Moments later, Xu Yunfan gazed at the corpses strewn across the ground and, with a flick of his wrist, shook the blood from his Thunderfire Qilin Hammer.

Hearing the tiger’s roar ringing in his ears, Xu Yunfan no longer hesitated. He picked up the bronze cage and rushed toward Celestial Craft City.

The gates of Celestial Craft City were guarded at all times by three hundred and sixty Blazing Arrow Crossbows, and a dozen or so new Mechanical Beasts from the Mechanical Hall were stationed on the walls. They should be able to hold the creature back for a while, long enough for the Sect Leader, Hong Baichuan, to intervene.

’This Tiger Demon might have been a formidable figure in the past,’ he thought, ’but in this era, even I can hold my own against it for a bit—to say nothing of a Bone Marrow Cleansing Grandmaster.’

Sprinting at full speed, Xu Yunfan stomped his foot. As dirt and stone flew, he shot forward like an arrow released from a Hundred-Stone Bow.

He tilted his head slightly, glancing behind him. The thirty-zhang-tall Demon Tiger was like a fierce beast descending a mountain, snapping all the trees in its path. Its earth-shaking momentum was a terrifying sight to behold.

The chase continued, one ahead of the other.

The thirty li of rugged mountain paths in the Shu Region were like flat ground beneath their feet, and in the blink of an eye, they had arrived outside Celestial Craft City.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Xu Yunfan yanked the Signal Arrow from his right hip and fired it into the sky.

WHOOSH!

The sharp, piercing sound of the Signal Arrow instantly spread throughout Celestial Craft City.

Qi Huan, who was on duty at the city wall today, heard the sound. He looked in the direction it came from, just in time to see Xu Yunfan sprinting toward them from a distance.

Qi Huan’s fingers gripped the crenellations of the wall. The morning dew collected in the cracks of the green bricks soaked his wrist guards, forming a thin layer of frost on them. If anyone had touched him then, they would have felt that his body was ice-cold.

His gaze shifted slightly, and a faint, distorted black line flickered deep within his eyes.

"Senior Brother Qi, look at that thing behind Senior Brother Xu!"

But Qi Huan acted as if he hadn’t heard, his eyes fixed on the familiar figure amidst the dust and smoke.

The bronze cage on Xu Yunfan’s back glinted with a strange green light under the morning sun. Each of his steps left an inch-deep crater in the rammed-earth road. But most of Qi Huan’s attention was focused on the contents of the cage, which were wrapped in Xu Yunfan’s clothes.

Whatever was inside made him unusually agitated. He almost failed to suppress the urge, and fine scales nearly manifested on his cheeks.

"Senior Brother Qi! Look behind Senior Brother Xu!"

Qi Huan’s gaze shifted. Thirty zhang behind Xu Yunfan, a distorted black shadow was hurtling forward, skimming the ground.

The creature’s limbs were bent backward at the joints like a spider’s. Rotting tiger skin was stretched over its disproportionate torso, and its exposed muscles had a deathly, cyanotic pallor!

When he saw its appearance clearly, his brow twitched involuntarily.

"A Demon Fiend..."

CRACK.

The crenellation in Qi Huan’s grip crumbled into pieces.

He could clearly see chunks of rotten flesh flying off the Corpse Tiger as it bounded forward. When the dark red pieces of meat hit the ground, they gave off wisps of black smoke, and the surrounding wild grass withered and curled at a visible rate.

Even more horrifying was the beast’s forehead. In the place where the "king" character markings should have been, a fist-sized tumor bulged, its surface covered with writhing, worm-like blue veins.

"It’s... it’s a Demon Fiend!" the junior brother beside him said, his voice trembling. "The day before yesterday, I heard a porter from the Cao Bang say that a large tomb in Shuzhou suddenly collapsed, and a Demon Fiend crawled out..."

"Crossbowmen, nock!"

The furious shout startled the crows roosting on the wall. The Profound Steel Wall of Celestial Craft City shuddered as panels popped open, revealing three hundred and sixty Blazing Fire Crossbows. The sound of their mechanisms turning in unison was like a swarm of locusts passing by. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝚠𝚎𝚋𝗻𝗼𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝚘𝐦

Qi Huan reached back and steadied his junior brother’s trembling shoulder, but his own palm was already slick with cold sweat.

This wasn’t fear. Rather, upon seeing the hideous and terrifying Demon Fiend, his mouth had begun to water without him realizing it.

’I want to... eat it.’

He shook his head, suppressing the unsettling feeling.

As the Chief True Disciple of Celestial Craft City’s Hidden Blade Pavilion, he had seen the Gu People from the poisonous mires of Dian Nan and the roving Wolf Thieves of the Western Regions, but he had never witnessed a monster that so defied the laws of nature.

The sound of the Corpse Tiger’s muscles tearing as it ran was clearly audible. It was obviously a corpse that should have long since decayed, yet now it was more ferocious than any living creature.

’The Primordial Spirits are reviving, and the Demon Fiends will rise...’

"Load Armor-Piercing Arrows!"

Qi Huan ripped the Copper Talisman from his waist and slammed it against the Command Pillar. The clang of metal on stone startled the dazed crossbowmen. "Ready the drawbridge winch!"

He forced himself to stare at the approaching Demon Fiend.

"Senior Brother Qi, Senior Brother Xu is almost at the moat!"

Xu Yunfan raced across the floating pillars of the moat. The medicinal fragrance seeping from the gaps in the bronze cage trailed behind him like an invisible, ethereal smoke, driving the Demon Tiger behind him into an even greater frenzy.

Celestial Craft City’s gate, cast from Profound Steel, was slowly lowering. From within the walls, three hundred and sixty seven-shot Blazing Fire Crossbows extended, their mechanisms clicking in unison. The Refined Steel arrow grooves reflected a cold, steely light.

This gate was on the other side of Celestial Craft City, facing the cliffs of the Ghostly Wail Abyss. On a normal day, no merchants came or went here—only disciples of the Celestial Craft Cave used it. Naturally, Xu Yunfan chose this entrance.

"Loose!"

At Qi Huan’s command, the sky filled with flaming arrows, weaving a golden-red net.

The arrowheads, coated in Black Oil refined by the Celestial Craft Department, ignited upon contact with the air, engulfing the Demon Tiger in a fireball dozens of feet wide.

The wretched beast’s rotting hide curled and peeled away in the flames. It finally burst out of the massive fireball, its fur completely gone, leaving only muscle fibers that constantly contracted and expanded with its every move.

Before the smoke had cleared, a piercing screech of metal on stone tore through the air.

The Demon Tiger’s sharp claws dug into the cracks between the wall’s bricks, gouging three-chi-long marks as it climbed the vertical surface.

Xu Yunfan ducked into a hidden door in the Profound Steel Wall that opened just in time. Now safe inside the ramparts, his pupils contracted. He had never imagined the Blazing Fire Crossbows would do nothing more than burn off its hide.

"Open the Earth Dragon Valve!"

Hong Baichuan’s roar came from within the city.

At that moment, Mo Shisan was dropped from high above by a disciple from the Giant Kite Team. When he glanced down and saw the Demon Tiger about to scale the battlements, he shuddered violently and scrambled to operate the console next to the crenellations.

In an instant, seven Mechanical Beasts, each over two zhang tall, burst from the ground. The gears in the chest of an Ink Jade Tiger Beast spun rapidly, and the "king" character marking on its forehead split open, shooting out thirty-six Black Gold Bone-Piercing Nails.

Leopard Beasts on either side swept their steel tails, and their bowl-thick, barbed chains cut off the Demon Tiger’s retreat.

As Xu Yunfan leaped onto the battlements, he saw the Demon Tiger’s jaw dislocate in an unnatural way.

The Demon Fiend bent its waist in a way no living creature could, its iron-hard claws gripping the Ink Jade Tiger Beast’s head. Its sharp talons stabbed precisely into the drive gears.

With a tooth-grinding screech of twisting metal, the thousand-jin Mechanical Beast crashed to its knees.

Xu Yunfan was a little surprised. "Senior Brother Mo, did you spend all this time just to modify this pile of scrap metal?"

Mo Shisan’s face flushed red. He stomped his foot and retorted, "These are old models! They haven’t been replaced yet! I haven’t even had a chance to bring out the Human-shaped Mechanism Armor I’ve been modifying! Who the hell knew you’d lure a Demon Fiend in here! You..."

"Now, now, Senior Brother Mo, don’t call me a jinx. I could have handled this Demon Tiger on my own."

"If you could handle it, why did you lead it here?!"

"I was afraid of getting hurt. Besides, Celestial Craft City has countless mechanisms, and I know just as much about them as you do! I knew this would save me a lot of effort. Afterward, we can just let those civil engineering guys from the Celestial Craft Department rebuild everything."

(There should be another Chapter later... I think.)