Harem Link Cultivation System-Chapter 69: The First Betrayal

The scuffling from the tunnel behind him became the thud of boots, the harsh pant of breath. Shadows resolved into figures, five, then ten, spilling into the cavern around the base of the chimney. They couldn’t see Feng Jian in the dark, but they could feel the Frost Core in Lin Tian’s pocket.

Feng Jian didn’t turn toward the mob. His sword remained pointed at Lin Tian’s chest. "Give me the core," he said, his voice flat and dead, "and your death will be quick."

Lin Tian’s map was a chaos of overlapping green dots. He was the center. The mob hesitated, sensing the other powerful presence.

They’re afraid of him. Good.

He didn’t answer Feng Jian. Instead, he took a single step backward, toward the encroaching disciples. "He’s got it!" Lin Tian shouted, his voice ringing off the stone. "The core! He’s trying to block the exit!"

It was a stupid. But in the dark, fueled by greed and panic, it was enough. A disciple near the front, a hulking figure Lin Tian didn’t recognize, roared and charged Feng Jian’s silhouette.

Feng Jian’s blade moved. There was a sound of a gasp, and the disciple fell. But the dam was broken. The mob, now more afraid of being trapped than of the swordsman, surged forward.

Chaos erupted. Swords clashed. Curses filled the air. Feng Jian became a whirlwind, cutting down two more disciples who got too close. But he was one man against a tide of desperate horde.

Lin Tian didn’t wait. As Feng Jian was engaged, he turned and ran not up the chimney, but into a narrow fissure in the wall his map had highlighted a second ago, a secondary path that coiled away from the main tunnel. He squeezed through just as a stray blast of qi meant for Feng Jian shattered the rock where he’d been standing.

He ran until the sounds of fighting faded. He slumped against a wall, his chest heaving. The black veins on his right arm reacting with the cold that made his teeth want to chatter. He pulled the Core from his pocket. It glowed with a blue-white light, illuminating the tight passage.

Can’t keep it on me.

He thought about ditching it, but the trial required a core to pass. He needed it, but he needed to hide it somehow. Then he thought a method.

Lin Tian focused, pushing his awareness. He wrapped his qi around the core, to cover it, layer after layer. The core’s glow dimmed. On his mental map, the golden guide line winked out. The other green dots lessened, though he knew they’d still be searching.

He allowed himself five minutes to steady his breathing and check the map. He was deep in a labyrinth of unused tunnels. The exit was still marked, but the direct path was now swarming with disciples and a very angry Feng Jian. He needed another way.

A single green dot appeared on the edge of his map, moving cautiously down a connecting tunnel toward his position. The label read: He Lian.

Lin Tian’s mouth went dry. He Lian. From his hunt team. The quiet one, always watching, always calculating. He hadn’t been in the mob at the chimney.

Is he lost? Or hunting?

Lin Tian extinguished the core’s light completely, plunging himself into the darkness. He pressed himself into a crevice and waited.

The footsteps were careful. A faint luminescence from a spirit stone appeared, revealing He Lian’s anxious face. He was alone.

"Lin Tian?" He Lian’s whisper was barely audible. "Are you here? I saw you."

Lin Tian remained silent. He watched He Lian’s eyes scan the darkness, not with the frantic greed of the others, but with a nervous, searching intensity.

"I’m not with them," He Lian continued, his voice a little stronger. "That was a massacre back there. Feng Jian... he’s a monster. We need to get out of here." He took a step closer. "I think I found something. A route the others haven’t found. It’s tight, but it bypasses the main cavern. We could get to the surface without running into anyone."

It was a perfect offer. Exactly what Lin Tian needed. But that was what made it so suspicious.

Why seek me out? Why take the risk? He’s rank what, thirty-something? He’s an opportunist. Zhao Yuming warned me about factions, but not about him.

Lin Tian let the silence stretch. He Lian began to look genuinely worried, his eyes wide in the ghostly light.

"Please," He Lian said, a tremor in his voice. "I don’t want to die down here. But alone... I don’t like my chances. You made it to the top twenty. You have better instincts than I do. A partnership. Just until we’re out."

The fear sounded real. The logic was sound. But Lin Tian remembered He Lian’s eyes during the hunt, always watching him. He remembered the distance he’d kept.

This was a trap. His feeling tell him that. The question wasn’t if, but how.

Lin Tian took a quiet breath. Then he shifted, letting a boot scrape lightly against stone.

He Lian jumped, his light swinging toward the sound. "You’re there! Thank the heavens. Are you hurt?"

Lin Tian stepped out of the crevice, keeping his cursed arm behind his back. "A little banged up," he said, his voice low. "Feng Jian is preoccupied. Your route. How did you find it?"

He Lian’s face relaxed into a mask of relief. "Pure luck. I got separated early, fell down a sinkhole. Ended up in these lower tunnels. I’ve been mapping them in my head. There’s an old air shaft, probably from when the sect first surveyed these caves. It leads almost straight up." He gestured with his light.

"It’s this way. But... there’s a section. It’s inhabited by something big. I heard it breathing. I didn’t dare go past alone."

There it is. The monster. He doesn’t want to fight it himself. He wants to lead me to it.

"What kind of something?" Lin Tian asked, feigning concern.

"I don’t know. Not a ghoul. Something... deeper. Its qi felt old, and thick. Like permafrost." He Lian shuddered. "But with two of us, we might be able to sneak past it. Or, if it attacks, one of us can draw its attention while the other goes for the shaft."

One of us. Meaning me.

Lin Tian nodded slowly, as if considering. "It’s a better chance than going back through the warzone. Lead the way."

He Lian’s smile was tight, quick. "Right. Stay close. And keep your light off. My spirit stone is almost dead, but it’s enough to see the path."

They moved, He Lian in front with his guttering light, Lin Tian a step behind in the darkness. Lin Tian kept his mental map active. He Lian’s path was winding, but it did seem to be trending upward, away from the main disciple concentrations. That was the clever part. The route was real. Only the destination was a lie.

After ten minutes of travel, the air changed. It grew heavier, colder in a different way. The dry, dusty chill of the caves change into a penetrating cold that seeped into Lin Tian’s bones and made the curse in his arm pain. The sound of dripping water echoed.

He Lian slowed, his steps becoming hesitant. "It’s just ahead," he whispered, his voice barely a breath. "The passage opens into a small cavern. The air shaft is on the far side. But... listen."

Lin Tian listened. Over the drip-drip of water, he heard it. A rhythmic sound, like a massive bellows. In... out... Each exhale was accompanied by a faint crackle .His map showed the cavern ahead. And in the center of it, there is a red dot. A hostile entity.

The system tagged it with a flashing warning:

[Alpha-level Frost Predator – Designation: Cave Wyrm. Juvenile. State: Dormant.]

A wyrm. This thing could kill a dozen disciples without breaking a sweat.

He Lian turned to him, his face pale in the dying light. "We have to be perfectly quiet. It’s sleeping. If we stick to the walls, we might make it across."

Lin Tian looked at He Lian’s fearful eyes, at the calculating tension in his shoulders. He wasn’t scared of the wyrm. He was waiting for his moment.

He’ll let me get halfway across, then make a noise. Or throw something. The wyrm wakes. It goes for the closest moving target, that is me. Then he runs fto the exit.

The plan was simple but brutal. Lin Tian felt a coldness settle in his gut that had nothing to do with the cave. This was the sect. This was what it meant to rise. He looked at He Lian, this disciple who had shared a campfire with him just days ago, and he felt no anger. Only a grim acceptance.

"You’re right," Lin Tian whispered back. "We go one at a time. You have the light. You see the path better. You go first. I’ll watch your back. If it stirs, I’ll distract it. You get to the shaft and secure the way up."

He Lian blinked. This wasn’t the script. He’d expected the stronger, more confident Lin Tian to take the lead. "I... I don’t know the exact footing..."

"You found the route," Lin Tian insisted, his voice firm but quiet. "You know it better. Go. Now, while it’s deep asleep. I’ll be right behind you."

For a second, He Lian hesitated, conflict warring on his face. Then, the opportunist in him won. This was even better. Lin Tian would be between him and the wyrm. If it woke up, he’d have a bigger head start. He nodded, a quick, jerky motion.

"Okay. Okay. Stay close."

He Lian turned and, with exaggerated care, crept into the cavern entrance. Lin Tian followed, lingering just at the threshold.

The cavern was larger than he’d imagined, its ceiling lost in darkness. Stalactites hung like stone fangs. In the center, on a mound of frost and bones, lay the wyrm.

It was longer than three men, its body segmented and covered in plates of iridescent blue ice. Its head was a wedge, with milky, closed eyes and a mouth lined with icicle-like teeth. With every exhalation, a mist of freezing vapor rolled from its nostrils, coating the nearby bones in rime.

He Lian was picking his way along the left wall, moving with slow pace. Lin Tian waited. He counted He Lian’s steps. He watched the wyrm’s rhythmic breathing.

He Lian was three-quarters of the way to the far wall, where a darker hole promised the air shaft. He glanced back, his eyes finding Lin Tian in the gloom. He gave a small wave. Come on.

Lin Tian took a step into the cavern. Then he stopped. He reached into the pouch at his belt and found a pebble he’d picked up earlier.

He Lian was almost there. His attention was fixed on the shaft, his body coiled to sprint.

Lin Tian drew his arm back toward a large, precarious-looking stalactite hanging from the ceiling directly above the mound of bones. He threw the pebble.

Tink.

The wyrm’s milky eyes snapped open. They glowed with a pale light. Its massive head lifted from the bones, icy sound toward the source of the noise.

He Lian, frozen in terror, was now bathed in the faint glow of those eyes.

"No!" He Lian’s whisper was a strangled shriek.

The wyrm moved with shocking speed. Its maw opened, and the air in the cavern dropped twenty degrees in an instant.

He Lian screamed for real then, a sound of pure terror. He abandoned all stealth, spinning and scrambling desperately for the air shaft. The wyrm’s head shot forward, its icy breath frosting the back of He Lian’s robes.

Lin Tian didn’t watch. The moment the wyrm moved, he was already running back the way they’d come. He Lian’s screams and the crashing sounds of the wyrm’s pursuit filled the cavern behind him.

He ran until the sounds faded. He didn’t stop until he found a small tunnel. He slid into it, pressing his back against the wall.

Silence.

His map showed the red dot of the wyrm back in its cavern perhaps returning to its mound. There was no green dot labeled He Lian anywhere nearby.

Lin Tian closed his eyes. He saw He Lian’s face in the final second, the betrayal turning to horrified understanding as the monster loomed. He felt nothing. No triumph. No guilt.

He made his choice. I made mine.

Lin Tian looked down at his cursed arm. The black veins seemed darker. He took out the Core.

He was alone. He was hunted, and he had a long way to go to get out.

End of Chapter 69