The northern perimeter of the Dark Mist Forest was a graveyard of ancient light. As Railin pressed deeper past the broken boundaries, the bitter air grew noticeably colder, thick with the stench of damp moss, decaying cedar, and the acrid, metallic tang of unrefined wild spirit qi. Sunlight no longer managed to penetrate the dense, tangled canopy overhead; the ancient trees grew so unnaturally close together that their twisted, blackened branches intertwined like skeletal fingers, forging a permanent ceiling of bark and pine needles.
Down here, on the forest floor, twilight reigned perpetual.
Railin moved through the thick, thorned undergrowth with silent, highly deliberate steps. Every breath he took was carefully measured—drawn deep into his lungs to feed the steady, icy energy circulating within his chest. Beneath his coarse servant's tunic, the harvested Silver-Vein Ghost Grass lay wrapped tightly against his ribs. Even without a formal alchemy furnace or spirit cauldron, his Ashen Devouring Qi had already begun its dark work. Tiny, invisible threads of black energy leaked from his skin, slowly siphoning the wild herb's pure, volatile essence and channeling a soothing, icy stream directly into his soul space.
The persistent, dull throb within his shattered meridians was completely muted now, replaced by a cold, crystalline clarity of mind that made the world around him feel intensely vivid. Every leaf, every drop of dew, every whisper of wind passing through the upper boughs was registered by his senses with terrifying precision.
His soul perception—far sharper and more expansive than that of any ordinary cultivator at the Spirit Refining stage—spread outward like invisible, vibrating webs, spanning a thirty-pace radius around his body. He could sense the microscopic tremors in the mud, the quiet rustle of venomous centipedes crawling beneath rotting logs, and the cold drops of condensation sliding off the ancient, mossy stone formations jutting out from the earth like shattered tombstones.
The two outer disciples back at the ravine mentioned a spatial anomaly somewhere in this northern perimeter, Railin thought, his pitch-black eyes scanning the swirling grey fog that drifted between the massive dark trunks. An automated monitoring array maintained by the academy elders wouldn't trigger a false alarm over a mere fluctuation. Whatever disturbed the fabric of space out here is either an ancient, forgotten relic unearthing itself... or a tear in the boundary.
He paused near the base of a towering, black-barked pine tree, extending his spiritual sense even further. The air in this sector was choked with wild, chaotic elements. Unlike the disciplined, filtered spirit qi found within the high-level inner halls of the academy, the energy here was raw, feral, and untamed. To a standard cultivator attempting to absorb it without an alchemy pill to neutralize the impurities, it would poison their meridians and induce Qi deviation.
For Railin, however, the concept of "impurity" did not exist. The Ashen Devouring Qi was a fundamental force of dissolution. It cared nothing for attributes, balance, or toxicity—it devoured all matter and energy, breaking them down into their most primal, baseline essence to feed his dantian.
As he shifted his weight to proceed up the rising muddy slope, his soul sense violently quivered.
A sharp, primal prickle of absolute danger erupted at the base of his neck.
Railin stopped dead in his tracks. In a single, fluid motion, he dropped into a low, predatory crouch behind the wide trunk of a massive, half-decayed cedar tree. He pulled his dark Qi entirely inward, sinking it into the deepest, darkest abyss of his dantian. He snuffed out his spiritual presence so completely that his vital signs vanished, blending seamlessly with the lifeless granite and damp earth beneath his feet. He became an extension of the forest's shadow—a ghost among ghosts.
Rustle... Scraping sound...
From the dense thicket twenty paces to his left, the thorned bushes were shoved aside with a dry, menacing rasp.
A monster stepped slowly out into the foggy clearing.
It stood nearly six feet tall at the shoulder, its massive frame covered in coarse, charcoal-grey fur that looked as sharp, rigid, and dense as iron needles. Its elongated, wolf-like snout dripped with acidic, yellowish saliva that hissed softly whenever it hit the wet moss below, burning tiny holes into the soil. But most terrifying of all was its visage—set into a bone-white, skeletal skull were four glowing, blood-crimson orbs that burned with unholy, insatiable hunger.
A Shadow-Iron Hound.
It was a low-tier demonic beast, roughly equivalent in raw power to a human cultivator at the Second or Third Realm of Spirit Refining. While its physical intelligence was low, driven entirely by feral instincts and territorial rage, its sense of smell and raw, bone-crushing physical strength were absolute. For an ordinary labor servant with shattered meridians, stumbling upon such a creature in the deep woods was a guaranteed, gruesome death sentence.
The beast lowered its heavy, bony head, its four crimson eyes darting suspiciously around the silent, misty clearing. Its broad snout twitched violently as it caught a faint, lingering scent in the cold air—the subtle, high-grade blood vitality still lingering around Railin's body from the Blood-Refine Bead he had swallowed earlier in the furnace room.
GRRRRRRRR...
A low, guttural growl vibrated deep within the beast's chest, setting the nearby giant ferns trembling. It took a slow, heavy step forward, its razor-sharp iron claws sinking deep into the muddy earth, leaving deep gouges in the soil.
Railin remained completely frozen beneath the shadow of the cedar tree, his mind cold, analytical, and entirely unbothered by fear.
If I attempt to turn and flee now, its terrifying speed will close the distance within ten bounds, Railin calculated, his eyes tracking every slight muscle twitch of the monster. If I fight it head-on using pure physical force, the loud crashing of our clash will echo across the valley, alerting the academy patrol units wandering the outer perimeter. I have to kill it silently. Instantly. And I must use its own massive momentum against it.
He slowly reached down, his fingers closing around a heavy, sharp shard of broken granite half-buried in the mud.
He did not channel a single drop of spirit qi into the stone—doing so would instantly emit an energy signature that the hound's sensitive instincts would pick up. Instead, Railin relied entirely on the dense, refined physical strength woven into his muscles, bones, and tendons from his recent alchemy refinement. He locked his focus onto the monster's movements, waiting for the precise, unmissable second to strike.
Suddenly, the Shadow-Iron Hound's four red eyes locked directly onto the base of the decayed cedar tree! Recognizing the hidden prey, it opened its jaws, exposing rows of jagged, yellow teeth, and let out a bloodcurdling, deafening roar before springing into the air!
SWISH!
The monster moved like a heavy, black streak of lightning. Its jaws were stretched wide, aiming to crush Railin's neck and snap his spine in a single, brutal bite.
Railin didn't retreat an inch.
The exact moment the hound launched its heavy body into the air, its underbelly was exposed for a razor-thin fraction of a second—the only part of its demonic frame not protected by iron-like, needle-sharp fur.
Railin exploded into motion.
He pivoted sharply on his back foot, slipping beneath the lunging beast with breathtaking, ghostly speed. As the massive Shadow-Iron Hound flew directly over his head, Railin drove the jagged granite shard upward with the entire, concentrated weight of his refined physical strength!
STAB! PACK!
The sharp granite shard sliced through the beast's soft, unarmored belly like a hot blade cutting through soft tallow. Hot, black, foul-smelling blood splattered violently across Railin's face and tunic as the monster's immense forward momentum carried it over him, dragging its own internal organs across the sharp stone before it slammed hard into the muddy ground on the other side.
CAW-RRRRGH!
The hound shrieked in harrowing agony, thrashing violently on the mud as black blood pooled around its body. Its four crimson eyes burned with pure, murderous malice. Despite the lethal disembowelment, its terrifying vitality fought to keep it alive. It dug its front claws into the earth, attempting to push its massive frame back up to let out another call that would raise the forest.
Before the sound could leave its throat, Railin was already standing beside its head like a spirit of death.
His right hand shot down like an iron vise, slamming onto the beast's upper snout and clamping its jaw shut. He focused a concentrated, violent thread of Ashen Devouring Qi into his palm and drove his bare fingers straight into the gaping, bloody wound in the monster's belly!
"Devour."
BZZZZZZZZ...
A dense, terrifying mist of pitch-black energy erupted from Railin's hand, instantly invading the beast's internal vascular system.
The Shadow-Iron Hound's four red eyes widened in sheer, unimaginable terror. The wild, volatile beast vitality surging through its veins was violently seized, bound, and dragged away by the dark energy. Railin's Qi acted like a swarm of ravenous, invisible locusts—tearing apart the monster's life force, stripping away its wild, chaotic malice, and forcefully dragging its pure, unrefined vital essence back into Railin's body through his palm.
The hound's frantic thrashing slowed. Its thick, heavy muscles withered at a visible rate. Its iron-like fur lost its metallic luster, becoming dry and brittle. In less than forty seconds, the giant, terrifying demonic beast was reduced to nothing more than a dried, hollow husk of skin, bone, and shriveled organs.
HAHHH...
Railin withdrew his hand, taking a long, shuddering breath as a massive, boiling rush of warm, refined beast vitality flooded into his dantian and blood vessels.
The dark ember within his core flared brilliantly, expanding dramatically in size and crackling with newfound power. The pure vital essence absorbed from the monster dissolved directly into his marrow and flesh, instantly mending the remaining micro-fractures in his skeleton and pushing his physical resilience to a stage that easily rivaled a Fifth Level Spirit Refining body-cultivator. He could feel his skin toughening, his eyesight penetrating deeper into the fog, and his soul space glowing with an eerie, icy brilliance.
He looked down at the withered husk of the Shadow-Iron Hound, his face completely devoid of pity.
"Not a single drop wasted," Railin murmured, wiping a smear of black beast blood from his cheek. "In the eyes of the heavens, everything is just fuel waiting to be consumed."
He did not linger to revel in his victory. The metallic stench of blood, however faint, would eventually attract other, larger predators roaming the deep woods.
Railin turned his gaze toward the towering northern ridge looming through the mist ahead. His heightened soul perception picked up a faint, rhythmic pulsing of energy echoing from beyond the jagged, black cliffside.
It was a strange, subtle spatial vibration—like the slow, heavy heartbeat of an ancient, invisible giant buried beneath the mountain.
Railin leaped over a mossy log, moving deeper into the dark, uncharted mist. He moved soundlessly, leaving no tracks, a dark phantom advancing toward a secret that would forever alter the balance of his power.
As he ascended the steep, slippery incline of the northern ridge, the forest began to change. The dense pine trees gave way to barren black crags and jagged limestone needles that thrust upward like the fangs of an underground dragon. The ambient temperature plummeted rapidly, freezing the moisture on the rocks into a thin, slick layer of black ice.
Here, the mist was no longer soft grey—it was tinged with a faint, violet luminescence that swirled in slow, unnatural spirals against the wind.
Railin paused on a narrow ledge overlooking a vast, circular sinkhole carved into the side of the mountain.
Down in the depths of the sinkhole, suspended three feet above the fractured rock, floated a jagged, teardrop-shaped tear in the air itself. It was a spatial fissure no larger than an iron shield, its edges flickering with dark purple sparks and low, thrumming hums that resonated directly in Railin's soul.
Surrounding the tear were ancient, broken stone pillars half-buried in the scree—remnants of a long-shattered sealing array that had worn down over centuries.
A pocket realm fissure, Railin realized, his dark eyes flashing with intense interest. It's an unstable entrance to a small, isolated dimensional fold. That explains why the academy's monitoring array registered a spike—the ancient seal broke, allowing spatial energy to leak into the main world.
He knelt at the edge of the sinkhole, watching the purple sparks crackle against the damp rocks.
An unstable spatial tear was extraordinarily dangerous. A single misstep could cause the fissure to collapse, shredding anything nearby into spatial dust. However, pocket realms of this nature—especially those sealed by ancient array pillars—invariably contained pristine, untouched resources: ancient medicinal herbs, lost cultivation manuals, or concentrated spirit veins that had been preserved away from the outside world for millennia.
If I can enter and harvest what lies inside before the academy dispatches senior elders to stabilize and claim this fissure, my progress will be accelerated by years, Railin reasoned. The risk is immense, but in my current state, slow and cautious cultivation is a death sentence.
He checked his surroundings once more, extending his soul sense to its absolute limit to ensure no patrol disciples were nearby.
Finding the perimeter clear, Railin stood at the edge of the pit. He took a deep breath, wrapped his body in a tight blanket of Ashen Devouring Qi to cushion himself against spatial shear, and jumped directly down into the glowing, flickering vortex of the purple fissure.
The moment his body crossed the boundary of the tear, the world around him shattered into blinding streaks of violet light and deafening spatial roars. The heavy pull of gravity vanished, replaced by a violent, tumbling sensation as the void dragged him deep into the unknown heart of the mountain realm.
See you in next chapter....