“Okay, so am I going to drive the carriage?” he asked as he headed to the front of the carriage.

Both Shen Ling’s and Xiannu Liang’s eyes widened in fear as they both shouted, “No!”

****

“I don’t see the problem with me driving the carriage, especially since neither of the two of you knows how to do it,” said Long Di as he held the reins of the Super Donkeys, and walked ahead of them.

“It’s… safer this way, for all the parties involved,” Shen Ling replied.

“I get the distinct impression that you’re trying to tell me something,” Long Di gave her the side-eye as he said this.

“No, I’m n-”

“You couldn’t properly drive a carriage if your life depended on it! Guess you can’t be a prodigy at everything, huh, you overachiever!” Xiannu Liang interjected.

“Sounds like you’re jealous,” Long Di shot back.

Xiannu Liang snorted in response, “W-What do I have to be jealous about?”

“For one, being able to achieve.”

“Y-You…!”

“And being able to construct coherent sentences, you’re not really setting the bar high here, are you?”

“Stinky Long Di!”

Shen Ling put her hand on Xiannu Liang’s shoulder and shook her head. This was understandable, as the verbal ass-whooping that Xiannu Liang just received would need time to heal and lord knows that such a beating rendered her unable to see that there was no coming back from this.

“Shen Ling, a question.” Long Di moved on to something else, putting the matter of Xiannu Liang behind him, which only angered the latter even more.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Do you remember what happened when you killed the boss bandit back then?”

When she heard this question, her expression turned complicated. However, she still nodded to indicate she did.

Long Di tried his best to approach the subject delicately since he saw she had issues with the situation back then.

“Can you tell me what happened back then? You unleashed a move I never saw you use again.”

He made sure it didn’t sound like he wanted her to use that move because of what the Destiny Scale said, but his curiosity got the better of him so he at least wanted to know as much as he could as the whole thing was bizarre.

“When I emerged from my first cultivation session of the Abyss Scripture, for just a brief moment, I had a complete comprehension of the entire Abyss Scripture,” she admitted with her head hung low.

“The entire Scripture? Is that bad? It doesn’t sound bad,” Long Di responded.

Xiannu Liang didn’t say anything in the face of this, a bit interested in the situation herself. However, she didn’t seem to judge Shen Ling and just continued to look at her in concern.

She took a while to formulate her words, as she didn’t think that she would be having this conversation today.

“… It’s not… bad,” she said after a while. “It’s just that when I used that move, it was purely on instinct. I could feel a pressure of malice that enveloped me.”

He then stopped giving her the side-eye and looked at her fully, “A pressure of malice?”

“What do you mean?” he questioned her even more.

“I’m not sure, to be honest. It’s just… it’s the only way I can explain it,” she said truthfully.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked.

“I didn’t want to burden you,” she said after a while.

“Oh…” responded Long Di. He felt that something was off, but ultimately believed her.

“Do you believe that you are an Abyss Ghost…? Shen Ling?” He called out to her twice before she finally responded.

She nodded, not daring to look at him. She opened her mouth as if she was about to say something.

However, before any words left her mouth, her eyes flashed before a hint of fear took over and Long Di, despite being a social handicap and an emotional cripple, was very sensitive to this particular sensation and acted on it immediately.

“What are you afraid of?” he asked.

She pursed her lips, not wanting to say anything more.

Long Di wasn’t having any of it, “Shen Ling, what are you hiding from me-”

“Please don’t take away my cultivation technique?” she blurted out, seemingly out of nowhere, with tears welling up in her eyes.

Long Di was confused for a hot minute about the weird direction this conversation took. He let out a sigh and looked tired before he lightly tapped her forehead.

“Ow…” she rubbed her brow with her hand, wondering what that was for.

He then continued on his way, before responding with, “Don’t ask stupid things. I want to expect great things for you.”

She then looked at him in surprise. “You’re not going to take away the technique from m…?“

“Stupid things, Shen Ling,” he repeated. Long Di was exhausted by this social interaction. He would pick it up again whenever he recharged.

She calmed down and realised that she was overthinking things. There were several reasons why she didn’t want to say the very little she knew.

In truth, a small part of her fear stemmed from her believing that Long Di would relieve her of her cultivation technique, which wasn’t something he was able to do nor something he would have done.

However, a large part of it came from the fact that when she was about to say something, her Auspice Gaze activated without her knowing and she saw how the ghostly trails all around were thrashing around in a frenzy. She never saw something like this before and knew that it wasn’t something good.

Weirdly enough, the minute the thought to tell Long Di what she had to say left her mind, the trails returned to relative normalcy. There was a great danger telling him that she could feel, so she kept it to herself.

In addition, she didn’t want him to get mad and take away her technique, since it would weaken her ability to protect him and everyone else. This was why it was the first thing she blurted out before.

“Senior brother Long Di!” she shouted after he walked a short distance ahead of her.

He stopped and turned around to look at her, not saying a word.

“I will never hurt you,” she finally whispered.

At which point he only responded with, “I know. Now let’s go, the young ones are struggling and I want to see what’s happening.”

Shen Ling smiled when she saw this and ran to catch up at his side, followed by Xiannu Liang, who decided that people from the outside are incapable of having a normal conversation.

B-Bam!

Several loud explosions took place and Long Di walked over to see Tie Lang and Jia Yan, and Feng Yu, all engaged in combat against a particularly vicious beast.

He was atop a cliff of sorts, so he had a good view of everything. He could also see Yaomu Shou some distance away, sitting on a rock, keeping a watch on them. She had a sword in hand, but it wasn’t the usual purple rapier-like sword she always had, but a more normal-looking sword in comparison.

Zi Yu stood behind her looking like some attendant ready to serve at any time.

The magical beast was similar to a salamander appearance-wise, and it radiated a type of heat energy that was extr mely dangerous to most cultivators, but as Feng Yu and the others practised a cultivation technique centred around fire-attributed spiritual energy, this heat energy was nothing more than a slight inconvenience.

It also had a semi-transparent sac that was located below its jaw that expanded and contracted in line with its breathing.

The beast was a rank 3 red-skinned salamander. Long Di long came to the conclusion that the people who named these beasts were powerfully lazy when naming these things, not that he was complaining.

A rank three magical beast was equal in rank to a Cauldron Forging realm cultivator. However, they were able to normally best anyone in these realms and fight a cultivator one realm above them.

Their naturally strong defensive capabilities and great strength granted them this ability. The only ones able to fight with them at the same rank would be geniuses capable of fighting amongst their own realm, but such geniuses were quite rare.

So even though the three disciples were all at the Cauldron Forging realm, they were, in essence, fighting a vicious Core Formation realm cultivator!

Even though it was three against one, the red-skinned salamander was certainly causing its fair share of damage as well.

However, it looked like they were nearing the end of their battle. The salamander was clearly at the end of its rope since they turned this into a battle of attrition.

…

Shu!

Feng Yu, who by now was riddled with injuries and burn marks, charged the salamander and could feel the heat assaulting her. The land all around was suffering from blackened scorch marks, and it was obvious who the culprit was.

Seeing that Feng Yu engaged it in a dead-on assault, the red-skinned salamander practically smirked in response.

Suddenly, its sac expanded and began to glow bright red. It opened its mouth and a light could be seen from deep within growing increasingly bright!

Jia Yan seemed to have expected this and tightened his grip on the axe before he took off in a mad dash!

He was approaching from the back and the axe he wielded, along with its incredible weight, slowed him down, but it was just about good enough.

He leapt far in the air and signalled for everyone to get ready!

The light from within came into view, revealing a massive fireball!

Before it could leave its mouth, however, Jia Yan’s massive axe came crashing down, trapping its own fireball inside!

Boom!

“Screeeeee!!!!!!”

Several explosions went off, followed by an ear-piercing screech! Obviously, this tactic left a whole lot of damage and the red-skinned salamander thrashed around, revealing for a moment, its large sac clear for all to see.

Shu!

Suddenly, right on cue, Tie Lang appeared in front of the massive beast with his target clearly being the sac under its throat.

“Heart ripping claw!”

His claws lit up with a silverish glow as he went batsh*t crazy on the sac in the little moment it was exposed!

This was the claw-based martial technique that Long Di bought for him, and it seemed he was finally able to execute it at a crucial moment.

The technique ravaged the sac with huge gashes that caused it to flap about. The red-skinned salamander released a guttural croak as blood flowed like a river from the sac’s opening.

It fell to the ground with a crash and could no longer move. Its lifeblood flowed seemingly without end, taking with it its life.

Everyone was happy with the results. Even Yaomu Shou was pleased as she brought them around fighting magical beasts to help raise their combat prowess, since Long Di had yet to return.

Feng Yu brandished her sword and was walking over to extract its core, known as the Beast Xin, when, without warning, a sword light came flying towards her!

“Heart ripping claw!”

Tie Lang arrived in a split second and used his claws to block the sword slash!

“Tie Lang!” Jia Yan ran over as he could see that Tie Lang’s hands were now a mangled mess!

A voice echoed out that was cold in its bearing yet still pleasant to the ears, “Taking so long to slay a single red-skinned salamander, truly useless. Now scram!”