Chapter 118 – The Skin Collector’s Offer
The rain had fallen in torrents for days, and still, the air seemed saturated with a strange tension, as though the land itself was holding its breath. Rin stood at the edge of a craggy precipice, overlooking a desolate valley. The valley had once been the site of an epic battle between two great sects—now only the bones of fallen cultivators and the rusted remnants of their weapons remained, scattered among the ashen soil like the forgotten remnants of time.
It was here, amid the broken and shattered, that the strange figure appeared.
Rin had sensed the presence long before the man came into view. The air shifted, a disturbance that was more than mere wind, as though something — or someone — had stepped through the veil of space itself. Rin's gaze hardened as he turned toward the soundless, shadowed figure emerging from the mist.
The figure was tall and draped in dark robes that rippled like smoke in the wind. A mask, molded from the flesh of some unknown creature, obscured his features. What caught Rin's attention more, however, was the man's attire: layers of skin, not his own, stitched together into an intricate quilt. It was a garment of human and animal flesh, expertly woven and fused into a patchwork of grotesque artistry. The skin glistened faintly, as if preserved by a dark power.
"You sense me, child of death?" The figure's voice was smooth, almost hypnotic, as it slithered through the air like a whisper carried on a cold breeze.
Rin said nothing at first, studying the man. He could feel a strange pulse in the air—a sort of latent death energy radiating from him. The man was not merely a cultivator; he was something far more disturbing, something beyond mere flesh.
"What do you want?" Rin asked, his tone wary but curious. He had grown accustomed to the undercurrents of death that surrounded him, but this presence felt different—like an ancient, hungry thing that had been waiting for centuries to find someone like him.
"An offer," the figure said, stepping closer. "A proposition, if you will."
Rin's eyes narrowed, his hand instinctively resting on the hilt of his dagger, Mourning Fang. His senses were finely tuned, and he could already feel the strange currents of energy coiling around the man like an unnatural aura.