Chapter 568: Kill
Translator: Radiant Editor: Radiant
“Stop, stop. Stay your hand,” the Howling Devil Cult Leader hurriedly shouted.
“What else is there to say?” Xue Ying’s true body was accompanied by his nine world bodies to surround the Howling Devil Cult Leader. He was ready to act at any time.
The Howling Devil Cult Leader said, “Unless I’m mistaken, you were sent here by His Highness, Dong bo Xue Ying. Is that correct, Tavern Master?”
“How did you know?” Xue Ying frowned.
“Hahaha…” The Howling Devil Cult Leader did not answer. The actual reason related to the fact that he obtained part of the memories of each of the nine souls with the greatest willpower. This included some basic information from Chi Qiu Bai’s memory, which let him know that a certain famous character originated from Chi Qiu Bai’s hometown, and that was Xue Ying! His reputation was too big, having long since spread across the whole Deity world and Dark Abyss, and his background wasn’t secret—he was native to the Xia Clan world from the material realm.
It wasn’t difficult for the Howling Devil Cult Leader to deduce that Chi Qiu Bai, a mere Transcendent from the material realm, could not know anyone with enough influence to invite someone over other than Xue Ying.
“It seems you know quite a lot about Chi Qiu Bai,” Xue Ying said in a cold tone of voice.
“Tavern Master, Dong Bo Xue Ying is just an expert from the Deity world; is it worth becoming my opponent for the sake of an outsider?” The Howling Devil Cult Leader then added, “In truth, I’m sure you can guess that I’ve already used up Chi Qiu Bai’s long ago during the cultivation of my secret technique. I couldn’t bring him out even if I wanted to! You can kill me, but you still won’t gain anything out of it. I can only hope that Tavern Master might show mercy. I, the Howling Devil Cult Leader, will definitely do my best to repay Tavern Master for any kindness you show.”
“He’s already dead?” A tinge of fury appeared in Xue Ying’s eyes.
“That is the case.” The Howling Devil Cult Leader was nodding ceaselessly.
“Then pledge an oath to confirm that his soul has already dissipated. Do this, and I’ll just start thinking up ways to bring him back from the river of time,” Xue Ying said. If he was unable to accomplish something, he could just ask someone else to do it in his stead. The stronger the person being reincarnated, the greater the price that had to be paid. Eternal Wind died as a Transcendent, so it would not be so difficult to reincarnate him. With Xue Ying’s current influence, it would be very easy to do so.
“That is…” The Howling Devil Cult Leader was clearly hesitating. Pledging an oath? Strictly speaking, Chi Qiu Bai could not be said to have truly died.
“You won’t pledge the oath? Does that not mean you’re lying?” Xue Ying no longer hesitated. The Howling Devil Cult Leader first said that he gave the souls over to some other powerful existence, and then immediately changed his mind, saying that how Chi Qiu Bai’s soul dispersed. Even then, he was ultimately unwilling to pledge an oath.
This meant he could only act!
“Hong hong hong!”
Xue Ying’s nine world bodies all waved their poles at the same time. Indeed, for the sake of concealing his identity, Xue Ying forewent using spears in favor of poles! In truth, poles and spears were similar in many aspects.
‘This isn’t good.’ The Howling Devil Cult Leader’s expression went completely pale. ‘Damn it! This Tavern Master is clearly a powerful existence from the Dark Abyss, but for the sake of that Dong Bo, he’s not showing me any mercy.’
Xue Ying’s nine poles were like nine pillars surrounding the world. Everything around was twisted and smashed entirely as if the cosmos apocalypse itself was descending upon this area. His surroundings turned into streams of particles, mainly because every last world body was powered by the luminous sun force coupled with the extreme annihilation mysterious body. Their physical prowess wasn’t any lower than that of the true body, making them so powerful that it felt exaggerated—he could rely on pure strength to produce an effect similar to the apocalypse.
Faced with this heaven-shattering assault, the Howling Devil Cult Leader felt his heart tighten; such power was truly too fierce. He could no longer afford to conceal any part of his combat power, so he erupted out with his full strength.
“Peng~”
Having fallen under the shrouding assault of the nine poles, the Howling Devil Cult Leader began feeling a strand of despair, yet he was nonetheless doing his best to fight back. His body began distorting, eventually taking on the form of a bloody shadow. While it was true that his body cultivation technique was not completely, he had already reached the final step, leaving him quite different from an ordinary figure.
Nine powerful souls were snarling out from the surface of his body, some male, other female, humans or beasts, young and old. Every last one of these nine souls was filled with hatred.
“This…” A feeling of great alarm overcame Xue Ying’s heart.
Of the nine illusions filled with rancor, one was a white-haired man with an appearance strikingly similar to that familiar older brother of his. This was the person he followed when he first became a Transcendent—he was the Eternal Wind Knight, Chi Qiu Bai. However, the current him was no longer as unruly as he had been in the past, and neither was the grief he had always been hiding inside visible. Instead, he seemed like nothing more than a crazy ghost, struggling with hatred as he leaped against the blood shadow.
Just what could he have been experiencing for him to turn into such a resentful ghost?
Xue Ying’s killing intent towards the Howling Devil Cult Leader suddenly exploded! By now, he could easily understand that Chi Qiu Bai and the other eight souls were in a similar state. Eternal Wind would never be able to regain his usual self, and Xue Ying could only ever hope to save him by killing the Howling Devil Cult Leader and then retrieving Chi Qiu Bai’s soul from the river of time.
With how strange his current state was, Chi Qiu Bai would never be able to reincarnate unless the Howling Devil Cult Leader died.
“Peng peng peng~” In spite of the complex emotions he was feeling, Xue Ying’s nine poles struck with the same destructive force from before. Rather, the killing intent in his moves was now even sharper.
“Hu.”
Through arduous effort, the blood shadow managed to flee the region of mounting apocalypse, though not before being struck by one of the poles. The terrifying strength caused his body to distort and tremble. Fortunately, his body had already transformed; bolstered by his current realm, he was able to shave off much of the impact, allowing him to survive the strike.
“Monarch Cheng Ming, save me, save me! If you rescue me, I’ll do whatever you ask,” the Howling Devil Cult Leader immediately sent a message out to a powerful existence of the Dark Abyss who resided three layers away.
“Die for me.”
This time, Xue Ying’s true body acted in concert with his nine world bodies. The ten earth-shattering, enormous poles struck out simultaneously, their power as terrifying as ever, their speed blindingly fast.
‘What? He’s not controlling the surrounding spacetime?’ the Howling Devil Cult Leader noticed, just as he began to despair. While his realm was not as deep as Monarch Mo Xue’s, he had long since grasped hold of the Time-Space Deity Heart, so he was startled to discover that the surrounding spacetime wasn’t being suppressed. This was a mistake that no ordinary powerful existence would ever commit! He immediately moved his blood shadow.
“Hua.”
Tearing through spacetime, the Howling Devil Cult Leader began his escape.
‘He’s running?’ Xue Ying began to feel a headache incoming. Indeed, his realm was simply not high enough. While he was quite strong in terms of head-on combat, he had no easy way of suppressing people using the fleeing ability of the Time-Space or Boundless Deity Heart. The Boundless Deity Heart and the Material Deity Heart were, after all, incredibly hard to grasp a hold of. Even stage four World Deities would usually only ever hope to slowly comprehend them, and most lacked the ability to grasp them entirely.
However, the Time-Space Deity Heart was much more common, and the Howling Devil Cult Leader was clearly one of the many who comprehended it.
“What?!” The Howling Devil Cult Leader’s expression changed greatly as he looked behind him while he was fleeing through the tunnel in spacetime.
“You can’t escape.” Xue Ying had stepped back on his black Starfield Flying Ship to begin his chase, and it so happened that his Starfield Flying Ship’s speed was much faster than his opponent’s.
Standing at the prow of his ship, Xue Ying opened his mouth wide, sending out a dull violet flame, which gave off the feeling of an incandescent dragon being formed. This technique was a domain-related ability that could envelop an entire target area. The Howling Devil Cult Leader failed to dodge it—he was engulfed whole. “Ah!” The burn was so painful that he let out a cry of agony. Such pain! When raised to the seventh layer, the Ten Apocalyptic Fire burned so hot that its power was similar to that of a powerful existence. In mere moments, the blood shadow of the Howling Devil Cult Leader began letting out sounds of ‘chi chi chi’. ‘This is bad… the flame is too terrifying! At this rate, it won’t be long until I burn to ashes!’
The “Blood Demon Scripture” was not a weak technique by any measure, but the Ten Apocalyptic Fire was simply too close to being an absolute art. On top of that, the Howling Devil Cult Leader’s body had yet to truly transform.
“Hong hong hong!” Simultaneous to the release of the Ten Apocalyptic Fire, Xue Ying’s nine world bodies all appeared and waved their poles in the cult leader’s direction.
On one side, the cult leader had to resist the burning ability of Xue Ying’s Ten Apocalyptic Fire, while on the other, he was facing the fierce assault poles of nine poles; he could do nothing but despair. By now, his focus was completely on escape, and it was only when he could not dodge an attack completely that he would try his best to reduce the incoming force.
But while he started out thinking he would die in mere moments, as he continued to struggle, he realized that he was strangely able to resist this two-pronged assault.
‘Something’s off.’ A certain suspicion began rising up in the Howling Devil Cult Leader’s heart. ‘This pole technique is mighty and fierce, but why is it that its application of the profound mysteries of the laws isn’t even comparable to mine? Furthermore, I was able to evade so many of these pole strikes, without him even managing to scratch me. Even when it comes to the strikes that hit me, as long as I concentrated on reducing the force, I was able to do it. Just how is it that I could survive up to this point?’
‘On top of that… he actually didn’t seal spacetime?’
‘Is there really a powerful existence out there who didn’t comprehend the Time-Space Deity Heart?’
‘Such incredible strength, yet he could barely match a new stage four World Deity with that pole technique. One’s realm can never be faked, so his realm likely is just this ordinary… perhaps he’s not even a new stage four World Deity, but actually a very powerful stage three World Deity? Is he just using special techniques to achieve such strength?’ The Howling Devil Cult Leader was quickly able to deduce a large part of the truth. He suddenly shouted out: “You’re not a powerful existence of the Dark Abyss! Are you not Dong Bo Xue Ying?”
He could think of nobody other than Xue Ying who would be able to put out this level of combat power despite having such a low realm. There was no need to even mention his willingness to act for Chi Qiu Bai’s sake!
