The cicada’s thunderous clicking hammered the mountainside, and boulders tumbled down from the upper slopes. These vanguard rocks rode the shattering noise, and in their wake came a wave of brown earth moving like sludge and building speed. No matter how tall the mountain was, we only had a handful of minutes at most before the landslide buried the portal to the Howling Blossom Valley.

  Adrenaline flooded my mind as I raced to put together a plan. With the cicada shrieking so loud that we couldn’t even hear the dull roar of collapsing earth, I had to make sure I gave my orders correctly the first time. With the noise and the time limit, I wouldn’t have the opportunity to provide further instructions.

  Fortunately, everyone was already assembled and within earshot.

  “We need to stave off the landslide long enough that the attendants can escape,” I said, to surprised expressions. “Shen Tongtong, take point and shoot down any boulders that look like they’re heading our way.”

  She nodded so stiffly I almost worried about what might have happened to her mind. I’d only used Ghost Fang’s technique to nudge a little fear into her, and I really had no idea how her mind might have manifested that. I was still a long way off from pupeteering a troop of monkeys.

  “Yes, expedition leader!” she said as she unslung her bow.

  “Ran Cong, assist as her spotter.”

  The Ran Clan’s educated young master looked surprised, but he offered no objections, and the pair raced up the path gouged by the stone cicada spirit beasts.

  “Shen Botao, I need you to try and stop the wave.”

  The young looked at me with deadly seriousness.

  “That’s impossible,” he said. “I’m only 7th stage Qi Condensing, it’s too much --”

  We didn’t have time for objections.

  “Can anyone else use earth qi?” I interrupted.

  “I’ll help him,” Chen Ai said as she tossed me Cabbagy.

  “Go to the Valley Entrance,” I said as I clasped her arm in a martial shake. “Stop it from being buried.”

  “I’ll assist as well,” said the old swordsman.

  “Go.”

  The three of them raced off up the hill, flaming arrows shooting over their heads as Shen Tongtong struck the boulders tumbling down.

  Ran Yaliu and Song Shuai stood waiting, one of them serious, and the other smirking.

  “Can your movement technique transport other people?” I asked Song Shuai.

  He glanced at the fleeing servants.

  “I can only move one person at a time,” he said. “And it’s difficult.”

  I nodded and gestured for the Ran attendant.

  “Use your music to assist their escape,” I said. “Song Shuai will ensure you return in time to rejoin the expedition.”

  She frowned at my blunt commands.

  “They’re only Body Tempering cultivators,” she said. “My music will hurt them.”

  I raised an eyebrow, and she blushed as she understood: anybody would take a little pain over being buried alive.

  “Assist the attendants,” I told them. “Help them get as far down the path as possible and then return as fast as you can.”

  With a gust of wind and a clap of thunder, they vanished and reappeared beside the nine servants who were already running downhill, all supplies abandoned to lighten the load of their feet. Music lilted, faint under the clicking, and the mortals rapidly increased their pace as though they were stampeding horses.

  I stood alone with the Dreaming Blade.

  “Command suits you, master.”

  “You’re already my disciple. You don’t need to keep sucking up to me.”

  “Some would say the opposite.”

  “They would be right!” Cabbagy added.

  I smiled.

  “Let’s go kill that cicada.”

  “Are you out of your mind, kid? Even freshly moulted, that metal cicada is in the 1st Stage of Foundation…”

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  I ignored Cabbagy and sprinted toward the spirit beast. My disciple kept pace, his core-strengthened body easily matching my blood-filled muscles despite his drained dantian. For a fleeting moment, I wondered what he would taste like, someone with qi-rich meat but no actual qi…

  The clicking grew cacophonous as we neared. The blasting noise thumped my organs and bones until I could taste the sound at the back of my throat.

  I hoped that killing the spirit beast would prevent the landslide from worsening. However, that might be easier said than done.

  I knew the monster was large, but he was truly different up close. The cicada’s head stood several stories tall, propped up by legs like tree trunks. Bright orange eyes glowed like miniature suns against a body of dark purple metal that gleamed with mucous from his recent shedding. Each wing could have filled a courtyard, and bright green veins pulsed as they filled with fluid and slowly expanded.

  He was a colossal creature of minimal intelligence, for he ignored the rumbling earth and the approaching landslide as he waited for a mate and for flight.

  My disciple attacked first.

  His four-star jian flashed brightly in the sunlight and struck the cicada’s face. Sparks blasted out as metal cut metal, but the screech couldn’t be heard over the clicking. The cicada shuffled backwards a step, but didn’t move beyond that. My disciple attacked again, darting about and slashing, but had no more success than a fly attacking a cat.

  He landed beside me after striking a dozen times in half as many heartbeats. His breathing was heavier than I was used to seeing. He truly had gone all out in defending Chen Ai.

  “I’m sorry, master,” he said. “I cannot destroy the creature without my qi.”

  Though his jian cut through the metal, it lacked the reach to strike the creature’s organs. It would take too long to hack our way inside, and we needed another strategy since I doubted my blood could achieve what his blade could not.

  I gritted my teeth and tried to think.

  The earth was still sliding down towards the valley entrance. At this rate, we could rush there, but I knew that we would be abandoning the attendants to their deaths…

  Should I just call this off? Wait for the entrance to be buried and then dig it up?

  “Strike the tymbal,” Cabbagy shouted.

  “What?”

  “It’s the ribbed sound organ at the waist!”

  I pointed, and my disciple understood instantly. He darted through the air and slashed his jian through the tymbal. Instantly, the clicking volume cut in half. The Dreaming Blade leaped to the other side and sliced through the tymbal there. The cicada, stupid as it was, shuffled about in confusion. I leaped back to avoid the gigantic legs and felt a sense of amazement at the sudden silence.

  No, not silence…

  In the distance, the rumbling of collapsing earth approached.

  “We need to stop that landslide,” I said.

  “Do you think Chen Ai and Shen Botao are strong enough?” the Dreaming Blade asked me.

  “I don’t know, and that’s what I’m worried about.”

  If they failed to stop the earth, they would be the first in line for the burial, unless they abandoned their task and entered the valley.

  But as soon as they entered the valley, it would start a countdown. Nine people must enter at a time, and if nine people didn’t enter within an hour, those who did enter would die. To enter the valley as an escape from the landslide would just mean certain death if it ended up being buried.

  The cicada shuffled closer to us, and we kicked off its thorax to clear some distance. An odd sound came from the impacts of our feet on the metal.

  “It’s hollow?”

  “Of course it is, kid! Muscles buckle the ribbed membrane of the tymbal, which produces a loud click, and the hollow abdomen amplifies the sound.”

  “How do you know all that?”

  “I speak all love languages, kid,” he said with a wink.

  My disciple looked at me curiously.

  “What are you thinking, master?”

  I gazed down the slope at the running attendants as a plan formed.

  “Disciple?”

  “Yes, master?”

  “How loud can you shout?”

  ###

  Chen Ai placed her hands against Shen Botao’s back and channelled her qi into the younger man. His cultivation, like hers, had recently leaped a stage, and she could feel the turbulent qi flowing through his meridians as he activated his earth manipulation technique.

  Through him, she felt his connection to the earth. As that connection expanded, she forced more of her qi into him and thus deepened the connection. She could feel the presence of the Great Northern Tree’s roots deep in the earth, but neither of them attempted to touch them. They were attempting to halt a natural disaster, and it was not something two people in the Qi Foundation realm should even dream of doing. But touching those roots would be a far vaster attempt, and one she dared not even consider. There are some things in the world, old and powerful, that should be left alone.

  Despite such reservations, when her senior brother asked her to stop a landslide, she volunteered.

  After seeing the Flawless Blade’s jian pass through his flesh as though it were water… she couldn’t help but believe in miracles.

  “I can feel it…” Shen Botao said through clenched teeth. “It’s so heavy.”

  Though the young man took the brunt of the weight, she too felt the landslide like lead weights stacked over her shoulders. This was a load her bloodline couldn’t help her carry. Roots of rock moved feebly at such a distance, as they were trying to manipulate at half a mile’s range. If Chen Ai wasn’t filled to the brim with elixir, there was no way she could have attempted this.

  Shen Botao’s technique slowly stitched itself into the sliding rubble, and Chen Ai leveraged her grass qi knowledge and enlightenment to ensure that the stone roots truly anchored themselves like living things.

  The two of them lost themselves in the task, but even in the back of her head, she knew it wasn’t enough. Their qi reserves drained with every root they placed, and the earth continued sliding.

  A huge boulder shifted loose from the mass and tumbled straight towards them, only to shatter as a flaming arrow struck it in the air. Burning pebbles bounced down around them, but Chen Ai didn’t spare any attention to looking back at Shen Tongtong and Ran Cong as they targeted more rolling boulders.

  All the teams had their jobs, and she had to trust that her senior brother knew what he was doing.

  “Song Shuai!” the Dreaming Blade shouted loud enough to almost break Chen Ai’s focus. “Bring the musician!”

  His shouts echoed, but Chen Ai didn’t spare any attention on what they might be doing; she only worried as the sound brought an extra weight to the landslide they were trying to slow. More roots snapped as the earth kept shifting.

  There was a clap of thunder, just one more rumble woven into the grumbling mountain.

  One more lead weight on her spiritual shoulders.

  Then music.

  Charming notes rang out as though from a pipa of the gods, each perfect chord as loud as the cicada’s horrendous clicking, and the song carried qi. A musical formation assembled in the air reverberated through the earth, but this wasn’t a song of hastening.

  Chen Ai and Shen Botao let out a synchronized sigh as the landslide finally slowed.