Chương 158: The Spoils of Moyun Ridge

Ning Nanzhi rolled her eyes so hard she nearly strained something.

"Be serious for once. Do you secretly have a Saint Body? No Spirit Body is this absurd. You don't just go around treating Tier 3 cultivators like they're common weeds!" Huaijin shook his head slowly.

"Haha! If I had a Saint Body, I would've turned that Blood Infant Elder into a smear on the ground long before he could even blink." He paused, then added with a thoughtful gleam in his eyes, "But my Earthly Fiend Spirit Body? It can evolve." Ning Nanzhi fell silent. She supposed that was true. The path was steep, practically a cliff face, but with a freak of nature like Huaijin, who could say what was impossible?

"After this battle," she said, her soft, melodic voice carrying a trace of genuine envy, "your name is going to spread like wildfire across the entire province." Huaijin gave no reaction, his expression as calm as still water. Within days, news of the Moyun Ridge massacre would reach every corner of Bing Province. And with it, the name Zhang Huaijin would become legend. After all, killing a Tier 3 demonic cultivator while being an entire major realm below him? That wasn't a feat, it was a phenomenon.

The cultivation world would be shaken to its core.

"Take it in stride," Huaijin said simply.

"With the Blood Infant Elder gone, the demonic filth under the Blood Infant Cave has been cut down to a single Tier 3 cultivator. And we eliminated four of their Tier 2 disciples." He continued,"This is your window. Crush them now, and you can wipe the Blood Infant Cave off the map completely." Ning Nanzhi nodded firmly.

"You're right. Every major power in Guiyun Prefecture owes you a debt they can never repay." She straightened, resolve hardening her features.

"Once I return to my family, I'll bring this news before the elders and make it our highest priority." The Ning family was Guiyun Prefecture's strongest force, and they had the most to gain from the Blood Infant Cave's annihilation.

"I'll be waiting for news of their end," Huaijin said, already turning his attention to the spoils of war. He began sifting through the storage pouches he'd claimed. A dozen seconds later, he stopped cold.

"... Are you kidding me?" He stared at the storage pouches in his hands, his eye twitching in disbelief.

"Are demonic cultivators usually this broke?" Ning Nanzhi had expected this reaction. She offered a knowing smile.

"If they had spirit stones to spare, they could buy whatever resources they needed. Why would they ever turn to demonic cultivation? Demonic cultivators are always penniless. That's half the reason the major powers can't be bothered to hunt them down. There's no profit in it." A flicker of understanding crossed Huaijin's face. Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.

If demonic cultivators weren't fixated on preying upon mortals, the righteous sects wouldn't even glance their way. Mortals were the bedrock of everything. Only with flourishing mortal populations could new cultivators be born generation after generation. The two eighth level demonic cultivators had barely scraped together ten thousand spirit stones between them. The rest was a pitiful scattering of low grade pills. Tier 2 spirit artifacts? None.

Just some cracked, second-rate junk that barely qualified as mid grade. Blood Infant Elder had fared somewhat better, thirty thousand spirit stones, some blood-path spiritual herbs, and a handful of ordinary spirit artifacts. As for Tier 3 resources? Not a single one. The old monster had poured everything he had into refining his Blood Infant. That abomination had consumed his fortune, his resources, his very soul. Given that, having anything left at all was already a miracle.

Demonic cultivators really couldn't compare to spirit beasts.

"Did that fight shake you up at all?" Huaijin asked, his tone softening. Ning Nanzhi shook her head.

"I've weathered worse. I fought through the spirit beast tide, remember? I'm not some delicate flower raised behind walls."

"Still," Huaijin said, his voice carrying genuine weight, "be careful out there. This time, Blood Infant Elder was coming for you specifically. As the Ning family's brightest star, you'll always have a target painted on your back." She felt the warmth in his words, a quiet concern that touched something deep in her chest.

"I know," she said softly.

"I'll watch my back."

"I should get going, then. If you ever have time, come visit me at the Purple Cloud Peak." A faint smile curved his lips.

"I'd like that." A delicate flush bloomed across Ning Nanzhi's porcelain cheeks. She called out her Silver Snow Leopard and departed without another word, the wind catching her robes as she vanished into the distance. Huaijin chuckled quietly to himself. He swung onto Haihu's back and left Moyun Ridge behind. Deep within the mountain, the Tier 3 spirit beast known as the Wind-Fire Stone Rat trembled in terror. That had been far too close. That human was a walking calamity, someone to never, ever cross.

After a long moment of deliberation, the rat decided it was time to abandon its territory and seek refuge under a more powerful beast. What Huaijin didn't know was that he had scared a Tier 3 spirit beast into fleeing its own home. From the battle alone, Huaijin had secured over forty thousand spirit stones. Combined with his prior savings, he had unknowingly accumulated a hundred thousand spirit stones. And that wasn't even counting the mountain of miscellaneous resources crammed into his storage pouches.

No wonder some powerful cultivators turned to plundering, ambushing and robbing their peers to fund their own advancement. The speed at which resources could be acquired that way was frankly obscene. Haihu was still too weak for real combat. Huaijin had stowed it in his spirit beast pouch before the battle began. For now, it served only as a mount. But the Azure Ink Dragon? That beast could fight alongside him. As he traveled, Huaijin sorted through his loot, categorizing everything with practiced efficiency.

The spiritual herbs he'd taken from the Blood Infant Elder? Fed to his Realm-Breaking Pearl. The Tier 2 upper grade spirit beasts he'd slain? Stripped of useful materials, then also fed to the pearl. His physical strength surged noticeably. To his surprise, the black and white energy swirling within the Realm-Breaking Pearl was nearly overflowing. The flesh and blood of those spirit beasts carried immense, dense energy. And this battle had pushed his cultivation further along as well.

A cultivator couldn't survive on seclusion alone. Combat was a crucible, a forge that tempered the spirit and shattered bottlenecks.

"With Blood Infant Elder dead," Huaijin mused, "the demonic cultivators in Guiyun Prefecture should go to ground for a while. I wonder if they'll actually manage to finish off the Blood Infant Cave." His thoughts drifted further ahead. In about a decade, Qingtai Prefecture would mobilize to reclaim the Blood Lion Mountain. That would spark a massive war.

But to muster all its cultivation forces, Qingtai Prefecture would first need to purge the demonic cultivators entrenched in its own territory, a lingering rot that had festered for too long. Before the spirit beast tide, the forces of Qingtai Prefecture would have already moved to cleanse that stain. And the Tier 3 demonic sect there, the White Bone Demon Cave, would be the primary target. Unless something was done, the demonic cultivators would only grow bolder, stronger, more brazen.

As he traveled, Huaijin continued to refine his cultivation. Deep within his dantian, the two Lightning Seeds spun faster and faster, devouring spiritual energy with ever-increasing hunger. Bing Yang Thunder and Darkwater Yin Thunder lashed through his meridians, their power scouring every fiber of his being. His internal organs, lungs, heart, liver, spleen, kidneys, his limbs and bones, his extraordinary meridians, his seven apertures... every inch of him was saturated with crackling, purifying lightning.

Huaijin's physical body grew stronger, moment by moment, breath by breath. Without cease.