"Meow~~"
"..." Pei Ye could not be bothered with the cat. He sat down on a stone stool as well and turned to Xing Zhi. "Lady Xing, how are Brother Shang and the others?"
"We'd already put some distance between us by then, and they were relatively less attractive targets... hopefully they'll make it back safely."
"Mm."
After a quiet moment, Pei Ye asked, "Do you think he'll come after us-Lady Xing? Lady Xing?"
"Hmm? Oh, that depends on what he wants." Xing Zhi withdrew her vacant gaze. "You spent more time with him. What do you think?"
"...I don't know either."
"I'm trying to find out," the black cat suddenly said.
The others already knew the cat was extraordinary. Only Chang Zhiyuan received a thorough fright. "It... it..."
"It's all right, Lord Chang. Remember the Divine Chi I told you about, the one that entered my dreams? This is him."
Chang Zhiyuan gaped, tongue-tied. It took him a good while to accept this information, and then he said rather awkwardly, "What I've been feeding him these past two days... hasn't been very good."
"It's fine. He doesn't eat."
Only then did Chang Zhiyuan unconsciously stroke his beard and nod slowly. "What exactly happened these past few days? We received a report from the villagers of White Bamboo Village saying that demon tiger ate Lord Jing."
"Yes."
At this point, Xing Zhi said, "Young Hero Pei, Lord Chang, you two talk first. I've recovered a little, so I'll go tend to my injuries-Bright Sword Master, this way, please."
"Sorry for the trouble."
Watching the two leave, Pei Ye turned back and slowly recounted his journey through the Firewood-Cang Mountains to Chang Zhiyuan. By the time he finished, the other two had finished treating their injuries as well.
Over the following hours, they all rested properly, especially Pei Ye and Xing Zhi. The exhaustion of the past few days was beyond words.
Qiongqi never came after them, and, happily, Shang Lang and his group returned once daylight was fully upon them.
Only Shang Lang's expression was somewhat troubled.
"I saw a rabbit turn into blue water," he said.
Qiongqi's golden eyes watched Pei Ye and the other two disappear.
By now, the consciousness belonging to Qiongqi had been swallowed entirely-after all, he had no Black Chi to build defenses for him.
His wings folded, and he landed on the ground.
Had Pei Ye still been the host, he would surely have felt more powers being released after Qiongqi and the Purple-Robed Man were devoured.
In the mountain forest, morning birds began leaving their nests, surrounded by the chirping of insects and the hiss of snakes. Only when the fierce battle stopped did it become apparent that this was no arena reserved for human combat, but a place where all manner of creatures had lived, bred, and slaughtered one another for generations.
The voices of all living things reached his ears.
Starting at the claws, Qiongqi's body began to split apart-or "disintegrate" would have been more apt-turning into countless deep-blue, impossibly tiny particles that poured onto the ground like sand.
Some were as large as finger joints, others as small as mung beans, and the smaller ones resembled grains of millet or even fine body hairs.
Profound Qi became wind, lifting all these tiny pieces of tissue high into the air before scattering them in every direction. It was as though a fine blue rain had fallen over the entire forest.
Within the area covered by this fine rain, a worker ant was crawling toward its nest with a scrap held aloft.
Many more ants like it marched ahead and behind in a long line, each carrying a piece of food.
Far ahead-past dozens of blades of grass, around three puddles, and finally over an enormous rock-they had found a gigantic corpse that required hundreds of worker ants to move.
They had carried it some distance toward the nest, but it was simply too large to pass through the gap between the enormous rock and the puddles. After more than a dozen companions drifted away, they decided to dismantle it there and carry it back to the nest piece by piece.
Just then, a slender object, somewhat shorter than its own body, floated down ahead of it.
Its vision held no colors, but judging by its sense of taste... it should not have liked this flavor before, yet now it was irresistibly drawn toward it.
The slender object was still swaying slightly, like a thread.
Movement meant life, and life meant food.
This was sound logic etched into its genes over millions upon millions of years. Besides, it seldom encountered anything smaller than itself that could move.
It crawled over, antennae waving. The instant it touched the object, the "thread" lunged forward and wrapped around it.
It felt its field of vision rising, while the scrap of food it held suddenly became much lighter. After turning in two circles without finding the "thread," it crawled back into line and followed the procession into the nest.
It crawled into the familiar storeroom and set down its scrap. Its companions continued back in formation to carry more, but it suddenly caught a more "delicious" scent.
Leaving the line, it crawled deeper alone, waving its antennae through the darkness to catch that trace of scent.
At last, it reached a chamber it had never visited before.
It touched antennae with the soldier ants-it noticed that these soldiers seemed to have grown smaller-and entered after exchanging scents.
The chamber was full of rustling sounds as its winged companions walked back and forth, feeding countless mouths.
It should not have possessed memories, yet now it seemed to remember-it and many of its companions appeared to have come from here.
It crawled over, and a plump white larva opened its mouth, waiting for food.
It opened an even larger mouth and bit the larva in half.
After an unknown length of time, it emerged, feeling that the entrance had grown narrower.
At the same time, those ever-valiant companions at the entrance seemed to have become delicious too, so it ate them as well and continued deeper.
A frog crouched in the grass.
It saw a gigantic ant "flow" out of the nest. It, too, could not distinguish colors, and had never seen anything like this before.
But that did not matter. Movement meant life, and life meant food.
This was sound logic etched into its genes over millions upon millions of years.
It flicked out its tongue and swallowed the huge ant, then startled and turned to leap back into the pond.
The grass was shaking, and something rather large was rapidly approaching.
It drew closer: a rabbit with blue markings growing across its skin.
Wherever it passed, the grass was stained deep blue as well.
Chapter 65: Sir
Zhu Gaoyang ran through a haze of confusion.
He did not know where he had arrived. It only seemed as though a thread ahead was pulling him along.
He clung desperately to that tiny spark of clarity deep within his heart. It was neither his own name nor his master nor anything like Dragon Lord Dongting, but merely the notion of "I."
He knew his purpose. He had to find something for the Divine Master... No, to hell with the Divine Master... I have to find... find what?
Do I really have something to find? That thing ahead-is it something I want to find, or an order from the Divine Master... no, to hell with the Divine Master!
Zhu Gaoyang was like someone trying to think on the verge of sleep. He struggled to remember something, but his thoughts only stalled, and after just a little while, he forgot what he was trying to remember, or even that he was trying to think at all.
Had anyone been able to enter his Mindscape Realm, the first thing they would have seen was a pair of lofty, indifferent golden eyes suspended in midair. Shadows filled every direction, leaving only a pool of water at the center. A water serpent coiled within the pool, encircling the sleeping Zhu Gaoyang.
The [Heart-Pond Serpent-Raising Art], passed down by Dragon Lord Dongting, was naturally a profound technique that acted upon the Mindscape Realm. Capable of both attack and defense, it generally left no need to fear losing a battle within the Mindscape Realm, so long as one did not encounter the Heart-Slaying Glaze.
Yet beneath the gaze of those golden eyes, preserving the spark of his true self already demanded everything it had. Even so, the shadows continued slowly seeping into the pool like ink. It might not take long for them to touch the serpent's body.
Because the task the "Divine Master" wanted him to perform was a search rather than a slaughter, he had mercifully refrained from destroying Zhu Gaoyang's brain with Dragon Saliva. Instead, after occupying his head, he had used Quail Head's mental control to invade his consciousness. Only this had given the heart-pond water serpent a chance to hold out a little longer.
But this delay was plainly nothing more than a delay. Before this body reached the destination indicated by that thread, [Quail Head] would surely complete its occupation of the entire Mindscape Realm.
This was a future the Immortal Lord had already seen clearly.
Perhaps he was stumbling, perhaps bounding as swiftly as flight. Zhu Gaoyang did not know how he was using his body. In any case, through the haze, he felt he had already traveled a considerable distance.
Zhu Gaoyang struggled to stop his feet. Though dazed and muddled, he occasionally remembered-whatever the Divine Master wanted him to do, he ought to oppose it.
A small courtyard suddenly appeared ahead.
It stood at the foot of the mountain, with a thatched house and a brushwood gate: one of the more secluded households belonging to the nearby village.
What is this... this isn't the direction the Divine Master indicated, so I should go there... wait, to hell with the Divine... yes, I should go somewhere the Divine Master didn't indicate...
He leaped down from the mountain.
Not far behind the little courtyard lay a large stretch of farmland planted with many medicinal herbs. Perhaps this was why the family lived here.
Dawn had only just begun to glimmer, but the family was already up. The man shouldered his hoe, shuffled along in straw sandals, and was about to push open the brushwood gate, small farming tools clattering in the little basket in his hand.
Then he looked up, saw Zhu Gaoyang, and let out a strangely pitched cry.
Zhu Gaoyang felt someone touching him.
He turned to see a person in a long black robe.
The images his eyes received were clear, but when conveyed to his muddled consciousness, they all became abstract.
A strip of dried beef, he thought.
Nothing worth looking at. Keep going somewhere the Divine Master didn't indicate.
With a light sweep, he shattered the square of woven branches blocking his way and stepped into the courtyard.
A shadow before him roared incomprehensible sounds at him. Irritated, he swept out a hand and turned it into a smear against the wall.
But immediately, a small figure rushed over, screaming. He waved his hand again and erased it from his sight.
Then a more slender figure rushed out of the house and froze upon stepping outside. Somewhat pleased by this quiet, he continued forward, but the figure soon burst into even more piercing cries. Annoyed, he picked up something beside him and hurled it over. At last, there was silence.
Satisfied, he stumbled forward in a haze. I need to go over... go somewhere that isn't the Divine Master... where was I going again?
The thread pulled at him.
Right. I need to go here.
He was about to turn and head back.
A voice rang out. "Zhu Gaoyang, look at what you've done."
Before you continue