She continued walking through the ruined street as if nothing had happened.
Wood creaked softly beneath her steps.
Dust shifted in faint spirals around her ankles.
The lizard remained perched atop her head, still and silent, claws lightly hooked into strands of hair for balance.
Without looking up, she said dryly,
"You said you would guard me."
No response.
"They attacked me," she continued, her tone light but edged. "And you just sat there."
The lizard blinked slowly.
From its perspective—
So that's a ghost.
The shape.
The distortion.
The way it moved without weight yet carried intent.
The way its outline wavered, unstable but malicious.
It looked exactly like it had imagined.
Not quite alive.
Not quite dead.
It stored the information away carefully.
Cataloged.
Analyzed.
The fox exhaled through her nose.
"Unreliable."
But she didn't truly sound annoyed.
Her eyes were scanning.
Measuring airflow.
Tracking residual spiritual threads.
Feeling the subtle pull in the air like faint strings tightening somewhere beyond sight.
Then she stopped.
"…Enough."
Her expression cooled completely.
"It's time to meet the one pulling the strings."
Her aura shifted—not explosively, not violently—but with quiet authority.
Like something ancient stretching after being confined.
She released her divine senses.
They spread outward like a silent tide.
Through broken walls.
Through shattered beams.
Across rooftops slick with dried blood.
Into the well.
Into the earth.
Into every corner of the village.
Nothing resisted.
Nothing hid.
Then—
She found it.
At the far end of the settlement.
Behind a cluster of collapsed houses.
A formation carved into the soil.
Crude.
But effective.
The lines were uneven, yet deliberate.
Blood channels etched into packed dirt.
Symbols carved with hurried precision.
At its center—
Bodies.
Stacked.
Layered.
Dried of blood.
Skin drawn tight against bone.
Not fresh.
Drained.
Used.
Spiritual residue coiled around them like smoke trapped in invisible grooves.
Above the formation—
A figure hovered cross-legged in the air.
Dark robes.
Aura heavy with yin energy.
Dense.
Oppressive.
His eyes were closed.
But the moment her divine sense brushed the formation—
His eyes opened.
Cold.
Sharp.
Calculating.
He tilted his head slightly.
So.
The ghosts were destroyed.
One by one.
Cleanly.
No backlash.
His lips curved faintly.
"…Interesting."
Back in the street, her turquoise eyes hardened.
"…Found you."
The air between hunter and prey tightened.
Invisible tension stretching across broken streets.
And somewhere in the ruined village—
The night grew heavier.
The wind shifted direction.
A faint current of yin energy rolled outward from the far end of the settlement like cold breath.
She didn't rush.
She simply adjusted her sleeves and began walking toward it.
Each step unhurried.
Each breath controlled.
The lizard remained atop her head, ears twitching faintly as it mapped the distortions ahead. Now that it focused on her breathing and filtered everything else, the world felt sharp instead of overwhelming.
At the other end of the village—
The hovering figure slowly lowered himself until his feet touched the edge of the formation circle.
The corpses beneath him were arranged deliberately.
Spines aligned.
Skulls facing inward.
Blood drained to feed carved channels that converged beneath his feet.
The formation pulsed once.
He studied the darkness ahead.
"She destroyed them easily…"
His voice was calm, but displeased.
"Not a wandering cultivator."
Back in the street—
She stepped past the final row of houses.
The sight opened before her.
The formation.
The piled bodies.
The hovering man.
Her turquoise eyes cooled.
"…Corpse refinement through resentment siphoning," she said flatly.
She didn't sound shocked.
She sounded irritated.
The man's gaze sharpened slightly.
"You recognize it."
"Of course I do."
Her eyes flicked briefly over the formation lines, tracing their flow instantly.
"Crude execution. Wasteful blood channeling. You lost at least thirty percent of the extracted resentment."
The man's expression shifted.
Not anger.
Interest.
"…And yet you walked straight into my domain."
She stopped a short distance away.
"No," she replied calmly.
"I walked into your feeding ground."
The lizard's golden eyes narrowed slightly, mapping the formation's structure.
It could "see" the lines now—like glowing veins beneath the soil.
The man slowly raised one hand.
The formation beneath him ignited faintly.
Yin energy rose like cold mist.
"You destroyed my ghosts."
"They were noisy," she replied.
The mist thickened.
The corpses trembled.
One arm twitched.
Then another.
Her gaze dropped slightly.
"…Reanimation?"
The man's lips curved.
"If you can destroy spirits so easily—"
The corpses' eyes snapped open.
Empty.
Black.
"—then let us see how you fare against what remains."
The bodies began to rise.
Slow at first.
Then with unnatural jerks, joints bending at wrong angles before snapping into motion.
The air grew heavier.
Denser.
She didn't step back.
Instead, she exhaled softly.
"…You're using villagers who were drained dry."
Her voice cooled into something sharp.
"That means their meridians are empty."
The man's brows tightened slightly.
Before he could respond—
She raised one hand.
And the air around her shifted.
Not explosive.
Not violent.
Just precise.
The lizard felt it instantly.
Her aura was no longer restrained.
Not fully released—
But no longer pretending.
The temperature in the village dropped.
The corpses paused mid-motion.
The man's eyes narrowed.
"…Who are you?"
She tilted her head slightly.
"You chose the wrong village."
The formation beneath him flickered.
For the first time—
He felt something he had not expected tonight.
Pressure.
And the night, once heavy—
Now felt suffocating.
He stared at her for a long moment.
Then—
He laughed.
Low at first.
Then louder.
"So that's it…"
His gaze swept over her body again, this time with clearer scrutiny.
"Fifth layer."
His lips curled.
"And injured."
His eyes gleamed coldly.
"And you dare stand there and speak to me like that?"
Her expression did not change.
The lizard remained still.
He lifted one hand toward the center of the formation.
There—
A black banner stood planted upright between the dried corpses.
Its surface was stitched with distorted faces, faintly writhing beneath the fabric.
Yin energy pulsed through it like dark veins.
"With your condition," he continued calmly, "you should have fled the moment you sensed me."
His fingers twisted slightly.
The banner trembled.
"Fine."
His voice grew colder.
"After I kill you…"
The air around the banner distorted.
"…I'll refine your corpse."
The fabric flared violently.
"And your soul."
He swung his arm downward.
The banner snapped forward like a living thing—
And from it—
Two massive ghosts tore free.
Unlike the earlier wandering spirits, these were condensed.
Solid.
Their forms thick with resentment.
Muscles defined in spectral mass.
Eyes burning with focused malice.
Their aura was stable.
Foundation Establishment level.
They let out a synchronized howl that shook the street and rattled broken beams.
They didn't drift—
They charged.
Fast.
Direct.
Her turquoise eyes narrowed slightly.
"…A ghost banner."
Her voice remained calm.
"Bound spirits refined through mass resentment."
One ghost reached her first—
Claws extended.
The second circled wide, cutting off retreat.
She didn't move yet.
"It allows the user to release stored souls as combat constructs…"
The first ghost swung—
She sidestepped lightly.
"…And feed them continuously with the formation's yin supply."
The second dove in from behind.
Her sleeve flicked—
A sharp crescent of qi sliced cleanly through its arm.
But unlike the earlier spirits—
It didn't shatter.
The severed limb dissolved into mist—
Then reformed instantly.
The man smirked from within the formation.
"Did you think they were like the others?"
The ghosts attacked again, more coordinated this time.
Angles tighter.
Timing sharper.
Shared intent.
Her eyes hardened slightly.
"…Troublesome."
She raised one hand—
But did not release a full strike.
Not yet.
The lizard, from atop her head, mapped their movements perfectly.
Two units.
Shared tether.
Energy supply routed from banner.
Continuous reinforcement through formation.
Weak point—
Not the ghosts.
The banner.
And the man controlling it.