Chương 86: Chapter 85: TO TASTE BLOOD

CHAPTER 85 TO TASTE BLOOD —∞— That explosion of innards as Yongyi's upper body was blown apart was Jieyuan's last clear sight before everything devolved into a flurry of colors and movements. Feiyuan (if that was even really her) became a blur; she didn't wait a beat after killing her lover—Yongyi's lower body, half-stump of a torso and legs, still yet to fall, hanging in the air—before she lunged forward, swiping her other arm forward at Wanxin. Except it looked strangely red. A gauntlet?

Wanxin also became a blur: Jieyuan just barely caught a flash of metal as Wanxin brought her sword forward to fend off the attack, slamming it against the grasping, clawing red hand. There was a snappy, sharp ring, like metal striking metal. Feiyuan and Wanxin weren't the only ones moving.

Yongyi's death was like the trigger of an explosion: the other transformed Liangshibai behind Feiyuan, previously still as statues, burst into movement; they rushed past the battling pair to meet the charge of Meiyao and the untransformed Liangshibai. Streaks of red filled Jieyuan's vision, red cloth and glowing red lines. Jieyuan didn't hesitate; he broke into a run toward the fray, toward Meiyao, but he was less than halfway there when one of those red streaks came at him: a rushing, blurring red form. WARNING!

Huaxin's warning. He was also getting something else from his other bond, from Ruby and Sapphire, but there was too much happening to parse it. A crimson-robed body filled Jieyuan's view. A glimpse of gemstone orange eyes framed by glowing, throbbing red veins. A pair of hands came swinging at him, both coated in a smooth, red material, the tips of the fingers sharpened and lengthened into claws. It didn't look like a cultivator's gauntlet, or at least not like any Jieyuan had seen before. Instinct took over.

Jieyuan threw his weight forward and whipped both the Shifting Sisters up and forward, striking into the red claws. The impact was thunderous: Jieyuan was nearly thrown back, arms shaking, but he managed to stand his ground. The transformed Liangshibai didn't give him a moment to recover, though, blurrily pivoting into another attack. Still running on instinct, Jieyuan moved to parry even as he thought, Huaxin, sequence, now! It came instantaneously, like Huaxin had been waiting for it: PARRY-STRIKE-TWIST-SIDESTEP.

A glimpse of the future, squeezed into an instant. Jieyuan translated the vision into reality. He parried the grasping strike with one of the Shifting Sisters and swung down the other at his attacker's chest; slick as a snake, the transformed Liangshibai twisted out of the way— good, means the attack's a threat to her— and crouched low before swiping her claws down at his legs. Jieyuan threw himself to the side, narrowly dodging it.

Huaxin didn't need to be prompted, following up with another sequence: SWING-BACKSTEP-DODGE-BLOCK. In the brief gap between the sequences, the transformed Liangshibai burst forward, red claws swinging down from above at his arms, like a coiled snake springing into an attack. Relying on unthinking instinct, Jieyuan side-stepped; the claws cut a tear into his sleeves and dug into his gauntlets, cutting into them without any resistance, but not so deeply that they breached skin.

The new sequence was in his mind now, though, and Jieyuan snapped into action, putting it into effect. And as he swung the Shifting Sisters at the Liangshibai, he also called on Twin Serpent Cognition, splitting his mind. He put the Twin fully in charge of his body, letting it continue Huaxin's sequence, and focused on his senses. On his physical senses. On the brief, fleeting glimpses he caught as his body fended off the Liangshibai's attacks. On the dull ring of metal and the chiming of crystal.

On the thick, pungent scent of blood, suddenly all around him, filling his nostrils. And on his other senses besides. On the spiritual void in front of him, where the Liangshibai he was fighting should have been. On the thick, overpowering sense of blood that Binding Blood Resonance marked as coming from the transformed Liangshibai. On Huaxin's anxious warnings, streaming like a rapid current into his mind.

And on the Shifting Sisters' frenzy, their egos baying for blood, howling for it, their presence stronger and louder in his mind than they'd ever been. Meanwhile, the Twin, in charge of his body, was very much busy keeping him alive. Huaxin's sequences—and in the gaps between them, honed instinct—had him barely standing his ground.

None of the attacks he'd made so far had landed yet, but they weren't meant to; their purpose was only to throw his opponent off, as she seemed wary of being struck regardless of where Jieyuan targeted. DODGE-ATTACK-PARRY-STRIKE. As the Twin put this new sequence into action, Jieyuan, only in touch with his body's senses, narrowed the focus into his attacker. A lot was happening around him, but he needed to get a handle on his own fight first.

The first thing he noticed was that the Liangshibai attacking him was a woman. Not one he recognized. Her orange eyes were opened unnaturally wide, fully fixed on his, but she was otherwise expressionless. She didn't make a single sound, either, quiet as still air besides the dull patter of her rapid footfalls against the crystalline ground. She was Orangerealm. Jieyuan was sure that whoever she was, she hadn't been one before, so whatever Taishou had done to her must have increased her realm.

Her orange eyes, at least, indicated she had the heavenly affinity for it. Her exact step was uncertain, but Jieyuan would put her as roughly third-step; her speed and stretch were both almost thrice his own. A gap that big in speed wasn't something skill could normally overcome, not between cultivators; even Daojue couldn't have pulled something like that off. But this wasn't a fight between cultivators. Not really. The Liangshibai woman might have been a cultivator before, might have been a proper martial artist.

Her transformation into whatever she was now had left her no better than a beast. She was fast and strong, but that was all there was to it, not a trace of skill to be found in her actions. And she lacked the strength, speed, and any other special abilities a third-step Orangerealm beast might have. Fighting her reminded Jieyuan of that fake Meiyao, that wildshape fox that had taken her form back in the Viridian Dome.

And also of something else: the amphis-wielding empyrean he'd faced in the Sword Tower; there was a slithering, snake-like quality in the smooth way she moved and struck. Another gap between the sequences; again, the Liangshibai woman didn't let up, moving so fast she managed an attack in that split-second between visions, coming at Jieyuan from the front with her claws swinging. But now, the half of his mind in charge of his body was ready for it.

He pulled back, and the attack missed him entirely— — STRIKE-PARRY-SIDESTEP-DODGE— And rushed right back at the fiend, throwing her off just as she came at him again. The rest of the sequence went as all the previous ones, fending off the attacks and ensuring he remained alive. The other half of Jieyuan's mind wasn't slouching, either. I'm sure of it now. The attacker didn't mean to kill him. In the few seconds that had passed since the start of the fight, the Liangshibai woman had attacked dozens of times.

And all of those attacks had one thing in common: she avoided his vitals like oil avoids water. Always, her attacks targeted his limbs: his arms, his legs; her claws never came anywhere close to his torso or head. It couldn't be a conscious decision. Not unless all the bestial, wild attacks were an act. Some kind of unconscious limitation, then. Earlier, Taishou had said he'd be testing out his new creations.

And, before, the man had made it clear he wanted at least Meiyao, Jieyuan, and Daojue alive for his own purposes. This, coupled with the Liangshibai woman's lack of skill and his abuse of Fatebloom Instinct, ensured he'd stayed alive so far and could remain so for the foreseeable future. But staying alive wasn't enough. No, he needed to finish this.

Not to mention Jieyuan could already feel some strain from his bond with Huaxin; the Fatebloom Heart wouldn't be able to keep up the sequences for much longer, and without them, Jieyuan wouldn't stand much of a chance. Thrice his speed was thrice his speed, and without precognition, he wouldn't be able to bridge that gap, no matter how dumb his opponent was or how much she was avoiding killing him. STRIKE-DODGE-PARRY-JUMP. Fatebloom Incarnation? Jieyuan considered his options while the Twin kept him alive.

The power might be enough to turn the tide, but he could only use it once; afterward, Huaxin would be unavailable for a good while. It was a last resort, and given the battle had only just begun, he couldn't go for it yet. Sacrificial Fire Immolation was even more of a last resort, and none of his other Lawgifts would work on a higher-realm target. Absolute Will Command? Jieyuan had just barely considered it when his body finished the sequence, and another one came to him.

One different from all the sequences before it. And not in a good way. RUSH-DODGE-STRIKE-PARRY. A flash of red from his side; a presence on his soulsenses and blood senses both. And then another transformed Liangshibai barreled into him: a man this time, ruby-red eyes crazed. Jieyuan managed to dodge the attack only because he'd seen it in the sequence.

The two Liangshibai came at him without pause, striking from either side; the new one was significantly slower than the woman, about as fast as Jieyuan was, but still very much a threat. Jieyuan dealt with their attacks as he'd seen in the sequence, swinging both the Shifting Sisters in a wide arc, but all that did was drive them off for less than a second. The Liangshibai woman rushed him, far faster, and he parried the attack. Then came the gap between the sequences, and this one was longer.

Jieyuan just twisted aside as the Liangshibai man struck at him, but a tip of its claw managed to dig into his left thigh, cutting a gash. At the same time, the woman recovered from the parry and came at him again, and Jieyuan wasn't fast enough; he dodged, but the attack dug deep into his right arm. The sequence came: TWIST-STRIKE-LUNGE-SIDESTEP-PARRY-DODGE. A much longer one, and the feeling of exhaustion he was getting from Huaxin was much starker now. The time for thinking was over. Jieyuan had to act. Now.

The Twin acted out the sequence; meanwhile, Jieyuan drew on Absolute Will Command and took temporary control over his lips to whisper: " See Maeva." Just as the sequence ended, with Jieyuan dodging a conjoint attack, he gave up control over his soulforce to the hallucination of Maeva, who'd just appeared beside him in white and yellow combat robes. No words were exchanged between them; she already knew exactly what he wanted to do. Huaxin, take a breather.

Jieyuan let go of Sapphire, and Maeva took the splitfang; the hallucination of her wielding it in her hand, but it was his soulforce, really, that held it in place. And then Maeva rushed the Orangerealm Liangshibai. The Liangshibai woman drew back to avoid the attack, and for the first time her expression changed: a flash of animal confusion crossed her face as she tried to advance toward him again, only for Maeva to attack once more. Using his soulforce, Maeva wasn't that much faster than Jieyuan.

But she didn't need to be concerned over pesky things such as bodily damage, given she had no real body. Jieyuan had no idea how long she'd be able to hold the Liangshibai woman off, but he didn't need much time. He just had to keep the Liangshibai woman in his line of sight at all times, even without focusing on her directly, because Maeva relied on his senses. The Liangshibai man charged at Jieyuan, claws swinging, just as before. But without his Orangerealm partner, this was a very different fight.

Roughly the same speed, a hundredth of his skill? The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. Jieyuan avoided the charge effortlessly with a side-step. He could've ended it there, but there was something he wanted to make sure of first, and it'd only take a moment. His mind remained split. And the half of his mind in charge of thinking did some quick work. The man, unlike the woman, registered in his soulsenses.

But it wasn't a soul and mantle Jieyuan sensed; rather, the man's spiritual aspect was a solid mass covering his entire physical body. A spirit. Like that of chromal beasts, plants, and artifacts. Confirmation that whatever Taishou had done to the Liangshibai he'd captured was irreversible; they couldn't even be considered human anymore, and whatever souls they once had were hopefully already on the Silver Stream. What Jieyuan was facing here was some sort of reanimated corpse, closer to an artifact than a human.

Some kind of corpse-fiend. Not just that, being Redrealm, there were two Lawgifts Jieyuan could use on it (it, not him). First, Natural Symphony Insight. Jieyuan brought the Lawgift to the forefront of his mind and focused his soulsenses on the Liangshibai corpse-fiend's spirit, on its spiritual song. And its spirit, previously an amorphous, tenth-shade red, human-shaped figure, split into lines. Strings.

Chords, virtually all of them blood-red and throbbing, practically copies of the glowing red lines riddling its physical body. It took Jieyuan merely a second to do a brief scan of them. Chromal properties. Powers. He had no time for a deep inspection, but a cursory one would go a long way. It was like strumming the strings of a lute, and a few notes quickly stuck out to him. BLOOD—SOLIDIFICATION. The power that created the blood-red, metal-hard substance used to form its clawed gauntlets.

And another; it sang high and deep of VITALITY. Regeneration? That gave Jieyuan a pause; it had some implications he didn't appreciate. Beyond those, only one other thing really stood out to Jieyuan: a few of the chords were dull, darkened, like they were dead. These, unlike the rest, weren't blood-red, didn't emanate BLOOD. Rather, they were crystalline, a spiral of muted colors, and very faintly, very vaguely, echoed CRYSTAL. The Liangshibai Bloodline?

But given their state, it didn't seem like the corpse-fiend could use them. Jieyuan pulled away from Natural Symphony Insight as his body easily avoided another attack; further off, Maeva was still keeping the Liangshibai corpse-fiend busy. He'd already meant to test one other Lawgift, but that VITALITY chord he'd seen made it even more important. Kill. Murder. Death. Jieyuan fully focused the thinking half of his mind on the corpse-fiend, on its death. On the intent to kill it.

On the single-minded, uncompromising resolution to bring about its end. A black mark appeared on the corpse-fiend's neck, over the red neck shroud he wore. There, and nowhere else. The revelation would've given Jieyuan a pause if he hadn't split the control over his body. The other half of his mind kept moving his body, unaffected, even as Jieyuan considered the implications. Absolute Death Sight showed him death marks on all the locations in a target you could strike to end them. And it's only the neck.

He'd suspected it'd be bad when he'd sensed that REGENERATION chord, but he hadn't thought it'd be to this extent. Even more so since both the Liangshibai corpse-fiends he'd fought avoided all sorts of damage to their bodies. It couldn't be an act on their part; they didn't have the human cunning for that. Was it some kind of instinct, then? Like animals, avoiding a blow, even if it wouldn't kill them? Like the shadow-bodied sword fiends from the Absolute Sword Trials?

No matter what it was, Jieyuan had everything he needed now. The corpse-fiend lunged at him, claws surging forward. But Jieyuan had seen the move coming from miles away. He simply took a large step to the side, and as the creature flashed past him, he twisted his body and swung Ruby down with both hands at its neck. It cleaved straight through as if it was moving through air, meeting no resistance whatsoever.

There was a great surge of vivid crimson blood as both bodiless head and headless body fell onto the crystal ground. A rotten, pungent stench assaulted Jieyuan's nose; it was coming from the blood of the corpse, he realized. He'd never seen such vivid, perfect red blood before, but its smell was that of rot and death. Putrefaction.

Ruby's ego let out a cry of immense, unbridled glee through their connection; there were thick, vein-like glowing blood-red lines just like the ones on the corpse-fiends all over its golden surface now spiraling around the rubies embedded in its blade. Those glowing red lines throbbed and pulsed; the blood on the blade began to shrink, and it took Jieyuan a moment to realize it was being pulled into them. Like they were drinking it. Jieyuan didn't have the luxury to puzzle that out right now, though.

He turned his attention to the Orangerealm corpse-fiend and Maeva. He'd kept their fight in his line of sight the entire time, but only now did he really focus on them. Maeva, wielding a Shifting Sister, was holding her ground perfectly; the corpse-fiend was way faster, but somehow she could react exactly how the corpse-fiend would move and attack preemptively. How's this even possible? Jieyuan had suspected Maeva would be able to hold off the Liangshibai corpse-fiend for some time, but not nearly this well.

He'd thought he'd all but bridged the gap between himself and Maeva. But it seemed bigger than ever. Then again, everything Maeva did was through him. Maybe when I improve, so does she? That was something to consider later, though. In any case, he wasn't complaining. Huaxin, one last sequence. A final one. A path to victory. Can you do it? Huaxin hadn't managed one before, but now?

Huaxin's powers worked off probability and short-term divination; Maeva running interference gave Huaxin more to work with, and now that he knew just how to kill the corpse-fiend, Jieyuan had narrowed the scope of futures Huaxin had to go through. There was a pause; Jieyuan could sense Huaxin's strained effort through their connection. And then: RUSH-DODGE-TWIST-TURN-STRIKE-SWING-KILL. A savage grin split Jieyuan's lips. All teeth. Now we're talking, buddy. RUSH.

Jieyuan charged into the fray, ducking under Maeva as she swung Sapphire; the corpse-fiend's orange gemstone eyes immediately latched onto his. It blurred towards him. — DODGE— But he was already dodging, throwing himself to the side. — TWIST-TURN-STRIKE— The corpse-fiend twisted toward him, and he did the same, pivoting on one foot and turning back toward the corpse-fiend, momentum shifting. The corpse-fiend, much faster, immediately reoriented herself and struck at him with both her claws.

— SWING— But at that same instant, Maeva brought her Shifting Sister in a downswing, and the corpse-fiend cut off her attack, pulling back—which brought her neck straight into the path of the Shifting Sister Jieyuan was swinging upward. KILL. This time, there was more resistance as the blade cut into flesh and skin and bone, but not so much that it stopped Jieyuan. The golden, red-veined blade came out blood-slick on the other side.

Thick, crimson, putrid blood showered Jieyuan as the two parts of the corpse-fiend fell to the ground. Ruby's ego let out another cry of pure ecstasy, its throbbing, glowing red veins drinking in the foul blood. But this time, as the blood disappeared into the blade, the veins on it gave another pulse, much brighter than the ones before. When the glow died down, the red veins were gone. But Jieyuan's soulsenses immediately caught the difference. Their spirit had changed. From first-shade orange to second-shade.

Ruby had just advanced to second-step Orangerealm. Jieyuan immediately looked over at Maeva and her Shifting Sister. Focusing his soulsenses on Sapphire, Jieyuan saw another second-shade Orange spirit. So it had advanced too, even though only Ruby had drunk the blood. One possibility after another occurred to Jieyuan, but he pushed them all down for now. Not the time. Instead, he finally turned his attention to his surroundings, giving the area a quick scan.

Everyone else was still fighting, and Jieyuan was surprised to find that they were winning. There were more than a handful of headless red-robed corpses on the floor, and everyone on their side was still up. Meiyao, Daojue, the Liangshibai—all of them were on their feet, fighting. Except Yongyi. But Jieyuan didn't let his thoughts linger on that. He focused on Meiyao first, but she clearly didn't need help; Yuyan was fighting by her side.

And seeing Meiyao's stepmother in action, Jieyuan recalled all the rumors he'd heard about her fighting prowess. Gleamstone shards spun rapidly in the air around her like a whirlwind of death, keeping two corpse-fiends at bay as she fought another—one that Jieyuan quickly noticed had no qualms whatsoever about targeting her vitals, its claws cutting again and again at Yuyan's chest and neck.

Meiyao, next to her, had her own opponent, another corpse-fiend (hers, Jieyuan quickly ascertained, was fighting non-lethally); Meiyao's hair was white, triangular ears tall and alert, sprouting out of the crown of her head as she moved far faster than a Redrealm should be capable of. Her new saber glowed green under its wrappings. A white blur kept darting around her. Xiaohu.

Suddenly, Yuyan surged forward, dropping under a claw-strike before surging back up, well inside the guard of the corpse-fiend she was facing. A blur of steel, and then the corpse-fiend's head was pushed up into the air by a great geyser of blood sprouting from its severed neck. Without missing a beat, Yuyan kicked off the ground and rushed toward Meiyao and the corpse-fiend she was facing. A few blurring moves, and another head was flying into the air.

Meiyao and Yuyan, together, turned their attention to the other two corpse-fiends Yuyan had been keeping at bay. They have it handled. A glance at Wanxin and Junjie showed they were also faring well; they weren't dominating like Yuyan, but both had red-robed corpses on the floor near them and didn't seem to be in bad shape as they exchanged moves with the corpse-fiends they were facing. Wanxin was also noticeably faster than everyone else, as fast as the corpse-fiend she faced. Third-step Orangerealm, then.

Not much of a surprise, given she was a sapphire-eyes, with fifth-order heavenly affinity. She wasn't half as skilled as her sister, Yuyan, though. Wanxin's enemy was also avoiding targeting her vitals, whereas Junjie's was very much going for the kill. And then there was Daojue. Jieyuan had confirmed he was doing well before, still on his feet and fighting, but now he realized something: Daojue was only one facing a single corpse-fiend, but the one he was facing was fast.

Faster than all the other ones Jieyuan had seen. Fourth-step Orangerealm? Daojue was also worse off than everyone else: his robes were torn in several places, and Jieyuan could see more than a few gashes on him. All of it on the arms and legs, though. Jieyuan didn't even have to consider it. He rushed over to Daojue, Maeva by his side; he was on Daojue's side in an instant.

Their months fighting side-by-side in the Viridian Dome let Jieyuan join the fray without so much as a pause, perfectly in sync with Daojue's rigid rhythm as he came in swinging with his Shifting Edge, just as Daojue parried a clawed strike. The eyes of the corpse-fiend flickered over to him; its body blurred as it pulled away—just as Maeva came in swinging from the opposite direction. But the corpse-fiend kicked off the ground, moving so fast it seemed to flicker, avoiding the swing aimed at its neck.

But Daojue was just as used to Jieyuan's style as Jieyuan was to his; without missing a beat, he stabbed Gleaming End at the corpse-fiend's neck. Another flicker-fast evasion, narrower this time. Jieyuan was ready, though, Shifting Edge swinging in again from the side. Another flicker. A narrow dodge. Maeva came in. Another flicker. An even narrower dodge. Daojue stabbed with Gleaming End again. Another flicker as the fiend dodged, but this time it wasn't fast enough.

Gleaming End pierced straight into its neck, the thick blade fully divorcing its head from its body. Daojue whipped Gleaming End back toward his side, and the corpse crumpled, the head joining it on the crystal ground just a beat later, falling into the already-pooling putrid blood with a wet squelch. Violet eyes considered Jieyuan for just a moment. Silent understanding passed between them, lightning-quick, before they both turned away to take in the rest of the battlefield.

It was just in time to see Meiyao and Yuyan rush over to Wanxin, leaving behind them a trail of red-robed bodies. That particular fight was over within a few blurry exchanges; Yuyan and Wanxin then rushed over to Junjie (Meiyao hung back this time), and the corpse-fiend he'd been up against was dispatched in moments. And just like that, all the Liangshibai corpse-fiends were on the ground. Headless. Proper dead. Just like that, it was over. Over? No, Jieyuan corrected himself. Not quite. Jieyuan looked up.

This battle, the corpse-fiends, all of it was just an afterthought. The real thing, the real battle, was up there. Jieyuan couldn't really make sense of it, though: far off in the morning sky, all he could see were blurs and streaks: some red, others kaleidoscopic, clashing over and over. Taishou and Qingshi. Maybe Yunzhu, too; Jieyuan wasn't sure. She'd disappeared at the same time those two had. That fight in the sky was the one that really mattered.

And Jieyuan couldn't even process it, never mind influence it in any way. None of them on the ground could. Jieyuan sent his focus inward. Huaxin? No response; their bond was distant, faint, barely perceptible. It had fallen unconscious, then. It wouldn't be of any more help today. Or even for the next few days, for that matter. Unless Jieyuan used Fatebloom Incarnation and forcefully woke it. Here's hoping I won't have to. He kept his eyes trained on the sky.

He couldn't make sense of it, but everything was hanging in the balance; he couldn't look away. Worse still was that he was fairly sure their prospects were grim no matter who won, because he really doubted Qingshi would just let them go. Best he could hope for was Taishou and Qingshi killing each other—Yunzhu too, while they were at it—but Jieyuan sure wouldn't bet on those odds. There was one Lawgift Jieyuan hadn't used for some time now. Path Glimpse Divination.

It didn't work nearly as well outside the Sword Tower; it took a lot of concentration, the visions lasting only instants. But there was nothing else he could do, and with Huaxin out of the picture for now, it was his only way of taking a peek at the future. He didn't know how much good it'd do, but it was better than nothing. Than doing nothing. He concentrated. Felt out for that vague, faint feeling of time and fate. Of possibility and chance. It took a few moments, but then he started to feel a building pressure.

Slow at first, but rising. A vision came to him, shaky. A few seconds into the future. Nothing. Just more streaks in the sky. He kept pushing it, but the vision slipped away. He concentrated again. Another vision. More seconds into the future. Still nothing. Concentrated again. A third glimpse. And this time, just at the end of it, he caught something. A red blur, headed downward. So fast Jieyuan almost didn't catch it. Jieyuan snapped out of the vision, eyes wide in alarm.

A red blur came down from the skies, just as he'd seen. And then it turned clear, revealing Taishou's form, floating once again over the Maw. Far out in the sky, Jieyuan could still see red streaks clashing against shimmering, kaleidoscopic ones. Qingshi was still fighting. Yunzhu? Or maybe… What were the odds Taishou had more than one clone? Awfully high, Jieyuan suspected.

"Well," Taishou said quietly, as he scanned the ground, "it looks like that was a failure. I must admit, I'm not sure whether to be impressed or disappointed." He sounded mildly annoyed. Peeved, if anything.

"Taishou—" Wanxin called out.

"Not now, dear," Taishou cut her off, dismissive, not even glancing at her.

"Very well. I was saving this one for once I made it to the cult, as a proof of concept to show my peers, but I guess there's no harm in bringing him out now." Taishou flicked his wrist; a thin red streak shot out from it, landing on the ground right at the edge of the Gleamstone Maw. Right in front of what remained of Yongyi's body. But unlike last time Taishou had done this, the ground was already coated in blood, so Jieyuan almost didn't catch the pool of blood spread on it.

And unlike last time, what rose off it wasn't a series of bodies, but just the one. A crimson-robed man. And this one stood out for three reasons. One was his age. He was old. Visibly so. Second was the fact that Jieyuan knew this corpse-fiend by name. And third was its citrine eyes, like yellow gemstones. Not red, or orange, but yellow. Zhaoyong. Father to Yuyan and Wanxin; Meiyao's surrogate grandfather. Or at least that was who he used to be. Now, Jieyuan was fairly sure, it was a Yellowrealm corpse-fiend.