Stranger Danger

“Now’s the time!”

A dozen or so breaths later, the tremors affecting the black coffin began to subside as if the headless Sage had finally been suppressed. It came at a huge cost, however. Cui Qiuyuan’s face was as white as a sheet, and he was wobbling on his feet like he might fall over at any moment. Considering that he was a powerful Grandmaster, this was decidedly not normal.

It was at this moment Ye Qing dashed out of his hiding spot. The world turned foggy and illusory, and a giant finger abruptly descended from above to squash Cui Qiuyuan like a bug.

“Boundless Heart Demon Tribulation”

Strangely, Cui Qiuyuan wasn’t looking up or trying to defend himself. Instead, he shivered and stared down one corner of the fog with shock and disbelief on his face.

“Mother…”

In Cui Qiuyuan’s vision, a woman was slowly walking toward him with a smile on her face. She looked gentle, kind, and graceful. She was exactly the same as Cui Qiuyuan had remembered her… his mother.

However, the woman slowly underwent a transformation. Terrible cracks began spreading across her face and body, and between those cracks were poorly woven stitches. It wasn’t long before she looked like a rag doll that had been put together using haphazardly, terrifying and heartbreaking.

“No… no… don’t come closer. Don’t come closer! Ahhh!”

Cui Qiuyuan’s eyes widened with panic and terror as he staggered away from the woman he called mother. Right here and now, Cui Qiuyuan looked less like the terrible Mortician and more like a helpless child.

The scene he was seeing was his biggest secret. It was also his greatest fear and nightmare.

As a direct descendant of the Clear River Cui Clan, one would think that Cui Qiuyuan enjoyed all the power and privileges that was afforded to a noble. In reality, that wasn’t the case.

His father had eight wives and over a dozen children, and unfortunately for him, his mother was the least favored of them all.

A long time ago, his mother left to visit her family but was attacked by a Stranger along the way. The Stranger had killed her and ripped her body to pieces.

Feeling that the clan was disgraced, his father found a random mortician to put her body back together. Then, she was buried as quietly and hastily as possible.

By a stroke of misfortune, Cui Qiuyuan happened to witness his mother’s final moment. The mortician was terrible at his job and made her look like a broken doll that had been stitched together using rags. Unlike her normal self, she looked, ugly, savage, and terrifying.

He caught a terrible fever after that, and throughout the fever, he kept dreaming of his mother smiling or crying over his prone figure. His ugly, nightmare-inducing mother.

After he recovered, an unholy desire was born inside his heart, and he became obsessed with the idea of stitching together a flawless corpse. And so, Cui Qiuyuan the “Mortician” was born.

He never wanted to see a body as ugly as his mother’s again. He would stitch the most flawless corpse in the world.

To this end, he gave up fame and glory and resisted all opposition to become a mortician in the Morgue of the Bureau of Punishments. Over time, the memory of his mother’s ugliest moment slowly faded from his mind as well.

But now, that forgotten memory had been dredged back to the surface of his consciousness once more. He felt as if time had been reversed, and he was a child jolting awake from the nightmare that was his mother’s corpse and cowering at one corner of the bed because he was too afraid to fall asleep again. He felt lonely, helpless, and terrified.

“No… this is fake. It’s all fake!”

For a moment, it felt like the emotions would overwhelm him. However, Cui Qiuyuan was ultimately a powerful, strong-willed Grandmaster. He quickly realized that something was wrong and suppressed his Demon's Temptation. At the same time, he sensed the giant finger descending toward him.

A terrifying flood of spirit washed out of Cui Qiuyuan, and he made a tearing motion. There was a shredding noise as a giant scar appeared in front of him. As it grew wider and wider, the finger broke, and the strange, foggy world collapsed into nothing.

“Sky Tearing Hand”

With just one move, Cui Qiuyuan had destroyed the giant finger and even ripped the Paranirmita Vasavartin Heaven into shreds. The first thing he saw upon returning to the real world was a young man less than ten meters away from him.

The young man was Ye Qing, of course.

Ye Qing looked stunned as if he could not believe that Cui Qiuyuan had awakened so easily. Then, he turned around and tried to escape.

“You think you can run?!”

Cui Qiuyuan’s face contorted with fury and murder as the space around Ye Qing abruptly crumpled as if an invisible hand was gripping it. Ye Qing barely got out a scream before the Grandmaster ripped both the space and Ye Qing into pieces.

“A mere ant dares to taunt me?”

Cui Qiuyuan stared at the bloody remains of Ye Qing with dripping disdain. To think that an ant who wasn’t even a Grandmaster thought he could catch him off guard. The ambush had been as futile as an ant trying to tip over a tree.

Yes, he was seriously injured right now. Yes, he didn’t possess even ten percent of his full strength. Even so, he could never be defeated by an ant.

On top of that, the bastard had dared to dredge up his heart demon and nightmare. For this sin alone, he deserved a million deaths!

It was at this moment every hair on Cui Qiuyuan’s body suddenly stood on end. But before he could react, a massive hand abruptly appeared above his head and slammed him into the ground. Web-like cracks spanning over ten meters spread in every direction, and at the center was a dazed and confused Cui Qiuyuan. Right now, the man felt like his body was about to break into pieces.

The pain was just starting, however. While trapping his head in a vice grip, the massive hand lifted his head into the air and slammed it into the ground again, and again, and again. Cui Qiuyuan was powerless to stop it like a rag doll was powerless to stop an abusive owner from tearing it to pieces.

Cui Quiyuan’s tormenter was Ye Qing, of course. The young man had transformed into a vigorous, ten-meter tall demonic ape before beating the absolute shit out of the Grandmaster. His right hand was grabbing Cui Qiuyuan’s head and slamming it repeatedly into the ground, while his left hand was trapping his body in a death grip to prevent the Grandmaster from breaking free.

Everything he did earlier was for this moment. The “Boundless Heart Demon Tribulation” was a distraction, and the dead Ye Qing was a bait.

Cui Qiuyuan was a Grandmaster, one who managed to survive being hunted by the imperial court of Yan and countless other factions no less. Therefore, he had to be a careful and intelligent man.

Knowing that Cui Qiuyuan was the type who became increasingly dangerous the worse the situation he was in, Ye Qing did not dare to underestimate Cui Qiuyuan in the slightest. After all, the slightest mistake could end up with his death, and since his cheat wasn’t infinite rebirth, he didn’t dare to gamble with his life at all.

That was why he sought to create a moment where Cui Qiuyuan’s guard was completely lowered. Only then could he execute his ambush without risking nasty surprises.

First, he used the “Boundless Heart Demon Tribulation” to dredge out Cui Qiuyuan’s heart demon and destabilize him. While the Grandmaster was shaken, he created an illusion of himself using the “Dream Butterfly True Scripture” for the Grandmaster to kill.

Since Cui Qiuyuan was shaken by the “Boundless Heart Demon Tribulation”, and every second counted in a life-or-death battle, the Grandmaster failed to notice that the warrior in front of him was a fake. After he killed the fake Ye Qing, he thought that he had dealt with the little rat who tried to ambush him during his moment of weakness and dropped his guard.

That was when Ye Qing descended upon him like a hawk.

In the end, Ye Qing’s plan had worked perfectly. Although Cui Qiuyuan was a Grandmaster, he wasn’t a body-tempering warrior. His physical body was obviously stronger compared to a generic Spirit Master’s, but a body-tempering one? A body-tempering Half-Step Grandmaster? It wasn’t even close. This was before mentioning that Cui Qiuyuan had lost an arm and taken significant injuries from the headless Sage as well.

All things considered, he would be lucky to escape Ye Qing’s punishment with his life.

After kissing Cui Qiuyuan’s face against the ground a couple more times, Ye Qing let go and raised both fists into the air. Then, he began striking the Grandmaster’s body repeatedly like he was playing the drum.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom…