A Farmer's Journey To Immortality

Outside the Rai City. Haan Di.

Hour of Shadow Rabbit. (09:00 PM - 10:00 PM)

The wind was quiet in the open wilderness, carrying only the soft crackling of fire and the faint smell of roasting meat.

The land was flat for a long stretch, broken only by patches of wild grass and a few scattered trees.

In the middle of this lonely place, a single campfire burned gently.

Next to it, Aksai sat with ease, flipping slices of seasoned demon beast meat over the flames. He whistled a quiet tune as he cooked, completely at peace, as if he were in his own backyard.

From a small rocky ridge about a hundred meters away, four Spirit cultivators from the Iron Mountain Sect crouched in silence, hidden behind the shadows of a few thick bushes.

One of the men, tall and sharp-eyed, frowned deeply as he stared at Aksai. "Is this man out of his mind?" he asked in a low voice, clearly annoyed. "Why would he decide to camp out here? He could've just stayed in Rai City. Does he want to die tonight?"

He shook his head. "There are rogue Foundation Building Experts out here. Bandits. Wanderers. Even madmen. Setting up a fire like that in the open? It's like asking to be robbed."

Another man, older and calm, kept his eyes fixed on Aksai. His voice was soft but steady.

"We shouldn't underestimate any Foundation Building Expert. Especially not a drifting cultivator. The ones without a master or a sect… they only live this long because they know how to survive."

The first man gave him a skeptical look. "Are you saying this is a trap? That he's waiting to ambush someone? Do you think he knows that we are following him?"

The older man didn't answer.

It was the woman in the group who finally spoke up, her voice low but carrying weight.

"We should be careful, but not scared. He may be the owner of Emerald Cove Island, but from what I've heard, he got lucky when the Lakir Clan fell. The Purple River Sect wiped them out.

This young sapling Aksai just happened to survive and got stronger during the chaos. He doesn't have any real background."

She paused for a moment, watching the flames flicker in the distance.

"I've heard rumors that he has ties to the Blackblood Sect, but outside the Wild Devil Lands, those ties are useless. Especially now.

The Blackblood Lord is dead. That sect is in trouble. They're fighting each other in the shadows, and they've got no time to care about a lone cultivator like him."

The third man, who had remained quiet until now, spoke up with some impatience. "So… are we attacking or not?"

The woman's lips curled into a crooked smile. Her eyes narrowed slightly.

"Even if it's a trap, he can't do anything against the four of us. I want to see what tricks this man pulls when he's backed into a corner," she said. "Before we kill him."

And with that, she vanished from her spot, her body flickering like mist in the moonlight. She used a high-level movement spell that made her presence disappear almost entirely.

Within moments, she appeared near the campfire, standing several meters away from Aksai.

Aksai looked up slowly, meat still roasting on the stick he held.

Then, one after another, the other three elders from the Iron Mountain Sect appeared behind her, forming a half-circle around Aksai.

The flames of the campfire danced gently in the night, casting warm flickers of light across Aksai's relaxed figure. He sat cross-legged on the ground, holding a wooden stick that still had a few pieces of roasted meat on it. The smell of charred fat and herbs floated in the air.

Across from him, four figures stood in silence, their long blue robes fluttering slightly with the wind. Their faces were hidden behind horned masks, giving them an eerie look, but their posture told Aksai everything he needed to know. They were confident. Calm. Not cautious at all.

Aksai looked up at them with a lazy smile and wiped the oil from the corner of his lips with a small cloth.

"Hello, young guests," he said, his voice calm and smooth, like someone greeting old friends. "Tonight's half moon is quite beautiful, don't you think?" He sighed in a dramatic way. "The life of a drifting cultivator is not easy, you see. One ends up having too many meals alone."

He gestured to a long wooden log placed near the fire, as if it had always been waiting for guests. "Why don't you sit? Eat something? Tell me how I may help you."

There was a short silence before one of the masked men let out a low, mocking laugh. His voice was sharp, full of disdain.

"Boy, you really have no idea what kind of danger you're in, do you?"

Without waiting for a reply, he lifted his hand and a flash of light appeared as he pulled a sword from his storage ring. The moment he gripped it, a surge of Spirit energy burst out of him as he dropped the disguise hiding his cultivation. The pressure of a true Foundation Building realm cultivator filled the area like a sudden weight.

The man raised his sword, and Spirit essence gathered along the blade before he swung it through the air. A glowing slash shot out like a wave, bright and fast.

It struck the Spirit colt that Aksai had tied a short distance away. The creature let out a single sharp cry before it was sliced clean in half, from head to tail. Blood spilled onto the dirt as the pieces collapsed to the ground with a heavy thud.

The sword-wielding elder looked back at Aksai. "You have nowhere to run now," he said coldly.

Aksai glanced at the dead Spirit colt, then back at the masked elder. He gave a casual shrug and took another bite from the meat still stuck on his skewer.

"I wasn't planning on running," he replied simply.

His gaze moved from one elder to the next, his expression calm and unreadable. The flickering firelight reflected off their horned masks, making them look even more like silent predators.

Aksai leaned slightly forward, his tone still friendly but with a trace of something sharper underneath.

"Before we start," he said, "may I know which organization you belong to?"

He smiled again, though this time it held no warmth.

"I like to know about people before I kill them."

At this point, someone decided to act upon their intentions.

None of the remaining three sect elders noticed when the fourth figure among them vanished like a shadow.

There was no light, no sound. One blink, and she was gone.

The lady elder had used a powerful movement spell combined with stealth techniques to erase her presence completely. Her steps made no sound. Her breath didn't stir the air.

She slipped through the darkness like a ghost, moving with the ease of someone who had done this dozens of times.

She drew a small, curved dagger from her belt, its edge coated in a dark green liquid that shimmered faintly even in the dim light of the fire.

The dagger wasn't just sharp—it was poisoned with a Spirit venom designed to corrode internal organs and weaken Spirit cores instantly. Her target wouldn't survive long, especially with the attack aimed at his neck.

As she moved in, she activated a series of Spirit spells silently. One to heighten her senses. One to strengthen her speed and grip. One to add power to her stab. With the last step taken, she stood right behind Aksai, who still hadn't turned around.

He didn't speak. He didn't move.

With perfect timing, she raised the dagger and aimed it at the base of his neck.

The strike came fast—too fast for any normal Foundation Building cultivator to react to. Her eyes showed no hesitation. She had done this before.

But just as the dagger tip was about to pierce skin, it stopped.

A faint clang rang out as the blade hit something solid—something that shouldn't have been there.

A translucent barrier, shaped like a turtle shell, flashed to life over Aksai's back. It was thin and clear, like a second skin, but strong enough to block her poisoned strike as if she had tried stabbing a wall.

The force of the clash sent a small ripple of energy through the air. The lady elder's eyes widened in shock, and her body froze for a split second as she tried to process what had just happened.

Then Aksai finally spoke.

"It is very rude to attack someone while they're eating, you know," he said softly.

He didn't turn around. He didn't even stop chewing.

The calmness in his voice should have sounded casual, maybe even lazy. But to the lady elder, it felt different.

It hit her ears with a strange weight, like something cold and heavy was settling on her chest.

There was a chill to it—like a whisper that came from deep within the Wild Devil Lands. Only a demonic cultivator who had not only survived but thrived in that chaotic region could make her feel this way.

Was she attacking Haitin Blackblood himself? The one who was called the young demon prince of the demonic faction?

"It's not what you're thinking," Aksai said, as if he could read her thoughts like an open book.

"I'm that guy's brother-in-law. Um... let's say future brother-in-law for now."