“What do you mean by fused?” Gu Qing Shan questioned.
“I won’t answer that much——- you have to agree to my conditions before I reveal anything else” the fake God slowly said.
“What conditions?” Gu Qing Shan asked.
“If you truly want to, give me some time to think of what I want” the fake God displayed a contemplating expression as if he was actually considering what benefits to ask for.
Gu Qing Shan glanced at him and declared: “Something’s wrong with you”
“What do you mea—–”
Before the fake God could finish his words, a cold gleam flashed.
The fake God’s limbs were sliced off, leaving his head in Gu Qing Shan’s grasp.
The Chao Yin sword hovered in mid-air, closely propped next to the fake God’s neck.
“Laura, seal him” Gu Qing Shan told her.
“Got it”
Laura hopped over and put a total of 179 necklaces onto his neck.
“I feel like he’s trying to stall for time” Gu Qing Shan scowled and quickly explained to the rest: “Even when his life had fallen into someone else’s hand, he didn’t try to beg for his life and insisted on refusing a transaction with words——– I think that monster might be able to sense his location——– I’m going to lead him away and search for information”
Zhang Ying Hao spoke up: “Wait a minute! If the monster truly can—–”
Gu Qing Shan cut him off: “This guy’s soul is very strong; I’ll need 30 seconds to finish Soul Reading”
Before he finished, Gu Qing Shan had already vanished in front of everyone together with the fake God.
A second later.
Boom!
A black tentacle shot up from the ground, then swiftly left.
Countless black tentacles appeared after that to crush the entire house before chasing after Gu Qing Shan.
Everyone was silently hovering in mid-air.
Laura had opened her umbrella, allowing the group to be undetected by the monster.
“That monster can truly sense the fake God’s location”
Boss mused.
“How dangerous, we were so close to being captured” Zhang Ying Hao sighed in relief.
Before the very last second, Gu Qing Shan managed to react in time and left with the fake God.
When that monster’s tentacle thrashed the room, it didn’t discover anything and found that the fake God was in motion, so it naturally gave chase.
The group, fortunately, managed to escape its pursuit.
Laura watched the tidal wave of tentacles below and called out in worry: “How could that be!? What about Gu Qing Shan?”
“Don’t be impatient” Boss calmly told her, “He said, Soul Reading will take a total of 30 seconds”
Boss flipped open the Book of Prophesized Destiny to Gu Qing Shan’s page.
“30 seconds later, I’ll summon him”
Ye Fei Li inhaled and said worriedly: “Now we can only hope that he’ll be able to keep it up for 30 seconds”
Zhang Ying Hao turned to Xuan Ya: “We can’t remain here. Transport us to a relatively secluded place and prepare to receive Gu Qing Shan”
“Yes” Xuan Ya nodded.
She began to prepare her [Fearless Transmission] again.
…
On the other side.
Gu Qing Shan flew out of city limits, quickly making his way through the countryside.
He grabbed the fake God’s head tightly in one hand while wielding the Earth sword in the other.
Soul Reading, begin!
Memories hidden inside the fake God’s mind slowly appeared in his mind.
All of a sudden, the tidal-wave like black tentacles was about to catch up to him!
Gu Qing Shan’s figure flashed and vanished.
He reappeared 1,000km away.
——-[Ground Shrink]!
However, right as he appeared, 7-8 black tentacles had already sprouted around him from the ground.
Gu Qing Shan swung his sword.
A wide arc sliced through and cut off all the black tentacles.
Lines of glowing text appeared on the War God UI:
[You expended 70,000 Soul Points to activate Earth’s Choice and slayed the Void Avatars: God of Life’s tentacles]
[Attention!]
[As you didn’t actually kill the other party, you are unable to obtain any Soul Points from this battle]
Tch, spending 70,000 Soul Points just to kill a bunch of tentacles, that’s a huge loss.
Gu Qing Shan could only pull his sword back, holding the fake God tightly as he fled in another direction.
More black tentacles were sprouting from below.
A loud and furious voice resounded from the faraway direction of the royal palace.
『 DIIIIII——IIIIIEEEEE—–』
Gu Qing Shan didn’t react to it at all, totally concentrating on avoiding the tentacles on the ground while trying to finish his Soul Reading.
Sha sha sha sha sha!
The tentacles swung like long whips, yet were as sharp and tough as spears, shooting towards him in bunches.
Gu Qing Shan’s figure weaved and moved between the countless tentacles like an arc of lightning.
He was wandering on the verge of death at every step of the way.
Time was moving extremely slowly.
After avoiding over a hundred attacks, only 2 seconds had passed.
What an intense pursuit this was!
Suddenly, Gu Qing Shan found himself surrounded by black tentacles.
—–he was completely enclosed!
The black tentacles moved to attack him——–
Gu Qing Shan’s figure shifted and shot up to the sky.
He could clearly tell that the entire country side was filled with tentacles, so regardless of where he ran, he would only end up surrounded.
Fly!
Fly as fast as you can!
Like a big bird, Gu Qing Shan soared towards the vast blue sky above at lightning-fast speeds!
From the ground below, countless black tentacles writhed and twisted as they shot up to the sky.
While Gu Qing Shan was fast, these tentacles were faster!
They turned into afterimages that coiled and whipped around Gu Qing Shan.
Gu Qing Shan continued to hold tightly onto the fake God’s forehead as he flew in a chaotic, irregular pattern between the tentacles.
His figure almost couldn’t be seen at all.
Using his countless combat experiences, his spirit sense, as well as [Ground Shrink], he managed to barely escape from the black tentacles every step of the way.
Again and again.
Only when he really couldn’t avoid them would he swing his sword to cut the tentacles off.
His Soul Points were rapidly being expended!
Four seconds passed.
The fifth second!
——-there were a long 25 seconds left until he finished searching the fake God’s memories.
Gu Qing Shan hid within the clouds.
Black tidal waves washed in from every direction like a gigantic maw that completely devoured the clouds.
The cloud was completely empty except for a single tree branch.
The black tentacles weren’t interested in this tree branch so they quickly retreated.
They noticed that they had been fooled!
——-Divine Skill, [Shadow Shift]!
Gu Qing Shan appeared at the shore of the ocean where that tree branch originally was.
The ocean ahead of him was as deep as the abyss.
Just as he was about to wield the Chao Yin sword to hide in the ocean, he abruptly stopped.
An old lady was standing on top of the ocean.
Her lower half was made up of countless writhing tentacles.
She stood in his way.
『 Little insect, tell me, how do you want to die? 』
The old lady narrowed her eyes.
Gu Qing Shan put his sword away and bowed, then asked: “Your Excellency, it is a great pleasure to finally meet you”
The old lady froze for a brief moment.
Gu Qing Shan continued rambling on: “This humble one is the servant of the Deity of Chaos, here at this treasured land for the sake of a transaction”
『 The Deity of Chaos? Do you not know what your God has done? 』
The old lady muttered in a threatening low voice, as if ready to kill him.
Gu Qing Shan relaxed his arms: “Your Excellency, I brought countless Soul Artifacts to this world, all for the sake of a transaction”
The old lady’s clenched fists froze.
Soul Artifacts!
That’s right, in order to advance any further, I need a large number of Soul Artifacts.
In the secret passage, this was the one who took out a real Soul Artifact to try and trade for that girl’s soul from me.
『 What exactly does your Deity want!? 』
The old lady suppressed her killing intent and questioned.
If it was something insignificant, she wouldn’t mind exchanging them for Soul Artifacts.
After all, in an all-out clash against a Deity, regardless of the results, the aftermath would be unimaginably harsh.
For example, the perfect place of concealment, Calming Soul Country, would surely be destroyed in a battle between Gods.
And she didn’t want to see that happen.
Gu Qing Shan’s thoughts were desperately moving.
Lines of glowing text were constantly scrolling across his eyes:
[You’ve run into a unique void monster——- Card: Soul Stealer’s body, the God of Life’s current soul vessel]
[This is a unique monster created from the fusion of an ancient void monster, an Inner Plane Deity, and the Water God Card]
[Card grade: Golden]
[To slay this monster with Earth’s Choice, you will require 50 million Soul Points as well as the Earth sword to be in your hand]
A Golden Card!
Gu Qing Shan was startled.
According to known Card grade, above Lapis is Azure, above Azure is Violet, and above Violet is Golden.
By utilizing a single Golden Card: [Earthen Dual Body], Gu Qing Shan managed to completely overturn a desperate situation in the Age of Old and triumphant against Lin who still had her Abyssal Fate Weaver form.
Who would’ve thought, he would once again run into another Golden Card in Calming Soul Country!
And he needed 50 million Soul Points in order to win against this Card!
This was an unacceptable astronomical amount.
Gu Qing Shan suddenly realized something
Perhaps—–
This monster is significantly stronger compared to the Soul Shrieker.
The Soul Shrieker had only just achieved apotheosis 3 days ago.
While this monster managed to fight against the seven Deities by itself countless eons ago.
Right now, it has turned into a vessel for the God of Life who had obtained the [Human Regiment] Card.
How strong would it actually be?
Gu Qing Shan’s thought made a turn and continued his conjecture.
——-after taking over the monster’s body, the God of Life didn’t stop there and even turned herself into a Card.
Why did she have to do such a thing?
Was she wary of something? Or simply afraid?
If she was afraid, what was she afraid of?
Gu Qing Shan lightly cleared his throat and explained: “The Deity of Chaos——- the great Soul Shrieker wants to destroy [Order]”
『 Destroy [Order]? 』the old lady repeated after him.
Gu Qing Shan gradually explained to her: “Indeed, the final remaining [Order] of every world is hiding within Calming Soul Country, as long as you give that [Order] up, the Deity of Chaos will grant you a great number of Soul Artifacts as both a reward and a fair exchange”
This was the truth.
The Soul Shrieker did indeed come for the sake of going after the [Demon King Order].
But in the old lady’s ears, that meant something completely different.
——-she took the [Human Regiment] Card, turned herself into a Golden Card, and obtained boundless power.
How should she give that up?
How could she possibly give that up?
Destroy… [Order]…
The old lady’s killing intent rose again as she coldly scoffed: 『 That [Order] no longer exists, your master will have to be disappointed 』
Gu Qing Shan glanced at her from top to bottom, then spoke hesitantly: “How regretful, our master can sense with certainty that the carrier of [Order] is indeed in this world”
He then continued: “However, since you insist that they do not exist——- forget it, the transaction is called off, goodbye”
Gu Qing Shan turned around to leave.
The old lady was stunned.
Gu Qing Shan abruptly stopped, turned around and tossed the fake God to her.
“Right, this person seems to be your subordinate. I’ll return him to you, let’s all us even”
“Farewell”
The old lady extended her black tentacles, caught the fake God, and searched him.
The fake God was no longer alive.
Not even his soul remained.
Which meant, she would be completely clueless about what actually happened.
The old lady gritted her teeth: 『 Bastard! Stop right there! 』
Gu Qing Shan actually stopped.
But right at the next second, he vanished without a trace.
30 seconds had passed.
Gu Qing Shan had been transported away through Boss’ summoning technique.
At the same time.
Far in the sky, the tree branch whose place was swapped with Gu Qing Shan was quickly falling down.
All of a sudden.
A cold gleam appeared from inside the branch.
The Earth sword had shown itself.
It turned into a streak of light that once again pounded the earth.
Rumble rumble rumble———
The wind swirled and clouds boiled.
The heavens had fallen into darkness.
The world that the God of Life had just repaired once again fell to the verge of ruin.
