"You said this wasn't the only case?"
Su Min frowned as she knelt to examine the withered corpse more closely. The skin felt like parched leather, cold and unnervingly brittle to the touch. She found no external injuries other than a few faint, recent bruises on the elbows and knees. These were likely caused by the man's final, terrified collapse as his strength failed him. There were no open wounds, no defensive cuts on his palms, and no signs of a physical struggle against a tangible assailant.
The only clear evidence was the lingering, foul spiritual residue that clung to the body. It felt like a greasy, invisible smoke against her senses—a clear indicator that the hunter had encountered something deeply unnatural. She recalled the chieftain mentioning that this wasn't an isolated incident. Since she rarely stayed in the village itself, preferring the silence of her secluded hut higher up the mountain, she hadn't heard the panicked rumors circulating among the locals.
"Yes, honored Master. This isn't the only case," one of the chieftains confirmed. His voice held a tremulous note of dread that was becoming all too familiar in this square.
"I see."
Su Min narrowed her eyes. Her mind worked quickly, discarding trivial possibilities and mundane illnesses. It was obvious now that the village wasn't suffering from a random tragedy. It was being systematically targeted by some unclean creature that fed on human life force. A predator had chosen this cluster of homes as its private hunting ground.
"What did these people who died have in common? Were they related by blood? Did they work the same trade? Did they frequent the same places before they died? Think carefully."
Silence met her rapid questions. The villagers and chieftains looked at each other, their faces blank with confusion. No clear pattern emerged from their frightened minds as they struggled to recall the mundane details of the victims' lives.
Then, a shrill, mad cackle cut through the quiet from the edge of the crowd. An old woman, her hair wild and her clothes in tatters, pointed a bony finger at the chieftains. Her eyes gleamed with an unstable light. "Hahaha! Retribution! It's Ah Cai! He is coming for them! He is taking them all one by one because you left him to die!"
"Who is Ah Cai?" Su Min asked. "The one who eloped with your daughter and then got beaten to death for it?" She was guessing, based on the common tropes of village tragedies she had seen before.
Others might have feared ghosts, attributing the deaths to a wrathful spirit, but she didn't. Her philosophy was direct. If a ghost causes trouble, she would simply find it and deal with it. There was no room for vague, lingering fears in her world. Ignoring the madwoman's continuing ravings, she turned her questioning gaze back to the chieftains. In her mind, she had already begun piecing together several overly dramatic scenarios of forbidden love and bloody revenge.
"That isn't it, young lady," the head chieftain quickly explained. He wiped his sweaty brow with a nervous hand. "People like Ah Cai, strong young men in their prime, are our most valuable resource here. They hunt, they farm, and they defend the village. I would never kill them lightly over a personal matter like a daughter's foolishness. The loss of even one is a blow to the entire community."
"Ah Cai was part of the herbal gathering team," another chieftain added, seeing Su Min's skepticism. "Much of the rare medicine you use in your pills comes from their dangerous efforts. But as you know, these mountains are home to tigers and black bears. Those creatures see us as prey. That's why I made a strict rule: anyone going into the deep mountains to gather herbs must carry a hunting spear and go in groups of no fewer than five. There is safety in numbers."
"Hmm."
An accident, then. It was a tragic but mundane explanation. This world wasn't like her past life, where big cats were confined to cages. Here, the wilderness was truly wild. The predators that ruled the peaks were powerful and fearless.
"A few days ago, a group of five men, including Ah Cai, went to gather herbs in the northern valley. It's a place rich with spirit grass. On their way back, a giant tiger appeared from the mist. It was monstrous. It didn't even need to stand on its hind legs to be nearly six chi tall at the shoulder. It moved like lightning, a blur of orange and black. It pounced and knocked down Ah Cai in a single move. The others said they had never seen a tiger that huge or that fast. It was unnatural. With just one bite, half the man's head was gone. There was no chance of survival. Not even you would have been able to save him from that."
"I see."
Su Min nodded, her earlier amusement fading into a focused clinical interest. There truly wasn't much anyone could do when death was that instantaneous. The story had the ring of truth.
"The others were so terrified that they dropped their baskets and ran straight back to the village. They were lucky to escape with their own lives. That madwoman is Ah Cai's mother. She couldn't cope with the grief, and her mind broke. She blames the other gatherers for leaving her son's body behind. As for the ghost seeking revenge, we thought it was just the ramblings of her madness, but now... with these bodies..."
"That's no ghost," Su Min interrupted. Her voice was cold and certain. "This corpse reeks of a thick, bestial demonic energy. You can't sense it because your spirits aren't attuned. A true vengeful spirit, born of pure human resentment, wouldn't leave an aura of raw animalistic corruption like this. The energy here is primal and hungry. It's not clever or hateful."
"Huh?" The chieftains stared at her, struggling to comprehend the distinction.
"I know what is going on now," she stated. The pieces clicked into place within her mind. "As the old saying goes, 'acting as a ghost for the tiger.' There's a specific type of malevolent spirit called a Chang Ghost. If a tiger develops certain spiritual talents through chance or longevity, it's recently killed soul of a person it's recently killed. The tiger then uses that bound soul as its servant—a spectral lure to draw in more prey by confusing them and making them easy targets."
"Then the people who died recently..." the head chieftain trailed off. His face turned a sickly pale as the horrifying implication dawned on him.
"Exactly," Su Min confirmed. "That beast has clearly developed a cunning intelligence. It deliberately killed these people in a way that mimics ghostly revenge, draining their life essence without physical wounds to sow paralyzing fear. It wants you too terrified to organize a hunt. But it's only mildly clever. It doesn't realize how much of its own corrupt demonic energy it leaves behind on the corpses—a signature I can clearly read. As for the Chang Ghosts themselves, ordinary weapons or fire can't harm them. You could swing a sword through them all day to no effect."
Ghosts had an insidious nature. They were beings of pure Yin energy that instinctively targeted the living to drain their vitality. In game terms, they were the type of enemy with low health but extremely high resistance to physical attacks. Regular steel blades passed through them like air. Only spirit-infused techniques or specialized tools could work. For cultivators who knew the methods, they were often just low-level monsters to farm for experience points.
But for ordinary people without any spiritual protection, they were a death sentence that could walk through walls.
"Master, please, you must help us! We are powerless against such things!"
At Su Min's clear explanation, the once terrified crowd began to calm, as understanding replaced blind fear. Then, as one, they all knelt before her. Their voices merged into a desperate, unified chorus as they begged for her intervention. They pressed their foreheads to the hard-packed earth in a collective plea.
If it had just been a story of simple spirits, many wouldn't have secretly waited for others to die first. But now, realizing a cunning tiger demon was systematically hunting them, they understood the communal danger. Without her, they might all be picked off one by one to feed the beast. Many of them had already seen the pale, floating forms of the Chang Ghosts drifting at the edge of the forest at dusk.
In that moment, she became their only hope. Hundreds of people kneeling together in the village square created a solemn and spectacular scene. It was a testament to their absolute desperation.
"Everyone, get up first," Su Min said. Her voice carried easily over the crowd without her needing to shout. It was infused with a subtle thread of spiritual energy that commanded attention. "This matter needs to be handled carefully and quietly. We can't alert our enemy. Bring the survivors from that herbal gathering team to a secluded place. The chieftain's lodge will do. The fewer people who know the details of our plan, the better. We don't know what other tricks the tiger demon might have."
"Bring Ah Yang and the others! Come with me to the lodge now!" the head chieftain ordered his men. He didn't hesitate, already pulling the sole surviving gatherer from the crowd.
"Oh, and one more thing," Su Min added. She turned back just as she was about to follow them. She pointed a slender finger at the withered corpse on the mat. "Burn this body. Now. Today."
"Huh?" the chieftain stammered, taken aback by the abrupt order. "But our customs... we must prepare a proper burial..."
"Corpses drained of vital essence like this one are saturated with demonic energy. They become anchors for corruption," she explained with impatient clarity. "If they are buried, that energy can fester in the earth. It will combine with the land's own energy and the spirit's lingering resentment to eventually produce future disasters. You don't want to know what might rise from that grave in a few years, digging its way out to seek the living."
The villagers looked on, utterly confused and horrified. Their ancient customs dictated that the dead be sealed in coffins and hung from sacred cliff faces to be closer to the heavens. Burning was for criminals and outcasts.
"The same goes for the other bodies from the similar deaths this week. Handle them the same way. If you don't believe me, wait a month or two and open their coffins. You will see their corpses completely unchanged. They won't be decomposing. They will look exactly as pale and withered as they did the day they were buried, perhaps even growing fine white hairs." She fixed them with a stern, unyielding look. "And don't even think about sending them to my hut for inspection. I run a medicine house, not a mortuary. I won't have that corruption near my home."
With that final instruction, Su Min turned and left without looking back. She followed the chieftain toward his lodge, having said all she needed to say. Whether they listened was now their choice, and they would bear the consequences. From what she had seen in the stories of her past life, disasters always started because someone in authority ignored a clear warning for the sake of tradition.
Still, she calculated it would take over a decade for a corpse festering with that level of energy to become a genuine, mobile threat. By then, the treasure gourd would have ripened, she would have had her Qi Inducing Pill, and she would have been long gone. She had already done her part by warning them. As the saying went, "you can't use kind words to persuade a damned ghost." She wouldn't waste more breath.
As for the tiger demon itself, she fully intended to hunt it down. According to her mental compendium of rare beasts, a tiger that had cultivated enough spiritual energy to command Chang Ghosts was a walking treasure trove. Its bones could be ground for strengthening tonics, its flesh contained dense spiritual energy, and its sinews were perfect for crafting bowstrings. Its demon core, if it had formed one, would be an invaluable alchemical ingredient.
If it had stayed quiet and hunted far from her territory, she might've spared it. But since it had caused trouble right under her nose, threatening the fragile peace of her seclusion and her supply of herbs, she had no reason to let it live. It had become a nuisance.
Besides, in the current age, spiritual energy was only just beginning to awaken, and only a small fraction of humans had the talent to cultivate. For tigers, whose animal minds were even less suited to such discipline, such cases were rarer still. Since the danger was manageable and the rewards were immense, there was no reason to hesitate. The hunt was on. It was time to hunt tigers.