Imperial henchmen? My divine skills are all hacked versions.

Snow Wolf Demon.

In the files of the Inspection Department, Xu Xian had read about the Snow Wolf Demon: a first-tier demon beast, equivalent to the human Body Tempering Realm.

However, this "equivalent" is a conversion on paper; in actual combat, it's a completely different story.

The hardness of a beast's fur, muscles, and bones far surpasses that of a human martial artist of the same level. In a one-on-one situation, a human of the same level will lose 70% of the time.

Now there are three heads.

On their side, only Xu Xian was at the first level of Body Tempering, while Zhang Hu and Zhao Bao were ordinary people without any cultivation.

"Zhang Hu, Zhao Bao, come closer to the fire."

Xu Xian spoke in a deep voice, "Wild beasts are afraid of fire. Zhao Bao, make the fire burn brighter."

Zhao Bao hurriedly added firewood to the fire, and the flames rose half a foot higher. Sure enough, the three-headed snow wolf demon stopped and did not approach any further.

Zhang Hu asked in a low voice, "Xu Xian, what are you planning to do?"

"We'll hold out for as long as we can; they might retreat by daybreak."

No sooner had he finished speaking than the largest snow wolf demon suddenly circled around from the side. It was too fast; a white shadow swept across the snow, bypassed the edge of the flames, and pounced directly at Zhao Bao.

Zhao Bao instinctively swung his knife, but the blade struck the wolf demon's forepaw, leaving only a shallow white mark without even breaking the skin.

The wolf demon swatted the knife away with one claw, and then swept the other claw toward Zhao Bao's face, freezing Zhao Bao in place.

At that moment, Xu Xian rushed to Zhao Bao's side, his blade flashing, slashing at the wolf demon's foreleg under its armpit, the blade stopping three inches into the flesh.

Zhang Hu immediately rushed over and dragged Zhao Bao back, the two retreating back to the campfire.

Enraged by the pain, the wolf demon abandoned Zhao Bao and slashed at Xu Xian's face with its claws. Xu Xian parried with his sword, but the immense impact sent him staggering back three or four steps, splitting the web of his hand that was gripping the sword.

That claw strike had at least a thousand pounds of force; if it weren't for his first-level Body Tempering foundation, he would have already collapsed.

Just as Xu Xian had regained his footing, the second snow wolf demon pounced from another direction.

Two wolf demons, one on the left and one on the right, and a third one lurking by the campfire, waiting for its chance to strike.

Xu Xian knew he couldn't hold out for long. His strength, speed, and defense were inferior to these demonic beasts. His only advantage was the fierceness of the Dragon Elephant Prajna Technique—but fierceness required sufficient cultivation to support it, and his foundation at the first level of Body Tempering was simply not enough to squander.

Just then, the Dragon Elephant Prajna Skill within his body began to operate wildly.

The heat in my dantian transformed from a river into a flood, impacting every meridian and every muscle.

Breakthrough at the second level of the Dragon Elephant Prajna Technique.

Cultivation progresses simultaneously with body tempering at two levels.

Xu Xian stood still, breathing heavily. He could clearly feel his body changing. His muscles were tightening, his heartbeat was more steady and slower than before, his hand holding the knife was no longer trembling, and the wound on his tiger's mouth was slowly tightening.

  

The second wolf demon pounced on him, its huge mouth opening to bite down on his neck.

Xu Xian turned his head to let the wolf demon pass, then suddenly exerted force with the hand holding the knife, the blade piercing through the fur, muscles, and trachea, all the way to the neck.

The snow wolf demon's massive body crashed onto the snow, spraying hot blood all over the ground.

One fatal blow.

Beside the campfire, Zhang Hu and Zhao Bao stood with their mouths agape, their knives dangling to the ground.

"Old...Old Zhang."

Zhao Bao's voice was weak, "Did you see that just now? That slash! He clearly couldn't cut that wolf demon before..."

Don't ask me.

Zhang Hu swallowed hard. "I didn't see it clearly either."

The moment the second wolf demon fell, the third one pounced from the side, its sharp claws sweeping towards his stomach.

Xu Xian turned to the side and used his left arm to block the claw. Three bloody marks ran from his arm down to his wrist, but his right fist was already full of power.

The Dragon Elephant Prajna Skill possessed unparalleled power. With a single punch, it struck the wolf demon's ribs. The third wolf demon let out a miserable howl and fell to the snow. It struggled for a moment but could not get up.

Seeing that things were not going well, the first injured wolf demon tucked its tail between its legs and ran away.

The white figure disappeared into the darkness in a few leaps.

Of the three-headed wolf demons, one is dead, one is injured, and one has escaped.

Xu leaned the knife on the ground and gasped for breath.

He gritted his teeth and examined the wound. The skin was torn and there was a lot of blood, but the bone was not broken.

After holding back for a while, Zhao Bao sincerely exclaimed, "Brother Xu, you're awesome!"

"A small-scale event..."

Xu Xian chuckled softly, tore off a strip of cloth, and wrapped it around his left arm several times.

"They won't come back before dawn. Zhao Bao, drag the dead one aside. Skin it after dawn; wolf pelts can keep you warm. Zhang Hu, continue the night watch."

Zhang Hu nodded, then turned and exchanged a glance with Zhao Bao.

The two had worked in the Inspection Division for many years and had seen quite a few martial artists, but they had never seen anyone like Xu Xian who broke through in the heat of battle and slew a demon with a single strike.

Zhao Bao dragged the wolf carcass while keeping his voice down.

"Brother Zhang, with Brother Xu's skills, how come he was just a lowly clerk in the Inspection Department? That knife strike he just made could easily get him a captain in the border army."

"Who knows..."

Zhang Hu shook his head: "From now on, call me Master Xu, don't call me Brother anymore."

Silent all night.

After daybreak, Xu Xian had Zhao Bao skin the wolf, and the three of them continued their northward pursuit in the morning light.

The snow wolf demon's claw marks were a great help to them; the new claw marks were aligned with the direction of the cart tracks, indicating that the wolf pack was also tracking the cart.

Following the two overlapping tracks is much faster than relying on sight to find the tire tracks.

...

Half a day later, Xu Xian reined in his horse at the entrance of an icy valley.

Deep in the icy valley, a carriage lay overturned beneath a massive ice wall. The carriage was badly damaged, with half of it buried under ice and the other half exposed.

The vehicle was marked with the emblem of the Di Kingdom delegation.

"Found it!"

Xu Xian dismounted and said, "You all stay on the perimeter and report any incidents immediately."

He walked into the ice valley alone. The carriage door was half open, swaying back and forth in the wind. Xu Xian approached, holding the hilt of his knife, and peeked into the carriage.

nobody.

But there were signs of fighting everywhere.

Three broken arrows hung on the carriage wall, and there were several deep knife marks on the leather seats. There was a human-shaped bloodstain on the floor of the carriage, which had frozen into black ice—someone had lain here and bled a lot.

Xu crouched down and crawled into the carriage, beginning to feel every inch of it.

Zhang Hu called out from outside, "Brother Xu, have you found anything?"

Xu Xian didn't answer. He felt a very thin gap under the seat, pried it in with his fingernail, and found that a piece of wood was loose.

He used the tip of his knife to pry open the wooden board, revealing a flat, hidden compartment underneath.

There was a letter in the hidden compartment.

Xu took out the letter. The envelope had been torn open, and half of the letter was missing, leaving only a tattered page.

He took the tattered page to the carriage entrance and looked at it by the light outside. The handwriting was delicate and strong, and only the character "Yun" remained at the signature; the rest of the characters had been torn off.

A few incomplete phrases can still be seen on the tattered page: "...If things don't go well...there might be trouble in the capital...be careful..."

Xu Xian examined the half-written letter twice, then put it in his pocket and put it away safely.

He didn't know who the "Yun" who signed the letter was, but based on his experience handling countless cases in his previous life, anyone who could use such wording to exchange secret letters was at least a core figure in the mission. They might even be above the mission's top level.

He closed the hidden compartment again and checked the outside of the carriage once more.

Within a radius of twenty paces around the carriage, dozens of dark red insect corpses lay scattered on the snow, each only the size of a grain of rice, frozen solid.

Xu Xian squatted down and poked at the dead insects with the tip of his knife, then remembered the bone Gu needles in the mortuary. They were all methods of Gu cultivation from the Southern Region.

These Gu worms and bone Gu needles belong to the same system, and may even have been released by the same Gu master.

He made a simple deduction: the gu worms were used for tracking, and the fact that these gu worms died around the carriage meant that the survivor knew how to expel the gu worms, or that he carried expelling medicine with him.

Now that the Gu worms have been dispersed, the pursuers have lost their tracking signal at least here, and the survivors may not be dead yet.

He stood up and continued searching deeper into the icy valley. The carriage tracks ended there, and someone had used branches or clothing to smooth out the remaining footprints and tracks.

The cleaning was rushed, and in some places you can still see the drag marks from the sweeping.

But not far from these drag marks, Xu Xian discovered several sets of footprints that hadn't been properly cleaned. They were three different sizes of footprints:

Two pairs of large ones and one pair of small ones.

The smaller one, less than two-thirds the length of Xu Xian's palm, could not possibly be an adult's foot.

It could be a boy or a girl.

Xu Xian called Zhang Hu and Zhao Bao over, "There are at least three survivors, still alive. Come with me."