Quinn Shepherd slept until afternoon at the inn in Tigerwell County, only to be startled awake by a commotion outside. He heard a shopkeeper shouting, "No idea where all these beetles came from—red ones, running wild everywhere! Can't kill them, can't chase them off! Here, officer, take a look—are these things dangerous...?"
Quinn's heart skipped a beat. He hurried up, woke Lina the Spirit Fox beside him, and packed their things. Downstairs, the innkeeper was explaining the beetle problem to a group of soldiers. The officer, just a martial artist, was clueless: "There are tons of these bugs in the city now. Wasn't like this before. Maybe it's because war's coming, so we're getting a pest outbreak. Just step on them if you see one."
"You can't crush them—they don't die. Fire won't work, and even dousing them with boiling water just makes them jump around. One even crawled into a guest's mouth earlier, and we couldn't dig it out..."
Quinn tossed a large Da Feng coin onto the table, threw open the window, and Lina summoned a gust of demon wind with her magic. Quinn leapt out, landing atop the roaring wind and shot away.
Right now, the sky over Tigerwell County was scattered with red corpse-biter beetles, flying every which way. Quinn flicked his fingers, each snap crackling with thunder; the nearby beetles dropped from the air before they even saw him.
"The Cult of the Corpse Immortal just won't quit. All because you killed their master's son, and now they chase us to the ends of the earth?" Lina huffed angrily.
Quinn landed and hurried along the road, grabbing a few baskets of steamed buns as he went—taking the whole basket and all. The shopkeeper was about to shout 'thief!' when a Da Feng coin landed on the stall, and his anger turned to delight.
Quinn stuffed buns into his mouth as he raced out of town. Lina leapt onto his shoulder, grabbed a steaming bun from the basket, yelped at the heat, tossed it from paw to paw, then braved a bite—only to stick out her tongue, panting from the burn.
The boy and the fox quickly finished the buns. Quinn glanced back—no sign of the red corpse-biter beetles following. He breathed a sigh of relief.
Lina burrowed into the pack and pulled out the Everpeace Empire's geography map. Quinn spread it open, studied it, then looked around to get his bearings. He picked up speed, heading straight for the capital.
Back in Tigerwell County, the red corpse-biter beetles couldn't find Quinn, so they swarmed out of the city. Outside, Uncle Joel Qiao stood on Mount Pingyang, recalling the beetles and frowning. Just then, a one-armed old man walked by, casually stepping on a beetle and crushing it.
Uncle Joel Qiao was about to curse, then caught himself: "My corpse-biter beetles are tough as iron—no way you can just crush one. This one-armed old man must be an expert. Better not mess with him."
After the old man left, Uncle Joel Qiao checked his bearings: "No sign of him nearby, and I've blocked the way behind. That kid can only go east, west, or north. My flying corpses are already at the east and west gates—no trace of him there. So he must've headed north."
He immediately set out, heading north.
He hadn't gone far when he ran into that same one-armed old man again, his empty sleeve swaying as he strolled north at an unhurried pace.
Uncle Joel Qiao ignored him. A swarm of corpse-biter beetles formed a crimson cloud, lifting him into the air, while the rest scattered through the forest, searching for any trace of Quinn.
Smack, smack.
The one-armed old man crushed two more corpse-biter beetles underfoot. Uncle Joel Qiao's brow twitched, but he held his temper. The beetle swarm drifted down, hovering two or three feet above the ground, stopping about twenty feet from the old man.
Uncle Joel Qiao bowed politely. "Elder, these corpse-biter beetles are mine. Stepping on one, fine—but why crush two?"
The one-armed old man stopped. "I thought they were wild bugs, flying around everywhere. So they're yours? My apologies, my apologies."