Rise of The Demon General

Pai Ning's hand was behind Amon's neck. The hand was currently bright purple. It formed a claw and was digging into Amon's skin. Amon fell to the ground.

"Wha… What… have you done… to me…?" Amon said weakly.

"I have hit you with my poison claw," Pai Ning answered.

"Wh… Why…?"

"Hmph, a weakling like you won't survive in this place, it's better that I end your suffering now. For a beginning Strength stage like you, you won't survive my poison. I should have just finished you now, end your misery. But considering that you have aided me a little before, I will let you live a while more."

"But… but…"

"Stop whining, you miserable boy!" Pai Ning kicked Amon. "It should take my poison a few hours more to reach your heart. You just savor whatever time you have left. Now, give me that!"

Pai Ning forcefully tore the two rings from Amon's fingers. It was a common space ring and an odd-looking black ring. She tried to send her consciousness to the black ring.

"What is this? Just a rubbish ring!" She threw the black ring to the ground. She then checked the space ring. Amon had cut the connection to this common ring beforehand, allowing her to delve inside the ring easily, creating the illusion that her cultivation level was higher.

"What have you been doing all this time, sightseeing? There is barely anything inside here!" Pai Ning uttered. Amon had also transferred all the stuff into his black space ring, only leaving a few worthless things inside his common space ring.

Pai Ning still stored Amon's space ring in hers. She then left without sparing Amon another look. Amon just watched her go.

After she was out of sight, Amon grabbed his black space ring and stood up. He touched the back of his neck. There were still some itches there. The girl's poison was rather potent, but his poison repelling pill was good enough to neutralize the poison.

Afterward, he tailed Pai Ning covertly.

*

Pai Ning took two and a half-day to arrive at the area where she could see the pyramid structure. Luckily, the girl didn't travel off course. Otherwise, Amon would have needed to do something covertly to redirect her in the right direction. In that time, Amon's fingers had grown. His cut hand was now back to normal.

Pai Ning took longer than Amon had told her because she was walking leisurely. 'Did she enter this dimension just for sightseeing?' Amon thought.

The girl was visibly excited when she saw the structure and immediately ran towards it.

'So careless,' Amon thought.

He continued to follow her from a safe distance. Hiding from one cover to the next just in case the girl somehow had the urge to look back.

Amon saw the girl enter one of the openings at the top of the pyramid. He ran to a different side and climbed the stairs on that side. After reaching up there, he hid beside the opening before peeking inside.

The girl was still looking at the carvings on the floor.

'Don't tell me she cannot tell which ones are the drawings of the serpents…?' Amon thought.

After some time, Pai Ning crouched down before slowly placing her two hands on the floor. Amon saw the spots she was placing her hands to were the correct spots. Pai Ning then started transferring her aether onto the floor. The two serpent carvings on the floor started shining once she did.

Pai Ning was visibly startled by the change, but the surprise soon turned to excitement. This meant that the boy wasn't lying to her. There truly was something here. She poured her aether onto the floor more vigorously. The glow on the floor started to spread out slowly. Not just on the serpents' carvings but was spreading outward.

The glow was growing slowly, though. It didn't even cover one-third of the floor yet when Amon saw Pai Ning's face become pale. She must have almost depleted her aether reserve.

Pai Ning tried to endure. The thought of finding hidden treasures in this dimension excited her greatly. She had heard about past expeditions. Not every youngster who came in here found valuable items. But those who did were lauded by the elders and were rewarded bountiful cultivation resources. If she managed to bring back treasures to the sect, her future success would be set in stone. She might even acquire a better position than her father who was simply a common elder.

Yet, she could feel herself become weaker with each passing second. She couldn't continue for long. Maybe she could rest first and then continue again later? She hoped the glow on the floor would not dissipate. She stopped transferring her aether. Or at least, tried to stop transferring her aether, but the aether inside her was still flowing into the floor.

"What…?" She uttered with an unsettling feeling.

She then tried to remove her hands from the floor. But as her hand left the floor, tendrils of dark energy shot out and coiled around her hands. They then pulled and forced her hands back onto the floor again.

"What the…! Let me go…!!!" Pai Ning shouted.

Yet, the black tendrils continued to grip her tightly, not letting her hands leave the floor. All the while, her aether continued to flow against her will. The floor was sucking her aether forcefully from her body.

'As I have thought, there's danger associated with this mechanism,' Amon thought as he watched the scene.

"No! No! Let me go! Let me go!" Pai Ning was yelling hysterically as she continued to try to pry her hands off the floor, with no success.

"No… no…" Her voice became weaker.

"No… I… I am… an elder's daughter… I… I was… destined… for greatness… I can't… die… here…"

She was getting so weak that she had trouble supporting herself. She laid flat on the floor with her two hands still stuck at the serpents' mouths.

She was so weak that Amon no longer bother to hide. He stood at the opening as she watched the dying girl without any emotion. No satisfaction for getting back at the person who had attacked him from behind, nor pity for a helpless girl in need of help. She was just a means to an end.

"Yo… you…" Pai Ning's eyes turned wide when she saw Amon's figure, but she had no strength to curse or scold or ask anything.

Her eyes slowly closed unwillingly, there was a tear coming out from her eyes before they closed.

After a while, the black tendrils released their grips and disappeared back into the floor. Before it did, the glow on the floor suddenly grew exponentially. It did not cover half the room before, but now, almost all the floor was glowing, leaving only the outer rim. Amon estimated there was still around 10% left of the floor area that was not glowing.

Amon waited for a brief while before stepping inside. He put one foot in first. When nothing happened, he did the same on the glowing floor. After making sure no black tendrils were coming out of the floor, he walked on the glowing floor towards the center. He paid attention to the shine as he walked. The edge of the shining parts was slowly receding.

'It doesn't last,' he thought. One with low cultivation won't be able to open the entrance to this pyramid. That's what it meant by the weak would perish. Amon estimated Pai Ning to be an Intermediate Strength stage cultivator, someone who had just entered the intermediate stage not long ago. But even with her cultivation, it was not enough to fill up half the room. Amon thought the requirement to enter must be one who was a strong peak Strength stage. Someone who was just a half-step toward entering the Transformation stage. Or could even be someone that had entered the Transformation stage. Considering this dimension only allowed youths of fifteen age or below, that was a very stringent requirement.

However, the spike at the last moment intrigued him. Could it be because Pai Ning had lost her life? He did read the theory that one's soul contained a large amount of aether. The spike was probably Pai Ning's life which was absorbed by the floor, allowing it to almost fill up the room.

Amon couldn't dally. The glow was receding. If it receded completely, then Pai Ning's aether would have been wasted. There was no guarantee that he could find another cultivator after this. Even more so of finding someone foolish enough to be duped like Pai Ning here.

Amon hurriedly came to the center of the room. He pushed Pai Ning's body aside and without hesitation placed his hands on the carvings of the two serpents' mouths.

There was a time not to take a risk, there was a time to. This was the time to take one. He only needed to fill up around 10% more to light up the entire floor. It shouldn't be a problem with his cultivation level.