Chapter 198: Corpse Dove
The two Corpse Dogs alone had already backed them into a corner. Now, with two more reanimated corpses joining the fray, Tang Dan and Tang Yongjun fell into utter despair as a bone-chilling fear washed over them.
"Open the door! Open the door! Ten billion! Xu Shanbao, if you just open the door, I'll give you ten billion!" Tang Dan screamed in terror.
But Xu Shanbao, already scared stiff, was curled up under a car seat, trembling uncontrollably and completely unresponsive.
Perhaps Tang Dan's screams had attracted the attention of the two corpses that had just risen. Their expressions twisted into ferocious masks as they lunged at him.
The two Corpse Dogs lunged at Tang Yongjun again. Just at this perilous moment, a pebble infused with True Qi struck the two reanimated corpses and the two Corpse Dogs with pinpoint accuracy. The vicious monsters crashed to the ground.
"Brother Dan, are you alright?"
Hearing the voice, Tang Dan's taut nerves relaxed. "Sister Qiu, if you'd been any later, I would have reanimated as one of them!"
The one who had rushed in to save them was none other than the An Family's Grandmaster, An Qiu.
Tang Dan warned her, "Sister Qiu, you'd better double-check them. These reanimated monsters might not go down in one hit!"
Just as Tang Dan had said, the fallen monsters rose again. But with a Grandmaster like An Qiu on the scene, they couldn't make any trouble and were quickly struck down once more.
Gazing at An Qiu as if she were his savior, Tang Dan said, "Sister Qiu, now I really regret not learning martial arts!"
An Qiu deftly knocked the monsters down again and scoffed, "With your meridians, you couldn't have succeeded even if you tried!"
"But I'm all better now!"
"It's too late even if you are. Just stick to your business!"
Tang Dan remembered that Chen Dong used fire to deal with corpses. He found some gasoline and doused the bodies. Only after he set them ablaze did the monsters finally stop getting back up.
After dealing with the bodies, Tang Dan stared coldly at the SUV.
Rewinding two and a half hours, Chen Dong had walked into a gloomy, dark cave. A nauseating stench, like rotting flesh, assaulted his senses, almost too much to bear.
Chen Dong frowned and ventured deeper. Less than a few dozen meters in, the dark cave split into several tunnels. Chen Dong casually picked one and had only taken a few steps when he saw the walls were packed with a dense black mass of crows. They were above, below, to his left, and to his right—absolutely everywhere.
The crows seemed to be asleep. Chen Dong's very purpose here was to eliminate this scourge, so he certainly couldn't let these crows, tainted by resentful energy, remain. Lightning flashed in his palm as he unleashed a powerful Palm Thunder down the tunnel.
After the flash of lightning, the cave floor was littered with crow carcasses. Using the same technique, Chen Dong sparked a fire with his lightning, and in an instant, the bodies began to burn with a SIZZLE.
Chen Dong's actions must have alerted the inhabitants of the other tunnels, for a roaring, rushing presence swept toward him.
In seconds, an uncountable swarm of crows flooded the tunnel, surging toward Chen Dong.
Chen Dong raised an eyebrow. 'Good,' he thought. 'Saves me the trouble of hunting them down one by one.' Lightning flared in his hand again. Killing these swarms with lightning was almost too easy. A single bolt could effortlessly vaporize a thousand of them; that's how densely they were packed.
Kill with lightning, burn the bodies. Kill, and burn again. Chen Dong was busy for over an hour. By his hand, at least tens of thousands of crows had perished.
After he killed and burned one more wave, it seemed as though he had finally wiped them all out, for no more crows came. But Chen Dong knew that wasn't the truth. He had alerted the being that dwelt deeper within, and the remaining crows had been ordered to stop throwing their lives away.
"If you won't come to me, then I'll come to you," Chen Dong murmured, stepping over the ashes and continuing deeper into the cave.
The deeper he went, the darker it became until the cave was utterly lightless. It was so pitch-black you couldn't see your hand in front of your face. Chen Dong no longer relied on his eyes to see; instead, he navigated using his True Qi and spiritual perception.
The tunnels were a complex, branching maze. Chen Dong could only follow the path with the densest resentful energy. The cave sloped gently downward. After walking for a long time, he sensed an immense concentration of this energy just ahead. His perception told him the source was suffused with a bloody glow, and when he opened his eyes, he could indeed make out a scarlet gleam in the darkness.
As Chen Dong drew closer, the tunnel opened into a massive cavern. The sickening stench was emanating from a Blood Pool up ahead.
Chen Dong's brow furrowed slightly. 'A Blood Pool like this couldn't have formed naturally,' he reasoned. 'Someone must have set this up.'
As if sensing Chen Dong's arrival, the Blood Pool began to bubble, then to boil violently. A rotten bird's head emerged from its surface.
The head was the size of a man's, with a sharp, hooked beak that didn't resemble a crow's. It was completely featherless, covered only in rotting sinew.
Chen Dong watched with wary eyes. Suddenly, the head's eyes snapped open, revealing not pupils, but two deep red orbs. The creature slowly rose from the Blood Pool, standing taller than a man and looking more like a giant, rotting vulture.
"You brat, what are you doing barging into my domain?" A sharp, piercing voice, like that of a eunuch from ancient times, echoed in Chen Dong's mind.
"You unleash those resentful crows to attack people, and you have the gall to ask me why I'm here?" Chen Dong retorted coldly.
The vulture-like creature, looking like a rotting corpse, spread its fleshy wings. With two clumsy flaps, it flew from the Blood Pool and landed on the edge.
That grating, squawky voice spoke again, "This one was still slumbering. They flew out on their own! This one knew nothing of it!"
Chen Dong sized up the monster with cold eyes, circulating the True Qi throughout his body, ready to strike at a moment's notice. He asked in a frosty tone, "What exactly are you? And why do you have so many of these resentful crows?"
"Heh heh... No need to be so tense, young man." Seeing Chen Dong's wariness, the bird-like corpse said, "This one, you see, is the renowned Lord Corpse Dove. As for those 'resentful crows' you mentioned... see for yourself!"
The Corpse Dove tilted its head, gesturing.