Home, Sweet Home (1)

After some days of heading westwards, Hei Su had finally managed to cross the desolate mountain range and entered the deep Great Changbai Forest. The change from the green grass plains where the flying city roams, to the lifeless, desolate mountains, to the lush green trees and thickets, was rather huge.

Right now, Hei Su had already crossed a great distance of several hundred li* but there was no hint of exhaustion on his face at all. He was merely strolling through the trees with their dark green-colored leaves, at a leisure pace. His surroundings seemingly peaceful with the occasional low growls of spiritual beasts.

The Great Changbai Forest occupied a gigantic piece of land and stretched all the way from the Southern Desert to the snowy mountains of the Northern Beast Mountain Range, dividing the continent into two. The neutral plateau was lined by high and vicious mountains that were completely barren of any water or food. Only in the north would the mountaintops reveal a slight opening and the plateau could easily be accessed . So whoever wanted to travel from the east to west, had to cross this crooked, dark line.

Unfortunately, the Great Changbai Forest was known for its deadliness. Besides steep cliffs and deep lakes; it also had swamps with poisonous gas, sudden extreme weather changes, quicksand, sinkholes and not to forget, an abundance of deadly ferocious beasts and spiritual beasts. In the depth of this forest existed even carnivorous walking trees; a favorite of Hei Su's nightmares.

While it was practically impossible for normal humans, it was way easier for cultivators to cross the forest. As long as they wouldn't wander off the trade route or let their guard down, even cultivators of the Forth Stage could travel safely.

Of course, some of the most dangerous parts would spell death even for a Ninth Stage cultivator. Even Hei Su wasn't daring enough to explore them all in the past.

This environment not only gave birth to many secrets and treasures, it also gave the best living conditions for everyone's favorite kind of people- the hermits.

At the very forefront being Tamers, Botanists as well as Alchemists, set up their homes in the deepest, darkest parts in hope to never encounter their own species ever again.

As a wandering Alchemist, it was of course a must to have a small hideout in here as well! And that was exactly where Hei Su was heading for.

Some-when 200+ years back he also build himself such a thing. He just wasn't sure at what stage he was back then but whatever it was, the him right now possessed basically nothing so it couldn't hurt to visit and see.

When he departed from home, Hei Su had refused to cheat himself by taking anything more than necessary. Like this he could make sure that everything he had would be of the mortal realms standards. And thanks to the last little incident, he had already secured a money source as well as a fine horse so now it was time to stock up on ingredients and equipment.

When he thought about that, Hei Su looked up at the sun. It was late noon already. He estimated that he would still need some days before reaching his old hideout. If everything went smooth, he would get there at night of the third day.

The summer heat was still trapped under the roof-like canopy. The dense foliage blocked out most of the sunlight and a pungent smell of decay permeated the dark scrub.

The deeper Hei Su ventured into the forest, the darker his surroundings became.

Hei Su led his horse by the reins as it got increasingly difficult to advance. Not only did the scrubs and thorns grew increasingly vicious, his horse also seemed to sense the omnipresent danger around it. The lurking eyes of dozens of beasts crept around them with a hungry stare.

The animal came to an abrupt halt just in front of a small clearance.

As he took a closer look at his surroundings Hei Su found obvious traces of a battle that had occurred not too long ago. Sharp weapons had left deep marks in the tree trunks and hasty feet had stirred up the dry leaves on the ground. There were traces of a campfire as well so it wasn't hard to figure out that someone was attacked while taking a rest.

Hei Su followed the traces with his eyes and noticed that they were following the exact same path, he was about to take.

This discovery made him frown in discontent. He hadn't thought that he would come across others, so far away from the trade route. How unlucky.

Nevertheless, he had to reach his destination as soon as possible because every additional day under the open sky was another day asking to become beast food; so there was no time for detours.

The dark trees towered up above and the sparse light-rays slowly turned golden as Hei Su continued to walk for several li. The battle traces grew more obvious as the fighting parties seemed to get more desperate.

After a while, pierced on a broken tree branch, Hei Su found the first corpse.

"Finally! A corpse!" After all this time Hei Su had grown curious as to what exactly had happened and this could finally bring some new information.

The man was of average height, and had a slender built. Where his eyes once sat, only two dark holes remained. His corpse missed a leg as well and his torso was torn open by some long and sharp beast claws. This gory scene was nothing for delicate minds.

Blood and dirt covered the entire remainder of beast food to a degree that Hei Su almost overlooked the mans clothes.

They were of good quality and workmanship and deep black in color; simple but not common and a silver colored hibiscus was embroidered on the right sleeve. It was obviously a sects core disciples uniform.

Which sect would have the guts to send their people so far into the Great Changbai Forest and nowhere near the 'safe' routes at that? Even more important, why?

A witty glimmer flitted through his eyes. 'Could it be....?'

Be it the wounds on the corpse or the battle traces around, non of them were old. It was highly possible that whoever fought here was still somewhere near.

With that in mind, Hei Su let his eyes wander between the trees before he dragged his horse forward.

Not far from him, in-between the thickets, a pair of gleaming brown eyes followed his every move. They rushed out only after Hei Su disappeared from their view. A shadow with brown eyes moved a few steps closer to the corpse, stopped and hesitated slightly before it changed directions to follow the fresh foot prints.

Some time later, Hei Su encountered a small stream. His horse bowed it's head and drank eagerly. He himself put his hands in the cool water as well. The mood inside the forest was always quite heavy and the intense summer-heat that was trapped under the trees, turned it into some weird kind of gloomy oven. It was hard to even breath properly.

The number of insects had increased a lot, be it for the late time of day or the fact that they were slowly getting closer to his destination. The steady buzzing was so loud that it almost covered the gentle bubble sounds of the stream.

Hei Su heaved a sigh. He was getting nearer; that would be the first time in 200 years that he made contact with something from his mortal life. It was a strange feeling, indeed.

He looked into the shallow stream and smiled back at the white grin that was beaming at him. That would be number two. This time only the head remained, with barely any skin left, the white skull with the long black hair looked strangely mischievous.

After his horse gave it's best to drain the water and his new little stalker decided to stay idle, Hei Su had made up his mind and lead the two of them down the stream.

The forest floor was sloping steadily, the trees got fewer and fewer until they opened up completely

and revealed a steep cliff that hung high above a vast swamp. This point was high enough to see over several hundred Li but all one could see was green water between green grass with the occasional deformed tree. Hei Su took his time to take in that nostalgic view.

The sun was only two fingers above the horizon. This was one of the more dangerous areas of the Great Changbai Forest as well as were his hideout was hidden.

Not willing to lift his eyes away; with an unhurried step to the side followed by a few steps back, Hei Su dodged the attack aimed at his neck. At the same place he just stood was now the back of a dark shadow facing him.

Hei Su stood behind the black clothed man with the brown eyes; his arms folded in front of his chest. The black clothed man whirled around and stared at him with a vicious glare.

Hei Su smirked at the aggressive stance of the man. The man on the other hand got increasingly more nervous. Seeing how the youth in front of him behaved, he either held great strength that far surpassed his own or he was acting overly confident. Confidence couldn't keep you alive in this forest.

Higher-stage spiritual beast were intelligent and in contrast to humans they could sense ones strength, so they would mostly attack those that are weaker than themselves. The weaker one was, the more one had to fight. In the same sense, the stronger one was, the fewer would dare to challenge.

In all this time the man had followed Hei Su, Hei Su hadn't been attacked once.

Hei Su lifted one of his eyebrows and the man in black broke out in a cold sweat.

After a moment of hesitation the man suddenly flung himself froward. He drew a long black-painted sword out of the sleeve with the silver hibiscus and pierced it towards Hei Su's chest. The action was extremely quick.

Hei Su jumped a few steps back and easily avoided the attack. Seeing that his attack didn't connect again, the man in black hurriedly changed strategy. He moved a few steps back and held his sword in front of him. The color of his eyes shifted to a brown-red.

A warm glow enveloped the black blade as suddenly a bright flame erupted. The man in black lifted his sword and drew a circle around himself, with the flames leaving a burning trail in the air. Like fairies joining his sword dance, little flames gathered around him.

A fiery inferno erupted with a loud roar and a giant serpent made of fire coiled it's way into the air. The huge red head tilted and rushed towards Hei Su with it's bloody mouth wide open. It could swallow half a man with one bite.