Junior Sister is skilled in subduing demons.

Chapter 205 The Thousand-Year-Old Shu Road

She looked at Ge Wensong, the boy who was using a twig to trace a path in the snow, his brows furrowed.

"The greatest enemy of the cultivation world has always been the demonic army." The cultivator pulled out a sheepskin map from his robes and spread it out with trembling hands: "The Go people will be dealt with by the human alliance. Your mission is to prevent the demonic army from getting involved!"

Ge Wensong suddenly looked up: "Why has this Shu Road been neglected for thousands of years?"

"Dangerous, the Shu Road is harder than ascending to heaven." After saying this, the cultivator stuffed the map into Shen Anzhi's hand and took off the signal tube from his waist: "Light it when you get to Longding Mountain, and disciples will come to meet you."

As they parted, the cultivator suddenly looked at Tuantuan, who was huddled behind Anzhi. The Iron-Eating Beast was scratching at the wolf fang marks on his armor with its claws. He paused for a moment, then revealed a desolate smile: "Iron-Eating Beast... well, it was this kind of spirit creature that assisted Ancestor Longbrow in sealing the Demon Realm back then."

And so, Shen Anzhi and Ge Wensong abandoned the main road and turned to head towards the narrow path of Shu Road.

Anzhi unfolded the map, the route outlined in vermilion trembling slightly in the wind, like a pulsating vein. Ge Wensong's sword tassel brushed against the back of her hand, bringing a touch of warmth: "Don't be afraid, I'm here."

Tuantuan suddenly let out a short whimper and looked up towards the direction of Dragon Cauldron Mountain. The night sky there was dyed crimson gold by the firelight, and the faint sounds of war drums and the roars of demon soldiers could be heard.

Anzhi gripped the map and the demon-slaying sword tightly, his fingertips unconsciously tracing the four characters "Millennial Shu Road".

“Let’s go.” Anzhi took the lead, his cloak fluttering in the wind behind him.

The ancient Shu Road.

The heatwave rolled through the canyon like lava, and Shen Anzhi's boots were so hot that he had to pull his feet back as soon as they touched the rocks at the edge of the cliff.

The ancient Shu Road before us is like a crack cleaved by a giant axe, embedded between towering cliffs. It was the only passage between the ancient Qiang people and the Deng people of the snowy region to the Land of Abundance in ancient times. At this moment, the chisel marks on the rock face still bear the marks of time. In some places, you can see blurry rock paintings. Deng people carrying tributes cross the river on chains, ancient Shu warriors with swords fight with wild beasts, and the totem of the black bird looks down on all living beings from the highest point.

"Hold on tight to this ancient vine." Ge Wensong's voice came through the hot wind. He had already climbed three zhang ahead, his fingertips, calloused from digging into the rock crevices, glistening with sweat.

Anzhi grabbed the ancient vine, which was as thick as her wrist. The surface of the vine was covered with amber-colored resin, which emitted a strange sweet fragrance. As soon as she got close, Ge Wensong stopped her: "Don't smell it. This is the sap of the Bewitching Vine. An ordinary person will fall off a cliff if he takes a sip."

The sun was scorching hot, almost melting people. The exposed rock walls reflected blinding light, and even the scabbard of the demon-slaying sword was too hot to touch. The air was filled with a rusty, metallic stench, a mixture of the corrosive fumes from the rotting corpses and poisonous plants below the cliff.

Anzhi unscrewed the demon-refining gourd at her waist, and the spicy barley wine slid down her throat, barely suppressing the burning sensation. This was the third gourd of wine she had drunk today. Her spiritual power was being consumed extremely quickly under the corrosive influence of the stench. If she were not a cultivator, she would probably have already turned into a pile of white bones at the bottom of the cliff, just like the martyrs in those rock paintings.

“Look here.” Ge Wensong suddenly stopped in front of a recessed rock face. The stone surface was covered with densely packed symbols, some resembling the bone arrows of a warrior, others the scales of a black python, and in the deepest part, the outline of an iron-eating beast, its claws resting on a ball of flame. “It’s like a warning left by our predecessors.” Ge Wensong’s fingertips brushed over the carvings, and he suddenly frowned: “The corrosive aura is getting stronger and stronger.”

As they rounded a bend, the sight ahead made both of them hold their breath. A slightly open cliff platform had become a temporary refuge, where refugees huddled in the shadows of the rocks, most of them pale and emaciated. Some had blackened strips of cloth wrapped around their legs, marks from burns caused by poisonous plants. Further away, in the crevices of the rocks, several corpses had begun to decompose, half-hidden by vines, clearly having not survived the deadly Shu Road.

"Girl, save us..." A woman carrying a child struggled to rush over, her arms covered in red rashes: "The Ge people have blocked the main road, this is the only way to go, but the demonic grass on this cliff..."

Before the words were even finished, the ferns on the cliff edge suddenly shook violently. Those seemingly ordinary leaves abruptly stood upright, their edges gleaming with a cold, serrated light, and their roots transformed into bluish-black tendrils, coiling towards the nearest child like venomous snakes.

"It's a plant spirit!" Anzhi swung his sword, severing the tendrils with a flash of light. Thick green liquid gushed from the cut, dripping onto the rocks with a "sizzling" sound, carving out small pits.

Just then, a black and white figure darted out from behind Anzhi with a "howl." It was Tuantuan that pounced on the thickest tentacle, opened its mouth, and bit down hard.

"Tuan Tuan!" An Zhi exclaimed. The plant spirit's green liquid splashed onto Tuan Tuan's fur, but was deflected by the bronze patterns that appeared on its body, as if coated with an invisible barrier.

Suddenly, it exerted its strength and uprooted the entire fern spirit, which was several meters tall, and slammed it against the rock wall like a whip.

With a loud "bang," the plant spirit's main stem snapped, and green liquid splattered everywhere. The remaining poisonous plants rushed forward in a frenzy, but were brutally broken by Tuantuan's body, and its claws smashed the flower buds full of poison sacs.

In a short while, the once menacing plant spirit was crushed into a pile of rotten leaves. Tuan Tuan stood amidst the mess, shook the grass clippings off its head, and suddenly lowered its head, using its uninjured right paw to pry open a piece of rotten leaf and pull out a fist-sized berry.

Shen Anzhi and Ge Wensong were dumbfounded. This was no longer the simple-minded beast that snatched food in the pigsty. The fangs it revealed when it tore apart the plant spirit, and the power it unleashed when it snapped the poisonous vine, clearly carried the ferocity of an ancient spirit beast.

Especially the bronze armor, which could completely resist the corrosive aura. Even the poison that the Demon-Slaying Sword had to be wary of was like nothing to it.

“It…” An Zhi was speechless for a moment, then suddenly remembered the words of the old man in the bamboo forest: the Iron-Eating Beast was the mount of an ancient war god, which fed on refined iron and could refine the turbid energy of heaven and earth. So those habits that she had regarded as naughty were actually instincts hidden in her blood.

Ge Wensong suddenly chuckled and reached out to rub Tuantuan's head: "It seems that Tuantuan's potential has been activated after he went out and started a business with the monkey, hahaha."

After hearing this, Tuantuan rolled its eyes and slowly continued walking towards the Shu Road. It had hated Ge Wensong before because it felt that Ge Wensong's appearance in the bamboo forest had changed Anzhi's attitude towards it. Now it hated him too, hated that Anzhi, a human, wanted to use it as a mount...

Seeing Tuan Tuan's haughty demeanor, Ge Wensong wisely turned to look at An Zhi, took out a clean handkerchief from his pocket, and carefully wiped away the sweat and mud from An Zhi's cheeks: "Let's rest first, distribute some dry rations to these people, we need to cross this Shu Road as soon as possible, the Qiang city is waiting for us."

The wind on the cliff still carried heat waves and the smell of decay, but looking at the proud Tuantuan carrying berries in its mouth, and at the tenderness in Ge Wensong's eyes, Anzhi suddenly felt that the Shu Road, which was as difficult as ascending to heaven, was not so difficult to travel after all.