Chapter 96: Demon Corpse Forest

My pace gradually slowed as I pressed forward, refusing to miss a single trace Qu Yuanshan had left behind along the way.

To hunt prey stronger than oneself, a hunter needed patience and judgment.

I had advanced to the fourth rank of the Yin-Yang Masters, and in truth I had Qu Yuanshan to thank for that. It was only under the pressure of his deathly pursuit that I had squeezed out my potential and broken through in battle.

But that also gave me a far clearer understanding of his strength.

He was formidable. If I faced him head-on, I would die without the slightest chance of survival.

So if I wanted revenge, I had to strike from the shadows.

Of course, I was not without any confidence at all. However powerful he might be, we were still within the same great realm; the difference between us lay in quantity of power, not in any overwhelming disparity of quality.

"Strange. The air here has changed. The deathly aura is getting stronger."

I thought to myself, every nerve on alert.

After going a little deeper, a shadow suddenly flashed over my head.

I was startled, and the Blood-Evil Blade shot upward at once.

But in the next instant, the blade froze in place, then slowly lowered.

It was a wolf demon hanging from a tree, already dried out into a strip of jerky, swaying gently above me.

I bared my teeth. Damn it, you nearly scared the life out of me.

I continued forward with great caution. This place was a little too eerie.

Then my gaze sharpened. Ahead, several beast corpses lay toppled on the ground.

A dense deathly aura coiled around them, yet there was no smell of blood.

I approached slowly, my pupils contracting. They were zombies—zombified demon beasts, most likely slain by Qu Yuanshan's Golden Flame Spear.

I rounded an ancient locust tree so massive that more than a dozen people could not have encircled it, and the sight that came into view made my heart pound wildly and my scalp go numb. My instincts screamed at me to run.

Within the dim forest, atop giant sky-reaching trees, countless demon beast corpses hung suspended in the air, packed so densely they were beyond counting.

My mouth and tongue went dry; my limbs went numb. I could not imagine who had done all this.

Then I thought again of those demon beast zombies I had seen earlier, and I drew a sharp breath. If all these corpses turned into zombies...

No, that was wrong. If all these beast corpses really became zombies, then even ten Qu Yuanshans would not survive.

Besides, there did not seem to be any trace of a battle ahead.

I steadied myself and kept moving, every muscle taut to the limit, afraid that any corpse here might suddenly lunge at me.

As I walked, I abruptly stopped.

Something was off.

This forest of beast corpses was trapped in a maze. I had been circling in place all along, and that bear corpse wearing red shorts had already appeared several times.

I took out my compass and raised an eyebrow, but my eyes remained fixed on that bear corpse in its red shorts.

The eye of the formation was there. Could it be that I had to take off its red shorts?

I leaped upward and slashed through the rope hanging the corpse.

Snap.

The rope broke, and the bear corpse crashed to the ground with a heavy thud.

One hand on my blade, the other holding a talisman, I remained guarded for a long while, but nothing happened.

I went on ahead, and the scene before me was indeed no longer the same.

Then, suddenly, a chill ran down the back of my neck, and my body rolled hard to the side.

A claw reeking of corpse aura brushed past me. It turned around, and there stood the bear corpse in the red shorts, now fully transformed into a zombie.

I flexed my neck, shouted once, and turned to run.

A life-and-death duel? Not happening.

But just as one of my feet stepped over a faintly glowing line, all the hanging corpses ahead suddenly opened their eyes and began to move.

Shit!

I pulled my foot back, and they immediately went still again, as if what I had seen had only been an illusion.

A low roar came from behind me. The bear corpse was closing in.

I looked at that line glowing with dim light. It formed a square, enclosing this entire area.

In other words, the circled-off ground was effectively a duel ring that could not be crossed.

There was no doubt about it: someone had deliberately set this up. It did not seem like a killing trap so much as a trial, a level to clear.

The bear zombie lunged at me, lightning fast, its black-glinting claws seeming ready to tear the very space apart.

With a flick of my hand, I sent out three talismans.

Boom.

The bear zombie was blasted off its feet, but in the blink of an eye it sprang back up and charged again at an even greater speed.

I shot upward and drove the Blood-Evil Blade toward its neck.

Clang.

The blade struck its body and rang out like metal meeting metal. The hardness of its flesh was even greater than steel plate.

The bear zombie spun instantly and gave chase.

I dodged with Netherworld Ghost Steps, but the bear zombie showed no sign of fatigue at all.

My head began to ache. If this went on, it would grind me to death.

But ordinary talismans did almost nothing to it, and I was reluctant to waste higher-grade ones. Every talisman I used was one less in reserve, and heaven knew what else I would have to face later. Besides, I had not even touched Qu Yuanshan’s shadow yet.

If this really was a level set by someone, did that mean I had to kill this bear zombie to clear it?

While evading, I noticed that the bear zombie also refused to cross the faintly glowing line.

If it crossed it, would that mean it was out?

I tried standing on the very edge of the line to lure it in, but the moment it reached the boundary, it would always turn away.

It could sense that line too. So... unless I concealed the aura it was emitting.

An idea flashed through my mind, and I threw an aura-concealing talisman onto the edge, activating it.

The bear zombie lunged.

At the last possible instant, I dodged.

This time, the bear zombie failed to stop in time and plunged straight beyond the line.

In that instant, the bear zombie suddenly shattered into countless pieces and collapsed with a thunderous crash.

Good heavens...

Cold sweat seeped from my back, and my fear only deepened. Just what kind of master had created this corpse forest? That was seriously terrifying.

I moved forward, and the hanging corpses merely swayed lightly in the wind, never opening their eyes again.

After walking for a short while, I suddenly found there were no more corpses ahead.

The deathly aura in the air was gone. Before me, the world was no longer dark and lifeless; sunlight filtered through the leaves, which were green and lush, bursting with vitality.

Had I crossed death and arrived at rebirth?

No. In situations like this, people would instinctively let their guard down.

But more often than not, danger would arrive without warning.

Whoosh.

A vine suddenly shot up like a spirit serpent, coiled around my leg, and hoisted me into the air.

In the same instant, countless other vines around me surged toward me.

I hacked through the vine around my leg and, while falling, detonated a Flame Talisman.

Firelight burst in all directions, and the vines rushing in from every side recoiled at once.

I landed, but before I could even breathe a sigh of relief, an old tree root whipped across my chest with a crack.

I grunted and was sent flying.

In the blink of an eye, those vines appeared again, and I could only unleash another Flame Talisman.

I dared not touch the ground again. My body held in midair, I suddenly twisted in an eerie motion and clung to the trunk of a great tree like a frog.

Then I saw it: on that black old tree, a blood-red eye had opened and was staring straight at me.

Almost reflexively, I thrust the Blood-Evil Blade into that blood-red eye. The old tree shuddered violently.

At once, the branches above bent down and tightened around me.

"Die!"

I shouted, and the power in my dantian erupted. The Blood-Evil Blade slashed downward straight through that blood-red eye.

In an instant, the old tree split cleanly in two. The branches binding me loosened and fell away, and from the裂 seam in the middle, a liquid thick as blood began to seep out in steady streams.

At that moment, the surrounding vines fled as if frightened.

I touched my chest. Because I was wearing protective robes, most of the force from the tree demon's strike had been absorbed, but my bones still ached faintly.

I let out a long breath and went on.

Then, suddenly, a suspension bridge appeared ahead.

Beside it stood a wooden signboard covered in strange writing that looked like the scrawl of ghosts and demons.

"What kind of hellish writing is this? I can't make sense of a single character."

I thought to myself.

I still did not know where Qu Yuanshan was. Since encountering that bear zombie, I had not found a single trace of him.

Still, since I was already here, I might as well see what lay ahead.

I stepped onto the bridge. The moment I did, thick black mist surged outward in all directions, swallowing the surroundings.

I knew it would not be that easy.

Step by step, I moved forward slowly. The bridge swayed beneath me, and it felt as though even my soul was swaying with it.

Then, several icy auras came rushing toward me.

Ghosts.

I was good at handling those.

The vicious qi of the Blood-Evil Blade soared to the heavens as I drew a circle through the air.

At the same time, I formed the Soul-Extinguishing Seal with my left hand and hurled it forward.

Several demon souls appeared, were caught and twisted together by the blade's murderous qi, and then were blasted by my Soul-Extinguishing Seal until they scattered into nothingness.

I began to speed up, breaking into a run across the suspension bridge.

Until, ahead, the black mist suddenly parted by several yards, and a woman beautiful enough to shame heaven itself appeared, smiling at me.

Only on her wrist coiled a small red snake, its body lined with thin flesh-like wings, making it look extraordinarily sinister.