Fire of Southern Radiance

The arrival of ghosts in Chang'an is clearly not a good thing.

Zhang Xuezhou preferred to stay indoors, but Rong Tianding seemed to be under the influence of an irresistible aura, his body restless and eager to respond to this call.

"Your meddling with such limited skills will kill someone!"

"But I couldn't control myself. It was like a calling, like when my mom asked me to sell pork, I couldn't resist!"

Zhang Xuezhou's advice was very practical, but Rong Tianding still couldn't control himself. He even felt his body gradually stiffening, and he wanted to break through the window and follow the direction of the echo.

"You're under a curse? How could you be under a curse... Could it be that there's something wrong with the Corpse-Eating School's cultivation techniques?"

Rong Tianding followed Dong Zhongshu and later joined Zhang Xuezhou, rarely coming into contact with other great cultivators.

Great cultivators would not make things difficult for a minor cultivator like Rong Tianding.

If he had to find a reason, Zhang Xuezhou could only think of the cultivation techniques that Rong Tianding had learned.

"But the Corpse-Eating School has already been wiped out!"

Looking at Rong Tianding's stiff body, his bluish face, and his growing sharp fingernails, Zhang Xuezhou felt that few of the cultivation techniques of various schools were easy to manage.

The people he came into contact with included the Yin- Yin-Yang School, Dong Zhongshu's Confucian School, Rong Tianding's Corpse-like School, Xu Ji and others' Agricultural School, Su Fang who was killed by Dong Zhongshu's Wind Technique, and also Venerable Yufeng and Venerable Yellow Sand.

Many cultivators either have serious flaws in their techniques or problems with their cultivation realm techniques.

The Corpse-Eating School clearly has a backdoor control mechanism.

"Cousin, is your mouth still normal?" Zhang Xuezhou asked.

"The only thing that's normal about me right now is my mouth," Rong Tianding said dejectedly. "What should I do? I really want to jump off a building and crawl out!"

With Rong Tianding's stiff arms forcefully pushed open the doors and windows.

If he hadn't jumped too low, he would have already leaped out of the window.

What else do you feel?

Zhang Xuezhou took a lion hair from the Nine Spirits Lion and used it to firmly bind the other person's hands.

As he prepared to tie Rong Tianding into a zongzi (sticky rice dumpling), he couldn't help but ask.

"I just want to go out. If I don't go out, I feel like I'm going to go crazy!"

"That serious?"

My mom's downstairs with a butcher knife, yelling at me to go butcher a pig. Do you think I should go?

"You absolutely have to go, or your aunt will beat you to a pulp!"

"That's exactly how I feel. If I don't go, I feel like I'll be crippled or die!"

Unable to pry open the window with his hands, Rong Tianding resorted to sweeping with his hands and banging his head against the window.

While Zhang Xuezhou was still squatting and binding his legs, he saw Rong Tianding lift his legs up, and he fell out of the window.

A dull thud was heard, and Zhang Xuezhou couldn't help but jump out of the window quickly.

Before he could check Rong Tianding's injuries, Rong Tianding had already gotten up and leaped more than three meters away.

"Cousin?"

Zhang Xuezhou exclaimed in surprise, only to see Rong Tianding already skipping and hopping away, faster than an average person could run at full speed. This left Zhang Xuezhou with no choice but to grab the lion's mane and run frantically.

"Why is Chang'an City, in such chaos!"

On the pitch-black street, only the patter of footsteps remained.

Few people are awake in the dead of night, between midnight and 4 a. m., and even fewer go out due to the lack of light.

Even if they hear any unusual noises, the public's reaction is not to go out and check the situation, but to close the doors and windows tightly and wait for everything to pass.

Just as Zhang Xuezhou thought, Chang'an City was under the emperor's nose, and the emperor was responsible for maintaining all safety.

Ordinary people would only leave their houses at night when the imperial court issued an order or when a major natural disaster struck.

Zhang Xuezhou followed Rong Tianding all the way, without encountering a single pedestrian, guard, or soldier.

He only heard a commotion when he saw light shining in the distance.

"Cousin, we've reached Guan Street, you need to stop," Zhang Xuezhou called out.

"I just can't stop, I want to go there right now!"

Rong Tianding exclaimed, only realizing when he felt he was slurring his words that his teeth were protruding, revealing two sharp, long fangs.

"Cousin, I think I've turned into a zombie! My teeth have grown longer, and it feels like I'm growing hair all over my body!"

"You've gotten stronger too! You haven't gotten tired at all after running for so long!"

Zhang Xuezhou tugged at the lion's mane, but still couldn't hold onto Rong Tianding.

Official streets were the areas where officials in Chang'an City lived in large numbers. These areas were not only guarded by servants, but also patrolled by guards.

This is a place that Zhang Xuezhou and his men shouldn't come to late at night; they could easily be arrested.

Zhang Xuezhou couldn't help but feel a little anxious.

When Zhang Xuezhou saw lanterns hanging at the gate of a wealthy household, the light from those lanterns allowed him to clearly see the simple stable where the horses were tethered.

This prompted Zhang Xuezhou to run to the side and then hang the loosened lion mane on the wooden stake used for tethering horses in the stable.

The lion's mane taut rapidly, then shook as if being pulled and tugged.

Zhang Xuezhou had to thank the Nine Spirits Lion for its immense power; even its lion mane was as difficult to break as a thin steel wire.

He wrapped lion hair around a wooden stake and finally caught Rong Tianding, who had been running for nearly an hour.

"You... how come you never get tired!"

Zhang Xuezhou, panting heavily, quickly unleashed his fossilization technique.

Once he had a stone in his hand, he quickly struck Rong Tianding's legs twice. The crisp sound of bones breaking rang out, and Zhang Xuezhou finally breathed a sigh of relief.

He was initially too soft-hearted and thought he could tie Rong Tianding up, but he almost ran himself ragged.

If Rong Tianding continued to run away, Zhang Xuezhou felt his life would be in danger.

"Cousin, it seems you broke my leg," Rong Tianding exclaimed. "I just recovered from my leg injury a couple of days ago!"

"We'll start treatment once you're fully recovered!"

Zhang Xuezhou was panting. When he dragged Rong Tianding to the vicinity of the lantern, he saw that Rong Tianding's fangs had emerged, and his face and many parts of his body were covered with dense, fine black hairs, like moldy tofu.

"Cousin, have you ever considered wasting your time?"

Zhang Xuezhou reached out and pulled open Rong Tianding's clothes, only to find himself unable to resolve Rong Tianding's symptoms.

"I've been thinking about this for a long time. It's not that you've been marked with a Technique Method or cursed, but rather that there's... something wrong with this cultivation method. We can't keep going like this!" Zhang Xuezhou said, panting.

"But I'm just starting out in this world, I don't want to become useless!"

Rong Tianding felt that life wasn't exciting enough when night fell, but he couldn't stand it when things really got exciting.

His leg had already been broken, but judging from Zhang Xuezhou's words, his cultivation method would also be ruined.

"Cousin, go for it!"

After pondering for a few seconds, Rong Tianding finally made up his mind.

"I've come to terms with it. Losing cultivation can be done again, but losing my life means we won't see each other again for another eighteen years!"

Compared to being reduced to a grotesque, inhuman state, this is clearly a slightly better outcome than having one's skills wasted.

Making choices isn't difficult; the real problem is how to waste effort.

After Rong Tianding handed the matter over to Zhang Xuezhou, Zhang Xuezhou couldn't help but feel troubled.

He was almost crippled by the God of Tu'er and the extraterrestrial demons, but Zhang Xuezhou didn't have the ability to cripple others. In fact, his Kunpeng Fighting Technique's offensive methods couldn't be used in this world; only the Moon Manifestation had the effect of dispelling intimidation.

"You can't cripple me, so neither can I... I think I can actually cripple myself!"

Zhang Xuezhou was at a loss, and when Rong Tianding recounted his own predicament, he suddenly remembered the technique he had learned.

This made him desperately muster the little Law Power within him.

A tiny white flame emerged from his fingertip. Before he could guide the flame to destroy his acupoints, in the blink of an eye, the fine black hairs on Rong Tianding's body were ignited, and he transformed into a figure of fire.

The fire, like a fuse ignited in gunpowder, rapidly spread towards the distant sky.