Wild cultivation begins with wielding the Taiyin talisman.

The journey was still peaceful, the wilderness as silent as a graveyard.

Ning Che suppressed all his doubts and anxieties, focusing instead on the task at hand.

Soon, they arrived at the black pine forest. The setting sun was fragmented by the branches, and the gray light fell through the dark pine needles, casting crooked red spots on the withered black rocks.

The two stepped into the shadows.

The wind whistled past his ears, carrying pine needles. Ning Che closed his eyes, and a faint, clear light emanated from the Taiyin Talisman in his sea of ​​consciousness. His magical power flowed through his meridians into his ears. He unleashed the full power of his Wind-Following Hearing technique, and the sounds within a hundred feet around him were as clear as a stream flowing over a rock, reflected distinctly in his soul.

The sounds of their heartbeats and even their breathing, the sticky sound of resin slowly seeping from the cracks in the tree trunk, even the faint rustling of mist condensing and rolling off the pine needles—everything was present. The only thing missing was the presence of any living creature.

No wild rabbits flee, no tits flap their wings, and even the most common wood-boring insects in the wilderness have disappeared here.

Where did they all go?

Ning Che slowly opened his eyes, the clear light in them vanishing in an instant. He raised his hand and pressed it against the machete at his waist, his fingertips tapping the hilt lightly twice. This was a habit he had developed on the battlefield; these subtle movements before battle helped him calm his mind more quickly.

"What's wrong?" Fugui asked in a low voice.

Ning Che looked into the woods and said, "I've been thinking about some things. Let's just take a walk for now."

Fu Gui was stunned for a moment upon hearing this, then understood. Ning Che had already explained the tactics to him last time, and he knew that some things could not be said here, or the demon would hear them.

The two exchanged a glance and tacitly changed their formation. Fu Gui, in front, slowed his pace and kept his eyes fixed on the road ahead, not missing a single movement; Ning Che, behind, kept glancing left and right, ready to activate his Wind-Following Ear at any moment.

Sure enough, after walking only a hundred steps forward, the surrounding fog suddenly surged.

The once straight black pine trunks twisted and deformed in the fog, the black stone slope underfoot vanished into thin air, replaced by a bottomless ravine, and at the same time countless shrieks rang in my ears, including the wails of women, the screams of children, and the cries of different wild animals mixed together.

The shadowy figure reappeared, and Fu Gui drew his bow and shot an arrow, piercing through the enemy's defenses. At the same time, Ning Che completely abandoned his defenses, closed his eyes, and fully activated his Wind-Following Ears.

The extraordinary stillness became his friend, allowing him to find the faint heartbeat of a living being—underground—without being disturbed by the noise!

Ning Che opened his eyes and charged forward, knife in hand.

Fu Gui knew that he had found his target, and his expression immediately lit up with joy. He followed him.

Along the way, the mist condensed into hundreds of dark shadows, but Ning Che shattered them all. At the source of the sound, they found a hidden cave entrance exposed in the rocks, only to discover that the entrance was just large enough for one person to crawl through.

The edges of the cave entrance were worn smooth, and the wind blowing out carried a heavy, rotten, and fishy smell, mixed with a strange odor of pine resin, making one almost nauseous.

Ning Che knelt on one knee, bent down and pressed his ear to the rock, activating his Wind-Following Ear once more. Seeing this, Fu Gui tacitly drew his knife and guarded the surroundings.

The target became clearer: the steady, eerily rhythmic heartbeat was coming from about a hundred paces deep at the end of the cave.

Fortunately, there was no fog in the cave, but could this be a trap?

Ning Che thought for a moment and then arranged, "I'll go in, you stay outside and keep watch. With your back against the black pine, no illusions will appear in the tree."

Fu Gui's face was urgent: "No! You're going in alone? This monster is hiding in its lair, who knows what dirty tricks it has up its sleeve. You'll barely be able to turn around, how are you going to fight? We'll go in together, even if we die together!"

"Uncle Fugui, going in together is a sure way to die." Ning Che patted Fugui's hand to comfort him, then pointed to the cave entrance and explained, "This cave can only accommodate one person at a time. If I'm attacked in front, you won't be able to help from behind; instead, you'll block our retreat. The biggest help you can give me is to guard the entrance from the outside and cut off their reinforcements."

He paused, tapped his ear with his fingertip, and gave a confident smile: "Besides, its illusions can't fool me. All the sounds underground can't escape my ears. Its advantage of hiding in the shadows is gone."

Fu Gui looked into his eyes, his lips moved again and again, but in the end he gritted his teeth and released his grip. He took three armor-piercing arrows coated with deadly poison from his quiver and stuffed them into Ning Che's hand, then handed him the tinderbox from his waist, saying, "Be careful."

"Alright." Ning Che slashed away a dark shadow with a backhand, then took the item: "See you alive."

"See you alive."

As soon as he finished speaking, Ning Che no longer hesitated, gripped his machete, and ducked into the cave entrance.

The cave passage was narrow and cramped, with the rocks overhead almost touching your back, forcing you to incline forward little by little by supporting yourself on your elbows. Cold water seeping from the rock and soil poured down your collar, chilling your spine. It was pitch black all around, so dark you couldn't see your hand in front of your face. Only at the end of the cave, the steady, unhurried heartbeat remained clear, like a death knell.

Ning Che closed his eyes, completely abandoning his sight and relying entirely on his super-hearing ears to perceive everything around him.

After crawling forward about fifty steps, he suddenly heard a strange noise, as if countless insects were crawling. He could even feel a fine tingling sensation on his body, and his instincts kept urging him to drive away these foreign objects that had crawled onto his body.

But they cannot appear out of thin air.

Ning Che suppressed all the strange feelings, ignored them, and continued forward until the view in front of him suddenly opened up, where he lit the tinderbox.

This was an underground chamber completely enveloped by the roots of black pine trees. Unlike the previous one, there was a thin mist here, but it didn't affect visibility. Countless tree roots as thick as bowls hung down from the ceiling and plunged into the ground, like beams supporting the cave. A white, wolf-like monster with extremely short hind legs lay in the center of the chamber.

In the corner of the cave, there were scattered skeletons that had long since decayed; most of them had disintegrated, and it was impossible to tell how many there were.

Some of the skeletons had half a hunter's leather armor hanging on them, and they were holding rusty machetes, the backs of which were embedded in tree roots. One of the skeletons even had an inscribed wooden plaque pressed against its chest. If there were no doubt, these were probably hunters from Shizhu Village who had gone missing in the Black Pine Forest in recent years.

Embedded in the pile of tree roots beneath the monster was a piece of jade, white as a full moon, with a six-eared rabbit carved on it, exactly the same as the relief Ning Che had seen in the ruins of the Moon Palace.

Ning Che's heart tightened suddenly.

Moon Rabbit!

Shi Xiujuan's ravings exploded in his mind: "The moon rabbit ran away, there's treasure hidden in the cave, the moon rabbit ran away..."

Just then, the monster braced itself on its forelegs, straightened up in a bizarre half-sitting, half-standing posture, and spoke in human language: "Emissary of the Demon Lord, why do you do this?"