Chapter 6: Tomb Guardians

The wraith guard swung its scythes at me, one at my head and the other at my abdomen. I was forced to jump back, because simply ducking would still cause me to lose my head considering the bottom scythe. Gritting my teeth, I jumped up and landed on top of one of the scythes that it was slashing at me.

With a single motion, I kicked its head. The wraith guard staggered back, but I didn't give it a chance to recover. Twisting around, I kicked its chest and sent it sprawling onto its back.

However, I wasn't taking its stationary figure for granted. Aware of its incredible regenerative abilities and near immortality, I stomped on its chest, causing cracks to expand all over its body in that single vicious strike. The pair of scythes went wide, the impact jarring its arms and causing to fall short of their target.

The wraith guard was really almost a non-living thing. One would expect a spirit beast to go into spasms, its limbs twitching uncontrollably. But the unnatural stillness of the wraith guard made it seem like I didn't fight a living being at all.

Keeping my eyes on the unmoving wraith guard, not at all surprised when the crystalline material that composed its body melted and flowed about to repair the cracks, I then jumped a few meters back before it could cut my legs out from under me. Skidding a few meters back, I risked a glance behind to check on my war spirit.

He was trading blows with the second wraith guard, spear meeting halberd in fierce clashes of sparks and vibrating metal. Qi swirled around them in violent tempests, colliding against each other like rival hurricanes and blowing stone and rubble off the ground. They were fighting evenly, though the wraith guard was having a very slight advantage and was driving my war spirit back.

I prayed that my war spirit could hold on for a bit longer. Once I was done with my opponent, I would help him eliminate his enemy. That said, I could use some help myself.

The wraith guard slashed at me, its dual scythes blinding flashes of light almost too fast for the human eye to follow. I was dodging on instinct rather than relying on my sight now, immediately sliding back a step or two the moment I saw the tiniest of motions from its limbs.

Gleaming arcs and crescent-shaped flashes filled the air, the wraith guard pressing on. Without a weapon, I couldn't exactly face it head-on or I would be cut into ribbons. I was made of flesh and blood. My physical body was not designed to endure the keen edges and killing power of metallic blades.

Perhaps body tempering cultivators might be able to withstand the strikes from the wraith guards, their skin as tough as steel and their bones seemingly adamantine. But I wasn't a body tempering cultivator. I had practiced summoning cultivation techniques, which required different specializations and training methods. It wasn't as if I was some overpowered Mary Sue protagonist who could master every technique in the world (otherwise everyone would become summoners instead of just learning a single cultivation technique).

On the other hand, summoning techniques brought me advantages that body tempering techniques otherwise wouldn't have. Perhaps I could be more flexible…

While ducking under another scythe and spinning away from the follow-up strike, I risked a glance at my war spirit and the second wraith guard. I estimated that they were about fifty meters away, enough of a distance that the wraith guard wouldn't be able to cross the wide space between us in a single bound.

Whereas I had some other trick up my sleeve that made the distance seem like a joke.

The wraith guard with the scythes pressed on with its attacks, thinking that I was vulnerable and seeking to capitalize on what it thought was a lapse on my part. Both of its scythes slashed toward me, twin crescents of death, but I danced away. At that moment, after it completed its huge attack, I saw an opening.

Raising my hands, I dismissed my war spirit. A good distance away, the wraith guard stopped momentarily when its opponent vanished before its non-existent eyes. If it was living and could express emotions, I had no doubt it would have displayed astonishment. However, its smooth, featureless face gave away nothing. It probably didn't feel anything at all, an automaton devoid of feeling and thoughts.

Wraiths, no matter their strength, had lost their sentience, enslaved by a curse to haunt the tombs forever as mindless killing machines.

A nanosecond after my war spirit disappeared from reality, he reappeared right in my hands – not in the usual half-ghost form that he usually assumed, but as an actual spear. Feeling the significant weight in my hands, I hefted up the spear and rammed it into the chest of the wraith guard while its guard was still down. Raging qi swirled tempestuously around my spirit weapon, detonating upon the point of impact and obliterating the wraith guard's body.

This time, even its incredible regenerative abilities couldn't save it from death. The wraith guard shattered, the crystalline material that composed its body falling apart and evaporating into nothingness. Wisps of shadows were all that remained of the crumbling wraith guard before it vanished completely from reality.

I didn't have time to examine its death process because the second wraith guard was already charging at me. It crossed the fifty or so meters in a couple of strides, swinging its halberd to cleave me in half. I wouldn't be able to turn around and parry its deadly weapon in time.

I didn't need to.

The spear vanished from my hands and my war spirit materialized once more, his spear parrying the wraith guard's halberd with a deafening clang. While he saved me from being cut apart, I spun around and struck the wraith guard in the chest with both my hands. Explosive qi blasted from my palms and cracked the wraith guard's torso, sending it stumbling back.

While it staggered, my war spirit spun his spear about and sliced the wraith guard into two before it could block his attack. A second passed before the upper half of its body slid off at an angle. There was no blood, no scream of pain. The wraith guard simply fell into two.

Even that wasn't enough to kill it, unlike the first wraith guard. The top half continued to writhe about, swinging its halberd in one last-ditch effort to hack my legs off. I jumped above the long, sweeping weapon and then landed on its head, crushing it onto the ground with my foot. The crystalline substance burst into powder, but I took no chances and continued to trample its back to make sure it stayed dead.

The bottom half of the wraith guard kicked at me, only for my war spirit to dive down and plunge his spear into its hips. There was a shudder before the remnants of the wraith guard crumbled into flakes.

Heaving, I stumbled back, only to notice something.

The halberd of the second wraith guard had remained, gleaming. It continued to emanate some sort of power, a familiar trace of qi that I immediately recognized.

"A relic," I murmured and reached out to touch it. My war spirit hovered at my shoulder, seeming to eye it – I couldn't tell because he didn't have a head. But I sensed that he recognized a kinship with the weapon. I smiled and offered it to him. "You want it?"

My war spirit accepted it without any hesitation. To my amazement, the halberd disappeared, turning into golden qi that then flowed into my war spirit. I realized that he was absorbing the halberd and merging with the arcane energies contained within the relic.

He grew, the armor on his left arm finally becoming complete. His torso expanded, with armored hips swelling out from a lengthening waist. The legs weren't there just yet, but I could almost see the beginnings of his thighs.

There was still no head, though. That was a little sad. I would like to see his face one day, but I guess I should be contented with speeding up his construction significantly. About 50% of him was now complete and I sensed that he would be more powerful than before. Not yet, though. As I mentioned before, it wasn't as if he suddenly gained a power-up. I needed to cultivate him thoroughly when I returned home, allow him to assimilate all these energies that he had absorbed.

My war spirit had yet to fully integrate the halberd with himself. That would be a difficult task, but one I would set aside for now. I had more important matters to focus on right now.

At least this trip wasn't a waste. I had recovered the relic that Mu Rong Lao had told me about – the one that would increase the strength of my summoned spirit. Just this alone made the entire risky exploration worth it.

"Wife, are you done?" I called out to Mu Rong Shu. She was busily dismantling the last of the killing arrays when my war spirit and I were done with our task. She scratched out the last of the runes that powered the array and glanced up with a smile.

"Almost. There's just one last defensive spirit array to crack open. I must say, I'm impressed. I always knew how capable you are, but to think you would defeat the wraith guards before I'm done. I was thinking of helping you once I'm finished with the spirit formations."

"Ha ha, well…I was just lucky." I laughed awkwardly, scratching my head. It was true. The wraith guards were difficult to deal with. If I hadn't gotten the sudden inspiration and found myself so far away from the other one, I probably wouldn't have been able to destroy them so soon.

"You give yourself too little credit. Wait…let me get rid of this…whoa!"

Mu Rong Shu suddenly jumped back when the circle flared up in front of her. Apparently she had accidentally activated a trap or something while dismantling the formation.

No, it wasn't a trap. The spirit formation wasn't a defensive type at all but a summoning type.

"Sorry, I got careless," Mu Rong Shu said, frustrated. "This spirit formation was designed to activate when all the other arrays are gone. I should have known the owner of this tomb would have another trick up his sleeve!"

"What formation is that?" I asked, watching the glowing circle of blue light and floating arcane sigils warily. I could see a massive shape materialize in front of us, solidifying. Then the formation disappeared, replaced by a gigantic black dog with three heads. Pushing my glasses up, I narrowed my eyes when I recognized the beast. "Cerberus."

Known as the guardian and watchdog of the underworld, the three-headed hound howled and pounced on us.

Before I could shout a command, my war spirit was already charging forward, meeting the Cerberus in the middle of the chamber. His spear rammed through the central head, turning it into blood, gristle and meat immediately.

The other two heads twisted around to bite him, but Mu Rong Shu and I struck from the flanks, each of us dealing with one head. Fiery qi glowed around Mu Rong Shu when she executed the Li stroke of her Eight Trigrams fist and obliterated the left head. As for me, I used Tai qi palm to strike the right head, the yin-yang symbol flaring brightly behind me. With a sharp crack, the neck of the Cerberus snapped and it slumped down.

My war spirit wasn't taking anything for granted. Hurtling over the three ruined heads, he drove his spear through the back of the massive beast, lancing through its heart and rupturing the organ. The Cerberus shuddered while Mu Rong Shu and I retreated, but didn't get up again.

"That was…weaker than I expected." I frowned. "A Cerberus shouldn't have been slain by us so easily."

"Oh…that's mostly because I tampered with the formation, so the Cerberus was unable to make use of even ten percent of its strength." Mu Rong Shu looked sheepish. She glanced at the formation. "I thought I would be able to completely dismantle the formation, but I didn't make it in time. So the summoned guardian wasn't as strong as it would otherwise have been."

"At least you've taken care of all the arrays." I sighed in relief and then approached the chamber. Before I could reach it, though, I noticed something and immediately tensed.

A small, dark shape was curled up at the corner of the chamber, not far from the door. Raising its head, the black-furred puppy whined pitifully as it stared at us with glistening eyes.