"What is the rush? You carry no bamboo token, nor do you bear any injuries that I can see."
Su Min's tone was perfectly calm as she looked at the panting, sweat-soaked messenger from her doorstep. A stray breeze ruffled her hair, carrying the scent of pine and damp earth, but she remained motionless. The local chieftains ruled their territories like petty, hereditary kings. They held absolute power over the lives and deaths of their subjects, and some were even known to claim the so-called "first night rights" of young brides within their domains. To her, such mortal authority was as meaningful as a fly's buzzing. It held no sway over her.
"Not for those matters, Milady," the messenger gasped. He bowed so low his forehead nearly touched the dusty ground. Small beads of perspiration dripped from his chin to the dry soil. "The three chieftains together, they... they humbly request your presence for urgent discussions. They beg for your insight."
He spoke with a reverence that bordered on fear. Everyone in the region knew that the bamboo tokens she issued couldn't be forged or stolen. A visiting, boastful Daoist priest had once tried to replicate one and failed miserably. He had later explained to anyone who would listen that each token carried a unique, powerful spiritual imprint that was impossible to copy. His voice had trembled throughout the tale. It was this mix of awe and terror that kept the messenger's posture so rigid and his words so polite, despite his obvious panic.
"All three chieftains? That's interesting," Su Min mused. She paused in her preparations for tea, the steam from the kettle curling around her fingers. Her interest sharpened slightly.
These three men ruled over the hundred-mile radius of mountains and valleys where she had deliberately secluded herself. She was still awaiting the maturation of her treasure gourd, and she preferred the quiet. The chieftains were usually wary of each other, and their alliance was a fragile thing at best. For them to jointly summon her, setting aside their pride and long-standing rivalries, meant the situation was far from trivial. It was likely existential. A token of respect for their unified, desperate request was warranted, so she decided to humor them with a visit. It was better to deal with potential problems before they reached her doorstep.
At that moment, on a large wooden terrace overlooking the main village's central clearing, the three chieftains were gathered. The sun beat down on the rough planks, but a cold chill seemed to emanate from the center of the platform. Their faces were grim, etched with a raw, unconcealed fear they rarely showed even to each other. They stared in horrified silence at what lay on the woven mat before them.
Though each was a powerful, stubborn man used to command and violence, they had managed to stay in a tense alliance out of sheer necessity. Without that fragile unity, their small territories would have long been swallowed up by rival, more powerful chieftains from deeper in the mountains or by the Great Wei empire's expanding, bureaucratic grasp to the north. Living deep in the mountains offered some protection from imperial taxes and conscription, but not complete isolation. They still felt the constant, subtle pressure of the outside world. Spiritual resources were richer here, yet so were the hidden, ancient dangers. Staying together was their only proven path to survival.
But what lay before them now went far beyond any normal territorial squabble, rival attack, or even imperial encroachment.
A corpse lay stretched out, and it was horrifying to behold. The man's arms were spread wide as if he had died reaching for something just out of grasp. His fingers had curled into frozen claws, and his face was fixed in a terror-stricken mask. His eyes bulged from their sockets, staring sightlessly at a sky he could no longer see. His mouth hung open in a silent, eternal scream, stretched far wider than should have been humanly possible. The most chilling part was his body's state. This man had only been in his early twenties. He was known for his strength and health, a promising hunter who could track a deer for days.
Now, overnight, his skin was withered, sunken, and deeply lines like old parchment. His thick, black hair had turned to stark, brittle white. He looked as if he were seventy or eighty years old, showing the marks of a life lived in hardship rather than a young man cut down in his prime. The sight alone was enough to make their blood run cold and their stomachs churn. This wasn't even the first case.
They had stationed extra guards around the village perimeter last night after the third body was found, yet the silent, unnoticed massacre of those very guards still sent chills down their spines. They had been found in the same withered state at their posts, their weapons still sheathed.
With no other choice and their own shamans and healers proving useless, they had decided to seek help from the "immortal lady" who had appeared mysteriously two years ago. The shock of Su Min's arrival and her subsequent brutal display of power had never faded from local memory. Even these hardened, ruthless chieftains treated her with the utmost caution and respect. It wasn't only fear that restrained them, but a kind of superstitious awe for her unnatural abilities.
"Gentlemen. What troubles you so?"
A voice, light and cool as drifting snow, cut through the tense silence. Su Min descended gracefully from the sky. Her cyan robes fluttered around her like a mystical crane's wings. She certainly wasn't going to walk all the way here like a commoner. After the messenger had confirmed the location, she had simply flown over the treetops, a short but impressive display of her cultivation. As for the poor messenger himself, he was left far behind, probably still huffing and puffing somewhere on the winding mountain path.
"Greetings, Master," the three chieftains intoned immediately. They bowed as one as her feet touched the wooden planks without a sound.
Their deference wasn't just because of her overwhelming strength, which could break them without effort, but also her unmatched, almost miraculous healing skills. A person who could kill as easily and indifferently as she could save a life from the brink of death was someone to respect, and to fear profoundly.
One of the chieftains, a burly man named Luo, trembled slightly as she glanced his way. He was the unfortunate soul Su Min had once used to establish her authority upon her arrival. Though she possessed a special, otherworldly quality bestowed by her cultivation, her current appearance was largely her own natural features, refined and heightened by her body's purification. She wasn't the kind of devastating, classic beauty that was said to shatter kingdoms, but her ethereal grace, piercing clarity of gaze, and the aura of untouchable power that surrounded her left people feeling breathless and insignificant.
When she had first arrived, her presence had been like a peacock strutting into a flock of plain white chickens. Every eye had immediately turned toward her, full of curiosity, lust, and avarice. As the old saying went, "Trouble brews at a widow's door." Su Min wasn't a widow, yet the kind of trouble her presence drew was even worse.
To secure a decade of peace for her seclusion and avoid constant, annoying interruptions, Su Min had decided she needed to make a stark, unforgettable example out of someone. Chieftain Luo had been foolish and arrogant enough to volunteer for the role. He had stormed into her clearing with a mob of his men, loudly and crudely trying to force her into marriage.
She had shattered his thighbone on the spot with a single, precise kick. The sound of the snapping bone had echoed through the clearing. She then proceeded to give his men a collective, thorough beating. She left every one of them bruised, broken, and thoroughly humiliated, forced to crawl back to their village.
But that was only the beginning of Chieftain Luo's ordeal. It was a lesson in despair.
After breaking his leg, she had even "kindly" treated him with her own Black Jade Bone Mending Paste. The ointment healed the complex fracture completely in less than three weeks, which was a miracle by any local medical standards. Yet just as he started to walk again, Su Min appeared before him exactly thirty days later. Another leg was broken, the crack sounding out in front of his new allies, who could only watch in stunned silence.
And she did it again. Another thirty days passed, and another leg was broken. No matter where he hid or how many guards he hired, she always found him. Once, when he tried conspiring with the other two chieftains to plan a joint attack against her, she caught him right after he left their secret meeting. Another leg was broken.
As for how she tracked him down every single time, it was simple. She had marked him with a faint, lingering spiritual seal the first time they met. Normally, any cultivator with a shred of training could sense and erase such a mark with a little effort, but unfortunately, neither he nor anyone in his village had the faintest bit of cultivation knowledge.
Eventually, after nearly a year of this cycle, the man broke down completely. He had wept and begged for mercy at her doorstep, swearing eternal obedience. Only then did Su Min relent, removing the spiritual seal with a wave of her hand. Her brutal, repetitive, and psychologically crushing display of power had been extremely effective. From that day on, no one in the region dared to even look at her the wrong way. Even the other chieftains treated her with genuine, warily given reverence.
The only side effect was that poor Chieftain Luo seemed to have developed severe psychological trauma. To him, Su Min's beautiful, composed face now resembled that of a smiling, jade-faced demon from the deepest hells.
"Tsk. The elderly often succumb to time's embrace. My skills can't reverse the natural flow of—wait."
Su Min's dismissive wave froze mid-air as she finally looked properly at the corpse. Her spiritual senses, which she had only half-engaged out of habit, suddenly flared to life. They sharpened on the body. The casual remark died on her lips as she sensed the lingering cold.
"Spiritual residue? And this aura... This is... Demonic energy?"
"He wasn't old, Master," Chieftain Luo blurted out. His own deep-seated fear of her was momentarily overshadowed by the visceral horror before them. His voice trembled, not from his trauma now, but from shared dread. "He was barely twenty. A strong boy! He aged like this, we think, in a single night! And this is already the fourth case we have found in the village this week! We are at our wits' end!"
Even the traumatized chieftain forgot his personal fear. Whatever was happening here, this silent, creeping horror that stole youth and life, was far deadlier and more mysterious than Su Min's targeted punishments.
"They have encountered something deeply unclean," Su Min declared after a moment's closer inspection. She knelt beside the corpse without touching it, her frown deepening. "Their essence blood has been completely drained. There's not a drop left."
Essence blood, or Jing blood, was the vital foundational energy and the primordial life force that every human possessed. It was the source of vitality, longevity, and the very spark of life.
For cultivators, losing too much could cripple their strength, stunt their cultivation progress permanently, or cause rapid, premature aging. It robbed them of their future.
For ordinary people, it was even more critical. Their very lifespan and basic health depended on it. Once fully drained, death followed swiftly and inevitably, as the body had nothing left to sustain it.
But draining essence blood wasn't as simple as spilling ordinary blood from a wound. It required a specific, vile technique. Even Su Min with her knowledge, couldn't do it without employing a special, forbidden method.