The wound on Bao Gu’s calf made every step she took excruciatingly painful. Normally, the hemostatic medicine sprinkled on the wound would stop the bleeding, but her movement caused the already sealed wound to bleed again, soaking through the cloth she had tied around it. The blood seeped through the fabric and trickled down her calf, dropping onto the fallen leaves on the ground. The intense pain caused her to sweat profusely, making each step extremely difficult.
Bao Gu dared not continue walking. Her wounds were bleeding, and wherever she went, the scent of blood would attract wild beasts. If she kept moving, she would either be eaten by beasts or bleed out due to the constant movement preventing her wounds from healing. She had to stop to treat her injuries and prepare for any potential attacks from wild animals.
Dragging her injured leg, she limped around to gather branches and leaves, then used her axe to sweep the fallen leaves into a pile. She took out a fire striker from her storage bag and lit the leaves, adding more branches to the fire.
Once the fire was blazing, Bao Gu finally felt a bit safer. She gathered more dry branches and leaves to light six fires. These fires were placed six to ten feet apart, forming a large circle. Fighting off dizziness, she collected more leaves for later use and chopped down a small tree, slightly thicker than her arm, splitting it into three-foot lengths to dry by the fire.
After all this, Bao Gu sat down within the circle of fire, unwrapped the cloth from her calf wound, and applied more hemostatic medicine. She took out two spiritual medicines from her storage bag that could regenerate flesh, stop bleeding, and replenish her qi, and ate them. She then took out some rabbit meat she had cooked that morning and tore off two legs to satisfy her hunger.
Perhaps due to the blood loss, Bao Gu felt extremely tired. She dared not sleep in these beast-infested woods, so she sat cross-legged and circulated the scant amount of qi in her dantian, practicing her cultivation while keeping her ears alert. Any rustling of leaves would cause her to open her eyes and grab her bow and arrow, ready to aim at the source of the noise, only to find rabbits, mice, squirrels, or deer passing by, or just the wind stirring the leaves on the ground.
Bao Gu had chosen a relatively open area where the sparse bushes couldn’t hide large beasts.
As night fell, Bao Gu heard the footsteps of wild animals in the darkness of the woods and saw the faint glow of their eyes flickering among the trees. She even sensed a beast circling her from a distance.
The forest was constantly noisy, with low growls and high-pitched roars, as well as sounds of fighting and running.
Bao Gu was on high alert, keeping her bow and arrow in hand and her axe by her side. Her wounds seemed to be healing, itching unbearably, making her very uncomfortable.
Perhaps because of the fires, the beasts did not approach.
Bao Gu kept an eye on the fires, thinking that as long as they didn’t go out, she should be fine since beasts are afraid of fire.
However, maintaining six fires required a lot of firewood. With her injuries, Bao Gu couldn’t gather much, and by midnight, there was hardly any left. She reduced the size of the fires to conserve wood, but it still wasn’t enough. Eventually, she had to reduce the number of fires from six to one, and even that couldn’t last until dawn.
Without a night watchman or an hourglass to tell time, she had no idea what hour it was and could only hope for daylight to come soon.
Bao Gu was alone in the wilderness, with no one to rely on for rescue. She knew that there were only four people on Lingyun Peak, including herself. Her Martial Aunt, the Great White Snake, was in seclusion at the bottom of the pool, preparing for the great tribulation of transformation; Yu Mi’s master, who had never appeared, was even less likely to help, and Bao Gu didn’t even know whether Yu Mi’s master was male or female, let alone their whereabouts. Relying on Yu Mi was also impossible, as she hadn’t appeared for three months, and even if she had something to look for her, she wouldn’t appear at night. The chances of Yu Mi passing by and noticing her under a tree in the depths of the forest were even slimmer, considering the vastness of Lingyun Peak and the fact that Yu Mi always flew high on her flying sword.
Suddenly, rapid footsteps charged towards her. Without thinking, Bao Gu grabbed her axe with her right hand and a burning stick with her left, standing up and turning to the right to see a dark shadow pouncing towards her. The shadow was smaller than the tiger she had encountered during the day, but its ferocity was terrifying. Bao Gu shouted and swung her axe at the shadow. She put all her strength into the swing, and due to fear and panic, as well as the long period of cultivating qi in her dantian, she unconsciously mobilized the qi in her dantian while swinging the axe.
It was a glossy black panther.
It pounced directly at Bao Gu, its claws aiming for her face.
Bao Gu swung her axe just as its claws were about to reach her, the sharp blade striking its forehead. At the same time, she smashed the burning stick onto its body, breaking the stick and sending sparks flying. The impact made her left hand ache.
The axe also struck the panther’s forehead heavily, first encountering resistance, then suddenly lightening as it pierced through the panther’s head. Bao Gu saw something, along with blood, fly off diagonally from the panther’s head.
After her axe fell, the panther also crashed heavily to the ground.
By the light of the fire, Bao Gu saw the panther’s head split open, revealing the red and white of its brain, its upper jaw gone, leaving only the lower jaw, teeth, and tongue exposed. The sight was as gory and chilling as it gets. She suddenly heard a very light rustling of leaves behind her and, out of sheer terror, turned around and swung her axe without checking if it was just the wind. As her axe swung down, she saw a shadow flash under the blade and leap to the side. She took a closer look and felt a chill run up her spine. If she hadn’t been cautious and turned around to swing her axe, she would have been dead!
A panther was staring at her from about a dozen feet away, growling threateningly.
Bao Gu, filled with fear and anger, gripped her axe and charged at the panther! She was too scared to cry and too scared to run. Now facing a wild beast, she had to fight for her life. She used the combat techniques she had learned, swinging her axe with a whoosh, creating a shield of axe shadows that flickered with cold light. As she charged forward, the panther leaped back several feet, creating distance between them. Seeing the panther retreat, Bao Gu’s fear lessened slightly. She realized that beasts could also be afraid, just like when she was surrounded by a pack of wolves earlier that day. She fought desperately, and the wolves retreated. They stared at her, and she stared back fiercely, and then the wolves withdrew.
This realization calmed Bao Gu a bit, and she focused on recalling the life-saving combat techniques she had learned over the past few days.
Combat techniques prioritize fighting spirit over fighting skills. In a narrow encounter, the brave prevail. When two strong opponents meet, it’s often the one who is not afraid to die and dares to fight desperately who comes out on top. Bao Gu thought of how she had just killed another panther with a single axe blow and her confidence soared. She told herself that beasts weren’t as scary as she thought. She had an axe and knew combat techniques. Beasts were just animals, slightly more dangerous than rabbits. She still had to skin them for blankets—the most important thing was that if she was afraid, if she ran, if she didn’t kill them, they would eat her. She shouted in her heart, “I don’t want to be eaten! Panthers, give me your skins!” She swung her axe and chased after the panther, the nearly ten-pound axe making a heavy whooshing sound.
The panther leaped back several feet and then turned to roar threateningly at Bao Gu.
Bao Gu swung her axe with the techniques from her combat training, her confidence growing with each swing. Ignoring the panther’s threatening roars, she let out a loud shout and accelerated towards the panther.
The panther suddenly turned and sprinted away, disappearing into the darkness.
Bao Gu shouted, “Don’t run!” The tearing pain in her calf returned, and after chasing a few steps, she stopped. Even though she had practiced qi cultivation for four months and had become much stronger and more agile, she was no match for the panther’s speed in the forest. If it weren’t for her sharp axe, she would have been scratched or bitten to death by the panther in a direct confrontation.
With the panther gone, Bao Gu turned to head back to the fire but noticed several pairs of green eyes staring at her from a distance. They formed a semi-circle, their green pupils shining like assassins in the darkness.
Wolves again!
As far as she knew, wild animals generally did not attack humans. Why did the animals here seem to have a grudge against her? Could it be that they found her nourished by spiritual medicines and fruits, her body tender and fragrant, free of impurities and dirt, and thought she would be delicious?
If the wolves swarmed her like they did that afternoon, she might get bitten several more times. She had been lucky not to be bitten in a vital spot that afternoon, but if she were surrounded again, she didn’t know if she would be so fortunate, especially with her injuries.
Combat techniques say the best defense is offense!
Bao Gu took a deep breath, enduring the pain in her calf, and once again swung her axe, charging towards the spot where four pairs of eyes were clustered.
As she charged at the four wolves, they quickly turned and dodged. The rest of the wolves pounced from both sides.
They were going to kill her and eat her here!
Bao Gu’s eyes turned red! She was going to fight them! She swung her axe, using the techniques she had learned from combat training, and struck at the wolves that pounced in front of her. The wolves surrounded her from all directions, and she was surrounded by the shadows of charging wolves! Bao Gu swung her axe fiercely, chopping, slashing, cleaving, wiping, smashing, sweeping, and blocking, continuously striking at the wolves that came close, until blood and flesh flew and the wolves’ howls of pain filled the air. Bao Gu felt her back and arms being scratched by the wolves’ paws, although she managed to fend them off with her axe and wasn’t pinned down or bitten. Still, her injuries persisted and increased. Her injured leg was bitten again, and the wolf that bit her had its head chopped off by her axe, its mouth still attached to her leg until she knocked down another wolf and the wolf’s head fell off.
After a fierce battle, Bao Gu was panting heavily.
Finally, the two wolves in front of her ran away with their tails between their legs!
Bao Gu looked around and saw no standing wolves.
The ground was littered with incomplete wolf corpses, none intact. Some were headless, others missing legs or split in half, some cut at the waist, and others with their bellies ripped open. Two wolves were not completely dead; one with a broken leg tried to stand up, but Bao Gu smashed its head with her axe, and it lay down, never to rise again. Another wolf lay on the ground, unable to crawl but still breathing. Bao Gu smashed its head with another axe blow, and it stopped breathing. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a light not far away. Looking up, she saw the two wolves that had run away watching her from a distance, and then the two pairs of green eyes disappeared, probably walking away.
The surroundings were silent, with no more animal noises.
Bao Gu sat down on the blood-stained leaves, gasping for air. Her back burned with pain, and her arms were covered in bloody wounds. Her clothes were torn to shreds, full of holes. She was covered in blood, some her own, but mostly from the wolves.
Bao Gu took out water from her storage bag and gulped it down, then stuffed a piece of spiritual medicine that could stop bleeding and stave off hunger into her mouth before crawling back to the fire to sit. She was tired and sleepy but dared not sleep, keeping her ears open for any sounds around her.
Before long, she heard the low growls of wild animals in the nearby woods.
She grabbed her axe and stood up, looking around from time to time.
The night was dark, and apart from the occasional glow of animal eyes, she could see nothing. She dared not move rashly, only occasionally walking a few steps to kick leaves into the fire to keep the sparse light from going out. The fire grew smaller and smaller, barely enough to illuminate. If the fire went out and she was plunged into darkness, Bao Gu would have no way out. She dared not let the fire go out, so she rummaged through her storage bag, even if it meant burning her clothes to keep the fire alive. She threw her blood-soaked, tattered clothes by the fire, slowly igniting them, and the fire grew a bit stronger.
The surroundings gradually quieted down.
Bao Gu’s clothes became fewer and fewer, until she was left with only a new set of outer disciple robes on her body, having burned all her clothes in the storage bag.
Finally, daylight came!
As the dim light brightened and the surrounding scenery gradually became clear, and when she saw no more beasts around, Bao Gu excitedly raised her head and let out a loud “Ah—” which turned into a “Woo—” as she burst into tears. She wanted to go home, back to her small courtyard with solid walls.
After crying for a while, Bao Gu felt a little better. She wiped her tears, ate the remaining half of the cooked rabbit meat with sobs, collected the dead wolves into her storage bag, and sat under a big tree with her axe, closing her eyes to cultivate. When she finished cultivating, she felt a bit better, but after a sleepless night, she was still tired and sleepy. She leaned against the tree with her axe and dozed off, not daring to sleep deeply, occasionally waking up in fright.
Later, the sun came out, and the bright sunlight shone on her face.
Seeing the sun, she remembered that her home faced north, and she had entered the forest on the north side of the house. To return, she should head south. She had only traveled for half a day, so if she was going in the right direction, she should be able to get back by the afternoon.
Bao Gu determined her direction by the sun and, dragging her battered body and carrying her axe, headed south.
Along the way, she encountered more wild animals.
If the animals didn’t pay attention to her, she would be cautious but ignore them. If any animal stared at her and showed signs of attacking, she would immediately swing her axe and charge at them. Although she couldn’t catch up due to her injured leg, her desperate demeanor scared the tigers and leopards into running away. With too many injuries and despite not being hit in vital spots and having spiritual medicine, she couldn’t withstand the blood loss, which made her pale and weak. She relied on the spirit of going home to keep going. Later, when she had no more strength, she had to try using the qi in her dantian to maintain her physical strength. During the qi cultivation stage, refining essence into qi, the qi in the dantian is transformed from essence and the energy of heaven and earth, so it should have some effect. She tried to mobilize the pitiful amount of qi in her dantian and found it somewhat relieving. If she felt too tired, she would sit and cultivate to rest or nibble on a piece of spiritual medicine. She didn’t walk fast, fearing another bloody battle with wild animals, and was very careful to conserve her strength. By the afternoon, she felt much more energetic and her wounds had stopped bleeding and were no longer painful. All her wounds itched, making her twist and rub against things as she walked, itching unbearably but not daring to scratch.
Bao Gu was very alert to the sounds around her but didn’t notice a figure flying past her on a rainbow sword in the sky behind her. The figure flew back to look at her for a while before turning away. That person was Yu Mi. Bao Gu didn’t know that Yu Mi had left her a good review in her heart: “Knowing to go to the wilderness to temper herself with wild beasts shows progress!”
