Chapter 109: I Have Seen Through You

Under the moonlit, starry sky, a man and a horse engaged in a chase. The white horse was incredibly swift, quickly shaking off Fang Junmei and vanishing without a trace.

Fang Junmei refused to give up. He flew in the direction where the creature had disappeared, searching through the latter half of the night until dawn, yet he found nothing.

"Getting clever, are we? Knowing how to change directions... I should have made you teach me first before curing your poison."

As the sun rose, Fang Junmei sat down on the grassy field. After wiping away his sweat, he spoke with a touch of frustration, though he couldn't help but chuckle at his own final words.

That horse was not him. But since it was not him, he had to accept every decision he had made.

In the early morning, the mountain wilderness was heavy with white mist, which soon enveloped Fang Junmei’s figure. He pressed his hand against the earth, feeling no tremors whatsoever.

...

After resting for over an hour, Fang Junmei set off to search again, still aimless. However, it was much better than before; at least he knew the horse truly existed, and they had developed a slight, albeit strange, connection.

He searched and searched.

It was not until the fifth day that Fang Junmei finally found the white horse again. When he discovered it, the creature was by a deep, cold pool, devouring several python-like monsters. The area around the pool was a scene of fleeing beasts.

As for the black, venomous patches on its body, they had vanished entirely, and it had returned to its original, snow-white appearance.

Sensing Fang Junmei’s arrival, the white horse cast a look of annoyance in his direction, its gaze filled with a warning as it continued to consume the monsters.

Fang Junmei watched from a distance.

Once the horse had finished its meal and saw that Fang Junmei still hadn't left, it let out a long, defiant neigh toward him.

*If you follow me again, I won't be polite!*

The message in its eyes was clear.

Fang Junmei smiled slightly and ignored the threat, acting like a shameless scoundrel.

After another huff, the white horse stepped into the void and headed into the distance. Naturally, Fang Junmei followed once more.

*Whoosh!*

With a sharp whistle of wind that shook the air, the white horse sensed Fang Junmei pursuing it. It suddenly spun around and charged straight at him. In a few flashes, it was right before him, lashing out with a hoof toward his chest. The sharp sound of the wind alone told him that this blow was significantly heavier than the one from five days ago.

As he was about to be struck, Fang Junmei’s eyes remained exceptionally calm. The moment the hoof lashed out, he dodged to the side with movements as swift as lightning and as agile as a phantom.

*Whoosh!*

The blow missed.

After the strike landed on empty air, a look of profound shock appeared in the white horse's eyes. Even a cultivator at the early stage of the Dao Embryo Realm might not have been able to dodge that kick, yet Fang Junmei, a mere lad at the late stage of the Floating Dust Realm, had managed it.

In truth, the moment Fang Junmei found the horse, he had activated the Three-Breath Divine Stone. After a hundred years of cultivation, his reaction speed had greatly improved. When facing opponents who were not unfathomably powerful, he would no longer suffer the embarrassment of his eyes capturing an attack while his body failed to respond.

"I have already—seen through your movements."

After dodging, Fang Junmei smiled faintly, his snow-white martial robes fluttering in the wind. Even he was satisfied with that dodge; it was the peak of his performance, even if the movement had been slightly clumsy.

Hearing this, the white horse’s eyes flashed with renewed shame and anger.

*Whoosh!*

It spun, flashed, and after closing the distance to Fang Junmei, lashed out with another kick.

Fang Junmei dodged again.

Once more, he successfully evaded the strike.

The white horse kicked repeatedly.

Fang Junmei dodged repeatedly.

Man and horse moved through the void as if playing a game, one attacking while the other evaded. At first, Fang Junmei’s movements were hurried and ungainly, but as his confidence grew, they became increasingly smooth and effortless.

Conversely, the white horse became more irritated, angry, and anxious. As its frustration mounted, its attacks lost all form, missing every time. It was clear that while its origins were mysterious and perhaps noble, its temperament was still far from refined.

*Neigh!*

This playful, skirmish-like brawl ended with a long, utterly frustrated cry from the white horse. After stomping fiercely on the void, it ignored Fang Junmei and galloped into the distance, leaving one to wonder which beasts would be the next to suffer.

"Over there!"

"It's here!"

Cries came from afar as two cultivators arrived on clouds. Upon seeing the white horse from a distance, they were overjoyed and gave chase.

The white horse, already incensed by Fang Junmei’s taunting, felt a surge of bottled-up rage. Seeing two more figures coming for it, its eyes blazed with fury. It spun around and charged straight toward them.

*Boom! Boom!*

Its heavy steps echoed like thunder!

Within ten breaths, two screams rang out. Two more cultivators had their heads crushed by its hooves. Fang Junmei, watching from not far away, shook his head. This horse was short-tempered, irritable, and incredibly proud. If it weren't trained, it would eventually provoke a true master and die a violent death. He wondered where its kin could be.

The horse killed the two men, took nothing, and ran off.

Fang Junmei, taking advantage of the situation, swept over, looted their storage bags, and burned the corpses to ashes before continuing his pursuit of the white horse.

...

This time, the white horse did not change direction.

Fang Junmei quickly found it and saw it was still devouring monsters. Sensing his arrival, it wore a dark expression and ignored him entirely.

Fang Junmei landed in a nearby clearing and watched from afar, neither approaching nor leaving, looking as if he were determined to stick to it.

From that day on, the man and the horse became linked in this manner. Wherever the horse went to feed, Fang Junmei followed. Occasionally, other cultivators would arrive, spot the horse, and leave; others would attempt to capture it, only to be killed by the horse’s lightning-fast strikes. Even if Fang Junmei wanted to intervene, he couldn't.

After more than a month of feeding, the white horse finally seemed satisfied and headed toward the direction of the Blood-Colored Stone Forest. One had to wonder just how much space it had inside its belly. Based on the large underground space Fang Junmei had previously seen and his interactions with it, the horse clearly swallowed the beasts whole to enjoy them slowly later.

The path back was not in the sky, but beneath the earth.

After flying for a while, the horse dived into a deep fissure in the ground, and Fang Junmei followed.

Ahead lay a pitch-black expanse, with narrow underground crevices barely wide enough for a horse to pass, spreading out everywhere as if the horse had carved many paths through the earth itself.

"It’s just enjoying those monsters, so why must this horse return to the underground of the Blood-Colored Stone Forest?"

After gauging the creature's direction, Fang Junmei felt a surge of confusion.

...

Setting aside the man and the horse, back at the Blood-Colored Stone Forest:

A few days later, two figures flew in from the horizon and stood above a valley. They stood proudly on the cliff overlooking the depths.

One was a scholarly-looking young man in white. He was handsome, but his face was as pale as a corpse, devoid of any blood, and his eyes were hollow—the very image of a consumptive patient. A closer look revealed a profound, calm stillness within those empty eyes.

The other was also a young man, dressed in colorful clothing. He shared a five or six-part resemblance with the man in white, though he had a more oily, pampered appearance, with his hair slicked and shining.

The man in white was at the late stage of the Floating Dust Realm, while the man in colorful clothes was at the middle stage.

"Big brother, this Blood-Colored Stone Forest is definitely strange. When I came here a few months ago, I heard miserable beastly howls coming from deep below," the colorful-clad man said. "But I searched for a long time and couldn't find what was causing it, nor could I even find any beasts."

The man in white nodded slightly and mused, "It must be some rare monster or venomous insect. If we can catch it, our 'Ten-Thousand Poison Blood Gu' technique will surely reach a new level, and we might even gain a powerful helper."

By the end of his sentence, greed glittered in his eyes.

The man in colorful clothes chuckled.

*Ten-Thousand Poison Blood Gu.*

The name alone suggested it was no righteous path. Indeed, this technique was a secret art of the Ten-Thousand Savage Mountains, accessible only to inner-sect disciples. It was refined using the venom and blood of monsters and insects; the more and stronger the sources collected, the greater the power—a truly sinister and malicious method.

These two were known as Tang Shi and Tang Yu, brothers with a fearsome reputation in the Ten-Thousand Savage Mountains. While they were ruthless to others, their bond as brothers was genuine.

"Let’s go. I want to see exactly what this thing is."

With a shout from Tang Shi, he dove down first, followed by Tang Yu with a sinister grin.

These two surely had no idea of the white horse’s true strength, or they would have fled far away long ago.

...

A few days later, in a cave within another remote valley:

Qi Yu was staring intently at a jade bottle. Inside were two moon-white, worm-like entities—one larger, one smaller. They writhed slightly, yet they did not look real; they were ethereal, like two segments of squirming moonlight, at once beautiful and hair-raising.

"Success! Time to head out and catch that creature."

Looking at the contents of the bottle, Qi Yu laughed heartily.