Mo Fan's steps froze.
He pressed himself into the shadow of a massive stalactite formation, using the terrain to swallow his silhouette completely.
Two human cultivators. In an abandoned mine shaft. In the dead of night.
What the hell were they doing here?
He was at his lowest point right now. If he ran into Xiao Hai—of all people—in this state, the outcome wouldn't be pretty.
What made it worse was the positioning.
In [Death Vision], the two red dots were sitting directly on top of the only passage back to his quarters.
Of course they are.
Mo Fan bit down on his frustration beneath his hood.
He was caught between advancing and retreating, with no clean option in either direction.
I need to know what they're after before I do anything.
A cold clarity settled behind his eyes.
[Death Vision] had excellent range for detecting life signatures, but its limitations were obvious—no visual feed, no audio. It told him where people were, not what they were doing.
Mo Fan's gaze dropped to the corpse of a mutant rat he'd killed earlier. He pressed two fingers lightly against it.
A thread of death-qi—barely a whisper—seeped in.
With a quiet click, a palm-sized low-tier skeleton rat pulled itself free from the remains.
After the life-or-death fighting in Linshui Village, Mo Fan's mental precision had been honed considerably. Maintaining control over a single low-tier skeleton was effortless now—the kind of thing he could do half-asleep.
"Go."
He closed his eyes and shifted his vision into the skeleton rat.
Under Mo Fan's careful direction, the tiny creature used its bone claws to nimbly scale the cave ceiling, tucking itself into the darkest crevices of the rock overhead, and crept in absolute silence toward the two figures at the passage entrance.
Through the skeleton rat's low but well-concealed vantage point, Mo Fan finally got a clear look at both men.
One was Xiao Hai, as expected.
The other he didn't recognize.
A middle-aged cultivator in expensive dark brocade robes—the kind of man who carried an air of entitlement even in a dust-choked abandoned mine. He was currently patting the grime off his sleeves with a silk handkerchief, his brow knotted in open disgust.
"Xiao Hai." The man's voice was flat with contempt. "Your Hundred Forging Peak—can it actually deliver? This godforsaken hole in the ground is supposed to produce some rare yin-attribute treasure?"
He pinched his nose and looked around with undisguised revulsion.
"This place is an absolute dump. If you hadn't sworn up and down on it, I wouldn't have set half a foot into this garbage heap for the rest of my life."
The Xiao Hai who had once swaggered around Mo Fan like he owned the mountain was now something else entirely—a fawning, cringing lackey. He pressed forward with a face full of eager smiles, practically tripping over himself.
"Lord Li, it's absolutely real! I swear it on my life!"
"Ever since I was demoted to Hundred Forging Peak, I've thought of nothing but how to redeem myself—how to earn the chance to return to the Main Peak and serve you again, my Lord!"
His voice carried the desperate pitch of a man with everything riding on this conversation.
"A few days ago, I happened to hear that Elder Sun has been urgently seeking a supply of exceptional yin-attribute heavenly materials—"
"Shut your mouth."
The man in brocade—Lord Li—went rigid.
He spun on Xiao Hai like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, his voice dropping to a vicious hiss as he cut him off.
"What Elder Sun?! There is no Elder Sun! We need it—us—do you understand?!"
Lord Li's chest heaved. His eyes locked onto Xiao Hai with the weight of a genuine threat.
"This matter is of the utmost sensitivity. Not a single word leaks out. If anyone outside finds out—we both die. Are you capable of grasping that?!"
Xiao Hai flinched like he'd been struck. Cold sweat broke across his forehead in an instant.
"Yes! Yes, of course! I understand completely!"
He nodded rapidly like a pounding garlic pestle and pivoted without missing a beat.
"My Lord, please hear me out! I personally risked my life to explore the edges of the mid-level mine. My cultivation is too shallow to go deeper—the toxic miasma and the pressure from the high-tier beasts down there were more than I could handle."
"But based on what I was able to detect—in the mid-to-lower levels of this mine pit, there is almost certainly a specimen of the legendary—"
He paused for effect.
"[Nether River Bone Lotus]."
"Nether River Bone Lotus?!"
The boredom on Lord Li's face evaporated.
His body went rigid. Something ignited behind his eyes—raw, hungry greed.
"You're certain?!" His breathing had gone slightly uneven.
"Absolutely certain!"
Xiao Hai's expression lit up. He pressed his advantage immediately.
"My Lord, my cultivation is simply too limited—the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. But with your cultivation at early Golden Core—if you would condescend to accompany me into the mid-level mine—"
"Obtaining that Nether River Bone Lotus would be as easy as taking something out of your own pocket! And then—"
Xiao Hai hadn't finished the sentence.
Dozens of meters away in the dark, Mo Fan felt the blood drain from his face the moment he heard early Golden Core.
Golden Core?!
If this old bastard actually lets Xiao Hai talk him into going down there, I'm dead. Completely, absolutely dead.
But then—
Lord Li let out a cold snort.
"Xiao Hai. Are you using a pig's brain?"
"Don't forget—this mine nominally falls under that madman Lin Dong's jurisdiction."
"If I go charging into the deep mine shafts and start fighting high-tier beasts, the spiritual energy fluctuations will reach his detection immediately."
"And then if the Sect Master gets involved..." His voice went flat and dangerous. "...Can you answer for that?"
Lord Li flicked his sleeve with sharp finality. He clearly had no interest in creating that kind of trouble here.
He cast one last look of distaste toward the dark depths of the mine, then delivered his ultimatum.
"I don't care how you manage it."
"Bring me that [Nether River Bone Lotus]—intact—within six months, and there may still be some hope for your return to the Main Peak."
"If you can't—"
He left the rest unsaid.
One cold snort. One sharp turn. Lord Li walked away without looking back, his robes sweeping behind him.
"My Lord! Lord Li!"
Xiao Hai panicked. He shot one last desperate look toward the mine's depths, stamped his foot viciously in frustration, and hurried after Lord Li—still trying to salvage the situation.
In the rock crevice far behind them.
The tiny skeleton rat watched the two figures shrink and disappear into the tunnel.
Its mission complete, the ice-blue flames in its eye sockets dimmed and went out. Its small frame quietly crumbled into bone dust that scattered on the underground air.
But Mo Fan didn't move.
He stayed pressed against the cold rock wall, his brow furrowed, turning every word he'd just heard over and over in his mind.
Elder Sun. Lord Li. Yin-attribute heavenly materials. Nether River Bone Lotus...
His eyes narrowed slowly. Something dangerous flickered in his pupils.
He thought back to the two inner disciples he'd overheard at the logging site days ago—the ones complaining about searching for [Stygian Mystic Grass]. The ones who'd been so careful not to say too much.
There was a connection here. There had to be.
And that story about refining Soul-Nourishing Pills from spirit herbs—that was probably just a front.
Mo Fan had the quiet, unsettling feeling that he had stepped into the edge of a very massive conspiracy.
Something that could get people killed.