The Greater Corpse General!

**Crunch... crunch... crunch~~~~~**

Bones were ground to powder, the sound alone enough to send goosebumps crawling across everyone's skin.

Within seconds, the Rotting Corpse had been reduced to a frozen mass of limp flesh — not yet fully dead, but utterly incapable of movement.

"Ah Li, stop wasting Magical Energy." The Woman in Black Stockings had watched her bearded attendant deploy an intermediate-level spell just to handle a single Rotting Corpse. She offered the reminder without looking up.

The bearded attendant called Ah Li quickly performed a peculiar bow, wearing the expression of a student dutifully receiving instruction.

"Come to think of it, we've been traveling together this whole time and still don't know what to call you." Shorty asked with a goofy grin. Sharp-eyed as ever, he'd already worked out that this woman was no ordinary person.

"Ye Meng'e," the Woman in Black Stockings said with complete seriousness, as though afraid to misspeak a single syllable. "The *yè* as in leaf, the *mèng* as in dream, the *ē* as in graceful. You may call me Meng'e."

Standing nearby, Mo Fan couldn't help but laugh. "Did you make this Chinese name up on the spot?"

The woman didn't answer directly. "Is there something odd about it?"

"The *e* from graceful... Meng'e." Mo Fan kept his face perfectly straight. "Chinese people rarely use that character in names. Honestly, 'Cuihua' would suit you better. You could even attach it to your real surname — something like 'Elizana-Cuihua,' a fine showcase of your mastery of both East and West."

Shorty, Brawny, and Liu Ru — all three Chinese — nearly choked on their Gray Garlic at Mo Fan's words.

*You just don't do that to a foreign friend!*

The Woman in Black Stockings, however, nodded thoughtfully, as if Mo Fan's suggestion genuinely warranted consideration. Her two attendants were almost certainly not Chinese either — being able to hold a conversation in Mandarin was already an accomplishment for them, so there was no chance they'd caught the cultural landmine buried inside a name.

"Don't listen to his nonsense," Liu Ru said, quickly throwing Mo Fan under the bus. "Your name is actually very lovely."

The Woman in Black Stockings smiled and let the joke pass.

"Um... can we call you that too?" Ah Li, the bearded attendant, ventured.

She glanced at him. Ah Li immediately shrank into himself, not daring to say another word.

For most of the journey, it was Shorty and Meng'e's two attendants who stepped forward to deal with the wandering Undead.

Their luck had held — they'd avoided the burial grounds entirely, staying safe well into the small hours of the morning. A fair amount of Gray Garlic had been spared in the process.

"About another hour until dawn," Shorty said, checking his watch.

"I thought the Ancient Capital Undead were supposed to be terrifying. Aren't they just a bunch of brainless stupid corpses?" Ah Li laughed.

"Brother, *don't* say that — the Land of the Undead has a way of turning on you. Those are exactly the kind of words you never say out loud!" Brawny cut in.

Ah Li just shrugged it off, still grinning.

Ahead lay a stretch of loose, dark earth — black as pitch. The clouds overhead were impossibly thick, pressing down low and heavy.

**CRACK!**

Without warning, a fork of pale white lightning split the narrow slice of sky. For one blazing instant, the oppressive black curtain above and the unbroken dark earth below were thrown into stark relief — leaving everyone feeling as if they were walking through an enormous sealed black box.

The air had grown stifling without anyone noticing. Thunder rolled through the clouds in a continuous drumbeat, and fat drops of rain began to fall, each one striking the ground hard enough to splash a tiny burst of mud.

"Damn it, it's raining!" Shorty cursed.

The words had barely left his mouth before the skies opened. White lightning cracked across the heavens, and the reflected light of rain filled the air in every direction — an endless, shimmering wall.

The downpour hammered the soft earth, turning every footstep into a squelch of mud.

Another flash of lightning — and there it was: a tide of blood-red flowing toward them through the rain.

Bloody water lapped at their feet. The sight sent a chill through the group, but the rain was too dense to see what lay ahead. For a moment, no one knew whether to reach for their Gray Garlic.

"Keep moving — the rain washes away the Gray Garlic's scent!" Brawny called out.

"So Gray Garlic doesn't work in the rain?" Mo Fan said.

"Right!"

Mo Fan had a string of curses ready, but the rain was coming down too hard to bother. They needed shelter, and fast.

"Does nobody in this group use the Water Element?" Mo Fan called out.

Nobody answered.

*If we had a Water Element Mage, a Water Control cycle on everyone and none of us would be in this state.*

Meng'e's two attendants were nothing if not devoted. They'd brought no umbrellas, so without hesitation they stripped off their outer coats to use as makeshift rain covers, shielding her the entire way — a display of deference that set her visibly apart from everyone else.

"There's more and more blood out there. Damn it — something big might be nearby!" Shorty warned, drawing on his experience.

"In this rain? If we have to fight, we'll all turn into mud statues," Mo Fan grumbled.

"What did I say? The Land of the Undead plays by its own rules — stop running your mouth!" Brawny laid the blame squarely on Ah Li's earlier boasting.

The group sloshed through the mud, pace quickening.

This was open flatland — no shelter anywhere unless they headed toward the Qin Mountains.

And the demon clans of the Qin Mountains were very *welcoming* to humans. Might as well have a pot of boiling oil already waiting, just for anyone foolish enough to wander in.

**WRAAAAAH!**

**GROOOOAH!**

Two shrieks tore through the darkness from somewhere close — the kind that slammed your heart against your ribs.

Liu Ru was nearest. She spun toward the sound — and the cold hit her all at once, spreading from her spine outward.

Through the curtain of rain, the silhouette of a massive, bull-like corpse was growing clearer — and it was moving straight for her.

The thing had several arms, each one clutching a rust-spotted blade or axe. The rain was washing the dried blood from those weapons as they watched, making them somehow more horrifying for it — how many lives had those blades taken?

The body was that of a bull — massive, grotesque, every limb a monstrosity. But what made it truly unbearable was the tiny woman's head perched atop that enormous frame. Filthy, tangled hair hung loose around it, and from beneath the rain-soaked strands glared a face twisted with malice.

"Why..." it opened its mouth, producing a garbled, wretched sound. "Why did you abandon me...!"

The voice had curdled past the point of recognition. Human words, but drenched in the death-hungry spite of a vengeful wraith.

"What the hell are you?!" Mo Fan yanked Liu Ru behind him.

Staring at the skin-crawling Blade-Axe Corpse General, he genuinely couldn't fathom how many dead things had been stitched and fused into this single body to produce something so hideously grotesque.

"A Corpse General — a *Greater* Corpse General! It's over, we're dead, we're absolutely dead!" Shorty stared at the Greater Corpse General in sheer terror, looking every bit ready to turn and bolt.