"You thought a trap like this could hold me?"
Once he confirmed that it was merely a pit, the Tiger Wraith's laughter rang out again, his voice dripping with mockery for Xu Taiping.
"So what if you can trap this body? I am a ghost cultivator. My yin soul can leave my body!"
Amid the Tiger Wraith's scornful words, Xu Taiping silently drew the long saber at his waist and stood beside a taut rope, as though waiting for something.
Boom!
Just then, a chilling gust erupted from the pit.
Swish!
Without hesitation, Xu Taiping slashed his saber down at the rope.
Crack!
Several jars of strong liquor suspended by the rope crashed down, landing squarely inside the deep pit.
A rich scent of liquor instantly spread through the air.
"You think you can crush me with rocks-wait! Liquor! This is liquor! Aah...!"
The Tiger Wraith, whose yin soul had already left his body, suddenly saw several heavy objects falling and assumed Xu Taiping meant to crush him to death in the trap. By the time the fumes began filling the pit, it was already too late to escape.
"Aah...!"
"Who? Who told you liquor was my bane? Aah...!"
"Could it be... could it be that bitch? Aah...! That bitch! It must have been that bitch!"
Agonized howls and curses rang out ceaselessly from the pit.
Once the liquor fumes touched the Tiger Wraith's yin soul, they acted like a deadly poison with no antidote. He could only dissolve into streams of black yin energy, darting wildly around the pit.
Standing at the edge of the trap, Xu Taiping let out a long breath at the sight.
"If I hadn't known liquor was this Tiger Wraith's weakness, I probably wouldn't have stood any chance at all."
Recalling everything that had just happened, Xu Taiping felt a shudder of lingering fear.
Without those repeated, risky attacks that had lulled the Tiger Wraith into complacency, without his desperate training over the past days to break through to the Ice Formation Stage, and without these jars of strong liquor, his path of cultivation might truly have ended here.
"Young hero... save me... just let me possess you... I... can... can tell you... where I buried... the treasures... I've collected... over the years...!"
Just then, a ghostly face formed from yin energy struggled up out of the trap and pleaded with Xu Taiping with immense difficulty.
"Let me ask you something." Xu Taiping ignored the Tiger Wraith's pleas. "Besides you, who else knows the location of the spring feeding the Green Bamboo Abode's water vein?"
"Pull me out, and I'll tell you!"
The Tiger Wraith wanted to strike a bargain with Xu Taiping.
"Will you talk or not?"
Xu Taiping shook the liquor jar in his hand.
"Don't!"
At the sight of the jar, the Tiger Wraith let out a piercing scream, frantically waving the hands formed from his yin soul.
"No one knows but me! I only found out by chance after killing the previous owner of the Green Bamboo Abode!"
The Tiger Wraith hurriedly explained.
"You're not telling the truth."
"No, everything I said was true! Please, please take that jar away!"
Xu Taiping tested the Tiger Wraith once more and found that he really did seem to be telling the truth.
Even so, he did not lower the jar. Instead, he broke open its clay seal.
"Boy, what are you doing? I really haven't lied to you!"
Thinking Xu Taiping was about to splash him with liquor again, the Tiger Wraith cried out repeatedly, his voice trembling.
"One more question." Xu Taiping leaned down to sniff the mouth of the jar before looking back up at the Tiger Wraith's yin soul. "How strong is that Tiger Demon you call the Great King? Does he have any weaknesses?"
"Well... I..."
When Xu Taiping asked about the Tiger Demon, the Tiger Wraith immediately grew cautious, stammering and not daring to speak.
"If I tell you about the Great King, then... then I really will have no road left but death!"
The Tiger Wraith looked at Xu Taiping, his voice pleading.
"If you don't, I'll scatter your soul to the winds right now."
Xu Taiping dipped his hand into the jar, wetting it with liquor, and gave the Tiger Wraith an innocent smile before flicking every drop onto him.
"Aah...!"
The Tiger Wraith's screams echoed through the mountains.
But there was nothing but wilderness for a hundred miles around. However loudly he screamed, probably no one would hear him.
"Made up your mind?"
Once the screams subsided, Xu Taiping wet his hand with liquor again and gave the Tiger Wraith another innocent smile.
"The Great King is the king of all beasts, with the body of a spirit tiger. Unlike us Tiger Wraiths, he has no weaknesses. However, half a month ago, several disciples of the Seven Peaks ambushed and severely wounded him. He will need at least another three months to recover fully. That is precisely why he sent us Tiger Wraiths out to find blood offerings for him." Here, the Tiger Wraith paused and looked at Xu Taiping with a trace of contempt. "Forgive my bluntness, but even severely wounded, killing you would be as easy as turning his hand."
Three more months to recover. That's about the same as my deadline for breaking through to the Gate Opening Realm...
Xu Taiping frowned, silently considering this.
To the Tiger Wraith, however, that expression looked like fear of the Tiger Demon.
Delight immediately stirred in the Tiger Wraith's heart. Forcing himself to endure the searing agony of the liquor fumes burning his yin soul, he warned Xu Taiping in a voice full of menace:
"So I advise you to let me go. If my soul is scattered, the Great King will certainly know!"
Hearing this, Xu Taiping raised his head and gave the Tiger Wraith a searching look. Then he suddenly tossed the jar in his hand high into the air, channeled his True Qi, and struck it with a palm thrust from a distance.
Bang!
The force of Xu Taiping's palm shattered the jar. Liquor scattered through the air like rain, all of it falling into the trap.
"Aah...! You shameless scoundrel! Just you wait! The Great King-the Great King will avenge me!"
Piercing screams instantly echoed through the mountains.
Xu Taiping turned a deaf ear to them and simply tossed in a torch he had prepared earlier.
"Grandfather said to answer evil with evil and repay kindness with kindness. Never bargain with a tiger for its skin or wallow in the same filth."
Listening to the Tiger Wraith's screams inside the trap, Xu Taiping murmured those words without a change in expression.
Whoosh!
The torch ignited the dry firewood laid at the bottom of the trap. Fueled by the liquor fumes, it burst into flame, sending tongues of fire more than ten feet into the air.
"Roar...!"
The instant the flames surged upward, a tiger's roar suddenly erupted from within them. Then the flames transformed into an enormous tiger's head.
"You dared kill my wraith servant?"
The tiger roared furiously at Xu Taiping.
"I heard several disciples of the Seven Peaks severely wounded you, and you'll need three to five months to recover. Is that true?"
Thanks to what the Tiger Wraith had said earlier, Xu Taiping was not particularly surprised by the appearance of this phantom Tiger Demon. Instead, he smiled as he put the question to him.
"Nonsense! This king's wounds will heal in three months at most!"
The Tiger King blurted it out almost without thinking.
But as soon as the words left his mouth, he realized something was wrong and flew into a rage.
"You dared trick this king into talking?"
Before you continue