Ruan Liulang also looked anxiously toward the road exit below. When he saw no sign of that Yin Bai, he felt a bit relieved and lowered his head to pull his hand out of the giant wolf's mouth. The giant wolf's jaws were filled with overlapping canine teeth, and it took him great effort to extract his arm. Like his neck, this arm appeared drenched in blood but was unharmed in terms of tendons and bones.
Ruan Liulang showed no intention of treating the wound immediately. Gripping the Thousand-Cuts Blade, he started walking toward us again. When he was about fifteen or sixteen meters away, suddenly my vision blurred, and then sparks crackled in the air before me, followed by a strong smell of burning.
As Ruan Liulang closed in, Hao Wenming and Huang Ran bent down almost simultaneously, each grabbing two handfuls of Buddha Ash and throwing it toward Ruan Liulang's direction. The moment the four handfuls of Buddha Ash flew out, sparks flew everywhere before my eyes. The Buddha Ash seemed to ignite like a combustible material burning in the air.
The Buddha Ash seemed to have an effect. Ruan Liulang retreated several steps until he reached the side of the giant wolf's corpse and stopped. His throat was injured; he stared at us helplessly but could not speak. Then he tried to advance a few steps again. This time, Sun Fatty and I joined the fray, each throwing handfuls of Buddha Ash at Ruan Liulang. After a shower of sparks, Ruan Liulang again retreated to his previous position.
Taking advantage of the moment, I asked Hao Wenming, "Boss Hao, is Ruan Liulang afraid of Buddha Ash? Then how did he just get through?"
Hao Wenming caught his breath and explained, "Ruan Liulang isn't really human anymore. Hey, Lazi, you've heard of chimei-wangliang, right? Those malevolent spirits and goblins? Ruan Liulang now is exactly a liang—one of those chimei-wangliang spirits. Before he appeared, he was still human, but because of his unlucky profession, he's long been exposed to deathly qi. Most of this deathly qi accumulated in his dantian. Only a little floated on his body's surface—probably trying to mask his aura and evade Yin Bai's tracking. Later, Huang Ran broke the deathly qi on his body, so he simply circulated the stored deathly qi from his dantian, spreading it through all his internal organs. Theoretically, he's a living corpse with fully functioning internal organs—essentially a liang."
"Boss Hao, stop beating around the bush. What do we do now? Although we have a lot of Buddha Ash, it can run out. What then?" Sun Fatty asked on my behalf.
Before Hao Wenming could answer, a wolf howl sounded near our ears. Before we could locate its source, someone suddenly said, "I told you to leave... but you wouldn't listen... Now no one can leave."
The voice startled us. The accent was familiar, but it was definitely not from any of us. Looking toward where the voice came from, Zhang Zhiyan was lying straight beside Po Jun. It couldn't be either of them; Po Jun needed no explanation, and Zhang Zhiyan had a speech impediment—if he spoke full sentences, it would have been after leaving the Tomb of a Transcendent Beast.
I glanced at Zhang Zhiyan and was about to look elsewhere when I suddenly saw his mouth move. Then, Zhang Zhiyan's voice came out: "All of you, accompany my clan to the grave..."
Now Zhang Zhiyan lay motionless on the ground. His eyes were tightly shut, but his mouth had parted slightly. Although we confirmed the voice just now was from Zhang Zhiyan, the speech speed and tone were very different from his usual manner. Even if someone killed Zhang Zhiyan, they probably wouldn't be able to say those words so smoothly.
As our eyes fixed on Zhang Zhiyan, Sun Fatty suddenly turned around like someone had stepped on his tail and said to Hao Wenming, "Boss Hao, that's Luo Simen!"
He spoke rapidly and urgently, without any pause. Hao Wenming frowned and replied, "Who did you say is Luo Simen?"
Sun Fatty waved his hand and continued, "I didn't say it was you. It's Little Stutterer! The voice we just heard from him was exactly the same as what Luo Simen said when we met him before."
Just now, I felt like I had heard that voice somewhere before. After Sun Fatty's reminder, I recalled the scene when Luo Simen spoke earlier. Except that Luo Simen's words were a bit awkward, the tone and manner were almost exactly the same as the voice that came from Zhang Zhiyan's mouth just now. Luo Simen had been a wax corpse for nearly a hundred years. Now his skin and flesh lie empty outside the Tomb of a Transcendent Beast; his soul had long since disappeared. If he had reincarnated, it would have been at least two generations ago. It seems very likely that, like Zhang Zhiyan, he was used as a mouthpiece.
At this moment, Ruan Liulang no longer intended to advance. He stood motionless on the spot like a grotesque wax statue. One hand covered the wound on his neck, the other tightly gripping his Thousand-Cuts Blade. His gaze was fixed on the area behind us, where the Buddha Ash was thickest. Following Ruan Liulang's line of sight, I looked back and saw a misty haze. The Buddha Ash obscured my Tian Eye to some extent, and I couldn't see clearly beyond the dust cloud created by the ash.
Another seven or eight minutes passed without any unusual movement. The voice from before, saying it wanted us to accompany it in death, showed no further action. Just as I began to relax, suddenly there was a crackling noise behind us, like the sound of cheap firecrackers from childhood New Year celebrations. The noise was continuous but not very loud.
Upon hearing the noise, Hao Wenming and Huang Ran's bodies both trembled simultaneously. They immediately turned to look at the densest area of the Buddha Ash, where the shadow of a wolf gradually became clearer — the owner of the Tomb of a Transcendent Beast: the white wolf named Yin Bai. It walked slowly, seemingly still wary of some substance within the Buddha Ash. As the white wolf became more distinct, the crackling noise grew louder, and sparks occasionally burst from its body. The wolf had dashed in at incredible speed earlier, with its fur almost entirely singed off by the flames. Judging by the current state, the wolf's fur should have been almost completely burned off, but there was no sign of charring. Instead, the sparks flickering over the wolf looked exactly like the scene when the Buddha Ash was swirling near Ruan Liulang.
Seeing the white wolf's head emerge, Ruan Liulang's expression turned grim. The red wax pellet he had originally prepared was meant to deal with this wolf, but he hadn't expected it to appear inside the Tomb. Having wasted that pellet, he had no other means to handle the wolf and could only clutch the Thousand-Cuts Blade, retreating step by step.
A few minutes later, the white wolf fully emerged from the dense Buddha Ash. It showed little interest in us and didn't even glance our way. Instead, it slowly approached Ruan Liulang. Without hesitation, Ruan Liulang turned and ran toward the hot springs above. For a nearly hundred-year-old man, his speed was surprisingly on par with a person in their thirties or forties.
Ruan Liulang hadn't run far when the white wolf suddenly let out a low howl. Suddenly, the running man tripped and fell hard to the ground. Ruan Liulang struggled on the floor for a long time but couldn't get up. After he fell, the white wolf slowed even more, stopping by the corpse of the giant wolf. It gently touched the giant wolf's head with its paw. Seeing no response, its eyes dimmed, and it ignored the corpse, continuing to approach Ruan Liulang.
Ruan Liulang's vocal cords were injured, and he could no longer speak. He tried to get up, but his legs felt numb, refusing to obey his will. The white wolf had already reached his side.
Contrary to what I imagined, the white wolf didn't immediately attack Ruan Liulang. Instead, it kept growling at him. Unlike when it dealt with the giant wolf, Ruan Liulang had basically given up resisting. His body started trembling more and more rapidly with each low growl from the wolf, like a frog encountering a snake.
At that moment, Zhang Zhiyan spoke again. His mouth emitted the same strange intonation as before: "Hand it over. Give me that thing." The words sounded like a voiceover for the wolf itself. Only then did Ruan Liulang react, trembling as he dug out a bronze box the size of a cellphone from his cloak. When Ruan Liulang met us earlier, he had come down from the hot springs, and it seemed he had come just for this small bronze box. I noticed Huang Ran's eyes twitch uncontrollably when the box appeared.
Looking at Huang Ran's expression now, if he weren't wary of the white wolf, he might have rushed to snatch the box from Ruan Liulang (I always had the feeling Huang Ran had hidden strength yet to be revealed). What was inside the bronze box? Was it really something like dragon whiskers? Or some other artifact? But judging by its small size, it seemed unlikely to hold much.
Seeing the bronze box, the white wolf opened its mouth and swallowed it whole. Ruan Liulang watched helplessly, unable to stop it. After swallowing the box, the white wolf's fur stood on end one by one. Its green pupils instantly turned blood-red. It let out a low roar at Ruan Liulang, who immediately rolled his eyes and fainted. Once Ruan Liulang lost consciousness, the wolf lost interest, slowly turning around and glaring at us with its bloodshot eyes.
After locking eyes with the white wolf, I felt a sudden wave of nausea and had to look away. Only then did the discomfort subside. Sun Fatty and the others also lowered their heads and spoke in hushed voices, "Hao, it seems like this is a private matter between Ruan Liulang and that mangy mutt… Nyeh and the wolf. We should probably get out of here."
Before Hao Wenming could speak, Zhang Zhiyan on the floor suddenly said, "You can't leave…" His speech was much more fluent than before. I glanced at the still-unconscious Zhang Zhiyan, then looked away from the white wolf. Now I was sure Zhang Zhiyan was acting as the wolf's mouthpiece. This white wolf seemed to have a special ability to control the speech of the dead and unconscious.
As soon as Zhang Zhiyan finished speaking, the white wolf let out a long howl. I thought it was a signal to attack. My finger was already on the trigger of my assault rifle (these bullets were specially made to fight Arcanobeasts; they might not affect a creature like Ruan Liulang but showed some effect against the giant wolf earlier). Unexpectedly, after the howl, the white wolf started circling in place, staggering as if drunk, circling around Ruan Liulang's body. Hao Wenming and Huang Ran were both stunned and couldn't tell what it was doing.
After circling two or three times, the wolf suddenly opened its mouth and spat out the bronze box it had swallowed earlier.
"That's some reaction… what is this box made of, some kind of distiller's grain?" Sun Fatty muttered upon seeing this. Then he said again, "Hao, this might be our chance to retreat."
Hao Wenming said nothing but glanced at Huang Ran. When the bronze box was spat out, Huang Ran's previously dim eyes flickered with a sudden glimmer. Both Hao Wenming and Sun Fatty noticed this, and Sun Fatty wisely shut up.
After being spat out, the white wolf regained its senses. It seemed somewhat annoyed and howled a few times before picking up the bronze box again and swallowing it. This time the box stayed inside the wolf's stomach for a shorter time. It hadn't even caught its breath when it suddenly spat the box out again, as if propelled by some force. This seemed to indicate some kind of rejection between the box and the wolf's physiology.
After that, the white wolf no longer dared to swallow the bronze box recklessly. It circled the box continuously, howling as if venting its fury. Suddenly, the wolf seemed to have an idea. It picked up the bronze box in its mouth and placed it on Ruan Liulang's body. I noticed Ruan Liulang's eyes slightly opened but he dared not move.
Then a bloody scene began. The white wolf suddenly bit down on Ruan Liulang's neck. When the giant wolf bit Ruan Liulang earlier, he hardly resisted, but this time he struggled desperately. Unfortunately, it only lasted a few seconds. With a cracking sound, Ruan Liulang's head separated from his body, and a gush of black blood poured out. The white wolf placed the bronze box into the pool of black blood, then began tearing Ruan Liulang's flesh and pressing the pieces onto the bronze box.
Watching this gruesome scene, Hao Wenming finally lost it. He glanced at the still-unconscious Po Jun and Zhang Zhiyan, then turned to me and Sun Fatty: "We can't stay here. Let's carry those two and head out. Once we reach Ying Spring, it should be safe…"
Before he finished, Huang Ran interrupted, "It's useless. Ying Spring no longer poses any threat to Yin Bai. Once it finishes dealing with that box, nothing here can hold it anymore. Even if we get up there, this Yin Bai will still catch up."
Huang Ran's words made Hao Wenming's expression strange. He no longer cared about the white wolf and grabbed Huang Ran's collar: "What am I missing here? Yin Bai's reaction to that box — you and Ruan Liulang came here for it, right?"
While Hao Wenming spoke, the white wolf was already tearing Ruan Liulang's upper body to pieces. Then it swallowed the bronze box together with the bloody flesh. Huang Ran's mouth twitched irregularly as he said, "Director Hao, loosen your grip first. Let's get through this alive. Anything you want to know, I'll tell you one by one."