Chapter 276

Chapter 276: The Heaven-Abandoned Life-Gambler

Dozens of people were chained and hung in midair. Beneath them, black vapor churned upward in constant waves, carrying the foul, sweet stench of decay.

A figure approached in the distance, dragging chains. Step by step, she came closer.

She was a woman, but only in the loosest sense of the word. Her face was withered, her skin slack as if it might tear at any moment. Her eyes were empty—so empty it made the air feel colder.

She tossed the chains down with a careless flick, then stared at the three of them without moving.

“Hang yourselves,” she said.

They had no choice.

Jiang You Sheng and Jiang Yi Yi grabbed chains and locked themselves in. Wang Jie did the same.

At once, the black vapor seemed to gain a will of its own. It wound around the iron links, then lifted them, suspending them among the others as the corpse-stench steamed around them.

Wang Jie watched his skin slowly begin to darken. “Where is this?”

The woman didn’t answer. She turned and walked away.

Not far off, Su Su opened her eyes. She looked exhausted—hollowed out. Her gaze flicked to Wang Jie and the others, then she closed her eyes again, refusing to speak.

Qingxiao finally rasped, voice weak. “This is the Corpse Sect.”

Wang Jie stared. “The Corpse Sect? Isn’t the Corpse Sect in First Nebula?”

Qingxiao spoke in broken fragments, each word dragged out as if it hurt. “Anywhere… has them. The Corpse Sect gathers… death aura. Doesn’t matter which nebula. Trial grounds… battlefields… anywhere can have a Corpse Sect.”

Jiang You Sheng’s expression twisted as realization hit him. “Then this is… the Corpse Sect’s Forward Camp?”

Qingxiao nodded.

“I suggest you protect yourselves with starforce,” he said hoarsely. “Resist the corrosion as much as you can. If you’re completely corroded, you won’t be able to go back.”

“Even if you never betrayed your sect, the outside world will still erase you.”

Jiang You Sheng went pale. “A Corpse Sect Forward Camp on the battlefield… we’re finished.”

Wang Jie frowned. “Senior Brother, what exactly is a Corpse Sect Forward Camp?”

Jiang You Sheng’s voice was low and ragged. “It’s a place the Corpse Sect uses specifically to gather death aura.”

He swallowed hard.

“They say every Forward Camp has a Star-Refining Realm expert guarding it.”

He looked down at the black vapor surging up.

“They use corpse aura to corrode you. Once the corrosion is complete, no matter how dazzling you were before, you can never go back.”

Another voice drifted from somewhere nearby, equally weak. “Third Zenith Heaven once had a peerless genius who fell into the Corpse Sect and was corroded by corpse aura. Later, even after he helped Third Zenith Heaven locate the Forward Camp and killed two Star-Refining Realm Corpse Sect experts… he still killed himself in Third Zenith Heaven.”

The voice trembled with disgust and fear.

“No one can remain unscathed in the Living Realm after being corroded by corpse aura. The only road left is the Dead Realm.”

Someone else spoke bitterly. “Our only chance is to be rescued before the corrosion finishes. I’d rather die on the battlefield than become something neither human nor ghost.”

Wang Jie stared at the black vapor below them.

This was corpse aura.

He drew on lockforce, forcing it outward to resist. It struggled. The corpse aura gnawed at it relentlessly, chewing it down.

But aura could fight aura.

Corpse aura was still aura. And the aura in his body, though different, was still aura too. Aura against aura was the most direct defense.

There were many people chained here—even a Hundred-Star Realm cultivator like Zhu Cheng.

No one knew who would be corroded first.

A soft clink sounded.

The woman returned, dragging two more people by their chains. She hauled them in and hung them up.

Her empty gaze swept over the captives. Without warning, she snapped her chain like a whip. The iron links punched clean through a person’s body, killing them instantly.

Wang Jie jolted.

Wasn’t the point to corrode them with corpse aura?

Why kill them outright?

The woman’s gaze drifted from one person to the next, then fixed on Jiang You Sheng. The chain in her hand twitched, poised to strike.

“Wait!” Jiang You Sheng shouted.

She stared at him.

“Why are you killing me?” Jiang You Sheng demanded.

The woman’s voice scraped out, weak and slow, as if every word cost her. “Waste… corpse aura.”

“I’m Roaming-Star Realm!”

She didn’t care. Her chain flexed again, ready to pierce him.

Wang Jie shouted, “By what standard?”

The woman’s head turned. Her hollow gaze landed on him.

Wang Jie forced himself to meet that gaze. “What standard do you use to judge whether someone is ‘wasting’ corpse aura?”

Jiang Yi Yi’s voice shook. “Yes—what standard?”

Around them, eyes turned in their direction. Indifferent. Detached. As if it had nothing to do with them.

The woman stared at Wang Jie. “None.”

“Then what about me?” Wang Jie shot back.

For the first time, something flickered in her eyes—the faintest spark of awareness.

“You,” she said, “don’t waste.”

Wang Jie’s heart hammered. “My value is higher than you think. I want you to spare him.”

It sounded arrogant even to his own ears, but he had no other way.

His life had been carried back on Jiang You Sheng’s back.

Jiang You Sheng’s mouth twisted. “Wang Jie… don’t. Find a way to live.”

He hesitated, then added, voice bitter and exhausted, “If you can… take care of Yi Yi.”

Jiang Yi Yi struggled against the chains, desperate, but it was useless.

The woman kept staring at Wang Jie. Wang Jie stared back, trying not to let his fear show.

A long moment passed.

Then the woman turned and walked away.

A ripple of shock passed through the captives.

He really could protect someone?

Why?

Tang Zhou, Qingxiao, and others stared at Wang Jie with disbelief. By what right could a lockforce cultivator protect another person here?

Su Su opened her eyes again and looked at Wang Jie. Then she closed them once more, focusing all her strength on using starforce to resist the corpse aura.

Jiang You Sheng looked at Wang Jie with complicated gratitude. Even Jiang Yi Yi’s gaze had changed.

“If you hadn’t stopped her,” Jiang You Sheng said hoarsely, “I’d already be dead.”

Wang Jie managed a strained smile. “The Corpse Sect is strange. No one knows what they’re thinking.”

Jiang You Sheng opened his mouth to speak again—

His whole body jerked.

His eyes rolled back, and he collapsed into unconsciousness.

Around them, the same thing happened. One by one, the captives lost consciousness.

Only Wang Jie remained awake.

Chains rattled.

He was dragged away.

It felt like being hauled as cargo—thrown from one place to another.

When Wang Jie lifted his head again, he saw a familiar sight: pale, dried arms, skin stretched tight over bone, holding his Star Compass.

He followed the arms upward.

A figure stood there with their head bowed, long hair hanging like filthy curtains. The face was impossible to make out, even the gender unclear.

Like a rag shaped into a person.

A dirty rag.

And his Star Compass was in that rag’s hands.

“Is this yours?” the figure asked.

Their eyes stared at him through gaps in greasy hair.

Wang Jie didn’t bother lying. In front of someone like this, denial was meaningless.

“It’s mine.”

The figure laughed softly. “I didn’t expect the Beidou Bridge-Pillar would be willing to send a Star Dao Master’s inheritor onto the battlefield—without even a protector. Strange.”

In a blur, the figure leaned in close.

Strands of hair brushed Wang Jie’s face. A bone-deep chill stabbed through him. The figure’s eyes felt like needles, and the reek of decay surged so strongly it made his skull throb.

“Is it really yours?” the figure murmured.

Wang Jie sucked in a breath, forcing calm. “If you don’t believe me, why ask?”

The figure eased back and glanced at the Star Compass. “Lockforce… and star dao. Heh. Interesting. Very interesting.”

The gaze sharpened.

“Who is your master? Which Star Dao Master?”

There was no point keeping it secret now.

His cheap master had once said he could use his name as a shield—but every time he did, it would lower his master’s opinion of him by a little.

Right now, Wang Jie didn’t care.

He was about to die.

“Shu Rang.”

“Shu Rang?” The figure tilted their head. “Never heard of him. Then he must be hiding his identity.”

They looked Wang Jie up and down again, then back to the compass.

“It would be a pity to let corpse aura corrode you,” they said softly. “A lockforce cultivator can have a better identity than a starforce cultivator under certain circumstances—easier to conceal. Especially one favored by a Star Dao Master.”

“Across the entire history of the Four Dipper Linked Bridge… people like you are almost nonexistent.”

The figure’s mouth curved beneath the hair.

“Heh. How about this, then? I’ll let you become one of the Hundred Coffins.”

Wang Jie’s mind went blank.

Hundred Coffins?

The figure’s voice grew almost gentle. “My name is Si Zhuo. I oversee this Forward Camp. I have the authority to confirm a Hundred Coffins.”

Si Zhuo’s dried fingers tightened around the Star Compass.

“Wang Jie, today I allow you to light dead-man incense and offer it to the Corpse Lord. You will sleep as one of the Hundred Coffins, and when you awaken, you will help my Corpse Sect overthrow the Living Realm and aid the descent of the Dead Realm.”

Before Wang Jie could answer, the world shifted.

Space warped. The starfield vanished, as if the illusion had become solid reality.

Only one thing remained ahead—a towering spirit tablet, indistinct and hazy, as if it could slip into the Void at any moment.

The inscription was long. Wang Jie could only make out a few words:

“…the Heaven-Abandoned Life-Gambler… Star Seat…”

An incense burner sat before the tablet.

Beside him, Si Zhuo opened a dried, skeletal hand and offered a single stick of incense.

Si Zhuo’s gaze fell on Wang Jie—cold, vicious, and absolute.

Wang Jie had no doubt. If he refused, he wouldn’t simply die. It would be worse than death.

And in front of the tablet, that gaze was filled with fanatic devotion. Anyone who dared defile it would be hated.

Wang Jie hesitated—only for a heartbeat.

Then he took the incense.

He lit it, palms steady only by force of will, and walked toward the burner.

The closer he got, the larger the spirit tablet seemed to grow.

It rose like a pillar that could pierce the heavens.

Pressure bore down on him—pressure from the Void, from the weight of ages, from a height his mind couldn’t comprehend.

It felt like a gaze from beyond heaven and earth had fallen upon him.

Si Zhuo watched in silence, eyes fixed on him.

Wang Jie reached the spirit tablet and slowly knelt.

“Speak,” Si Zhuo said.

Wang Jie’s throat tightened. He forced the words out.

“Disciple Wang Jie offers to the Corpse Lord and sleeps as one of the Hundred Coffins.”

He lowered his head and knocked it once.

The moment the words left his mouth, the spirit tablet vanished.

Everything vanished.

In its place stood a coffin—deep black, bottomless, carved with patterns that made no sense no matter how long he looked.

Si Zhuo’s voice softened, almost kind. “Sleep. In one hundred days, you will awaken, and you will be one of my Corpse Sect’s Hundred Coffins.”

Wang Jie rose and looked at Si Zhuo.

Si Zhuo’s gaze had changed. It was no longer cold and predatory. It was almost warm, as if Si Zhuo now regarded him as a junior of his own.

“Senior,” Wang Jie asked carefully, “does this mean I’m already considered a Corpse Sect disciple?”

Si Zhuo smiled. “Yes.”

“Even if you go back to Black-White Heaven, confess everything, and prove you never did anything against Black-White Heaven—it will be useless.”

Wang Jie’s heart sank.

“Because you lit dead-man incense and offered to the Corpse Lord,” Si Zhuo said. “In the Living Realm, that is a great taboo.”

“If you were merely corroded by corpse aura, there might still be a chance you’d be imprisoned and not killed. But lighting dead-man incense… guarantees death.”

Wang Jie didn’t know what he was feeling anymore.

Shuang Hua Sect. Black-White Heaven. Fengmen. Now the Corpse Sect.

Every step he took felt wrong.

And this step…

Corpse Sect. Hundred Coffins.

Wasn’t that the identity of dead Chu Yao?

Now he was one too.

He couldn’t help wondering how it would feel if he ever met dead Chu Yao.

Or Liu Ying—the one who had been taken away.

“Get in,” Si Zhuo said. “After one hundred days of sleep, your future will change.”

Wang Jie asked, “Then… can I cultivate aura while I’m there?”

Si Zhuo shook his head. “No.”

“Why?”

“Because you are Hundred Coffins,” Si Zhuo said calmly. “Hundred Coffins handle infiltration, assassination, contests, intelligence, and countless other tasks. But the most important task is passing on the incense line.”

Si Zhuo’s smile thinned.

“If you cultivate my Corpse Sect’s aura, then once you return to Black-White Heaven, they’ll see it instantly. That’s why you can cultivate nothing.”

Wang Jie stared at him. “Then what’s the point of becoming Hundred Coffins at all?”

Si Zhuo’s voice turned amused. “Are you asking for benefits?”