“How can he still live?” He Yu asked.

  “Is it really him?” Chen Fei shot him an uncertain look.

  “You feel it, too, then.”

  “It’s faint, but yes. But how?”

  He Yu couldn’t say. With his own eyes he’d seen the pillar shatter, seen it crumble. He’d stood beneath Jin Xifeng’s furious red sun as the light of heaven faded. As the radiance was consumed. Could this be some trap? One last blow to anyone who returned to the sect, looking for treasure or hoping to find survivors?

  It seemed unlikely. The feeling was faint. More like a memory than the towering presence He Yu had felt in those times he’s brushed his perception against Elder Cai’s spirit. Whatever the truth, there was only one way to find out.

  “We should at least investigate,” he said.

  As he resumed the march up the cracked stair leading to the inner sect, Chen Fei followed. “It will be dangerous,” she said. “Whatever is creating that presence is fighting something.”

  He Yu focused his qi sense and saw she was right. As distant as the source was, he clearly felt techniques activating. The sparking heaven and the blinding radiance Elder Cai had brought to bear against Jin Xifeng were all there—if only faintly. He called his guandao to his grip.

  They reached the top of the stair and passed through the formation gate that marked the outer boundary of the inner sect’s lowest mountain. The scene here was worse than on the lower mountains. Rubble littered the plaza, pits and craters scarred the flagstones, and collapsed pavilions rimmed the space like fallen sentinels. An inauspicious sensation hung in the air. Not a result of Jin Xifeng’s lingering influence, which was even more concentrated here than on the lower peaks, but something just as sinister. The stench of rot drifted through the silent, empty plaza.

  Off to one side, at the foot of a path that He Yu remembered once led to a tea garden, something moved. Chen Fei noticed it at the same time as he did. They both fell into ready stances, heaven and metal qi exploding out from them both as they prepared for what could only be an attack.

  What He Yu expected, he couldn’t have said. What he saw was beyond his worst fears.

  With jerking, spasm-like movements, a corpse emerged from behind a heap of collapsed timber and roof tiles. It gave off a presence that contained only death and decay. Although its robes were torn, decayed, and covered in blood, they’d once been fine. Its rotted skin dripped off its face like melted wax, but the dull red gleam in its eyes fixed upon He Yu and Chen Fei.

  It raised a hand, and a whip-like tongue of fire lashed out, sending a shower of embers over the ruined plaza. The technique had an aspect of what He Yu could only call decay to it, an aspect unlike anything he’d ever encountered before. It felt like death, but not in the same way that killing intent did.

  Killing intent held the promise of death. The potential, the threat. This was like death had already come and gone, leaving only the cold silence of its passing. It was a dark emptiness that left a profound discomfort lingering on He Yu’s spirit.

  The Spring Rain Mirror flashed into place and turned aside the fire whip. Chen Fei crossed the plaza in an explosion of strength and power. A silver ring of formation characters flashed around her fist, and the walking corpse exploded. She did her best to hide her disgust as He Yu approached.

  “There will be more of them, won’t there?” he asked.

  “Nobody buried them,” she said, shifting her attention to the collapsed buildings and lengthening shadows past He Yu.

  He didn’t blame her for being nervous. How many had died here, he couldn’t have said. Hundreds. Maybe even thousands. As quick as that last exchange had been, it would serve as a beacon. If He Yu’s instincts were right, the red gleam in the corpse’s eyes meant they were somehow still connected to Jin Xifeng, too.

  From behind the same collapsed building as the first corpse, another shuffled into view. Then another, and another. Each of them had the same dull crimson shine in their lifeless eyes. A few had the twisting ropes of shadow He Yu had seen around King Hao and Sha Xiang. It was all he needed to see to confirm his hunch.

  With a sweep of his guandao, he sent a blade of wind and heaven rippling across the plaza. A golden arc crackling with heavenly qi sheared through a half-dozen of the walking corpses. They fell, but continued to drag themselves forward with their rotting arms, eyes fixed on He Yu and Chen Fei, their mouths opened in silent cries.

  He Yu suppressed a shudder. He’d seen death, smelled the scent of rotting and burning flesh alike. He’d killed with his own hand enough times that his killing intent was sharp and refined. He may have even killed some of these corpses fifteen years ago during Jin Xifeng’s attack. But the sight before him was a step beyond.

  He activated Heaven’s Descending Blade. Half a hundred bolts of heavenly fury rained down upon the plaza. Gold and purple and blue and green, the sparking scintillating arcs of brilliance and destruction cleared the way for He Yu and Chen Fei. The shuffle of feet and the stirring of deathly not-qi was warning enough.

  “We should keep moving,” he said.

  The corpses were slow, and individually weak, if their first encounter was to be trusted. The corpses may be weak, but they were many. Neither of them had fully recovered from their battle and subsequent flight from Xin Lu. The medicine had helped, but neither of them were at full strength. And both of them knew well the power of overwhelming numbers.

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  The deeper they pushed into the ruins of the inner sect, the thicker the dead grew. Thicker, and stronger. At first, the encounters were much like the first plaza. He Yu could call the fury of heaven and obliterate scores of them with barely a gesture. Chen Fei’s formations were especially effective at sealing them, as they were now closer to spirits than the human cultivators they’d once been. Should any of them get too close, He Yu and Chen Fei were both more than capable of handling them in direct combat. At least, at first.

  The first group they’d encountered after reaching the inner sect had likely been Body Refining disciples in life. The lower-ranked disciples had been rallied in the final hours of the battle to guard against the Sunset Court’s incursion to the lower inner sect. They would have died by the hundreds there, as the frenzy took hold and they turned on one another even as they fell at the hands of Jin Xifeng’s true servants.

  By contrast, the corpses seemed to be roughly equal to Foundation stage cultivators. Maybe low Third Realm for the stronger ones. Whatever their true strength was, it was clearly weaker than it had been in life. Nothing they couldn’t handle. As they pushed further into the inner sect and made their way to the ever higher mountains, all that changed.

  At first, the corpses just became more durable. Only a little, but a little was something to be concerned about. He Yu first noticed when several of them remained on their feet after he unleashed a technique on them. He hoped it would be a fluke, but that hope proved itself short-lived. Soon, most of the corpses they encountered were strong enough to be considered fully in the Fourth Realm. Both in terms of how tough they were to defeat, and in the strength of their techniques.

  He Yu slammed a fist into a corpse that had pushed inside his guard. Heaven qi spiked through his opponent, burning it to ash as, once again, the shadow of the dragon wrapped itself around his arm. He longed to examine what this was, but as it manifested more frequently, his suspicions drew together into a solid guess. It would take time in cultivation to sift through his insights and be certain, though.

  “Are we getting any closer?” Chen Fei asked. Gore spattered her clothes and bearskin mantle. She’d long since taken to partially activating her Titan Panoply, protecting her hands and forearms with a solid layer of metal and mountain aspected qi.

  “I can’t tell,” He Yu admitted. With a quick activation of the Peerless Judgment, he double checked before he continued. “The presence is faint, and the further we get, the more it seems to be coming from all around us.”

  “I’d felt the same thing,” she said. A corpse lunged for her. She grabbed it in one, qi-enforced hand. Silver light flared around her wrist before the corpse crumbled to dust in her grip. “Should we keep going?”

  It was a tough call. The longer they stayed, the greater the risk they’d be overwhelmed. Just because they were keeping ahead of the horde now didn’t mean their fortune would last. The balance would shift against them eventually, as they ran low on qi and had to fall back on their limited stock of medicines. It was only a question of how long that would take.

  But if Elder Cai somehow still lived—well, that would make it all worthwhile. Even if he was weakened, he could at least provide guidance and insight. With enough time, he could cultivate back to his full strength. Hadn’t he said the whole reason he’d remained at the peak of Divine Soul Apotheosis was to maintain the Dawn Palace? The formation was shattered. All the power he’d needed to spend maintaining it was now his once more. He might even advance to the Ninth Realm. Surely, an expert at the Heavenly Immortal stage with Elder Cai’s experience could defeat even a monster like Jin Xifeng.

  Pushing deeper carried with it tremendous risk. But He Yu couldn’t see any other way to freeing the empire from Jin Xifeng’s grip. As much as he wanted to face her himself, he had to be realistic. Even when he’d had the help of all his friends, Jin Xifeng was so far beyond their combined strength that they would be like infants to her. She could crush them all with hardly a thought or a care. As much as his Way pushed him to the heights, to become a hero in truth, and to forge a legend to last forever, he couldn’t beat her. Not as he was.

  “I don’t know,” he said after some time. “Is the risk worth it? I don’t know. Will we find what we hope, or will it just be another corpse? I’m sure you’ve felt it, too. Jin Xifeng’s influence lingers here. It’s not just that the dead were unburied. With nothing to feed on, corpses like this should have faded to nothing by now. The red eyes, the unnatural shadows. They died under her influence, and even though they’re just empty husks, she still won’t let go of them. They’re still driven by wants they don’t even understand anymore.” He Yu sent a lance of heavenly qi into an approaching group of corpses. It took two more techniques to deal with them all.

  “Yu,” she said. He turned to her, and she banished one of her gauntlets. She reached out and briefly touched his cheek before reforming her technique. “Its hard to do the right thing when you don’t know what it is. Not every choice you make carries the same weight. We can leave whenever you want. I think part of becoming a legend is knowing that whatever you choose, it was the best one you could have made at the time. I’ll be with you every step of the way.”

  It was an echo of so many talks they’d had over the years. Either sitting together against the wall of her immortal’s cave looking out over the expanse of winking stars and glittering snowcapped mountains, or within the sparking and crackling depths of the Thunder God’s Shrine, surrounded by the storm contained within. Even now it was tough to admit the wound still ran deep. Watching Li Heng, Yan Shirong, and Tan Xiaoling turn and walk away.

  He understood—he truly did. They had their duty. To their station and their family and clan. Something He Yu and Chen Fei alike were unmoored from. A burden neither of them had to bear.

  But it still felt like a betrayal.

  “We’ll keep looking,” he said. It would be the same if he left Elder Cai. At least it would be to He Yu.

  “I know,” she said with a smile. “We’ll turn back if it gets too dangerous.”

  They pushed ever deeper and ever higher. Every step of the way, they were dogged by more shambling corpses than the step before. The sight of disciples overwhelmed by the endless tide of spirits and beasts lurked at the edges of He Yu’s memory. Fighting his way through a battle of chaos to find his friends before they fell. All the while, they were attacked. All the while, Jin Xifeng’s lingering influence grew stronger. It wasn’t hard to see why Xin Lu had left them. This place was cursed.

  When they finally reached the source of the fading presence, He Yu’s heart sank. It certainly looked like Elder Cai—but centuries aged. When he moved, he briefly faded from sight, a sleeve or a hand vanishing, only to reappear as he connected a strike or activated a technique. His spirit felt diffuse and weak, even here. He may have been the equivalent of an early Nascent Soul at best. More likely, a peak Golden Core, judging just by the power of his techniques.

  The worst part—he was locked in battle with a half-dozen spirits. He Yu remembered them. Their distended bellies and dislocated jaws. Tongues that hung to their stomach, and long spindly arms ending in twisted clawed hands. It was clear to see this wasn’t a battle Elder Cai could win.

  He Yu unleashed his presence. The hunger spirits turned to him as one. He shot forward, and heaven’s fury followed.