Cultivation: I Can Steal Lifespan from Spirit Beasts

Chapter 187: Fifth from the Bottom

At the sole checkpoint leading out of the Eastern Sage Sect’s garrison, the rugged ravines and jagged gullies had been brutally crushed flat by high-tier techniques, forming a massive, barren staging ground.

Cultivators streamed into the clearing. Today was deployment day for the Heavenly Gate Sect. Having received their mandates, squads of cultivators were gathering to receive their final marching orders.

The vast majority were Qi Refining cultivators.

Wang Ba stood among them, having flawlessly restrained his Foundation Establishment aura. His Heavenly Gate Task Token had directed him to arrive at this specific time and coordinate with the commanders of the Profound Mystery Path, who would assign him his personnel.

Naturally, he didn’t dare disobey.

Buried in the crowd, the surrounding Qi Refining cultivators were completely oblivious to the apex predator hiding in their ranks. Consequently, they didn’t bother filtering their anxious gossip.

“…I wonder which True Cultivator we’ll be assigned to this time. Gods, I hope it’s someone strong,” a cultivator muttered, wringing his hands.

“I heard the Slaughtering Life Path elite are joining this deployment. If we get assigned under one of them, we’re set.”

“You mean True Cultivator Zhu Ziji?” a nearby cultivator interjected. “He’s top five on the Combat Power Ranking. The man’s a walking slaughterhouse. But the spots under him have probably already been taken by the core sect disciples.”

Hearing this, an older cultivator couldn’t help but shake his head and laugh mockingly.

“You’re dead wrong, Fellow Daoist. A strong cultivation base doesn’t mean it’s safe to follow him. The Slaughtering Life Path operates on a psychotic doctrine: plunge into the abyss of death to find life. Even True Cultivator Zhu constantly throws himself into suicidal meat-grinders. Have you never noticed the pitiful handful of survivors that crawl back with him?”

“Exactly,” another cultivator chimed in. “Instead of drooling over the Combat Power Ranking, you’d better pray you look at the Survivor Ranking. That’s the only list that actually matters to fodder like us.”

As the cultivators passionately debated the merits and horrors of the various Foundation Establishment commanders, a mild, polite voice suddenly interrupted.

“Excuse me, do any of you happen to have a copy of these rankings? Might I take a look?”

The group turned to see a remarkably plain-looking cultivator. Despite his unremarkable features, his brow and eyes radiated a profound, unshakeable tranquility. He offered them a warm, cupped-fist salute.

“If Spirit Stones are required, I am more than willing to pay,” he added politely.

One cultivator’s eyes flashed with greed, his mouth opening to demand a toll, but a boisterous, broad-shouldered man waved him off.

“It’s public gossip, brother! We’re all Left Path cultivators here; no need to bleed you for Spirit Stones.” The bold cultivator reached into his Storage Bag, tossed over a scroll, and laughed. “Name’s Meng! If you find yourself in a tight spot out there, Fellow Daoist, stick with my crew.”

“Many thanks, Fellow Daoist Meng,” the plain cultivator smiled, cupping his hands again before melting back into the crowd.

Meng shrugged, assuming the quiet man was just struck with pre-battle jitters, and resumed arguing with the others.

Retreating to the edge of the staging ground, Wang Ba unfurled the scroll. It contained two meticulously updated lists: the Combat Power Ranking and the Survivor Ranking.

Listening to the ambient chatter, Wang Ba quickly deduced their origins. These lists were an underground intelligence network, compiled by the bottom-feeding Qi Refining cultivators based on the frontline performances of the Foundation Establishment elites.

It was a desperate survival tool.

The Combat Power Ranking documented a True Cultivator’s raw strength, realm, and confirmed kill count. It told the grunts whether their assigned commander had the firepower to punch through an ambush, or if they needed to prepare to scatter at the first sign of trouble.

However, the grunts quickly realized that raw firepower rarely correlated with crew survival. Some commanders were demigods on the battlefield, yet their squads were routinely annihilated.

Zhu Ziji of the Slaughtering Life Path was the prime example. He ranked fifth overall in combat power, but dead last on the Survivor Ranking.

Wang Ba read the terrifying statistic: Squad Survival Rate – <10%.

For every twenty men Zhu Ziji led into the meat-grinder, barely two came back breathing.

Wang Ba scanned the lists. He wasn’t on the Survivor Ranking, having never led a squad. But he did spot his name on the Combat Power Ranking.

Due to his complete lack of combat history and his recent breakthrough to the Foundation Establishment stage, the underground rankers had dumped him at the absolute bottom of the barrel.

He was ranked 386th. Fifth from the bottom.

Wang Ba didn’t care about the slight, but the sheer number of names on the list stunned him. The Heavenly Gate Sect possessed nearly 400 Foundation Establishment cultivators! It was a terrifying concentration of power, eclipsing even the combined forces of the Exquisite Ghost Market’s second floor. Then again, considering the Sect laid claim to five entire kingdoms, it operated on the scale of a sovereign empire.

He swiftly memorized the top-ranked names on both lists.

Moments later, the staging ground was packed shoulder-to-shoulder.

Without warning, several Foundation Establishment commanders clad in the crimson and black robes of the Heavenly Gate Sect dropped from the sky. Simultaneously, the earth groaned and violently ruptured, forming an elevated earthen platform beneath their boots.

“Silence!” the lead commander roared, his voice infused with suppressing Qi.

The chatter died instantly. Thousands of cultivators, both core sect disciples and Left Path conscripts, froze in place.

Satisfied, the lead commander nodded. “I am Yue Xiang of the Profound Mystery Path. I will forgo the introductions. We will now assign your squads according to the task manifests.”

The crowd remained dead silent.

Yue Xiang pulled a glowing parchment from his robes and began to read, his magically amplified voice washing over the staging ground.

“Jiang Yi! You take command of Zhang En, Lu Shaofeng, and these eighteen others…”

A young woman sashayed to the front of the platform. Her smile was enchanting, every delicate frown and subtle glance radiating an intoxicating, feminine allure.

Wang Ba’s eyes narrowed slightly.

Jiang Yi. Ranked fifty-fifth on the Combat Power Ranking. A mid Foundation Establishment expert.

But it wasn’t the rank that caught Wang Ba’s attention. It was the identity.

Mysterious Maiden Path. Male cultivator. If Wang Ba remembered correctly, this Jiang Yi was the Master of Lin Yu—one of Wang Ba’s old acquaintances from the Eastern Sage Sect. Shortly after Lin Yu had achieved Foundation Establishment, his Master had ‘assimilated’ him.

Looking at the hyper-feminine allure of the male cultivator now, it was obvious Jiang Yi had fully digested Lin Yu and was already hunting for his next host. Wang Ba coldly memorized the man’s aura and looked away.

Yue Xiang continued down the list.

“Bo Xi, you lead…”

“Ma Shuntian, you…”

“Zhu Ziji, you lead…”

At the mention of the Slaughtering Life Path butcher, a collective shudder ripped through the crowd.

Wang Ba watched a skeletal, lean cultivator slowly approach the platform. Like Wang Ba, Zhu Ziji’s facial features were entirely unremarkable. But the man’s aura was nauseating. He looked as though he had just waded out of an ocean of gore; Wang Ba could practically smell the coppery reek of fresh blood radiating from his pores.

Even the arrogant Yue Xiang treated Zhu Ziji with noticeable deference.

As the assignments continued, Wang Ba mentally cross-referenced the commanders’ faces with the rankings. He heard his old acquaintance, Bao Chao, get assigned to a mid Foundation Establishment meat-grinder. Wang Ba felt a twinge of pity, but there was nothing he could do.

Finally, his name echoed across the clearing.

“Wang Ba! You lead Yan Qi, Meng…”

Wang Ba stepped out of the crowd and approached the platform. Hearing Meng’s name, he couldn’t help but let out a dry, amused chuckle. What a coincidence.

In the crowd, Meng stared as the quiet, polite man who had just bought him a scroll strolled up to the commander’s platform. He vigorously rubbed his eyes, looking as if he had just seen a ghost.

Thank the heavens I wasn’t an arrogant prick, Meng thought, breaking out in a cold sweat as he hurried to line up behind Wang Ba. Seeing Wang Ba’s faint smile, Meng’s terror subsided slightly.

But then, a horrific realization hit him. He remembered the name ‘Wang Ba’ on the Combat Power Ranking.

Fifth from the bottom.

We’re dead, Meng groaned inwardly, his stomach plummeting.

For a bottom-feeding grunt, an unknown commander was a death sentence. Wang Ba had zero data on the Survivor Ranking, meaning his tactical style was a total mystery. On the Combat Power Ranking, he was practically a newborn Foundation Establishment pup. His Qi had evolved, sure, but his combat experience was likely indistinguishable from a tenth-layer Qi Refining grunt.

Their squad was effectively marching into enemy territory without a True Cultivator to protect them. It was a suicide squad.

Yue Xiang of the Profound Mystery Path seemed to realize the glaring weakness of Wang Ba’s unit. To prevent an immediate mission failure, the commander reassigned a veteran to babysit them.

“You Wanli! Fall in behind True Cultivator Wang.”

“…Yes, sir.”

A hardened, tenth-layer Qi Refining cultivator stepped out of the ranks. Though his face twisted in obvious, barely-concealed disdain at being assigned to a bottom-tier commander, the ingrained terror of a Foundation Establishment aura forced him into line behind Wang Ba.

With his twenty-man squad assembled, Wang Ba received his mission manifest and a Storage Bag loaded with formation supplies from Yue Xiang.

Turning to his men, Wang Ba swept his gaze over them. Every single one of them was hiding a cocktail of terror, resentment, and mutinous dissatisfaction behind their eyes. Wang Ba sighed internally. He didn’t blame them, but dragging this band of terrified mutineers through a warzone was going to be an absolute nightmare.

Especially given their objective.

They weren’t fortifying the garrison. They had to push deep into the southeast theater, infiltrate Luolan Mountain, and establish a forward operating formation. The route cut directly through a massive swath of territory currently occupied by the Incense Path zealots.

With no time to build camaraderie, Wang Ba led the squad to an isolated corner of the staging ground and flatly briefed them on the mission parameters.

Hearing that they were ordered to march through occupied territory, all color drained from the squad’s faces.

An older cultivator with a graying beard, who possessed the face of a kind, honest grandfather, suddenly stepped forward, wringing his hands.

“This… Senior Wang, perhaps you could speak with Senior Yue? Surely they can assign us a different sector? This objective is simply a suicide march for a unit like ours.”

“He’s right, Senior Wang! We have to request a transfer! This is impossible!” another chimed in, smelling blood in the water.

Wang Ba’s expression instantly turned glacial. His gaze swept over the dissenters, lingering on the seemingly kind-hearted old man.

A hidden blade, Wang Ba noted coldly. The old man was trying to incite a mutiny and use Wang Ba as the sacrificial lamb to take the fall. In a wartime deployment, questioning a direct mandate was treason. If Wang Ba actually brought this complaint to Yue Xiang, the commander would execute him on the spot to set an example.

The squad felt the ambient temperature plummet. The suffocating pressure of Wang Ba’s Foundation Establishment aura slammed down on them, freezing the blood in their veins.

“The mandate is absolute,” Wang Ba stated, his voice devoid of all warmth. “If anyone mentions altering the mission parameters again, I will execute you myself to save the commanders the trouble.”

You Wanli, the veteran tenth-layer cultivator, rolled his eyes, a sneer flashing across his face. But still within the shadow of the garrison, he kept his mouth shut.

Brutally suppressed, the squad huddled together to desperately plan a marching route. Most of them remained dead silent, glaring at the dirt, completely unconvinced by Wang Ba’s leadership.

Meng, feeling a faint sliver of camaraderie from their earlier interaction, stepped up and offered several tactical suggestions.

His strategy was painfully simple: total stealth. Move like ghosts. Evade all contact with the Incense Path. Prioritize the formation, and run at the first sign of a fight.

Given Wang Ba’s abysmal combat ranking, Meng was clearly planning for the inevitable moment they had to abandon their commander and scatter into the woods.

Wang Ba, however, nodded in total agreement.

“We proceed exactly as Meng suggested. Total stealth. Evade all combat.”

The squad blinked in surprise. The sheer pragmatism of the order slightly softened their resentment.

Well, he’s weak as hell, but at least he knows it. He listens to advice, one cultivator transmitted to another.

Yeah. It’s his only redeeming quality, came the cynical reply.

Wang Ba’s Divine Sense easily caught the subtle fluctuations of their telepathic whispers, but he didn’t care. Let them scheme.

If they were ambushed by a superior force, Wang Ba would simply activate his second-grade High Grade flying magical artifact. Unless the enemy commander possessed a strictly speed-oriented relic, they would eat his dust.

At worst, the mission would fail.

Failing a mandate incurred a massive penalty in Sect merit points, but Wang Ba didn’t give a damn about merit points. He hadn’t even unlocked access to the Heavenly Gate Sect’s treasure vault. Points were imaginary; his life was real.

The only actual downside to failing was that the Sect would simply throw him into another meat-grinder the next day. He couldn’t fail every mission without drawing the ire of the higher-ups.

I’ll just have to play it by ear, Wang Ba concluded wearily.

With a flick of his sleeve, he ordered the march. Following Meng’s route, the squad hugged the dirt, flying low and silent as they pushed into the treacherous southeast theater.

Author’s Note: A quick correction—Wang Ba’s flying magical artifact is second-grade High Grade, not Top Grade. Apologies for the previous mix-up.