The rain kept falling. It was raining in the Central Continent as well.
A disciple from outside channeled a Water-Repelling Spell as he entered the Elixir Hall. His boots stepped onto the wooden floor, leaving a small, spreading wet patch. Keeping his head lowered, not daring to look up, he walked to the center of the hall, respectfully clasped his hands, and knelt. His knees hit the floor with a dull thud.
“Elder, Black Mountain Fort is gone.”
Bai Cen sat beside the medicine furnace, holding a medicinal herb that emitted a herbal fragrance, which he was tossing into the hearth. Flames licked the walls of the furnace, making soft crackling sounds. His eyes did not move at all, his gaze remaining fixed on the dancing fire in the hearth. It was as if he had not heard.
The disciple knelt on the floor, his forehead pressed against the cold ground. He did not dare to raise his head, move, or even breathe too loudly. After waiting for a moment and seeing that Bai Cen remained silent, he raised his voice slightly, repeating more clearly, “Elder, Black Mountain Fort has been razed to the ground. There were no survivors. In the city... not a single living soul remains.”
Clang! Black smoke suddenly billowed from the medicine furnace. The flames in the hearth flared up violently before shrinking back just as rapidly, as if strangled by something. Then, it exploded. The furnace lid flew off, slamming against the wall and bouncing twice before rolling into a corner. Debris from the hearth splattered everywhere, emitting a burnt, foul stench. Bai Cen's hand remained frozen in midair in the posture of throwing in herbs, with half a stalk of the unthrown herb still pinched between his fingers. He slowly retracted his hand, turned his head, and looked at the kneeling disciple. There was no expression on his face, but the light in his eyes had changed—shifting from casual indifference to dark malice and calculation.
“Say that again.” His voice was not loud, carrying a raspy, withered quality. It did not sound like a voice that belonged to his youthful appearance at all.
The disciple prostrated himself completely on the floor, his forehead pressed tightly against the stone tiles, his voice beginning to tremble. “R-Reporting to the Elder, Black Mountain Fort has been razed to the ground. In the city... there are no survivors.” He felt a cold gaze pinning the back of his head, as if something were slowly gnawing at his scalp. His back was already drenched in cold sweat.
Bai Cen did not move. He simply stared at the prostrate disciple as if looking at a bug. Then, he raised his hand, grabbed the medicinal hoe from the desk, and hurled it. The hoe struck the disciple's temple, and fresh blood flowed down his brow bone, dripping onto the blue brick floor and onto his fingers that tightly gripped the ground. The disciple did not dodge, nor did he dare to. He only prostrated himself even lower, almost crawling on the floor. The bright red blood dripped onto the stone tiles, making soft pattering sounds before being swallowed by the residual flames in the hearth.
“Get out,” Bai Cen's voice held no anger, only coldness. “Get the hell out.”
As if granted a grand amnesty, the disciple scrambled to his feet, almost crawling as he backed toward the door. Just as his fingers touched the doorframe and he was about to push it open, Bai Cen's voice rang out again. “Wait.” His hand froze in midair, and his entire body pinned to the spot. He stiffly turned his head back, preparing to face his judgment.
Bai Cen drew two ice-blue calamity seeds from his sleeve, rolled them in his palm, and casually tossed them over. “Take them. Consider it compensation for your injury.”
The disciple caught the calamity seeds, his hands shaking, his eyes filled with a mixture of greed and ecstasy. He looked down at the two deep-blue crystals in his palm, the cold light of the ice crystals reflecting in his pupils. Kneeling on the floor, he kowtowed frantically, his forehead slamming against the wooden floor with loud thuds, leaving a dent in the wood.
“Thank you for the reward, Elder! Thank you for the reward, Elder!”
Bai Cen did not look at him, simply waving his hand. “Fine, get out of my sight. Hurry up and scram.”
Clutching the calamity seeds, the disciple stumbled out the door. The moment the door closed behind him, he impatiently pinched one of the seeds and stuffed it into his mouth. Swallowing it, the icy spiritual energy flowed down his esophagus, into his stomach, into his meridians, and into his bones. His entire body felt as if it were soaked in ice water, yet also as if it were thrown into a furnace—cold and heat intertwining, causing every single pore on his body to shiver.
Closing his eyes, he tilted his head back, a trace of a smile hanging on the corner of his lips. If he could feel this euphoric forever, even dying would be worth it. Leaning against the wall, he panted heavily.
The disciple guarding the Elixir Hall nearby watched him consume it, the light in his eyes shifting to a near-manic longing.
“Junior Brother Zheng... No, Senior Brother Zheng.” The guard approached, his voice dry, his lips chapped. He licked them several times with the tip of his tongue to moisten them slightly. “Do you have any more calamity seeds? Please, give me one... I beg of you... I can barely hold back anymore.” On the side of his neck, a reflection resembling ice crystals faintly emerged.
The disciple surnamed Zheng was currently immersed in the afterglow of the surging spiritual energy. Extremely annoyed at being interrupted, he swept his sleeve. “Scram!”
The gate-keeping disciple was sent stumbling back two steps. Unable to maintain his balance, he fell flat on his backside. Dazed for a moment, he scrambled back up, his eyes instantly turning bloodshot. He lunged forward, death-gripping Junior Brother Zheng's collar. “Give it to me! You must have extras! Give it to me now! If you don't, I'll kill you—” His voice warped, emitting a low, inhuman hum.
The disciple surnamed Zheng sneered. His sword slid out of its scabbard by half an inch; a cold light flashed, and then it was sheathed again. A thin line cracked open on the gatekeeper's neck, and beads of blood seeped from the wound, emitting white vapor.
The gatekeeper's pupils dilated, and his lips twitched. He wanted to say something, but only a few muffled, raspy gasps squeezed out of his throat. Reaching out in an attempt to grab onto something, his fingers clawed fruitlessly at the air before he collapsed stiffly to the ground.
The killer bent down, ripped the storage bag from the corpse's waist, and rummaged through it. It was completely empty, save for a few shattered spirit stones. He threw the storage bag back onto the corpse and spat fiercely. “Tch, pauper.”
From the window of the Elixir Hall, Bai Cen watched the farce unfold outside. Expressionless, he toyed with an ice-blue calamity seed in his hand, tossing it up and catching it, tossing it up and catching it. Finally, he squeezed hard, and the calamity seed crumbled into fine powder in his palm, slipping through his fingers and scattering onto the blue brick floor like a miniature snowfall.
“Consume them,” he muttered, watching the squabbling disciples outside, his lips twitching slightly. “Go ahead and slowly consume them.” In the entire sect, forty percent of the disciples were already using calamity seeds. Once they started, they could never let go.
He smiled. The fortune above his head showed no signs of darkening at all.
“Su Li is dead,” Bai Cen muttered to himself in a calm tone.
“Then my sword pills will all belong to me.” He stood up, walked to the desk, and tapped his fingers twice on the surface. Jiang Ci was dead, and the sword soul was gone. What could he use to fuse the pill?
After pondering for a long time, he managed to come up with a solution. He summoned a disciple and spoke in a flat tone. “Go to the Soul Hall and bring over the remaining half of the soul left over from the last time we refined the Truth-Telling Pills.” Without a sword soul, he would try using a blood relative's instead. As he thought of this, a smile spread across his face, growing wider and increasingly maniacal.
The firelight in the Elixir Hall illuminated his face, casting a long, stretched shadow onto the wall that resembled a twisted beast.
Outside, the rain continued to fall.
Rate on N.U.
