Chapter 231: The Real Ancient Tomb

Everything inside the tomb came apart in the howling yin wind, breaking apart to show what had really been there all along.

A winding little path, dotted with ruined houses. Faded papers, black and red, pasted on the wooden doors, with withered grass roots and dried moss crumbling in the corners of the buildings.

He was still in the village, still standing where he'd started. The whole climb over the hills and through the water, the crawl down the robber's shaft, all of it had been an illusion.

The moment the illusion dropped, Zhang Yuanqing snapped his head around toward the quiet path behind him. yin energy as thick as ink was pouring out from the far end, welling up layer upon layer like heavy smoke.

Right in front of the rolling smoke was Little Goofball, bawling his eyes out.

His little limbs paddled at the ground, crying and crawling at once, pushing himself forward at a speed no baby that age had any right to move at. The smoke-like yin cloud chased him, ready at any second to swallow the round, chubby little infant spirit whole.

The little spirit servant was leaning on his master completely, the way a child leans on a parent.

A cold went straight through Zhang Yuanqing from the inside out. Every nerve in him was screaming at him to run. Every muscle seized up on reflex as adrenaline flooded them, shrieking at him not to fight. This was the sort of adrenaline response that kept one’s legs from turning to jelly while they fled.

The illusion was broken. There was still time to run.

He looked at Little Goofball, about to be swallowed up by that wall of "smoke," and his face gave one hard twitch. Then, he lowered his head and charged. Straight at Little Goofball. Straight into the tidal wave of yin energy.

Only when he began running at that terrible mass did he really understand the infant's fear. Its aura rolled over him, carrying a power he could not resist. Before the cloud even reached him, it took the courage right out of him, even though he was a Nocturnal Specter. This was the pressure that a higher tier being exerted on a lower tier one of the same class, the same way a Nocturnal Specter held sway over a spirit body.

Mid-sprint, Zhang Yuanqing shook the Yin Yang Spell Robe open and threw it on, then called out the Houtu Boots, pulling them on as he ran. His steps turned heavy all at once, each one landing with a dull thud, and the ragged panic in his chest slowly stilled.

After another dozen meters of hard running, his legs went weak and his calves began to cramp. His face was already white as paper. The closer he got to that cloud of yin energy, the more his fear climbed.

No, I can't stop, he commanded himself.

Two faint glimmers appeared out of the air and became the Thug's Gauntlets and the Burst Pistol.

Fuck it. What's there to be scared of? Everybody dies sooner or later, let's do it. The thought reared up the instant his hands closed around the two items, and it handed him a huge boost of confidence. The fear is his belly was snuffed right out.

Thud, thud, thud.

He finally reached Little Goofball, spread both arms, and crushed the infant spirit against his chest as it flung itself at him.

The inky cloud of yin energy surged up to engulf his face. Zhang Yuanqing watched as the endless rolling black opened up to reveal a pair of embroidered shoes and a pleated red skirt.

The smoke parted further upward, revealing two full, generous curves, then drew back further like a curtain, uncovering a fine jaw.

Finally, a face of ruinous beauty. Widow Li at the head of the village hadn't been wrong. The woman really was exceptional, but also very pale. Pale in a way that got under your skin.

Worst of all were her eyes. The sockets were flooded with pitch black energy, her pupils blood red like gemstones.

Zhang Yuanqing's whole body shook hard, his teeth chattering. There wasn't a drop of color left in his face. He'd gone as ghastly white as the woman in red herself. Yet his heart was beating at a speed past what it was built for, pumping so hard you could watch it move in the rise and fall of his chest.

He was filled with unspeakable terror. This was the worst enemy he'd ever faced head-on, second only to the Demon Eye Heavenly King.

The Demon Eye Heavenly King had no aura that could crush a Nocturnal Specter. The woman in red was another thing. In life she'd plainly been a powerful Nocturnal Specter—no, an Astral Envoy.

Those black-rimmed eyes with their blood bead pupils fixed themselves on Zhang Yuanqing without a shred of emotion. She slowly raised a hand. The sleeve slid back, and a pale, delicate hand came free, reaching for his throat.

Something within Zhang Yuanqing detonated. A massive jolt ran through him just as he felt himself on the edge of death, allowing him to briefly overcome the fear.

The boot on his right foot glowed with a yellow light that almost seemed solid. The muscle in his right leg swelled and split his pant leg open.

Crack!

Zhang Yuanqing whipped out a roundhouse kick, straight at the pale hand that was reaching for him.

The pale, delicate hand paused its forward momentum, turning over to face its palm sideways.

Crack!

His kick landed squarely in the commandery princess's palm. She had caught his foot.

Zhang Yuanqing heard the bones of his foot shatter with a sickening crunch. The hand looked delicate, yet held a strength beyond imagination. More terrifying still, the killing kick from the Houtu Boots hadn't so much as budged that fine pale hand.

The thought in his mind—kill her—died out quickly. I can't win. can't win.

He seemed to lose his reason, and slammed both hands together at his chest, past caring.

Boom!

A hard wall of scorching wind and crimson fire flung up the commandery princess's skirt and blew her black hair back, but her face stayed cold and rigid.

Seeing the Thug Gauntlets' ineffectiveness, Zhang Yuanqing swore inwardly. The Houtu Boots couldn't knock her back. Why the hell did I think a Transcendent-tier glove would do anything?

Worst of all, that little stunt had just burned precious life-saving seconds.

The commandery princess let go of his foot, and the pale hand shot in again, almost closing around his throat. A thin white sheet of frost crawled quickly across his neck.

At the last possible instant, Zhang Yuanqing hit the war drums button on the Cat King Speaker and summoned the Red Dancing Shoes at the same time.

Dong. Dong. Dong.

The dull, deafening drumbeat tore at the eardrums. It struck at every mind and spirit body, sending dread into the heart of anyone who heard it.

The commandery princess's hand paused for a fraction of a second, barely noticeable.

Two smears of red light wound themselves around Zhang Yuanqing's feet. The instant they finished settling in, his body dropped downward with no warning at all, opening into a full split to duck under the attacking hand.

The pupils of the commandery princess seemed to shrink when she heard the war drums. The look in them turned crueler still, as black veins appeared one after another across her pale cheeks. Her face remained stiff, but Zhang Yuanqing felt every bit of fury as it rose within her.

The drums drove her berserk? No, the drums can't do that. He blanked for a second, then something clicked.

It was Demon Lord. Demon Lord had run this dungeon back in the day. He'd have carried the Cat King Speaker too, and the drums had gotten to the commandery princess. It seemed like they'd dragged up some nasty memory of hers.

Fuck, what did that dumbass Demon Lord do to her back then? Zhang Yuanqing cursed him up and down.

Under the Red Dancing Shoes' control, his legs sprang back and launched him upward, and he tore off toward the edge of the village. The shoes weren't held down by the commandery princess' aura.

Zhang Yuanqing gritted through the pain in his right foot, killed the war drums in a hurry, and looked back.

His eyes widened. The smoke-like yin cloud had shaped itself into a palm bigger than a house and was reaching for him. In its center stood the enraged commandery princess.

The hand came down like a toppling tower, straight for the fleeing man and his yin corpse.

Zhang Yuanqing split his consciousness in two on the spot, dropped half of it into the yin corpse, and at the same time called a human-shaped membrane thin as a cicada's wing out of his inventory. The Perfect Skin.

He flung the item hard at Corpse No. 1 behind him.

Corpse No. 1, under Zhang Yuanqing's conscious control, caught it and pulled it down over its head. The membrane "melted" into a puddle of liquid and coated Corpse No. 1.

A second later, Corpse No. 1 transformed into a bright, good looking young man in his early twenties.

It was, unmistakably, Zhang Yuanqing.

This Zhang Yuanqing turned and fled down a side path, parting ways with the original.

The giant hand seemed to feel some unseen pull. It froze in midair, wavered for a moment, then chased the "Zhang Yuanqing" that was really the yin corpse.

It didn't follow me. As he sensed the tidal wave of yin rush after the corpse, Zhang Yuanqing was filled with the joy of having crawled out of the grave.

A wave of immense weakness came over him, but he didn't dare stop for a breath. He drove the Red Dancing Shoes toward the fields, toward the mountains at the back of the village. The shoes ignored terrain and cost him no stamina, so he could run flat out and make it to the tomb without pausing.

Corpse No. 1 wouldn't hold up long. No, it wouldn't be able to run far enough. The commandery princess would kill it soon enough. The tomb was the safe refuge, not the edge of the village. If given the chance, he was sure she'd hunt him down past the borders of the village.

Zhang Yuanqing flew over the pitching slopes and the great slabs of jutting rock as though it was flat ground, heading straight for the robber's shaft that was in his memory. Everything he'd seen before had been an illusion, but it hadn't been a lie. It had been an illusory realm built on top of the real thing.

He'd never been to the tomb before, yet every last piece of it had felt so grounded and realistic, from the tomb's architecture to the burial goods. That was what had fooled him. This was the truth hiding within the lie. The bronze mirror had been dug up out of the tomb. It was a place it knew, so it could build an illusory realm that was seamless.

A few minutes later, Zhang Yuanqing reached the robber's shaft he'd seen in the illusion. He had been right. The tomb sat exactly where he thought it would be.

"Off," he commanded, removing the Red Dancing Shoes, and worked his way along the narrow passage.

The red dancing shoes came tap-tap-tapping after him, a message appearing above them.

【Would you like to dance with me...】

The shoes were dogging him shamelessly, begging for a dance.

At the end of the robber's shaft, Zhang Yuanqing sprang into the burial chamber and looked around. Sure enough, there stood the clay maidservants and guards at the four corners, cracks and broken limbs and all, identical to the ones in the illusory realm.

Only then did he let himself rest, dropping flat onto the ground and sucking in ragged breaths. The air in the chamber was close and stale, plainly short on oxygen. That part didn't match the illusion.

"I actually missed that detail, ugh. I guess not having any real tomb-robbing experience cost me..."

Zhang Yuanqing sighed.

Tap tap, tap tap...

The red dancing shoes leapt into the chamber after him, came to his side, lifted its left foot, and kicked him.

【Would you like to dance with me...】

If its master didn't pay the price soon, the Red Dancing Shoes' regard for him would continue to drop, and eventually, they'd turn and hunt him.

That kick meant the shoes didn't love him anymore.

"I will, I will..." Zhang Yuanqing muttered as he hauled himself up.

Helplessly, he gritted his teeth through the splitting pain in his foot and danced one full dance with the Red Dancing Shoes.

His foot felt worse for it.

He put the shoes away and slumped back down, doing his best not to move his injured right foot.

The Houtu Boots were the only reason he had managed to tap dance through the whole thing on a foot with shattered bones.

Honest folk always did have stamina to spare.

Sometimes, an item's price was its own kind of ability. He'd beaten down his own fear, beaten back the pressure of a higher-tier being, entirely on the backs of the two Fire Sage items, the Thug's Gauntlets and the Burst Pistol.

That had been the foundation supporting everything he'd pulled off after. It had pushed him into some reckless moves, but he'd come out ahead.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, a vast pressure rolled down from above.

Zhang Yuanqing went cold inside. He curled up on instinct and tipped his head back to scan the ceiling.

The commandery princess had come hunting.

He waited nervously for a long stretch as the pressure above circled around for a good while before finally drawing off.

It's gone. Zhang Yuanqing let out a long breath, then pressed a hand to his chest in grief. A shame, though. I lost a whole yin corpse...

Using the Perfect Skin's property to make the yin corpse "bear his karma" and turn it into his stand-in had been a sudden flash of inspiration.

Fu Qingyang was right. The more dangerous the moment, the more he could break his own limits.

The Perfect Skin was cursed and a pain to use, but from a certain perspective, it was a genuine treasure.

I hope the commandery princess doesn't take my items, or this run really will be a massive loss.

Zhang Yuanqing got to his feet and turned his gaze to the passage door to the main tomb. In the earlier realm, the coffin and chests wouldn't open. He wanted to see whether, in the real world, they would.