Finally.
They came out of the treeline like silver ghosts—first one, then ten, then the full weight of the pack. Fifty wolves. Fur the blue-silver of a winter sky, fangs like short swords, eyes burning gold in the shadows. Their growls ran together into something that felt less like sound and more like pressure—a single intelligence speaking through fifty throats.
The horses screamed. Even Wei went pale.
"Spirit-Touched Silver Fangs," the old man said quietly. "At least fifty. Each one Body Tempering 8." He swallowed. "The pack leader will be stronger."
Lin Mei's hand found her sister's arm and held on.
Lu Chen drew his sword.
Yes.
Yes. This master is excited. I've waited too long.
Too late.
The wolves charged.
---
Lu Chen moved to meet them.
Flowing River Slash — the first wolf's momentum carried it past him in two pieces. Thunder Strike — a second flew into a tree with a crack that startled the canopy. Phantom Mirage Step — he vanished from the sight of the next cluster, reappeared behind them, and Whirlwind Lotus Cleave dropped four before they'd finished turning.
The guards charged forward beside him. Lu Chen watched three of them struggle for a full minute with a single wolf, trading cuts and injuries, before one of them finally drove his sword through by sheer force when the opportunity arose.
Lu Chen had killed four in that same minute.
He saw the moment they realized it—the way their movements slowed, the way they started glancing at him between swings. He didn't wait for the embarrassment to settle into something heavier.
"Protect the wagon," he said. "I have this."
Wei barked the order before the last word landed. The guards pulled back to form a ring around the carriage, and Lu Chen felt the quiet relief in their retreat—not from danger, but from the particular misery of being outmatched by someone half their age in front of the people they were supposed to protect.
He didn't dwell on it.
He had wolves to kill.
Phantom Mirage Leap carried him over a charging cluster, his body cutting through the air. Crimson River Ascent brought him down through the center of them in a spiral. Three didn't get up.
The next wave came harder—thirty-one of them in a sustained press, working in coordinated groups of three, angling for his flanks, his blind spots, the spaces between his strikes. Smart. Faster than the first wave. He burned through blood qi meeting them, technique following technique, the forms bleeding into each other until it stopped feeling like a sequence and started feeling like a single continuous motion.
Behind him, the guards had found something useful to do with the ones he'd already dropped. Knives. Methodical, practiced work. The spiritual beast materials market was lucrative, and soldiers who'd been made redundant in a fight needed something to do with their hands. Nobody commented on this arrangement. It suited everyone.
Zhao was particularly enthusiastic. "This one's fur is pristine! Pristine, I tell you! The wife is going to love this!"
"You have a wife?" the caterpillar-eyebrow guard asked, not looking up from his work.
"Of course I have a wife. I'm a catch."
"You hid in a latrine."
"Latrines are for hiding. Wives are for loving. Different things."
The third guard shook his head. "I can't believe you have a wife."
"Neither can she, some days."
The remaining twelve came in one final press—the ones that had held back and watched and decided that numbers were better than caution.
They were wrong.
Whirlwind Lotus Cleave into Crimson River Ascent. The combination carved through them like wind through grass.
The pack leader came last.
It was twice the size of the others. Its fur shot through with veins of silver light. Eyes burning gold like forge coals. Its aura pressing down at Body Tempering 9. It didn't charge recklessly like the rest—it circled him, reading him, its intelligence running cold behind those burning eyes.
Then it lunged—not at his throat but at his sword arm, trying to strip the weapon.
Smart.
Lu Chen let it bite down.
Iron Hide held. The fangs ground against his forearm like steel on stone, and the wolf's confusion lasted exactly long enough for Lu Chen to drive his knee into its ribs with concentrated blood qi behind the strike. The crack of ribs shattering echoed through the clearing. It was sharp and wet, the kind of sound that made even the guards pause mid-stroke. Lu Chen smelled its breath—hot, and, like something had died inside it weeks ago and just never left.
He finished it with a clean Thunder Strike to the spine before it hit the ground.
Finally.
The first bridge was finally within reach.
Lu Chen stood among the corpses and struck a pose—like a proud rooster surveying its domain.
If anything, it looked like an injured one.
One arm hung slightly too high. His knee was bent at an awkward angle. His sword hand was raised in triumph, but the blade wobbled from exhaustion. The overall effect was less "victorious warrior" and more "man who had just fallen down stairs and was trying to pretend it was intentional."
Fortunately, neither Lin Xue nor Lin Mei was paying attention to his stance. They were already mesmerized by his face. They didn't notice the pose. They only saw the sharp jawline, the steady breathing, the way his amber eyes still burned with the aftershock of combat.
Old Guard Wei and the guards, however, were awed by his prowess. Even Zhao had stopped working on the wolf pelts to stare.
"Did you see that?" Zhao whispered. "He killed the pack leader. With his knee. And then a sword. In that order."
"We saw," the caterpillar-eyebrow guard said. "We were here."
"I know but—did you see it?"
"We saw it, Zhao."
Zhao nodded slowly, then his face scrunched in thought. "I still don't understand why my wife married me."
"Neither do we, Zhao."
"Neither do I, honestly. But she did. And that's what matters."
The third guard clapped him on the shoulder. "She probably had low standards."
"I'll take that as a compliment."
"It wasn't a compliment."
"I'm still taking it."
Lu Chen lowered his blade, exhaling slowly. His blood qi was at sixty percent. His body ached. His pose had been—admittedly—terrible.
Shut up.
There won't be a future reference.
---
Lu Chen turned.
At the edge of the treeline, where the sunlight barely reached, a figure stood watching.
A young woman. Pale skin. Silver hair that would've caught moonlight the same way the wolves' fur would. Simple grey robes. A carved flute held loosely in one hand. Her aura was quiet but present.
Body Forging 1.
Above him.
She was looking at the clearing. At the fifty corpses. At the guards working through them with their knives.
"You killed them," she said, tilting her head at an angle that shouldn't have been comfortable. Her voice was barely above a whisper. "All of them." She smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes—it didn't even try. "Do you have any idea how long it took? To raise them. To earn their trust. To make them mine?"
She stroked the flute. Once. Twice. A nervous habit that looked anything but nervous.
"Do you know how hard it is to find wolves that listen? That obey?" Her smile widened. "They were good children. Loyal children. And you—" she laughed, a small, broken sound— "you just... slaughtered them."
She lowered her head. When she raised it again, her eyes had gone the same burning gold as the wolves'.
"But that's fine. That's fine. Children can be replaced." Her voice had found a new register—light, almost pleasant. "You'll feed my new children. All of you."
She raised the flute to her lips and played one note.
Low. Long. It hung in the clearing like stubborn industrial smoke that refused to leave.
The ground trembled.
The wolves—almost fifty of them, lying dead in the dirt—except the ones worked through by the guards—began to twitch.
Lu Chen's grip tightened on his sword.
I see it.
I know that too.
No, Lu Chen thought, watching the dead things slowly, horribly begin to rise. It really isn't.
System. Initiate breakthrough.
---
[TO BE CONTINUED...]