"Jiangbei... Witness the Birth of This King!"

Inky darkness enveloped the sky above the sinkhole. Inside the cave behind the wall, lamps burned brightly. One in darkness, one in light. The rocking chair swayed slowly back and forth, its creaking rhythm like a lullaby. Chen Fan, who had borne immense pressure ever since arriving in this world, gradually relaxed as he listened to Zhou Mo and the others chatting and laughing in the camp. A night breeze brushed across his face. The cool touch of rain extinguished his lingering restlessness. Lying in the rocking chair, Chen Fan unconsciously drifted into a dream, his chest gently rising and falling with his breath as his body greedily savored this rare moment of peace and ease. Noticing this, the people in the camp's cave instinctively lowered their voices. They glanced toward the figure of Chen Fan resting in the rocking chair atop the wall. The glow cast by the ghost fire traced a soft rim of light around his profile. Watching this scene, Zhou Mo subconsciously stopped roasting his meat and straightened up, staring in a daze. It seemed to him as though the stationmaster, alone with his chair, had cleaved the Eternal Night in two. Behind the rocking chair lay the camp the stationmaster had built with his own hands; before it lay the devouring Eternal Night. It was almost as if... The man asleep in the rocking chair was the camp's true wall. Holding the darkness outside. *** Jiangbei City. "Tonight is the twelfth night since the arrival of the rainy season." The Wild Wolf Gang Leader stood upon the city wall, looking out into the darkness beyond with a conflicted expression, falling silent for a long time. Several days had passed since the last flesh worm ghost tide struck, and Jiangbei City had ultimately weathered the disaster. Yet... The losses were devastating. The Wild Wolf Gang's foundation was more than half depleted. Even with the backing of the common folk and merchants, it was not enough to make up for the exhaustion of their reserves. Those rare, precious exotic treasures were nearly impossible to replenish, requiring sheer luck and years to amass. And yet, The rainy season was far from over. Nearly twenty days remained. "Gang Leader," his confidant beside him stepped forward and said in a low voice, "our resources are no longer enough to defend the city. We may have to retreat back into the gang's territory. Unless... we spread the word that the Jiangbei Chen family disguised themselves as our men to take delivery of the supplies on the night of the flesh ghost tide. That would make the townsfolk and merchants pressure the Chen family to join us in defending the wall." "..." After a long silence, the gang leader replied in a raspy voice, "We have already done all we can." "There is no need to spread this news. Even if every merchant and citizen in the city joins together to pressure them, no one can do a thing to the Jiangbei Chen family as long as they stay holed up behind the tier-3 walls of their own compound. It would only drive the two sides into open hostility." "The city... will most likely fall." "When the city is about to be breached, as has always been the custom, the Jiangbei Chen family will take in some people to shelter. At least a portion will survive." The confidant nodded heavily and asked, "Then do we still defend the wall?" "We keep defending it." The gang leader shook his head with a soft sigh. "As long as we do not run into a catastrophic crisis, we hold the line. But if another major disaster like that flesh ghost tide hits, the brothers are to take their families and pull back to the gang's territory." "I am willing to exhaust the gang's foundation to defend Jiangbei City." "But I will not spend my brothers' lives on it." "Understood," the confidant answered once more. *** Meanwhile— Elsewhere, in the darkness. A cloaked man sitting cross-legged on a jade platform slowly opened his eyes. A dazzling glint shot out like solid light, and the scarlet triangles spinning slowly within his pupils gave him an intensely eerie aura. Shattered ghost stones lay strewn all around him. "Just one final step." Sitting in the rain, the man spread his arms, greedily breathing in the rain-drenched air. His eyes brimmed with yearning as he murmured, "Cultivation truly progresses fastest in the rainy season. Now, I am only one step away from advancing to ghost king!" "Jiangbei..." "Witness the birth of this king!" A moment later— "Hm?" He glanced down at the four life stones laid out before him, his brow furrowing as his expression instantly darkened. One of the life stones had already shattered. That was Qianhou's life stone. Before entering seclusion, he had commanded Qianhou to lead subordinates and demolish the walls of the two cities out on the wasteland. It seemed an accident had occurred. "How could this happen..." Anger and doubt flickered in the man's gaze. He had visited Jiangbei during the last rainy season; the city defenses of those two cities were not formidable enough to kill Qianhou. With Qianhou's ability to split apart, killing it was nearly impossible so long as it wished to flee. He fell silent. His expression shifted continuously. This meant his plan had gone awry. Without Qianhou to tear down the walls, breaching the cities would cost him a great deal of his forces. Most importantly... He needed to lay down the Blood Sacrifice Grand Array across the Jiangbei Wasteland to push through the final threshold before becoming a ghost king. Qianhou had been carrying the ghost stones and array materials. With Qianhou dead, those things were gone as well. Other things could be replaced. However, that Mountain Skeleton Embryo was a priceless treasure and the primary material for the Blood Sacrifice Grand Array. Without this natural exotic treasure, the array's potency would be greatly reduced, leaving no guarantee that he could break through to ghost king. Next year? Wait another year to prepare, and break through to ghost king in the next rainy season? The moment that thought surfaced, he snuffed it out. He had waited for this day for far too long; he could not let all his past efforts come to naught. No matter the cost, he had to ascend to ghost king during this rainy season! The man swept his gaze across the army of ghost creatures quietly crouching on the ground around him, a flicker of resolve crossing his face. Picking up two life stones from the ground, he rasped, "Qianxi." "I command you to awaken from the desert. Take the ghost stones amassed over this past year, lead your forces north to the Jiangbei Wasteland, investigate the cause of Qianhou's death, recover the lost Mountain Skeleton Embryo if possible, and assess the degree of damage to the walls of the two cities. For the remaining time, hunt at your own discretion." "Qianhu." "I command you to lead your forces across the Dead Sea. Take the ghost stones amassed over this past year and head south to the Jiangbei Wasteland. Go to Nameless Mountain to search for the Mountain Skeleton Embryo. If you cannot find it, rendezvous with Qianxi on the wasteland and await my arrival." Every word he spoke materialized into solid form, drifting through the air and leisurely sinking into the life stones in his grip. Soon, both life stones lit up at once, and text drifted from them in tangible script, manifesting upon the blank ghost skins at his side. On one ghost skin, there were only two words: "As commanded." On the other, the message was rather more complicated: "King, Nameless Mountain was the seclusion ground of that entity from a hundred and eighty years ago. Over the years, all ghost kings born on the Jiangbei Wasteland have tacitly forbidden their subordinates from approaching Nameless Mountain for fear of offending his taboo. Are we... truly to go?" "..." The man's expression grew grim, and he hesitated for a time. A hundred and eighty years ago. That person had secluded himself on Nameless Mountain to cultivate. When he broke through and prepared to leave, he casually swung a hammer, calling upon the forces of heaven and earth to nearly smash the entirety of Nameless Mountain into the ground, leaving behind an unmistakable... hammer crater. Even if he ascended to ghost king, he would have no hope of blocking that single hammer strike. They were not on the same plane of power. He had never witnessed that scene with his own eyes. Yet all these years, he had followed the rules handed down by his predecessors and never set foot near Nameless Mountain. Even knowing there was a high likelihood of finding a Mountain Skeleton Embryo on Nameless Mountain, he had never entertained the thought, choosing instead to journey far from Jiangbei to locate a specimen elsewhere.