Demons

Three months later.

The four returned to the entrance through the long mine tunnel they had dug.

Old Liu dismantled the formation at the cave entrance. Once he had put it away, Great Cultivator Yang looked over the others and said with a smile,

"Same rules as always. We'll part ways here!"

He looked at Fang Yu. "Next time we go into the mine, I'll notify you through the market ring. If you're in the market, you'll receive the message."

"All right!" Fang Yu nodded. Great Cultivator Yang's words meant he had accepted him; otherwise, he would not have said anything more.

"Farewell!"

With that, Great Cultivator Yang turned into a streak of light and flew down a mine tunnel, vanishing from sight in the blink of an eye. Old Liu and Strongman Zhang each chose a tunnel and left as well, and moments later, Fang Yu was alone.

A thought stirred in Fang Yu's mind. He activated the Spiritual Pivot Resonance Chapter and made a divination about leaving the mine alone.

[Auspicious]

"Not bad. It looks like those three didn't have designs on him. Maybe it was because he dug up the fewest Spirit Stones of the four, so he wasn't worth making a move on."

Fang Yu murmured to himself, then turned into a streak of light and headed for the exit.

Over three months of mining, he had dug up Spirit Ore worth roughly five thousand Spirit Stones in total, far less than the others.

Great Cultivator Yang in particular had mined nearly twenty thousand Spirit Stones' worth by himself. Even if someone had entertained any ideas, they would probably have set their sights on him.

Still, he was at Qi Refining Great Perfection, so Fang Yu reckoned Old Liu and Strongman Zhang would not lightly entertain such ideas either.

Fang Yu flew along the route he had taken in, casually dealing with several groups of Night Sha along the way, until he reached the mine entrance.

Just then, a powerful pressure bore down on him. A beam of spiritual light shot down from above the tunnel and enveloped him, and a voice rang out beside his ear. "Hand over half your Spirit Ore!"

With a movement of Fang Yu's spiritual sense, half the Spirit Ore flew out of the Storage Bag he used specifically for it. The spiritual light enveloping him dimmed and vanished, while the ore flew into a cave to the side.

The pressure disappeared along with the spiritual light. Fang Yu strode out of the mine and into the large cavern at the entrance, where plenty of miners were still recruiting people to form teams.

Sensing that half his Spirit Ore was gone, Fang Yu strode out of the mining area and headed for the market.

The Autumn Moon Mountain vein really was a fine place. In just three months, he had mined five thousand Spirit Stones' worth, and that was with him showing extreme restraint. If he stopped holding back and mined freely, he could dig up at least a hundred thousand Spirit Stones' worth in three months. Even after half was taken, he would still have fifty thousand.

No wonder more and more cultivators were coming to Autumn Moon Market. It was simply the best place to strike it rich.

Fang Yu visited several shops in the market and exchanged all his Spirit Ore for pills that could increase his Law Power, then returned to his unfinished cave abode.

After this mining trip, he had gained a very direct understanding of the entire mining process, as well as the environment and dangers inside the mine. Next time, he could go in and mine alone. He should not be short of Spirit Stones anymore.

Before his next trip into the mine, though, he could return to Anping Prefecture for a look. By his reckoning, it had been more than two years, and there was not much time left before the next grand market.

Dao of Qi Ingestion. Anping Prefecture.

"Kill!"

Fang Yu stood atop a mountain, watching from afar as tens of thousands of mortal soldiers fought on the plain ahead.

"Anping Prefecture really has fallen into chaos!"

Fang Yu murmured, a little worried. Now that Anping Prefecture was in turmoil, he did not know whether the grand market would still be held.

"Thump, thump, thump..."

Suddenly, a rapid sound like drumbeats came from afar. Fang Yu looked toward it and saw a single rider appear on the horizon, followed by a densely packed mass of cavalry. Like a flood, they charged at the battlefield's flank.

Among the cavalry, one rider held a banner embroidered with a fierce tiger. In the middle of the triangular charging formation was a figure who looked somewhat familiar to Fang Yu.

The troop of roughly eight hundred cavalry sliced into the battlefield as smoothly as a butter knife. Screams rang out wherever they passed, and in the blink of an eye, they had punched through one side's battle formation.

"Ah... it's the Ghost Servant Cavalry... Embroidered Tiger is here..."

"Run..."

"Kill!"

"The general is mighty! Kill..."

"..."

The cavalry's arrival immediately changed the course of the battle. The two armies had originally been locked in a stalemate, but after one side's formation was pierced, its ranks fell into disarray and its morale plummeted. Defeat followed like a collapsing mountain, and the soldiers broke and fled in all directions.

"Kill..."

Clad in dark red armor, Zhang Hu raised his spear and roared. Then he led the cavalry, who had already reformed their ranks, in another charge at a formation that was still barely holding together.

From afar, Fang Yu sensed that Embroidered Tiger's cultivation was at the Fourth Layer of Qi Ingestion and forcibly suppressed the urge to make a divination. In a mere two years and change, Embroidered Tiger had raised such a large force, and his own cultivation had reached the Fourth Layer of Qi Ingestion. It was simply too fast.

Well, cultivation in Qi Ingestion did not require a great deal of Spiritual Qi. Dao Attainment was the most important thing. As long as one could accumulate Dao Attainment quickly and had a somewhat ample supply of Spiritual Qi, one could rapidly advance one's cultivation.

Embroidered Tiger was a child of destiny, so he was bound to lack neither Dao Attainment nor Spirit Stones. His way of accumulating Dao Attainment ought to be connected to conquering the world or killing on the battlefield.

Several days passed in the blink of an eye. The fighting on the battlefield below had long since ended. The soldiers clearing it dug a huge pit for ten thousand bodies and threw the corpses of the fallen enemy soldiers into it for burial.

The corpses of their allies, meanwhile, were all carried away in the direction of Anping Prefecture City.

Fang Yu had watched a battle involving more than ten thousand people from beginning to end. At first, he had been awed by the grand spectacle, as if he were watching a war blockbuster, but gradually his heart began to feel heavy. The sight of the bodies buried in the pit in particular filled him with a sense of sorrow.

"War really is too cruel!"

With that sigh, he closed his eyes, tossed a pill into his mouth, took a Spirit Stone in his hand, and began to cultivate.

The days passed, and several months went by in the blink of an eye.

"Rumble!"

On this day, the sky grew gloomy, and a torrential downpour fell amid rolling thunder.

Fang Yu opened his eyes and looked at the curtain of rain, as though the heavens themselves were pouring down. His mood lifted. He reached out and caught the drops of rain blocked outside his body by his protective spiritual light, saying,

"What heavy rain!"

Suddenly, a thought stirred in his mind, and he looked toward the pit. At some point, a black cat had appeared beside it, giving off faint fluctuations of Law Power-or rather, Demon Power.

A demon?

A thought stirred in Fang Yu's mind, and his attention fell entirely on the black cat. It crept forward, its nose twitching, and crawled into the pit, coming to a set of remains exposed by the rain.

"Inhale..."

As the black cat took a sharp breath, a soul in the form of a soldier emerged from the corpse and was drawn into its nostrils.

The black cat immediately gave a start and began rolling back and forth as though it had sniffed catnip.