Chapter 191

Nightfall cloaked the Mist Mountains.

Thick fog obscured everything, making this place eerily silent.

Yet amid this silence, a disheveled figure stumbled and sprinted, darting swiftly through the trees.

He was a tall middle-aged man with a brown goatee, a powerful longbow slung across his back, and a short sword sheathed at his waist.

"Ha… ha… cough, ha…"

He gasped painfully, his chest rising and falling like a bellows; his left hand had vanished at the wrist, leaving a grotesque wound crudely bound with cloth.

In his right hand he clutched a parcel half his height, and even now, he had not the slightest intention of putting it down.

His left leg appeared to have had a large chunk of flesh sliced away, revealing purple-black bone beneath.

Logically, with such severe injuries, he should have stopped to rest properly.

But he dared not pause a single step, as if something terrible was relentlessly chasing him from behind.

This was the Mist Mountains—a death zone.

Sprinting recklessly through this dangerous land was foolhardy, tantamount to seeking one's own death.

But the middle-aged man had no choice.

His name was Shi Diwen Burns, the great-great-grandson of the legendary adventurer Vadele Burns.

Vadele had been the sole survivor to escape after venturing deep into the Mist Mountains.

Though his outcome seemed better than the other two who died violently, in truth it was not much better.

In his final years, Vadele contracted a strange illness that drained all his life's savings without cure.

As a result, his entire family was burdened with crushing debt.

After three generations of effort, they finally repaid those debts—and the Burns family was utterly ruined.

Once prosperous because of the legendary adventurer, now fallen because of him—this was a kind of cycle.

Shi Diwen, as the sole descendant of this generation, had always sought to restore his family's glory!

As the descendant of the legendary adventurer, Shi Diwen had long dreamed of returning here, hoping to fulfill his ancestor's legacy!

For this, he had labored his entire life.

Finally, at age forty-eight, he succeeded in forming his own adventuring party, recruiting a group of like-minded companions.

They all wished to enter the Mist Mountains to explore and gain fame through it.

But in truth, they only planned to wander the outskirts and then return home to boast and deceive.

Only Shi Diwen truly intended to delve deep, seeking the treasure his Ceng Zufu had seen.

He knew how astonishing his idea was—that revealing it might terrify others.

So Shi Diwen stayed silent, pretending to share their goal, planning to go alone once they reached the Mist Mountains.

But the actual situation… was utterly unlike what they imagined.

The grim reality showed them that adventure in this life-dead zone was far from the glorious dream he'd envisioned.

It was not something one could come and go as one pleased.

The group had set out confidently, relying on their crude map, intending to harvest some rare plants of the Mist Mountains as proof of their journey.

But when they arrived, barely inside the outer edge of the Mist Mountains, a sudden, inexplicable fog spread without warning!

The fog, like a white curtain, instantly swallowed everything, engulfing them all.

Afterward, their once-clear map and landmarks became useless; they shouted loudly, but only their own echoes answered.

In panic, they began aimless wandering, trying to find a familiar landmark.

But the more they walked, the more lost they became, until they completely lost all sense of direction.

Finally, at a critical moment, Shi Diwen overruled the others, shouting for everyone to calm down and stay put.

Though his family had fallen, Shi Diwen still possessed the strength of a high-rank rogue—strongest among them all.

Under his firm authority, leveraging his strength and prestige, Shi Diwen finally calmed the others.

But when they counted heads, they discovered three of the original ten had vanished in the fog!

The three disappeared without a sound, leaving no trace.

Before they vanished, no one had heard cries for help, no signs of struggle or scuffling.

It was as if those three had simply vanished into thin air!

Shi Diwen remembered those three—among them was a high-rank thief slightly weaker than himself.

That even such a high-rank thief vanished without a sound jolted everyone awake.

Yes.

This place had never been a tourist attraction—it was a life-devouring death zone.

After that, the others placed all their hope on Shi Diwen.

Under such pressure, Shi Diwen refrained from rash action; after long thought, he ordered everyone to rest where they were.

No one was to sleep; they sat together in a circle, waiting for dawn.

The fog would not last forever—once it lifted, they could find their original path again.

This plan was ultimately accepted by all.

Through collective effort, they successfully lit a bonfire and endured the unbearable night under its light.

But when morning came… the fog had not lifted.

No—they weren't even sure if the sun had risen, if they had truly reached the next day.

The fog enveloped everything.

Including sunlight. Including time.

And worse still, when they began to argue over it, they noticed one person had become utterly silent.

That person had been silently staring at the campfire that had already burned out, giving no response whatsoever to everything around him.

He was dead.

And he hadn't died of fright.

Rather, someone had reached in from behind and taken his heart.

Upon realizing this, everyone felt a bone-piercing chill.

This person had been sitting right among them yesterday, and not a single person had fallen asleep — no one had seen what the killer looked like.

They didn't even know when exactly the killer had struck!

At the same time, just as everyone felt fear gradually devouring their hearts… the surrounding fog grew even thicker.

The fog was engulfing everything.

Once the fear reached its peak, an argument naturally erupted.

They were accusing one another.

Why did you insist on coming to this place?

Why did you make such a crazy decision?

At the fiercest point of the quarrel, they even drew their blades and pointed them at each other!

But in the end, the fight never happened.

Because before the fight could break out, Shi Diwen personally cut off both their heads.

"Nobody's allowed to argue — everyone listens to me!"

(End of chapter)