Beneath the setting sun, lonely smoke rose over the Great Desert, where a broad road cast of solidified stone stretched straight ahead to the edge of the horizon.
An orange-red twilight suffused the boundless wasteland. The residual warm breeze before nightfall brushed across the yellow sands with rolling waves of heat, drowning out the battle cries that were already drawing to a close on the ground.
Countless mutated vultures wheeled on beating wings through the sky, their sharp beaks endlessly crying out in sharp, thrilled shrieks, blotting out the dying sun like a swarm of locusts.
Listening to the screams that drew closer and closer outside the carriage, the young man in brocade robes, who had been sitting quietly on a prayer mat sipping tea, slowly opened his eyes.
*Rustle.*
He gently drew aside the carriage curtain, and the scene outside instantly met his gaze.
Giant freight carriages, linked end to end several tens of paces away, formed a temporary wall against outside enemies.
Yet at this moment, it was already breached.
All because of the desert insect tide—the terror of every caravan in the Great Desert.
Enormous joint-legged beetles continuously swarmed in from atop the carriages and through gouged-out breaches, their mouthparts grinding out tooth-grating screeches.
The surviving guards of the Mu caravan were making a futile last stand with the spirit blades in their hands. They were all skilled experts of the Mu Family Chamber of Commerce, but the insects were simply too numerous.
Kill one, and two more crawled in, as though infinite.
Finally, at a certain moment.
As the guard commander's body was run through by the bladed leg of a green beetle, the final line of defense erected by the guards collapsed.
Fresh flesh and blood stimulated the nerves of these joint-legged beetles. The blood flowing from the heaps of corpses converged into a web of crimson rivulets across the highway, trickling down toward the yellow sands on either flank.
Mu Xingyi watched the scene before him in silence, the faint smile at the corners of his lips seemingly timeless.
Would he die?
He probably was going to die.
Waiting for death to arrive, Mu Xingyi's thoughts remained as tranquil as ever.
Given the current situation, unless he crossed paths again with a Grandmaster like Brother Zhou who was willing to lend a hand...
Ah, no.
Even if someone intervened now, it would already be too late.
Mu Xingyi's gaze swept over the utterly battered cargo carriages.
The caravan under his command was destroyed, and seven or eight tenths of the goods were lost. Even if he managed to return to the clan as the primary person in charge, he would most likely be put to death.
As he was musing,
*Thud, thud, thud!*
A hurried knocking interrupted Mu Xingyi's placid thoughts, and he instinctively looked toward the door.
This time, however, without waiting for his permission, the person outside shoved the carriage door open in haste.
It was a middle-aged, chubby man drenched in blood, holding a thick standard-issue saber whose edge was already notched. Viscous fluids of green and red covered nearly his entire body.
Uncle Di—the only trusted confidant his mother had left him.
Looking at the grim severity on a face that had always been affably jolly, Mu Xingyi asked gently, "Uncle Di, what is it?"
Di Tong stared at the young master's ever-calm, unruffled expression. After a moment of silence, he said in a deep voice, "Young Master, Young Master, you must leave immediately."
"Leave?"
Mu Xingyi murmured softly. Catching the tragic stench of blood from outside the carriage and savoring the fine, fragrant tea Brother Zhou had gifted him, he shook his head and unhurriedly uttered three words: "It is useless."
"Then please forgive my offense!"
Di Tong did not seem surprised by this response in the slightest. His pudgy hand tightened instinctively around the saber hilt as he stepped forward, speaking briskly: "I will hold the rear, and the twenty-odd iron cavalry guards will cover you with their lives. Young Master, you will definitely be able to break out of this insect tide!"
As he spoke, he reached out directly to seize Mu Xingyi's collar, hauling him up from the mat like scooping up a chick. He hoisted him onto his shoulder, ready to turn and stride out of the carriage.
Subjected to such an audacious action, Mu Xingyi showed no intention of resisting. Yet after a momentary pause, he still spoke softly to the uncle beneath him who had watched him grow up: "Uncle Di, you seem to have misunderstood.
"I am not saying we cannot break out of this insect tide. Rather, the person in the clan who wants me dead is my father."
"..."
Di Tong's hefty frame abruptly froze. The fleshy fullness of his face trembled involuntarily, his narrow eyes betraying an indescribable, helpless sorrow.
Seeing this, Mu Xingyi's smile remained unchanged. He reached out and patted the uncle's trembling back. "Since we have these final moments, why not sit and chat with me for a while, Uncle Di?"
"..." Di Tong stood speechless.
Amidst the cries of battle outside, the two sat down once more inside the carriage.
The broad blade in Di Tong's hand flashed with a trail of light as he drove it straight into the carriage's floorboards. The jade-green blood staining it immediately soiled the luxurious rug.
Yet at such a time, neither had any mind to care.
Mu Xingyi smoothed the creases in his robes, lightly adjusting his long sleeves as he poured Di Tong a cup of fragrant tea, remarking placidly, "The fragrant tea Brother Zhou gave me tastes quite fine. Rich in spiritual qi, astringent without being bitter, sweet without being cloying. It must be some sort of tribute tea."
Di Tong stared at the pale green tea in the cup, his voice sounding slightly hoarse. "Young Master, since you knew the Clan Head wanted to kill you, why did you refuse Young Master Zhou's goodwill when departing the city that day? If we had their protection..."
"Uncle Di."
Mu Xingyi shook his head with a smile. "Brother Zhou's status is extraordinary, and his visit to the Western Desert surely entails important business of his own. We met merely by chance. Imposing on him for too long would be rather unseemly."
With that, Mu Xingyi paused, letting out a soft sigh. "Moreover, even if I accepted that favor, Brother Zhou might shelter me for a time, but could he shelter me for a lifetime?"
Clutching his robes, Di Tong bit out each word: "At least you could flee..."
"My father is no fool."
Mu Xingyi poured himself a cup, smiling as he said, "That he harbored murderous intent toward me on this journey suggests he has long plotted this."
*Bang!*
Di Tong suddenly slammed a fist onto the table, splashing tea from the cups as he gritted his teeth. "Yet you never fight or vie for anything! Why must the Clan Head take your life?!"
Mu Xingyi took a silk handkerchief to wipe the water stains from the tea table, smiling as he said, "This tea is quite expensive. Don't waste it."
Saying so, Mu Xingyi turned his tranquil gaze toward the direction of the Monan Protectorate. "The reason my father wants to kill me is actually very simple. So long as I exist in this world, I am an indelible disgrace to him."
"..." Di Tong's eyes widened slightly.
Mu Xingyi smiled faintly, refilling Di Tong's cup, his tone distant and melancholy: "Yet if he wanted to kill me, all he needed was a single word and I would have ended my own life. Why drag in so many innocent souls?"
Having said that, he gently shook his head. "It is far too much trouble..."
"..."
Di Tong stared at his young master before him, picked up the cup, and downed the fragrant tea in indignation. Just as he parted his lips to speak—
*Clang!—*
Time seemed to freeze.
Accompanied by a flurry of wooden splinters, a sharp clawed appendage shattered the array formations on the carriage, pierced through the defense of the Black Tortoise wood, and, without the slightest warning, severed Di Tong's fleshy head cleanly from his shoulders!
*Squelch—*
The headless corpse kneeling before Mu Xingyi turned into a fountain, a cascade of blood spurting from the neck and instantly drenching him.
Spattered and speckled, an extraordinary crimson.
Witnessing the sudden turn of events before his eyes, Mu Xingyi's gaze remained utterly devoid of ripples. He glanced at the tea in his hand, stained with Uncle Di's blood, raised the cup, and took a gentle sip.
Savoring the sweetness of blood upon his taste buds, Mu Xingyi suddenly realized that his body was growing inexplicably exhilarated...
The next instant,
*Rumble—*
A colossal joint-legged beetle tore the carriage apart. The blast of force hurled Mu Xingyi outward, sending him rolling across the blood-soaked sand for dozens of paces before he finally came to a halt.
Enduring the dizzying haze in his head, Mu Xingyi pushed himself up from the ground with some difficulty, dusted off the dirt clinging to his clothes, and raised his eyes to survey his surroundings calmly.
The battle between the guards and the insect tide had long turned into a slaughter.
The beetles' razor-sharp limbs pierced the flesh of the guards and accompanying commoners, running through their torsos and ripping them into two halves with a single tug.
Severed limbs flew amidst scattered gore, while the wet crunching of mouthparts tearing through meat sent chills down one's spine.
Watching this gruesome sight, Mu Xingyi stood quietly where he was, waiting for death. Yet both the desert beetles and the caravan guards fighting desperately seemed to overlook him by unspoken consensus.
A dozen or so stench-ridden giant beetles swept past him, brandishing their bladed legs, but not a single one attacked him.
Seeing this, Mu Xingyi looked down at his own palms and let out a soft sigh.
Like this again.
It seemed he would not be able to die today either...
Well, no matter.
This place was several hundred li from the nearest major city under the Monan Protectorate. Given his physical condition, he would likely perish in this wasteland before he could ever walk that far.
With that thought in mind, Mu Xingyi began walking unhurriedly away from the ambushed caravan. But halfway out, his steps paused slightly. Gazing in the direction of Thousand Thorns Gorge, a hint of contemplation surfaced in his eyes.
*Since I am going to die anyway, before death comes, I might as well visit Thousand Thorns Gorge to see Wan'er one last time...*
Using Source Qi to draw over a ration pack and a waterskin, Mu Xingyi turned and began walking toward Thousand Thorns Gorge.
Twilight like woven brocade, the setting sun like blood.
Mutated vultures circling the heavens, countless beetles erupting from the earth, a butchery steeped in gore, and the young man in brocade robes who seemed entirely like an outsider.
Everything was bizarre yet strangely harmonious.
Yet this harmony lasted only for about half a quarter of an hour.
For a woman from the Western Regions, her thighs and flat belly bare, stepped without warning into the path of Mu Xingyi's advance.
She looked at him with cold eyes.
He looked at her, her features obscured beneath a sheer veil.
Treading on the yellow sand with bare feet, the Western Regions woman walked toward Mu Xingyi, unclipping a pair of ring blades from her waist as she moved.
A moment of mutual gaze,
and Mu Xingyi casually dropped the rations and waterskin he had just picked up onto the ground, then quietly closed his eyes.
Neither spoke a word.
*Squelch—*
In the quiet, the soft sound of a blade entering flesh rang out.
Feeling warm liquid splatter across his face, a smile curved at the corners of Mu Xingyi's lips.
He knew it.
That father of his would never make such an amateur oversight.
He wanted to open his eyes to look once more upon the yellow skies beneath the setting sun, but the moment he did, Mu Xingyi saw the Western Regions woman run through by a beetle's bladed leg.
It was a very, very long, slender leg blade.
Thrusting up from beneath the sands, it impaled her upward from her buttocks and jutted out through her shoulder, running entirely through the Western Regions woman's body and hoisting her into midair.
Blood trickled down along the bladed leg to the earth, yet the woman, suffering this fatal impalement, did not perish immediately.
Her eyes glared wide as she struggled to resist.
Yet in the next moment,
another slender leg blade pierced forth without warning from beneath the sand, driving straight through her brow.
With the death of the Western Regions woman, the entire earth began to tremble.
Grains of fine yellow sand danced into the air and fell, over and over, until reaching a critical threshold—
*Rumble—*
The yellow sands rippled and flew across the sky as if an earthen dragon were turning over, and a colossal joint-legged beetle, a full hundred zhang tall, emerged upon the surface.
Bathed in the sinking sunset, streams of sand drifted down from its titanic form. Bladed legs a hundred zhang long stabbed into the sand, propping up its mountainous physique like an ancient behemoth that had endured since the dawn of time!
"..."
Looking up at the insect before him, Mu Xingyi's tranquil gaze caught the folds upon its abdomen, and he saw the humanoid head gradually surfacing there.
At this moment,
a flash of sudden realization flickered through Mu Xingyi's serene peach-blossom eyes.
He finally understood why that father of his insisted on his death,
and why
his mother had never been willing to speak of his biological father...
***
*Buzz—*
Accompanied by the whistle of tearing air, a dark brown spiraling bone spike pierced cleanly through a giant beetle ten zhang tall, draining its vitality in an instant.
After the beetle died, the residual nerve impulses caused its long, slender jointed legs to curl instantly into a ball.
Glancing at the disgusting bug, Xu Yuan patted the sand and dust clinging to his clothes and said to Xiao Bai beside him with mild disdain, "Seriously, can't you keep an eye on our surroundings while you cultivate?"
Bai Muxi slowly opened her eyes, smiling radiantly as she said, "Young Master, I was watching. You just struck too quickly."
Xu Yuan rolled his eyes, somewhat exasperated. "Watching? The bug came right into visual range and you still hadn't acted?"
Bai Muxi blinked with a smile. "Thousand Thorns Gorge is crawling with these bugs everywhere. If we strike every time one enters visual range, we'll never finish killing them."
Xu Yuan sighed and said no more, quietly tossing a piece of firewood into the campfire before him, sending up a shower of sparks.
At this moment, the two were nestled inside a narrow ravine within Thousand Thorns Gorge. Steep cliff faces stretched endlessly upward; though the evening sun had not yet set, the ravine was already cast into total darkness.
After arriving in Thousand Thorns Gorge, Xu Yuan suddenly found himself missing his life back in the Wanxing Mountain Range.
Although that too had been dull, at least in the Wanxing Mountain Range he could hunt demonic beasts every day for entertainment, whereas here in Thousand Thorns Gorge, there was nothing but bugs and more bugs.
Not that they were inedible—the Western Desert indeed had a tradition of eating demon insects, and properly prepared, even venomous bugs could be made into dishes.
Crisp to the bite, with meat tender and chewy.
Yet the problem was that applied only after they were prepared.
Just looking at the huge, dense compound eyes on the heads of these enormous beetles made Xu Yuan thoroughly nauseated, let alone cooking them for dinner.
Mankind's visceral dread of joint-legged insects truly ran deep to the marrow of the bone.
Furthermore, day and night in Thousand Thorns Gorge were two completely different worlds.
By day, everything was tranquil and calm. But once night fell, the rustling and skittering of creeping bugs sounded everywhere; to say nothing of looking at them, even the mere sound was enough to sicken someone.
Over the course of more than half a month, Xu Yuan had almost reached his breaking point.
Seeing her young master brooding as he fed the fire, Bai Muxi completely dispersed her cultivation art, pursed her lips, and swept her lovely eyes around.
Several dozen palm-sized spheres of flame condensed in the air. With a flick of her finger, the fireballs shot out in all directions into the darkness.
Accompanied by a chorus of agonized screeches from the beetles, everything around them temporarily returned to stillness.
Xu Yuan glanced at Xiao Bai.
Bai Muxi blinked her pretty eyes ingratiatingly.
Xu Yuan rolled his eyes and went back to feeding the fire.
*Hah. Kindness shown only after a reminder is the cheapest of all.*
*Day one of missing the chest-binding princess.*
After the silence lasted for roughly half an hour, an ink-robed, graceful figure dropped lightly beside the campfire.
Xu Yuan looked at the treasure huntress who had toiled all day and asked with a smile, "How was it? Any discoveries today?"
Ran Qingmo slowly sat down beside Xu Yuan and said softly, "This afternoon, about a hundred li north of here, I saw a manor."
"A manor?" Xu Yuan raised an eyebrow.
Ran Qingmo thought for a moment and said earnestly, "Yes. A big sister inside wanted to invite me in to rest, but I refused."
Chapter 577