Chapter 1056: Illusions of Brush and Ink

The man turned, shifting sideways to draw his bow once more.

Raising his arm, he loosed three more arrows.

A single shaft pierced two firebirds at once, either severing heads or snapping wings. With that, every flaming bird in sight plummeted to the ground.

Li Gu's eyes narrowed as he looked toward the mountain peak.

He immediately sprinted up the slope.

The Painter paused, stroking his beard.

He then set his brush to the paper.

Wild beasts already populated his painting, vivid and lifelike. He laid down the final stroke, dotting an eye.

"Roar!"

A tiger's roar echoed from the painting.

A fierce tiger leaped free from the Painted Scroll, charging straight at the approaching archer.

Li Gu raised his bow and fired.

The tiger twisted aside, letting the arrow bury itself into a nearby trunk without taking a scratch. Here in the dense woods, a bow lost its advantage.

The tiger was the lord of the mountain; naturally, it felt no fear.

"Roar!"

The mountain lord let out another roar, crossing the distance in a few great bounds and closing in on the archer.

Yet Li Gu suddenly planted his feet.

His gaze narrowed as killing intent surged around him.

He pulled out a single arrow, nocked it, and drew the bowstring taut, tracking the beast as it bounded through the mountain ravine.

He released the string.

The whistle of parting air shrieked once more.

"Thwack..."

The tiger had ducked behind a tree.

Yet the arrow blasted straight through the solid wood.

"Crack!"

The trunk was nearly split in half, a massive hole blown clean through its center.

The arrow did not stop.

"Thwack!"

After punching through a second tree, the arrowhead drove directly into the tiger's skull.

With half the shaft protruding from the splintered wood, the heavy beast was pinned in midair.

The tiger let out a single whimper before falling completely still.

"Splat..."

Dead, the creature dissolved into a puddle of black ink that splattered against the ground.

Li Gu stepped forward. Seeing the ink, he instantly understood.

"So that's how it is..."

He looked back up toward the peak.

The white-haired, white-bearded Painter stood there, looking down at him with a smile.

The Painter swept his brush again, drawing an auspicious cloud.

He stepped onto it, floating into the air with his Painted Scroll in hand.

Li Gu hurriedly drew his bow, intending to shoot him down.

But The Painter merely raised and lowered his hand. With a splash of ink, a heavy bank of dark clouds rolled across the sky.

"Pitter-patter..."

A drizzle began to fall.

Startled, Li Gu glanced back down the mountain.

"Not good!"

If fire didn't work, rain would do just as well.

They were still a two-day journey from the Military Camp. If the provisions got soaked in the rain, the consequences would be disastrous.

"Raise the tarps! Raise the tarps!"

The soldiers moved quickly, but the rain had arrived too suddenly. Disaster loomed.

Li Gu halted in his tracks. This time, he drew his bowstring back empty, without nocking an arrow.

He closed his eyes. The exact moment a raindrop struck his cheek, he let go.

"Twang!"

The bowstring thrummed.

In that instant, the falling rain seemed to freeze.

A blink later, the deluge reversed, flowing back toward the sky.

The raindrops shot upward like arrows.

High above, the dark clouds were cleaved in half. Sunlight spilled through the massive rift, and the rain parted, entirely sparing the provision carts in the ravine.

Li Gu breathed a sigh of relief and returned to the convoy.

The commander dismounted and cupped his fists. "Greetings, Mister Li."

Li Gu waved it off, only asking, "Are the provisions safe?"

"Thanks to you, Mister Li, they are completely unharmed."

Li Gu hummed in acknowledgment. "Hurry up and move out. Their first plan failed, so they will certainly have a backup. We need to be as fast as possible."

"Understood!"

The provision carts pushed forward at top speed, not daring to delay for another second.

Li Gu returned to his horse carriage, his mind involuntarily drifting back to The Painter.

Painting objects into reality...

What an incredible technique!

Along with it, an old memory surfaced.

It was from his youth, back when he was still a mountain bandit. Back then, Mister Qingshan had nearly taken his life with a single pebble.

That was when he learned that there is a sky beyond the sky, and that there is always someone greater. After that, he traveled everywhere to seek guidance—asking commoners, questioning martial artists, seeking out immortals. Eventually, he gained enlightenment, acquiring this longbow and his archery arts.

This was the first time he had truly bared his fangs, yet he hadn't expected to run into such a formidable opponent so soon.

The carts exited the ravine.

But after walking a short distance, the commander sensed something was wrong.

"Halt."

He ordered his men to bring the Geographical Maps and examined them closely.

Comparing them to the road ahead, the commander frowned.

"This path isn't right..."

Seeing the convoy stop, Li Gu called out.

"What happened?"

"Mister Li, this road doesn't match the Geographical Maps, nor does it line up with my memory."

Li Gu's brow furrowed.

He observed the surroundings carefully and noticed the discrepancy. The Painter had summoned a rainstorm earlier; while the grass and trees on the left side of the road were soaked, the vegetation on the right bore no trace of rain or dew.

Li Gu reached out and took the saber from the commander's hand.

"Shing."

He strode forward and slashed out.

The blade sheared through a patch of weeds, but the severed ends were black.

Li Gu wiped the substance with his fingers, brought it to his eyes, and gave it a sniff.

"Ink, as expected..."

Standing back up, he hacked away the rest of the overgrown weeds.

The chopped grass melted into puddles of ink.

A path appeared before them—the true road marked on the Geographical Maps.

The commander stepped forward, turning pale at the sight.

"Mister Li, what kind of sorcery is this?"

Li Gu sighed softly. "The work of an extraordinary painter. This complicates things. We must proceed with caution."

Not daring to let his guard down again, Li Gu had the commander bring him a horse so he could lead the way.

Along the journey, he constantly tested their surroundings.

He found several illusions and hidden traps, exposing them one by one.

But as they traveled further, they still ended up losing their bearings.

The commander constantly checked the Geographical Maps, but nothing matched up.

Right now, reality was half-true and half-false. Truth hid within lies, and lies hid within the truth.

Even Li Gu struggled to tell them apart.

Only now did he realize that The Painter's true terror didn't lie in wild beasts or firebirds, but in these illusions caught between truth and falsehood.

"Mister Li, we are completely lost..."

"How could this happen...?"

Unable to wrap his head around it, Li Gu lowered his head in deep thought. His gaze drifted to the shadows of the trees on the ground.

He stared blankly, and then realization struck him.

"The sun?"

He raised his bow and fired an arrow straight at the sun he saw in the sky.

Under the commander's disbelieving eyes, the arrow punched a clean hole right through the sun.

The sun instantly dimmed, its torn edges revealing what looked like the corners of a piece of paper.

It was a fake sun!

That was exactly why they had lost their sense of direction in the woods.

"Then where is the real sun?"

Li Gu's heart sank. He couldn't understand how The Painter had pulled this off.

Where had the real sun gone?

In a daze, his mind flashed back to the moment The Painter departed.

That rain!

Those dark clouds!

"So that was when he made his move..."

"It was the clouds!"

The Painter had drawn clouds to blot out the real sun, then replaced it with a fake one so they couldn't find their direction.