Li Yuanxi, the Fifth Nether General, ranked just below Yuan Nan and Song Yuanchi on this expedition to the Demon Thunder Monastery. His cultivation was deep, and it was he who first discovered Xiao Zhongzi stealthily moving through the underground river.
When the chase began, Li Yuanxi charged ahead, using his exceptional escape techniques to close in on Xiao Zhongzi, keeping the distance between them to less than thirty li.
Xiao Zhongzi's cultivation might not be remarkable, but his concealment and evasion techniques were razor sharp. On top of that, he knew the terrain around the monastery inside and out. Every time Li Yuanxi thought he was about to catch him, Xiao Zhongzi would pull some strange maneuver and open the gap again.
After several rounds of this, Li Yuanxi was barely able to keep up. The rest of his sect had already fallen fifty li behind, and the only one still close to him was a member of the Vermilion Hook Sect.
He had crossed paths with that man twice, exchanging a few blows. Though the figure moved with uncanny agility and kept his face hidden, Li Yuanxi had already guessed that he was most likely "Soul Snare," one of the Four Edges.
No one else would show up in such disgraceful garb.
Up ahead, Xiao Zhongzi's aura began to fade again. Li Yuanxi grew wary. He remembered that the last time Xiao Zhongzi slipped away, the same thing had happened. If he let himself be fooled again, he wouldn't be able to show his face.
But just as he focused all his attention on tracking that faint aura, the familiar presence of "Soul Snare" closed in once more.
In just the moment it took him to lose focus, Xiao Zhongzi widened the gap again. Li Yuanxi cursed inwardly, but before he could resume the chase, a flash of green flickered through the trees to his side. A long vine shot out like a venomous snake, piercing toward him.
With a low shout, Li Yuanxi surged his true breath through his chest. When it burst through his meridians, the force shifted from raw power into something fierce and razor-sharp. Amid a soul-piercing shriek, he pressed a single finger against the vine's tip.
The vine went taut in an instant, but remained completely unharmed. Instead, a massive tree twenty zhang away exploded into splinters.
From the shower of debris, a figure sprang out. Twisting deftly among the dense branches, the figure sent seven or eight serpent-like streams of qi lashing toward him, drawing in the surrounding primordial qi and crackling through the air.
At that moment, Xiao Zhongzi's aura vanished without a trace.
Li Yuanxi didn't even have the luxury of anger. Driving his true breath to its limit, he spun his body in a great arc, releasing a blade-like whirlwind of force that cut through the serpent strikes just enough for him to break free. His body shot skyward, straight toward the spot where Xiao Zhongzi's presence had disappeared.
Soul Snare's assault abruptly ceased, as though he too had sensed the change on Xiao Zhongzi's side.
Luck was with Li Yuanxi that day. After flying barely a dozen li, he caught the faintest trace of Xiao Zhongzi's aura again.
He dared not slow down. Locking firmly onto the target, a spark of joy flickered in his eyes, and he dove into the forest like a hunting falcon.
But just as he pushed into the forest, force slammed into him from behind. The weapon hadn't even changed. Once again it was a vine torn straight from the trees.
Li Yuanxi roared with fury, cursing eighteen generations of Soul Snare's ancestors as he whipped around and struck the vine head-on with his palm.
The instant his strike connected, a chill shot through him. The qi coiled around the vine vanished as if by magic. The vine itself crumbled to ash, but a blade of true breath, ten times sharper, slipped in from the other side and drove straight at him.
Only his profound cultivation saved him. In the space of a heartbeat he shifted his meridians and twisted his body aside. Even so, the strike grazed him, grinding violently against his protective true breath before punching through and damaging his channels.
Pain ripped through him, making his whole body shudder. He even felt the ache spreading across his back.
His back?
His pupils flared wide. He didn't even have time to shout "Not good!" Before the thought was complete, he snapped a sealing incantation in his heart, muscles tightening all at once.
"Netherfiend Spirit Body?"
A voice rang out. So strange that for a moment he couldn't even tell if it belonged to a man or a woman.
An instant later, a palm heavy as a falling mountain crashed down on the crown of his head. Li Yuanxi let out a piercing howl as blood spurted from all seven orifices. The alien force carried by the netherfiend spirit leaping through the air was even denser and more solid than the ground itself.
Li Yuanxi struck back with everything he had.
But just as Li Yuanxi raised his palm, agony exploded across him; crown of the head, neck, back, ribs, and ears all struck at once. Fingers, palms, fists, elbows, knees—five devastating bursts of true breath pierced his body as if through paper, converging in his chest before detonating in a violent blast.
The netherfiend spirit force inside him, no matter how fierce, was torn apart under that overwhelming torrent of true breath. He spat out a mouthful of blood mixed with fragments of his own organs, clutching at the air in a futile grasp. By then he already knew. This was no work of Soul Snare.
What he didn't know was when the Tongxuan Realm had birthed cultivators so terrifying, so perfectly in sync. Or why they wanted him dead.
He would never know.
A final killing palm pressed lightly to his forehead, snuffing out the last flicker of his consciousness.
Even as his body still hung in the air, the crushing, continuous shockwaves ripped through flesh and bone alike. By the time he hit the ground, not a trace of human form remained.
Shui Die Lan's graceful figure rose lightly. With a touch of her toes on a tree branch, her speed surged again, and in a blink she was flying side by side with Li Xun.
"The Seventh, the Tenth, and now this Fifth Nether General. That makes three I've killed." Shui Die Lan bent down three fingers one by one, then glanced at Li Xun with a hint of reproach in her eyes. "And you? You only went after Song Yuanchi, and he still got away! Hmph, I was hoping that ugly ghost would end up all alone."
Li Xun only smiled. "He's not far from it already."
It was simply the fate of the Underworld Monarch Sect to suffer. Of their seven generals, two had already been killed by him, one cut down by Gu Pin'er, and now, by sheer misfortune, they had run into Shui Die Lan—the peerless assassin. With one ruthless ambush, executed to perfection, she had cut down three more as easily as chopping vegetables.
If not for Li Xun holding back for his own reasons, even Song Yuanchi, no matter how cunning, would not have escaped with his life today.
Seizing the momentum, the two had struck together and eliminated Li Yuanxi, who had been separated from the main force. By now, the Underworld Monarch Sect's strength in the southeastern forest was more than half destroyed. Only Yuan Nan and Song Yuanchi remained, hardly a threat.
What the Endless Nether Lord, so notorious for his protectiveness, would think upon seeing nearly half of his elite wiped out was anyone's guess.
Yet rather than worry about the storms that mighty figure might stir up in the days to come, Li Xun's attention was fixed more on Shui Die Lan and what she had just revealed of her abilities.
He felt he had glimpsed her true strength. Only a corner of it.
The Fifth Nether General, Li Yuanxi, happened to be someone Li Xun himself had once fought.
Li Xun knew he was stronger than Li Yuanxi, but even so, if they fought in earnest, it would have taken a hundred exchanges or more before the outcome became clear.
Yet in Shui Dielan's hands, Li Yuanxi had not lasted even two breaths.
Even with their ambush, and even with Li Xun's finger strikes interfering from the side, Shui Die Lan's storm of attacks in that instant was so swift, so strange, that it almost seemed as if she had split into multiple bodies.
This was a level of power beyond anything Li Xun had previously understood. Just how strong was Shui Die Lan? He realized he would have to reassess her entirely.
Shui Die Lan seemed unaware of the look in his eyes. All her attention was locked on Xiao Zhongzi, who was darting and twisting like a fleeing rat. "Truly cunning," she said coldly, "but today he won't escape."
Hearing this, Li Xun furrowed his brow for a moment, then let it ease, and finally gave a bitter smile. "Hasn't your fellow already gone after him? Do you really plan to fight over the credit?"
Shui Die Lan answered with a perfectly calm smile. In that smile, Li Xun saw all the answer he needed.
But before she could act on it, a strange cry rang out from the jungle.
Soul Snare, who had charged furthest ahead while they were dealing with Li Yuanxi, was suddenly struck across the waist as if by a heavy staff. His body curled from the blow and was hurled backward, crashing through who knew how many trees before skidding dozens of zhang across the ground. Only then did he finally stop, unable to rise for the moment.
Both of them froze in surprise. Shui Die Lan reacted first, her eyes turning icy as she swept her gaze toward the distant sky a few li away.
Li Xun, quick to read the situation, moved like a spirit monkey, leaping through branches and leaves. In a few agile shifts, he had already put some distance between himself and Shui Die Lan.
Just as Li Xun concealed his presence, three li away a tall figure stepped out of the sky—Ti Wujiu. His stern, commanding gaze swept forward like a golden serpent of lightning through the void, cutting through all distraction to lock directly onto Shui Die Lan's face.
With Ti Wujiu's arrival, the chase instantly rose to an entirely new level.
Shui Die Lan gave a cold humph, her slender figure seeming to blur into a veil of mist, indistinct and untouchable.
From that moment on, the two began to clash across the empty air. For the time being, it was impossible to tell who held the upper hand.
Li Xun also caught Shui Die Lan's whisper in his ear.
"Xiao Zhongzi!"
He nodded in understanding, then turned and shot away in that direction. Yet inwardly he was laughing. His earlier move to let Song Yuanchi slip away was already paying off.
The true experts, Yuan Nan and Ti Wujiao and the rest, had all been drawn over by the disturbance. If Shui Die Lan was dragged into their fight, so much the better. Judging by the current situation, the plan was working quite well.
Taking advantage of the gap Shui Die Lan had opened for him, Li Xun pushed his speed to the absolute limit, steadily closing the distance to his target. Xiao Zhongzi really did seem to be injured; Li Xun could feel it. His speed had dropped sharply, nothing like when the chase had first begun.
Should I release a puppet as a distraction? Li Xun wondered. If he disappears for a while, it might give me the chance to make him disappear forever. That would be the safer play… Wait
A sudden chill shot through the air from the side. Li Xun halted abruptly, and in that very moment, he realized something he had overlooked: If Ti Wujiu was here, where was Yuan Nan?
Alarm bells rang frantically in his mind.