Vampire Progenitor of the Immortal World

Chapter 83: Chapter 63 : The trail (2)

Ethan didn’t enter.

His current appearance wasn’t ideal.

The robe he’d been wearing since the river was torn in several places, and traces of dried blood remained on the fabric. To someone who knew what had happened, it might be enough to attract attention.

And Ethan had no way of knowing whether news of the escaped cultivator had already reached this place.

He moved around the outskirts instead, searching for somewhere out of sight. Eventually, he found a secluded gap between several temporary structures and slipped inside.

A short while later, he emerged wearing a long dark-brown outer robe. The hood came far enough forward to conceal most of his face, while the loose fabric covered the damaged clothes beneath.

It wasn’t an elaborate disguise. It didn’t need to be. Ethan only needed to stop looking like someone who had recently survived a battle.

He left the gathering from another direction without speaking to anyone. Once the temporary settlement disappeared behind him, he continued deeper into the wilderness. For some time, nothing disturbed the journey.

Then Ethan’s blood picked up something.

He slowed.

Several presences were approaching from behind. He didn’t turn around immediately. He simply continued walking.

The strongest presence belonged to a Qi Refining cultivator. The others were weaker, all of them at Body Tempering. Ethan’s eyes narrowed slightly.

They could simply be traveling in the same direction.

He kept moving, paying little attention to them at first. But after a while, he changed his course. A short distance later, the group changed theirs as well.

Ethan glanced over his shoulder. Nothing about their movements looked unusual from a distance, but they had followed the change. Ethan kept his perception n the group. Nothing about their movements seemed unusual at first, but when he changed direction, the presences shifted with him.

He altered his course again.

They followed again.

Ethan’s suspicion deepened. That was too precise.

He broke into a run.

His steps quickly lengthened into a full sprint, his body cutting between the trees as branches and wet leaves flashed past him. The damp ground gave way beneath his feet, but he barely slowed. He didn’t know whether the group was truly following him, but he had no intention of waiting around to find out.

Behind him, the distance began to widen. One presence after another faded from the range of his blood perception. The Body Tempering cultivators were falling behind.

But one remained.

The Qi Refining cultivator.

Ethan’s expression hardened. He pushed his speed higher. The distance widened again. For a moment, the cultivator’s presence nearly disappeared. Then it returned. Still behind him. Ethan slowed slightly.

That was strange.

The early Qi Refining presence shouldn’t be fast enough to catch him, yet he hadn’t lost him either. Ethan changed direction sharply, and the cultivator adjusted almost at once. Ethan changed direction again. The cultivator followed.

Ethan accelerated.

Still there.

He stopped treating the pursuit as coincidence.

They were following him.

But how?

He had changed direction several times, varied his speed, and moved away from the road into terrain where ordinary tracking would become difficult.

Yet the Qi Refining cultivator continued to find him. Ethan kept moving, his mind working through the possibilities.

They shouldnt weren’t following his footprints. At least, not entirely. If they were, the repeated changes in direction should have created more delay. Instead, the pursuer seemed to know which way to go.

Not exactly where Ethan was. But where he needed to go to continue finding him. That distinction bothered Ethan.

Ethan accelerated again.

He kept running, even after the presence behind him had grown faint. The forest rushed past as he pushed farther from the road, putting more and more ground between himself and anything he had left behind.

The presence remained. Ethan didn’t slow down.

Not yet.

Ethan let his Blood Perception spread behind him. Only one presence remained within range; the others were already too far away to matter.

That changed things.

He didn’t know whether more cultivators were coming or whether the others had been sent along another route, but allowing the pursuit to continue was dangerous. If it dragged on, there was no telling how many more people might eventually become involved.

He needed to break it.

He scanned the terrain as he ran.

Then he saw a stream.

It wasn’t wide. Water moved steadily between the banks, breaking around stones and exposed roots. Ethan’s eyes lingered on it as an idea began to form.

More like a gamble.

He changed course toward the stream.

When he reached the stream, Ethan stepped into the water and moved toward the middle, where the current was shallow enough for him to stand. He lowered himself until he was mostly beneath the surface and kept still, letting the rushing water and scattered stones break up his outline.

Then he waited.

He didn’t know whether it would work. If the pursuer knew his exact location, hiding here would accomplish nothing. But if the man only knew the direction...

Ethan waited.

The Qi Refining presence approached.

Fast.

The cultivator appeared on the bank. Ethan’s breath caught. Those familiar robes. Azure Cloud Sect. For a moment, the suspicion that had been following him since the pursuit became certainty. It was them.

They really had followed him this far.

Ethan remained still beneath the water as the cultivator continued toward the stream. Spiritual energy gathered beneath the man’s feet. His body lightened, and he crossed the narrow stream in several quick movements, barely disturbing the water before landing on the opposite bank.

Ethan remained submerged.

The cultivator went farther.

Then stopped.

Silence.

Ethan watched through the moving water as the man’s expression changed. He reached inside his robe and pulled out a small object.

A thin piece of paper. The cultivator shook it, and a faint spiritual glow appeared across its surface. Ethan’s eyes narrowed as the man studied the object before looking ahead. He found nothing. His gaze shifted to one side, then the other, but there was still nothing to see. His expression tightened.

He turned and looked behind him.

Ethan understood.

Something had changed. The direction the man had been following was no longer correct. The cultivator turned around.

Ethan moved.

Water exploded around him as Ethan surged from the stream. Droplets scattered into the air, but before they could fall back into the water, Ethan had already crossed the bank and covered the distance between them. The cultivator barely had time to turn. Ethan was already in front of him.

Ethan’s short dao flashed toward him before the cultivator could properly gather his Qi. The man’s body reacted on instinct. Qi burst from his body, forming a thin barrier just as the blade struck. The impact knocked him backward, his feet scraping across the wet ground as the hastily formed barrier shuddered beneath the blow.

"What!"

Ethan was already moving.

He stepped in and slashed again before the cultivator could regain his footing or gather enough Qi for another defense. This time, there was no barrier between them. The blade struck, and the cultivator stumbled back hard.

"You!" He angrily glared at Ethan.

Ethan followed immediately, giving him no room to create distance.

"You actually stopped running!"

Ethan didn’t answer.

He stepped in again.

The cultivator hurriedly raised his weapon to block. The impact shook his arm, forcing him back several steps.

"Do you know what you are doing?" he shouted, his voice strained as he fought to steady himself.

"Do you think you can just..."

Ethan attacked again.

The man’s words broke off as he twisted aside. The blade passed close enough to tear through his robe. He stumbled, caught himself, and immediately tried to gather his Qi.

Ethan didn’t give him the chance.

Another strike came before the Qi could fully circulate. The cultivator barely managed to raise his sword in time, and the force of the blow drove him backward.

"You..!" His voice shook with anger.

Ethan’s gaze flicked briefly toward the talisman in his hand. The cultivator noticed.

His fingers tightened around it.

"You think this will save you?" As he glanced at the talisman still clenched in his hand.

"My fellow disciples are already coming!" he shouted, almost as if saying it could force Ethan to hesitate.

"They’ll catch up to you!"

Ethan’s dao came again. The cultivator blocked it clumsily, his footing slipping on the wet ground. He tried to create distance, but Ethan was already in front of him.

"You demonic cultivator!" The words came out almost as a snarl now.

"What kind of technique are you using?"

Ethan gave him no answer. He attacked again.

The cultivator’s face twisted with frustration. He raised his sword, blocking one strike before another forced him back. His breathing had grown heavier, and the Qi he was trying to gather kept breaking apart under Ethan’s attacks.

"Surrender now!" he shouted, his voice carrying more anger than confidence.

"My fellow disciples will be here soon!"

"you can escape this time around"

Ethan saw the fear beneath the anger.

Backup?

That was what the man was relying on. Perhaps they really were coming. Perhaps they weren’t. Ethan wasn’t going to wait around to find out. The cultivator suddenly raised his weapon and tried to attack.

Ethan moved first.

His dao cut low, catching the man’s leg. The cultivator cried out and collapsed onto the wet ground. His weapon slipped from his hand as he reached toward Ethan.

"You..."

Ethan stepped back, keeping the blade ready as the man’s face twisted with rage.

"You won’t escape this!"

"You are done!"

Ethan ignored him.

Ethan stepped forward and snatched the talisman from the man’s hand. He didn’t stay to see what the man would do next. He turned and disappeared into the forest in a blur. Ethan didn’t stop until the stream and the cultivator were far behind him.

Only after putting enough distance between himself and the cultivator did Ethan slow down. He let his Blood Perception spread through the surrounding area, searching for any other presence nearby.

Nothing.

He waited a little longer, keeping still as he listened to the forest around him.

Still nothing.

Ethan finally looked down at the object in his hand. The talisman was small enough to fit comfortably between two fingers. It was made from thin, treated paper, its surface slightly yellow beneath the faint traces of moisture from the stream. Fine cinnabar-colored lines covered it in a compact pattern, converging toward a small eye-looking formation at the center.

Nothing about it looked particularly impressive, but Ethan had already seen what it could do. He turned the talisman over in his hand, examining it from different angles, but nothing happened. He held it still for several breaths as he directed faint qi into it before a faint warmth slowly appeared beneath his fingers.

Ethan’s eyes narrowed.

He took several steps in one direction. The warmth weakened almost immediately. He stopped, turned, and walked back the way he had come. The faint warmth returned beneath his fingers.

So it reacted to distance.

Ethan stood still for a moment, watching the sensation remain steady. It wasn’t pointing to a precise location. It was giving him a direction.

He tested it again, moving farther away. The warmth weakened until, after putting enough distance between himself and the area, it disappeared completely. When he returned, the faint response appeared again.

Ethan remained silent as the pieces came together. They hadn’t been following his footprints. They had been following a signal. Somehow, this talisman was linked to him, and its effective range was limited.

That explained why the Body Tempering cultivators had eventually fallen behind. It also explained how the Qi Refining cultivator had kept finding him whenever Ethan changed direction. The man hadn’t known Ethan’s exact location. He had only known which way to search.

Ethan looked at the talisman again.

He didn’t know how the connection had been established. Perhaps it was related to something taken from him during the earlier confrontation. Perhaps there was another method involved.

He couldn’t be certain, and that uncertainty was enough to keep Ethan from relaxing. How many of these talismans did the sect possess? One? Several? Dozens? He had no way of knowing.

And what other functions this particular talisman might have that he hadn’t discovered yet. Could another talisman locate this one? Could it transmit something back to the sect? Could they use it to learn more about him than simply his direction?

Ethan turned the talisman over in his hand again. He had no answers.

He didn’t know if carrying it with him would give the sect another way to find him. Ethan made his decision and crushed the talisman between his fingers. The spiritual pattern broke apart. The faint warmth vanished, and the paper tore into pieces beneath his grip. He let the fragments fall to the ground and watched them for a moment.

The pursuit had taught him something he couldn’t ignore. He had thought that putting enough distance between himself and the his pursuers would be enough. His speed had allowed him to leave the weaker cultivators behind, and he had even managed to draw the one of the sect’s disciples away from the others. But none of that had mattered once the sect had a way to keep finding him.

Ethan looked toward the forest ahead. Distance alone wasn’t enough. At least not anymore. He needed to know what other methods the sect could use to track him, how far those methods could reach, and what other things he might have missed. Until he understood that, disappearing would only be temporary.

Ethan turned and continued onward.

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