Way too untamed, way too wild

In Yiling

Lan Wangji arrived to the region of Yiling shortly after lunch time. Even from far away, he could see the silhouettes of dark, looming mountain on the horizon, the much rumoured Burial Mounds. A dark aureole was covering it everywhere and he supposed that it really was shrouded in the resentful energy, just as he had heard.

As he was approaching, the mountains were becoming more clearly pronounced and he could see they were completely bare, not even a speck of greenery to be found. There was no way that anyone could be living there, not even a demonic cultivator. Or else, he would have to be getting all his supplies and food elsewhere. The intruder must have been a resentful creature after all, something which could live on resentful energy alone.

He landed just a way from the town, not far from the barrier erected around the Burial Mounds over a century ago. He had been warned that this close, he would feel the nauseating effects of the resentful energy already, but to his surprise, he could only feel a slight discomfort, as if something wanted to approach him and touch him, but nothing more. Could it be that over the years, the power of the resentment had been slowly diminishing until there was only this much left?

He would have to inform his brother about this as soon as he would get back, it was possible that after such a long time, the Burial Mounds could have been possibly cleared and exorcized, made habitable for humans once again. The knowledge was however not useful to him at the moment since it would most probably take years for the resentful energy to really dissipate. He did not have that much time, he had to deal with the situation at hand now.

He went to the edge of the barrier and started examining it. He would have expected for it to be much stronger when it was separating such a dangerous place from the outside world. He tried to stick one hand through it and it went across with only a little bit of effort. Lan Wangji raised his eyebrows in bewilderment, the barrier was almost non-existent, it was no surprise that a resentful creature could have gotten out and was terrorizing the nearby town.

He pulled his hand back through the barrier again. Unless it would be completely necessary, he did not want to actually go inside. The Burial Mounds he could see behind the barrier looked extremely unwelcoming, only rocks and dead trees, a dead landscape where black dust mixed with resentful energy were swirling around. He was sure that nothing could live there for long, it really was a land of death.

He shuddered when a gust of ice cold wind made it through the barrier. He had seen enough; he would rather go affront the enemy on the town's outskirts. He turned around without looking back and headed towards Yiling.

The town itself was pretty small, but lively despite its closeness to the dreaded Burial Mounds. As he was walking around, people recognized him as a cultivator, the great Hanguang-Jun, his reputation was preceding him. He was immediately surrounded by people who were asking him for help with the fierce corpse which had been terrorizing them as of lately.

He nodded, it was after all what he came to do in the first place. He decided he would use this opportunity to get more information about the whole situation. He had left the Discussion conference so abruptly before that he knew only what he had heard there and it was not much he could go about. Not when it came to fighting the fierce corpse.

"Tell me more," he asked the gathered town's people and they seemed more than happy to oblige. Although each of them was talking in turn, their words did not quite match:

"It only comes during the night, every night, it crawls around and makes terribly scary noises."

"No, no, you had seen it wrong! It is a giant, and when it walks, you can feel the earth trembling beneath your feet. But otherwise, it is completely silent."

"Yes, it is enormous. But it actually does not have a body, it is only a large cloud of black smoke."

"I have seen it as well, when I went to fetch fresh water in the morning, I was afraid to even open my door, the smoke was still there, covering the whole street."

"What are you talking about? It only comes out at dusk and disappears in less than half an hour!"

Lan Wangji's head was starting to hurt. All the people talking around him had their own version and they wanted to share it with him. However, each version was different and he still had nothing to go by. The fierce corpse could have been either big or small, a young woman or a man just before death, or a beast. Supposedly it would make terrible noises itself, or it could have been causing a storm of wind, or it could have just come and go without alerting anyone. He was not getting anywhere with this. The only thing which came up in all of the stories was that resentful energy which used to be around when the intruder was approaching.

He raised his hand and the crowd around him fell silent. "Thank you. I will now go prepare. Do not come out at night."

All the people looked happy that he was about to deal with the fierce corpse and they bowed to him. Then they went their way to do what they had been doing before he had showed up.

He started slowly walking around again, paying attention to the infrastructure this time. He had to figure out where would be the best place to affront the fierce corpse, or whatever his opponent-to-be actually was. He gripped his sword tighter. He was pretty much sure that should it be a normal fierce corpse, or several of them, he would be able to manage perfectly fine on his own. The war had pushed him to hone his skills in the ways training could never do.

He was however afraid that if it really was some kind of beast he should be fighting, seeing how it severely injured a group of cultivators before running away to the Burial Mounds, it would be much harder. Then again, there was no reason he could not just retreat if things started getting out of hand and come back with someone to watch his back later. Of course, this option would be only possible if no innocent lives were at stake.

He finally found a good spot for the ambush. Just a bit away from the last buildings of the town, on the way to the Burial Mounds, if a hardly visible and un-kept path could be called that. He prepared all his talismans and his sword and waited for the nightfall when the fierce corpse was supposed to leave his lair and descend into the town.

The surroundings were clear of any obstacles so he would be able to spot any incoming intruders right away. Even if he had warned the town's people to stay home tonight, he was glad that this place was not inside the town itself, just in case the fight would get too violent or dangerous. Since there were still several hours until dusk, he sat down with his legs crossed and started meditating.