Chapter 211
Chapter 211
“Hey, Xiao Wu, there’s no need…”
Old Cao’s voice sounded behind me. He probably wanted to stop me, but it was too late.
I was not actually a reckless person.
Apart from fearing that a delay might invite trouble, I chose to rejoin the battle because my rest had restored thirty percent of my strength.
With that much recovered, I could communicate through my will with my household familiar, Roundy, and draw on some of its strength for my own use!
“Fat bird, lend me a little more strength.”
I silently spoke within my heart.
A faint, displeased birdcall immediately seemed to sound in my mind: Didn’t you just borrow some today?
Even so, warmth instantly spread through my dantian, and more qi surged into my limbs and bones.
My strength recovered to fifty percent!
That was enough to launch one more attack with the ritual blade.
Shing!
I drew the ritual blade from its sheath again and shouted as I ran forward.
“Brother Big Bull, let go of that blood fiend and leave it to me!”
Hm?
They were locked in battle with the blood fiend–or rather, they had gained a slight upper hand and were confident they could finish it within a minute or two.
They had not expected me to charge in now.
Ergou nimbly dodged the blood fiend’s claws and called, “Young Mr. Wu, have you recovered? You used up so much strength just now. Be careful!”
“Don’t worry!”
I joined the battle, making it five of us attacking the corpse fiend.
Overhead, the effect of the Crimson Ghost Moon created by the spirit-paper arts had begun to weaken.
The edges of the paper were even curling. It would probably ignite and destroy itself at any moment…
I seized my chance when the blood fiend raised both arms and exposed an opening while Big Bull and Silent Gourd entangled it. Lowering my body, I abruptly closed the distance!
The ritual blade in my hand, filled with every last trace of my qi, stabbed toward the blood fiend’s heart again.
Shnk…
This time, the entire blade sank into its body!
The sensation transmitted through the tip confirmed that I had pierced its heart.
At that moment.
The blood fiend’s body went rigid, then began shaking wildly.
Caw… ROAR!
It released one final, deafening roar. Its sharp claws stopped blocking the Dog-Blood Daggers wielded by Big Bull and Silent Gourd and thrust toward me instead.
“You’ve got to be kidding! It can still attack?”
I was dumbfounded.
Ordinarily, any corpse fiend short of the strongest and most vicious kind should lose the ability to attack the instant its heart was destroyed.
Because I had pierced its heart at close range, only half a meter separated us. And my attack with the ritual blade had instantly consumed all the strength I had just recovered.
As those steel-blade claws stabbed toward me, I had no chance whatsoever to defend myself or dodge…
In that instant.
My vision and thoughts seemed to enter a slow-motion shot from a movie, and the scene turned black and white.
I could clearly see the pair of red claws drawing closer and closer!
But my body would not move.
I could only watch helplessly as they prepared to pierce my chest.
“Is my life… about to end?”
Complex emotions welled inside me.
I seemed to hear the terrified shouts of Big Bull, Ergou, and the others nearby, and Old Cao farther away.
Their voices were muffled, indistinct, and strangely distant, as if I had sunk beneath the water.
Closer, closer!
The half-foot claws were less than half an inch from my chest… At last, their tips touched my clothes.
Even through the fabric, I could feel a piercing chill from their sharpness. A faint pain immediately pricked my skin.
But!
At that moment.
They stopped.
That was right!
The blood fiend’s hands froze the instant the tips of its claws touched my clothes.
They had come so close–only the tiniest distance remained.
But they could advance no farther.
In an instant.
My surroundings returned to normal.
The world was no longer slow or black and white.
I raised my head in astonishment.
The blood fiend’s eyes had closed. When a corpse-fiend closed its eyes, it meant its corpse qi had dispersed and it had completely “died”!
Thump.
The arms it had raised toward me dropped and hung limply at its sides.
The next moment.
Thud.
The blood fiend collapsed to the ground.
It now looked like an ordinary dead body.
We had destroyed it completely!
Thump…
I too fell backward onto the cold ground, my limbs weak.
Terror covered my face. My mouth hung open as I gasped like a fish stranded on shore, unable to utter a word.
Cold sweat had soaked all my clothes!
That interval might not have lasted even a second, yet to my mind and senses it seemed as long as a century. I had crossed the boundary between life and death!
“Young Mr. Wu, how are you?”
“You scared us to death just now!”
“Exactly! My mind went completely blank.”
Big Bull and his three companions came to my side, carefully helped me from the ground, and asked after me with concern.
“Xiao Wu! Xiao Wu, are you all right? I told you not to be impulsive, but you wouldn’t listen. No matter how steady you usually are, you’re still a hot-blooded young man. Young fellows just can’t hold back.”
Old Cao also ran over from the tree and took my hand.
His face showed anxiety and lingering fear, mingled with relief and reproach.
I swallowed and finally managed to speak.
“I’m… I’m fine. But that was close! It missed by the tiniest amount. The blood fiend’s claws nearly pierced my chest.”
My voice was hoarse and weak.
Brushing so close to death had been tremendously draining to the mind.
Old Cao and the others lowered their gazes with mine toward my chest…
Several holes lay in a straight line across my outer garment, revealing slightly reddened skin beneath.
Fortunately, the skin was unbroken, so naturally I was not injured.
The tips of the blood fiend’s claws had only just touched the surface of my clothes. Their sharp aura had barely penetrated the fabric before they lost the ability to move even one millimeter farther.
It had been utterly destroyed!
The tension passed, and joy burst from our hearts.
Lively Ergou could not resist clenching both fists, throwing back his head, and shouting.
“Oh yeah! We actually killed a corpse fiend! A corpse fiend! I never even dared imagine something like this. It’s like a dream. That savage thing could slaughter an entire village… and we killed it!”
Big Bull, the steadiest of the four coffin carriers, gave him a slap and laughingly scolded him.
“Most of the credit belongs to Coffin-Bearer Cao and Young Mr. Wu. They did the real work. At our level, the four of us would be finished if we met a powerful vicious corpse, never mind a monstrous thing like a corpse fiend.”
“Big Bull is right, Flat-Top Number Two.”
Grinning, Flat-Top rubbed Ergou’s head, where little hair remained after the blood fiend’s sharp claws had shaved most of it away.
“Get lost! I’m not becoming Flat-Top Number Two!”
Ergou grew furious.
Ha ha ha ha!
Old Cao and I doubled over with laughter…
The oppressive fear that had filled the courtyard was gone. Only relief and the joy of victory remained!
But amid our laughter, I still saw Old Cao glance from the corners of his eyes toward one particular place–where the paper horse and paper figure with spiritual resonance had been torn apart.
We truly owed our victory to their help. They had further injured the blood fiend and laid the foundation for our counterattack.
Unfortunately, they no longer existed…
They might have been lifeless paper creations, but Old Cao had poured his heart into making them. He was bound to feel somewhat dejected.
We relaxed and joked for a while, using the opportunity to rest and recover.
Some miscellaneous cleanup remained.
For instance, although the blood fiend’s corpse qi and evil power had completely dispersed and it was now an ordinary, decaying ancient corpse, we still needed to burn it immediately as a precaution!
And although we had destroyed the blood fiend, we still had to determine its origins. At the very least, we needed to study the sinister coffin more carefully!
With the blood fiend lying inside, we had only been able to examine its surface, not investigate deeply.
Now we could inspect the coffin thoroughly, inside and out…
“But before we handle the cleanup, let’s see what kind of corpse core this blood fiend formed. It’s a rare thing. Even I haven’t seen many!”
Old Cao took a Dog-Blood Dagger from Big Bull.
Then he crouched and personally cut open the throat of the blood fiend on the ground. Once a corpse fiend was destroyed, its body became the same as any ordinary corpse, so the sharp dagger sliced it easily.
Old Cao inserted his fingers through the opening and carefully twisted them around inside the throat, feeling back and forth…
Dark-red blood immediately flowed everywhere. It was rather disgusting.
Once a yin creature like a corpse-fiend absorbed enough moonlight essence and yin qi to reach the level of a vicious corpse, its corpse qi condensed into the shape of a bead–usually hidden beneath the throat near the collarbone.
That was perfectly normal.
After all, demons that reached a certain level likewise began forming what was called a demon core–and did so much more easily than corpse-fiends.
Similar objects could also be found in old yellow cattle, old yellow dogs, and roosters that had lived for many years in the countryside.
Ordinary farmers in rural areas might obtain one if they were lucky!
Take an old yellow ox, for example.
The stomach of a long-lived yellow ox sometimes contained a relatively precious medicinal material known as a bovine gallstone.
A complete bovine gallstone was oval, light in weight, and golden yellow to yellowish brown, with a fine, glossy surface.
According to Chinese medicine, bovine gallstone had a fragrant scent, a mildly bitter taste followed by sweetness, and a neutral nature. It could reduce fever, neutralize toxins, and calm fright. Taken internally, it treated high fever with unconsciousness, mania, infantile convulsions, spasms, and other conditions. Applied externally, it treated swollen and painful throats, mouth sores, carbuncles, swelling, uremia, and more…
If an old yellow ox was fortunate enough to live even longer, its bovine gallstone might become an ox bezoar!
That made it more precious still.
At auctions in major cities and even Europe or America, natural ox bezoars fetched prices comparable to diamonds!
If the old yellow ox advanced another step–not only living to a great age but awakening intelligence and slowly cultivating by absorbing the spiritual energy of heaven and earth–its ox bezoar could transform into a true demon core…
At that point, however, humans could no longer consume it.
So cultivation should not be regarded as something profoundly mysterious.
Bovine gallstone, ox bezoar, ox demon core!
They were essentially different forms of the same thing.
A farmer would rejoice at finding a bovine gallstone, go mad with excitement at an ox bezoar, and upon seeing a demon core… er, farmers probably had few opportunities to see one.
Thus, corpse cores and demon cores were not particularly abstruse or mysterious either.
I had also read some so-called “immortal cultivation” novels. They spouted all kinds of nonsense, describing demon cores as infinitely powerful objects capable of destroying heaven and earth… It left me unsure whether to laugh or cry.
Of course, the beads condensed by corpse-fiends and demons were still extremely valuable!
The stronger the creature, the greater their value.
Although most human practitioners could not use crystals such as corpse cores and demon cores, they could still sell them for money!
That was right!
I had heard that some truly elite tycoons in large cities collected and admired such objects to display their extraordinary status!
But I had digressed. Back to the matter at hand!
After probing inside the corpse fiend’s throat for a while, Old Cao’s face brightened.
“Found something! Heh. Sure enough, it was hidden below the throat.”
He drew his fingers out…
We stared intently.
Between the index and middle fingers of Old Cao’s right hand was a crystal-clear, gleaming bead like a red crystal!