Escort · Battle with the Iron-Spined Bear

Dugu Yan spent the night at the inn. When she came out early the next morning, much of her healthy complexion had returned.

Her purple hair was tied in a ponytail, and she wore a fitted dark green outfit, with a short dagger tucked behind her waist and a bundle in her hand.

Nan Feng saw her at the door. She had already paid for her room and was waiting against the doorframe. When she saw him, she swung the bundle onto her shoulder.

"Let's go. I've finished my business, and I'm heading back to Heaven Dou City."

"Same way." Nan Feng nodded. He had been planning to go to Heaven Dou City anyway, so traveling together suited him.

Ye Lingling came out of the next room. When she saw Dugu Yan, her gaze lingered for a moment. She nodded to Nan Feng without asking any questions. All three were headed to the same place, so they set off together.

Dugu Yan walked half a step ahead, occasionally tilting her head. It was a habitual movement she made when sensing her surroundings with her Jade Phosphorous Serpent Martial Soul.

"Who were those three?" Nan Feng asked.

Dugu Yan's steps faltered.

"Outer members of Spirit Hall. They targeted me because of my grandfather. Spirit Hall wants to force the Dugu Family to pick a side, but my grandfather won't budge, so they looked for a chance to strike. Drug me, kidnap me, and force my grandfather to bow his head."

She turned to glance at Nan Feng.

"I've run into things like this several times. If you hadn't been there last night, I probably would have had to spill blood to get away."

Nan Feng understood. Spilling blood meant burning her blood essence through her Jade Phosphorous Serpent Martial Soul to release a deadly poison-a strike that would kill a thousand enemies at the cost of eight hundred of her own. If she had actually used it in her condition last night, the backlash would have been immense.

"Don't shoulder this kind of thing alone in the future," Nan Feng said. "Senior Poison Douluo may command a lot of respect, but not everyone in Spirit Hall will necessarily give him face."

Dugu Yan didn't answer. She turned her head away, and the corner of her mouth twitched.

Ye Lingling leaned close to Nan Feng. "Her poison attribute is slowly recovering, but there's still some of the drug left in her meridians. It'll probably take another two days to clear."

Nan Feng nodded.

Ahead, the road curved into a narrow passage between two mountains. A steep cliff rose on one side, and a dry riverbed roughly two zhang deep lay on the other.

Nan Feng stopped at the entrance. The scent of a wild beast had crept into the air, mingled with the musty smell of earth and rotting leaves.

Dugu Yan stopped too, her hand going to her short dagger.

"There's something ahead."

Before the words had even faded, a deep roar came from the far end of the passage, making the loose stones tremble.

A massive Soul Beast came around the bend, blocking the entire passage. It was built like a bull in its prime, six chi tall at the shoulder, with thick grayish-brown armor and a single horn atop its head.

An Iron-Spined Bear.

Old Huai's voice came from the crack at the base of the tower. "Around thirteen hundred years old. Three times as big as Tang San's Iron-Armored Rhinoceros. Even a Soul Ancestor can't break through the thickest parts of its armor."

The Iron-Spined Bear lowered its forequarters, pointing its horn at them.

Dugu Yan stepped back. Nan Feng stopped her and took two steps forward himself.

"I'll deal with it. You two stand back."

"You're a level-sixteen Soul Master, and you're going to fight a thirteen-hundred-year-old Iron-Spined Bear?" Dugu Yan stared at him.

"Your Soul Power hasn't recovered. Even if we fought it together, we wouldn't gain any advantage." Nan Feng drew his short staff, the iron hammer tucked into his belt. "Watch the rear for me. Don't let anything else sneak in from outside the passage."

Dugu Yan gritted her teeth and retreated to the rock wall by the entrance, her hand on her dagger. She argued no further, her body taut.

Ye Lingling retreated behind the rock wall on the other side, a pinkish-white glow from her Nine Heart Begonia shining in her palm.

The Iron-Spined Bear pawed the ground twice with its forehoof, then charged.

Nan Feng didn't retreat. When it was five paces away, he activated Tower Suppression.

The shadow of a cyan tower sprang out from beneath his feet, covering the middle of the passage.

The Iron-Spined Bear charged into its range, and all four legs sank at once. Its mad rush faltered for a moment.

In that instant, Nan Feng slipped to its flank and thrust his short staff at a gap in the thick armor around its hind leg joint.

The tip struck an armor plate with a dull thud, sending a numb jolt through the web of his hand.

The Iron-Spined Bear recoiled in pain and swung its hindquarters violently, its tail sweeping across. The gust struck Nan Feng's shoulder, sending him stumbling three steps back into the cliff wall.

The back of his head struck stone, and his vision went black for an instant.

"Nan Feng!" Dugu Yan's voice came from behind him.

Nan Feng had no time to answer. The Iron-Spined Bear turned and charged again, giving him no opening to use Tower Suppression.

Nan Feng gritted his teeth and sank his awareness into his dantian. Holding none of his Soul Power back, he ran the Compression Method at full speed. His Soul Power circulated twice as fast, and the force surging from his dantian was nearly twice as fierce as usual.

He activated Tower Suppression a second time. The tower's shadow condensed into a tower-shaped pillar of light that rose from the ground and slammed into the Iron-Spined Bear's chest.

The impact drove the Iron-Spined Bear back two steps. It flailed with its forehooves before regaining its footing.

Nan Feng seized the opening and charged, iron hammer in his left hand and short staff in his right. The staff stabbed at a gap between the armor plates on its face, while the hammer smashed toward the outside of its foreleg joint.

The Iron-Spined Bear tossed its head, avoiding the staff, but the hammer struck a seam between the armor plates on its foreleg. The plates shattered, and a piece flew off, exposing grayish-red flesh.

The Iron-Spined Bear howled in pain and thrust its horn forward. Nan Feng twisted aside to avoid the direct attack, but the side of the bear's head struck his left ribs, knocking him through the air and into a pile of loose stones at the edge of the riverbed.

Agony tore through his left ribs. At least one bone had cracked.

"Damn it."

Nan Feng climbed to his feet and spat out a mouthful of blood-streaked saliva.

The Iron-Spined Bear turned and charged again, its eyes turning dark red.

Nan Feng straightened and held his ground. He put the short staff back behind his waist and pressed both hands against the pillar of light from Tower Suppression. Driving the Compression Method to its limit, he poured all the Soul Power in his body into the half-open door at the base of the tower.

The tower jolted violently in the depths of his soul.

Something shoved against the door from within, and cyan light surged through the crack. A suppressive force far beyond his normal level poured out from the tower's base and flowed down his arms into the ground.

The ground throughout the passage shook.

The loose stones beneath the Iron-Spined Bear's feet sank half a cun. All four legs seemed nailed to the ground. Its massive body trembled violently, unable to take a single step.

Its roar changed pitch, turning from a bellow of rage into a wail. White foam seeped from the corners of its mouth.

Nan Feng charged up to it and swung his iron hammer in a full arc, smashing it into a seam in the armor at the base of its horn.

One blow. Two blows. Three blows.

The armor plates shattered, and half the horn broke off. The Iron-Spined Bear let out a piercing scream, but its limbs remained pinned by Tower Suppression, unable to move.

Nan Feng switched to his short staff and drove it into a gap that had been forced open between the thick armor plates on its neck. Half the staff sank in.

The scream stopped abruptly. The massive body went rigid for a breath, then toppled onto its side on the rocky road, kicking up a cloud of dust.

The dust settled, leaving only Nan Feng's heavy breathing.

He stood there, his left ribs hurting so badly that every breath felt like a knife tip scraping bone. The web of his left hand had split open and was bleeding.

But he was standing. The Iron-Spined Bear lay at his feet, silent and still.

A deep purple Soul Ring rose above the corpse. Its purple was dark, a sign of considerable age.

Level sixteen wasn't a multiple of ten, so he couldn't absorb the Soul Ring. That was an iron rule, and even the tower couldn't change it.

The deep purple ring floated there for a while, its color gradually fading until it dispersed into the air.

Nan Feng's Soul Power was still at level sixteen, four levels short of level twenty. But the door had loosened more than before, bringing him another step closer to pushing it open.

Dugu Yan ran over from the entrance, her steps hurried and her composure gone.

She stopped in front of Nan Feng. Her gaze moved from his left ribs to the blood at the corner of his mouth, then settled on his trembling left hand.

Her lips moved, but all she said was a very quiet, "You're crazy."

Nan Feng pulled at the corner of his mouth in something like a smile.

"It was blocking the road."

Dugu Yan stared at him for two seconds, then suddenly took hold of his arm. Her grip was light but steady.

"Sit down. I'll bind your ribs."

She rummaged through her bundle for strips of cloth and deftly wrapped them several times around his left ribs. When she was done, she stood and brushed the dust from her hands.

"That pillar of light just now." She looked at the ground Tower Suppression had pressed into a depression. "What was it?"

"Tower Suppression, at full power."

Dugu Yan fell silent for a moment.

"To have that kind of suppressive force at level sixteen, what exactly is the origin of your tower?"

"I picked it up."

Dugu Yan glanced at him but didn't press him. She turned to examine the corpse and walked around it once, then suddenly crouched and pointed to a spot on its back.

"There's something under this armor plate."

Nan Feng endured the pain in his ribs as he walked over and crouched down, then pried the armor plate open with the tip of his short staff. Beneath it was a layer of dark red flesh, with a thumb-sized dark red crystal embedded in the middle.

A Soul Bone. The Iron-Spined Bear's Soul Bone.

"Not bad luck." Dugu Yan stood and dusted off her hands. "The chance of an Iron-Spined Bear producing a Soul Bone is very low. The fact that you ran into one means this mountain has richer Soul Beast resources than the areas outside."

Nan Feng took out the Soul Bone and tucked it into the innermost layer of his bundle. Its quality wasn't high, but it was old enough.

The real gain had come during that incense stick's time in the passage-his first time using the Compression Method and Tower Suppression together at full power. The instant he released his compressed Soul Power, the first door at the base of the tower had been forced open farther than ever before, and the cyan light in the crack had doubled in intensity.

The door had loosened. It only needed one final push, and that push lay at level twenty.

The two continued onward. Dugu Yan walked at Nan Feng's right, occasionally turning to glance at him. Despite the injury to his left ribs, Nan Feng hadn't slowed his pace. The Soul Power in his dantian was repairing the cracked bone.

After they had walked for a while, Dugu Yan suddenly spoke.

"Nan Feng."

"Mm?"

"I don't regret giving you that piece of Purple-Patterned Meteoric Iron."

She didn't look at him as she said it, her gaze resting on the distant mountain ridge.

"My grandfather often says that things should be given to people worthy of them."

Nan Feng turned to glance at her. The profile of her face was sharply defined, and her purple ponytail swayed in the wind.

She said nothing more. She hitched her bundle on her shoulder and continued forward. Their shadows stretched long across the dirt road, overlapping and separating again.

Ye Lingling walked a few steps behind. She merely tightened the straps of her medicine basket and continued following them.

Heaven Dou City was still far ahead. But the road lay beneath their feet, and if they walked it one step at a time, they would get there eventually.