Volume 2: The Path That Can Be Told – Chapter 108: Killing in the Desert

After casting his spell, this Earth Immortal’s body went rigid as he lay motionless on the ground, clearly dead.
Wukong focused his gaze and faintly saw a wisp of soul rising from the corpse and moving toward another Earth Immortal of slightly lower cultivation. Since practicing the “Mysteries of the Void Art,” Wukong’s vision had improved significantly; seeing ghosts and spirits was no longer a problem for him.
This Earth Immortal must have used some obscure spell, sensing something, and moved around to avoid the soul’s ambush.
Wukong was astonished. Immortals were divided into five categories: heaven, earth, gods, humans, and ghosts. This soul didn’t belong to any of these categories; it resembled an immortal’s original spirit escaping. He hadn’t expected it to be so powerful—taking an Earth Immortal’s life seemed effortless. Could this be soul theft?
Was the master of this realm Laozi? Why set up such a deadly trap?
At that moment, one Earth Immortal shouted, “Everyone, gather closer and form a circle. Those who know soul magic should warn each other early and watch out for one another.” Under these circumstances, his idea was actually quite effective, but no one responded. In the path of cultivation, people only cared about their own affairs.
Wukong saw more and more souls gathering at the periphery, but their cultivation was far inferior to that of the killer soul. He sneered, unconcerned. What could these weak souls do to me?
Soon, many souls created a passage, seemingly to welcome some important figure. Sure enough, a powerful soul appeared from behind. Upon examining it closely, Wukong found its cultivation level to be that of a Heavenly Immortal. He smiled inwardly—these Earth Immortals were in trouble.
Unexpectedly, this powerful soul fixed its gaze directly on Wukong, its greedy expression even more vivid than that of a living person. Wukong was stunned. Was it targeting me? Then he remembered a line from the story: “These lonely souls, for some reason, only target those with high cultivation.” Well, if that’s the case, let it come.
Wukong had already concealed his cultivation level to that of a first-rank Earth Immortal. Somehow, this soul detected it. He decided to raise his cultivation to the sixth rank of Heavenly Immortal—such a high level made him stand out among the more than 300 people here.
As expected, many other souls, sensing his overwhelming presence, swarmed over, each ready to pounce but hesitant to move forward due to the leader’s presence.
Among these 300 people, many had been here before, always managing to escape by sheer luck. After waiting for so long with no signs of action, those who knew each other began chatting. Some with mixed knowledge described the situation, and everyone’s gaze toward Wukong became complicated.

Sixth rank of Heavenly Immortals—how difficult must it be to reach such a level? Yet even in this array of dark souls, there were those at the eighth rank of Heavenly Immortals who perished here. Seeing Wukong’s fearless demeanor, that great dark soul raised his cultivation to the sixth rank of Heavenly Immortals. Filled with annoyance, he didn’t know how to command the swarm of souls. Thousands of dark souls surrounded Wukong, but the chapter describing this was already thrown aside by Wukong. On this stretch of sand, a very strange scene unfolded: over three hundred people gathered together, their eyes fixed on a man in white robes, each acting as if facing a formidable enemy—yet the man in white was not even their opponent. After a while, everyone felt the ground shake, and then a huge full moon emerged from behind the clouds. Someone shouted loudly, “Everyone, be careful!” Soon, a black line rushed toward them at incredible speed, like an army of ants spreading everywhere. Wukong, who had been indifferent to the dark souls before, now became alert. Only when the black line reached his feet did he realize it wasn’t ants at all—it was dark red liquid covering the entire desert; it was clearly a stream of blood! In just a short time, the entire desert was covered by this eerie blood. Under the moonlight, the distant area took on a bluish-green hue, with sand dunes rising like mountains. What a desolate land of blood and mountains! When the last grain of sand was covered in blood, the group of dark souls all raised their heads and cried out loudly. Naturally, they couldn’t produce any sound, but Wukong could clearly see that these souls surrounding him were arranged in an orderly pattern—this was clearly a formation, though he didn’t recognize it. Their posture of looking up at the sky reminded Wukong of one word—sorrow! Yes, sorrow—the sorrow of dying before achieving success, the sorrow of looking up to the sky only to find no response, the sorrow of failing and being left with regret… In the distance, dark clouds gathered swiftly. In an instant, they transformed into a figure wrapped tightly in black clothes, floating in midair like a ghost. Wukong was astonished upon seeing this person. He was also a dark soul, and what was astonishing was that he had managed to take on a human form solely through the power of his soul! There are ten categories of beings in the world: gods, humans, ghosts, reptiles, scales, feathers, insects—plus seven divine apes. Dark souls seem similar to the primordial spirits of these first ten categories, but they are not primordial spirits. If an ordinary immortal loses his physical body, his primordial spirit can rest and recover slowly, allowing him to take over another body and become an immortal again. But dark souls lack a tangible primordial spirit; they can’t even enter reincarnation and can only exist as souls in the world.

Ghostly spirits exist only because they had strong attachments in life and refused to let go, thus refusing to enter the cycle of rebirth. They may possess some peculiar abilities, but only useful for their own original spirit. Yet even the most ordinary magical spells are beyond their reach. Immortals have their own powers, and ghosts have theirs; this ghostly spirit used its ghostly power to take human form—unknown how many people it had killed to achieve this. When these numerous ghosts saw the man in black appear, they seemed terrified and all bowed in reverence. As the man in black approached, Wukong finally saw that he had no face—just a pitch-black expanse—and his black body was not solid; if there had been any light, it would have appeared translucent. Strangely, despite having no face, Wukong could clearly sense that the man in black was staring at him—a feeling as if being fixedly watched by eyes from the depths of hell. For the first time, Wukong felt a tremor in his heart, even worse than when facing Buddha. It wasn’t that this man was stronger than Buddha, but rather that he was too eerie. Suddenly, the man in black vanished silently from his spot. Wukong immediately shouted internally that something was wrong and used the “Vertical Shadowless” technique to disappear as well, hiding his true form in the air. He activated the “Mystical Void Secret Technique,” and saw the man in black sweep past where he stood like the wind. If he hadn’t moved, he would have been struck head-on. Annoyed, Wukong realized that his combat skills were useless against such ghostly beings. The only way was to release his original spirit and use void energy to match the ghostly spirit’s power. But he wasn’t sure if that would work. Scratching his head, he realized his knowledge was still limited. After failing to hit Wukong, the man in black shook himself and transformed into a huge black net, which rushed into the crowd of over 300 immortals. At least a dozen people were caught in the net; most died before they could even make a sound, with no injuries at all. Two others still stood there, seemingly unharmed, but their vacant eyes showed they were as good as dead. After succeeding, the man in black fled like a black arrow, never looking back, and vanished in an instant. Seeing their leader gone, the ghosts slowly disappeared into the moonlight. This sudden disaster came oddly and left just as strangely. Those who survived let out a sigh of relief, calling themselves lucky. They had all seen the man in black before—his attack had killed over a dozen skilled earth immortals instantly and turned two sky immortals into fools. None of the more than 300 people could resist him.

Wukong revealed his true form, still filled with many uncertainties, but who else here could he consult? Seeing Zhang Hui standing blankly in the crowd unharmed, he went over and pulled him along, determined to leave this place as soon as possible.
Zhang Hui said, “In the Blood Desert of Cangshan, one cannot ride clouds before sunrise and can only fly at low altitude. But even if we fly all night, we won’t be able to escape this desert.”
Wukong thought to himself that if he used his Cloud Somersault, he might be able to get out, but since the Cloud Somersault couldn’t carry people, he couldn’t abandon Zhang Hui here. So he said, “In that case, it doesn’t matter if we fly all night.”
There was no conversation throughout the night. As the red sun rose in the east, everyone took to the clouds and left. Wukong noticed that the blood-red hue on the sand gradually faded under the sunlight, arousing his suspicions. There must be something strange about this place. Once he got more familiar with this realm, he would return to investigate further.
Wukong took Zhang Hui with him and soared into the sky, flying eastward toward the rising sun. This realm was very different from Lord Laozi’s realm—rich in spiritual energy and with strong winds—though it wasn’t much different from the original Journey to the West world.