Gu- an insect that is cultivated to be a living curse. Venomous, poisonous, filled with toxic yin qi and curse magic. Gu Cultivators came in two sorts- the very fragile, who were frequently sickly and emaciated from all the dreadful things they had to do to cultivate their pets/spells/companions, and the inhumanly strong. There was no chance of confusing the two. The latter had grafted Gu onto, and into, themselves, turning themselves into a sort of insect-human hybrid.

The woman in front of Tian was the former sort. She had a starved, feral look that he found eerily familiar. She was a stand back type- let her little monsters do the fighting for her. She would set traps too, circumstances permitting. She wouldn’t want to get into hand to hand fighting, though she doubtless would have some vicious means to protect herself.

The analysis flashed through Tian’s head as soon as the woman appeared. The only real factors beyond his control were traps and what she would do once he was close. So he made sure he was already dead in her eyes before trying anything. He put away his rope dart. Shifted away from whatever it was that was buried under the sand. And then charged into the swarm of Gu.

The heretic snorted but didn’t look away as the insects swarmed around Tian. He felt them bite into him, injecting venom. Numbing his flesh. The pain… was no longer unreal. It was expected. The burrowing curse energy dug in all over his body and face. He frantically slapped at the bugs as he tried to run though the swarm. Maybe he killed a few. Maybe not. The important thing was that his feet kept moving closer.

“You will die without ever reaching the hem of my robes. All that easy living didn’t mean much in the end, did it?” He could hear the smile in her voice. He didn’t know what she was talking about. He screamed. It was hard not to scream- the curse energy wasn’t just trying to kill him, it wanted to break him as it killed him.

“And at long last, you get the tiniest taste of what you deserve. What you all des-” Tain stumbled in front of her, falling towards her feet. Just as she expected. Except Tian shoved hard off his lead foot, reaching her chest in a single move. His hands slapped against her boney ribs, breastbone, neck. Thin. She was so thin under her protective silks. She was taller than he was, but couldn’t have been much heavier.

He heard bones snapping with every hit. Tian doubted she was alive enough to register it. He felt the penetrating force burrowing in, hitting her organs, her nerves, hitting… something else? Tian felt a sudden burning sensation in his gut. She had stabbed him. He kicked off backwards, tumbling away. There was something on that blade- not a curse this time, just poison. Strong enough to cut through the nightmare pain he was already in.

Tian switched to Advent of Spring and swallowed an antidote as he scrabbled for distance. He was bleeding badly and it’s not like the Gu had just gone away- they were on him in force, stinging away. This time he could feel what was happening. Advent of Spring was working in synergy with the Hell Suppressing Sutra. It was absorbing the curse energy and converting it into pure vital energy for his body. His fleshy body was resisting the poison fiercely. It might not be an immunity, but it was putting up a hell of a fight until antidotes and Advent of Spring could finish the job.

He had wondered just what all those body refinements had done for him. He was starting to understand. His fleshy body wasn’t normal anymore. What it was

, was still unknown. But his Dustless Physique clearly agreed with whatever was being done. Lotuses didn’t share their ponds with other flowers. Invasive qi, curses, any of that, could screw right off.

It didn’t seem to be stab proof, however. And the woman clearly had some kind of physique herself.

“Animal.” Her voice came out in a rasp. Her head was tilted crookedly on her neck, one ear uncomfortably close to her shoulder. She was holding a thin, curved knife in her hand. He didn’t see her draw it. Was it in her storage ring? Of course it was. Stupid to not think of that. Stupid to think heretics would be like his brothers, carrying their weapons on their hips.

He casually slapped some bugs while observing her. He had felt his vital energy infiltrate her. He felt it destroy things inside of her. It was, or should have been, a perfect ambush. Apparently she knew something he didn’t. And she was done waiting.

The heretic moved towards him in a blur. The knife lashed out, forcing him to jump to one side again, pulling the wound in his belly further open. Tian yanked out his rope dart and tried to get it into motion. It felt clumsy in his hands. He had gotten so used to cycling between his combat arts that fighting without them felt unnatural. But he couldn’t just dump Advent of Spring. He was still being attacked by the damned Gu, and the curse would eat him alive if he didn’t keep on top of it.

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The rope dart flicked around his body, spinning up, over, around, in front and behind. Building momentum, becoming elusive. He kept his feet moving, not trying to push the pace. The heretic rotated in place, keeping Tian squarely in front of her. He flicked the dart out in a probing attack. The knife blurred, knocking the dart head to one side. Tian recovered the dart and kept circling. What was she waiting for?

His eyes darted to her other hand, but it was just hanging there. Really hanging there. Not so much as a twitch or clench. He paused, trying to understand what he was seeing. It was just for a moment.

It was too long.

The heretic rushed in. Her knife came down from above, stabbing for the side of his neck. She was on him now, body to body. Thin as she was, she could still knock him down. Thin, but hard as rock. She fell on him, constantly stabbing for his neck. Tian blocked with the rope, trying to keep the knife away. She was stronger than him. Not a lot stronger, but strong enough. The dagger pressed closer. Steadily closer.

Her eyes were glassy. Tian could see them through the rough goggles she wore- glassy and bloodshot in the dawn light. She wasn’t using her left hand. She wasn’t doing much with her legs either. He had done some kind of damage to her. Just not enough to kill her. Her one arm could out muscle his two.

Tian grit his teeth and switched over to Snake Head Vine Body. The pain was immediate. Near crippling. The heretic pricked the skin of his neck with the knife. Just pricked it, but the blade didn’t pull back. Just kept steadily pressing in. He wrapped the rope dart around her arm and neck with a desperate push of vital energy. Cinched it tight with another. Then he made the barbs pop up, and shoved up with his hips.

With wild daring, he rolled her onto her back, gashing his neck in the process. Not deep enough to hit the artery, but he could feel the poison going to work immediately, fighting against the antidote. He had leverage now. He used it. Tian got one foot flat on the ground, and stood. The heretic tried to follow. Tian stomped on her chest instead.

The arm was shredded. So was the neck. Neither was cut off, but both were two thirds destroyed. He felt the strength go out of the knife hand. He didn't trust it. Tian sawed the rope from side to side and cut off the heretic’s head. Then did the same with the arm.

Something started crawling out of the stump of her neck. Long, segmented, feelers, legs, something awful- Tian smashed it over and over with his rope dart. He stabbed it a dozen times, then blew Gu bane powder into the neck wound. He was getting lightheaded. Almost fainting with pain. He grabbed her knife, her storage ring, stowed her head, switched over to Advent of Spring and ran for the desert. He had done far, far more than could be expected of him. Far more than was his job. His job was to be the medic. To stay alive, so he could keep everyone else alive. So his job now was to clear the battlefield and heal up.

“I killed a level eight or nine on my own. That’s an achievement. That’s a big deal,” Tian thought. Things were hazy. The poison and the curse were taking turns kicking the hell out of him, and his spells would need time to fix him up. He didn’t know how the rest of the battle was going. Didn’t know how Sister Hong was doing. Tian found himself a nice dip in the rough sand and lay down in it. Later he would bury himself. For now, he just breathed and tried to heal.

“In retrospect, it was probably stupid to try and change the situation on the battlefield. Not my job, really. But sometimes you have to do the job before the job, right Brother Su? That spark of human empathy.” Tian hoped he was keeping the inside voice on the actual inside. “It seemed very necessary at the time. But I think I overdid it.”

He poured blood clotting powder into his gut wound. Really not what you were supposed to do. Not right at all. But it did have a cleansing property, and he had seen far, far too many wounds from heretic weapons turn septic. He poured some on his neck too. His neck wasn’t as bad. A half inch further and it would have been an entirely different story, but as things stood now, it wasn’t bad. He was just exhausted, cursed, poisoned, stabbed in the gut, probably infected with something nasty, and the battle wasn’t even over yet.

Ah. Tian? Have you considered the humble vole? Smart little rodent. It knows it can’t beat any damned thing in a fight so can you guess what it does instead?

There was heavy urgency in Grandpa Jun’s voice. Tian didn’t ask questions. He switched over to Snake Head Vine Body, bit back a scream, and started using the rope dart to pull the nearby sand over him. He couldn’t dig much deeper, but he was determined to at least cover himself at least a couple of feet deep.

Oh. He still hadn’t figured out what was the thing buried underground, had he? Tian couldn’t muster the energy to worry about it. He was more worried about whatever was a big enough problem to make Grandpa Jun break his silence in the middle of a battle.

There was a sharp crack, then a sudden quiet.

“Stubborn beast. If you don’t come out, I’ll drag you out.” Tian didn’t recognize the voice. It sounded… unpleasant. Like there were bubbles and clicks in it that shouldn’t be in a human voice.

“Drag you out? Wait. This ambush site… was this what that True Disciple was really after? Did he know the Gu Masters would be launching their own attack here?” Tian’s mind raced.

“Oh, don’t bother running. You low things have served your purpose.” There was a sudden thrum of insects. Not a few dozen- a few thousand. Tens of thousands. Tian kept digging deeper and deeper, using the barbs to pull sand from under him and dumping it on top of him. It wasn’t very fast, but it was very steady. He just hoped it was fast enough. He knew what that all encompassing sound meant. A Heavenly Person heretic had taken the field. Senior Brother Ku seemed to be missing. Maybe he decided that collecting the easy money was a little too hard.