He woke up from a thousand years of sleep. Like the bones that were rising from a black swamp as thick as oil, his memory pieces ran amok in his brain like glittering butterflies. The butterflies from a hundred years ago, a thousand years ago, and ten thousand years ago crashed, resulting in brilliant and hazy fire, which licked his brain cells and cleansed and reorganized his soul again and again.
He put on a mysterious smile. There were indescribable cunningness and unstoppable ambition in this smile.
He slowly opened his eyes, and the two swirls in his eyes stopped spinning, changing from the original black, white, and red into mysterious gray.
He moaned, like any person would after a good night’s sleep. His immeasurable consciousness surfaced in the gray swirls; he was back. He was finally back!
Then, Li Yao saw a big hand that was turning larger and larger still before his hands, until it smacked his face brutally.
“Ouch!”
His facial organs were displaced, his teeth were dancing, and he was flung away in midair, but before he sensed the pain, he had been slapped again on the other side of his face.
The two slaps refreshed him and pulled him back from the lost abyss. He felt that he was not the Blackstar the Great who dominated the universe ten thousand years ago, nor Blackstar the Great who claimed the country a thousand years ago, but more like a big spinning gyro.
“Li Yao, wake up!”
He heard a determined voice, followed by another heavy blow on his face. The person shouted, “Don’t be lost! Don’t be deceived by Wuying Qi! Do you hear me? I’m your best friend, Long Yangjun! I have to wake you up today! I have to wake you up even if my soul and my life are burned out!”
A storm of fists, palms, knees, and feet landed on Li Yao’s face and body mercilessly and incessantly.
“Ahhhhhhhhhhh!”
Li Yao meant to resist, but the previous battle against the remaining soul of Wuying Qi, or maybe the Blood God, had drained him. He was now exhausted and weaker than ever. How could he resist Long Yangjun’s brutal savaging? He could only hold his head and scream like he was a pig being butchered.
“Go away! No matter whether you are Wuying Qi or anything even eviler, get away from my best friend, Li Yao!”
Long Yangjun roared deafeningly and kicked Li Yao crazily again, almost making Li Yao throw up. “Li Yao, hang in there. I’m trying to save you. You need to pull yourself together and fight side by side with me!”
“S-Stop kicking! It’s me!”
Li Yao finally cried devastatingly, with tears running on his swollen face. “I’m Li Yao! I’m really Li Yao! What are you doing exactly?”
“Cut the crap! I don’t believe you!”
Long Yangjun was still kicking him hard. “You must be Wuying Qi’s remaining soul who has possessed Li Yao. I knew that you wouldn’t be defeated so easily. Anyway, I’m going to kick you to death today!”
Li Yao felt that the whole planet had rolled over him hundreds of times.
Even the battle against Wuying Qi was not as painful as this.
“You’re just getting back at me for what I did to you earlier!”
Li Yao shouted as loudly as possible, “It’s me! It’s really me! Stop beating! I’ve already taken care of Wuying Qi’s remaining soul! It’s really me! I’m going to fight back if you don’t stop! I mean it!”
“Is it really… you, Li Yao?”
Long Yangjun kicked Li Yao brutally yet again before she finally stopped in satisfaction. But she still gazed at Li Yao vigilantly as if she would not hesitate to attack again if anything goes wrong.
“Of course! You know it!”
Grimacing in pain, Li Yao held his cheek and roared, “You just wanted to beat me up! You had always wanted to beat me up, hadn’t you? You were only trying to get back at me! That’s outrageous! Ouch. That’s too outrageous!”
“Hehe, a scoundrel views all other people as scoundrels. It’s true that I do not like you and often have the urge of punching you in the face, but I certainly wouldn’t really do it without a good reason.”
Long Yangjun rubbed her fists that had become swollen due to the beating. Appreciating her masterpiece, she said, “Just now, when you and Li Jialing fought Wuying Qi’s remaining soul, Wuying Qi’s remaining soul suddenly exploded into two streaks of light that dashed into each of you. Then, you became weird. You were like a rigid statue, with gray mist popping up. You were also murmuring to yourself nonstop, as if you were possessed.
“In order to save you, I summoned all my strength by burning out my soul and my life despite my exhaustion, determined to exterminate the evil power that possessed you even if I couldn’t wake you up. But instead of thanking me, you’re questioning my motive? That’s too… Hahahahahaha. Sorry, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to beat you so hard. Hahahahahahahahahaha!”
The solemn expression on Long Yangjun’s face collapsed. She laughed so hard that she could barely catch her breath.
“If you hadn’t laughed in the end…”
Li Yao squinted and glared at Long Yangjun. “… I might have believed you!”
“I was not lying.”
Long Yangjun took a deep breath and tried to stop laughing. She found a broken piece of a suit and gave it to Li Yao as a mirror. “Look at yourself right now.”
“This is…”
Li Yao gasped hard as he looked at the mirror.
In the mirror, although his face had been deformed by Long Yangjun, there was grayness in his messy hair. Near his temples, the grayness looked like a flower or a mysterious crown!
“How did I turn into this?”
Li Yao stroked his hair and cried, “Why have I grown such mysterious gray hair? It makes me look elegant, unpredictable, and revered. This doesn’t agree with me. I am so much more handsome right now that people will be too awed to talk to me!”
Long Yangjun found it hard to believe. “What are you talking about?”
“Nothing. I’m just testing my sense of humor.”
Li Yao looked at himself in the mirror and took a long breath of relief. “Thankfully, I’ve maintained my basic sense of humor. I couldn’t have said that if I were corrupted by Wuying Qi’s soul, could I?”
“… Fine. You’re right if you replace ‘sense of humor’ with shamelessness.”
Long Yangjun thought for a moment and was not as wary as before. “Vulture Li Yao is the only person in the whole universe who can be so shameless. Wuying Qi’s remaining soul couldn’t have made such a statement. So, welcome back, Li Yao! By the way, have you really shattered Wuying Qi’s remaining soul?”
“Well, it’s rather mysterious. We’ll talk about it later.”
Li Yao asked in a hurry, “How long was I unconscious? Where is Jialing?”
“Five minutes. You’ve been unconscious for five minutes. Li Jialing is still lying there. His situation does not seem as bad as yours since he has been sound asleep, so I’m here to wake you up first,” said Long Yangjun, clenching his fists.
“Only five minutes?”
Li Yao did not realize that such a long time in the memory palace was only a brief instant in reality.
However, just because Li Jialing was sleeping did not mean that his situation was not bad. On the contrary, the young lion might be in grave danger!
Right then, as Long Yangjun pointed at him, Li Jialing roared in agony.
Li Yao and Long Yangjun looked at each other, both feeling that it was not good.
By the time they rushed to him, Li Jialing had jerked like a lobster that fell into boiling oil.
His gold hair was wreathed in a black fog again, which corroded his hair and his skin like venom, as if it was going all the way into his flesh and his blood.
Under the excruciating pain, he transformed himself. His muscles were torn apart, and his bones expanded. He turned into a gargantuan monster like a standing lion!
“Hooooooooo!”
Li Jialing held his head tightly and spewed out plumes of black smoke. He writhed as if two armies were fighting in his head, leaving deep scratches on the floor that was as tough as iron.
“Jialing!”
Li Yao grew anxious. Nobody understood Li Jialing’s situation better than him. Could this young man who was only in his twenties defeat Wuying Qi 2.0 with his own willpower?
Li Yao came close without caring about anything, hoping to wake Li Jialing up with brotherhood. “Listen to me! I’m Li Yao! I’m your big brother!”
“Hooooooo!”
Li Jialing, who had been caught by madness, heard nothing of it. He crashed Li Yao’s chest like a black tornado and nearly ripped it apart. Li Yao was easily knocked away.
It was not Li Jialing’s power at all, but the enormous legacy that Wuying Qi 2.0 bestowed upon him!
Pu!
Li Yao fell on the ground again and vomited blood crazily. When he sat up in dizziness, he found that Li Jialing was crouching not far away in a black fog and gazing at him bloodthirstily.
“Don’t… Don’t be rash! Let’s just talk nicely!”
Creeped out, Li Yao hurried to open his hands to show that he was not malicious. He said sincerely, “We’re brothers, aren’t we? If you don’t like the way I addressed you, I can call you big brother!”
