but not because of the threat.
He was listening.
That voice contained many things. There was killing intent, but not much. More than that, there was probing, evaluation, and the conflicted desire and rejection of companionship born from long-term solitude.
A crack opened in the poison curtain.
A young girl stepped out.
She looked about twelve years old, half a head shorter than Su Chen.
Her face was startlingly pale, the unhealthy pallor of someone who had not seen sunlight for a long time.
Yet her features were exquisitely perfect, like an overly flawless sculpture whose creator had spitefully placed a crimson mole between her brows.
She wore a short robe stitched from unknown beast hide, its cuffs badly worn.
The boots on her feet were clearly a size too large, as though they had been stripped from a dead person.
Seven or eight gourds of different colors hung from her waist, covered in dense sealing runes.
A faint fragrance drifted from her body.
The scent was not strong, but Su Chen noticed that a small blade of grass by his feet turned into gray powder less than five seconds after touching it.
"You entered my territory."
The girl's gaze swept from Su Chen to the ten enormous beasts behind him, and her pupils imperceptibly contracted.
But there was not the slightest hint of retreat in her tone.
"Want to die?"
The Nether Phoenix Flame around Mo Qianye suddenly surged, purple light instantly dispersing a large swath of poisonous mist.
Su Chen raised his hand slightly.
The flames fell at once.
"Who are you hiding from?"
Rather than answer her, Su Chen directly threw out a question.
The girl's expression changed.
For only an instant.
A crack called panic appeared on that ice-cold face.
She swiftly stitched it back together and put on that unapproachable mask again.
But Su Chen had already seen it.
"Your poison array has a defensive radius of roughly four hundred meters. It covers a considerable area, but the poison mist isn't evenly distributed."
Su Chen calmly stated the results of his analysis.
"The southwest is thinnest, while the northeast is thickest."
"If this were only meant to scare off soul beasts, there would be no need for such a directional arrangement."
"You're guarding against people, and you know your enemies will come from the northeast."
The girl's expression completely changed.
This time, it was not just an instant. She remained frozen for several seconds.
"Who exactly are you?"
She took a step back, her right hand pressing against a pitch-black gourd at her waist.
"Just passing through," Su Chen said. "What about you?"
A long silence followed.
The girl's hand remained on the gourd, her fingertips glowing with a faint green light.
She was weighing her options.
Fight, or flee.
In the end, she chose a third option.
"Chu Yao. Poison Sect."
She enunciated every word as though forcing thorn-covered ice from her throat.
"If you know about the Poison Sect, turn around and leave now. You still have time."
Su Chen did not turn around.
"The Poison Sect has an eight-hundred-year legacy. It excels in refining countless poisons and primarily cultivates gu arts."
His tone was as calm as if he were reciting from a textbook.
"Six years ago, Spirit Hall wiped out the entire sect on the charge of colluding with evil soul masters."
Chu Yao's breathing suddenly quickened.
"They said we were evil soul masters."
Her voice dropped, and a coarse hatred seeped into its hoarseness.
"The Myriad-Poison Gu Mother has been the Chu Family's martial soul for eight hundred years. Eight hundred years ago, no one called it an evil martial soul."
"Spirit Hall coveted my family's Myriad-Poison Secret Canon and demanded that my father hand it over with both hands—my father refused."
She paused.
"Then there was no after."
Mo Qianye said nothing behind them, but the Nether Phoenix Flame around him dimmed slightly.
Su Chen took a step forward.
Chu Yao suddenly stepped back, her voice turning shrill. "Don't come closer! The toxins on my body aren't something I can control—if you get too close, you will..."
Su Chen did not stop.
He walked up to her, reached out, and directly grasped her wrist.
Dark-gold Soul Power condensed into a dense, thin membrane in his palm, neatly blocking those all-pervasive toxins outside.
Chu Yao's entire body stiffened.
Not from fear.
Since the day she awakened the Myriad-Poison Gu Mother martial soul at the age of six, no one had touched her again.
Her mother had to wear three layers of thick beast-hide gloves to hold her.
When her father taught her lessons, he always stayed two zhang away.
She had grown used to it.
She thought she had stopped caring long ago.
Su Chen released her hand, stepped back half a pace, and spoke in a businesslike tone.
"The Myriad-Poison Gu Mother cultivates both gu and poison, and can provide a legion with multiple poison-based debuffs."
"Its offensive power is average, but its control and weakening abilities are top-tier."
He looked directly into Chu Yao's eyes.
"My legion lacks a debuff support role."
"Come with me."
"I'll feed you, keep you safe, and help you get revenge."
Chu Yao stared at him.
When this boy said the words "help you get revenge," his tone was no different from when he said "I'll feed you."
Calm.
Certain.
As if he were stating a fact that had already happened.
Chu Yao was silent for a long time.
"You aren't afraid of my poison?"
"I have ten Dark Golden Terrorclaw Bears."
Su Chen jerked his chin toward the rear.
"Compared to their bad tempers, your poison is much gentler."
Behind them, Iron Wall was rubbing its enormous cheek against an ancient tree to scratch an itch, making the centuries-old giant tree sway as though it might fall at any moment.
Nearby, Little Gold was innocently gnawing on a hard rock, its loud crunching especially clear in the poisonous mist.
The corner of Chu Yao's mouth twitched.
She was not sure whether this person was praising her or mocking her.
She started walking and followed Su Chen.
After taking a few steps, she finally spoke, her voice still stiff.
"I have nowhere else to go. Don't misunderstand. It isn't because of you. I just temporarily need a..."
"Mm."
"Can you wait until I'm finished?"
"Mm."
Chu Yao seemed to choke on her words and took a heavy breath.
"One day, I'll poison you to death."
Su Chen did not even turn his head.
"Get in line. Spirit Hall is ahead of you."
Mo Qianye silently sighed behind him.
Another troublesome one.
The group set off again.
The diamond-shaped battle formation of the ten Fearclaw Bears subtly adjusted its structure, leaving an absolutely safe space at the center.
That was Chu Yao's position.
Iron Wall deliberately slowed its pace. Its mountain-like body completely blocked off the remaining corrosive poisonous mist around them.
Chu Yao walked within the bears' encirclement, surrounded on all sides by silent yet powerful dark golden figures.
For the first time, she felt safe.
But she would rather die than admit it.
Su Chen returned to Iron Wall's back and looked toward the northeast.
That was the direction of Netherworld Valley.
His second Spirit Ring.
The blade he needed was there.
And farther away, beyond the reach of his gaze—
Two incomparably terrifying auras were tearing through the night over the outskirts of the Star Dou Great Forest at an astonishing speed.
Soul Sages.
Two of them.
Bibi Dong had given them seven days.
They had reached the forest's edge in only two.
Leading them was a gaunt old man in Spirit Hall's dark red robes, his face like dried orange peel.
Behind him, an ink-black Spirit Ring radiated a palpitating aura in the darkness.
A seventy-thousand-year Spirit Ring!
"The target entered the Star Dou Great Forest?" he asked in a hoarse voice.
The other Soul Douluo beside him immediately bowed. "The intelligence is confirmed. He brought a companion, as well as... ten Ten-Thousand-Year Dark Golden Terrorclaw Bears."
At last, a trace of expression appeared on the gaunt old man's face.
It was a twisted smile.
"Interesting."
He took a step forward, and his figure instantly vanished into the boundless darkness of the Star Dou Great Forest.
Before you continue