"Priest?"
When Li Ban heard the word, his ears immediately perked up.
He had heard "Priest" once from Du An; at the time, the term was mentioned alongside "Wizard Lord."
That alone spoke to a Priest's status.
It definitely had something to do with a Wizard.
But what surprised Li Ban even more was that the word "Priest" Nana had just shouted sounded exactly like the "Priest" of the Wizard World!
Could these two Priests be the same kind of person? Did they share the same identity?
Was this place actually the Wizard World, or somewhere else?
Li Ban decided to wait a moment and see how things developed.
It felt like a warning.
Sensing that something had happened back in the Wizard World, he hurriedly circulated the spiritual rhinoceros inside Flute Sound to answer the Wizard Embryo Fragment's throbbing, returning to the Wizard World in an instant.
He opened his eyes. In the darkness, he clearly saw a figure sitting by the bed with their back to him.
Long hair cascaded down to her waist, drifting and swaying without any wind.
Like a female ghost!
Fortunately, right before Li Ban drew his blade to slash, he spotted a pair of large ears.
"Cat Girl?" Li Ban sat up, a trace of pleasant surprise in his voice.
Cat Girl turned around, revealing large eyes that had grown perfectly round in the dark. "I didn't make a sound. How did you know I was here?"
Moving silently and erasing her killing intent were Cat Girl's specialties.
Even when she assassinated the grand prince, Li Yuan, he only noticed her presence at the very last moment.
She hadn't expected a sleeping Li Ban to jolt awake the second she sat down.
Li Ban hadn't undressed to begin with; he'd merely taken off his shoes to lie down, so sitting straight up was no issue.
"Intuition, I guess. But you were already stealthy enough," Li Ban marveled. "You were sitting right next to me. If you were here to assassinate me, I definitely wouldn't have been able to react in time."
Cat Girl's eyes widened, but before she could say anything, Li Ban asked with concern.
"The situation was urgent last time, so I couldn't rush over to check on you. How are you? Are you hurt?"
Her perked-up cat ears immediately drooped.
"I'm fine!" Cat Girl said energetically.
Right after she spoke, she suddenly turned her head and spat a mouthful of blood onto the floor.
The two of them stared at the blood on the ground, stunned for a moment.
Then, Cat Girl turned back, wiped her mouth, and changed her tune. "It's not a big deal."
Li Ban frowned and got up. He didn't know the first thing about medicine, but looking at Cat Girl's complexion, she didn't have that paper-pale sickly weakness.
"You're injured and still acting tough. Have you seen a doctor?"
Cat Girl patted her chest. "Ordinary doctors aren't even as good as me. Didn't you see my heroic bearing in the Beast Arena? My recovery is super strong."
She whispered to Li Ban, "This is also my element ability."
Hearing that it was an ability, Li Ban felt a little relieved.
"You've completely betrayed that side now. What are you going to do next?"
Cat Girl's expression changed. She suddenly pretended to be on the verge of tears, pinching a nonexistent handkerchief to dab the corners of her eyes.
"This lowly one has no identity anymore. I can only follow you. My lord, you mustn't fail me!"
Li Ban didn't take her joke to heart.
Since they had met, Cat Girl rarely had a serious moment anyway.
One second she could be calm and haughty, and the next she could brazenly flatter people.
However, her proposal was still worth considering.
"I'm heading to the Unreturning Place to try joining the Myriad Ancient Pagoda there first. If you have nowhere to go, why not come with me?"
"Alright!" Cat Girl smiled happily, the tail behind her swaying gently.
Shi Ming's snoring suddenly stopped. He sat up, uncomfortably rubbing his neck. "Ah, my neck is going to break..."
He saw that in the darkness, there seemed to be two people sitting on Li Ban's side of the room.
Shi Ming was quite bold; he groped his way over in the dark for a couple of steps and finally, by the moonlight through the window, saw a woman sitting next to Li Ban.
"Ah!" Shi Ming suddenly covered his eyes. "See no evil, hear no evil. Should I step out?"
Li Ban raised a hand and lit the candlestick on the tea table.
"No, you're the person I'm escorting. You can't leave my sight."
"Swish!" Cat Girl's claws extended out long, and she said viciously, "Then poke his eyes blind and his ears deaf!"
Shi Ming immediately lowered his hands and stared at Cat Girl in disbelief. "Y-you, how can a woman be so violent?"
Li Ban pressed down Cat Girl's hand. "He's possessed by the God of Fortune. Don't provoke him."
Cat Girl probably wouldn't understand if he said Undying Halo.
So Li Ban phrased it differently.
Before Cat Girl could quite process it, tears suddenly streamed down Shi Ming's face across from them.
Cat Girl suspiciously retracted her claws. "I haven't even moved yet. How did he get scared into crying?"
"Uh, I, I'm not crying out of fear." Shi Ming seemed extremely moved. While wiping his tears with his sleeve, he was sure to explain, "Everyone else says I'm a jinx. Only... only Brother Li says I'm possessed by the God of Fortune—sob—Brother Li, rest assured! From now on, you are my brother! I absolutely won't run away and cause trouble for you."
Li Ban hadn't expected a casual remark to actually move Shi Ming to tears.
He'd thought that someone who could say "May you die a worthy death" at Lu Weizhong's birthday banquet would have a strong heart.
Who knew that after sobbing a couple of times, Shi Ming would let out a huge yawn.
His sleepiness had surged up again.
But looking at Cat Girl, Shi Ming asked, "How about I go sleep outside?"
Cat Girl stood up and stretched lazily. "No need. I'll just sleep on the roof beams."
But Li Ban stood up and pressed Cat Girl back down onto the bed. "It's so late, and there's no way to book another room now. Little Cat, you're injured. Just sleep here for now."
He tipped his chin toward Shi Ming. "Go back to your bed. We still have to travel tomorrow."
Cat Girl readily complied. She had already taken off her shoes and gotten onto the bed, and she even patted the tiny bit of space remaining. "We could squeeze in together, you know."
Shi Ming's eyes widened.
If anyone had to squeeze in together, shouldn't it be him and Li Ban?
A lone man and a lone woman sharing a bed... wasn't that inappropriate?
Even if it wasn't just a lone man and woman, sharing a bed right in front of a third person was even worse, right?
Shi Ming thought he was already rebellious and unorthodox enough, but compared to this cat-eared woman, he was far too normal.
Li Ban had no intention of going over. "You two get some rest. I'll make do on the chair tonight. After tomorrow, we'll just book two rooms."
With that final word, he coaxed the injured patient and the weakling to sleep.
Shi Ming was still a bit embarrassed. He dragged a folding screen in front of his bed to block his figure before lying down in his clothes.
Cat Girl also fell asleep very quickly.
When she slept, she curled up into a ball just like a real kitten, almost coiling into a complete circle, with only her tail occasionally sweeping across the bedding.
Li Ban knew this was a sign of her lack of security.
But for Cat Girl, an assassin, to fall asleep in front of him was already the greatest form of trust she could give.
Although it was late spring, the night was still a bit chilly. Li Ban went to the cabinet and grabbed a thin quilt to drape over Cat Girl.
While covering her, he could feel that she actually woke up for a brief moment, but she didn't open her eyes and just continued to pretend to sleep.
Li Ban didn't expose her pretense. After tucking her in, he went back to the high-backed chair by the round table and sat down.
He crossed his arms, leaned his head back against the chair, and closed his eyes to rest.
As for the Shadow World, he would investigate it when he had free time.
Although it was an extra opportunity, the Wizard World was his true foundation.
With Cat Girl joining them, Li Ban's journey to escort Shi Ming would be much easier.
After leaving the small town, they would once again live out in the wilderness, sleeping under the open sky for a few days.
Before they left, Cat Girl, being experienced in long-distance travel, took Li Ban to buy oilcloth, hammocks, and other supplies. Her preparations were far more comprehensive than Zhang Baishan's had been.
This way, they could live a little more comfortably in the mountains and forests.
The oilcloth could be spread on the ground to keep out the dampness, or held overhead to block the rain.
After entering the mountain forest with a full set of equipment, life was indeed much more comfortable.
On the road, Li Ban kept an eye on Cat Girl from time to time to see if she would spit blood again.
However, ever since that night, Cat Girl had been lively and bounding with energy.
She caught bugs, chased rabbits, fished, and snatched bird eggs.
She looked as if nothing was wrong with her at all.
Cat Girl was in charge of catching food, Li Ban was in charge of roasting it, and Shi Ming was completely useless—only opening his mouth and waiting to be fed.
On their third day into Daqingshan, just as they were about to reach the next small town, a narrow mountain pass appeared before the trio.
This mountain path was exceptionally narrow.
One side was a cliff face, and the other was a steep slope.
There were quite a few wildly growing branches right in the middle of the path; it was obviously a route rarely traveled by people.
"Did we take a wrong turn?" Li Ban pulled out the Gazette of the Nine Provinces and flipped to the maps of Yu Province and Langzhou to take a look.
Shi Ming also leaned over. "We might have turned onto a side path too early."
Cat Girl glanced at it and immediately looked away. "This map is a blurry mess. It doesn't matter, as long as the direction is right."
She was used to running all over the place, so she didn't care about a minor issue like getting slightly lost.
"You guys wait here. I'll go clear the way."
Li Ban hopped off the cart, walking over with a Throwing Axe he had picked up but hadn't yet fused with. He prepared to chop off the protruding branches and roots on both sides of the narrow path to prevent them from damaging the wheels.
Right at that moment, a drawn-out bird chirp suddenly rang out from above his head.
"Chirp!"
Li Ban looked up, spun around, and instantly hurled the axe in his hand straight at the area beneath the sound's source!
"Ambush!"
Cat Girl, who had been sitting cross-legged on the mule's back with a blade of grass in her mouth, twitched her ears and leaped up the instant Li Ban shouted.
Barely a split second later, two black spikes crisscrossed right through the spot where she had just been, nailing themselves directly into the earth.
Their entire lengths sank in, leaving three holes in the ground.
The mule still didn't know what had happened; it merely shifted its hooves uneasily.
Almost without pause, another three black spikes shot toward the descending Cat Girl.
In midair, Cat Girl somehow twisted her body, changing her posture from a vertical stand to a horizontal lay, dodging two of the spikes.
The third spike was originally aimed right at her lower abdomen.
As a result, she tucked her legs in, kicked out, and actually stomped her foot on the spike, subsequently borrowing the force to change her downward trajectory.
Upon finally landing, the claws on both of Cat Girl's hands fully extended. She casually plucked a spike from the ground and hurled it backhand toward the direction it came from.
After the enemy's five strikes, Cat Girl had already locked onto their position.
After the spike left her hand, she tapped off the ground with one foot. Moving even faster than the spike itself, she arrived behind the trees a step ahead of it and violently yanked out the ambusher.
The opponent still tried to resist in close-quarters combat but was no match for Cat Girl at all. In just a few quick moves, she grabbed his shoulder and arm, pressed a hand down on his head, and abruptly hoisted him upward.
"Thwack!"
The black spike, which had been thrown first but arrived later, buried itself deep into the enemy's eye socket.
This was probably a case of: if your throw isn't accurate, it doesn't matter; just move the target.
Cat Girl casually disposed of one enemy, while Li Ban found himself facing two on his side.
At the time, he was just about to bend over to chop a tree. Upon receiving Silver Kingfisher's warning, he didn't even look up before immediately hurling the Throwing Axe in his hand toward the direction of Silver Kingfisher's sound.
With a sharp clang, someone parried the Throwing Axe away.
Having confirmed the enemy's position, Li Ban immediately used Mental Piercing.
"Ugh!" An enemy who was just about to leap out from a hiding spot convulsed all over, lost their balance, and fell down.