At Return Town, everything was as usual.
When they arrived, it was noon, the vendors were shouting and selling, people were coming and going, it looked like a very busy and lively scene. The group stopped at the intersection for a while, they had a surreal feeling.
"Seventh sister."
Dongfang Minghui could feel it best, before even stepping foot in the town, Little Colour and Love Flower hid in the space ring and yelled that it is too stinky. A stench filled the entire Return Town, like a kind of haze hovering over it.
When she saw the others looking as normal, she couldn't help but ask, "Don't you guys think it stinks?"
Several people looked at each other and shook their heads, "Do you smell anything?"
"No."
Qian Wanyu watched her pinch her nose, her eyebrows knitted together, and reached out a hand to soothe her, "There must be something fishy going on, from now on, everyone should be more careful."
The people nodded.
Li Weifeng and his group, however, gave them a strange look, especially Geng Shan who asked curiously, "Why do they think something is strange?"
"Return town looks like it's very peaceful, how could they make it sound so serious." Jin Jing muttered.
"In any case, it's better to be careful."
The group of them first looked for an inn which was considered to be relatively good in Return Town, but the rooms were simple and the dust in the house was everywhere, a waiter stood by, looking as if he was waiting for orders.
Because of the large number of people, they picked a separate compound, the compound had a total of five rooms. The people divided equally, Qian Wanyu's side had three women and three men so they asked for two rooms, the remaining three rooms were given to Li Weifeng's group.
The women had one room and the men had one room.
"Seventh sister, you really can't smell the stench?"
Once the door was closed, Dongfang Minghui took a look at the layout of the room and went over to ask, ever since entering Return Town, the smell was like a shadow, giving her the illusion that the whole town was full of undead everywhere she went.
Bai Ruo picked a table at random, unhooked the sword on her back, and routinely wiped the blade, she simply replied, "No."
"Not really."
Qian Wanyu also shook her head, she picked a position the same as Bai Ruo, her fingers gently wiped and dust came off it, "Everyone do not sleep tonight, I think this inn and everything else could be very problematic."
The three people next door were also on alert.
Dongfang Minghui closed her eyes and released her spiritual power to try to block out the foul smell, but unfortunately, for some reason, the method given to her by Seventh sister failed and she almost fainted from the smell.
"Ninth Sister, are you all right?"
Qian Wanyu saw that she had a pruned up face and her whole body was lifeless, it looked as if there was a real problem…
"Qing Mo, is there a possibility that Ninth Sister is really smelling the scent that we have not smelled?"
"Yes, your Ninth Sister is close to plants, her senses are much stronger than the average person, plants absorb the scent a hundred times more acutely than humans do, if she can smell it, maybe there is really something very wrong here."
"I have something for this." Dongfang Minghui was weak but she held out her hand, "Seventh sister, quickly give me that porcelain bottle of jasmine-scented pills you took out earlier."
Without absorbing some fresh floral scent, she and her flower friends were going to choke!
Qian Wanyu laughed and gave the porcelain vase she had taken in the tomb of the undead earlier.
Dongfang Minghui snatched it and gave a little bit to each of the five little ones in her space ring then crushed the pills and the whole room smelled like jasmine, she sniffed hard several times and it took her a while to finally get over it.
"Strange, why do I seem to smell the stench again..?"
No sooner had she said that than a sharp scream was heard coming from the room next door.
The people in the courtyard immediately sensed that something was wrong.
Qian Wanyu and Bai Rou were so fast that when the scream started, they each grabbed their weapons and rushed out, while Dongfang Minghui was slightly slower and felt something when she followed them out of the room.
She looked back and saw a tall dark figure standing just a meter away from her, and because of the light, she couldn't see their face.
"Who are you?"
Dongfang Minghui reacted almost instinctively, shooting out her flying needles and plum blossom nails as the other party reached out towards her. The other party stepped aside and dodged her concealed weapons, then reached her in the blink of an eye, a strange yet familiar face could be seen, "You-"
"Ninth Sister!"
She heard Seventh sister's urgent cry and rushed back just in time to see the black figure run with Minghui on their back.
The five of them tried to track the person in black but after tracking for a while, they lost him… Qian Wanyu was considered to be the only one who could somewhat keep up with the other party's speed but just tracking one person almost exhausted half of her spiritual energy!
"The other party is at least Spiritual Emperor." Qing Mo saw clearly in the soul sea but Minghui continued to maintain her speed, the rest of the group had already run out of strength, the first ones were Situ Hao and Mu Sheng who almost exhausted all their spiritual energy halfway through.
The other side was truly four levels higher than them and stronger by a wide margin.
"Wanyu, they seem to be in trouble."
Qian Wanyu was forced to stop when she heard Qing Mo's words, she had long found out that the other party was much stronger than herself, the more she chased, the further the distance between the two became, the moment she stopped, she lost the person's trail in the blink of an eye.
"Calm down, if you go crazy at this time, Dongfang Minghui will not come back."
Qian Wanyu breathed deeply and tried to calm herself down, the water thunder whip in her hand was still shining with a faintly cold light, she turned around and ran in the direction of Bai Rou and the others.
Situ Hao and Mu Sheng were forced to stop, no matter how much they released their spiritual energy, they couldn't catch up with the person in front but once they stopped, they noticed something in the darkness shining like the eyes of some animal.
"It can't be…" Situ Hao sat down paralyzed and immediately took out some spirit liquid from his space ring and handed a bottle to Mu Sheng as well, his spirit power only managed to recover to like fifty percent from it, he threw a light illumination skill.
The whole darkness was instantly lit up.
The scene in front of him scared the two men into a cold sweat, they were surrounded by a flashing red glow of the undead, they stood in the darkness, illuminated by the light making their grim red eyes look even scarier.
"Brother Situ, do you feel as if they look even more terrifying than the group of villagers before?" Mu Sheng asked with chattering teeth.
"Help–" Situ Hao used his spiritual power to send his voice out over a distance.
The light illumination skill lasted for less than half a stick of incense, and when the light faded a little, Situ Hao threw another light ball out to maintain the light, "Junior Mu Sheng, do something, or else we're going to be their food!"
Mu Sheng's forehead was oozing cold sweat, he just tried to summon Xiao Bai to let it scatter some poison powder, but with the passage of time seeing the state of these undead they seemed completely unaffected, his wood spiritual power here was useless on the undead…
"Hopefully, Sister Wanyu and Sister Bai Rou or the others can find us."
Not only them, Bai Rou and Li Yunan were also caught by a pile of undead, the two of them stood back to back, looking at the group of approaching undead, "Senior sister Bai, have you noticed that the ones in Return Town seem different from those villagers?"
"Hmm."
Naturally it was different, these group of monsters all had a sharp red light in their eyes, just a glance could tell them that they were much harder to deal with than those dull-eyed undead. If her guess was right, these group of undead pretended to be normal people in the day and at night they turned into this… No wonder it always felt so out of place when they arrived.
Bai Ruo wrapped a white cloth around her right hand and the hilt of her sword then got into a stance.
"It seems to be Situ's voice." Li Yunan heard the call of help coming from Situ Hao at a distance of more than a hundred meters from them, "Senior sister Bai, fighting like this, we have to fight all night, why don't we find them as well?"
"Good."
Li Yunan was a water Spiritual Master, Bai Rou was ice, Li Yunan used water on the ground which Bai Rou turned into ice, in the blink of an eye, the undead around them all had frozen legs.
At least make it would make it slightly more difficult for them to move.
"How long can it last?"
"An incense stick of time?"
Bai Rou also tried this sort of mass freezing for the first time, without Li Yunan's assistance, this could not be done by just her level of power.
"Are you guys okay?" When Qian Wanyu rushed back, the group of undead were frozen into ice, it looked like things had been easily solved by them.
"It's Situ Hao and Mu Sheng."
"Go."
When the last ray of light was about to disappear, Situ Hao had already drunk five bottles of spiritual liquid, but it didn't help, the light still weakened bit by bit and the undead around them had started shuffling closer.
"Mu Sheng junior brother, are we going to die?" Situ Hao cried, he hadn't married a pretty girl home, their Situ family for his generation only had him and he hadn't inherited the Situ Family's trademark skills. He still had a lot of life to enjoy, there… were still a lot of things not yet completed.
Mu Sheng felt this was the first time he'd been relied on and he laughed bitterly, "Situ senior brother, we can still last at most half an incense stick of time."
"Hmm?"
Mu Sheng's second plant, Little Green was a magic plant that could summon the surrounding plants to help, just a moment ago while Situ Hao tried his best to stall for time, he secretly released Little Green and summoned some vines over to help.
But maybe because the corrosive smell of Return Town was too heavy, all the surrounding plants started to wither and die, little green still summoned vines from the outskirts to try and help wrap the ankles of the undead.
When the light finally died and the darkness fell, Little Green had managed to summon some vines to wrap around the ankles of the undead so that they could not move for the time being.
Situ Hao saw this scene and was secretly relieved. But before he had time to catch his breath, he saw a group of the undead break free from the vines, "Mu Sheng, I just saw something wrong right…?"
How did he get the feeling that some of the undead could use spiritual power?
Mu Sheng laughed miserably, this was the end even that last half stick of incense worth of time is gone, "Brother Situ, you saw it right, these undead had mutated…"
"Ah…"
Situ Hao suddenly felt his feet were touched by an icy cold thing and jumped three jumps, directly jumping to Mu Sheng's body, "Ah, there's something below." Were these undead even crawling now?
Mu Sheng kneeled down and saw that the ground was white, like ice. He saw that some frost had formed on Little Green's body.
"It's Senior Sister Bai Rou!"
"How clever." Bai Rou leapt down from mid-air, holding the big sword with both hands and swung in front of Mu Sheng and Situ Hao slashing vertically towards a group of undead.
Situ Hao raised his head and saw a white light from the knife, the group of undead who had not had time to dodge were mowed down quickly creating a road in front of her, Bai Ruo coldly looked at them, "Aren't you going to go?"
Qian Wanyu used her water thunder whip and just around a group of undead used some thunder essence, the bursts of thunder illuminated the whole sky with lightning, from mid-air, you could see a street full of undead, they froze and raised their heads as if looking at the spectacle.
"Mine as well."
Li Yunan threw wind flowing fan in his hand into the sky and another thick lightning bolt fell from the sky.
Situ Hao saw the scene behind him clearly and drew a cold breath, he pulled Mu Sheng closer and hid back behind Bai Ruo again, immediately grabbing two bottles of spiritual liquid for himself and Mu Sheng, and then handed a small bottle to Bai Ruo, "Drink it, your spiritual power can recover a little."
Bai Rou crushed the cap of the bottle with one hand and drank it all in one gulp, "You two weren't scratched by the undead were you?"
"N-no."
If they got scratched it would be the end, Situ Hao felt that they had accidentally entered a land of undead the moment they set foot in Return Town. No wonder he felt that the innkeeper's movements were stiff, he dared to guess that the other party was undead as well…
They actually stayed with the undead for so long without noticing!
"These undead seem to have intelligence."
"Hmm."
Not only that, they were no different from living people in the daytime, but they turned into these terrifying existences at night.
Two thunderbolts blew a street full of undead into dust, most did not run but a few of them turned and escaped.
When Qian Wanyu and Li Yunan came down from mid-air, there were not many left.
"The whole town didn't become undead right?" Mu Sheng suddenly questioned, they fought with so much noise yet the whole town was quiet, there was no reaction at all, this situation could only mean one thing.
Everyone looked at each other, Qian Wanyu look calm but the expression on her face turned colder, "After we solve them, we'll go back to the inn and have a look."
Earlier, if it wasn't for the people from Shengling Academy suddenly screaming, they wouldn't have fallen for that trick of drawing the tiger away from the mountain, and Ninth Sister wouldn't have been taken away…
"Good."
Bai Rou and Li Yunan looked at each other, both knew that the situation was not too good they had to make it quick. The situation was almost lopsided, the remaining group of undead were like those villagers, with dull eyes and inflexible body movements.
When they hurried back to the inn, the whole place was quiet, when they left before the lights were bright, now the lights had been put out, the more important thing was that even though there was so much noise, those people of Shengling College really did not hear anything.
"Everyone be careful."
Qian Wanyu gripped the water thunder whip and kicked open one of the doors, no one was inside so she followed by another door, the other door also had no one.
"Where did everyone go?"
The whole inn, along with the shopkeeper and the waiter had disappeared.
Qian Wanyu sat down on the steps outside and calmed down the spirit power that was churning in her body, she almost couldn't restrain her dark spirit power and was almost about to rank up…
"Wanyu, calm down, calm down." Qing Mo anxiously walked around in the sea of souls, "Just think, your Ninth Sister is so resourceful, surely she will be fine."
"Right."
Situ Hao looked at them and sat down directly on the ground with a sigh regardless of his image, "It's over, I've lost little Minghui again." He can already foresee the fat old man cursing when he found out – how come it's not you going missing??
Bai Rou put her large sword on her shoulder, "I'll go look for her."
"I'll go." Li Yunan waved the iron fan in his hand and stopped Bai Ruo, "You stay and protect them."
Qian Wanyu jerked her head up, "Don't bother going, the person who robbed Ninth Sister is a Spiritual Emperor, you guys will be sacrificed for nothing even if you go."
The other party was not a Darkness Spiritual Master, there was no death aura on them, they were not the same group of people as the Death Spiritual Masters that tried to take Ninth Sister last time, this was the only thing she was still relatively relieved about, but she still wasn't sure why the other party wanted to take Ninth Sister.
"Spiritual Emperor…"
Bai Rou's face tightened, and Li Yunan also frowned.
"What are you thinking, Sister Wanyu?"
Since the other party bothered using such a strategy like drawing the tiger from the mountain and summoning so many undead to besiege them, as long as this mastermind was uncovered, all the problems would be solved. Qian Wanyu glanced at Mu Sheng, "The undead in Return Town have some anomalies, if my guess is good, there's some of them that were transformed from Spiritual Masters into undead…"
"Yes, I've observed their eyes, one kind was a dead gray gaze, the eyes were dull and deep gray. The other kind had flushed red eyes and can use their spiritual power to resist our attacks." Bai Rou told the group what she had found.
Mu Sheng nodded, there were even Spiritual Masters in that group of undead, it was too scary.
But, at the same time, it also caused them more headache, the undead were still difficult to deal with, how can they deal with the stronger undead?
"The mutant undead had higher intelligence than the ones from the village and they are also good at hiding themselves." Li Yunan added.