Time Like Smoke

Plague Rat led the mist ball into the passage and quickly vanished.

Chen Zhou watched his receding figure and raised an eyebrow.

"Do hundred corpse patchworks appear in the Earth Dissolving Cave too?"

He directed this question to Jing Hui.

Jing Hui was still dazed; he blinked, came back to his senses, and gave a bitter laugh.

"I am not sure either."

"I have been dead for a thousand years; I no longer know what Tianchi Province has become."

Chen Zhou nodded and asked no more.

Before long, Plague Rat scurried back, the mist ball in his hand gone.

He shouted as he walked, "Done."

Then, he glanced at the Scorpion Demon on the ground and clicked his tongue.

"You're still here?"

The Scorpion Demon shuddered in fear.

Not having seen him for over a hundred years, he couldn't believe the little black rat could handle such a monster so easily now.

In the past, if a single hundred corpse patchwork wandered in, all the demons in the Earth Dissolving Cave would flee en masse, often suffering heavy casualties.

Seeing this, it was clear that when the rat had beaten him earlier, he had truly held back.

The Scorpion Demon didn't know how to answer, so he just awkwardly shrunk back.

He wanted to leave, but he couldn't bear to part with the pills on the ground; he wanted to stay, but he feared the black rat would turn on him, leaving his face flushed with indecision.

Plague Rat didn't bother with him and walked straight back to where he was, crouching down to continue stuffing pills into the rock cracks like they were trash.

"My Lord, I took that sticky clump to the surface and disposed of it."

"The Earth Dissolving Cave is a dump, but it's a place to stay at least."

"How about I go catch an old demon from around here for you? Those old-timers have lived a long time and know a lot; we can ask them about the current state of Tianchi Province."

Chen Zhou gave a slight nod.

The ecology of Tianchi Province was indeed unique.

In the thousand years since Jing Hui's death, this land had undergone many strange evolutions, and the environmental changes were staggering.

If there was a demon familiar with local affairs, it would make planning future actions much easier.

"Go then, and keep the noise down," Chen Zhou ordered.

Plague Rat acknowledged and vanished into the shadows.

Not long after, a scream and the sound of something heavy hitting the ground echoed from the darkness.

"Running? Where do you think you're going?"

Plague Rat's grumbling voice drifted over.

A moment later, he emerged from a rock crack, dangling a trembling little demon by its scruff like a chick.

The little demon had a shifty, rat-like appearance, its front claws clutching several freshly snatched Flesh-Reconstitution Pills, its eyes wide with terror.

"Stealing my pills and trying to bolt? Do you think life is that easy?" Plague Rat glared fiercely at the little demon.

The little demon was so panicked that it simply stuffed all the pills into its mouth, chewing and swallowing desperately.

Then it flopped onto the ground, acting as if it had nothing left to lose, muttering incoherently.

"I've already eaten them; I can't spit them out. Kill me or slice me up... do whatever you want..."

Plague Rat laughed in exasperation and kicked it. "You spineless bastard."

"I'm just going to ask you something. Answer well, and I might give you a few more."

"Answer poorly, and I'll stuff you into a hundred corpse patchwork's stomach."

The little demon's eyes lit up at the mention of more pills, but then it looked suspicious. "Really? Such a good thing?"

"Shut up," Plague Rat snapped. "Where is that old bastard Gray Rat? Take me to him."

The little demon blinked, looking confused. "Gray Rat? Who's that? Is there a demon by that name in the Earth Dissolving Cave?"

Plague Rat frowned and patiently described him. "That big gray rat who's lived forever. Lazy as hell, always hiding in his hole and refusing to move."

"When I left, he'd already been here for centuries. He should be even older now, right?"

Back when Plague Rat wasn't called Plague Rat, but just Little Black Rat, he had heard many stories about Tianchi Province and Jing Hui from Gray Rat.

It was because he learned from Gray Rat that a shard of Jing Hui's shattered plague origin was hidden in the Earth Dissolving Cave that he had risked absorbing it, eventually setting off across Tianchi Province to collect the other shards and ultimately clashing with the Plague-Eating Stove.

The little demon shook its head, still unable to place the name.

"I don't know. I've only been alive for thirty years; I've never seen a big gray rat like that."

Plague Rat clicked his tongue and kicked the little demon away.

The little demon tumbled but ignored the pain, looking expectantly at Plague Rat.

"Um... the pills..."

Plague Rat grabbed a handful and tossed them over, waving him off. "Scram."

The little demon was overjoyed; it scrambled up, stashed the pills, and vanished into a rock crack in a flash.

Plague Rat was about to go catch another one when he heard a cautious voice behind him.

"Are... are you talking about that fat gray rat?"

Plague Rat looked back to see the Scorpion Demon had followed him, standing not far away and dragging his injured leg.

Plague Rat raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, the one who always loved gnawing on a moldy bone and treated it like a family heirloom. You know him?"

The Scorpion Demon nodded, then shook his head.

"I know of him. He's dead. He died about fifty years ago."

The smile on Plague Rat's face froze. "Dead?" he asked in disbelief. "That old guy was as shrewd as a ghost. Who in the Earth Dissolving Cave could have killed him?"

The Scorpion Demon cast a wary glance at Chen Zhou; he felt an instinctive dread toward the man in the black robe.

Finding that Chen Zhou was also looking at him, his scalp tingled, and he hurriedly answered Plague Rat's question.

"Fifty years ago, something happened on the surface. Many dormant hundred corpse patchworks were activated."

"Several of them fell into the Earth Dissolving Cave all at once. That old fellow wasn't very agile; he was a bit slow, ran into one, and was gnawed until not even a shard of bone remained."

Plague Rat fell silent.

Although he had some history with Gray Rat, he wasn't exactly grief-stricken.

Yet, hearing the sudden news of an old acquaintance's passing in this lonely, cold underground world still left him feeling a faint, inexplicable sense of melancholy.

Time was like smoke; old friends were no more.

The Scorpion Demon watched him cautiously, not daring to make a sound.

After a long while, Plague Rat gave a mocking laugh.

"Fine, dead is dead."

He turned and returned to Chen Zhou's side.

Sensing Plague Rat's emotional shift, Chen Zhou spoke calmly, "On the path of cultivation, life and death are unpredictable."

"Since he's gone, do you have any other long-lived friends?"

Plague Rat composed himself and shook his head.

"My Lord, that old guy wasn't really my friend."

"I lived in the Earth Dissolving Cave for over two hundred years and didn't have many friends."

"Gray Rat barely counted as one; when I was young, he taught me how to hide from powerful demons."

"But then one time, while I wasn't looking, he tried to steal the food I'd worked so hard to save."

"When I found out, we fought. He was ruthless, and I fought to kill, so we had a falling out."

"After that, I left the Earth Dissolving Cave for the surface. I spent over a hundred years searching for the shards of Jing Hui's origin, which eventually led to my conflict with the Plague-Eating Stove."