Nightfall

“There is only absolute silence, no sounds at all. No ants crawling by, no leaves rustling. Nothing at all. Your ears eventually become very sensitive because you desire so much to hear any sound. You can even hear the bodies around you rotting. You hear how the bloated bellies of the corpses explode and they sound like a thunder!”

The old monk’s shrill voice reverberated in the quiet room like a never ending roar of thunder.

“All the bodies in the room have rotted, or dried out and these sounds have stopped. The sounds that have previously made you nauseated have become the most wonderful things in your memory. Do you know this feeling?”

“In the end, you can even hear your blood flowing in your veins, your muscles losing its water content. You can hear your stomach drying out and sticking to your intestines. You hear them tearing. It’s really interesting, isn’t it? If you listen for a long time, you’d definitely want to vomit. But the problem is, you can’t.”

The old monk’s eyes had lost all its shine. He reminisced about the decades of suffering like a granite statue. He muttered, “Even the strongest cultivators must eat or drink. You have to eat something, no matter how disgusting it is. If you spit it out, you will die.”

The old monk suddenly yelled shrilly, “I know that living like this is even crueler than death. I should have killed myself when I was imprisoned by Ke Haoran. But this fellow, he seemed bold and tough, but he had a heart more insidious than the devil himself. He knew that I thought of living, and he made it so that I could never die! He is the real devil!”

Ning Que asked, after a moment of silence, “What did you eat to survive for the past decades?”

The mountain of bones below the old monk consisted of both dried corpses and white skeletons.

Ning Que’s gaze landed on them, and could not help frowning.

Mo Shanshan followed the trajectory of his gaze and found that there were several silvers of bones in the mountain of bones. There were marks on them that looked as if a beast had chewed on them. She had a sudden epiphany. Her body stiffened and her face became especially pale.

The old monk laughed loudly when he saw their reactions. His laughter was bitter and shrill, and it sounded like a sad ghoul crying grievously. However, the tears that flowed from his eyes were cloudy and pebble-like due to the fact that he was severely dehydrated.

Even the toughest man might feel sympathy for the old monk; looking at the pair of old, cloudy eyes, listening to the heart wrenching, crazy laughter, and thinking of how he had been imprisoned in the Front Gate of the Devil’s Doctrine for decades, leading a life worse than death. However, Ning Que did not feel anything like that. He looked at the old monk and said, “Sympathy is not something that can be pleaded for.”

The old monk’s crazy laughter stopped. He looked at Ning Que with what seemed like a ghost fire in his eyes.

Ning Que looked at the rock walls and continued after a moment of silence, “It must be due to the fact that I have seen too much danger as a child. I am someone who lacks a sense of security. I like thinking about what would happen to me should something happen all the time. Who would raise Sangsang? What would happen if Sangsang meets with an accident? How can I persuade myself to continue living?”

“If someone treated Sangsang like how you did, I would think long and hard about how to revenge. It’d be too easy on you if I were to kill you with a single stroke of my blade. If I break your arms and legs and throw you into a shit hole, you might not last for long. You won’t suffer for long. That wouldn’t make me happy either.”

He retracted his gaze and stared at the old monk. He smiled lightly and sighed. “Now that I think about how you have spent the last few decades, I realized how Youngest Uncle is indeed a genius who is well versed in cultivation. He is even talented in torture methods. I will not pity on you. I will learn from such methods, and I can only hope that I will not have to use it in the future.”

The old monk did not know who Sangsang was, but Mo Shanshan did. She glanced at Ning Que.

The old monk smiled and did not say anything else. The questions that he had asked previously already released the anger he had felt for the past decades. He had something more important to do now.

He lowered his head slowly and placed his dry lips on the girl below his palms gently.

Ye Hongyu looked at the old monk coldly. However, goosebumps erupted on her skin. Anyone would find it impossible to get rid of the fear in their hearts when they were about to be torn into shreds and eaten slowly.

A series of chocking sound rang in the quiet dark room.

Ning Que had pulled out the podao behind his back. He leaped up like a tiger who had finally caught his prey after an entire night of waiting. He leaped towards the old monk in the Bone Mountain.

He was suspended in mid-air and a shred of light splashed out like a thunderstorm.

Ning Que and Mo Shanshan’s sense of perception were severely injured by the old monk. They were no longer able to control parts of their bodies. However, they had managed to overcome this through unknown means and forcefully regained control of their bodies. At this time, the old monk was about to sink his teeth into Ye Hongyu’s flesh and was not aware of the happenings around him. This was a good time for them to ambush him.

The old monk managed to see the light reflecting from the blade from the corner of his eyes. The podao in Ning Que’s hands was only half an inch away from his neck. He would be unable to prevent his imminent death no matter from which angle one looked at it from.

However, the glace from the corner of his eyes was sufficient.

The old monk saw the light from the blade and his mental state rippled.

Other than the sacredness of Haotian, there was nothing faster than one’s mental state.

A power that, while not strong, was mild and pure in state exuded from the old monk’s gaze. The numerous white bones in the pile of bones answered to the power and flew up. A strong femur stood and blocked the shiny blade.

It was unknown which powerhouse from the Devil’s Doctrine this strong femur belonged to. Its spirit was long lost, but its strength still lingered. It collided with the blade strongly. A deep gouge appeared, but it did not break apart.

The entire room was filled with a Confinement tactical array set by Youngest Uncle back then. The Fu character set on the podao by the two Senior Brothers could not absorb any Qi of Heaven and Earth. He could not fight against the bone controlled by the old monk’s Psyche Power.

Ning Que harrumphed. An immense force came from the blade, breaking his wrist. Blood spurted from his mouth as he was thrust backward with a great force.

The white shards of bones activated by the old monk’s Psyche Power began to beat on his body like a storm. He suffered hundreds and thousands of heavy blows and blood spewed from his body without stopping. The bones in his body cracked and broke.

Ning Que fell to the ground heavily with a loud crack. More blood splattered on his shirt. It was fortunate that the bones had fallen to the ground after leaving the Bone Mountain as a storm and did not attack again.

Neverending pain radiated from all parts of his body as if all the bones in his body had broken. Ning Que frowned. He set the podao on the ground and leaned against it to get up, but succumbed to the pain. He fell on a knee heavily.

The old monk’s face was pale and his cheeks were sunken. His pupils were bright and his body wavered lightly. It was evident that he had paid an enormous price countering the sudden attack from Ning Que. Several decades of power and the bite of flesh he had consumed earlier had long been expended. However, no matter how weak he was, he still controlled Ye Hongyu under his palms.

…

…

Being separated from the Qi of Heaven and Earth was a scary existence for cultivators. There were several feats of Taoism that cannot be completed without the Qi of Heaven and Earth. This was especially since Master Lotus had previously hurt their sense of perception with his high state. They were unable to use their perception to control their bodies. Cultivators in this situation were like calligraphers without their brushes and musicians without their instruments. They were aware of what to do, but had lost all abilities and would surely fall into a total despair.

But Ning Que was unlike most cultivators in the world. He had just learned about cultivation. In the past ten years, he had fought on the thin line between life and death. He did not depend on any Taoist Laws or flying swords, but on the three swords behind his back and himself.

Even the impact on his sense of perception by Master Lotus could not force him into a total despair. That was because his control over his physical body was stronger than anyone could imagine after numerous battles. He could control his bones and muscles. He had tightened and loosened his muscles at a high speed during the long conversation they had previously. He had wanted to relax his body, leaving the control the sense of perception had over him.

One had to acknowledge that Ning Que was really good at combat. This was especially so when he was in a situation that seemed to be utterly hopeless, where he was weak and the enemy was strong. He would become especially calm and his will to combat would become even stronger then. It was a pity that the difference in abilities between the two was so large that even the will to combat or analysis could not help to mend the gap.

“The control you have over your body is so strong?”

The old monk looked at Ning Que who was kneeling on the ground with a look of surprise. His brows floated in the air as he sighed. “Even though the Desolate Man are strong in both spirit and body, but the connection between their body and perception is not as good as yours. It is hard to imagine that there is a wayfarer of the Academy in this generation that would be so well suited to cultivate in the Devil’s arts. It’s such a pity, such a pity.”

Ning Que was severely injured and could no longer hold the hilt in his hands tightly. His body wavered, but he eventually fell to the ground once more. He did not listen to what the old monk had to say clearly. Instead, he wiped the blood off his lips and coughed painfully twice.

Everything had happened too quickly. Mo Shanshan was not mentally prepared for this at all. Now that Ning Que was lying in a pool of blood, her eyes were filled with worry. However, she had no way of getting closer to see how he was doing.

Ning Que looked at her expression before he slowly maneuvered himself against her back with great difficulty. He coughed painfully again before saying in a weak voice, “I won’t die for now, but I really can’t move anymore.”

The old monk looked at him and got even happier as he looked on. He said in a pitying manner, “Such a talent. If you weren’t a disciple of the Academy, I would want to teach you all my skills and see how you would end up in the future.”

Ning Que had once thought that he was a genius in cultivation. However, he had only entered the cultivation path after much difficulty. Once he had gotten on the path, he had seen too many true powerhouses. There were Second Brother, Chen Pipi and other weirdos like them. And then, he had met the Calligraphy Addict and the Tao Addict who were geniuses too. That was when he had gotten rid of such stupid notions and realized that he was but just an ordinary person in cultivation.

That was why he could not help feeling that something was odd when he heard the old monk’s lament. The corners of his lips flicked up with difficulty. He panted and said self-mockingly, “I only have ten clear acupoints in the Snow Mountain and Ocean of Qi. How could I be a talent?”

The old monk looked at him and said weakly, “If you wish to cultivate in the Devil’s arts, so what if you only had one clear acupoint?”

Ning Que leaned against Mo Shanshan’s back weakly. He looked at the old monk in the Bone Mountain and smiled with difficulty. He said, “Master, I am willing to cultivate in the Devil’s arts under you. Will you let all of us go? Why do we have to fight to our deaths?”

The old monk looked at him pityingly. He answered weakly, “Is this the time to make such jokes?”

Ning Que coughed twice and gasped, “It is not a joke, I can swear on this by the name of the Headmaster of Academy.”

The old monk smiled laboriously, “Ke Haoran and I have been life-long enemies. I know the truth of the Academy better than anyone else in the world. I might believe others, but I know that there is no one trustworthy from the Academy.”

Ning Que could not help laughing loudly when he heard that. However, pain wracked his chest and he started coughing violently again.

The old monk looked at him puzzledly, “Why did you choose that moment to attack if you could have held back? Even though the timing was good, it was still a little too early. Would it not have been better if you waited for the moment when I start devouring her flesh?”

Ning Que coughed up fresh blood and replied, “It was indeed too early, but I do not like watching people eat human flesh.”

The old monk’s expression turned vicious when he heard the words “human flesh”. He said coldly, “I have been chewing on bones and dried meat. In the end, the meat had turned into dried dregs. Do you think they taste good?”

The old monk looked at the young couple leaning against each other and said bitterly, “The human flesh that I have eaten when I traveled the world was because they were part of my plan and because I wanted to make myself stronger. Do you think I’m a crazy pervert who likes eating human flesh? Do you really think that human flesh tastes good?”

The old monk thought of the black robes that had floated by the Devil’s Palace decades ago. He smiled rather lunatically and said, “Ke Haoran sealed me in this jail away from the world. He forced me into eating human flesh. And then, there was a fellow who came here. He wouldn’t release me or kill me no matter how much I begged. Instead, he got me another ten bodies and left them for me to eat. He said that this was a reward from Haotian. If I am a devil eating humans, what are they?”

He looked at Ye Hongyu who was still beneath his palm. Her face was pale as she pursed her lips stubbornly, unwilling to beg or cry out in pain. He looked at Ning Que and said icily, “This Taoist woman is the first fresh meat I’ve eaten in decades. It already tastes better than anything else. Do you want to try it?”

Ning Que looked at the haunted eyes on the old monk’s face. He said after a moment of silence, “No, I know that it doesn’t taste good.”

Mo Shanshan who was leaning against his back weakly did not understand that. She thought that he was just speaking factually. Everyone knew that human flesh didn’t taste good without having to eat it personally.

However, the old monk had understood. Surprise filled his worn face and the enmity in his eyes turned into sympathy and benevolence. He sighed in admiration, “The Academy is indeed the Academy. I admire them.”