Aberrant Ghost

Two quarters of an hour later, The battle was drawing to a close. The once-even, lush mountain forest had collapsed in jagged swaths, piece by piece, and much of the ground remained blanketed in residual ice crystals from the clash. *Boom!!* With one final roar, the fighting ceased, and an eerie, terrifying quiet settled over everything. The burly man lay flat on his back in the center of a massive crater, gazing up at the still sky where the full moon hung high. He let out a long breath. "Phew... It's finally over." With that, he lay quietly for several breaths before struggling to his feet, lingering dread still visible in his eyes. Those two had truly been formidable just now, but fortunately, they had grown careless. Thinking this, the burly man gave a slight shake of his head, casually scooped up a severed hand dripping with blood from beside him, and ambled slowly toward the edge of the crater. Next to his crater was a river flowing down from the mountain range, but the river valley carved by this stream had now run dry—fallen trees and rubble-strewn hollows gouged out by the aftershocks of the battle had cut off the river midway. Sweeping his gaze around, the burly man quickly spotted his target: A short-haired, one-armed old man standing beside the dry river valley. Approaching him, the one-armed, short-haired elder glanced back at the burly man, his voice neither warm nor cold: "Are you all right?" The burly man managed a strained smile and said in a low voice, "My injuries aren't too bad. Too bad about Zhou Jing—" "Number Two!" The old man cut off his attempt to speak her name. They could not leave behind the slightest trace. "..." The burly man was taken aback, then nodded and corrected himself: "Too bad Number Three is dead." With that, he glanced toward the woods a hundred zhang away. A corpse lay there. It belonged to the plump woman; she had been frozen into an ice sculpture, then had her chest blasted through with a single punch. The short-haired elder seemed utterly indifferent to their companion's death, saying softly: "No matter. Number Three's life is of no consequence." The burly man was somewhat displeased by the old man's cold-bloodedness, but in the end he said nothing. He glanced in the direction where that woman's Source Qi had vanished earlier: "Then what about Ran Qingmo?" The short-haired elder replied in a low voice: "It does not matter. She is already heavily wounded, and with the mark I placed on her, she won't get far. I'll pursue her shortly." "What if you can't catch up?" the burly man hesitated. "That woman likely still has cards up her sleeve." The short-haired elder hesitated briefly before saying, "No matter. For a third-rank cultivator, making a round trip to the nearest county seat from Shengshan would take about three days. That is more than enough time for us to destroy all traces. It's just that the plan may have to be postponed a bit, as we've most likely dragged the Chancellor's Manor into this." Pausing, the burly man lowered his voice and asked the elder again: "What about that man from earlier?" The short-haired elder said nothing, merely pointing toward a large crater in the center of the river valley not far away. The burly man swept a glance over there. The flesh and blood of the man who had launched that sudden ambush had completely vanished, leaving only a withered skeleton and a blood-red robe lying quietly in the middle of the crater. Pulling back his gaze, a trace of amusement entered the burly man's eyes: "If this fellow had ambushed me or Number Two, the three of us really might have fallen here; too bad he chose to ambush an old man like you." The short-haired elder glanced at the burly man and said softly: "Some of this person's methods are quite bizarre. His cultivation is merely around the seventh rank, yet he could unleash Source Qi around the third rank, seemingly through external aids." Hearing this, the burly man chuckled. "You old codger have the nerve to call someone else's cultivation technique bizarre? Yours is the one that's truly bizarre. To tell the truth, there are times I feel you're hardly human anymore." With that, the burly man tossed the severed hand he was holding over to the short-haired elder. "Hmph." The short-haired elder gave a cold grunt, caught it effortlessly, and jammed the severed hand directly against the stump of his wound. After a moment of silence, a bizarre aura surged. In the blink of an eye, flesh and blood began to writhe. Countless granulation buds sprouted and connected at the stump, and in the end, the entire arm—flesh and bone—was seamlessly rejoined. The burly man watched the scene before him, fell silent for a moment, and clicked his tongue in wonder: "Old man, is that a secret technique or a cultivation method? You don't even die when your head gets chopped off. Rebirth from a drop of blood is a technique of the Origin Realm." The short-haired elder shot him a cold glare and said: "Cut the crap. I'll clean up the traces of battle here. Hurry back to control the array and slaughter everyone inside Shengshan County. That Ran Qingmo escaped; whether I can catch her or not, we must make haste to tie up loose ends." Hearing this, the burly man's expression turned solemn, and he said in a low voice: "Then I'll head back to the array control node first. Come over once you've cleaned up here." "Mm." With those words, the burly man regulated his breathing briefly, then turned into an afterimage, speeding off into the distance. Yet the direction he headed was not toward Shengshan County, but deeper into the interior of the Wanxing Mountain Range. The short-haired elder watched him disappear into the distance, shook his head gently, and walked slowly toward the spot where the blood-robed man had died. Stopping beside the withered skeleton, the elder gazed at it for several breaths, shaking his head slightly. "To think these clothes are completely undamaged. The material is truly peerless. Too bad I cannot use it; I can only find an opportunity to have an auction house sell it off." As he spoke, the short-haired elder bent down to pick it up. Yet at that moment, several lustrous, shimmering cherry blossom petals drifted down from behind him. Seeing this, the short-haired elder's fingertips froze. He remembered that there were no cherry blossom trees nearby. What was more, the current season was not when cherry blossoms bloomed. Whipping his head around, the short-haired elder saw two familiar figures behind him—one illusory, one solid—chatting and laughing together. The blood-robed man gave a low laugh and said: "See, Old Man Luo? I told you I could handle it myself, but you just wouldn't stop worrying." The illusory figure of the middle-aged scholar replied with a chuckle: "For a brat of merely the seventh rank to comprehend a Dao Charm so thoroughly, this old man can admit I underestimated you. Besides, this Meishen Dao Charm truly is quite profound." "..." Beholding the scene before him, the short-haired elder's constricted pupils trembled slightly. Then, he noticed everything around him beginning to change. The blood-red robe lying quietly on the ground had vanished, replaced by the withered skeleton of a woman, while his own lower body had already been frozen into an ice sculpture. A bone-chilling frost was continuously creeping upward. Meishen Dao Charm... Connecting that with the words he had just overheard, the short-haired elder instantly realized he had fallen into the enemy's illusion and slain his own companion: "You... What is this? What's going on?! Impossible!" "Nothing is impossible. That companion of yours called 'Number Two' has already led Ran Qingmo to the array control node." With that, Xu Yuan ignored the old man's low shout and turned to ask the Saint's remnant soul: "Old Man Luo, this person's cultivation technique is so bizarre. Have you ever seen anything like it before? I ambushed him, only to be ambushed in turn. I nearly capsized in a ditch." The Saint's remnant soul shook his head. "I know not." Xu Yuan clicked his tongue, a hint of disdain in his eyes: "Tsk... How come you know nothing at all?" "What's your hurry, brat?" The Saint's remnant soul's voice carried an unhurried smile: "Though this old man has never seen a similar cultivation technique, I have seen a similar creature. In fact, this old man is exceedingly familiar with such creatures." Xu Yuan frowned: "Creature... What do you mean?" The Saint's remnant soul fixed his gaze on the elder, who was gradually being frozen into an ice sculpture, grinned, and uttered two words: "Aberrant ghost."