Chapter 191 - The Wrong Bloom
Su Bai opened his eyes.
The moment he did, everyone else quietly breathed a sigh of relief. Their fingers were no longer gripping their weapons hard enough to whiten their knuckles.
Zhuge Jing watched Su Bai through the edge of his fan.
Something had changed. He could feel it.
But feeling it and understanding it were two different matters. He felt that the fog around Su Bai had only become thicker.
That was very unreasonable.
Usually, when someone experienced an inner change, traces would leak out. Even if a person hid well, there would be a pattern to analyze.
With Su Bai, the pattern seemed to be that there was no pattern.
Zhuge Jing closed his fan halfway. That was also a kind of pattern, but it was a very annoying one.
Su Bai stood up.
He raised his hand and recalled the Petrified Calamity-Magnet back into his system inventory.
The twenty-foot clearing shrank at once.
Su Bai looked ahead.
"Let’s continue."
There was a faint trace of excitement in his voice.
Everyone heard it. Everyone also pretended they did not.
The group advanced again.
Su Bai led them along the broken road.
From the memories he had seen from the dead soldiers, the true battlefield of the Inner Area was divided into three layers.
The first layer was where they were now.
In the ancient battlefield, this place had been the reinforcement front. Rear soldiers, frontline support teams, supply carriers, formation repairers, and reserve cultivators had gathered here before being sent deeper.
The roads here had once carried troops, medicine, weapons, formation plates, and orders toward the battlefield ahead.
Back then, this layer had not yet been swallowed by Ashen-Blood Miasma.
The second layer was the active main battlefield and defensive line. That was where the reinforcements from the first layer had rushed toward. The largest formations, command platforms, and defensive chains had been placed there to stop the enemy from pushing farther outward.
The red mist had not fully swallowed that layer either at the time.
The third layer was different.
That was the red mist zone.
During the ancient battle, the Ashen-Blood Miasma had already existed there. It was where the harshest fighting happened, and also where soldiers who returned had to be evaluated before being allowed back into the defensive line.
At that time, returning from the red mist did not only mean surviving battle. It also meant proving that one was still oneself.
Su Bai looked ahead quietly.
The current Inner Area was no longer the same as the ancient battlefield in those memories.
If there had once been a proper safe zone inside the first layer, it had most likely shattered long ago.
But the old military paths still existed. And if the military paths existed, then the supply points might still exist too.
That was their first destination.
Layer One had not been the harshest battlefield, but it had carried the most practical things.
Most of it was probably destroyed. But in a ruin like this, "most" was not the same as "all."
...
They had not walked far before the Soul-Bloom Bud inside him pulsed.
Su Bai stopped.
The others stopped almost at the same time.
Zhuge Jing did not ask loudly. "What is it?"
Su Bai looked through the mist ahead.
Bai Zhi’s Glass-Lotus Clear Sight thinned the red haze just enough for vague shapes to appear in the distance. Several human figures were moving along a broken military path that slanted from deeper in the battlefield toward the outer direction.
At the center of that group, one figure carried something wrapped in layers of red-black miasma. Another flesh fragment.
The Soul-Bloom Bud inside him pulsed again.
This time, Su Bai felt it clearly.
Among those figures, only one carried an active bloom structure.
The carrier. The one holding the flesh fragment was a Soul-Bloom Returnee.
"Enemies ahead," Su Bai said.
Everyone raised their weapons. The response was immediate.
Su Bai was about to move when he suddenly paused.
A thought appeared in his mind.
The Soul-Bloom Bud could recognize active bloom structures. Soul-Bloom Returnees could recognize each other.
Recognition go both ways.
Su Bai slowly looked at the approaching human figures.
The corner of his mouth moved slightly.
Zhuge Jing felt his heart become cautious.
"Brother Su?"
"Don’t panic," Su Bai said. "Whatever I do next, don’t question it."
Everyone became even more tense.
In most situations, those words were not comforting.
Su Bai continued, "When I raise my hand, attack at once."
Tang Ziyan frowned. "What are you going to do?"
"Talk."
Chen Feng almost thought he had heard wrong.
"Talk?"
"Yes."
"With them?"
"Yes."
Chen Feng looked toward the human figures moving through the mist.
They were carrying a flesh fragment. They were walking from deeper in the Inner Area.
They were very clearly enemies.
Su Bai added, "Do not follow me. Act dazed. And remember my words from earlier."
That last sentence made Zhuge Jing’s eyes move.
He understood a little, but it’s enough to know that Su Bai was about to use whatever he had gained from the "candy."
Zhuge Jing’s fan shifted once.
"Do as he says."
Su Bai walked out of the group alone.
The human figures ahead finally noticed him.
They stopped.
Their faces were pale, their eyes were sharp, and their robes belonged to different eras.
The figure at the center held the flesh fragment.
Its eyes turned toward Su Bai.
The red-black flesh fragment pulsed once.
At the same time, the Soul-Bloom Bud inside Su Bai pulsed back.
The carrier froze.
Su Bai smiled behind the mask.
The Soul-Bloom Returnee had sensed the bloom structure inside him.
It recognized the closed bud as something similar to itself. Something that should have belonged to the same side.
The carrier stared at him. Its voice came out dry and layered.
"Returned?"
Su Bai lowered his eyes slightly.
"Not fully."
The carrier’s head tilted.
The other human figures did not attack.
Behind Su Bai, everyone watched in complete silence.
Liu Meng visibly tensed. Tang Ziyan’s hand had already entered her sleeve. Chen Feng’s sword was half-drawn, and Yan Lie looked like he wanted to burn the entire scene just to make it easier to understand.
But no one moved.
Su Bai pointed back at the group.
"Them," he said. "Not opened yet."
The carrier looked past him.
Through the red mist, it saw the others standing stiffly behind Su Bai. Because they had been warned, no one looked relaxed. No one tried to speak. Their tense stillness looked close enough to being dazed under corruption.
The carrier’s lips curved.
The flesh fragment in its hand pulsed.
A thin thread of Ashen-Blood Miasma escaped from the fragment and drifted toward Su Bai.
The group’s hearts tightened.
Su Bai did not move.
The miasma touched his body, passed through the inverted lotus barrier, and entered him.
His expression remained calm.
His breath did not change.
The red-black thread vanished into his Dantian like water falling into an endless well.
The carrier watched. The other human figures seemed to relax.
To them, the test had passed.
If Su Bai had been a normal cultivator, that thread of miasma should have made his aura recoil, his soul tremble, or his body reject the contamination.
The carrier nodded.
"Let’s bring them."
Su Bai nodded back.
The others almost could not believe what they were seeing.
Su Bai had walked up to the enemy. The enemy had not attacked him. The flesh fragment had tested him. He had passed.
And now he was bringing the enemies toward them.
Chen Feng’s expression became very still.
This was not because he was calm. It was because if he allowed his expression to move, he might curse.
Zhuge Jing’s fan covered half his face.
His eyes, however, were bright.
The enemy saw Su Bai as something related to them.
That was absurd. It was also useful.
Su Bai returned slowly.
The carrier walked beside him, still holding the flesh fragment. Behind them, the remaining human figures followed. Their formation had loosened. Their guard had dropped by a small but fatal amount.
They believed they were bringing half-corrupted prey deeper into their control.
They did not know they were walking into a group that had already been told the signal.
Su Bai arrived at the edge of the group.
He stood in front again.
The carrier stood beside him.
Behind them, the human figures continued forward.
Tang Ziyan’s eyes were lowered.
Qin Baoshan’s shield remained steady.
Ji Ruyue’s frost stayed quiet.
Bai Zhi’s lotus light hid beneath her sleeves.
Lin Weiyang’s mechanisms stopped clicking.
Everyone looked dazed enough.
At least, they looked dazed to enemies who already wanted to believe it.
Su Bai raised his right hand.
The attack happened at once.
Qin Baoshan’s shield slammed forward and sealed the path. Ji Ruyue’s frost burst outward in a thin line, locking the legs of two human figures. Tang Ziyan’s hidden weapons flashed silently through the red mist. Chen Feng’s sword finally left its sheath and cut toward the nearest false body. Yan Lie’s fire erupted low to the ground, blocking retreat.
Zhuge Jing’s fan snapped open.
"Break the rear first."
The group moved together.
The enemies had no time to react properly.
They had walked too close.
They had lowered their guard.
Most importantly, their carrier had trusted the wrong bloom.
The mist around them was still thick, but Bai Zhi’s Glass-Lotus Clear Sight and Lin Weiyang’s mechanisms had already marked enough positions for the group to strike without hesitation.
Su Bai moved at the same time.
The Starving Wraith’s Devouring Maw opened beside him.
The Maw struck the carrier’s chest and sank into the dense miasma supporting its hollow body. The carrier stiffened. Its hand twitched around the flesh fragment, but Su Bai’s Nether Threads had already wrapped around its wrist.
The flesh fragment was pulled free.
Su Bai dragged it away and sealed it in one smooth motion.
The carrier’s face twisted.
The bloom structure inside it surged.
It wanted to erupt.
In the past, Su Bai would have needed to suppress it with the Petrified Calamity-Magnet, or force Devouring Maw to swallow the bloom after it began spreading.
This time, the Soul-Bloom Bud reacted first.
Inside his Dantian, the black-red bud pulsed.
The carrier’s blooming force paused, just for an instant.
That instant was enough.
The bud pulled.
The bloom that should have opened outward was dragged toward Su Bai instead. The red-black force twisted, stretched, and thinned like a flower being forced to fold before its petals could unfold.
The carrier’s body shuddered violently.
Su Bai’s eyes brightened.
The carrier opened its mouth, but no cry came out.
Its bloom collapsed inward.
The Soul-Bloom Bud swallowed the first mouthful of bloom force.
The carrier died standing.
A breath later, its body fell apart.
Su Bai did not waste time. The flesh fragment struggled in his sealed grip, but without the carrier’s protection, its resistance weakened quickly.
Weeping Needles entered. Ashen-Frost Blight Flame followed.
The flesh fragment stiffened. Its pulsing slowed.
Su Bai sealed the stilled fragment into a jade box and stored it separately.
By the time he looked up, the rest of the fight had already tilted completely in their favor.
The enemies were not weak, but the ambush had ruined them.
They had expected dazed prey. Instead, they met prepared cultivators who had been waiting for Su Bai’s signal.
Zhuge Jing only needed a few short commands to keep everyone from overextending.
Without the Soul-Bloom Returnee carrier, without the flesh fragment, and without the first strike, the remaining human figures collapsed quickly.
Su Bai watched the final enemy fall.
Everything had gone too well.
That was usually suspicious. But this time, the logic was clear.
The Soul-Bloom Seed had given him recognition. The Soul-Bloom Bud had retained it. Because of that, Su Bai could identify the Returnee without guessing.
The Returnee could also sense him. That was the important part.
To the Returnee, Su Bai did not look like an ordinary living cultivator. He carried a bloom structure, and when the flesh fragment tested him with Ashen-Blood Miasma, his body accepted it without rejection.
In the enemy’s eyes, that meant he had already been touched by their side.
So Su Bai just need a few lies.
After all, if a flower recognized another flower, why would it suspect that the other flower had teeth?
Su Bai looked inward.
On the Crystalline Tree Spirit Root, the black-red bud pulsed faintly.
It had grown by a nearly invisible amount, but Su Bai noticed it.
The bloom force it had swallowed became nourishment.
Su Bai’s throat moved. He gulped.
The others finished clearing the remaining figures and gathered again. Their eyes moved between Su Bai, the place where the carrier had fallen, and the direction where the jade box had already disappeared into his storage.
For a while, no one spoke.
ABDHYR2R4Y6SH4TZA