Flayers

While Sheng Zhen was making his way towards the Trial Grounds, the others were still trying to find the Tomb. But finding a single tomb in such a large trial space was not easy.

But first, they had to worry about hostile beasts and traps filling the entire trial space. And to make matters worse, Demonic Sects were hunting down the cultivators.

Wei Song looked down at her ice-blue jade broach held in her bloodstained hands. This was the jade broach that served as an identity token of the Gentle Snow sect as well as a means of emergency communication. And she was doing exactly that.

"Inner Disciple Wei Song, remain where you are, I will be coming at your location", as a static-filled voice came from the token and Wei Song sighed in relief.

"I will be waiting Senior Mu."

She activated the location transition formation on the broach and cut off the communication. She came along with Alchemist Hall but while entering along with Trial Space, she got separated from the main group.

Despite the trial space being huge, most of the participants did not land far from each other.

~Crash~

The tree Wei Song was hiding on was bisected in half. Wei Song jumped a moment before the sword energy could touch her.

Landing on the ground, she immediately pulled out her white shortsword.

In front of her stood a man covered in head to toe in black, and his red eyes glowed with an unholy glow. In his hand was a sword thinner than cicada's wing. Looking at him, Wei Song cursed,

"Damn, it is one of you zombie bastards."

She had already tussled with few demonic cultivators since her arrival, but she had no desire to mess with one of the Yin Sea Sect's Flayers. Merciless and cruel, Flayers were the assassins of the Yin Sea.

The flayer did reply and swung his near-invisible sword at her. Wei Song easily parried the strike easily and waved her free hand at the assassin. An ice sword grew out of her hand and within second extended dozens of meters, cutting off the assassin's left arms legs as well as a couple of trees in the back. Wei Song was in the fifth realm of the Golden core, way higher than the assassin's ninth realm of False Core.

The Flayer did not even flinch at the loss of his limbs and lunged at Wei Song with his sword. Wei Song, pushing her advantage, covered her sword in chilling frost and struck the Flayer's sword. Under the immense strength of a Golden Core cultivator, Flayer's sword buckled and Wei Song took the opening to strike at Flayer's Heart.

"Got You"

Seeing the sword coming to kill him, he flayer let go of his sword and bit his cheek.

~BOOOM~

He exploded in a shower of blood and gore. Wei Song immediately used her Frost Qi to shield her.

"That is why I hate bast...Aahhh"

She looked back and found another Flayer Sticking a dagger in her spine.

"Cough...you bastards used each other as bait", she held the arm of the Flayer and swing her sword at his neck. The head of the Flayer went flying.

"Agh," Wei Song groaned and used her Frost Qi to freeze the blood coming off the wound. For a mortal such wound would be fatal, but to a cultivator, no so much. But despite her vitality, the injury was debilitating, and it prevented her from fighting at full potential.

"Damn suicidal fiends, did not even blink an eye before killing themselves."

The constant attacks were wearing down on her, even if she was stronger, they fought like madmen.

Just then Wei Song sensed multiples needles lying towards her back and dodged. Turning, she saw six more Flayers standing on the trees.

Now they have finally revealed themselves, it means they are confident enough to take her down.

"Shit, you bastard, moronic zombies shitheads, me Wei Song, your ancestor is going to bury you here."

She took a combat stance but she was not feeling as confident as she was displaying. She could feel, every single one of the Flayers in front of him was a Golden Core.

Flayers did not say anything, opting instead to rush at her together...

And just then the entire section of the forest in front of Wei Song froze. The Flayers, the dirt, the leaves the trees, everything was frozen inside out. The light in Flayer's eyes died down and Wei Sng took a sigh of relief.

"Took you long enough"

A large luan with a long blue plum flew down and landed on the icy ground in front of Wei Song. On its back were eight ladies wearing blue robes similar to Wei Song. But Wei Song's gaze was fixed on a lady standing in middle, wearing deep blue robes different from others around her. An icy aura was lingering around her, remnants of frost attack a moment ago.

"Mu Liqin, why did you take so long? Did you wanted me to die?"

Mu Liqin's eyes twitched, and she just said, "Get on, we don't have much time."

"What? Did you find the tomb or something?"

"Yes", Mu Liqin replied.

__________________________________________________________________

Sheng Zhen made his way through the forest, rapidly advancing towards Tomb's location. Because the place where cultivators were dropped was not far from the tomb, it did not take him long.

But when he was just a few miles away from Tome, he sensed something.

~Slick~

Sheng Zhen did a sharp twist in the air, dodging a small but incredibly fast projectile. Changing his trajectory mid-air, he landed on a large branch. He looked down to see what was it that attacked him and found a small throwing knife embedded in the rock.

Because of the sudden ambush, he was pushed out of the state of invisibility.

He looked around to see the attacker but found none. Neither could he sense any human presence nearby.

"Who are you? Why did you attack me?"

Just then he somersaulted backward to dodge another knife, but this time he sensed the location of the attack.

'There', he jumped towards the place where the attack came from and punched. The attacker was taken by surprise and could not react.

Sheng Zhen held back on his strength but even that much was enough to send his attacker flying, along with an entire tree his attacker was standing on.

He landed beside where the attacker fell and swore, "What the..."

In front of him was a man, or at least what looked like a man, covered in head to toe with black garbs. It looked like a man but to Sheng Zhen's, that thing did not felt like a human.

The attacker had his arms broken at many parts and his legs did not look either. Sheng Zhen came forward to heel the injured man, "Um sorry but you attacked first. Let me heal..."

The man bit his cheek and...

~BOOOOM~

The man exploded in a shower of blood and gore. Sheng Zhen could not erect a Qi shield and was sent flying into the trees.

The force of the explosion was so strong that even his skin, which was strengthened ridiculously by Body Refining and absorbing Gold Bear's blood was reddened.

"Agh", Groaning, he got up and looked at the crater left by the explosion and was chilled to the bone. A name came to his mind, and it suddenly made sense why he could not the attacker.

They were not human, not any more so there was nothing human to sense. He focused on the cold and repulsive feeling he sensed from the attacker and gasped.

Behind him, in front of him, around him, he sensed hundreds of Flayers, and they had only one target, Sheng Zhen.