Chapter 48: Lair

Seeing the battle drawn to a close and their presence no longer required, the ten water buffaloes dissolved into thin air, returning to the spiritual fields.

"How are you holding up? Can you stand?" Mangu stepped forward in genuine concern, utterly won over by the decisive, deep-blue sword strike Lu Yang had unleashed.

Though he and Meng Jingzhou had aided from the flanks and wounded the tiger demon, Mangu suspected that even without their assistance, Lu Yang’s singular strike would have slain the beast all the same.

Lu Yang swallowed a packet of Qi-replenishing powder, and his breath soon steadied as his aura began to climb at a pace far too rapid to be credited to a mere few packets of medicine.

"Had I known, I would have bought pills instead. This powder is terribly dry," Lu Yang muttered. Circulating his Water-Condensing Art, he conjured a small globule of water at his fingertips, from which a two-finger-wide stream shot straight into his mouth.

"Was that the Size-As-You-Will technique just now?" Meng Jingzhou remarked, having watched Lu Yang abruptly shrink and expand, finding the maneuver reminiscent of a spell practiced by an uncle in his clan.

Yet to his knowledge, that particular art was exceedingly difficult to master, its threshold so high that success was utterly impossible before the Golden Core stage.

"Something of the sort, though what I used was a spell called 'Reducing to Inches'."

"Reducing to Inches?" Meng Jingzhou’s mind filled with questions; as a son of the Meng family, he had heard of countless spells, yet this name sounded entirely foreign.

Could it be an original technique created by First Senior Sister Yun Zhi?

Thinking of it that way, it made perfect sense.

"This humble maiden, Lan Ting, greets the three fellow Daoists," Lan Ting said, walking over with a graceful, measured stride.

"The three of us are disciples of the Daoist Inquiry Sect. This is Meng Jingzhou, and this is Mangu," Lu Yang introduced, having only named himself earlier in the heat of the moment.

"So it is Daoist Meng and Daoist Mangu." It was evident that Lan Ting possessed exceptional breeding, treating everyone with polite deference, having even shared the mountain temple to shelter from the rain without driving away Qi Wu and the other mortals.

"Our thanks to Daoist Lan Ting for lending a hand. Otherwise, facing both tiger demons at once would have been quite a headache, and the mission might well have ended in failure," Lu Yang expressed his gratitude.

These were merely polite pleasantries, for in truth, the three of them still held unused trump cards.

"So this was your mission," Lan Ting noted softly, offering no further comment, as her own descent from the mountain was also to fulfill a secret task.

She was simply a stranger in a strange land; having stayed hidden by day, she had encountered the storm by night and sought a place to lodge, never expecting to stumble into such an affair.

"This maiden possesses a slight acquaintance with the art of talismans. The pelts of these two tiger demons look quite fine; would you be willing to part with them and yield them to me?"

"Naturally," Lu Yang smiled. "If there is anything else Daoist Lan Ting requires, please feel free to take it."

Though tiger pelts were highly valuable, they paled in comparison to the assistance Lan Ting had provided.

Lan Ting shook her head, offering no further requests.

Having grown up in the wilderness with his parents, Mangu was intimately familiar with the art of skinning; pressing his two fingers together until they were sharper than a butcher's cleaver, he brought his hand down, flawlessly stripping both pelts in a few swift strokes.

After accepting the pelts, Lan Ting bade Lu Yang and his companions a courteous farewell and vanished into the depths of the mountain forest.

Her senior sisters had once warned her that before one's psychological resilience was strong enough, one must never rashly approach members of the Daoist Inquiry Sect, lest one be assimilated by them.

"Jingzhou, do you want the tiger bones and the tiger whip?"

Meng Jingzhou was thoroughly bewildered. "What would I want with tiger bones and a tiger whip?"

Lu Yang grinned mischievously. "To boost your yang energy, of course."

"Get lost!"

With his Pure Yang Spiritual Root, why would he ever need a yang boost? Any more energy and his body wouldn't even be able to endure it.

"Put away these two tiger demons; they are the crucial evidence for completing our mission." Lu Yang produced his identity jade pendant and swiped his thumb across it, drawing both carcasses inside.

The jade pendant could double as a storage ring.

"Let's go. That tigress made quite a racket coming here, knocking down plenty of trees. We can retrace its path along the trail it left, which should lead us straight to their lair."

The two tiger demons had entrenched themselves in Pine Mountain for years, so a den was certain to exist.

The heavy rain meant nothing to the trio, as any simple rain-averting charm was enough to keep the water at bay.

Following the fallen trees and shattered boulders, it was not long before they located the demon lair.

It was a cavern three meters high, pitch-black and swallowing all sight within.

"Does anyone have a torch?" Mangu inquired, peering into the absolute darkness where hidden mechanisms might easily lurk.

He had read in books that these eerie caverns were the perfect setting for traps—where a misplaced step on a loose brick could unleash a volley of arrows from the walls, turning a man into a pincushion.

Or perhaps a sudden cloud of toxic gas would billow out, dealing instant death.

At the very least, a rolling boulder might come hurtling down to crush them.

"Who would rig their own home with so many traps? Are they afraid their own return would be too convenient?" Lu Yang said, exasperated by Mangu's tendency to let his imagination run wild in the strangest ways.

Even so, a torch did lend an undeniable air of adventure to the exploration.

With a torrential downpour outside and three companions holding a torch to discover treasure inside, the sheer atmosphere of the scene was an enticing thought.

"Who carries a torch when they go out?" Meng Jingzhou scoffed. They were cultivators, so why use a torch when they could simply employ fire-control techniques?

"Open your mind," Lu Yang countered, pulling out a deep-fried dough stick. Spitting a spark onto it, the entire pastry instantly erupted into flames.

By the looks of it, it would burn for quite a long while.

Holding the blazing dough stick without fear of the heat, Lu Yang looked thoroughly pleased with himself.

The food from the cafeteria was truly versatile; besides being edible and useful in a fight, it could even serve as a torch.

A wave of realization washed over Mangu; indeed, one always learned something new when following Brother Lu.

Holding the burning dough stick high, Lu Yang led the way, with Mangu and Meng Jingzhou following closely in his footsteps.

There were no traps of the sort Mangu had envisioned.

There was only the den of wild beasts.

Rare treasures from merchants, classics and histories from scholars, martial arts manuals from fighters...

These items did not need to be surrendered to the sect and were counted as their personal spoils of war.

"Jewelry and antiques..." Among the three, Meng Jingzhou was the most worldly, leaving him with the task of discerning the origins of their haul.

"A teacup from a century ago, not worth much." To cultivators, a century passed as swiftly as a white horse leaping a crevice, an utterly fleeting span; any ordinary household item could easily boast a hundred years of history.

In the cultivation world, antiques were the least valuable commodities, prized only by mortals.

"A rusted iron saber. Why would a tiger demon keep such a thing—to sharpen its teeth?" Meng Jingzhou shook his head.

Lu Yang thought to himself that one shouldn't look down on a rusted blade; a single nick could give you tetanus, whether you believed it or not.

"Pictographic Boxing? If I recall correctly, it's a mortal martial art that mimics animals?" Meng Jingzhou flipped through a few pages and, losing interest, tossed it to Lu Yang.

Lu Yang, however, found himself somewhat intrigued and intended to practice it whenever he found some spare time in the coming days.

"The Words of the Sages..." Meng Jingzhou sneered repeatedly. "What use do two beasts have for the teachings of the sages? They remain beasts nonetheless."

The Words of the Sages was an introductory text for Confucian cultivators, recording the earnest teachings of the ancient masters; Mangu knew its contents by heart and possessed a profound understanding of them.

Mangu put the book away, not because it held great material value, but because its spiritual status was extraordinary, demanding that it be treated with proper care.

It was a mark of respect for the sages.

"Hmm? There is a letter here, addressed to the tiger demon?"