Chapter 440 Offending him openly!
As she thought about the sword skill, time passed in a blink of an eye. When the twenty hours ended, Su Li didn’t wait to be reminded by the voice from the nothingness. She stood up and dragged her seemingly broken body towards the eighth step.
Whoosh!
The scene changed and the same high platform came into Su Li’s view as before.
Su Li walked to the weapon rack and picked up a long sword. She turned herself into a blur, and rushed towards the middle-aged man without saying a word.
She fought in a desperate way just like the previous six rounds.
The existence in the nothingness looked coldly at the bloody rain on the high platform, with coldness flashing in its eyes. He had thought Su Li would die at the fifth step, and didn’t expected that this woman was more resilient beyond his imagination. She had striven to get to the eighth step.
“I have already used the half of the Will of Sword left behind after the inheritance, but she can survive until now with her cultivation in Zhuji Realm. How could it be possible? It’s… ridiculous!”
He murmured with a sense of annoyance and shock. It had a limit to change the rules of the inheritance on the Star Path, and it was also dangerous for him to do that. He didn’t want to take the risk unless he had to.
“Just wait a few moments. If it does go so far, I will never allow anyone to take away my belongings!”
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
On the top of the high platform, the two moved so fast that they became blurred shadows. In the constant-moved shadows of the swords, blood was dripping like raining. It was difficult to tell whose blood it was.
Su Li waved the long sword. Sometimes she released the control of the sword and changed gestures between Ao Sword Skills and Cuixing seamlessly. She could use the skills much more proficiently than the time when she just embarked on the Star Path.
The skills that Su Li used the sword at the beginning were pretty rough. After several life-and-death battles, her skills of using sword were being rapidly polished, smoothened, and perfected.
The existence in the dark sensed the change as well, and his face became even more gloomy.
Swish!
The middle-aged man took a step back and changed the movement of the sword with a flick of his wrist. The dense purple sword light was instantly turned into a sword net shrouding on Su Li.
It’s the killing move!
Su Li’s eyes were flooded with sternness. Holding the sword with the backhand, she turned upwards and the sword was immediately turned into a rotating shadow, breaking upwards in a cone shape.
“The sixth Move of Cuixing, Break!”
All of a sudden, a violent gale blew in the field. The gale wrapped Su Li’s body into it, so she could barely be sensed.
Seeing that the two sides in the field were about to collide, the existence in the dark revealed a smile. She still tried to comprehend a hint of Will of Sword under this circumstance, and chose to use the straightforward killing move. How stupid she was! It was also a waste of her excellent talent.
He turned around and faded into the nothingness. He even lost interest in the result.
It would be a wonder if she didn’t die after a forcible fight with her exhausted condition.
But at this time…
“Boom!”
The strong pressure of the gale spread out to the whole field and shredded the sword net into pieces in the blink of an eye. It also tore the middle-aged man into shreds. Some pieces of his body even fell under the feet of the existence in the nothingness.
“Did she win?!”
The existence in the nothingness was horrified. He suddenly turned to the eighth stone step, and happened to see the ragged, blood-stained girl falling on the stone step, seriously injured and unconscious, as what happened after the fight of the previous two steps.
“How did she win?”
The existence in the nothingness looked terrible and even got a dry mouth. He took Su Li’s death for granted, so he didn’t watch the battle carefully.
“Luck? Or… has this woman been hiding her real strength?!”
He muttered and roared, “It’s impossible! Even a practitioner of Yuanying Realm couldn’t be possible to pass the test, let alone the one in Zhuji Realm… I do not believe it!”
He opened its two eyes wide, staring at Su Li in detail. Su Li was lying on the stone step without moving. Being shocked and disoriented, it actually forgot to continue his lie about the time limit for healing. He didn’t realize until Su Li woke up. At that time, more than sixty hours had passed.
“You… you… have done well. It was not easy for you to get here. There are only seventy hours to heal in this step, and you have already spent sixty hours. Go to the ninth step in ten hours!”
Su Li ignored the severe pain on her arms, propped up her body, and barely sat up. She asked in suppressed anger, “Ten hours? Why don’t you just let me die?”
Seeing that she finally showed her emotions, the shadowy existence subconsciously sighed with a relief. This time, she really reached her limit.
Damn, she had been pretending to be weak in order to deceive it. It was lucky that the Star Path was still long. If she didn’t die at the ninth step, she would not survive the test at the tenth step. That’s for sure!
Thinking of this, he was fully relaxed and used his deep voice again. He snorted, “I have given you the opportunity. Don’t regret since you have come here!”
“… You!”
Su Li’s blood-stained face showed a look of exasperation. She snarled, “I am suspecting that this Star Path was deliberately set up by some senior with an intention of destruction to kill the descendants! I want to go to the arbitration of the Star Path!”
The existence in the nothingness changed its look slightly. Then he remembered that Su Li was just at Zhuji Realm, and her soul-body could never reach the realm of a perfect nature soul, so the arbitration she asked could not look through her. There was nothing to fear.
Thinking of this, he laughed and said confidently, “You even know the arbitration of the Star Path. Well… Geniuses are always proud. Since you won’t admit that you are weak, just do that as you wish. I won’t stop you.”
Different expressions shifted on Su Li’s face, as if she was in a struggle. After a few moments, she did not make other moves, but seized the time to meditate and recover from injuries.
Seeing this, the existence in the nothingness smiled more obviously, “It’s good that she can’t keep calm. The more flippant your mind becomes, the easier you will die. I wonder how long you can stand.”
Sitting on the stone step, Su Li was pale. It was hard to tell whether it came from her anger or her injuries. Her eyes closed tightly, but she was at peace inside, quite the opposite of the impetuous emotion she showed.
Her injuries looked more serious, and both arm bones covered with cracks, like porcelain which would fall apart at any time. However, Su Li was clear that her real injuries were much less than those at the last step.
After coming out from the test illusion, she did not faint at all, but had been using the Ghost Valley Meditation Direction to recover from her injuries. Taking advantage that the existence in the nothingness didn’t react, she got an extra of twenty hours.
If she guessed correctly, the voice in the dark would only give her forty hours to heal.
“It’s the ninth step now, and I have not figured out how long it can affect the Star Path. Moreover, my injuries and pneuma and blood are not fully restored. It is inappropriate to offend him with my real strength. But… even a fool will find that I am pretending if I go on in this way.”
Once the ten hours were up, Su Li opened her eyes with light shining in them.
It’s only a matter of time to offend him openly. From now on… She just needed to get less hurt.
She stepped forward onto the ninth step. A fierce battle began on the high platform once again. But the existence in the nothingness found something wrong as it observed how desperately Su Li was fighting.
How could it be possible that she had strength left?
Wasn’t she so seriously injured that her both arms were about to shatter? How could she still hold the sword?
The battle puppet felt no pain. Neither did she?
…
His doubts increased, so did his foreboding. The battle of the ninth step lasted for three days and three nights and ended up as Su Li pierced the head of the puppet with her broken arm.
“She survived again …”
It stared at Su Li standing on the ninth step, whose arm was separated from her body. He suddenly felt a chill for no reason. What kind of prodigy did he make trouble with?
A trace of vague regret even rose in its heart and it even thought of beating a retreat. However, there was no way out at this point either for him or Su Li.
“It’s the tenth step, she… will definitely die!”
He muttered with nonconfidence that he never noticed before.
“Eighty hours for the tenth step!”
Su Li opened her eyes and heard a cold voice, which was less dynamic but stiffer than before.
“It’s not that man… he began to get suspicious.”
Su Li seemed to ponder. She picked up the broken right arm on the ground, which she broke deliberately, and put it back. The arm shook on the side of her body. Then, she closed her eyes and continued to heal.
Although it was very unreasonable that the time for healing was extended by only ten hours, she did not pretend to be angry as before. Since they both had known the truth, there was no need to argue.
“There was great arbitration as well as small one. It won’t make much difference to him only because of embezzling the reward of the Star Path. If he didn’t make a big mistake, I will be killed after the arbitration…”
While healing herself, Su Li pondered.
“Even if he could have an influence on the on the test of the Star Path, it would not be too much. Otherwise, I would have been killed long ago if he set the strength of the puppet to Huashen Realm or even higher.”
“It was also possible that he was not willing to take the risk to deal with me. After all, I was just one of thousands of practitioners who go through the Star Path. It was unworthy for him.”
“However, if I can get to the last few steps, I am not sure if he will take the risk…”
Su Li lowered her eyes and calculated silently for a moment. And then she became silent and calm like a lake without waves.
…
When the time was up, Su Li stepped on the tenth step in silence.
It was a watershed from the ninth to the tenth step. The purple color of the sword light in the puppet’s hand became darker, and deep notches were left on the high platform after each slash.
Su Li’s situation was getting even more difficult. Every time when she dodged or counterattacked, she just passed by close to the edge of the sword and criss-crossed wounds were left on her body…
But it seemed to be a wonder for the existence in the dark that Su Li survived every time when he thought the puppet could kill her. No matter how fierce she was wounded and how much healing time he had shortened, Su Li would get up and move on to the next battle.
The eleventh step, the twelfth step…
It was bloody on every step.
Su Li did not count how many times her blood drained, and she did not speak another word from the tenth step. She kept tirelessly fighting, and the Will of Sword imprinted in her heart became increasingly clearer.
Until the end of the sixteenth step, Su Li fell out from the illusion and was about to heal. She finally heard that familiar but not powerful voice again.
“Enough!”
Su Li was stunned slightly. She looked at the middle-aged man who appeared in the nothingness and became gradually clear with his teeth gritted. Then she sneered and spoke in a hoarse voice under the angry gaze of the middle-aged man, “It’s the sixteenth step. Can’t you hold back any more at last? You are more reclusive than I’ve thought.”
Hearing these words, the middle-aged man became completely gloomy.
