Where Immortals Once Walked

The Red General went on, “Strictly speaking, only two of the remains here are remains of heavenly gods, the rest are servant races.”

General Nanke blinked. “Servant races?”

“They are the attendants and armies of the heavenly gods. The only purpose of their existence is to serve the gods.”

Casually, the Red General snapped off a finger bone and cut into the cross-section to inspect it. From the side, He Lingchuan saw something startling. The bone within was actually still a pale red.

After three thousand years, ordinary human bones would not leave even ash behind, yet these divine remains still retained their activity.

How terrifying.

The Red General nodded with satisfaction. “These probably fell into water and didn’t get exposed to light directly. Later, as the terrain shifted, the water dried up, and they ended up buried deep underground. That’s why their activity was preserved until now.”

He Lingchuan seized the chance to ask, “Do divine remains fear sunlight too?”

“In the short term, no. However, the sun’s true fire wins through persistence,” the Red General replied. “These remains were never compatible with this world to begin with. After centuries upon centuries of wind and sun, their activity gets shaved away bit by bit.” Then she added, “But that only applies to lower-ranked gods. As for the most powerful high gods, they are existences that are very difficult to erase.”

General Nanke asked the question that had been sitting in everyone’s throat, “How many gods are there beyond the heavens?”

One ruined site of Bei City alone had yielded so many divine remains.

“Five thousand years ago, there were fewer than 100,000. The World-Ending War wiped out at least half. Now, even if you count generously, there’s only 150,000.”

“In three thousand years since the World-Ending Cataclysm[1], only 100,000 heavenly gods were born?” General Nanke shook his head. “Terrible, truly terrible.”

A hundred thousand sounded like a lot, but spread across three thousand years, that was only a little over thirty births per year.

If humans had reproduction that low, extinction would not be far off.

The soldiers all laughed.

The Red General seemed to smile. “In these three thousand years, how many humans has the world reproduced?”

“Uh...”

“Not as many as you imagine, either, right?”

But that was because of war, plague, and other disasters. Humanity’s ability to multiply had never been in doubt.

Before General Nanke could argue, the Red General continued, “Heavenly gods have long lifespans. Correspondingly, producing offspring is difficult. The amount of life-force and energy required is astonishing. It’s very different from humans, who can pretty much have a child whenever they feel like it. A hundred thousand new heavenly gods in three thousand years? Hah, that’s thanks to humanity’s contribution.”

In that last line, He Lingchuan heard nothing but biting mockery.

At that moment, another craftsman came running to report, “The roots and the bones have grown together!”

The old locust’s roots were tangled with the divine remains, some even embedded in the bones. It was impossible to tell where one ended and the other began.

The smaller roots looked... disturbingly like capillaries.

Through those roots, the curled divine remains were bound tightly to the dragon-claw locust tree above them.

The Red General did not have the tree forcefully separate them. Instead, she lightly stroked the roots and murmured, “Interesting. The locust tree is actually drawing nourishment from divine remains. The power of gods was never something creatures of this world could use, not until nightmare qi appeared and broke that barrier...” She smiled faintly. “This tree monster thinks it’s gotten a huge bargain. In truth, it’s being subtly controlled by the divine remains. In another seventy or eighty years at most, this locust tree will become the divine remains’ second body. If West Ji’s mandate had lasted that long, they’d have been in for a disaster.”

“There’s still consciousness left inside divine remains?”

“Several years after a heavenly god dies, a new consciousness can sometimes be born within the shell,” the Red General explained. “In the past, that only happened with the strongest divine remains. But now, times have changed. Who can say what’s possible?” After saying that, she ordered, “Dig out all the divine remains and take them with us. As for this tree—” She hopped up and rapped the trunk. “Leave half the stump buried in the earth. Cut down the rest and haul it away.”

The craftsmen looked miserable. “General, our tools won’t work.”

This old tree was simply too hard. As soon as they even tried to pry into it with their tools, they simply snapped.

The Red General pointed at the roots in the pit. “Cut the main roots first, and then try again.”

He Lingchuan severed two main roots. When the craftsmen tried again, the tree finally became workable.

The locust tree had intelligence. It no longer dared oppose the Red General.

Everyone worked in a frenzy. General Nanke quietly asked the Red General, “We’re taking these back? What for?”

“To refine a treasure, a lethal one.” The Red General smiled and said, “Even the locust wood can be used. This truly is an unexpected delight.”

He Lingchuan and his companions kept chopping and hauling, but they could not help stealing glances at her.

When the Red General and Zhong Shengguang planned the conquest of West Ji, was it only to respond to the vicious challenge Beijia had thrown at them, or had they also come for these divine remains?

What does she intend to make with them?

We mobilized troops, marched long distances, fought a war of annihilation, and toppled an entire state. Was it all just to obtain these remains? If so, then the “treasure” she plans to refine can’t possibly be ordinary.

He Lingchuan could feel that as time went on, Panlong City’s entanglement with the gods, and with Beijia, was only getting deeper.

* * *

On a rainy night, in a narrow valley.

The mountain forest had been empty and silent all night. Wild grasses glistened in the rain, and snails huddled at the roots, their heads tucked in. Then, suddenly, more than a dozen people rushed into the valley, tracking mud with every step.

The grass was trampled, and a snail was crushed with a wet pop, but in the pouring rain and in the heavy, cattle-like panting of the fleeing men, that tiny sound was swallowed instantly.

They ran through darkness, but the valley floor was all jagged rock. It could be high one step, then low the next. One unlucky bastard cried out, “Ah!” He had twisted his ankle.

“Move, move! The monsters are about to catch us!”

“How did we end up in the mountains?”

“Idiot, mountains are better!” the last man snarled. “Hurry up and find a cave to hide in!”

However, their luck was atrocious. They searched every nook and cranny, but there was not even a shallow hollow, let alone a proper cave.

The man with the twisted ankle panicked. “Son of a—this is Mount Niutou[2]! There’s only one little hollow halfway up the mountainside! There’s nowhere to hide! What do we do?!”

The men supporting him did not answer. They exchanged a few looks.

What could they do? If the monsters caught up, they could only ditch the cripple and run.

If they did that, then maybe they could buy themselves a bit more time to run, and perhaps they could even escape.

Just then, someone pointed ahead and shouted, “Hey, hey! There’s light! Light!”

Everyone squinted and saw it was true.

Far off, they spotted two points of orange light. The lights were high up, likely on the mountainside, and they were swaying with the wind and rain.

Against the ink-black depth of night, it was glaringly obvious.

If there was light, then it meant that there were people.

The cripple stared, baffled. “I’ve been to Mount Niutou plenty of times, how could people be living there?!”

“Go, go!” The men were overjoyed and did not listen to him at all. “That’s at least three, no, six hundred meters!”

They were about six to seven hundred meters away from the place where the lights were, and the path was steep.

The worst part was that they were hauling dead weight.

The men’s eyes met in perfect understanding. Without a word, they dumped their injured companion and sprinted toward the light.

“Hey! Don’t leave me!” the unlucky man screamed. When no one responded, he threw out bait. “I’ve got two hundred taels of silver! Whoever helps me up there gets it!”

Two hundred taels?

One man’s steps faltered, hesitation flashing across his face, but the others were already running without looking back.

Yeah, right. Who’d believe this idiot has two hundred taels? At noon, he’d been gnawing on dry buns and wouldn’t even pay extra for meat.

He spat and chased after the others.

“Run!” They were terrified the injured man’s shouting would draw the monsters. Several men fell but did not dare waste time, so they immediately scrambled back up and continued running.

Behind them, the unlucky man’s cries grew faint, then vanished beneath wind and rain.

It became an obstacle course. In the pitch-black night, the group of men fought their way through a field of jagged rocks, crawling on hands and knees until they finally reached the source of the lights.

A hawk-beak outcrop jutted outward. Beneath it yawned a cavern, enormous and deep, roughly thirty meters across. The farther in you went, the higher the ground rose, but the depths were black as ink; nothing could be seen.

The two orange lights were, astonishingly, wind-shielded lanterns mounted on long bamboo poles outside the cave entrance.

The poles were long and swayed in the wind, which explained why the lights had seemed to flicker from far away.

The desperate men had no time to wonder why the lanterns were placed there as roars came from behind them.

They looked back and saw several dark figures weaving through the jagged rocks.

The monsters had caught up.

“Quick, get inside!” They burst into the cave in a panic.

Inside were several small houses, all lit. Figures moved within. The outer walls were plastered thick with mud.

The men ran up and hammered on a door. “Open up! Save us!”

They hammered on it twice, and it opened.

They craned their heads inside.

Huh? No one.

Where did those figures through the window go?

However, there was no time to think. They rushed in, bolted the door, and blew out the lamp on the table.

The walls felt incredibly solid to the touch, and it even seemed to be tabia[3]. Even the doorboard was coated in a thick layer of mud. Once it was closed, you could barely tell where the door even was.

Soon, footsteps came outside, then the sound of monsters scratching and scraping at the ground.

The men held their breath.

Then the scratching moved to the door.

Suddenly, the lamp on the table lit.

Everyone jumped and spun around, yet they saw no one standing by the table.

The lamp had lit on its own.

Outside, the monsters paused for a heartbeat, then the light drew them. They crowded in and slammed the door.

The men threw themselves against it, bracing with all their strength.

The windows were too small, so the monsters would not be able to fit through them.

But they could not hold out for long. An irresistible force pressed in, and with a long creak—

The door opened.

The gap between monster and human vanished.

Instantly, the room filled with roars, screams, and snarling. Things crashed and toppled.

Blood splattered the paper window.

Then, silently, the door closed again, closing so quietly that none of the living creatures inside noticed.

Soon, a wet crunching sound began.

The mountain wind grew stronger. Outside, the two bamboo poles swung wildly.

The valley returned to its original stillness.

Since no more visitors were coming, before the next gust arrived, the lanterns under the rock automatically went out.

Heaven and earth said nothing; everything was contained in the sound of rain.

* * *

State of Chiyan, Shuangyi City.

He Lingchuan arrived while it was still early. Inside the city, there were only two main streets, and compared to the Baoshu King’s territory, its prosperity was nowhere close, perhaps even off by more than a single tier.

1. The word used here was slightly different from the one in the previous paragraph, hence the difference in translation. ☜

2. Note that Niutou literally translates to oxhead or head of some bovine. ☜

3. Tabia is a traditional, highly durable, and environmentally sustainable building material used in ancient China, composed primarily of a mixture of lime, clay, soil, and sand. It was widely used to construct, restore, and strengthen ancient city walls, tombs, and water conservancy facilities. ☜