A Bloody Awakening

“Now is the best time for us to take action!”

The leader of the den patted Lin Xingjian on the shoulder.

“Rest assured, however, the task of abducting the fairy will not fall upon our shoulders.”

“When the time comes, I’ve heard that more formidable individuals will take action; our role, as mere small fry, is simply to peddle various demonic pills. We will also receive a portion of the spirit stones acquired from these sales.”

Lin Xingjian no longer paid close attention to the many words the Den Leader uttered thereafter.

He had already gleaned the vast majority of the crucial intelligence and underlying facts.

His disguise proved utterly flawless, leaving no room for suspicion, which lent an exceptionally high degree of credibility to the Den Leader’s pronouncements.

As midnight descended, a profound stillness enveloped the world, the moonlight cascading like liquid silver across the earth, cloaking everything in a delicate veil of argent light.

Lin Xingjian, maintaining his perfect guise as Chen Jie, moved with spectral silence through the deepening shadows of the night.

He understood with chilling clarity that his elaborate deception could not endure indefinitely; action was imperative before the first hint of dawn touched the horizon.

‘I cannot prolong this charade any further,’ he mused. ‘While my demeanor and actions today have closely mimicked Chen Jie’s, subtle imperfections are bound to exist. Though that fool may not have noticed them yet, he is likely to perceive my strangeness in the days to come.’

He meticulously calculated his next move within his mind, resolving to strike this very night.

Since no further intelligence could be extracted, it was best to dismantle this den first, thereby ‘killing the chicken to scare the monkey’ (TL Note: A Chinese idiom meaning to punish an individual as a warning to others).

Lin Xingjian meticulously tallied their numbers, confirming that every single individual, save for Chen Jie, had returned to the stronghold.

“The time has come,” he murmured.

Lin Xingjian let out a chilling sneer, his form appearing exceptionally frigid beneath the moonlight, akin to a frost-rimmed blade glinting in the depths of a winter’s night.

The ethereal, cool glow of the moon cascaded gently upon him, sharply delineating his tall, unyielding figure clad in black.

He stood like an imposing mountain peak, rising majestically from the encroaching darkness, radiating an almost palpable, unseen aura of oppression.

“We can proceed,” he declared.

Lin Xingjian cleared his throat, his voice emerging low and potent as he addressed the profound darkness of the night.

“The codename for this operation,” he announced, “is ‘Leave No One Alive’!”

No sooner had his words faded than a shadowy figure materialized behind Lin Xingjian.

Its form was ethereal and ghost-like, akin to a black cat silently prowling through the deepest hours of night.

Many of the slumbering Qi Condensation cultivators remained lost in peaceful dreams, serene smiles gracing their lips, utterly oblivious to the imminent arrival of danger.

By the time any flicker of awareness stirred within them, their throats had already been brutally severed by keen blades.

Warm, crimson blood erupted forth, rapidly coalescing into a dark, viscous pool upon the cold ground.

They perished without even the chance to utter a single sound, their lives extinguished as swiftly and irrevocably as a candle flame caught in a fierce gust of wind.

The Shadow Sect operated with a singular, ruthless principle: to kill without question.

With each swift slash of a blade, each precise thrust of a sword, throats were sealed. In a mere ten breaths, every Qi Condensation cultivator within the den had been utterly annihilated, not a single soul left alive.

Though not a single sound escaped their lips, the copious gush of blood soon permeated the air with a thick, cloying stench, causing the Den Leader to snap his eyes open abruptly.

He instinctively sniffed the air, the intense, coppery scent of blood assaulting his senses.

The aroma was acrid and overwhelming, reminiscent of a demon’s foul breath.

A slight furrow appeared between his brows, swiftly followed by an expression of mingled terror and profound bewilderment.

He knew with absolute certainty that this was not the decaying stench of dead animals; human lives had been brutally extinguished.

And most assuredly, not just one!

“Preposterous!”

“How could they have been discovered with such terrifying swiftness?”

The Den Leader’s eyes widened to the point of tearing, his mind instantly engulfed by a surge of panic and gnawing doubt.

In the profound silence of the pitch-black night, his whispered murmurs seemed to vanish without a trace, like a clay ox sinking into the sea (TL Note: A Chinese idiom meaning to disappear without a trace or to be completely ineffective).

“It’s utterly impossible!”

“Completely impossible!”

“I have maintained heightened vigilance, every action meticulously cautious, and the surroundings are meticulously laced with numerous mechanisms and traps.”

“These traps, each one a product of my painstaking effort, are so sensitive that even a fleeting bird could trigger their warning alarms.”

“Yet, righteous cultivators have attacked, and there hasn’t been the slightest disturbance?”

“How, then, did they manage to approach with such absolute stealth?”

Fine beads of sweat quietly began to prickle the Den Leader’s forehead, gleaming like unsteady, cold stars beneath the hazy, dim moonlight.

He slowly raised a hand to push open the window, his movements imbued with a palpable caution, his gaze darting anxiously towards the surrounding traps.

The moment the window swung open, the potent, acrid stench of blood, carried by the night wind, surged into his nostrils like an overwhelming tide, forcing him into a fit of uncontrollable coughing.

Having long traversed the treacherous paths of the martial world, and as a practitioner of the Demonic Path, he was intimately familiar with the scent of human blood.

Such an overpowering aura of blood suggested that no fewer than a dozen individuals had met their end.

“What, precisely, is the reason for this?” he wondered.

He pondered the question repeatedly in the depths of his mind, his voice unconsciously trembling with a nascent fear.

His eyes wide with alarm, he wasted no time, reaching out to snatch the weapon resting by his bedside.

It was a formidable saber, its polished surface gleaming with a frigid, menacing light.

Strange, arcane runes were etched along its blade, radiating an eerie, bone-chilling cold even within the pervasive gloom.

His hand clenched tightly around the hilt, his knuckles turning stark white from the sheer force, before he abruptly thrust open three successive doors.

He roared at the dozen or so cultivators still slumbering within the room, his voice rendered sharp and grating by a potent cocktail of tension and fear.

“All of you who still live, quickly follow me and charge out!”

“Those sanctimonious hypocrites of the righteous path are upon us! We are in dire peril; there is no time to lose!”

He understood with grim certainty that escape alone was an absolute impossibility.

Only by employing these subordinates as a desperate shield could he grasp a fleeting chance at survival.

Yet, in the very next moment, he froze, utterly dumbfounded.

He had just bellowed with such force that his voice seemed to threaten the very roof, yet not a single individual stirred from their sleep.

Every single person appeared utterly deaf, heedless of his frantic shouts.

His face flushed crimson with rage, veins throbbing visibly on his forehead, he lashed out with a furious kick at the nearest slumbering figure.

“Still sleeping? What hour do you think it is?!”

“Get up, now!”

“A pack of utterly useless fools! You’ve all embarked on the path of cultivation, yet how can you remain so profoundly sluggish?!”

The Den Leader, consumed by an uncontrollable fury, unleashed a torrent of curses.

Yet, the only reply he received was a profound, deathly silence.

To his shock, the kick not only failed to rouse anyone but instead sent the body tumbling like a discarded rag doll, coming to rest at the Den Leader’s feet.

He instinctively fixated his gaze upon it, his pupils constricting sharply in an instant, nearly sending him collapsing onto the floor.

It was a freshly severed, blood-soaked head.