The Back Mountain woods of the Small Pond Sect were not a forbidden zone, but they were far from safe.
At twilight, the trees twisted into gnarled silhouettes that looked like grasping claws against the darkening sky. The air grew cold, carrying the damp scent of decaying leaves and wet earth. Shadows stretched long and thin, swallowing the path ahead.
"Faster!"
Zhao Dahu shoved Li Fan's shoulder, nearly sending the smaller boy stumbling into a thorny bush. "Stop dragging your feet. If I don't see that pendant in ten minutes, I'm breaking your legs right here."
Li Fan stumbled, letting out a pathetic whimper. He clutched his chest, looking around with wide, terrified eyes.
"Senior Brother... please... it's dark," Li Fan stammered, his voice trembling. "They say the ghost of Elder Mo haunts these woods... he eats the souls of disciples who wander too far..."
"Shut up," Zhao scoffed, though he glanced nervously at the swaying branches. "There are no ghosts. Only weaklings scaring themselves."
Li Fan lowered his head to hide the cold mockery in his eyes.
Ghosts? he thought. I have met Elder Mo's ghost in Life 200. He doesn't haunt these woods. He haunts the latrines in the Inner Sect because he died of constipation. But fear... fear is a useful spice.
Li Fan continued to walk, counting his steps.
Three hundred and fifty.
He knew this path better than the lines on his own palm. In Life 14, he had hidden here from a rival sect. In Life 67, he had hunted spirit rabbits here to survive.
He knew that forty steps ahead, the terrain changed. The soil became loose, hiding a natural limestone fissure that had been covered by decades of rotting foliage. It wasn't a man-made trap, but a natural one—a "Hunter's Pit" that had claimed the leg of a wandering deer in Life 3, and the life of a lost disciple in Life 99.
"It's... it's just up ahead," Li Fan whispered, pointing a shaking finger toward a massive, dead oak tree—the Old Crow Tree. "My father buried it between the roots."
Zhao's eyes lit up. He saw the tree. He saw the seclusion. Greed overrode his caution instantly.
"Finally," Zhao grunted. He pushed past Li Fan, striding eagerly toward the tree. "If this turns out to be a rock, Li Fan, I'm going to skin you alive."
Li Fan fell back, letting Zhao take the lead.
He slipped his right hand into his sleeve, gripping the cold handle of the folding shovel. He channeled a wisp of Qi into the Heaven-Deceiving Copper Coin in his dantian.
Stealth Mode: Maximum.
His presence, already weak, completely vanished from Zhao's spiritual sense. To Zhao, Li Fan was just a scared bug shivering in the background.
"Where?" Zhao demanded, circling the massive tree. The ground was covered in a thick carpet of dead brown leaves.
"There," Li Fan said, his voice barely a breath. He pointed to a patch of ground slightly to the left of the main root. "Under the gray stone."
There was indeed a gray stone there. Li Fan had placed it there himself in Life 800 as a landmark, though Zhao didn't need to know that.
Zhao knelt. He didn't have a shovel, so he used a dagger he pulled from his boot to stab the earth.
Thud.
"The soil is loose," Zhao muttered, excitement rising in his voice. "Someone definitely dug here before."
Of course it was loose. It was a sinkhole covered by leaves.
"Keep watch," Zhao ordered, not even looking back at Li Fan. "If anyone comes, you whistle. Understand?"
"Y-yes, Senior Brother," Li Fan squeaked.
Zhao began to dig with his hands and dagger, tossing dirt aside like a rabid dog. "Come to papa... come to papa..."
Li Fan took a silent step forward.
Then another.
He stood three feet behind Zhao Dahu. The large youth was on his knees, his neck exposed, completely fixated on the imaginary treasure beneath the leaves.
Li Fan looked at the back of Zhao's neck.
In Life 1, killing a man had made Li Fan vomit for three days.
In Life 10, he had hesitated, and his target had turned around and stabbed him.
In Life 1000...
Li Fan raised the shovel. He didn't use Qi. Qi flared and gave off light. He used pure, kinetic mechanics—hips rotating, shoulder driving, gravity assisting.
Crunch.
The edge of the shovel slammed into the base of Zhao's skull with a sickening, wet thud.
It wasn't a clean decapitation. It was a blunt, brutal trauma.
Zhao didn't scream. His brain simply shut off for a second. He slumped forward, his face smashing into the dirt he had been digging.
Li Fan didn't stop.
Rule #1 of the Jungle: Double Tap.
Li Fan stepped in, raised the shovel high, and brought it down again. And again. And again.
Thud. Crack. Squelch.
He hit him until the shovel bent. He hit him until the back of Zhao's head looked like a smashed watermelon. He hit him until he was absolutely, mathematically certain that no amount of healing pills or miraculous luck could bring this man back.
Li Fan stopped.
He wasn't panting. His heart rate hadn't even increased. He stood in the silent woods, holding a bloody shovel, looking down at the twitching corpse of the man who had bullied him that morning.
"Greed," Li Fan whispered to the corpse, "is the deadliest poison. It kills faster than any arsenic."
He dropped the shovel and knelt beside the body.
He didn't feel guilt. He felt the satisfaction of completing a chore, like sweeping dust from a floor.
He began the loot.
He patted down Zhao's robes.
Item 1: Leather Pouch.
Li Fan opened it. Inside were his own three Spirit Stones, plus fifteen others.
Total: 18 Spirit Stones.
Item 2: Low-grade Iron Sword.
Garbage, but sellable for scrap metal.
Item 3: Identity Token.
Useless. Destroy immediately.
Item 4: A small bottle of 'Spring Breeze Pills'.
Low-tier healing pills. Useful.
Li Fan pocketed everything except the token. He stood up and retrieved the yellow jar from his sleeve—the Corpse Dissolving Powder he had bought an hour ago.
"The merchant said it was diluted," Li Fan muttered, popping the cork. The smell of vinegar and acid wafted out. "Let's see if he ripped me off."
He kicked Zhao's body into the depression—the natural sinkhole—and poured the yellow liquid over it.
Hiss...
White smoke rose instantly. The clothes began to sizzle, followed by the flesh. It wasn't fast—the merchant had indeed watered it down—but it was working.
Li Fan sat on a nearby rock, watching the body melt.
He waited for thirty minutes. The smell was horrendous, burning the inside of his nose, but he didn't move. He watched until the flesh sloughed off the bone, until the bones softened into jelly, and until the jelly dissolved into a black sludge that soaked into the porous limestone beneath.
"Slow," Li Fan critiqued. "Next time, I'll refine my own powder."
He stood up and used the shovel to bury the black sludge with fresh dirt. He kicked dead leaves over the spot, arranging them to look natural.
Within an hour, there was no trace of Zhao Dahu. No blood. No body. No weapon.
Just the silent, indifferent woods.
Li Fan dusted off his hands. He took the shovel, folded it, and hid it back in his sleeve.
He checked his appearance. His robes were slightly disheveled, his hair messy. Good. That fit the narrative.
He took a deep breath, changing his facial expression.
The cold, dead eyes of the assassin vanished. In their place, the wide, watery eyes of a terrified victim appeared. He hunched his shoulders, making himself look smaller, weaker.
"Time for the second act," Li Fan whispered.
He turned and began to run back toward the sect. He forced himself to stumble, tearing his robe on a branch. He scratched his cheek until it bled slightly.
He ran not to his dorm, but toward the Enforcer Hall.
As he ran, he began to scream.
"Help! Help! Someone help!"
His voice echoed through the quiet night, shattering the peace of the Small Pond Sect.
"Senior Brother Zhao! Don't go! Don't leave me!"
Li Fan sprinted, his lungs burning, his face a mask of pure panic.
The kill is easy, Li Fan thought as he saw the lights of the Enforcer Hall ahead. The lie is the art.