The roar of collapsing stone pillars rolled overhead like muffled thunder, and Su Qingxue gripped Ye Fan's palm so tightly it hurt. The tear mole at the corner of the girl's eye danced with every step she took in the firelight, and the golden tassel in her hair chimed against his shoulder—a little habit she habitually used to mask her nervousness, which he remembered clearly from his past life.
"To the left!" Lin Zhaoyue's sharp cry pierced the smoke and dust. Ye Fan instinctively swerved sideways as a boulder the size of two people with arms linked grazed his back and crashed down. Amidst the flying debris, he saw that the white robes of the Cangwu Mountain sword cultivator were already stained with dust, yet she still stood as straight as a pine with her sword in hand, every strike precisely cleaving the falling stone beams while the turbulence stirred by her sword tip enveloped the group and propelled them forward.
"Watch your step, Big Brother!" Chǔ Hóngzhuāng's voice came from behind, laced with the soft sweetness distinctive to Southern Xinjiang. The young girl had crouched down at some point, pinching a golden silkworm the size of a fingernail between her fingertips. The insect buzzed as it beat its wings, and a few wisps of eerie blue poisonous mist hissed into the air from a suddenly cracking fissure in the ground ahead—a lethal trap laid by the mummified corpse and remnant soul of Xiao Zhan. Hóngzhuāng tilted her head and whistled, and the golden silkworm shot tow…
Chapter 279