Remembering You For Eternity

2.34 Return of The Yin Maiden (1)

And because she was useful to pinpoint the general locations of human Daemons, Zuo ZhouLei did not have any more excuses to not want her in the journey.

"It's as what Zuo Shan'er has claimed. A small family of farmers are Daemons." Cao Lu's brows were knitted in discomfort, "I don't know if it's anything to condone what we have done, the farmer's son is barely a teenager after all. But how could someone, with supposedly no cultivation base at all, be able to face JinHai almost at the same level of strength."

"If JinHai did not have his 'Muhou', that kid would have done some damage." She shuddered as she recalled the fight her brother had earlier that day and narrated them briefly for Xiao Zi and Ao Xiang;

The nails of the young teen, longer than how a normal human's nails should be, had raked across Zuo JinHai's chest, ripping his outer robe. Zuo JinHai was fortunate that he only suffered a tiny wound and in his retaliation, his sword reached longer, effectively ending the teen's life.

Xiao Zi and Ao Xiang looked at each other in silence, neither wanted to ask Cao Lu to elaborate her experience with how's and why's. They felt both guilt and relief that they opted to kill and purify the animals rather than dealing with the human Daemons in town.

Ao Xiang was the strongest beast-master and they were generally accompanied by a few other beast-masters, including Lu Bing. This time at Ru'an, there were four beast-masters in total, excluding Ao Xiang. Therefore, previously he did not have a guilty conscience as he followed Xiao Zi to hunt the escaping dog daemons.

Even with Shen Wei's and Zuo ZhouLei's qi boost, the Fire Phoenixes of the beast-masters stationed in town were not enough to purify the human daemons. Or perhaps, no one had expected that the least harmful adolescent boy, the son of a farming couple, would suddenly go berserk, possessing strength and agility on par with that of an Enlightened. While his parents were writhing in the flames of the beast-master's Fire Phoenixes, the boy managed to almost mortally wound Zuo JinHai.

At the end, Zuo JinHai's sword reached him faster, effectively killing the boy in one stroke. Though it was not the first time Zuo JinHai had killed, it was certainly the first time for him to take the life of such a young boy.

After being purified, the parents, just like Long TianShan years ago, ended up mentally crippled. Everyone just wished that it would be a long-lasting condition, lest they would find out that their only son had left the world.

The trio returned to Ru'an, and saw the crestfallen expressions of their friends. They were all standing in front of the only inn in town. Shen Wei, Zuo BingTan, Zuo ZhouLei, Zhen Zhu, Lu Bing, Ding Shun, Yu Mei, Zuo Shan'er, and a few other cultivators were present.

Cao Lu noticed the only person that should be there, but wasn't,

"JinHai?"

"His wound festered all of a sudden. The physician that examined him had returned home, merely saying it's an infection and there's nothing to worry about." Zuo BingTan replied to his sister's question, but even he sounded doubtful of the physician's verdict.

Before CaoLu managed to go in the inn to check on Zuo JinHai, a man with a number of servants flanking behind him approached their group. The group recognized them as the town's vice-magistrate. Shen Wei was about to greet the man who had personally welcomed them into the town days ago, but he quickly stopped in his steps.

The middle-aged official's steps were quiet, much too quiet for one who did not have an ounce of cultivation. If one would pay closer attention, his and his followers' breathing was non-existent too. The six people behind him also looked at them with expressionless eyes. Their physiques were scrawny and thin, but perhaps by instinct, the cultivators and beast-masters present felt that they were actually dangerous.