At first, the rock sheep had been somewhat wary, but after eating so much sweet red grass, it harbored no further suspicions. Even when it saw the silhouettes of the two men, it did not flee, instead following the sweet red grass as it trotted steadily up the slope.
The crest of the slope ended in a sheer cliff, a hundred feet above the ground.
The two men had strewn the sweet red grass all the way here, and the rock sheep followed, climbing higher and higher.
One turned sideways, clutching a handful of grass to guide it right to the cliff's edge, while the other slipped behind it and shoved with all his might!
The rock sheep plunged off the cliff.
"Easiest catch yet." The man wiped the sweat from his forehead. "Sheep and deer are always the stupidest, easiest beasts to take."
Yet when he peered over the edge, he froze in disbelief.
The rock sheep had not actually tumbled to the bottom. Instead, it was perched on a small, sharp outcropping just ten feet down. The protruding rock was barely the size of a pomelo, yet the sheep stood upon it without the slightest wobble, steadier than the men standing on level ground.
It was still leisurely chewing on the sweet red grass.
"Wait, what?" His companion was dumbfounded as well. "What do we do now?"
The sheep stood halfway down, marooned in midair, and there was no way they could climb down there.
The first man thought for a moment, then untied a coil of rope. "Lasso it and haul it up!"
The two tied a slipknot and were just about to cast the line when a voice suddenly spoke from behind them:
"What are you doing?"
To have someone speak from behind while committing a foul deed in the middle of nowhere was a terrifying shock.
The two instantly drew their weapons with a crisp rasp of steel and spun around.
Standing upon the cliff was a young girl of unknown origin, barely six or seven years old, with an exceedingly pale face and very large eyes.
"Is this a monster too?"
"She's human!" The man forced a broad smile. "Little girl, where did you come from?"
The girl turned and pointed toward the small town.
"Hurry back. This is no place for you."
The girl shook her head. "I can't go back."
"Why not?"
"I'm hungry!" As she uttered the word "hungry," she parted her lips, revealing two canines, slender and sharp. "I can't stay in town!"
The town was filled with sleeping people exuding the fragrant aroma of food, but she was forbidden to touch a single one, lest she cause trouble for her young master.
"Why waste your breath on her!" His companion kept one eye on the rock sheep below. The potency of sweet red grass was limited; the higher a demon sheep's cultivation, the faster it regained its wits, and the greater their trouble would be. "Push her off, quick!"
This spot was too close to town; it was bound to attract unwanted trouble.
The moment she heard the words "push her off," the girl let out a piercing shriek.
In the dead of night, her cry was a weaponized screech that drilled into their brains, making their scalps tingle with numbness.
The sharp, resonant scream echoed over the valley, startling every night bird having a sweet dream nearby and sending them up in a flurry of noisy chirping.
Damn it, this was bad.
Both men reached out simultaneously to seize her, but just as their hands were about to close around her, the little girl vanished into thin air.
"A ghost?"
The thought had barely crossed their minds when a small figure materialized on the shoulders and back of one of the men.
The girl was clinging to his back.
The man grabbed her hair, trying to tear her away. But she opened her mouth and sank her teeth directly into his carotid artery!
*Gulp, slurp.* He could actually hear the sound within his own blood vessels.
Blood was forcibly drawn from his limbs and viscera, surging through the ruptured artery and clamoring to be swallowed into her mouth.
This little girl was undeniably a monster—an out-and-out fiend!
Worst of all, as she drank his blood, her fangs simultaneously pumped a frigid yin fiend aura into his body, plunging him into an icy abyss and leaving him unable to even raise an arm!
Seeing his comrade on the verge of being drained dry, the other man was appalled. He swung his blade, aiming to sever the girl's head.
No matter what kind of monster she was, she couldn't cause trouble without a head, could she?
Right then, the wind stirred behind him. A tremendous force slammed into his lower back, catapulting him more than ten feet away!
As he flew through the air head over heels, he caught sight of the rock sheep.
The sheep had climbed back up already?
The effects of the sweet red grass had worn off so quickly?
He should consider himself fortunate that the rock sheep's horns did not thrust straight forward like a common goat's; otherwise, two bloody holes would have been punched through his waist.
Even so, he was in agony. The slightest movement sent excruciating pain searing through his spine.
A headbutt from a rock sheep could shatter solid bedrock and send tigers and leopards flying; striking a man into partial paralysis was effortless.
The man struggled to his feet, the pain in his back nearly blinding him.
Looking over at his companion, the once burly man had collapsed like an empty sack of rice, his eyes bulging wildly. The little girl still had her teeth clamped into him, refusing to let go, her own eyes having turned blood-red.
Damn it. Now there were two monsters—a two-on-one.
Just then, another voice sounded from the slope. "What's going on here?"
The man turned his head and saw, to his horror, two more uninvited guests.
One of them beckoned to the girl. "Taozi, come here."
The girl dropped the man she was holding, darted over like an arrow, and hid behind him, looking utterly terrified.
The surviving man cursed furiously in his heart. *Who in the hell is the one terrified here?!*
The newcomers were, of course, Fu Shanyue and He Lingchuan.
The moment they heard the shriek, they had rushed over. Both were masters of light-foot techniques, and this low slope was only about two thousand feet from the town, allowing them to arrive one after the other in mere moments.
Taozi immediately cut straight to the point: "Young Master, this man wanted to steal our sheep!"
He Lingchuan narrowed his eyes.
The man hastened to say, "We didn't know the sheep belonged to anyone! Our apologies—we only wanted to hunt a wild sheep for meat!"
Taozi pointed toward the cliff. "They tried to push me off!"
Fu Shanyue cracked his knuckles with two crisp pops. "Are you going to jump yourself, or do you need us to lend a hand?"
One against four—how could he possibly fight? The man's face twisted in despair, and he walked toward the cliff's edge step by step.
Everyone expected him to put up some final struggle, but to their surprise, he pushed off with his feet and leaped cleanly over the edge!
"Eh?" He Lingchuan darted to the cliff's edge and looked down. "That resolute?"
It was the first time he had seen someone forced off a cliff jump so cleanly, far bolder than he had been.
Though the rain had stopped, the moon remained hidden behind thick layers of clouds. The surroundings were pitch-black, and beneath the cliff was a pool of total darkness.
Yet with He Lingchuan's sharp eyesight, he still caught a brief flicker of something moving in the dark after the man plummeted.
Fu Shanyue stepped forward, preparing to jump down after him.
He Lingchuan grabbed him by the collar and yanked him back, uttering just two words: "A trap!"
Nor was he idle himself. He drew his blade, Fusheng, and hurled it straight into the darkness where the sheep thief had disappeared.
A wretched scream instantly echoed from below.
Fusheng never missed; there was no telling where the sheep thief had been struck.
At the same time, however, He Lingchuan heard a dull *thud*, as though the blade had struck something else—something remarkably hard and blunt, unlike metal.
The sheep thief had jumped, yet there was no sound of a body hitting the ground.
Instead, something seemed to stir in the darkness.
"There's something down there," He Lingchuan said at once. "Someone is receiving him."
No wonder the thief had jumped so decisively.
"Pursue!" Fu Shanyue wasted no words, sliding down a crevice in the rocks.
He Lingchuan was already well accustomed to Fu Shanyue's relentless temperament. He leaped onto the rock sheep's back and bounded down the opposite side of the cliff.
With him and Fu Shanyue forming a pincer movement from both sides, the enemy could only flee due north.
The northern terrain was flat and easy to pursue across.
Taozi lay sprawled at the edge of the cliff, eyes wide as she watched.
No person or monster emerged from below.
The two descended the cliff at blinding speed, barely slower than jumping straight down, and reached the bottom in the blink of an eye.
He Lingchuan pulled a handful of fluorescent grass from his storage ring and flung it outward.
A gentle glow immediately illuminated the bottom of the cliff.
It was completely bare. There was nothing at all, save for several barren boulders with patches of grass growing in the fissures.
The two exchanged a glance, both sensing something amiss.
Where was the sheep thief who had jumped down?
Where was the person receiving him?
Where was the trap?
How could there not be a single trace?
Fu Shanyue stepped forward and pressed his hands against the large boulders several times to ensure it was not an illusion.
Although he possessed origin power, which should have allowed him to see through illusions, checking by hand was safer. After all, the world was vast and full of wondrous things.
"Nothing."
"There was a massive creature down here just now," He Lingchuan asserted. "Either a living beast or a vehicle."
"They must have used an escape technique." Fu Shanyue hissed softly. "Someone skilled in the earth escape technique in this day and age is rare indeed." With that, he drew his purple-gold hammer and pounded the ground twice with heavy thuds.
This artifact was designed specifically to shatter illusions and barriers.
The ground trembled, but no anomaly was shaken out.
Fu Shanyue looked up and called to the little girl on the cliff, "Taozi, see anything?"
Taozi shook her head. "Nothing at all!"
She stood high above, scanning the surroundings in search of any moving objects.
"An earth escape technique only covers a few dozen feet; they couldn't have gotten far." Having used the ability himself, Fu Shanyue naturally spoke with authority. "They must have combined it with an illusion."
"They sure ran fast." He Lingchuan was inspecting the boulders below the cliff. "Yet the grass in the fissures has been flattened."
So his earlier observation had been correct: whatever it was, it was large.
Fu Shanyue sniffed the air and pointed. "Blood."
Fresh blood was splattered across the blades of grass.
Judging by the volume of blood, the sheep thief was severely wounded.
He Lingchuan picked up a branch and used it to lift something from the ground. "Hey, what's this?"
Transparent, sticky, and stretchable...
"Looks like snot." Fu Shanyue also grimaced in disgust. "Or slime left behind by some creature."
He Lingchuan carefully stored the slime-coated branch and the blood-spattered grass into his storage ring.
The two climbed back up the cliff to inspect the other sheep thief's corpse.
Indeed, the unfortunate wretch had already been drained dry by Taozi, showing no vital signs by the time they had arrived.
Fu Shanyue examined the wound on the man's neck and exclaimed in surprise, "Taozi, how long were you drinking?"
"From the moment I screamed until you arrived, Young Master," Taozi mumbled timidly, fearing his rebuke. "I don't know why, but I was so hungry!"
That couldn't have been more than ten-odd breaths of time. How could a newly born earth fiend child drain a full-grown man completely dry in that span?
He Lingchuan asked in an undertone, "Do earth fiend children drink blood too?"
"They do, but it shouldn't be this ferocious." Fu Shanyue scooped Taozi up, inspecting her eyes and teeth, and even took her pulse.
The look on his face was strange, a mix of astonishment and pride.
"Young Master, is something wrong with me?"
Chapter 436