Chapter 27 – Please Don’t Make Me Do This!

  Lin Yue’s hand trembled slightly as she pulled another talisman from her storage belt, and her lips moved swiftly as she whispered the incantation to ignite the talisman in her fingers and flick it at one of the approaching Corpse Puppets.

  The talisman sailed through the darkness like a flare and slapped against the chest of the Corpse Puppet, catching in its ragged robes. The effect was immediate when the talisman’s script ignited into a searing flame that caused the Puppet’s withered flesh to crack and crumble.

  The creature convulsed and let out a hissing moan before it collapsed into a smouldering heap. Lin Yue tossed another talisman, then a third, with each burning through the cursed flesh of the reanimated dead.

  The corpses were strong and fast but mindless. They had lost whatever skill they possessed in life, only retaining the enhanced bodies that came with cultivation. Lin Yue’s talismans were effective against the Puppets, and she pulled out a few more before looking at Mei Lian.

  The young woman surged forward with a wild grin on her face. Her sword gleamed faintly in the red moonlight, retaining its silver appearance as it sang through the air with each swing.

  The weapon had been forged by the Sect and was a low-grade artifact suitable for Qi Condensation stage cultivators and had no trouble cleaving cleanly through bone and rotting flesh. Limbs tumbled to the ground, and heads rolled as Mei Lian danced around her opponents.

  Mei Lian was using the Thousand Rivers Waterflow Sword Art, the technique she had chosen from the Nine-Treasure Pagoda, when she reached the 1st level of Qi Condensation. It was a sword art that taught about the adaptability of a sword’s strike.

  ‘A thousand rivers all flow to one sea.’ Mei Lian thought as her understanding of the sword art deepened with each swing. There was a multitude of ways to use the sword in her hand, to swing the weapon and the angle of the strike.

  But, regardless of the method, the result would be the same: to strike her opponent. Just as a river would eventually reach the sea, so too would her sword eventually reach her target. It was inevitable.

  “They’re nothing without their techniques!” Mei Lian shouted, and her eyes blazed with pride as she cut down another Puppet.

  She pivoted gracefully to duck under a clumsy swipe and drove her blade upward through a puppet’s chest, before slicing outward in a single motion. The body bucked once, then crumpled to the ground.

  Mei Lian smiled in delight at Lin Yue before turning to look at Jun De to see if her Senior Brother had noticed her performance. She was already imagining the praise he would heap upon her for cutting down a half dozen puppets when she caught a flash of motion at the edge of her vision.

  Jun De moved like a phantom made of light. Each movement of the Luminous Step left a shimmering trail of golden Qi that lingered for a moment before dissolving into motes. He flowed through the ranks of Corpse Puppets and was too fast for their sluggish reactions to follow.

  One swung its arm at him, but Jun De twisted, and the Heavenly Deflection Art flickered around him to bend the trajectory of the puppet’s blow away from his body.

  Jun De responded to the attack with one of his own. The Falling Star Palm lit his hand with radiant power, and golden Qi spiralled down his arm. He drove it into the chest of a Corpse Puppet, and the explosion that followed was devastating.

  The Corpse Puppet was torn apart, and fragments of flesh and bone were scattered across the ground as three more fell from the erupting energy, and his Qi swept across their bodies like a wildfire.

  Lin Yue stared in shock, with a talisman still clutched in her hand. Mei Lian’s mouth hung slightly open, and the pride that she felt was now tinged with awe.

  “Senior Brother Jun is as amazing as always!” Lin Yue praised.

  Even as she spoke, Jun De vanished in the blink of an eye as a Corpse Puppet lunged at him. He reappeared behind it, his palm already pushing forward in mid-strike. His palm strike caught the puppet between its shoulder blades, and its body erupted in a blossom of gore.

  The trio carved their way through the first wave of Corpse Puppets with relative ease. And even Jun De stopped screaming in his mind as he saw how easy it was to defeat them. Their strikes were heavy but clumsy, and they didn’t coordinate their attacks.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  ‘Alright, this isn’t so bad either! I got this!’ Jun De thought as another Corpse Puppet detonated at the end of his palm. His Qi reserves were still plentiful, and he didn’t feel strained or tired at all.

  But, just as Jun De was growing used to fighting the Puppets, a 2nd-Level Qi Condensation Corpse Puppet reached them, followed by two more. These ones moved with an intent that the other Corpse Puppets lacked. Their bodies were larger, stronger and faster, while they retained some faint memory of the combat skills they possessed in life.

  Lin Yue threw a talisman toward the lead puppet and whispered the incantation that set it alight. It struck the puppet in the chest, and it burned for a moment, then fizzled out with a disappointing hiss. The corpse twitched, and it showed damage to its flesh and clothing, but it didn’t fall.

  “That should have worked.” Lin Yue muttered in confusion. Her next talisman exploded in a flash of light and flame, but it also failed to stop the puppet from reaching her.

  It lunged at her, and her vision was filled with its long, black fingernails.

  Lin Yue stumbled back in terror, and the Corpse Puppet almost reached her before Mei Lian stepped in front of her and intercepted it with a sharp, upward slash of her sword. The blade bit deep into its flesh, but it didn’t cut off the puppet's limb as she had expected it to.

  Instead, the Puppet grabbed the sword mid-swing and locked its fingers around the metal. Mei Lian’s eyes widened in shock at the puppet’s actions.

  “Yue, now!” Mei Lian screamed, her voice prompting Lin Yue to act. Coming out of her terrified daze, the young woman slapped another talisman to the puppet’s torso while Mei Lian kicked it backward and released her grip on the sword.

  The talisman detonated into flames that blew away the puppet’s upper half, and the corpse collapsed onto the ground.

  “That one nearly broke my wrist.” Mei Lian said as she grabbed her sword from where the corpse still clutched it in its hand. She flexed her fingers and rotated her wrist to relieve the pain before preparing for the next Corpse Puppet.

  “We’ll need to combine forces from now on. We don’t have time to breathe.” Lin Yue muttered as another Puppet advanced, this one just as fast as the previous.

  They fought in tandem, with Lin Yue hurling talismans to weaken the Puppet and burn its skin while Mei Lian struck precisely where the flames had weakened the Corpse Puppet’s resistance. Fighting these stronger Corpse Puppets took more energy, and there was more risk, even if they supported each other.

  When the second corpse fell, both Lin Yue and Mei Lian were exhausted and low on Qi.

  Just a short distance away, Jun De had also met a 2nd Level Corpse Puppet as well.

  ‘Maybe I should keep my distance.’ Jun De thought, and he was already looking for a way to escape. His body once again acted by instinct, cycling its golden Qi and charging forward with the Luminous Step.

  ‘NO! What am I doing!?’ Jun De appeared right in front of the Puppet before it could raise its fist to attack. A ripple of golden light appeared around Jun De as he channelled Qi into his palm and struck out.

  His palm struck with a sound like thunder, and he could hear bones snap and limbs dislocated in the Corpse Puppet. It was pushed back but stubbornly refused to fall, instead falling to its knees and struggling to stand.

  Jun De used the Luminous Step to dash forward, and he slammed his next Falling Star Palm straight down onto the Puppet’s head, detonating the attack through its skull and torso. The headless Puppet teetered for a moment before falling.

  He felt a surge of Qi enter his Dantian, cycling furiously and replenishing what he lost.

  ‘What was that?’ Jun De thought in confusion. Did destroying a more powerful Corpse Puppet give him some of its Qi?

  The darkness finally began to fray at the edge; the deep crimson sky slowly lightened into a bright red, and the blood moon descended below the horizon, replaced by the angry sun.

  Jun De had never been more relieved to see the sun in his life.

  As the light touched the earth, the Corpse Puppets froze in mid-motion, and their hollow eyes turned toward the dawn while the Qi inside of them unravelled like smoke on the wind.

  One by one, they collapsed like marionettes whose strings had been cut.

  Jun De turned toward Mei Lian and Lin Yue, relieved to see that the pair were unharmed. They appeared tired and looked as if they had been dragged across the ground, covered in dirt and sweat, but they were alive and uninjured.

  Seeing them staring back at him, Jun De smiled and nodded.

  “You both did exceptionally well; I’m glad that I had you looking out for me!” Jun De said truthfully, but to the two young women, it sounded like he was being humble and kind to them. They had seen how much better he was at fighting against the Puppets.

  “Senior Brother Jun, what about the others?” Lin Yue asked with uncertainty, and Jun De looked into the distance where the others in his group should have been.

  “We need to assist them.” Jun De said confidently. In truth, he wanted to surround himself with as many people as possible in order to ensure his safety.

  They found their group a fair distance away, exhausted and covered in injuries. After a quick count, Jun De found that there were several people missing, and the Disciples explained that they had been taken away by the Corpse Puppets as soon as they had fallen.

  Jun De stepped in front of the group, and they took comfort in his presence.

  “Senior Brother Jun, what should we do?” One of them asked.

  ‘How the hell should I know?!’ Jun De thought as he frantically tried to come up with a response.

  “We continue as planned, staying on the outskirts and fighting as a group. I have no doubt that these Corpse Puppets are assaulting everyone inside the Site, not just us. We need to use this opportunity to rest and recover.” Jun De said.

  He sat down on a meditation mat brought from his storage bag and cycled his Qi while everyone else did the same.

  Unnoticed by Jun De, a faint golden glow appeared in the sky above him.