The Endless Promise

33. Lurked

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At the same time, at Xu Weiyan's camp, a disciple suddenly shrieked and stood up, his limbs moving stiffly. His sword appeared in his hand and he suddenly lunged at another disciple.

Fortunately, the disciple blocked the attack. "Oy! What are you doing?!" The disciple snapped at him.

"I- can't- control- my body!" He said, eyes wide in fear.

There was another shriek, and then another.

Before long, the disciples were suddenly fighting off several of their comrades.

As one disciple approached her, she instantly recognized the signs. "They've been possessed!"

She had seen this on Caoyang, in the Shadow Abyss- the level on the mountain before the Lava Sea.

In the shadow abyss, evil spirits and tricky ghosts abounded, all with the sole aim of killing everything around them, and Weiyan had narrowly avoided one who possessed the other cultivators, making them kill each other.

A disciple shot an attack at her, snapping her back to the present.

"Try not to hurt them!" She ordered and moved quickly between them, hitting a few acu-points and rendering the possessed disciples immobile.

There were eight in all and she crouched to examine one, taking his pulse. A dark aura flowed through him.

"This is the work of a Level Nine evil spirit!" She declared, drawing her hand away quickly, as the dark aura nearly attacked.

"Level Nine!" The disciples began muttering.

"Impossible!"

Weiyan straightened and instantly shot a bright red flare into the sky, then she cast a few hand seals and directed her aura at the possessed disciples.

"We're ending this mission here! Who has weightless talismans?" She asked, and a few disciples brought out theirs.

The talismans were activated on the possessed disciples, making them light enough for a person to carry two at once.

"I've sealed the aura within them, and reinforced the technique, so they won't be able to move for two day. One disciple carries two possessed. Zhou Yun." She turned to an older disciple. You'll lead the way back, and someone else watches the rear."

Zhou Yun nodded, and she continued.

"The rest of us will stay and look for Zhang Cheng..."

Zhang Cheng might be an idiot, but he was still one of them!

"Go now!" Weiyan ordered.

The disciples nodded and began to move...

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Meanwhile, back at Haoyuan's camp, the disciples had seen their scouts' signal, but before they could react, a few beasts were already upon them.

"That's a level five earth boar!" Someone pointed at a large green boar with gleaming tusks.

"Weren't we on a level three mission?!"

But the boar was the least of their problems.

Behind the boar was an even bigger sabre toothed tiger, it's blue fur shining and rippling in the firelight, and as they watched, three more sabre tooths stalked into the clearing.

All level five!

Even running away was impossible at this point, and Xu Haoyuan ran a quick mental calculation. There were six in their group who could fight a level five. Two were the scouts who hadn't returned, but that still left four.