Chapter 35 The Grudge of the Dead: What exactly is this funeral procession doing here? ...

With a clang, the wind blades collided with something incredibly hard, like swords clashing together, while the sharp energy was aimed straight at his face.

Zhou Yaren tilted his head slightly, his neck visibly stiff, but he saw the other person through the misty fog—a blurry face.

Since it was something that could open his eyes, it couldn't be considered a living thing, so it must have crawled out of the filth.

The rusted joints made Zhou Yaren less agile than usual, and her movements were quite sluggish. In addition, the soft and sticky soil under her feet caused her to sink into a deep pit with every step, and when she lifted herself up, her shoes were covered in mud and water. It was not easy for her to move forward or backward, and she was a beat slower when she made a move. Two thin bloodstains appeared on the side of her neck.

The wind talisman followed closely, piercing the opponent's eye socket. Knowing her own weakness, Zhou Yaren used ruthless force.

Then, a strange, muffled groan came from the thing's chest, and a dark hole was poked into its right eye.

It was only momentarily slowed by the nail before it pounced on again, tearing at Zhou Yaren's arm with immense force.

With a cracking sound, the arm was suddenly dislocated.

Fearing his arm would be torn off, Zhou Yaren dared not resist. He was dragged into the air and spun around by the other's rough force. At the same time, his other hand condensed a wind blade and cleanly severed a head. Foul-smelling black blood splattered on his face, but Zhou Yaren didn't even blink. When he landed, he had already put the dislocated arm back in place.

The movements were fluid and graceful. When he looked up, he saw Bai Yuan standing not far away in the filthy soil. The black umbrella that had been held above his head had been folded up and was now held upside down in his hand.

That silent demeanor suddenly reminded him of the first time he saw Bai Yuan in the Ghost Bureau, and the subsequent terrifying dream—

He kept his lips tightly closed and didn't open his mouth, yet he vaguely heard himself asking, "What is that?"

This question seemed to come from the depths of his heart. He didn't know what he was asking, nor did he understand why he would ask it, but the other party seemed to understand and replied, "Report the death umbrella."

Why have you come?

"Here comes to report the death."

Looking back now, Zhou Yaren was suddenly overwhelmed with unprecedented complex emotions. But this emotion came at a rather inopportune time, because at least three dark figures were faintly visible in the thin veil of miasma, and he had no time to sort out anything else.

“My Yin-opening talisman can only last for half an hour at most. After half an hour, there may be no way to go.” Bai Yuan calmly stepped aside a few paces. “You should hurry up and finish this quickly.”

Zhou Yaren hadn't expected that there would be a time limit; it was his own fault for not asking clearly beforehand.

The dark figure in the fog suddenly rose from the ground, leaping several meters high, and swooped down towards him like an arrow piercing the sky. Zhou Yaren's attack was swift, and the sharp force of the wind pierced directly into the opponent's chest.

Because of the delay, and because he was fighting three opponents alone, Zhou Yaren's other wind blade was intercepted and pierced directly through his palm. Blood instantly flowed all over his hand, dripping onto the filthy soil and seeping into the earth in an instant.

Ignoring the pain, the wind talisman that had been gathered in his palm was destroyed by the returning wind blade. Zhou Yaren dodged the fatal blow and came face to face with a pale, dead face.

This "person" was emaciated, with deeply sunken cheeks, giving him a pointed, monkey-like appearance, and exuding an aura of congenital malnutrition. "It," however, was tall, like a bamboo pole, with hardly any flesh on its body, as if it had only focused on growing taller and stronger during puberty, neglecting nutrition and becoming nothing more than skin and bones.

If Zhou Yaren's eyes were intact, he would definitely recognize that this "person" was Qin Da, whom he had met in the dilapidated temple, who unfortunately had his flesh eaten away by blood leeches and died tragically outside Beiqu City.

But he had never "met" Qin Da before, so naturally he didn't recognize him at this moment.

Zhou Yaren used her bloodied palm to condense a wind blade and slashed it horizontally. The swift blade arrived a little late, but it missed by a lot, only slicing off Qin Da's ear at the root, just past the skin and flesh.

He frowned, dissatisfied with his increasingly stiff limbs, which made him move rather clumsily, at best causing him to be dragged down and injured, and at worst, inevitably leading to his death.

He certainly couldn't let himself die here. Panting, he took a few steps back, tearing off a piece of his clothing to wrap tightly around his hand to stop the bleeding. His whole body was soaked by the steam; having been in the water for so long, it began to drip water. Just as a "person" lunged at him, Zhou Yaren remained motionless, then seized the opportunity to unleash a wind blade that ripped "it" open.

Zhou Yaren felt a blur before his eyes, and the thing that had been disemboweled suddenly fell out of the open cavity as if a layer of skin had been shed. Zhou Yaren retreated in a panic, but the dark thing had already slammed into him on the head, approaching him with lightning speed. Zhou Yaren's vision was obstructed, and he couldn't see it clearly at all.

What is that?!

He was startled, and then a heart-wrenching pain shot through his shoulder. At the same moment, his lower back was struck hard, sending him flying. A large chunk of flesh was bitten off his shoulder.

He knew that the world was full of wonders, and now was not the time for surprises.

Without giving Zhou Yaren any chance to catch his breath, a sharp human bone thorn pierced his heart.

Zhou Yaren suddenly flipped over and kicked Qin Da, who had almost stabbed him to death. Then he pinched a wind blade, and the surrounding energy swirled up like a whirlwind, bringing with it a sharp edge that could grind flesh and crush bones.

He didn't know what it was, so he planned to dissect Qin Da in front of him and see for himself.

Just as the wind blade was about to rip open Qin Da's belly, a frantic scream rang out from ahead: "No—"

Zhou Yaren's hands paused for a moment, because the voice was so familiar, so panicked, fearful, desperate, even painful...

"Big brother...big brother, please don't kill my big brother..."

Qin San burst out of the fog, tumbling and scrambling forward, his small and frail body recklessly lunging towards Zhou Yaren and the wind blade beside him.

Zhou Yaren hadn't expected a living person to suddenly appear halfway through his journey. He abruptly stopped, only then realizing that these things weren't filth crawling out of the filth, but rather the funeral procession that had risen from the dead the previous night. They hadn't jumped into the Yellow River as the witnesses claimed, but like him and Bai Yuan, they had followed the traces of the Stone Mortar Immortal and entered the River Tomb.

"This is Qin..."

Before he could confirm, Qin Da seized the opportunity while the other party hesitated and suddenly attacked with a sharp human bone.

Zhou Yaren shoved Qin San aside, and the bone spur pierced his collarbone.

Bai Yuan observed for a moment, then decided not to linger any longer. She suppressed her physical and mental discomfort and walked forward step by step, her eyes revealing a hint of displeasure and dissatisfaction—even a clay bodhisattva crossing a river can barely save himself, yet he dares to be soft-hearted at such a time; he must be tired of living.

Bai Yuan listened to the sounds of fighting behind him and couldn't understand it at all. Didn't he have any evil desires? Even in the filthy world, couldn't he be driven by any evil desires? Why would he feel kindness towards a wild girl who suddenly appeared?

Unless one is mentally deficient and incapable of distinguishing right from wrong from birth, true and virtuous humanity cannot grow in this world.

Human nature is so complex, with selfishness and generosity on one hand, calculation and tolerance on the other, kindness and malice combined in one person, creating a complex and contradictory individual.

She really didn't want to think about others, after all, she couldn't even figure herself out, but she couldn't stop her mind from wandering.

Perhaps that's not called having a kind heart; it's just that the person is too soft-hearted.

Bai Yuan was still not satisfied, because being too soft-hearted often harms others without benefiting himself; otherwise, he wouldn't have been nailed to the filthy earth by bone spurs, finding himself in a situation where he was attacked from both sides.

Bai Yuan grew increasingly dissatisfied with the situation. With Zhou Yaren's physical abilities, he could only endure the miasma of the filthy land for half an hour at most. His limbs were already gradually stiffening, and his movements were becoming increasingly restricted, yet he still didn't know how to avoid danger. What was he after? Did he want to die too quickly?

That's not to the point. It's not that they can't even handle these few things, otherwise it wouldn't be a pity if a piece of trash died.

Bai Yuan is really troubled. Why is his head full of talk about death? Does the resentment of the dead in this filthy land want to drag more people down with them? Is he short of these rotten bones or what?

She knew she was entangled in evil, filled with thoughts of certain death, which naturally seeped into her very being. It was no wonder that such persistent evil would wear down even the hardest stone; otherwise, there wouldn't be so many people and ghosts led astray. She was constantly immersed in resentment and aversion to these venomous thoughts, fearing she would go mad.

If she goes completely mad, it will probably cause a human catastrophe. So even if she can't help herself, she should be careful not to go mad, and only go mad in a measured way.

Bai Yuan sighed silently in his heart, feeling that he had really had a hard time. He had not gained any benefit from the world from beginning to end, but instead had to do his best to collect debts for those who died unjustly.

The word "debt collector" made Bai Yuan frown. She hid in the misty, miasma-like atmosphere, silently avoiding attention, drifting away like a ghost. At the same time, she was thinking to herself that Zhou Yaren, with her vigorous and lively presence, would be like "human meat char siu" spreading its aroma for miles around in the lifeless river tomb. It would be perfect for her to stay there and attract evil spirits, diverting the trouble.

So Bai Yuan naturally abandoned him and followed the trail of the immortals to find the root of the matter. In fact, when they encountered the attack at this place, Bai Yuan roughly knew that the enemy was nearby.

But what exactly is this funeral procession doing here?

Bai Yuan looked at the coffin placed in the fog from afar, and the few coffin bearers who were digging in the filth beside it. He wondered to himself, "Could it really be that they came here to be buried?"

Bai Yuan observed the situation calmly until he heard some strange gurgling sounds, seemingly coming from the stomachs of the diggers, like some kind of ventriloquism. It wasn't human speech; to Bai Yuan, it was like a dog barking or a cat meowing—completely incomprehensible. But he could clearly sense they were communicating, as their stomachs were gurgling back and forth.

After the gurgling ended, one of the coffin bearers carefully wiped the mud off his hands in front of his clothes, slowly squatted down, and gently put his hands into the pit, carefully fiddling with them for a long time.

From Bai Yuan's perspective, she couldn't see what was inside the pit. She stared intently, not daring to approach rashly, lest she alert the coffin bearers, until they stood up, holding a round or flat ball of flesh.

What is that thing? Bai Yuan stared at it with bated breath. It wasn't round or flat, but it was about the size of a handful. It looked like a plump lump of flesh.

How could it be a lump of flesh? Bai Yuan was filled with deep confusion. What flesh? Whose flesh?

Buried in the filthy soil of the river mound, it hadn't rotted completely; in fact, it looked remarkably fresh, as if it had just been cut off its body.

Then another person bent down and took it with both hands, as if holding some fragile and rare treasure, afraid of bumping or knocking it, and carefully placed it into the coffin covered with filth.

Then, before the second, third, and fourth clumps of flesh could be lifted out of the pit, a sudden bang rang out, and bone spikes pierced Qin Da like flying arrows, pinning him firmly to the coffin.

The runes on the bone spurs seemed to be shrouded in gunpowder smoke. Qin Da's abdomen twitched and his whole body quickly withered, turning into a pool of viscous black liquid that dripped out and seeped into the filthy soil. Finally, he shriveled up into a hollowed-out skin, hanging on the coffin like a tattered rag from the bone spurs.

Everyone turned to look, and saw Zhou Yaren slowly revealing her face as she emerged from the hazy mist.

To Bai Yuan, that aura was that of someone who had "fought his way through," with a hint of invincibility, and a fierce, murderous glint in his eyes.

He merely glanced at the white grievance he thought was hidden before facing the coffin bearers who had inexplicably risen from the dead. Since the two sides couldn't communicate, there was no time for idle talk, only a life-or-death struggle. Master Shen, who was closest to Zhou Yaren, was the first to be hit and was fiercely bitten by a whirlwind carrying talismans.

These creatures in human skin are quite troublesome and cannot be dealt with easily. Zhou Yaren had already spent a lot of effort killing just the three, let alone now facing eight or nine.

Knowing yourself and your enemy is the key to victory in every battle, but he is trapped here without even knowing who his opponent is.

The nailed Qin Da turned into a splash of black liquid. Based on Zhou Yaren's experience, it should not belong to ordinary spirits and souls. He had to ask, "What exactly are these things?"

Having observed the situation for so long, Bai Yuan probably had a general idea of ​​what was going on: "Wang Xiang".

"What?" Zhou Yaren made a hand gesture, trying her best to curl her stiff fingers.

The whirlwind that gripped Old Master Shen expanded in circles, whipping up a thick, pungent, fishy wind that rippled outwards, threatening to twist people into pretzel shapes and lift them into the air. The two people beside him immediately grabbed the coffin lid and shoved it over the coffin, body and all, to protect the three fleshy lumps inside from being swept away by the demonic wind.

“Mountains produce owl-like creatures, waters give birth to monstrous ones.” Bai Yuan stood outside the bloody wind, staring at the scene in the eye of the storm, where Zhou Yaren had activated the Xun Formation. By incorporating several monstrous creatures into the Xun Formation, mixed with the water vapor floating in the air, it looked quite like a force to be reckoned with. Bai Yuan calmly said, “This is the River Tomb, so it’s not surprising that it produces some water monsters.”

It turned out to be a phantom image. Zhou Yaren had heard of it in rumors, but this was the first time she had ever encountered it.

The Wangxiang is a water monster or water ghost. It is ethereal and directionless, ever-changing like water. When it puts on human skin, it is like being stuffed into a human mold, making it appear full and human, leading people to mistakenly believe that a dead person has come back to life.