Bait, Monster

The narrow shaft twisted and turned, its stone walls slick and smooth. Slanting steeply downward, it made stopping impossible. Feeling the speed of their descent, Lian Youming kept one arm around the girl in his embrace while gripping his military dagger in the other, its blade pointed downward so he could react to any sudden danger at a moment's notice. Even now, he was still turning over the conversation among those martial artists in his mind. Experts from various sects had actually joined the White Lotus Sect. Had some earth-shattering event taken place in the martial arts world in years past? Then there was the secret guarded by the Old Man Who Guards the Mountain, the White Lotus Sect's objectives, and the various sects—everything seemed to be linking together in ways unseen. Darkness. Dead silence. Apart from the rustle of their clothes as they slid down, nothing remained except the sound of their heartbeats. Lian Youming held tight to the girl. Bringing her down with him was a decision he had weighed carefully. Until her identity was clear, she harbored danger, yet at the same time, she could be his lifeline. If she truly was an innocent, bringing her down was naturally to save her life. But if she was an enemy—a member of the White Lotus Sect—judging by her behavior, she hadn't displayed the slightest trace of martial prowess, let alone any killing intent. That meant she still intended to keep up the act. If so, why not travel together? Going together naturally gave him a way to deal with those martial artists as well. Now that various factions had converged on the Changbai Mountains, turning them into a tiger's den, and Li Da was nowhere to be seen, escaping unscathed would be harder than reaching the heavens. Thus, he could only pit tiger against wolf and take a dangerous gamble. Even if this fierce tiger had designs of her own, he was at least safe until she tore off her disguise completely. Besides, Lian Youming almost wished she would drop the pretense openly; he was frankly sick of living in constant suspense. But she offered no resistance whatsoever, and he could hardly throttle her to death in cold blood. Throttle someone who offered no resistance at all? What was more, back up on the mountain, if they had dropped all pretense, winning the fight aside, so many people were lurking in the shadows that it wouldn't have done him any good. As for those two men from the Xingyi Sect, the reason Lian Youming had chosen to give Xue Hen's name was that he hadn't known whether they were real or White Lotus cultists in disguise, so he had used Xue Hen to bait their killing intent and gauge their reaction. Yet given the current situation, no one could be trusted. Ghost knew whether there were other traitors within the sects. Since the White Lotus Sect seemed to hold the upper hand, Lian Youming naturally had to bring her down with him. Suddenly, gusts of chilling wind blew up from deep within the shaft, carrying a peculiar rotting stench. Lian Youming's grip on the dagger tightened. His fingers clamped down, sinews bulging across his arms, and he braced his feet outward against the walls to slow his descent, his nerves tightening along with his muscles. In the darkness, a faint, flickering light abruptly appeared in his field of vision. "Hold on tight!" No sooner had the words left his mouth than the two of them shot out of the shaft. Beneath the opening hung an enormous rope net. Before he could adjust his balance, Lian Youming and the girl landed on it together. The moment they settled, the girl blanched and cried in terror, "Look beside us, quick!" Lian Youming's expression darkened as well; he didn't need her reminder to sense it. Turning his head, he saw a ghastly, skin-and-bones face, its cheeks shriveled and sunken, baring two rows of blackened teeth like wind-dried meat. A pair of black, hollow sockets stared straight at him, close enough that their faces nearly touched. "It's dead." "A Japanese soldier?" Looking at the mummy's uniform and gear, Lian Youming furrowed his brow tightly. A quick glance showed seven or eight mummified corpses scattered across the net, crammed right in with them. Seeing that the net hung not far above the ground, Lian Youming simply slit an opening in the ropes beneath him, dropped through first, and once he had found his footing, caught the girl as she jumped down. Then the mummies tumbled down after them, dropping to the floor like dumplings into boiling water. "Why would they look like this in death?" Lian Youming made another quick inspection and found that the corpses were completely intact; the only wound was on the neck, as if some beast had ripped open the throat. Without time for a closer look—worried that more martial artists might descend from above—he cast only a hurried glance before surveying their surroundings. This was a naturally formed cavern. The light came from several bulbs mounted on the walls, flickering continuously and exceedingly dim. In addition, thick electrical wires and cables ran across the walls like monstrous serpents, extending into five different tunnels that branched off in all directions like a spider's nest. Lian Youming pursed his dry lips, full of shock and suspicion. How many years had it been since Japan surrendered? There was still electricity—could there actually be living people inside? Looking around, he picked the second tunnel on the right and strode briskly toward it, the layout from the map floating clearly into his mind. "What's your name?" he asked. "Xiao Li." The girl still appeared weak and docile, filled with fright and fear, her pupils trembling, yet she followed closely at his heels. Lian Youming let out a sigh. It seemed that from the moment he rescued her, he had had no choice but to brace himself and press forward. Yet the farther they went, the more carvings appeared on the stone walls, until they came upon a massive stele embedded in the rock. "What kind of ghost scribbles are written on this?" To his surprise, the girl chimed in at that moment: "Trespassers shall die!" Her voice was faint and low, like someone talking in her sleep. Lian Youming didn't hear clearly and failed to catch the meaning, asking reflexively, "What did you say?" Before he could press her, a dull crash suddenly boomed from the tunnel entrance, as though a heavy stone had dropped to the ground. Lian Youming's face altered slightly. Hurrying the girl along, he quickened his pace. After thirty or forty meters, the view opened up before them. "An ancient tomb was actually hidden inside this underground fortress?" At the end of the tunnel was a stone chamber. A massive stone sarcophagus lay across its center, surrounded by piles of rotting wooden crates. Silver dollars and silver ingots lay scattered across the ground—along with a corpse. This person was not a mummy, nor a Japanese soldier. He was middle-aged and wore a Sun Yat-sen suit... "Did he come in from another entrance?" Lian Youming felt as if he had seen a ghost. He hurried over, and a single touch revealed that the body was still faintly warm; he had clearly died not long ago. Looking at the burly man's hands, they were covered in thick calluses, and his frame was tall and robust—unmistakably a martial artist. Yet such a man had suffered broken, twisted limbs, and a gaping tear was ripped into his neck, the flesh turned outward in a gruesome sight. "Why did he die the exact same way as those Japanese soldiers?" Lian Youming's expression turned grim. His gaze snapped upward, sweeping the surroundings with utmost vigilance as he drew his pistol. "Strange... with such a large wound, why is there so little blood?" the girl finally spoke up on her own, shivering, her voice tiny. Lian Youming's eyes flickered. He had noticed it too, but what was one supposed to make of such a bizarre scene? There were no lightbulbs in the stone chamber, but curiously, torches burned in all four corners. Lian Youming suddenly felt a chill, especially standing inside a burial chamber with a stone sarcophagus resting beside him. *It couldn't be some zombie or monster leaping out to suck human blood, could it?* He naturally didn't believe in such nonsense, but with the man's artery torn open, most of his blood missing into thin air, and those Japanese soldiers dying the same way, how else could it be explained? Lian Youming glanced again at the corpse's limbs. Wounds that snapped and dislocated bone and sinew were no ordinary feat. In an instant, a spine-chilling thought sprang into his mind. Could it be the work of a human? But why drink blood? Lian Youming couldn't help recalling what Yan Lingyun had once told him: his Three Yin Earth Fiend Force could absorb nutrition from food to bolster qi, an exceedingly sinister martial principle. Could there be a martial artist cultivating their arts with vital blood? Lian Youming's scalp instantly went numb. An evil entity cultivating through human blood was hiding inside this underground fortress—how terrifying was that? "That bastard Xie Laosan didn't explain anything..." Then his thoughts took another turn, and Lian Youming swallowed hard. Something was wrong. The map Xie Laosan provided had an unknown origin, with no context or explanation. Very likely, it was bait meant to lure a bunch of martial artists here to their deaths... Just as his hands and feet turned ice-cold, a piercing shriek suddenly rang out from the other end of the tomb. "Ahhh!" Lian Youming immediately hurried toward the sound with Xiao Li. Torches were lit along the way, interspersed with numerous flickering electric lights, as though welcoming them. Reaching a three-way junction, Lian Youming saw a young man in a collared shirt lying sprawled on the ground. "What did you run into?" Terror covered the young man's face. The moment he opened his mouth, warm blood surged out. "There's... cough, cough... save... save me..."