Even despite the superhuman endurance granted her by her cultivation, Jie felt exhausted, and the others looked it too. But they carried on following the frozen river in the moonlit night until Pan Tian at last called a halt.

"We should all rest. This is a long race and if we let ourselves get too tired, we'll make stupid mistakes that'll cost us time or get us killed. We'll camp in the trees over there. Unless anyone has any objections?" Pan Tian asked.

Ithilix and Jie looked at each other. Xue yawned.

"Alright then," Pan Tian said and led the way into the loose cluster of trees.

Once they were some distance away from the riverbank, Pan Tian waved her hand, activating her storage ring. A strange material and stakes appeared on the frozen ground. All of which were covered in runes Jie didn't understand.

It didn't look like enough material for the four of them and Jie wondered if she'd be sleeping outside as a result of her failure to prepare. Or, if perhaps Pan Tian had spare tents for the rest of them.

Pan Tian rapidly set up the tent with practiced ease. The result was a short structure only slightly longer than Jie was tall. It barely came above her waist. Pan Tian then withdrew a smooth stone with a runed engraving from her storage ring and pressed it against the tent fabric.

That seemed to activate it somehow and the tent shimmered and took on the appearance of its surroundings until it looked nearly invisible. So much so that Jie might've missed it even as close as she stood to it if she didn't know it was there. She couldn't even sense the material with her spirit sense.

Pan Tian stepped inside and suddenly vanished from Jie's spirit sense.

"Huh... neat trick," Jie muttered to herself.

A moment later, Pan Tian stuck her head outside. "Well? Don't just stand there. Come in," Pan Tian said.

Jie did so, though she couldn't imagine it was going to be particularly comfortable with the four of them packed so tightly together. If they could even fit.

The instant Jie stepped beyond the threshold of the tent flap, she sensed Pan Tian again as well as the many other items within. The ceiling, which Jie had to squat to slip under was now over two meters high, with curtains dividing the house-sized interior into multiple rooms. Including what appeared to be a bathroom of some kind. Complete with a bathtub Jie couldn't wait to use. The chance to scrape off plant muck and mud suddenly felt irresistible.

Jie couldn't help smiling.

I love this world. She thought.

Ithilix and Xue followed her inside the tent, though neither of them seemed as impressed by it as Jie felt.

"We'll rest here for the night and head toward the Lake Temple at first light tomorrow. These stones will key you to the tent so you can sense where it is and avoid getting lost outside," Pan Tian said as she handed a runed stone to Ithilix and Jie.

"I'm reasonably confident that this is a safe place for us to rest. Well... as safe as anything is in the valley. But, even so, we should be cautious. So, Ithilix do you mind getting started on identifying what we've collected so far while Jie and I double-check the area around our camp and hide our tracks?" Pan Tian asked.

"This one would suggest that this one should go with Jie as this one's hive senses are better suited for scouting," Ithilix said.

"I agree, but I thought you both might think I was trying to get time alone with the loot to take more than my fair share," Pan Tian said.

Ithilix shook her head. "This one trusts you," she said.

"So do I," Jie said.

Pan Tian smiled. "Well, okay then. I'll get to work identifying it. Just dump it around that table over there. Only the items and the spiritual medicine we've collected. I don't want my tent filled with magical beast corpses. I'll make a note of what we got from the droguth though, since I still remember it. Xue, you can get some rest if you like," she said.

Xue yawned and curled up on the spot, seeming unwilling to bother moving more than he had to.

Jie didn't blame him. It wasn't just the physical exhaustion from traveling all day or the fights themselves. It was the emotional drain of constantly being on alert, the life and death battles, fearing for her friends and herself. It left her feeling wrung out to the point her bones ached and all she wanted was a moment to sit down and feel safe, warm, and comfortable. Maybe even to sleep.

But Jie pushed that feeling away as best she could. She could rest soon enough. For now, her friends needed her help to ensure they were safe to do so, and she wasn't going to let them down.

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Jie stepped back outside the tent with Ithilix. When she did so, she still sensed Pan Tian and the tent thanks to the runed stone Pan Tian had given her.

Jie walked beside Ithilix as the two of them scouted their surroundings again. It was quiet. The crunch of snow beneath their feet, the bitterly cold wind whistling through the thin trees that surrounded them, and their breathing were the only sounds to be heard.

Despite the danger of the valley and their exhaustion, Jie and Ithilix both took a moment to appreciate their surroundings by some unspoken agreement.

It was beautiful in a brutal, yet serene way. Peaceful and so utterly quiet that Jie found herself breathing deeper of the cold air as she relaxed beside her friend.

The stillness of their surroundings brought a kind of stillness to her mind. And that gave her a strange feeling of connection to the land around her. Almost as though, if she could somehow quiet herself further, she would connect to the land in some mystical way. Yet, it always felt just out of reach.

After what could've been an hour or just a few minutes, Jie and Ithilix resumed their work. Ithilix taught Jie a bit about hiding their tracks and Jie helped as best she could. Though, Ithilix was vastly better at it and did almost all of it herself.

When they were done, they returned to the tent where Pan Tian sat with several piles of treasure laid out before her and a stack of scrolls at her side.

"Are we in any danger?" Pan Tian asked.

"Not that we could find," Jie said, "it's really beautiful here."

Pan Tian nodded. "Good. I'll have everything identified soon," she said, "if you want to bathe, do it now. There's scentless soap if you need it. Don't use anything with a fragrance. The last thing we need is to make it easier to sniff us out."

Jie leaped at the chance, though she washed Xue first. The cat's fur was filthy, and Xue gave her grateful nuzzles as she removed clumps of muck and returned his fur to pristine condition.

Jie thought cats were supposed to hate any bath other than those they gave themselves but Xue seemed to enjoy it if anything. Though that might've been because he was glad to be rid of the muck tangled in his fur.

Jie then did the same for herself. By then, Pan Tian and Ithilix were finishing up with identifying and they called Jie over as she wrapped a towel around her hair.

"Ithilix and I have identified everything. I think we should quickly go over some of what we've got and then divide up the loot between us. We can split the spoils better at the end of our run. But it's good to have things somewhat divided in advance. Otherwise, if someone gets killed or betrays the others, we might lose out," Pan Tian said.

It made a practical kind of sense to Jie, but the casual way Pan Tian spoke of betrayal or accounted for someone getting killed bothered Jie slightly. She was sure Pan Tian cared about them, but it still bothered her... perhaps because it felt wrong to even think of protecting their loot against somebody dying. Or maybe because she didn't want to think about such a thing happening.

Jie kept her mouth shut, however, as she knew Pan Tian was simply being practical and not heartless.

"Aside from the magical beasts which we all stored in various quantities, we've got quite a bit of loot to go over. We have a total of twenty-three spirit coins from the chests and the lady in white. I've divided them up as best I can. Jie, you can carry your share and Xue's," Pan Tian said as she slid twelve coins toward Jie then stored five herself with Ithilix getting six.

"The ghosts in the tower gave us a shield of indomitable will, a rusted sword, a dagger of corruption, a mace of bloodletting, and a cursed club of stupidity," Pan Tian said.

"Wait the club makes you stupid? We're not cursed are we?" Jie asked, suddenly feeling worried.

Pan Tian shook her head. "It lowers the intelligence of the wielder, not anyone else, and we didn't touch them," she said.

"Why would anyone make something like that?" Jie asked.

"Revenge, a joke, to trick a rival... there are lots of reasons," Pan Tian said, "we'll split the weapons fairly evenly among us. After we finish up in the valley we can take them all to auction and split the earnings if that sounds good to everyone?"

Jie and Ithilix nodded. Xue seemed content to remain curled up in a ball, either asleep or trying to be.

"The desert ruins weren't a bad haul for us either," Pan Tian said, "we got twelve ninth star Expert ranked spirits of the desert, eighteen relentless endurance body conditioning pills, fourteen desert rubies, six dewdrop cacti spiritual medicine at the seventh star Expert rank, and three healing spring water potions effective for the ninth star Expert rank.

"I think we should consume the spirits of the desert, dewdrop cacti, and the body conditioning pills ourselves and keep the healing spring water. We can sell the rubies later though."

Again, Pan Tian looked to Ithilix and Jie and again what she proposed seemed fair and reasonable so they both nodded.

"The dead students we found are... more complicated. One of them was carrying a signet ring for the Ashcrow family. I don't know if he had permission from his family or if he took it for some other reason. It should be worth quite a bit of coin given it could be used to impersonate the Ashcrow family... but I think we should try to sell it back to the Ashcrow family instead. They should understand the significance of keeping it under their control, so we might even earn a little goodwill from them at the same time. And I'd like to avoid creating issues on that kind of scale even if we could probably get more for it from other groups," Pan Tian said.

"This one agrees. Selling it to others would make us the target of the Ashcrow family's wrath. Better to make money without creating needless enemies," Ithilix said.

"I agree," Jie said. Though in truth she felt they should just give the ring back to the family... but selling it back to them rather than to their enemies seemed like a good middle ground.

Pan Tian nodded at their words. "I'm glad we all agree on that," she said, "they had other items too. Twelve heavenly moon pills, a golden saber for the lower dantian, fourteen seventh star Expert rank dewdrop cacti, fifteen healing pills best for the eighth star of the Expert rank, and two hundred and fourteen scrolls of wisdom. They're at a variety of strengths but generally around the sixth star Elementalist rank. Nothing special for a scroll other than a handful. They had fourteen elixirs of hidden prey--"

"What are those?" Jie asked.

Pan Tian pointed to one of the familiar blue potions that pulsed with a white glow. "Same thing I gave you at the start of the valley. They help hide us from stronger cultivators," she explained.

Jie blushed slightly, feeling embarrassed for not knowing even simple things.

"Oh... thank you," Jie said.