Where Immortals Once Walked

Sun Fuling smiled and said, “Only the gods sit aloof in the highest heaven and have no inherent conflict with mankind. Only they could have made such a thing possible. Look, ever since states arose among men and began using origin energy, monster immortals and human immortals waned, and wild monsters could no longer match mankind, Daoist cultivators have had to bow to emperors, seeking marquisates and ministerships.”

He Lingchuan said curiously, “If that’s so, why do some still claim origin energy was taught by immortals?”

“Historical records say that in the Middle Era, monsters ravaged the land and tormented the people. Floods and monsters were listed as the Two Great Calamities, and human immortals or cultivators were the monsters’ mortal enemies.” Sun Fuling elaborated, “As spirit qi dwindled in the world, cultivators wanted to seize it from monsters, and monsters from them. Some old scholars believe that origin energy came from the immortals because for a long period, the sects allied with human states to fight monsters together. Faced with a common enemy, the sects deliberately courted goodwill from mankind. As for gods, they were too nebulous; they were unseen and unverified.”

Thus, states founded by humans spread across the world, while most monsters were driven into mountains and marshes.

Oddities like the northern monster state were, after all, rare exceptions.

“Gods...” The word was mysterious, yet He Lingchuan heard it often. Nian Songyu had even invited a god to descend into himself, hoping to seize the Generous Pot. “Why would gods help humans?”

She spread her hands. “Who truly understands something so insubstantial? I’ve heard countless tales, most of them strained and far-fetched.”

She smiled and said, “If you want answers, ask Commander Zhong or the Red General.”

True enough, those two stood closer to the gods than most.

He scratched his head and changed the subject. “You’ve got, what, a dozen days of holiday? How do you plan to spend them?”

“I’d like to—”

A shriek split the air from the west, cutting her off.

High and thin, it came from either a woman or a child.

The sound snapped off at once. However, He Lingchuan had already identified the direction the sound came from. He pointed to a golden rain tree[1] close by and said to Sun Fuling, “Stay under that tree and don’t move!”

The golden rain tree was large. Though winter had stripped its leaves, the trunk and the low wall beside it formed a sheltered angle. With the afternoon sun slanting from the west, the spot lay in shadow, making good cover for one to stand inside.

He himself sprinted toward the scream.

Three low walls and two earth houses later, he found a small boy facedown over a threshold.

He turned him over.

It was a boy of six or seven. His eyes were bulging, and his face was terror-stricken. His neck was broken.

A few bloody punctures marked the boy’s throat, as if gouged by sharp talons.

The boy stared at him, mouth working soundlessly; he could not force out a word. His last breath rattled, and just like that, his life had come to an end.

The dead could not be revived. Catching the killer mattered first. He set the small body down and looked around for any tracks and clues.

He had hunted monsters as a patrolman more than once, and now, his experience was proving its worth. At once, he spotted a footprint in the dirt beside where the boy had been.

It was a human footprint, and it was barely as long as his palm.

He vaulted onto the wall. Fresh smears of blood streaked two roof tiles, signs that forelimbs had been pressed there, staining the clay with the child’s blood.

Chase!

He used the Swallow’s Return movement technique, chasing along the tracks he had ascertained.

Three months of day-and-night practice paid off. He threaded through narrow lanes and between close houses with barely a wobble, his speed hardly checked by clutter. He was swift as a swallow.

Ahead, a black figure flickered along an eastern wall and seemed to leap through someone’s window.

Found you!

He alit on the roof above it without a sound and held his breath to listen.

A long moment passed. Nothing emerged. Perhaps it was waiting for him to blunder inside.

He refused the bait. He brought out a small bottle, lit it, and flicked it through the window.

Crash!

Glass broke.

In moments, thick, ochre smoke diffused from door and windows, and a rasping cough rose within.

So the killer’s human?

The smoke was meant to smoke out beasts and monsters—weasels, foxes, burrowing spiders—but it worked on humans just as well.

Only a few breaths later, a black figure vaulted out the window and bolted.

They were separated by barely seven to ten meters.

He had been ready. A flick of the wrist, and his sleeve arrow shot forth.

It struck.

He had aimed for the back of the heart, but the arrow landed on the other party’s leg instead.

When it came to hitting a target in motion at high speed, his aim was still a little short.

The black figure stumbled, let out a strange, low howl, and lunged onward.

What a shame.

His sleeve arrows were market-standard, bought through Skinny. They were of acceptable material and force, but they were obviously nothing special. If he had used the violet-gold arrows that he had gotten custom-made by Li Fubo, the creature’s thigh would have been punched clean through; with the cord, he could have dragged it back bodily.

As it was, the arrow only slowed it.

It was at moments like these that the importance of gear showed.

Regardless, He Lingchuan did not dare delay. He dropped from the roof and ran after it.

The smoke still clouded the alley, making visibility poor. The instant his boots hit the ground, a stir of wind behind him raised the hairs on his neck.

Ambush!

With no time to think, he let his legs go soft and rolled sideways. Then, as he came back up, his right hand found his changdao’s hilt and hacked forward in a sweeping cut.

Indeed, another black figure had lain in wait, choking on the smoke but determined to strike him from the back.

They’re working in a pair!

Even so, a searing pain licked across his back.

He had been hit.

If he had reacted even half a heartbeat slower, then the thing would have gouged three or four holes right through him.

His blade struck its chest. The feel was like biting into cured hide, not the clean give of flesh.

The black figure screamed and came on with a storm of blows.

Steel clanged and sparks flew as their weapons clashed in the smoke.

Only then did he realize that this one was much larger than the first, though far less nimble. It was then no wonder its instinct had been to lie in ambush instead of fleeing.

It coughed again and again, the smoke slowing its strikes. If not for its thick skin and heavy meat, he would already have cut it down.

Its hide was tougher than a hundred-year-old vine. The battle-worn changdao from the patrol armory did little against it. So long as it guarded its head and neck, he could not break it at a stroke.

With that thick hide, it was nearly unassailable.

He Lingchuan finally got a clear look at the other party. It was gaunt as a skeleton wrapped in skin. The skin itself was a dusk-dark hue, set with fine scales.

At first glance, it appeared to be man-shaped. Its hind limbs were longer than its forelimbs, and it was capable of upright movement and attack. However, its forelimbs had only three toes, with hooked, scissor-like claws hard enough to meet his blade head-on.

The most appalling part of it, however, was its face, or perhaps lack thereof. The creature did not have a face, only two deep and empty holes in its skull for where a person’s eyes would have been, each containing a jittering green ghost flame. There was also a third hole, meant for either a nose or a mouth, and a sound similar to the hissing of an insect was coming from it.

Suddenly, it spat a mouthful of green phlegm at him.

They were close, creating a rather disadvantageous situation for him. Still, he dared not take the spray. He snapped his blade up as a shield.

At once, he heard a soft, corrosive sizzle along the steel, and an acrid stench hit his nose.

If that had splashed on my face...

I would probably have had to say goodbye to my good looks, in this dream at least.

A black figure flitted along the wall. The nimble creature he had chased earlier had returned, wordlessly joining the fight.

One brute, one quick—two against one. How many chances did he have?

Close calls followed one after another.

If not for the past days of kill-or-be-killed in the Martial Review Hall, sharpening both his nerve and his technique, he would have been gutted in two exchanges and kicked out of this dream early.

Even so, he did not know how long he could last.

Should he risk a wound to take out the nimble one first? He was weighing the odds when a splash sounded behind him. Someone had thrown a pot of boiling water, dousing the big brute from head to toe.

It shrieked at once, its rhythm shattered.

The cry was uncanny, half insect screech, half night-cat wail.

He would never waste such a gift. As it reflexively twisted back, he chopped at the creature’s neck with everything he had.

At the same time, something dark smashed into its skull with a thunk, knocking it forward into the path of his changdao.

Azure fluid sprayed, which He Lingchuan decisively avoided.

The creature’s neck was nearly severed, with a huge gash across it, but the vertebrae had not been cleaved clean. A strip still clung.

He Lingchuan’s blade snapped.

The earlier spit had already corroded the blade. Add a full-strength hew, and it could no longer bear the strain.

The brute toppled and writhed, limbs drumming. Its partner, sensing disaster, spun and fled, fleeing faster now than before.

He fired another sleeve arrow at its back and could only watch it vanish.

“What are you doing here?” The smoke had thinned. He could finally see who had helped him.

It was Sun Fuling.

She was holding a large pot.

She had thrown the boiling water and then crowned the thing with the pot, perfectly timing her strike to match his cut. Otherwise, he might not have split the creature’s neck at all.

On the ground, the brute still could not stand, but it kept raking its claws. Its reaching claw nearly caught Sun Fuling’s shoe. He yanked her back in a hurry. “Didn’t I tell you to wait under the tree?”

“It sounded really lively here,” she said, not much frightened, and crouched for a closer look. “What in the world is this?” Half of its neck is severed, yet it’s still not dead.

He Lingchuan answered, “I’ve never seen it before either.” Since joining the patrol, he and his squad had slain forty to fifty monsters at least, and none of those monsters looked like this.

To call it a “monster” did not quite fit; it looked more like an evil ghost.

But ghosts feared the true fire of the sun; they did not roam by day, much less under full sunlight.

He had seen it clearly in the chase. The sun had struck its body, and it had not flinched.

“Where’d you get the hot water?”

Sun Fuling pointed at the house. “I picked it up right off a stove inside. The water just so happened to start boiling.”

“Someone lives here?”

“Yes. He’s lying on the floor.” Sun Fuling turned and started for the doorway.

1. This is an actual species of tree, specifically koelreuteria paniculata. ☜