Nee Chen hurried to the village elder's house to tell him his worries. The village is at peace this early in the morning. The fog is low and the sun is still obscured in the clouds.
*Knock *knock *knock
Nee Chen knocked on the door only to receive silence.
The people are still asleep so it is understandable why it is so quiet. Maybe, the elder is still sleeping, but Nee Chen cannot calm his heart. So he knocked once more.
*Knock *knock *knock
And finally, the door opened. It was Xiang Ya, the most beautiful girl in the village and the village elder's only granddaughter.
Nee Chen was surprised by Xiang Ya's appearance. Dark hair, supple lips, beautiful face, fair skin…
"Boobs..." *ahem
"..."
"..." *gulp
"*Cough~ brother Chen, why did you come?" Xiang Ya dispelled the momentary awkward silence with a cough.
"I—"
"WAAAAAAAAA~ WAAAaaaaaAAAAAAaaaaaaa~!"
When Nee Chen was about to speak, a familiar annoying cry interrupted him. He frowned at the sight of the dashing Lu Gao.
"C-cultivator! B-brother Chen, my mom... waaAaaAa.. hik... hik..."
Seeing Lu Gao hyperventilating in pain, Nee Chen felt something gravely wrong. Nee Chen calmed little Gao by slowly rubbing the kid's back.
"What happened?" Xiang Ya asked little Gao, but the kid is clearly having a hard time answering.
It didn't take long for Xiang Ya and Nee Chen to know the answer. Three men hurriedly walked to their side, all of them bleeding.
All of them are familiar people that Nee Chen usually made interactions with.
"Demonic cultivator!"
"Run!"
"He killed all of—"
*SLAAAASH!
Blood scattered in the air revealing a robed figure just behind the three men. It was Zha Dong.
"They ran quite fast..." He playfully said as he flexes his sword.
Nee Chen was frozen in his place, while Lu Gao has already fainted from the shock of seeing blood once more. Xiang Ya was similarly shaken.
…
Lu Gao remembered still hearing the chirping of the crickets. He was waving his wooden sword, fantasizing about the amazing powers he could wield if he were a cultivator.
Lu Gao was playing in the village's periphery at that time when he saw… a certain cultivator killing his mom who was searching for her kid.
Slashed right in the gut, Lu Gao watched his mom's entrails burst into the damp soil, her blood and white matter mixing with the dirt.
"M-mo-mom..." Lu Gao muttered in a small voice.
As a boy with an inquisitive mind, and a desire for exploration, Lu Gao is someone who is considerably knowledgeable among his peers around his age.
Lu Gao recalled the time when he visited the butcher's workplace. The smell of blood is sickening, but that's not what really gave the little boy the heaviest impression in the butcher's workshop.
It was the squealing.
"K-kyaaa~" That was the last thing Lu Gao heard from his mom.
Knowing that it might be his fault that his mother died, little Gao felt strong guilt for playing without asking permission from his mom.
"N-no..." Lu Gao ran.
The village is big so it took Lu Gao some time to run towards the village elder's house. The massacre followed him as he hears intermittent screams of pain from the many houses around him.
"Who is this?"
"Ah! He has a knife!"
"That's a fucking sword!"
"Please, not my child!"
It snowballed into a chaotic disorder as the villagers woke up at the screams, resist with all their might, and do their worst to survive.
It was futile as the demonic cultivator make quick work of them.
He, Zha Dong, was killing the villagers with a manic smile. Zha Dong personally drove his sword to his victims' hearts. After that, he extracted their bones with perverse obsession. His movements are fast as expected from a cultivator.
Every house in the village was visited by this grim reaper. Zha Dong reserved the biggest house in the center of the village as a finale.
When Zha Dong reached his final destination, he found some stragglers left.
…
"Well, what do we have here? A beauty, a farm boy, and a brat…" Zha Dong casually said as he clean the blood from his sword by rubbing it in the dead man's robe.
In his struggle to take control of his panic, Nee Chen rushed to the fainted Lu Gao. The demonic cultivator remained unmoving at the sight of a panicking farm boy.
Nee Chen carried Lu Gao into a concealed space among the hay. He worriedly gazed at the panicking livestock around.
The murderous intent of the deadly cultivator felt so vivid, Nee Chen is having lapses in his judgment.
Nee Chen is scared, but he wants to do something, just anything. Hiding little Gao like this seems futile, but it's better than doing nothing.
Nee Chen then raised his head, his eyes landed on Xiang Ya. He was about to take a step when chilling murderous intent once more engulfed him.
Frozen in place, Nee Chen was left helpless in the face of the demonic cultivator's mysterious means.
"Heh~ It was just killing intent, but this farm boy is already like this." Zha Dong scoffed.
Xiang Ya is trembling in fear as Zha Dong approached her.
"Not bad." He pinched the girl's chin, examining Xiang Ya's face. Zha Dong then pressed his lips to the trembling girl.
When Xiang Ya felt the cold sensation of dread, she doesn't know what to do. But the cultivator's intrusive act made her boil in disgust.
Xiang Ya bit Zha Dong's lips causing the cultivator to flinch in shock. Xiang Ya retreated, hurriedly cleaning the filth that touched her lips.
Zha Dong watched Xiang Ya scratch her tongue and rub it with the dirt. The already angry cultivator is now seething with hatred.
"You slut! I show interest in you and now you insult me?!"
Nee Chen blankly watched Xiang Ya getting her first kiss stolen, and... the next second, being slapped by the cultivator in fury.
Zha Dong's palm is filled with demonic qi. He used it to slap the girl mercilessly. Xiang Ya was sent crashing into a hut and another.
Nee Chen's eyes turned bloody red in fury. "You fucker, if you want to hit someone, hit me!" With sheer will, Nee Chen moved.
Xiang Ya can feel several broken bones in her body. She coughed blood and grimaced in pain.
Nee Chen arrived by Xiang Ya's side. He doesn't even dare to touch her afraid that he might exacerbate her injuries. "Xiang Ya, please, d-don't... don't lose consciousness... Please!"
Zha Dong watched pathetically at the drama unfolding in front of him. "What a bunch of insects..."
Cold sweat drenched Nee Chen's back, and the color of despair etched itself on his face. Is this the end? He thought that this might be it... The miserable end of a farm boy, and the demise of One Well Village...
Nee Chen felt weak in his arms, and legs, causing his knees to give out. Slumped, the young man felt his world turn upside down. At the back of his mind, he prayed for the nightmare he had to remain an illusion or a hallucination.
Maybe... all of this is not real. But... that's just wishful thinking.
Zha Dong with malicious intentions laid his fangs bare. "What a pity, she was kind of my type. Never mind, she's not even that beautiful."
Nee Chen tilted his head at an unnatural angle and glared at Zha Dong in chilling wrath.
Zha Dong doesn't know why, but the sight of the menacing Nee Chen made him flinch. However, Zha Dong has no leeway to pay attention to the irregularities that Nee Chen has shown... for a strong presence suddenly revealed itself.
"You insolent fool! How dare you lay your filthy hand on my granddaughter?!" Words brimming with qi echoed in the winds. It was elder Fu--- Xiang Ya's grandfather.
Carrying a long curved blade, he erupted at the demonic cultivator. Xiang Fu, the retired cultivator of the One Well Village glowered. "You bastard, you must be eager to die!"
"How dare a 3rd stage talk to me like that?" But Zha Dong just spat back with contempt. "Do you think that the Will Reinforcement realm is enough to deal with me?"
There are 11 stages of cultivation known to the current world. From 1st stage to the 4th stage, they are namely: Martial Tempering, Mind Enlightenment, Will Reinforcement, and Spirit Mystery— these four specific stages are also known as the Four Earthly Attributes.
Being in the Spirit Mystery realm, it could be said that Zha Dong has already attained the basic Four Earthly Attributes, capable of wielding the synergistic powers of martial, mind, will, and spirit.
In a sense, there might not be a big difference between 1st to 3rd stages, but that's a different story for 4th stages that possess deep-to-the-bones superhuman qualities. Even without the use of qi--- Spirit Mystery experts can easily crush rocks, hear from a hundred li, and see from a thousand li.
"Old man, I will make you despair!" Zha Dong's demonic qi churned with excitement.
Xiang Fu didn't mind his foe looking down on him. It is because he is aware of how truly outclassed he is in terms of cultivation levels.
However, Xiang Fu is not showing any worries on his face. What he lacks in cultivation, he will fill up with fighting spirit and technique.
Xiang Fu with a resolute heart raises his blade and then spat back.
"You will make me taste despair? I have been there, it ain't a fun place."