Chapter 75: Great Harvest!

Well...

Trouble was here.

Damian remained crouched beside Brother Fan’s corpse for several seconds after hearing the name Ning Ruomei.

The implications were unpleasant enough that his thoughts briefly wanted to run in twelve different directions at once, but there was still one small matter to handle before <Speak With Dead> expired.

Five questions.

He had asked four.

Wasting the last one because he was busy internally screaming would be rather stupid.

Damian pushed the sudden mess of suspicions aside.

"Who did Ning Ruomei bring with her to Willowbank Front, and what were their cultivation realms?" Damian asked solemnly.

Brother Fan answered immediately.

"Two Qi Condensation inner protectors accompanied her. One is at Level 9 and the other at Level 8. She also brought four Body Tempering inner disciples, two at Level 10 and two at Level 9. No Foundation Establishment cultivator came with them."

That was useful.

Very useful, actually.

Ning Ruomei herself was supposedly at Peak Qi Condensation.

Add two Late Qi Condensation cultivators, four elite Body Tempering disciples and whatever forces already existed at the Nightmare Corpse Sect’s local camp, and her side possessed considerable strength by Willowbank standards.

But no Foundation Establishment cultivator?

Damian’s brow furrowed.

Before he could ask anything else, the magical structure sustaining <Speak With Dead> reached its limit.

Brother Fan’s corpse relaxed.

The faint animation disappeared from his face, and whatever remnant Damian had been communicating with returned to wherever dead cultivators went after being temporarily dragged back into customer service.

Damian remained beside him.

"Ning Ruomei..."

So she was Xie Man’s daughter, huh?

She had infiltrated the Evergreen Sect for years under an important position, or at minimum constructed an infiltration deep enough that her identity had become intimately connected to one of the most dangerous Refined Corpse Puppet attacks Damian had faced.

Now she had appeared here, at the same battlefield as himself.

Wonderful!

Just wonderful!

Before Damian could properly unpack that headache, several familiar notifications manifested.

......

The six cultivators he had just eliminated were Body Tempering Levels 6, 7, 7, 8, 8 and 9.

Forty-five total cultivation levels.

<Skill Upgrade System> happily converted every one of them.

[Valid Souls detected.]

[Total Souls Converted: 6.]

[Skill Points Acquired: 45.]

[Current Skill Points: 79.]

Damian nodded appreciatively.

"Now we’re talking."

Seventy-nine Skill Points and he had barely begun his little forest excursion.

His decision not to spend the original thirty-four was already looking increasingly wise.

The Valorian Overworld System was more conservative.

[Combat Evaluation Complete.]

[First successful elimination of an organized elite human patrol through sustained battlefield spellcraft: +1 EXP.]

[Victory achieved against six high-level Body Tempering combatants without bodily injury: +1 EXP.]

[Experience Points: 9/66.]

Two points.

Damian could live with that.

The Overworld System clearly cared far more about novelty, achievement and meaningful danger than whether he murdered six people or sixty.

If he kept farming identical patrols all afternoon, it was probably not going to shower him in Experience just because the corpse pile became increasingly concerning.

<Battle God> was much more enthusiastic about quantity.

Brother Fan’s patrol added another forty-five qualifying cultivation levels to its accumulated record.

His existing Experience gain increase from qualifying kills had stood at 3.4%.

Now—

[Battle God — Qualifying Kill Contribution Increased.]

[Current Future Kill Experience Increase: 7.9%.]

There it was.

"Seven-point-nine percent already?"

Damian liked where this was going.

Then the faint Battle Aura accumulated from his previous victory strengthened again.

The change remained subtle, but Damian could feel it more clearly now. There was a faint pressure underneath his ordinary presence, something built from uninterrupted victory and killing intent that had not existed yesterday.

Five hundred kills from now?

That might become interesting.

Five thousand?

Well... perhaps people would eventually start wondering why the friendly potion merchant felt like he had personally buried a small country.

Then <Demonic Plundering Dao Body> came knocking.

As before, Damian chose Attributes.

The random harvest from the six corpses produced a surprisingly balanced spread.

One Level 8 disciple possessed DEX 11.

+1.1 DEX.

Another gave AGI 10.

+1 AGI.

Brother Fan himself happened to possess CON 12.

+1.2 CON.

A Level 7 cultivator surrendered STR 8.

+0.8 STR.

Then came WIS 5 and SPI 4 from the remaining two.

+0.5 WIS.

+0.4 SPI.

Damian rolled his shoulders as the changes settled into him.

Excellent.

The physical benefits were immediately noticeable, but he was almost happier about the mental gains.

His cultivation method had naturally strengthened Intelligence and Wisdom after reaching Qi Condensation, but Spirit remained much harder to increase.

If murdering demonic cultivators occasionally dropped mental Attributes too...

Well!

Was it unethical to call people loot boxes after killing them?

Probably.

Would Damian stop?

Unlikely.

His current visible Attributes had already shifted dramatically since leaving Willowbank.

STR had risen from 8 to 9.4.

DEX from 9 to 11.3.

AGI from 7 to 8.9.

CON from 8 to 10.2.

WIS had reached 11.5 while SPI climbed slightly to 10.4.

And the day was nowhere near finished!

Damian whistled for his Gale Beakrunner, and the enormous bird emerged from the trees then slowed beside him.

"Back toward camp."

The creature chirped.

Damian climbed aboard before pausing.

Actually...

Why hurry?

Ning Ruomei was at the enemy base.

Whatever she wanted clearly involved Willowbank Front, and Damian needed to prepare rather than blindly walk into whatever she had arranged.

He had come outside to hunt, and there were Skill Points and Attributes everywhere.

And, most importantly, he still needed battlefield experience.

Damian changed direction.

"We’re taking the scenic route home."

The Gale Beakrunner probably regretted returning.

......

The first additional patrol appeared less than fifteen minutes later.

Seven cultivators at Body Tempering Levels 6, 7, 7, 8, 8, 9 and 9.

They were stronger collectively than Brother Fan’s group, but Damian now understood the battlefield environment much better.

The fight lasted less than two minutes.

Damian used the miasma, his <Divine Sense>, manual spellcasting and cantrips to break their formation before finishing the survivors at close range.

By the end, seven corpses decorated a small ravine.

The systems summarized the harvest.

[Skill Points Acquired: 54.]

[Current Skill Points: 133.]

[Battle God — Future Kill Experience Increase: 13.3%.]

The Overworld System awarded only one Experience Point for the continued invincibility, bringing Damian to 10/66.

Apparently novelty decay was real.

His Attribute harvest proved considerably more exciting.

+0.8 STR.

+2.2 DEX.

+1.1 AGI.

+1.2 CON.

+0.5 INT.

+0.4 PER.

Damian also extracted another +0.3 CHA from one unfortunate disciple.

"Thank you for your contribution to my future handsomeness."

The corpse declined to comment.

......

His next patrol contained eight fellows, and this group was even nastier.

Their cultivations were Body Tempering Levels 6, 7, 7, 8, 8, 9, 9 and 10.

A peak Body Tempering disciple!

Had Damian encountered these fellows before reaching Qi Condensation, he would have approached with considerably more caution.

Now?

They barely lasted longer than the others, which meant approximately four minutes.

The Level 10 leader even managed to force Damian to dodge twice after releasing a surprisingly vicious Corpse Claw Martial Art, and <Perfect Combat Instinct> finally got enough opposition to show some teeth.

Damian’s body began responding before conscious thought finished forming.

His enhanced DEX and AGI converted information into motion frighteningly well.

Every successful exchange fed <Battle God>, making the next movement feel smoother than the last.

By the time the leader realized Damian was becoming more comfortable as the battle continued, three of his companions were already dead.

The remainder followed shortly afterward.

Another harvest.

[Skill Points Acquired: 64.]

[Current Skill Points: 197.]

[First victory of a CR 5 opponent: +1 EXP.]

[Eighth battle without suffering injury: +1 EXP]

[Experience Points: 12/66.]

[Battle God — Future Kill Experience Increase: 19.7%.]

Attribute gains:

+1.6 STR.

+2 DEX.

+1 AGI.

+2.1 CON.

+0.3 CHA.

Damian looked at the numbers.

"Holy shit."

The Nightmare Corpse Sect’s foundational technique really did produce good physical bodies.

These fellows might have been psychopaths marinating themselves in corpse juice, but whatever cultivation method they used was certainly not trash.

Damian was beginning to understand why their Body Tempering disciples could perform so well despite belonging to a newer sect.

......

The final patrol he encountered consisted of six cultivators.

Levels 6, 7, 7, 8, 8 and 9.

By then, Damian’s mentality toward these engagements had shifted considerably.

The first human battle had carried weight, and the second had taught him caution, while the third and fourth had turned into practical combat training.

By the fifth group of the day? He was purely hunting.

There was no joy in watching people die, but there was no hesitation left either.

They were enemy combatants actively searching Evergreen territory for people to kill, and Damian possessed neither the time nor inclination to pretend otherwise.

The battle ended with the Level 9 leader attempting to escape through the river.

A <Frost Ray> solved that problem.

[Skill Points Acquired: 45.]

[Current Skill Points: 242.]

[Ninth battle without bodily injury: +1 EXP.]

[Experience Points: 13/66.]

[Battle God — Future Kill Experience Increase: 24.2%.]

Damian nearly laughed at the Skill Point total.

Two hundred and forty-two!

Yesterday, nineteen Skill Points had felt valuable.

Now?

The Nightmare Corpse Sect had apparently launched a promotional event.

His final Attribute harvest from this group added another +0.6 STR, +1.1 DEX, +2.1 AGI, +0.9 CON and, surprisingly, +0.2 LCK.

By the time Damian finally turned toward Willowbank Front, the cumulative changes were ridiculous.

His visible physical Attributes now stood at approximately:

STR: 12.4.

DEX: 16.6.

AGI: 13.1.

CON: 14.4.

INT: 11.5.

WIS: 11.5.

SPI: 10.4.

PER: 3.9.

His hidden CHA and LCK still refused to reveal their underlying totals, but <Demonic Plundering Dao Body> had added a cumulative +0.7 CHA and +0.4 LCK since he began hunting today.

Thirty-four human enemies dead, two hundred and forty-two Skill Points, twenty-four-point-two percent increased future kill Experience from <Battle God>, and five uninterrupted victories feeding his Battle Aura.

On paper?

Damian was having a fantastic day.

His face suggested otherwise.

......

The rebuilt silhouette of The Evergreen Sect Base Camp eventually appeared through the trees.

Damian slowed the Gale Beakrunner.

Something had been bothering him during the entire return journey.

Ning Ruomei’s behavior made no sense.

The woman was not stupid, quite the opposite in fact.

She had hidden within the Evergreen Sect’s sphere for years.

Her position had been good enough that people trusted her, and the infiltration connected to her identity had penetrated so deeply that Damian’s encounter with the Refined Corpse Puppet had completely blindsided the Evergreen Sect.

That required patience, planning, and discipline.

A stupid spy did not survive for years inside enemy territory.

So why would someone like that arrive at Willowbank Front with enough fanfare that random Body Tempering patrol members knew the Ancestor’s daughter had shown up?

Why allow her arrival to become camp gossip?

Why increase patrols immediately?

And, most ridiculous of all, why issue an order telling people to look for someone who was "out of place"?

Damian’s expression gradually darkened.

That was not subtle at all... that was a fucking neon sign!

If Ning Ruomei genuinely wanted to hunt Damian without warning him, she could have entered Willowbank Front secretly, disguised herself again, sent ordinary scouts, or even quietly distributed his appearance to trusted people and waited.

Instead, she had practically announced:

Hello, Damian! I am definitely not here looking for you! Please ignore all these suspicious patrols searching for a suspiciously undefined suspicious person!

Damian rubbed his chin.

"A taunt..."

That explanation fit far better.

She wanted him to discover her.

Or more precisely, she had created a trail obvious enough that an intelligent target would discover it.

That made the whole thing feel less like an investigation and more like a test.

A test of Damian’s intelligence.

If Damian failed to notice the clues, then Ning Ruomei learned something valuable.

He was powerful, strange and dangerous, but intellectually ordinary enough to manipulate through straightforward deception.

Eventually, he would walk into whatever trap she prepared.

And if Damian did notice?

No problem.

Because her plan apparently accounted for that too.

She expected him to understand she was here and to realize she was looking for him.

On top of that, she was still confident that events would eventually bring him into her hands.

Damian’s unease deepened, especially thinking of the second problem.

Ning Ruomei knew what he could do better than almost anyone alive inside the Nightmare Corpse Sect.

She had experienced the catastrophic interaction between Damian’s strange fire and Corpse Qi head-on during their previous encounter.

Since then, Damian had only become worse, much worse.

His ordinary fire magic treated Corpse Qi like high-quality fuel, Basic Holy Water could purge their corruption almost perfectly, and <Divine Sense> neutralized much of their battlefield concealment.

His cultivation had reached Qi Condensation and his current physical body now possessed attributes that would make ordinary cultivators cry.

Against members of the Nightmare Corpse Sect specifically, the matchup was so lopsided that calling it unfair would be reasonable.

Within Qi Condensation...

Damian genuinely suspected he was practically invincible against them.

Perhaps some terrifying genius possessed strange trump cards capable of challenging him.

Fine.

Nothing was absolute.

But under normal circumstances?

A Peak Qi Condensation Nightmare Corpse Sect cultivator walking toward Damian was basically volunteering to discover how combustible their own cultivation technique could become.

And Ning Ruomei knew that.

She had brought two Late Qi Condensation protectors and several peak Body Tempering disciples.

That was indubitably strong by Willowbank Front’s standards, but frankly completely insufficient if her actual objective was Damian Baines.

Which led to the obvious question circulating in Damian’s mind as he entered Willowbank Front with his earlier excitement completely gone.

If Ning Ruomei knew what he could do...

If she deliberately announced herself...

If she expected him to recognize the trap...

And if she remained confident that he would eventually fall into it anyway...

Then what the hell did Ning Ruomei have to rely on that made her so certain she would come out on top?

Ning Ruomei’s earlier infiltration thread and the distinction between her real identity and the Refined Corpse Puppet were checked against the existing canon reference.