Chapter 27: The Crimson Village
The late summer night breeze should have carried the lingering warmth of the day and the fragrance of grass and trees. Instead, what struck Furina's face was a thick, acrid stench of char, mingled with something far worse—an indescribable, sickening odor of burnt flesh.
She wrinkled her nose, banishing the last wistful thought of a hot meal from her mind.
The dirt road beneath her feet was rough and uneven, the stones biting through the soles of her shoes. Huo Yun'er lay fast asleep in the soft palanquin Mademoiselle Chevaleyda had woven from water bubbles. Huo Yuhao walked alongside, his brow slightly furrowed, faint glints of pale gold flickering through his eyes from time to time. He was fully engrossed in practicing his Spiritual Detection soul skill—like a child with a brand-new toy, tirelessly probing every inch of the space around him.
Then, abruptly, his steps halted. His nostrils flared, and his young face instantly hardened with tension.
"Something's wrong up ahead..." He lowered his voice, a wariness beyond his years creeping into it. "It's not just the smell of fire. There's... the heavy stench of blood. Very strong."
Furina's heart sank. Following his lead, she rose on tiptoes and peered toward the distant hollow nestled between the hills.
In the deep, heavy darkness, an orange-red glow flickered and danced—unmistakable, blindingly vivid. At this hour of the night, any ordinary village would have long since extinguished its lights and surrendered to sleep. What could have set such a blaze ablaze?
Before she could ponder further, a gust of wind swept past, carrying something far more chilling than mere scent—a scream. It was brief, yet so raw and visceral it seemed to tear through the soul itself. The sound was saturated with absolute terror and agony, and then, just as suddenly, swallowed by the dead silence that followed.
"Trouble!" Huo Yuhao's expression shifted sharply.
Furina pressed her lips thin. "I can see that."
She turned swiftly to the members of the Salon Solitaire flanking her, her words rapid and crisp. "Madame Hevmayer, raise a water-mist barrier. Conceal our presence and sound. Lord Usher, guard Auntie and Yuhao. Do not leave their side for a single moment. Mademoiselle Chevaleyda, stand ready to reinforce us at a moment's notice."
The three acknowledged the orders, and faint blue currents of water-elemental power rippled silently into motion.
"Sister Furina! I'm a soul master too—my soul skills can—" Huo Yuhao stepped forward urgently.
Furina raised a hand and flicked him lightly on the forehead. "And get in the way? Your mother is right here! Do you want her to watch her son throw himself at an enemy we know nothing about? Stay put. Protecting your mother—that's your mission right now!"
Without another moment's delay, she drew a deep breath, and her silhouette vanished into the darkness ahead. Her hand tightened around the hilt of the Splendor of Still Waters at her waist.
The closer she drew to the village, the more suffocating the wrongness in the air became. The stench of blood—thick as rusted iron—was so dense it seemed almost to congeal, clinging viscously to her nostrils and the back of her throat. Rather than taking the main path, Furina vaulted lightly onto the thatched roof of a cottage at the village entrance, intending to survey the situation from above.
Crouching low, she moved carefully across the loose, slippery straw. The pallid moonlight barely managed to sketch the horrors below: collapsed fences, scattered farming tools, vast dark stains spreading across the ground... Fully focused, she suddenly felt her footing give way beneath her and nearly lost her balance.
She looked down—and in the sickly moonlight, she saw what had tripped her. A length of intestine, dark-crimson and slick with gore, hung from the eaves, swaying gently back and forth.
"Urgh—" A violent wave of nausea surged up her throat. Furina braced herself against the cold brick chimney beside her, barely managing to keep it down. She forced her gaze away and gasped for air—only to inhale more of the nauseating mixture of blood and char.
The faint sound, slight as it was, alerted a figure below—someone in the midst of dragging a corpse across the ground.
It was a person draped in a dark crimson robe. Slowly, he raised his head, revealing a pale, twisted face, the corners of his mouth still slick with half-dried blood. Under the moonlight, the four soul rings rising beneath his feet were blindingly vivid—two yellow, two purple, the classic configuration of a Soul Ancestor. But the hues of those rings carried something sinister, especially the purple, so deep it bordered on black.
"Oh?" The crimson-robed man licked the corner of his mouth, a savage, greedy grin splitting his face, his gaze locking onto Furina on the rooftop. "Where did this little insect crawl in from? Tch, and a female soul master at that? Strange soul power fluctuations, though... Tender, delicate flesh—just the thing to nourish this lord's body..."
Furina's hand, clutching the sword hilt, trembled faintly. It wasn't entirely fear. More than anything, it was visceral revulsion and raw fury. She now saw clearly what the man was wielding as his "weapon"—it was no scythe at all. It was a grotesque construct of seven or eight villagers' heads, their faces frozen in twisted, dying agony, strung together in an obscene chain. Clotted blood still dripped from the ends of their hair.
What made her scalp crawl even more was the man's left sleeve, hanging empty—and yet now squirming violently as if possessed by life. In the next instant, with a sharp shwoop, a slick, scarlet tentacle, thick as an infant's arm, shot forth from the sleeve's opening. At the tip of that tentacle gaped a twisted face—like that of a human infant—emitting a grotesque, cackling giggle aimed directly at her.
The scene far surpassed any description she'd ever read in novels or seen in games. The combined assault of sight and smell sent her stomach into violent revolt.
"Seeking death!" Seeing Furina seemingly frozen in fright, the crimson-robed man let out a strange, gleeful howl. The tentacle shot at her like a venomous snake, a foul wind trailing in its wake.
A jolt of adrenaline shot through Furina. Acting on pure instinct, she threw herself into a graceless sideways roll, narrowly evading a direct hit—though the sheer force of the passing strike grazed her cheek, drawing a thin line of blood. She could feel the freezing breath of the face on that tentacle as it lashed past.
"Damn it!" she swore under her breath. This thing was even more disgusting and dangerous than she'd imagined!
The crimson-robed man, irritated at missing his mark, swept his free right hand through the air. Soul power churned around him, and in the shadows behind him, dozens of razor-sharp blood spikes condensed in an instant—then came hurtling toward her like a storm of hail! Thudthudthudthud! The granary wall where she'd been crouching was instantly riddled into a hornet's nest.
She couldn't fight here. She had to draw him away—as far from Yuhao and the others as possible!
The thought flashed through her mind, and without a shred of hesitation, Furina turned and bolted toward the threshing ground at the far end of the village.
"Don't run, little beauty! Let your big brother give you a proper welcome..." The crimson-robed evil soul master flicked his grotesque tentacle as he sauntered after her, his tone dripping with the sadistic playfulness of a cat toying with a mouse.
Furina ignored him entirely, sprinting at full speed. The threshing ground was comparatively open, dotted with haystacks and an abandoned stone mill. As she streaked past a towering pile of straw, a sharp glint flashed in her eyes. She skidded to a halt and spun around, pouring every drop of soul power into her blade without reservation!
"Hummm—!"
The Splendor of Still Waters sang with a clear, resonant note, its azure radiance blazing outward! Gripping the sword in both hands, she swung upward from below with all her might. A condensed, crescent-shaped blade of water—massive and keening—ripped through the air with a shriek, hurtling straight toward the pursuing evil soul master!
This was a technique she had forged in this very moment—'Crescent Water Slash'! Though not a formal soul skill, it was one of the Splendor of Still Waters' innate abilities to command the water element.
"BOOM!!"
The water blade collided violently with a hasty volley of blood spikes the evil soul master had summoned, detonating into a shockwave of churning mist and gore. Straw and dust flew in all directions.
Seizing the momentum, Furina sprang lightly onto the nearest tall haystack, claiming the high ground. Without pause, she lashed out with two more slashes, two smaller but swifter arcs of sword energy flying in a cross-shaped pattern toward her enemy!
Yet the evil soul master barely staggered from the impact. A bloody aura spread around him, extinguishing most of the follow-up sword energies before they could land. Even more unsettling: the small section of tentacle severed by her water blade, upon hitting the dust, dissolved at once into a puddle of putrid blood—then, as if possessing a life of its own, slithered rapidly back to the wound and melded together, restored in the blink of an eye!
"Is that all you've got?" The crimson-robed evil soul master flicked his newly healed tentacle with a sneer, his expression one of cruel disappointment. "You're nothing but a pretty display. Not even enough to scratch an itch for me..."
"Shut your mouth!" Furina cut him off sharply. "I'm not done with you yet."
"Just look at your face—pale and blue in turns, a dark cast to your brow. Textbook symptoms of blood and qi deficiency, and severe malevolent entity intrusion." Her tone turned almost pitying, deliberate and leisurely, as if she were a bona fide physician making a house call.
The evil soul master was thrown off by the sudden shift, then erupted in fury. "What nonsense are you spouting, you filthy brat?!"
"No nonsense at all." Furina's smile didn't waver. She raised the Splendor of Still Waters, its radiance blazing, and leveled it before her. "This doctor specializes in stubborn, complicated conditions—especially cases like yours... where the demonic corruption has already sunk to the marrow!"
"Threads—interweave!"
—Borrowing this, Miss Yelan.
The words had barely left her lips when the blade's resonance reached its peak! In the next instant, countless strands, fine as gossamer and nearly imperceptible to the naked eye, erupted forth at a speed that transcended vision. Like sentient filaments, they enveloped the evil soul master in a flash! These water-threads ignored the blood-colored barrier he frantically threw up, piercing into his body with unerring precision.
"Gaaaah!" The evil soul master howled in shock and agony. To his horror, he realized the threads, once embedded, were not causing direct physical wounds—instead, they were madly draining his blood! The sanguine soul power he'd cultivated for years, along with his very life force, was flowing uncontrollably out through the threads at a terrifying rate!
In the span of a breath, suspended in midair between Furina and the evil soul master, an enormous sphere—the size of a millstone and composed of pure, condensed blood—had already taken shape and was rapidly swelling! Its surface roiled and squirmed, radiating an overwhelming stench of blood and a sinister, corrupted soul power fluctuation.
"This is a secret ancestral remedy—bloodletting therapy." Furina controlled the horrifying blood sphere hovering in the air, her tone as casual as if she were describing a homely recipe. "Specifically formulated to treat your condition: blood and qi stagnation, demonic deviation. Don't you worry—the treatment is quick, and results are guaranteed."
This was the unique power of the Splendor of Still Waters, a divine artifact—Judgment of Water. Through these water-threads, she could command water in all its forms. And blood-water... was still water.
True, unmistakable terror finally spread across the evil soul master's face. He tried to activate a life-saving soul skill, attempting to dissolve his body into a bloody mist and flee—only to find, with dawning despair, that the azure threads embedded in his flesh acted as the most tenacious of shackles. They bound him even in his misted form! He felt like an insect caught in a spider's web—the more he struggled, the faster he was devoured!
"No! You can't kill me! I am—" He shrieked in panic, attempting to cow her with his identity.
"Like I care who you are!" Furina's gaze hardened. She was about to channel her sword's force to the fullest and drain this scourge dry—
At that decisive moment—
"...Wuu... wu-wuuu..."
A faint, stifled sobbing drifted intermittently from the far end of the village, mingling with the wind and the crackling of dying flames. It was soft, yet piercingly clear.
Furina's focus, against her will, was pulled in that direction for a single instant. The water-threads she controlled experienced a minute, fleeting hesitation.
And that split-second opening was all it took!
The evil soul master, ruthless and decisive to the core, a crimson flash of madness flaring in his eyes, used his right hand without a moment's hesitation to tear his own left arm—the one entangled by the water-threads—clean off at the shoulder!
"Psshht—!" A spray of blackened blood erupted.
"You little wretch! Mark my words! If I don't repay this grudge, I, the Bloodfiend, am no man!" Accompanied by a shrieking, venomous curse, the one-armed evil soul master detonated into a dense shower of thick, bloody rain. But the rain did not scatter. Instead, as if possessing life, it swiftly seeped into the cracks and shadows of the ground, its presence fleeing into the distance in an instant. He was gone.
"Damn it!" Furina stomped her foot hard, a fierce wave of unwillingness and self-reproach surging through her.
She'd let the monster escape! She dispersed her soul power, and the immense blood sphere in the air collapsed, splattering to the ground and drenching the earth in dark, viscous crimson.
She followed the sound of the crying. Madame Hevmayer was drifting toward her, carefully cradling five or six unconscious, ragged children in several enormous transparent water bubbles. The youngest were barely five or six years old; the oldest, scarcely ten or so. Their faces were deathly pale, their bodies smeared with grime, and some had singed hems. The sobbing came from a tiny girl curled up inside one of the bubbles, weeping in her half-conscious delirium.
Huo Yuhao came running, panting heavily, his face a mask of anxiety and lingering fear. "Sister Furina! We found them at the cellar entrance... Inside, there were... there were so many more..." He couldn't finish. His face was ashen—he'd clearly witnessed the hellish scene as well.
In his spiritual sea, the Tianmeng Ice Silkworm's voice sounded, still carrying a shudder. "Good grief, you humans and your evil soul masters—you're a hundred times more twisted and barbaric than even the most savage soul beasts! No humanity whatsoever!"
Furina gazed at the surviving children, and a knot in her heart loosened. But the thick stench of blood and the brutal images of the battle she'd just fought rushed back into her mind. She looked down at her hands, caked in dust and speckled with dark stains of blood—and the thought of that giant blood sphere she'd manipulated, formed from human blood... The overwhelming physical revulsion finally overpowered whatever battle-adrenaline had kept it at bay.
"Huurgh... blaargh..." She couldn't hold it in any longer. She bent over, bracing herself against the ruined earthen wall, retching violently, her stomach convulsing, bitter acid burning up her throat.
"Sister Furina! Are you alright?!" Huo Yuhao rushed to her side and supported her swaying body, gently patting her back. The young man's face was etched with worry. He himself had vomited uncontrollably earlier when he'd discovered the piled corpses and the surviving children in that cellar. With a raspy voice, he said, "I-it's... it's okay. I threw up pretty badly too just now."
Furina retched until tears streamed down her face. When she finally managed to catch her breath, she took the waterskin Huo Yuhao handed her, rinsed her mouth, and swallowed a small sip in an effort to suppress the lingering nausea.
She straightened and walked over to where Madame Hevmayer had laid the children on a level patch of ground. She crouched beside the smallest one—the quietly sobbing little girl—and reached out, intending to wipe the child's grimy face with her sleeve. But as she extended her hand, she realized her fingers were still trembling faintly, beyond her control. After a few wipes, the girl's face was only smeared more than before.
It was only then, belatedly, that a bone-deep exhaustion and the hollow, shaking aftermath of survival washed over her. In the focused heights of battle, she hadn't noticed. Now, with the tension loosened, every muscle in her body felt weak and unsteady.
"Damned bastard!" Furina stared in the direction the evil soul master had fled, her fist clenched so tightly her nails nearly bit into her palm. "I let him get away after all!"