Chapter Seventy-Three: The Corpse-Hidden Cave

The first page.

“This…”

“This is the arm of that Master Never-Forget. I have already sealed his aura with my power. As long as I release it in a moment, we will be able to follow it and find where he is hiding.”

Xiyue spoke calmly. At that moment, she was slowly folding a small pink paper kite. When it was finished, she raised her hand lightly, and in an instant I could feel a surge of terrifying energy bursting forth from the arm before me. Within that dreadful aura, I could clearly sense the same presence Master Never-Forget had given off before.

“Congeal.”

The moment that aura was completely absorbed into the little pink paper kite, Xiyue softly uttered a single word.

At once, the paper kite came to a stop before me.

“We’ll set out after nightfall. Master Never-Forget is now a corpse-burial man. If we do not stop him soon, he will fully transform into a corpse ghost. By then, things will become troublesome. And now there is also that zombie he forcibly stuffed with countless wandering spirits.”

I nodded.

When night finally fell, we left the house.

By then, Tu had transformed into a wrist guard and wrapped itself around my right wrist. The Sword of All Beings was still wrapped in cloth and placed in my backpack. At my urging, Xiyue had also changed into modern clothing, a fitted women’s outfit I had specially gone to buy on short notice from a nearby supermarket.

A tailored white blouse, a pair of long jeans, ordinary high heels, her long hair flowing over her shoulders, and a pair of glasses with pink frames. I had to admit that standing before me at that moment, Xiyue looked exactly like someone who had stepped out of the cover of a fashion magazine.

“What are you staring at? Is my wearing this outfit really that strange?”

Perhaps influenced by the change, Xiyue seemed gentler and more approachable than before.

I shook my head. By then, I had already been completely captivated by her. She gave me the feeling of Su Ying, but compared with Su Ying, Xiyue was even more beautiful. Perhaps because she evoked the same feeling in me, I actually came to feel that the Xiyue before me was the very Su Ying I had once thought of day and night.

Suddenly, many things surged through my mind.

Before I knew it, tears had fallen.

“You miss her?”

Xiyue seemed able to read my heart. They say women are made of water, and their thoughts are as delicate as water; that was doubly true of a woman as formidable as Xiyue.

I nodded without hiding it.

Before, I had told Xiyue the whole story of my love with Su Ying.

“Today, I will be your Su Ying. Don’t cry. When I see your tears, my heart aches.”

“Especially badly.”

At those words, my heart seemed to be pierced several times by a needle all at once.

“Xiyue…”

I reached out and pulled her into my arms. The feeling was impossible to put into words, yet in that moment I could also feel the warmth of her body. I gradually sensed that Xiyue no longer seemed as cold as before; instead, there was a faint softness to her.

“Xiaodong, stop thinking about it. From now on, I will be your Su Ying, all right?”

Xiyue, who had seemed as cold and sealed as ice, suddenly spoke such tender words. Hearing them made my heart tremble violently. At that moment I knew my own emotions were surging beyond control. In truth, after spending so long with Xiyue, I had already forgotten Su Ying’s exact face.

I was silent for a long while.

Only when I saw the sky outside gradually dimming did I speak softly. “Let’s go.”

Xiyue nodded.

Of course, I also knew that if Master Never-Forget could not be restrained, then once he truly became a corpse ghost, the consequences would be unimaginable.

After leaving the house, Xiyue took my hand and used spatial displacement. In an instant, we arrived beside the dormitory building that had already collapsed. At that time, many workers were busy there. Xiyue and I followed the road outside the school until we reached an empty corner. There, Xiyue opened her hand and breathed upon the pink paper kite. At once, it shot forward in an instant.

Beating its wings, the pink paper kite flew steadily into the darkness.

“Follow that kite. It will lead us to Master Never-Forget.”

Xiyue stood beside me, watching the rapidly moving pink kite as she spoke. I nodded, and with a flash of my body, I chased after it.

Fifty minutes later, the paper kite led us to an unnamed mountain on the outskirts of Chengdu. There were a few villages here, but because it was already dark, we could not make out the surroundings at all. Standing beside me, Xiyue said softly, “It’s here. Ghostly energy fills this place, and corpse energy is thick in the air. That Master Never-Forget is somewhere around here.”

The pink paper kite lingered atop a mountain peak for three minutes, then flapped its pink wings once more and flew deeper into the forested hills ahead.

“Go!”

With a flash, Xiyue and I hurried after the little pink paper kite.

I could feel the aura within Xiyue’s body gradually conceal itself, while the moonlight around us dimmed.

“It’s just ahead. I can already feel the dense corpse energy!”

I nodded as well, for by then the stench was already so strong that I felt nearly faint from it.

The smell of rotting corpses was not something ordinary people could bear.

The pink paper kite circled around a pitch-black cave, hovering and spinning above its mouth.

“Return.”

Xiyue reached out to the little pink kite, and in an instant it shattered in her hand. The next moment, we entered the cave.

I did not sense Master Never-Forget’s aura, nor did I see the elderly Mr. Zhou, who had turned into a zombie.

The moment we stepped inside, a foul stench hit us, so overpowering that breathing became difficult.

“It seems Master Never-Forget and that zombie are not here!”

I gave a faint sound of acknowledgment and asked Xiyue whether we should leave now.

Xiyue shook her head. Then, with a single step, the surrounding space rippled like a wave. She swept her hand, and the pink paper kite she had just crushed turned into a shower of pink specks, illuminating the entire cavern clearly.

“There…”

In that flickering pink light, I immediately saw corpses strewn across the ground in disorder. Counting them carefully, there were actually nine bodies. They were all women, completely naked, their faces filled with corpse energy, a vile stench rising from them. At a glance, it was obvious they had been bitten to death by a zombie, yet some special method had then been used to force the corpse energy out from within.

“It seems that Master Never-Forget’s ambition is truly enormous.”

As Xiyue spoke, her brows knit tightly.