Chapter 29: The Four Fiends of Lanshan

One of the screams was eerily familiar—barely discernible as the monk’s voice.

“Who are you? Who are you people?” Feng Lao’s furious voice came from the Soul-Suppressing Banner.

Wang Yu sprang up in a carp leap and turned toward the site of the explosion.

When the shockwave cleared, the giant impure bone fish had vanished, the gray aura shielding the hull was gone, but two new figures now stood on the deck—one tall, one short.

The tall figure wore a gray Eight Trigrams Daoist robe, a long sword strapped to his back, and held a tattered white lantern in one hand—he was a Daoist in his thirties, his face gaunt and sickly.

The short figure was a wrinkled dwarf, with small eyes, a head full of gray braids, a black leather pouch at his waist, golden rings encircling both arms, and a venomous sneer fixed on the crowd.

“Impressive tactics—you hid inside the impure bone fish and sneaked aboard undetected, then destroyed our ship’s protective artifact with one strike,” Feng Lao said coldly, staring at them; cracks now marred the main shaft of the Soul-Suppressing Banner, rendering it unusable.

Wang Yu swiftly scanned the deck again and saw only a handful of crewmen still standing; even the cultivators with protective charms were wounded and trembling with residual terror.

The impure bone fish’s self-explosion had been far more powerful than anticipated—if he hadn’t undergone military training in school and instinctively rolled to the ground at the blast, his fate would’ve been no better.

At this moment, Yin Fu’s body trembled as if about to collapse; the two black giant dogs lay motionless at her feet, their bodies riddled with wounds.

Yu Bin’s face was pale; his bronze mirror seemed smaller than before, its surface dim and lifeless.

The young Huang couple stood together, but the man’s shoulder bled profusely, and their blue protective aura had vanished entirely.

The masked youth stood upright, yet now held a short yellow ruler before him, his eyes gleaming with sharp intensity—as if unharmed.

The worst off was the monk, closest to the blast; his arms, clasped around his staff, were now a bloody pulp, white bone barely visible beneath, and one eye deeply pierced by a shard of shattered bone.

He stared at the two newcomers, his lone eye burning with fury.

“You destroyed my body, severed my Dao path—I’ll kill you!”

Before the Daoist and dwarf could answer Feng Lao’s accusation, the monk roared, his arms glowing yellow; he hurled his crescent staff at the newcomers while muttering incantations—behind him, two shadowy yellow arms materialized, all four hands simultaneously forming seals and pointing at the staff from afar.

“Boom!”

The staff exploded midair above the Daoist and dwarf, spilling countless streams of deep-blue liquid that rained down, filling the deck with a foul stench.

“Hmm, poison blood of the Double-Tailed Wolf—this is precious stuff! Don’t waste it!” The dwarf chuckled, and his black leather pouch detached from his waist, soaring upward; a torrent of white radiance poured from its mouth, gathering all the blue fluid into itself, swirling once in midair before settling back onto his person.

“Qi Condensation late stage—Small Universe Bag! You’re Qian Kun Zi of the Lanshan Four Fiends!” Feng Lao’s pupils contracted as he recognized the dwarf.

The Lanshan Four Fiends!

Upon hearing this, every other cultivator turned pale.

The monk, who had just attacked, froze, his face draining of all color.

At that instant, the sickly-faced Daoist flickered like a ghost, appearing before the monk with his lantern in one hand; his long sword, which had been on his back, now rested in the other, and a crescent moon materialized along its blade as it descended toward the monk.

“Spare me!”

The monk panicked, both arms blazing with yellow light as he raised them to block; the two shadowy arms behind him slammed upward into the air, creating a shockwave.

“Whoosh!”

The crescent moon suddenly blazed with icy radiance, swelling to many times its size, completely engulfing the monk’s form.

When the cold light vanished again, the monk lay severed in two, his body in a pool of blood, his arms split into four pieces scattered beside his headless torso.

This Qi Condensation mid-stage cultivator hadn’t even blocked the sickly Daoist’s first strike; nearby cultivators recoiled in terror.

“A Class-Entry Sword—Moonfall Sword! It’s the Moonfall Daoist—definitely the Lanshan Four Fiends!”

A cultivator dressed like an old farmer near the ship’s edge screamed in terror, flipped over, and leapt straight off the deck, aiming to dive into the river below and escape.

But before he could fully descend, a massive impure bone fish erupted from the black mist below, swallowed him whole, then thrashed its tail and vanished back into the fog.

Only then did they realize that with the Soul-Suppressing Banner shattered and the gray barrier gone, black mist now spread across the deck’s perimeter; more bone fish climbed aboard, and several giant impure ones hovered just beyond the fog, circling the deck without attacking—yet.

“You know our rules,” the dwarf patted his black pouch, tilting his head with menace. “Surrender, and you live. Resist, and not a soul escapes.”

The cultivators on deck turned grim.

Wang Yu swallowed hard, his heartbeat accelerating.

Though he’d never heard of the “Lanshan Four Fiends,” their terror was clear from the others’ reactions.

“Hmph! Don’t be fooled by their words—the Lanshan Four Fiends are infamous; they’ve never spared anyone. Besides, only two of them arrived. I still have a backup ship-protection artifact—I can hold one off, while the rest of you overwhelm the other. If we unite, we can capture them.”

Feng Lao sneered, stomped his foot, and a circle of white light flared beneath him; slowly rising from the deck was another miniature banner, a few inches tall, its surface flashing with yellow talismanic script—clearly no ordinary artifact.

Seeing this, Yu Bin and the others on deck perked up; some immediately began forming seals and chanting incantations, ready to follow Feng Lao’s plan—but most still hesitated.

At the same moment, Feng Lao drew a deep breath and reached for the miniature banner beneath him.

“Puff.”

A blood-red sword tip suddenly pierced through Feng Lao’s chest from nowhere; behind him, the air rippled, and a slender green figure silently materialized—round face, large eyes.

It was the missing girl in green robes—Qin Er.

In her hand, a blood-red short sword pierced through Feng Lao’s chest from behind; her face beamed with a mischievous grin, as quirky and elusive as ever.

Feng Lao screamed; his waistband’s tobacco pipe exploded, releasing thick smoke that surged like a living thing, engulfing both of them. Inside, explosions of fire erupted continuously, mixed with Feng Lao’s roars and the girl’s tinkling laughter.

This sudden twist left everyone stunned—but the sickly Daoist’s next words snapped them back to reality.

“Kill them. Leave no survivors.”

No sooner had he spoken than the dwarf produced a white horn from nowhere, raised it to his lips, and blew hard.

Oooh… Oooh…

The bone fish in the surrounding black mist stirred violently, then surged forward in fury, attacking the cultivators and surviving crewmen alike.

“Run!”

Someone shouted; several figures leapt skyward—some glowing with aura, others stepping on white clouds, others diving into the water like the old farmer; among them were Yu Bin and the young Huang couple.

Wang Yu, who had quietly slipped to a corner of the deck, now ignored everyone else and slammed his foot down hard.

“Crack!”

The deck beneath him shattered, revealing a hole large enough for a man; he tumbled through it, landing directly in the ship’s lower cabin.

“Woo… woo…”

Several bone fish, each about a foot long, slithered down through the hole—but Wang Yu, prepared, slashed them swiftly with his blade, cutting them into seven or eight pieces, then kicked down hard again; with a burst of cracking wood, he dropped into the next lower cabin.

When he boarded, he’d studied the ship carefully—it had three decks below the main one. Now on the second level, he didn’t go further down; instead, he growled softly.

“Overclock Sync.”

His senses flared open; everything around him slowed, his mind entering super-mode.

Using all the information he’d gathered, he rapidly calculated his precise location aboard the ship, searching for the optimal escape route…

In just two breaths, Wang Yu sprinted down a corridor, ran a short distance toward the stern, then dove into a seemingly peripheral cabin, slammed the door shut, flipped his hand—and a yellow talisman appeared in his grip: the “Golden Light Talisman” he’d acquired earlier.

Following the young Huang’s instructions, he channeled a trickle of internal Qi into the talisman, then slapped it onto his chest.

“Puff.”

A faint golden aura shimmered over his body, enveloping him entirely; faint spiritual glyphs resembling characters flickered across the shield.

Normally, Wang Yu might have studied it closely—but now, fleeing for his life, he wasted no time; his long blade flashed, slicing a wide opening in the cabin’s outer wall.

“Gurgle… gurgle…”

River water surged in like a flood, flooding the room.

Wang Yu, prepared, bit down on his Iron Essence Blade, took a deep breath, held it, and gripped the edges of the opening tightly, anchoring his body against the current.

When the room filled completely and his body floated upward, he kicked off hard and swam out through the opening, escaping the ship.

Outside the ship, the river water held little black mist, but some bone fish drifted lazily about.

Wang Yu surfaced quietly, then strained toward the distant shore.

“Crack… crack…”

Before he’d swum far, several bone fish surrounded him, gnawing at his body with sharp jaws—but the golden aura rippled, leaving him unharmed.

Wang Yu ignored the biting fish entirely, swimming hard while dragging the gnawing horde behind him.

With system assistance, his control over his muscles and limbs reached a subtle state—using one-tenth the effort to achieve ten times the swimming power; he felt as if he’d merged with the river, even sensing a strange warmth from the water around him.

The bone fish circling him, as he moved his limbs in a blur, were flung far behind.

From afar, the water churned behind him, leaving a long, white trail.