The Immortal’s Poison

Xiao Sha shook his head from his place inside the sleeping bag. For safety reasons, he had only planted markers on the evil cult followers. He had not expected the Tibetans would kill every single evil cult follower, leaving him without a clue.

From Wen Leyang’s perception,.it does help that they came up with some conclusions but the actual facts do not perturb him. He has already made up his mind to investigate the evil sorcerer’s identity, with or without any help. Wen Leyang looked towards Old Gu in excitement. “I take it that you will not be leaving?”

Old Gu shook his head, ” Why the hell should I leave when the mission is still not complete?”

As long as the evil sorcerer’s plans were yet to be foiled, Gu XIaojun’s mission was still considered incomplete. Wen Leyang smiled as he consoled Old Gu, “I will be teaming up with head lama Rangjung to investigate the later events…”

Before Wen Leyang could finish his sentence, Gu Xiaojun heaved a sigh and interrupted him. “Do you think I do not want to leave yet?”

When he could not come up with a solid plan, Old Gu always relied on his instincts and experience as a soldier, even though he was just an ordinary human, no matter whom the enemy he was facing.

Gu Xiaojun waved his hand. The odd expression on his face vanished, switching back to his usual look of command and experience. He frowned as he spoke to Xiao Sha, “Think hard again. The Tibetans shaved away the African cult follower’s hair, is it possible that…”

Xiao Sha shook his head so hard that his teeth chattered. “That’s not how the trick works. The markers I placed are completely unrelated to…”

Fei Fei stood by frowning. She had been contemplating something from where she stood and finally, she spoke slowly, “Chief, please let me try.” As she said this, she fished out a GPS device from the bottom of her backpack and being to operate it swiftly.

Fei Fei tinkered for a bit, then swept a beaming smile towards the three magic elites, Wen Leyang, Rangjung, and Po Tu. “Which of you immortal seniors could please give me a lift and run for another few rounds? We will need to revisit every corpse pit as I need to download the coordinates of each location.”

…

Wen Leyang was a spry young man and would usually have no problem running for a bit while carrying a girl on his back. Running up to all eight corpse pits with almost no rest in between? That was proving to be quite the challenge.

At every corpse pit, Fei Fei would download the coordinates of their location. This process took no less than half a minute before she was jumping up on Wen Leyang’s back again, yelling, “To the next one!”

Wen Leyang gave out a strained laugh as he ran, tilting his head to look at Fei Fei and ask, “Why did not do this earlier?”

Fei Fei shook her head, her face filled with regret. “This did not occur to me earlier. I was only focused on figuring out the cause of death of the evil cult followers, that’s why I did not think to download it…”

Even though Wen Leyang could move as fast as the wind, by the time they arrived back at their campsite, the sky was already brightened. Fei Fei did not care for any rest, instead started bustling about her device, connecting the coordination of the eight corpse pits. With the aid of the GPS device, the calculations which resulted were much more accurate than what Fei Fei first drew on her map.

Po Tu was a creature that strode to make headway into any situation. It looked towards head lama Rangjung, who was smiling serenely but not speaking, and then to Wen Leyang who was panting on the ground. It finally could not conceal its curiosity any longer. Po Tu moved its huge head closer to Fei Fei and asked, “What are you doing?”

Head lama Rangjung immediately followed and nodded fervently, “That’s right, that’s right! Please tell us, quick! I have been wanting to ask that question since earlier.”

Po Tu shot a glare towards the lama. “You were smiling in such a steady and sure manner that I thought you knew what was going on.”

Rangjung sniggered as he shook his head. “She was so focused on her task earlier, I didn’t want to break her concentration.”

Fei Fei giggled and started to explain in a calm and composed manner, “As we discussed earlier if the positions of the corpse pits are located as I predicted on the world map, then knowing where burial grounds of the evil cult followers’ are, we can predict where they had come from.”

Gu Xiaojun nodded. “That is correct, so?”

Po Tu turned its huge and square face towards Old Gu, “Turns out you do not know what this little girl is up to as well? Why did you not ask?”

Old Gu burst out laughing.”I do not usually ask about the process, I merely wait for results.” As he said this, he waved to Fei Fei to continue speaking.

“The Tibetans did a thorough job. They made certain to kill these people at a certain location so there must be some purpose for that…” Fei Fei continued.

Head lama Rangjung smiled then, he continued Fei Fei’s conversation, “Uh… I do not fully understand the principles of Devilry Arts but I think I can make a guess on its effects. These evil cult followers may not have possessed great magical powers but they had magical powers nonetheless. Of course, they would have acquired a certain level of power after having practised from some time, that is to say, their abilities would have been much stronger if they were back on their own native homes instead of in a foreign location…”

At this point, the head lama frowned. The group looked at him with a mixture of curiosity and loss. The lama’s words were a little too abstract for them to understand.

Rangjung pondered for a moment as if trying to think of a better way to explain himself. He spoke again after a few minutes, rephrasing, “Let me put it this way, think of the evil cult followers as medicinal ingredients. The Persians were like ginseng grown in the mountains, The Khmer were the Lingzhi mushroom from snowy peaks, etc etc. The ginseng’s medicinal effects are strongest when freshly picked from the mountains and forests. By the time it is taken to the inland, no matter how well preserved, its medicinal effects would have greatly diminished. The evil cult followers that worshipped Xiang Liu are also the same.”

After this explanation was provided, Wen Leyang could roughly understand the story. He came from an elite family devoted to refining and learning about poisons from many generations passed. In essence, this concept was the same as refining a poison. The toxicity of a poison ingredient was much purer and stronger when used and harvested in its own cave rather than in another location. Wen Leyang responded to Rangjung’s statement, “The evil sorcerer cast a magic spell to dig out the heart of the Persians. If these hearts had been dug out from them back in their homeland, its effect would have been much greater there. When their hearts were dug out on the highlands, its effect was greatly reduced.”

Rangjung could finally convey his theory in an understandable way. He laughed heartily and nodded. “That is correct! It is the same for these evil cult followers. The evil sorcerer did not have the energy to travel all around the world to visit the birthplaces of these followers to harvest their hearts, lungs, bones, and blood. That was why he lured them put into the dessert. However, in order to achieve and maintain the maximum effect, at the base of the Tanggula Mountains, the evil cultivator had exerted his power in creating a miniature version of heaven and earth. This miniature version of heaven and earth may have been a scaled down but it was complete in terms of ratio to the real world. Within this space, he matched the evil cult followers to the location of their native homeland and killed them there, extracting the materials he needed.”

Rangjung halted for a moment, allowing the group time to digest and understand what he had just told them before providing them with the conclusion. “Rather than killing them in any random location, by doing this, he had managed to extract materials which have a better effect.”

Simply put, the head lama’s convoluted theory was that the residents of Tuer Town chose to kill the evil cult followers on selected locations, which were in accordance to their native lands, in order to achieve and maintain the ‘medicinal effects’ of the parts extracted from them.

Fei Fei stared in bewilderment at that theory. She had not expected the head lama to be able to unravel the evil sorcerer’s and his followers’ methods. His statement sounded very plausible. She nodded her head and continued to explain her idea, “I wasn’t thinking of that…”

Head lama Rangjung looked disappointed for a moment.

“I was only thinking of the fact that the evil sorcerer had instructed to kill those Xiang Liu followers in very precise locations. This would certainly be a matter of extreme precision for the evil sorcerer. There must be no mistake in calculating these locations. Where they were told to kill the people and dig out their hearts, that would be where the Tibetans would kill the followers and dig their hearts out!”

The group nodded in agreement. Fei Fei was indeed an intelligent young lady. Even though she was unaware of the evil sorcerer’s ways and practices, her own speculation comes very close to head lama Rangjung’s explanation, who has extensive and strong cultivation roots.

A smile hung on Fei Fei’s face, making it so no one could read her expression. She spoke her next words full of pride, “It was only because of the unsually precise locations of where those evil cult followers had been killed, I had thought of a method that could possibly be useful in locating them. That was why I requested Wen Leyang to run with me on a trip.”

Wen Leyang had been listening to many stories for the past few years. He had already become a professional audience. He chimed in and asked, “What method is that?”

Fei Fei nodded at Wen Leyang with eyes of joy, she pronounced each word carefully, “Distance! Direction! No matter how small the map of the world was scaled down, they would still require a point of reference, a united and original starting point. That means the person who drew the map and the position that he used to observe this miniature world must be a fixed location. Do you understand that?”

Old Gu and Xiao Sha, who had received strict training on the knowledge of surveying and drawing maps, nodded without the slightest hint of hesitation.

Tutatunte was at a loss for what to do. He cracked open his lips in a smile, revealing two rows of ghastly white teeth as he sniggered.

Xiao Sha had since come out of the sleeping bag. He was originally a healthy person and had rested for more than half the night, he had regained his energy by now. He chuckled as he tried to explain to Wen Leyang. “If you were to draw a map,” He stretched out a hand and placed two pieces of rock on the ground, one big and one small. “In order to get an accurate measurement of the distance between these two pieces of rock, you will need to fix your position. Only then can you scale down the size of these rocks and the distance in between in the correct ratio and draw out precise illustrations. No matter which mapping point you choose, during the process of drawing the map, you changed change your location. If you fail to do this, for example, you draw out the distance of you and the big rock is one kilometre away, then you run two kilometres towards the small rock and draw it at from that point. If you refer to the map that you have drawn, the distance between the two rocks would certainly be inaccurate, do you understand that?”

As Xiao Sha was not very articulate and Wen Leyang did not possess any basic knowledge of mapping, he could only understand the rough idea. Nevertheless, he understood the heart of what they were saying. In order to draw out a precise map, there would have to be one fixed mapping point, which would be the original starting point mentioned by Fei Fei.

The giant pangolin Po Tu gave out a ‘hah’ as it said, “Stop talking about the big rock and the small rock, it’s better if you not mention it at all. You’re making us more confused!”

Fei Fei could feel the group coming around to her idea, she continued, “This mapping point could be any location, it doesn’t have to be in the centre of this miniature heaven and earth. We’re currently trying to locate the mapping point of this space. Theoretically, it is where the map drawer stood when they cast the spell. This mapping point could be of importance but it could also not mean anything. Worst case scenario, the evil sorcerer could have simply found a random spot and decided where the pits should be after. We may not find anything even if we rush over there. Best case scenario, the evil sorcerer had set up base there since the beginning of their plan and has not moved from that spot. That base may have become the mapping point for the miniature heaven and earth out of convenience.”

No matter what the circumstances may be, they would still have to check out that spot and clear it of any suspicious activity. Wen Leyang was frowning so hard that his brows twisted like a pair of pretzels. He understood everything Fei Fei had side but to him, trying to locate this mapping point was like giving him a world map and asking him to find the position of the person who drew that map…

Fei Fei looked towards Wen Leyang with a smile. She shook her head gently, “It’s not like what you imagine.”

Wen Leyang hastily stretched out his hand and rubbed his face. “When I’m with you, I can’t get even an inch of privacy!”

Fei Fei laughed out loud. “A different mapping point will not affect the ratio of the map but it will affect the position of the corpse pit. If the location was a different point, all the locations of the corpse pits would rotate accordingly.” This was known as the principle of equidistance. Fei Fei held a GPS in her hand which she used to download the coordinates of the corpse pits and the actual coordinates of the represented land from the world map. This was not a difficult thing to do, simply time consuming. About an hour or two later, Fei Fei cheered in glee, “The zombies have entered the mountains! The point is on the Tanggula Mountains, to the southeast slope of the Geladaindong Peak, on the Jianggendiru Glacier!”

Gu Xiaojun and Xiao Sha jumped up simultaneously. They started packing swiftly, preparing to depart as soon as possible. Gu Xiaojun was brimming with enthusiasm upon determining the target of their mission. In high spirits, he fed the group with the geographical knowledge he possessed, “The Jianggendiru Glacier is also known as the Jianggendiru Snowy Mountain. It was formed way back in ancient times. The ice has been accumulating there for thousands and millions of years. The ice is a dozen meters thick, maybe even in the hundreds! It’s a place on the highland where few people tread.”

Xiao Sha tossed all the heavy luggage onto Wen Leyang and head lama Rangjung’s back unceremoniously. He chuckled as he continued Old Gu’s sentence, “The Jianggendiru Glacier was completely unknown to man but it was marked down during a geological expedition to find the original source of the Yangtze River. It was determined that these snowy peaks were the source and thus the location rose to fame.”

Wen Leyang laughed. The opportunity for the descendants of the Yan and Huang Emperor to visit the source of the Yangtze River was indeed a fortunate event. Suddenly, a thunder-like roar erupted from Rangjun’s throat!

In that instant, Wen Leyang thought that an enemy was approaching. Before he could react, head lama Rangjung’s has already moved, looking like a fire cloud in his red robes. His body flashed past Wen Leyang as he moved to Xiao Sha’s side. He grabbed Xiao Sha’s wrists, “What are you say… oh no!”

Before Rangjung could finish his sentence, he jumped up, hands trembling. With a sound of a crack, Xiao Sha’s entire arm dropped out of its socket and into the lama’s hands. Rangjung had not intended to hurt Xiao Sha but he had not expected Xiao Sha to be so fragile.

Strangely, Xiao Sha’s face did not show any signs of pain or agony. He looked at the lama serenely, “Great master, you ought to be more careful! The bones and bodies of an ordinary human cannot bear to be grabbed by you so forcefully.” As he said this, his shoulder shook. From the sleeve, fresh blood spurted out and an arm started sprouting out. Rangjung realized he had been tricked by the small-eyed boy’s folk magic. He turned around and looked down at the arm he held in his hands. The arm felt absolutely lifelike in its appearance and texture. There was no way to tell if the arm was real or fake.

Rangjung tossed the arm back to Xiao Sha. His worried expression was replaced by a look of mixed emotions, not knowing whether to laugh or to cry. He continued his earlier line of questioning, “Is it true that the Jianggendiru Glacier is the original source of the Yangtze River?”

Xiao Sha nodded in confirmation. He asked almost in a mocking voice, “The great master has been a heavenly walker on these highlands for decades now. How could you not know of this?”

“I did not know, I did not know…” Rangjung frowned, obviously distracted. A few moments later, he gave out a forced laugh and said, “This is still about the heavenly water spirit. There is certain to be a strong heavenly water spirit of the original source of the great Yangtze River. The evil sorcerer and his minions have entered the Tanggula Mountains in search of this precious water element!”

The Tibetans had failed to locate the heavenly water spirit of the Namtso Lake thus, led by the evil sorcerer, the enemy group had rushed towards the original source if the Yangtze River on the top of the Tanggula Mountains. They had already killed all the evil cult followers before they entered the mountains. It seems they were determined to acquire the heavenly water spirit that was located on the Jianggendiru Glacier. Maybe the evil sorcerer had even found his prized treasure by now.

Gu Xiaojun and Wen Leyang wasted no more time. They immediately move to depart when a series of babbling shrieks rang out. Tutatunte ran over and stretched out his arms, blocking everyone’s way. He shrieked continuously as he gestured. His intention was obvious, he wanted to follow the group into the mountains. He wanted to avenge his fallen comrades.

“You are lucky you weren’t killed. You should go home!”

Tutatunte’s gesturing became frantic. The giant pangolin grabbed ahold of him and tossed him some feet away.

This was an urgent matter. Wen Leyang and the rest did not have time to argue with their African brother. Not to mention that these three cultivators would be carrying the luggage and one special agent each on their backs. They moved swiftly and in a flash were gone, disappearing under the foothills in the blink of an eye.

Tutatunte’s face was filled with sorrow. He stood up and brushed the dirt off himself. Clenching his teeth, he ran towards the direction of the Tanggula Mountains after the group.

Wen Leyang and the divine beast Po Tu were used to seeing high mountains and great rivers. Upon first entering the greatest mountain on the highlands, they were slightly disappointed. The place was not as grand as they had imagined. The mountains were not as jagged or steeped as they had predicted. After having run some distance, they felt the sky was so low that it was about to fall on top of their heads and crush them.

The blanket of white clouds above their heads was like blooming white lotus flowers, auspicious and friendly.

The winds of the Tanggula Mountains were not so friendly though. It was bitter and cold, bitting into their like the howling, chilly winds in the dead of winter but the air was so thick and heavy that no ordinary person could have endured it. It pressed on the bodies of the explorers mercilessly, every step they took felt like it took every ounce of energy they had.

Wen Leyang had not expected the Tanggula Mountains to be as luxuriously green and idyllic as his family home but he had also not expected the hike to feel so heavy. The sensation was less like they were hiking the mountain, more like the mountain was hiking them…

Neither of the three cultivators cared to show off. They hurried through their journey in the day and at night rested for a fixed six hours. Every one of them understood that a violent battle was on the horizon.

On the third day, they crossed a nameless mountain ridge and finally strode over the snow line. The main peak of the Tanggula Mountains, the Geladaindong Peak, was near. It looked like a giant beast that was sound asleep. Its towering body curled up into a ball laid down quietly. Nobody knew if this beast was truly asleep or if it was merely closing its eyes, secretly peering at however entered the mountains!

Since crossing the snow line, Wen Leyang could not help but slow down his footsteps. He did not dare to speak too loud. He had yet to absorb the poison of the surrounding water element. He did not wish to cause a collapse of the snowy peak with his Faulty Punch.

These soaring mountains were high and lacked oxygen. Even Fei Fei’s laughter sounded strained. “There’s no need to be so cautious, it’s fine to speak out loud. The cause of an avalanche is actually due to the melting of glaciers and natural gravity. Frankly, even if a helicopter passed through, it would not trigger an avalanche! The probability of snow collapsing from one’s shouting is nonexistent! However, an avalanche is certainly terrifying so everyone is very careful about it. That is why they pass on false information on to others, out of fear!” Upon saying that, she started shouting loudly as a prank.

Xiao Sha was on the head lama’s back. He turned around and shouted towards Wen Leyang, ” If an avalanche is capable of being triggered by the sound of a voice, it would also be triggered by the footsteps of hikers! Those that hike snowy mountains often use ice picks to dig into the road, the clanging sound that action makes is much more aggravating than the sound of any human’s voice.”

Wen Leyang hastily picked up his pace. He spoke to Xiao Sha in a voice filled with caution, “It is best to be careful. My encounters for the past few years have all been low probability events!”

The giant pangolin that was walking at the head of the line slammed its tail. It turned around and scoffed. It shot a Wen Leyang a contemptuous glare. “Can your encounters be any more than mine? This old father can even dig out an old demon every time it burrows underground!”

Wen Leyang had not heard such a carefree thought in the last few days. He could not help but laugh out loud. His crisp and loud laughter echoed through the mountains. The echo of his laughter rang throughout the snow-capped mountain. It sounded like the mountains were haunted. Just as the sounds of Wen Leyang’s laughter faded, a loud ‘crack’ sounded. The crystal clear sound of cracking ice reached everyone’s ears.

The three transport vehicles stopped dead in their tracks. They stood looking at one another and thought in their hearts that this could not really be happening right now…

The crunchy sound of ice cracking rang out continuously. A spider web of fissures started appearing about ten metres away from the group but the fissures moved slowly like someone was using a chisel to knock on the ice from underneath the surface. In a few moments, with the sound of a pop, the ice sheet broke in the shape of a hole the size of a well. A white, shadowy humanoid figure leapt out of the hole like a fish.

When they realized it wasn’t an avalanche, Old Gu, Xiao Sha, and Fei Fei let out a sigh of relief and watched the man who had just sprung out of the ice with intense interest.

On the other hand, Wen Leyang, Rangjung, and the giant pangolin gazed at one another in astonishment. The expression on their faces was hideous. One of them achieved saint-status from introducing poison into his body, the other was a master in the mindful training of the Tibetan Buddhism Sect, while the last of them has achieved mastery in the Demon Arts. They had already cast out their psychic net to cover their entire surroundings but even now, when their eyes could see the white shadow’s facial features and even the frost between the man’s brows, their ability still captured nothing. They could not sense this man’s presence at all!

The person that had suddenly appeared was not old. He appeared to be a youth of thirteen or fourteen years old, being of bony and short stature. There was nothing remarkable about his appearance but his entire person seemed to shine and was transparent like he was built out of ice carving and snow bricks. His white robes covered him from head to toe so he appeared to be fused to the entire snow mountain.

The white-robed youth sized them up carefully. After a while, he looked towards Gu Xiaojun who appeared to be the oldest in the group, “Where are all of you heading?”

When he spoke, everyone was startled. He may have had a snow doll-like and youthful appearance but his voice was surprisingly hoarse. It pierced at ones’ eardrums. It was as if there was a razor blade stuck in his throat and he slashed every word he spoke into two.

Even Wen Nine and Wen Thirteen could have seen that a person who could break through an ice sheet dozens of meters thick was no ordinary person.

Gu Xiaojun’s face was ghastly pale, the expression on his face could not be read. “Who are you then? An obscure cultivator of the Tanggula Mountains?” As he spoke, Old Gu squeezed the giant pangolin’s shoulders, signalling the beast to be prepared. The white-robed youth had arrived in an absolutely unprecedented was and could possibly be related to the evil sorcerer. They could not be too wary of him.

At the same moment, Wen Leyang made a hand gesture towards the head lama without speaking. They shuffled along slowly, trying to encircle the opposing party.

The white-robed youth immediately picked up on their hostility. His mouth cracked into a smile, “Please don’t misunderstand me. There was quite a crowd that had entered the mountain recently. I am here to ask you if anything auspicious is about to happen…” The youth’s smile was relaxing and made one happy, his laughter, on the other hand, was terrifying.

Old Gu had no intention of telling the truth. He sneered as he pondered how to go about the matter. Suddenly, a loud cry rang out, echoing between the layers of snow-capped mountain, rushing into the depths of their eardrums. The moment the white-robed youth heard the cry, his expression changed to one of shock. With a shriek, he dove head first back through the ice like a robust seagull.

All at once, Wen Leyang, Rangjung, and Po Tu gave out a simultaneous shout. They struck, fast as lightning, grabbing towards the white-robed youth!