The path down was familiar and yet strange. Above, the air had always tasted faintly of clear metal. Below, it thickened with smoke and cooking oil. The further they went, the more the world filled with human sound—carts creaking, dogs barking, children shouting with untrained lungs.
Yuming's senses adjusted reluctantly. Without the constant pressure of spiritual qi, the mortal world felt… heavy. Not in the body, but in the mind. Every person they passed carried a weight that cultivation grounds seemed to smooth away: hunger held behind polite smiles, exhaustion not disguised by a breathing technique.
The Sea of Suffering….
By afternoon they reached the first of the two villages: low houses of wood and clay near a pond choked with reeds. The water was green and still. A few fishermen stood on a narrow dock, their nets limp in their hands. When the villagers saw the boys' robes and the faint glint of the clan emblem, their faces changed with exceptional speed. They bowed too quickly; their gratitude carried a sharp edge of fear.
"Immortal Young Masters," the village head said, hands shaking around the brim of his hat. "You've come. You've finally come."
Yujin's chin lifted. "Explain the situation."
The man swallowed. "R- responding to the Immortal Young Masters. At night… something comes from the water. It takes people and pigs. We find marks, sometimes claw marks, sometimes blood. But often nothing at all… just gone."
"Gone," Yuming echoed. He walked to the pond's edge and crouched. The mud smelled like algae. He closed his eyes and let his awareness spread. Although his spiritual sense hadn't opened, his original five senses were all heightened.
There was the residue of a demonic qi, faint, like old smoke clinging to cloth. It wasn't thick enough to startle him, but it was there.
Yuming often referred to "spiritual qi." Spiritual qi actually was a broad term for many different essences. When Yuming typically spoke of spiritual qi, he was referring to a mixture of "Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi" and "Mountain Mist Qi."
The leftover qi here was clearly different, with a malevolent undertone. He opened his eyes and studied the dock. He saw scratches in the wood—three shallow lines, and a smear where someone had tried to clean, but the stain had sunk too deep.
Logically, there should have been signs of struggle. A grown man couldn't have just disappeared without a trace, especially if the demon was "weak."
"Where do the attacks happen?" Yuming asked.
"Here. By the pond. Sometimes by the canal, sometimes in the fields. It comes where there's water, where it can hide."
Yuming looked around and began to speculate, when the man quietly added, "But… it doesn't come up the western path. At least, not often."
Yuming thought for a moment before asking: "What's the geographical layout around here, is it just your village and the other that's being attacked?"
The elder nodded. "Yes. The village five miles east is called Green Pine Village, and they've also been suffering. To our north is a large forest, and north of that is a slightly larger village called Homestay Village."
"How frequent have the attacks been?"
"Every two or three days, for the last two weeks."
Yujin pulled Yuming to the side. "Let's split up. I'll head to this 'Green Pine Village' and you can stay here. We'll meet again in three days."
Yuming agreed. Since the Liu Family had said this was a weak demon, he trusted that it was a weak demon.
After Yujin left, Yuming headed back toward the village center. The village itself was in decent condition—sturdy houses, clean lanes, even a few repaired fences—but its population was strangely dense. Men crowded the lanes and loitered beneath eaves, too many faces for too few homes, their clothes road-worn and their eyes guarded, as if every stranger was another danger.
"What happened to all of the women?" Yuming asked the elder, who accompanied him back.
The elder looked helpless. "It's not a lack of women—it's too many men. There's been natural disasters in the far north, and refugees have flooded in this direction."
Yuming gulped. Some disasters truly were natural, but if they occurred consistently, there were probably high level cultivators behind the scenes. Obviously, he didn't mention this to the village elder.
He walked with the elder to the edge of the pond, choosing a stretch of dock that gave a clear view of the reed line and the narrow canal mouth. If the demon truly came from the water, it would have to pass through one of those points. He checked the boards for weak spots, then took a seat with his back to a post, legs folded, posture loose.
The elder lingered, uneasy. "You should go," Yuming said gently. "Bar your door. Don't let anyone outside after dusk."
When the man finally left, the village sounds dimmed. Mist began to gather over the pond. Yuming watched the water without blinking, waiting for the first wrong ripple.
….
Night came and went without an attack, and the next night passed with no noise as well, leading Yuming to wonder if something had happened on Yujin's end. The third night was still silent, thus he spent the next day anxiously waiting for Yujin to return.
In the early afternoon, Yuming finally spotted Yujin's tall frame making its way through the village square, with people quickly moving out of the way around him, paying their respects. His mouth was clenched. "Did you kill it?" he asked Yuming, with a trace of frustration.
This is what Yuming had feared. "No…" he sighed. "Which means you didn't see it either?"
"Not a sound," Yujin grimaced. "But, in my village one of the laborers passed out one evening."
"He passed out? As in falling asleep?"
"Well, I guess. But in the middle of a field. He woke up confused a few hours later."
Yuming and Yujin both wore solemn expressions. They both understood what had happened.
"Some demonic cultivator was likely guiding the beast, and poisoning people so they'd be easier for it to capture. That indicates that the beast itself is probably very weak, weaker than we even assumed," Yuming concluded.
Yujin nodded, and Yuming continued talking, "What did you do when you first got to the other village?"
Yujin shook his head. "Not much, Green Pine Village is even smaller than this one, and so I could see all of the surrounding farms from near the village square. I really just sat there, bored out of my mind…"
"And you didn't see anyone leave on the first day?"
"No. That would make the culprit too obvious, he's probably still there."
Yuming was stunned. "B- but you still came back here? He could leave!"
Yujin brushed him off. "This mission isn't worth it anyways, I'm not willing to spend a week or two looking around for this fellow for a small reward."
Yuming gave Yujin a fierce glare, then calmed down. "It might not be a problem. Would you be willing to keep working on this if there were multiple culprits? We'd get a bigger reward."
Yujin's eyes lit up. "You mean…"
Yuming started speaking excitedly. "Think about it, whatever poison the culprit has been giving farmers probably also attracts the beast, right?"
Yujin didn't argue.
Yuming's speaking grew faster. "That means, if no one signaled the beast, the beast would have attacked, given that the beast was probably trained to attack those who drank the poison. The beast couldn't have been living with him in the village—not only is it hard to hide, but it doesn't make sense geographically." Yuming's hands swayed wildly as he spoke. "So the culprit likely left, and if so, he should have left before you arrived. But why would he leave pre-emptively?"
Yujin's gaze sharpened in realization, and he followed Yuming's lead: "Because there's another culprit! One who left this village as soon as we arrived!"
Yuming clapped, "You've got it! But…" his enthusiasm dampened. "We're still relying on assumptions. Can we be sure the culprit didn't slip out from under your watch?"
Yujin scoffed, "I cultivate Hollow-Reed Guard, even if it's simple, it improves my sensory abilities. I doubt any loose cultivator operating here of all places could get past me."
Yuming's expression brightened a bit. "The way I see it, we'll only be able to find the culprits in a short time if they keep attacking this area. I think they're restricted, given that they've already taken the risk of attacking these villages time and time again. We need to determine if they have patience. If they do, we shouldn't waste our time here, but if they don't, we catch them!"
Yujin frowned. "How do we know if they have patience?"
Yuming smiled. "Think, where else in the area could they have attacked if not here or Green Pine Village? Homestay Village, to the north! If Homestay was first attacked in the last few days, we can assume multiple culprits who don't have time to wait!"
They didn't waste time. Yujin led the way out of the village, his steps sharp with impatience now that he finally had a direction to strike. Yuming followed a half-step behind, mind racing as he measured distances. Homestay Village was north, beyond the forest; far enough that a mortal messenger would need nearly a day, but close enough that a low-level cultivator could cross in a few hours.
The path narrowed as they entered the trees. Branches tangled above them, turning the afternoon sun into a dim green haze. Occasionally, Yuming caught signs of snapped twigs and crowded footsteps, signs that the mortal traffic had thickened recently.
When they finally emerged, Homestay Village came into view: quite a bit larger than the first village, with more barns and a wider main lane. Smoke rose from several chimneys.
But the villagers weren't moving normally. Men gathered in tight knots near the square, with low voices and pale faces. A few women knelt beside the road, scrubbing at dark stains with buckets of water that had already turned pink.
Yuming's heart sank. He approached the nearest group and showed the clan emblem. "When did it happen?"
The village head looked up, eyes bloodshot, too tired to bow and yell "Immortal Master!"
"Last night," he rasped. "Near dawn. It took Old Han's son from the canal bank."
Yujin's jaw tightened and Yuming met his gaze. It was time to prepare.
….
Homestay Village.
In an inconspicuous room of a small inn, a brother and sister paced around frantically.
The brother paced in tight lines, boots grinding grit into the floorboards. His robe was damp at the hem and smelled faintly of reed water. He didn't stop moving, because a moment of stillness would let the fear catch him.
His sister leaned against the wall by the door, arms crossed, jaw locked. A strip of talisman paper was stuck to the wood beside her, meant to dampen sound. It barely worked. Outside, the village murmured like a sea.
The brother collected himself and spoke. "Liu Family… what a Liu Family. What vicious beasts!" The resentment wasn't hidden at all.
The sister looked solemn. "If they really cared about 'Righteous' or 'Demonic' they'd at least leave a few spirit stones for the rest of us. How else is father supposed to break through?"
The brother bit his lip, and stared angrily at the cultivation technique in his hand.
"Dew-Thread Unsealing Art."
His father had saved for years and finally bought this technique to open his meridians at a market run by the Liu Family. It was apparently a safe technique, gentle on the body, without risk of scarring.
It was a very slow technique that would allow the cultivator to guide thin, Cold Qi threads through blocked points in the meridians. At first, it seemed to be working well, and he and his children were ecstatic that he'd be able to awaken his dantian.
But the Dew-Threat Unsealing Art never mentioned its major drawback: it wouldn't break blockages in the meridians, it would just dissolve them, the dissolution thus creating sludge. It would put the cultivator into a state of 'meridian silt,' and their qi circulation would be delayed, forever.
It would be one thing if it only stopped his cultivation, but it did more than that. The disrupted circulation of the Cold Qi made him cold-bodied—constantly shaking, always chilly, frequently tired. His meridians became sensitive to the point where normal cycling would give him great pain.
It got to the point where the small family was spending all of the money they had on pills to ease his pain, and many of those pills came from the Liu Family. Needless to say, they were unhappy that the Liu Family had come to catch them in order to "vanquish demons and uphold the Righteous Path."
The brother cursed. "Those beasts… and they call us demons."
"Just look at what they're doing in the north!"