Chapter 74: Trouble Brewing...

Damian had briefly considered questioning Brother Hei’s corpse before leaving.

After all, <Speak With Dead> was sitting right there in his magical arsenal, and interrogating dead enemies was considerably easier than convincing living demonic cultivators to cooperate.

Then common sense prevailed.

His spell was not unlimited. Even using the ritual method, Damian could only extract so much useful information within a given period, and each corpse possessed only the knowledge it had while alive.

Brother Hei was a Body Tempering Level 7 ambusher assigned to a cannon-fodder battlefield.

How much strategic intelligence could he realistically possess?

Damian glanced back toward the corpse.

"Sorry, buddy. You’re not important enough to necromance."

The Gale Beakrunner chirped in seeming agreement.

There was another issue bothering Damian.

Those seven idiots should have known better.

He had never concealed his cultivation. He had not suppressed his aura, disguised his realm or used a mystical treasure to appear weak. Even Jian Rui, Bo Wen, Lin Meiyu and Shen Lian could sense that he had entered Qi Condensation.

So why had seven supposed elite ambushers watched him pass beneath their tree and concluded that he was some Body Tempering rich kid?

Because they were cannon fodder.

Their cultivation might have been respectable among outer disciples, but their perception, experience and access to proper methods were clearly garbage.

"This really is the poverty battlefield."

Damian shook his head.

He also left his thirty-four Skill Points untouched.

There was no hurry. His first fight had mostly involved using a sledgehammer because he wanted his first human kills finished cleanly before his brain found creative ways to complicate matters.

A Level 3 Spell Slot and <Fireball> were excessive against seven Body Tempering cultivators.

Useful? Absolutely.

Efficient?

Not particularly.

And <Misty Step> had naturally been how Damian disappeared from his Gale Beakrunner and reappeared behind the original ambushers.

Twenty-five Mental Energy was expensive, but for breaking through his first human-killing hurdle with an overwhelming opening advantage?

Worth every point.

Now that hurdle was behind him, Damian intended to fight properly and squeeze actual value out of his toolkit.

He had cantrips, manual spellcasting, his physical Attributes, <Perfect Combat Instinct>, and perhaps even Refined Qi if someone forced him to use it.

Why spend artillery shells killing mosquitoes when he had a perfectly good slipper?

............

His next targets appeared roughly twenty minutes later.

This time, Damian found them first.

Six Nightmare Corpse Sect disciples moved through the forest in a loose patrol formation. One sweep of <Divine Sense> told Damian that they were several grades above Brother Hei’s robbery crew.

Their leader had reached Body Tempering Level 9, two others were Level 8, and the remaining three sat between Levels 6 and 7.

Now this was what an elite Body Tempering patrol looked like.

Damian slowed the Gale Beakrunner before entering their detection range and slipped from the saddle.

"Stay."

The giant bird gave him a suspicious look.

"Yes, I know what happened last time. Stay anyway."

Damian moved through the undergrowth while keeping the patrol within his <Divine Sense>.

The six remained disciplined, but after several minutes without encountering anything, conversation began.

"I swear this whole front gets worse every week! Elder Luo had three more tents converted into treatment areas yesterday!" one disciple complained.

"Then stop getting cut, fool!" Another replied with disdain.

The conversation shifted to a failed recovery mission, then to the mysterious visitor who had arrived at the camp the previous day.

"Did any of you see who came through the southern gate?" one disciple asked.

Brother Fan, the Level 9 leader, immediately stiffened. "Don’t talk about this."

That only encouraged them.

"I heard she came from the main sect and Elder Luo personally received her." A Body Tempering Level 8 young woman whispered.

"Was she also an Elder?"

"No, and stop asking." Brother Fan said.

"Then who is it?" The others kept pressing.

"The Ancestor’s daughter." Their leader could only sigh and reveal in order to shut them up.

The patrol nearly broke formation.

"Holy shit! The Ancestor has a daughter?"

"Keep your voice down!"

"Why the heck would she come here?"

"I don’t know! She arrived yesterday, the central compound was sealed off, and patrols increased afterward. That’s all." Brother Fan snapped.

"So she came for something specific?"

"Whatever she came for is above our heads. We patrol, kill Grass Munchers and return alive. Anyone who investigates personally can ask Elder Luo before he turns them into corpse fertilizer."

That ended the conversation.

Damian remained hidden as the patrol continued onward.

Nightmare Corpse Sect Ancestor Xie Man’s daughter had appeared at this miserable Body Tempering battlefield, received directly by their commander and apparently shown no interest in ordinary military matters.

She had clearly come here for something.

But what it was specifically, Damian had no clue.

Well... for now.

His gaze settled on Brother Fan.

Heh, perhaps he had just found a corpse worth questioning.

First, however, Damian needed to make him one.

............

"I still think this whole thing is—"

"Ignis!"

A streak of orange light ripped from the thickets and the Level 6 disciple never finished speaking as the <Firebolt> struck him in the side of the head.

WHOOM!

Flame swallowed his upper body, and he dropped without managing a proper scream.

The remaining five exploded outward in a quick reaction, creating distance.

Brother Fan reacted instantly.

"ENEMY! DEFENSIVE FORMATION!"

Talismans appeared, weapons came free and Corpse Qi spread through the polluted forest air.

Brother Fan drew a long black saber and scanned the trees.

"Who is there?!"

No answer came.

While the others searched nervously, Damian moved around them outside their senses. Their ambient Corpse Qi concealed him from ordinary Body Tempering perception, but Damian had <Divine Sense>.

He began constructing <Web> manually.

Several seconds later, sticky white strands erupted from another direction, catching three disciples and binding them against a tree.

"Cut it!"

"I can’t move!"

"Burn it—"

"Glacies!"

A pale-blue ray struck one of the two remaining disciples in the face. Ice spread across his skull and neck before his frozen head shattered against the ground.

Brother Fan’s breathing stopped.

One man had burned, three were trapped and another had been killed by attacks from different directions.

His imagination supplied the obvious answer.

A demon beast!

Some horrifying creature capable of manipulating fire, frost and webbing!

A three-headed spider?!

Before he could decide whether such a thing existed, Damian calmly stepped from behind a tree and Brother Fan froze.

His perception finally locked onto Damian’s Qi Condensation cultivation and his shoulders slumped.

"So it was a Senior."

With a look of defeat, he pleaded with Damian. "If Senior intends to kill us, then please make my end quick."

Damian glanced toward the webbed disciples.

"Ignis!"

The web ignited and the three captives screamed as the flames consumed them.

Brother Fan’s fear turned to anger.

"Senior is truly shameless! This battlefield exists for Body Tempering disciples! The higher realms fight elsewhere according to the rules both sides have maintained. For someone of your cultivation to slaughter juniors... do you possess no pride?!"

Damian shrugged. "Maybe next time don’t join the faction that threatens to kill me and declares all-out war."

Brother Fan stared at him in confusion before slamming a formation plate onto the ground.

BOOM!

A dark hemispherical barrier erupted around him.

Damian immediately recognized it as a Low Grade Two formation.

"You may be powerful, Senior, but this is a Low Grade Two Black Tortoise Corpse Barrier! I have already sent a distress signal. Reinforcements will arrive shortly!" The fellow spoke triumphantly.

Damian studied the barrier with interest. "You’re not bad. You know escaping is hopeless, and your sect probably doesn’t care whether you live or die. So you’re gambling that I’ll decide you’re too troublesome and leave."

Brother Fan’s expression changed, but he tried to sound nonchalant. "Senior is spouting nonsense! If you remain, you will regret it!"

Damian gave him a strange look. "However, you were right about one thing. I don’t have time to waste here."

Damian manually constructed <Web> again, this time covering the barrier’s exterior.

"Ignis!"

The web ignited and flames engulfed the entire dome, forcing the formation to consume energy at a terrifying rate. Brother Fan frantically replaced the Spirit Stones powering it, but each batch dimmed almost immediately.

Then—

CRACK!

A fracture spread across the barrier.

"No!" The fellow roared with terror, but it was too late.

CRASH!

The dome collapsed.

Brother Fan turned to flee, but Damian’s dagger pierced his back and entered his heart.

Damian caught him before he hit the ground.

This one was worth questioning.

............

The ritual took time.

Damian laid out the corpse, constructed <Speak With Dead> and completed the spell.

"Cum Mortuus in Lingua Mortua!"

The corpse jerked.

Brother Fan’s dead eyes opened. When he saw that he had somehow been brought back to life despite being killed, he was filled with terror.

As fellows who played with undead and corpses, he knew most about the danger and horror of a denied afterlife, so right away, his mental defenses shattered into crumbs.

"I’ll answer! I’ll answer truthfully! Ask anything!" He screamed with despair.

Damian almost felt cheated.

He had five questions available, so he began asking away.

"The Ancestor’s daughter who arrived yesterday. What is her cultivation realm?"

"Peak Qi Condensation. It is said that she can attempt Foundation Establishment at any time."

Damian’s amusement faded.

A peak Qi Condensation cultivator, and the daughter of Xie Man, had come personally to the lowest battlefield in the war?

Interesting.

"What was her objective?"

"I don’t know. But patrols increased after she arrived, and we were given a new directive."

Hoh? A new directive right away? Clearly this pertained to the reason why she came here.

"And what was this new directive?"

"This morning we were ordered to watch for anyone unusual. Specifically, anyone from the Grass Munchers side who did not belong on this battlefield."

Damian’s expression stiffened.

Someone out of place, huh?

A person like that here at Willowbank, a battlefield almost exclusively populated by Body Tempering cultivators?

And what had Damian done today?

He had descended from a high-quality Spirit Boat as an unknown Qi Condensation Guest Elder, taken over the camp, healed more than two hundred disciples and begun hunting Nightmare Corpse Sect patrols.

This was the epitome of ’not belong’, right?

But how the heck did they know?

Oh right, the Evergreen Sect was basically a leaking pipe. Nightmare Corpse Sect fellows could walk up and down the place it seemed.

Damian sighed, not wanting to call his allies ’pig’ teammates, as there could still be another explanation.

Perhaps the Nightmare Corpse Sect expected some other reinforcement.

Perhaps another special cultivator was moving through the area.

Perhaps this had nothing to do with him.

All of the above were indeed possible.

Except Xie Man had already demanded Damian’s death or surrender personally.

And now Xie Man’s daughter herself had arrived this morning around the same time he did, searching for someone who did not belong.

Damian’s certainty rose sharply.

One final question remained.

"What is her name?" Damian demanded with a somber expression.

"Her proper name is Xie Mei, but she prefers her mother’s maiden name..."

"Ning Ruomei!"

Damian’s expression changed completely.