Do You Know Your Crime?

The two monsters thought with one mind and pulled with united strength, unleashing astonishing power. Amid the gasps of the onlookers, He Lingchuan had already been buried up to his waist. The youngest ferry ghost whelp's back was instantly struck by seven or eight weapons, turning into a mangled mess of flesh and blood. Xu Chun produced a short spear from nowhere and impaled it clean through. Willow, Skinny, and Duan Xinyu pulled on He Lingchuan with all their might, trying to yank him out like a scallion from the mud. Ignoring the pain, the whelp pulled the sleeve arrow's head from its chest and backhanded Xu Chun, sending him flying ten feet into the rock wall before it threw back its head and roared. As if answering the summons, the distant bone puppets abruptly accelerated by thirty percent! Its savagery aroused by the wounds, the ferry ghost whelp suddenly erupted with terrifying ferocity, battling the patrolmen without falling. Its strikes were devastatingly heavy. Even Door Plank was sent flying more than four feet back along with his shield. Skinny took an accidental blow as well; with a sharp snap, his left arm broke, and he was flung against the wall, his skull nearly fractured. Fortunately, this violent strike inadvertently dragged He Lingchuan out of the ground, exposing the head of the second ghost whelp hiding beneath the rock. He Lingchuan did not hesitate. Sweeping his blade along the ground, he severed its head in a single stroke. With a dull clatter, the ghost's head rolled twice across the floor. "Pick it up, hurry!" Green fluid splashed into He Lingchuan's eyes before he could wipe it away. He rolled forward and caught the whelp's head in his arms, not daring to let it touch the ground again. This bizarre underground palace absorbed the power of dead whelps and funneled it to the strongest surviving one. The youngest was formidable enough already; it could not be allowed to gain the power to drag people into the earth anytime and anywhere. Right then, a searing agony shot through He Lingchuan's eye, forcing him to clutch his face with a low groan. "The medicinal powder, quick!" Willow flurried to sprinkle powder into his eye, but it seemed too late. Fighting through the blinding pain, He Lingchuan forced his eyes open. His left eye could register only red and white, unable to form a coherent image. The green fluid had gotten inside. This left eye… was likely blind. Glancing toward the headless corpse, Duan Xinyu had grabbed it and pinned it to the wall with a long spear. A gap separated the body from the rock wall, preventing them from touching. As long as there was no contact, the cavern could not absorb the whelp's remaining strength. He Lingchuan impaled the severed head onto the spear as well. By now, the army of bone puppets had finally arrived. With a mighty leap, the youngest ghost whelp landed in their midst. Dozens of surrounding bone puppets converged on it, quickly melding into an ivory-white suit of bone armor that shimmered faintly. The armor provided seamless protection, even sprouting sharp barbs at the joints. A bloody ghost whelp had transformed in the blink of an eye into an imposing general of bone, radiating murderous intent. Snapping off a rib from one of the bone puppets, it ground the bone down with a few brisk rubs, honing it into a jagged sword. The moment it raised the sword, the puppet army surged like a tide toward their prey. The ferry ghost whelp had run out of patience. Besides, some unsettling change seemed to have occurred outside the underground palace; it had to end this battle quickly. The patrolmen unleashed their supernatural arts in succession. Wiping away the blood and sweat from his face, He Lingchuan pushed himself up against the wall and slashed his saber toward the first lunging bone puppet! *** Chifeng Town. The sun slanted westward. The landslide clearance was nearly complete, with only the last few rods remaining blocked. The mountain spirit perched atop the jagged peak had not been idling either, using its magic to reinforce the weathered boulders poised to tumble from the heights, ensuring they would not fall for at least a day or two. Headman Hu came to inspect the progress for the fourth time, craning his neck to peer down the mountain road. Naturally, the far end remained deathly quiet, devoid of human voices. The patrolmen who had entered the mine shaft had yet to emerge. Just then, the hurried clatter of hooves echoed from afar, sounding like seven or eight mounts. Headman Hu's expression shifted slightly. Holding up his torch, he turned back and soon caught sight of dark red armor. The Gale Army! The incident here had actually alerted the Gale Army? Seeing this from above, the leopard demon leapt down from the rock and bounded over at a swift trot. The galloping horses reined to a halt right before Headman Hu. The leading figure pulled hard on the reins, and the steed reared up on its hind legs before settling into absolute stillness. Another rider galloped forward from behind. The rider was Hu Min. He dismounted and demanded immediately, "Headman Hu?" "Ah, yes!" Headman Hu lost his composure. "My lords, wh-what has happened?" He suddenly caught sight of the leading commander's face, and his eyes went wide with terror. "How long have those three patrol squads been inside?" Headman Hu stammered, "Nearly... nearly four hours?" Hu Min nodded, then abruptly asked, "Do you know your crime?" "Ah?" Headman Hu panicked. "Wh-what crime could I have committed? Please don't..." At that moment, the mount of the figure behind Hu Min snorted loudly. Headman Hu shuddered, a warm stream trickling down between his legs. A cold voice spoke. "Shi Ying, the patrolmen have not returned yet?" It turned out the leopard demon was named Shi Ying. Though a local mountain spirit and Zhong Shengguang's own spirit pet, it flattened its ears submissively and replied: "Not yet, General." "Why didn't you go with them?" The tip of Shi Ying's tail twitched, but it dared not utter a sound, abandoning its earlier excuse about supervising the roadwork. Hadn't it simply wanted to slack off? Back then, it had no idea the monster inside the mine shaft had already devoured over a hundred people. "Hu Min, interrogate him thoroughly." Even the speaker's cloak was a vivid red. "The rest of you, follow me." The soldiers responded in unison: "Yes, General!" Headman Hu squeezed out a desperate cry with all his might: "Spare me, General Red!" Unfortunately, no one answered. Watching them turn into the mountain pass, Headman Hu sprawled in the snow, sweating profusely. "Thirty-seven miners were lost. Excluding the two who escaped, thirty-five were killed," Hu Min's voice echoed above him. "Hah, an incident occurred in the mine, yet you stalled for two whole days before reporting it! During those two days, you secretly gathered outsiders to enter the shaft—at least forty to fifty men—and not a single one came out, did they? Add the patrolmen who went in today, and the toll is nearly ninety!" Headman Hu's face drained of all color, his lips trembling violently. He dropped to his knees and knocked his head repeatedly against the ground, crying out with each bow: "Mercy, my lord! I was only following orders! Have mercy!" "Do you have any idea what a disaster your cover-up has caused?" Hu Min fought the urge to kick him square in the forehead, mindful of the figures behind him. "Over the past two days, the monster inside went north and devoured an entire village—another seventy or eighty souls!" Headman Hu's head buzzed, numb with shock. "In just three days, that monster found the time to devour a hundred and seventy people, not even counting the local spirits and wild beasts!" Headman Hu pleaded instinctively, "My lord, that village has nothing to do with me! I had no idea the monster went out to hunt!" "Fascinating. Why didn't it eat you lot, then?" Hu Min stroked his chin. "You were clearly closer. Why bypass you and travel all the way north?" Headman Hu's voice was faint. "I-I don't know either. We're just a mining town!" Aside from mining and smelting ore, they did nothing else. "Start talking. Why delay reporting for two days, and who did you contact to recruit those forty or fifty extra men?" Hu Min said coldly. "Confess who is behind this, and your sentence might be mitigated." The terrifying severity of Panlong City's punishments flashed through Headman Hu's mind. He nearly pressed his forehead into the earth. *** Since the road leading to the mine had yet to be cleared of the blockage, General Red led his men on foot. Less than half an incense stick's time later, the Chifeng mine tunnel came into view. Half-hidden by large trees, the opening looked no different from when He Lingchuan and the others had arrived, with the nearby low huts swallowed by the mountain's looming shadow. Situated on the northern slope, the entrance already appeared faintly sinister, resembling the gaping maw of a beast waiting for prey to plunge inside. General Red asked the sand leopard, Shi Ying, "How many mountain spirits and wild beasts have gone missing around here?" "More than thirty." In other words, within three days, the creature within had consumed nearly two hundred living beings. No beast, no matter how depraved, would slaughter so excessively unless hunting as a pack. "A sizable number," General Red murmured, almost to himself. "Yet it also indicates the strongest ferry whelp was born only three or four days ago." The elite soldier of the Gale Army behind him asked, "General, shall we enter the mine?" "No rush." To an ordinary bystander, the wooded mountain looked serene and still; but in General Red's eyes, sinister energy surged toward the heavens, and the lingering malice of the newly dead roiled upward as if defying the True Solar Fire itself. The moment he neared the mountain, he could sense the presence of the so-called 'divine child.' This newly spawned ferry whelp was exceedingly arrogant, making no effort to conceal its aura. Such arrogance and such an insatiable appetite would actually make things simpler. General Red drew out an open-mouthed golden alms bowl from somewhere. Slightly smaller than a washbasin, its base was supported by three feet carved in the likeness of hornless chilong dragons. He instructed the mountain spirit Shi Ying to lead the soldiers in gathering snow from the branches of ancient trees—specifically, ancient scholar-trees—and place it into the bowl. Various trees blanketed the mountains, and scholar-trees older than two hundred years were everywhere. The snow melted into water upon touching the bowl. Looking down from General Red's angle, the bottom was not flat, but rippled with contours. As he stroked the bowl's rim, the vessel began to morph rapidly, gradually taking on the likeness of mountains and rivers. Ridges and valleys formed, and soon, even miniature low huts and a cavern entrance emerged… It was an exact miniature of the Chifeng mining area where they stood. Even the gnarled postures of the two trees outside the mine entrance were reproduced identically. It was virtually a scale model at the bottom of the bowl. Now, they lay submerged beneath the rippling water. General Red then dipped a finger inside and stirred in a clockwise circle. No one could tell whether he was chanting an incantation, but the surrounding air suddenly began to stir. The wind grew fiercer, forcing even the guards to retreat several paces. Mist began to billow from within the golden alms bowl, turning from faint wisps into dense vapor that soon shrouded the entire basin. Curiously, the mist rose only as high as the rim, as though held back by an invisible lid, churning restlessly within. Before long, nothing remained inside the bowl but thick, roiling vapor. General Red withdrew his hand, yet the mist continued to surge as though something were slithering beneath the surface. In the blink of an eye, a dorsal fin broke through the mist—a very long, unbroken ridge followed by a sinuous tail that wound through the sea of fog like a serpent or crocodile, carrying an imposing presence. Then, it revealed its true form upon the sea of mist: A miniature flood dragon. Though composed entirely of vapor, its sharp horns, scales, whiskers, and jaw were vividly defined, without the slightest detail spared.