At the edge of the cliff.
The crowd had launched a collective attack on Du Yifeng and his companion. However, despite Du Yifeng’s mediocre cultivation level, his methods were startling.
The Du family was, after all, an established clan. Setting aside cultivation and swordsmanship, the spiritual treasures and elixirs held by Du Yifeng and Du Yuxi were a level above those of their fellow disciples; naturally, the others were no match for them.
Yet, they had managed to stall long enough for Ruo Zhiwei and the conscious disciples to escape. Most of those capable of fleeing had already scattered. Du Yuxi, gripping his sword and gasping for breath, looked around to see fallen fellow disciples strewn everywhere.
Du Yuxi was a kind-hearted youth. He still didn’t understand what was happening; he had simply stood by his brother’s side out of instinct. He had exercised restraint, merely knocking the others unconscious.
However, seeing that everyone had been incapacitated, Du Yifeng was in no hurry to approach the wooden cart. He was injured himself, and his movements were somewhat labored as he wobbled across the hillside toward the nearest fallen disciple.
Du Yifeng lazily stepped on the man’s head. Then, pulling a sharp dagger with his left hand, he slashed heavily across the man’s throat—blood sprayed out instantly. He didn’t even blink, looking for all the world like an asura-possessed demon.
“……!!” Du Yuxi was visibly terrified by his own brother.
They had already defeated these people, and they truly lacked any power to resist. Du Yifeng could have simply taken what he wanted and left. Instead, he was now murdering his fellow disciples to silence them.
No… silencing them was useless. Du Yifeng had already set himself against the Haiqian Sect. Many had escaped earlier, not to mention Senior Sister Song, whom they could never hope to defeat. The Haiqian Sect would surely retaliate against the Du family in the future.
Du Yifeng had to be utterly insane to act this way…
Seeing a second person about to fall victim to Du Yifeng’s blade, Du Yuxi lunged forward, his trembling hand grabbing Du Yifeng’s steady wrist.
His chest was still heaving, yet he watched as Du Yifeng—half his face splattered with blood and looking disheveled—raised his eyes. The murderous intent in his gaze was indifferent, yet chillingly calm.
“Yuxi, let go.”
Du Yuxi did not let go. He asked tremulously, “Is Brother going to kill me too?”
Du Yifeng let out a sneer. He shook his head and said, “You are a good child and my own blood. Why would I kill you?” Moreover, in his current state, he couldn’t easily kill Du Yuxi; it would only result in them perishing together.
He continued, “If you cannot bear to watch my actions, you are free to go down the mountain and return to the Sect to report my deeds. The Du family might even be spared the consequences.”
From his words, it was clear that Du Yifeng knew exactly what he was doing.
Because of this, Du Yuxi was even more confused.
He stood dazed for a moment before slowly releasing his grip. “Then why is Brother doing this…?”
Squelch—the warm blood of the man beneath his feet splattered onto the faces of the two brothers, who shared eighty percent of their features.
Du Yifeng first calmly confirmed that everyone on the ground had breathed their last. Then he spoke: “Those Ruo Zhiwei took away are all newly joined inner disciples whose cultivation is inferior to yours… In the battle just now, only Qin Hang fled when he saw things going south. He will likely choose to regroup with Ruo Zhiwei…”
Du Yifeng sighed slightly, returned to the side of the shivering Du Yuxi, and patted his shoulder.
“Follow me.”
The two returned once more to the highest point of the cliff. The red moon had reached its zenith; even before they drew near, the ground beneath them was bathed in a blood-red glow.
Du Yuxi finally saw the eerie wooden cart clearly. He frowned deeply; there was clearly nothing on top of it.
He wasn’t sure if it was a trick of his mind, but a dark shadow seemed to be wriggling beside the cart, using a long, thin tongue to take something from it.
Du Yifeng didn’t see that thing; his focus was entirely on the expression of the person beside him. Du Yuxi felt that he was simply dazed by the shock he had endured.
“Yuxi, you truly are a fine talent with a pure heart and a firm Will of Dao,” Du Yifeng said with a faint, imperceptible sneer at the corner of his mouth.
Du Yuxi looked at him in confusion, but Du Yifeng said no more and walked toward the moonlight.
The wooden cart was clearly empty, and the moonlight was heavy with demonic energy, as if it had already tainted the slopes of Mount Wangyue. Yet, Du Yifeng calmly reached out and picked up what he saw.
Having killed so many, his state of mind was already placid. But when he flipped open the pages, his pupils dilated violently, and his cheek twitched uncontrollably.
Thinking he was having a fit, Du Yuxi hurried over.
He had watched with his own eyes as Du Yifeng picked up “this thing” from the empty cart, after which Du Yifeng’s expression became like that of one possessed.
Seeing him approach, Du Yifeng spread the ancient book open before his eyes.
“Look, what is this?”
As he recognized the handwriting on the ancient tome, Du Yuxi’s pupils also contracted in disbelief.
In their family, a legend circulated: an ancestor of the Du family had ventured deep into the Demon Realm and brought back unimaginable wealth, which allowed the originally impoverished Du clan to prosper. That ancestor, defying the world’s taboos, had written a demonic chronicle titled Oddities of the Realms.
It wasn’t just the Du family; most of the prominent families in Songshan Province and even the entire continent had ancestors who made their fortunes by finding treasures in the Demon Realm.
However, if mortals frequently entered and exited the Demon Realm without a sound mind, they were easily corrupted by demonic energy—giving rise to the common concept of “Nightmares.” Later, the cultivation world intervened, forbidding mortals from entering the Demon Realm at will.
The Du family ancestor happened to be among the last group of mortals to successfully return. Behind the back of the righteous path, he secretly wrote Oddities of the Realms. But it wasn’t long before word leaked out from within the family; the ancestor was killed, and the book was burned and destroyed.
Yet Du Yifeng believed that the Du family—no, every family—had some information regarding the treasures of the Demon Realm passed down through the generations!
When Du Yifeng was a child, he was fortunate enough to see a small booklet containing a few transcribed lines of Oddities of the Realms. But now, before his eyes, was the very thing he had yearned for and set his will to find: the original chronicle written by the Du ancestor!
He saw the look of disbelief on Du Yuxi’s face as his brother murmured, “Wasn’t it burned… Why would it appear here?”
Du Yifeng tucked it into his robes like a precious treasure, his face beaming with an excited smile and his eyes burning with ambition. He glanced at the red moon hanging over Mount Zizhong.
“Yuxi, you are just like the others… you truly know nothing about demonic cultivators.”
“If it was done by demonic cultivators, then isn’t it extremely dangerous!” Du Yuxi exclaimed in alarm.
Du Yifeng smiled, trying to soothe him.
“Demonic cultivators are indeed terrifying, but there is a kind of power they possess that makes one envious beyond measure.”
Du Yuxi gazed at the man before him. His nose was beaded with cold sweat; his entire body was stiff with an extraordinary fear.
Sure enough, Du Yifeng walked down lazily. He turned back, looking over with the slightly reddened corners of his eyes tilted upward—or perhaps he wasn’t looking at him at all—and left behind a faint, final sentence.
“The human heart itself can fall into the demonic path.”
“……”
Beneath the branches of a tree not far away, Qin Hang watched the two brothers with a pair of cold, piercing eyes. His knuckles had turned white from gripping his weapon so tightly.
Shasha… shasha…
In the sound of the wind, aside from the rustling of footsteps treading on withered leaves, there came the sound of faint, mournful sobbing.
At the front of the group, Ruo Zhiwei, who had been focused on leading the way, couldn’t help but stop and look back at the junior disciples behind her.
They followed in a scattered, disoriented line. Of the senior disciples who could protect them, only Ruo Zhiwei and Nan Ji remained. So much time had passed without any other seniors regrouping with them that everyone understood the grim reality: the others had likely met a tragic end.
“Wooo… hmmm…”
It was unclear who started it. Perhaps it was the oppressive, dim environment where no sunlight could reach, or perhaps it was the uncertainty of their own survival. They could have faced a legendary demonic cultivator in a fierce battle, but instead, the majority of their comrades had been slaughtered by a traitor.
In any theater of war, such an event would be a devastating blow to morale.
As Ruo Zhiwei stopped, the others halted as well, covering their faces and weeping.
“Sigh…” Ruo Zhiwei felt a sense of helplessness, but after allowing them a moment to vent their emotions through tears, she spoke in a cold, steady voice.
“Crying like this isn’t the solution.” Her calm tone forced them to raise their eyes.
“If you don’t want to experience something like this again, the only way is to work harder to become stronger and improve your own power.”
“If you still wish to find the demonic cultivators, recover the remains of your fellow disciples, and leave Mount Wangyue, then dry your tears and keep moving forward.”
Her words served as a wake-up call.
Indeed, the Sect’s mission was for them to find the hidden lair of the demonic cultivators and kill them if they were able. Even if this battle was impossible to win, they could not return empty-handed.
One disciple raised their voice: “Senior Sister Ruo, let’s search the mountain further.”
The others agreed in unison. Seeing this, Ruo Zhiwei nodded with a sense of relief.
Nan Ji wanted to say something, but he realized that even if they returned now, the mindset of these disciples would be difficult to change. Ruo Zhiwei was right.
The path the group took to descend the mountain was diverted midway as they turned toward the back of the mountain.
Along the way, they encountered only small forest animals, but soon even those disappeared, leaving only silence in the woods.
The back of Mount Wangyue faced the Demon Realm and Mount Zizhong directly. It was shaped like the slope of a shoe—a trapezoid. As the group circled around from the cliffside, the path gradually leveled out.
It was difficult to notice in the gloom, but the withered leaves beneath their feet became fewer, and the earth grew softer.
Someone accidentally discovered that weeds and vines were growing on the previously parched land. The leaves of the vines were round, plump, and very much alive.
Only the trees remained in a state of lingering death.
“There seems to be someone up ahead!”
A disciple spotted something. The group emerged from the woods to find a vast expanse of fields. The farmland stretched out boundlessly, and a small mountain village sat nestled in the distance.
“There really is a village here…” They found it utterly unbelievable.
“Everyone, stay alert,” Ruo Zhiwei cautioned, holding back the excited disciples.
The disciples nodded and began walking in pairs, slowly stepping onto the fields.
The ridges between the fields were different from mountain paths. While the mountain was covered in stones, the ridges were lined with grass. Even if the ground was somewhat dry and cracked, it was much softer and more comfortable than jagged rocks.
The group kept their eyes on the thatched huts in the distance while scanning their surroundings, wary of anything that might suddenly pop out of the grass.
No matter how confused they were, they could see that most of the crops were withered, hanging limply and half-dead with almost no fruit. Someone passing by a rice paddy plucked a head of grain and crushed it in their palm; as expected, it was nothing but an empty husk.
There is no sunlight here; how could it be possible to grow food?
They drew closer and closer to the cluster of thatched huts.
As a grove of corn slowly shifted out of their line of sight, a hunched, dark figure was revealed standing behind it.
The crowd stopped simultaneously.