Chapter 6 : Chapter 6
Chapter 6: Keep Walking. Do Not Look Back!
It was a wolf-shaped monster!
It stood no more than five feet tall, yet its fur was black as ink from head to toe, without a single stray patch of color.
A cruel, ravenous hunger burned within its scarlet eyes, while visible black demonic qi steamed from its body. The foul, fishy stench rolling off it struck from far away and was enough to make one retch.
Chen Guan nearly slammed headfirst into it!
Fortunately, his reaction was quick enough. He yanked hard on the reins, and the black horse beneath him reared up with a frightened neigh, barely stopping two zhang away from that black shape.
Luo Li looked up. After only a single glance, her hand shot to the short sword at her waist.
“It... it’s a demonic beast!”
A demonic beast was one kind of demon fiend—an abomination born when a wild beast devoured the flesh and blood of a person or creature tainted by some uncanny thing, only to be corrupted and twisted by that power!
They lacked the intelligence of true spirit-creatures. In their heads, there remained only the most primitive instincts of slaughter and devouring.
Yet compared to human cultivators, they possessed bodies that blades and spears could scarcely penetrate, along with an innate frenzy for bloodshed.
Once battle began, it would not end until one side lay dead!
Against such a thing, even three or five ordinary cultivators of the same realm joining forces might still fail to defeat it!
Judging by how solid its demonic qi had become, this demonic beast’s strength was no lower than the Xiantian Realm.
The moment the demonic beast smelled the blood and qi of the humans and horses ahead, greed instantly flared within its scarlet eyes.
“Awooo!”
It let out a furious howl, then slowly lowered its body. Its hind claws dug tightly into the ground, and the knotted muscles of its rear legs bulged upward like rising stone as it assumed the stance of a flying pounce!
Now this was trouble!
Luo Li’s expression turned grave. Her right hand silently settled on the hilt of the sword at her waist. Fearing that she might provoke the bloodthirsty beast before her, she drew the blade out inch by inch, trying her utmost to make not the slightest sound.
Yet Chen Guan, who stood in front of her, merely swept a casual glance over that demonic wolf. He neither drew his saber nor showed any tension. Instead, he cupped his fists in greeting and slowly spoke.
“Great Wolf Immortal, let us pass. Bridge to bridge, road to road. You take your broad road, and I will take my narrow plank bridge.”
“We are all folk of the road. Could you spare us a little face?”
Luo Li was left dumbfounded.
This fellow... had he gone mad?
He was actually trying to reason with a demonic beast that knew only slaughter?
What kind of delusion had her grandfather been under to spend such a heavy sum hiring a lunatic like this to escort her?
Yet what happened next made Luo Li’s eyes widen.
The murderous demonic wolf, which had been coiled and ready to spring, actually did ease the tension from its hind legs after hearing Chen Guan’s words. Even the ferocity in its eyes receded by a few degrees.
Seeing this, joy flashed across Chen Guan’s face.
He hurriedly reached to his waist, untied a black cloth pouch, and took out a walnut-sized lump of black dough, which he tossed toward the demonic wolf.
The dough ball rolled to a stop at the wolf’s feet.
“When one is away from home, it is good to make a friend. Take this little bit of passage money as a token of respect.”
The demonic wolf cast Chen Guan a glance with its scarlet eyes, then lowered its head and sniffed at the black dough ball.
It seemed to confirm something. The violent aura around its body drew inward once more. In one bite, it picked up the dough ball, then turned and leaped away, vanishing into the forest beside the road after only a few bounds.
“Hah...”
Luo Li let out a breath of relief, and her hand loosened from the sword hilt.
Yet no trace of surviving disaster appeared on her face. Instead, she looked at Chen Guan with utter disdain.
She truly had not expected that this escort, whom her grandfather had praised as though he were some heaven-sent wonder, would choose to deal with a demonic beast by spending money.
What kind of escort was this supposed to be?!
It was simply humiliating.
Chen Guan turned around and saw the way she was looking at him. Yet he still wore the expression of a man to whom nothing at all had happened. Curling his lip into a grin, he said with a smug face,
“Well? Now you’ve seen what I can do, haven’t you?”
“I’m telling you, in this lifetime, you will never find an escort more professional than me!”
Luo Li looked around at the surroundings and ignored him.
That had only been a demon wolf that had just stepped into the Xiantian Realm. Its strength was meager. Any truly capable escort would have cut it down with a single saber stroke long ago!
Yet this fellow had relied on some crooked little trick of unknown origin to fool the beast away, and he still had the nerve to stand here boasting about it?
She could not be bothered to waste another word on this scoundrel.
Luo Li shot Chen Guan a frigid look, pressed her heels against her horse’s sides, and went forward on her own.
Seeing the contempt in her eyes, Chen Guan could not be bothered explaining anything to this foolish girl.
What made demon wolves terrifying had never been their ability in single combat, but the nature of their species.
They were the largest pack-dwelling wild beasts in the lands around the Ten Directions Marsh. Once they became tainted by uncanny corruption, it was often the entire pack that underwent the transformation.
With the ten years of escorting experience Chen Guan had accumulated, one glance had been enough for him to tell that this demon wolf was no more than a sentry out on patrol.
Killing it would have been simple.
But after that, one had better be ready to face the siege of thousands upon thousands of demon wolves.
This only showed the worth of a seasoned escort like him.
He knew how to use the trade’s own road-talk and rules to avoid danger.
Had it been some other hotheaded fool, this little girl would likely have died eight hundred times over by now.
Yet the road ahead was nowhere near as smooth as Luo Li had imagined.
Chen Guan forcibly dragged her along in winding detours through that sinister forest, like some old farmer who had lost his way.
For the entire afternoon, they repeated the same sequence again and again: stop, cup fists, toss out a dough ball, detour...
Only deep into the night, after Chen Guan had paid out five or six lumps of black dough as “passage money,” did he finally lead her around and out from the far side of the mountain range.
Luo Li was almost driven mad with anger.
Mostly because of her grandfather’s funeral affairs, coupled with today’s hard riding, she had gone a full day and night without eating. She was so hungry that stars were beginning to burst before her eyes, and everything she saw seemed to carry a double image.
But that bastard ahead of her not only made no effort to get her something to eat, he even had the gall to mock her in that infuriatingly sardonic tone.
“Serves you right!”
“Who told you to be so stingy that you could not even bear to pay a little meal fee?”
Those words directly robbed her of the last of her strength. She no longer had enough energy left even to quarrel with him.
Fortunately, from where they were now, one could vaguely make out lamplight flickering at the foot of the mountain in the distance.
As they drew nearer, those lights gradually became clearer.
And the eerie smell that had filled the deep mountain forest all day long—that cold, rotten stench tinged with blood—had already vanished.
In its place came the familiar scent of mortal hearth-fire and cooking smoke.
Grrr—
At that moment, Luo Li’s stomach disgraced her yet again with a loud growl, the sound especially clear in the stillness of the night.
Chen Guan found it somewhat amusing, but he could not be bothered taking another jab at her. So he pretended not to hear it and continued leading the way unhurriedly ahead.
That pace was even slower than when they had been crossing the mountain earlier.
“Can’t you go any faster?!” Luo Li could no longer endure it. There was already a hint of tears in her voice.
The moment her words fell—
Chen Guan’s figure ahead of her suddenly stiffened, and his gaze abruptly sharpened.
“Not good!”
The careless, half-hanging expression that had lingered on his face before vanished without a trace, replaced by a seasoned alertness.
Without turning back, Chen Guan immediately lowered his voice and slowly warned Luo Li behind him, one word at a time.
“Keep walking. Do not look back.”
“Hmph, as if I need you to tell me!”
Luo Li clutched her stomach and shot him a vicious glare.
But some people were born with a stubborn streak. The more you told them to go east, the more they had to step west at least once, or their whole body would itch with discomfort.
Luo Li was plainly just that sort of person. In truth, at this hour of the night, she had not even thought of glancing back.
But after Chen Guan said that, she suddenly felt that if she did not look back even once, she might regret it for the rest of her life.
And so, almost by reflex, she turned her head.
Yet the instant her head shifted by only the tiniest angle, her pupils contracted violently. Even the horse beneath her froze where it stood, as though it had been turned to stone in an instant, utterly unable to move.