Looking closely, the mysterious figure wore her hair in a Nine-Dragon Flying Phoenix coiffure. She was dressed in a crimson gauze robe threaded with gold, a Lantian jade belt trailing long at her waist, a white jade tablet held within her flowing sleeves. Her face was like lotus petals, her brows like drifting clouds. Her robes danced wildly in the wind, as though she were a fairy from the Moon Palace, standing high above and gazing down upon the mortal world. Her immortal beauty was beyond description, her majesty innate. A肃杀 aura coiled about her body, making her nearly impossible to look at directly.
Beneath her cloud-like brows, a black silk ribbon covered her eyes. Even so, one could still sense the cold glint hidden beneath it.
Who exactly was she?
Chen Sanshi had assumed she was heading toward Lingji Cavern. How had she returned so quickly?
Moreover—
The blind woman still seemed to harbor no hostility, nor any intention of taking action. She simply stood at a high vantage point, calmly observing the battlefield.
Whether the word "observe" was accurate was uncertain, yet that was the first impression she gave.
It was not only Chen Sanshi; Xu Baoren on the opposing side also noticed the blind woman's abrupt appearance, and his movements grew even more frantic.
At this moment, the situation along the riverbank was becoming clear.
The Guiyuan Sect disciples had just dealt with a large number of wandering souls. Their losses in mana were already immense—how could they withstand the sudden Heavenly Gang Sword Formation?
Not to mention that their primary combat forces were all being held back!
Deng Wuchang wielded two blades, one long and one short. In his divine beast form, his massive body darted and weaved continuously. True Force surged like a golden storm.
Qian Qiren and Cui Zichen each controlled flying swords and cast spells in a pincer attack. Their offensive was equally fierce.
But they too had been worn down in advance and were unable to inflict effective damage.
Deng Wuchang did not grow impatient. At times he attacked, at times he defended, entangling them steadily to stall for time.
"Junior Brother Qian, Junior Brother Cui!"
Xu Baoren was increasingly unable to hold on. He shouted loudly, "The situation is urgent—come assist me at once and regroup with the other two sects!"
The implication was clear.
The three of them would abandon the remaining disciples and flee this place.
It sounded cruel, but it was a desperate measure.
These attackers had arrived with ferocious momentum, striking precisely when they were at their weakest. If the battle continued like this, they would be picked off one by one until all perished.
"We're coming!"
Qian Qiren and Cui Zichen understood the situation as well.
"Demon fiend, you still dare to entangle us!"
Cui Zichen gathered strength and brought down a sword strike, forcing back the golden-form blade-catcher. A miniature bronze bell appeared in his hand. With a flip of his palm, the bell flew above the blade-catcher's head and suddenly expanded.
Dong—
As the toll of the bell rang out, Deng Wuchang's vision went black, and his entire body was enveloped within it.
"Go help Senior Brother Xu."
Cui Zichen swallowed several pills to restore mana. "This Beast-Trapping Bell is a second-tier upper-grade magic artifact. He won't be able to break out anytime soon!"
Clang clang clang—
Inside the bronze bell, Deng Wuchang wielded his twin blades, hacking with full force against the bronze walls. Aside from ear-piercing screeches and a few cracks left behind, he was unable to shatter it outright.
"Hah—"
He continued slashing while sighing. "I've done my part."
After trapping the blade-catcher, Qian Qiren and Cui Zichen rushed at top speed toward Xu Baoren's position, launching a three-sided assault against the Emperor of the Great Han.
Chen Sanshi showed no fear. Spear in his right hand, sword in his left, Thick Earth protection guarding his body, Ten Thousand Swords Descend behind him—facing three alone, he did not fall into disadvantage.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
In an instant, the riverbank was filled with the thunderous hum of colliding magic artifacts and crashing spells.
Chen Sanshi's immortal path cultivation was still only at Early Stage Foundation Establishment, so his mana was not as deep as theirs. But that had never been his killing method—these techniques were merely a means to close the distance.
His true reliance remained his peerless spearmanship and exquisite swordsmanship. Casting spells was simply to create better opportunities for close combat.
Spell cultivators had fragile bodies; once approached at close range, that was their weakness.
Not to mention that the Dragon Gall Silver Spear was imbued with Heaven-Scorching Fire. Every strike, whether it hit a vital point or not, burned away the opponent's mana.
In fewer than 10 exchanges, the spells that Xu Baoren and the others once wielded with ease had become increasingly difficult to sustain. They could not find a single flaw in their opponent. Every move seemed meticulously calculated in advance—perfectly countering their techniques, defending and retaliating at precisely the right moment.
Boom—
A fire dragon roared through the overwhelming bombardment of spells, finding a gap and surging out, piercing directly through Xu Baoren's abdomen.
At the same time, Chen Sanshi swept the Dragon Abyss Sword horizontally, blocking Qian Qiren's flying sword that had attacked from the flank.
"Ah!!!"
Qian Qiren roared ferociously, his face twisted. The hands forming his seal trembled as though bearing the weight of a mountain. Shouting through clenched teeth, he cried, "Brother Cui—quick!"
Without needing to be told, Cui Zichen had already circled behind him. Golden light flared across the surface of his flying sword as he aimed straight for the white-robed man's back.
In the blink of an eye, Chen Sanshi twisted the spear blade, shredding Xu Baoren's internal organs into pulp. Fire-Element True Force layered again and again before erupting at its deepest point. Flames spread like clouds, burning the corpse to ash. In a blaze, he drew a dazzling arc and swept straight toward his rear—
Clang!
It crashed head-on into the flying sword that had come sneaking in.
Cui Zichen staggered back on his knees.
Seizing the opening, Chen Sanshi pivoted, the dragon-head of his long spear pointing straight at Qian Qiren's crown.
"What?!" Qian Qiren was terrified. He tried to recall his flying sword to defend, but under the suppression of Dragon Abyss Sword, he felt as if a mountain were pressing down on him—he couldn't move it at all.
Before he could think of another response, the Dragon Gall Silver Spear had already thrust in, like a flaming flood dragon. It swallowed his head in a single bite, leaving only a headless corpse to plummet straight down from midair.
Chen Sanshi did not pause. The Purple Thunder Bow appeared abruptly in his hands. He drew the bowstring, using the long spear as his arrow, aiming at Cui Zichen—who had just landed and was about to flee—and loosed a charged shot.
The flaming flood dragon howled in, carrying Heaven-Scorching Fire that blotted out the sky. Cui Zichen had nowhere to dodge. He hurriedly raised a hand and summoned back the Beast-Trapping Bell that had confined the blade-catcher earlier, dropping it over himself as a shield.
Boom!
The long spear struck. The Beast-Trapping Bell, already riddled with cracks, shattered completely. Under the searing shockwave, Cui Zichen was blasted away like a kite with its string cut.
He felt as though his internal organs were burning, his vision swimming in darkness. Only after he forced back a shred of consciousness did he see sword light flare.
Dragon Abyss Sword swept past—Cui Zichen's head flew high, and his life was severed for good.
Chen Sanshi slung the bow across his back, Dragon Abyss Sword in his left hand, and with his right he snatched back the spear. Wrapped in surging, heaven-high flame, he slammed down with a thunderous crash, like a meteor fallen from beyond the skies.
With Xu, Cui, and Qian all dead, the Guiyuan Sect no longer had sufficient fighting strength. He did not hesitate, charging into the melee and harvesting lives without mercy.
After the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, the battle ended.
Starting from "Liu Feng," the 12 Guiyuan Sect disciples who had come to the Nine Nether Forbidden Land in search of treasure were all executed. Not a single one escaped.
Because the fight had not lasted long, the Tianyong City officers suffered only 5 minor injuries, with not a single death.
Corpses covered the ground, blood flowing like springs.
"Cut off their heads and bring them back to the Great Han."
As Chen Sanshi gave the order, his gaze turned once more to the mysterious figure on the earthen slope.
The blind woman still stood in the wind, unmoving, like a divine statue, silently watching everything before her.
What in the world was her game?
Even while slaughtering his foes, Chen Sanshi had never dared to commit fully, keeping an eye on the rear—afraid she might suddenly make a move.
"Miss?"
Since she had shown no hostility, he could not very well press her aggressively. While ordering his men to clean up the battlefield, he spoke and asked, "Do you need something?"
Just then, a sandstorm swept in.
The blind woman stood amid the sky-full yellow grit. Her red lips moved slightly, and faintly—barely—two words could be heard.
"Leave. Now."
"Leave now?" Chen Sanshi was puzzled. He immediately swept his eyes across the surroundings again, and then he suddenly sensed something wrong with the ground.
One Guiyuan Sect corpse after another lay sprawled across the earth. Warm blood still streamed from their wounds, but instead of pooling on the surface, it seeped into the deeper soil with eerie speed, vanishing almost at once—like some bloodthirsty feral beast lurking underground, greedily drinking it in.
At the same time, the purple flowers symbiotic with the corpses began to bloom with waves of crimson spiritual light, quickly covering an area within roughly 330 meters.
"Not good."
Chen Sanshi finally understood the blind woman's warning. Fire-Element True Force exploded in an instant. Dragon Abyss Sword, wreathed in scarlet flame, stabbed down violently, incinerating an ancient cultivator's corpse at his feet to nothing.
At the same time, under the illumination of that spiritual light, all the ancient cultivators' remains came to life!
One pair of eyes after another snapped open. One after another, cultivators who should have died hundreds of thousands of years ago shot into the air, rising to hover in midair.
The sudden change startled every Tianyong City officer.
"Damn it—did the corpses get back up?!" Wang Zhi bulged his mung-bean eyes, utterly unable to believe what he was seeing.
"A-Are these zombies?!"
"No." Qi Cheng analyzed calmly. "It should be these purple spirit plants on the ground. They're parasitizing the corpses—it's the plants controlling the bodies."
More and more corpses "revived," densely filling the air as they hovered, sealing the Tianyong City men in from all sides, leaving not even a drop of space.
Their hollow eyes looked down at the ground. Their hands formed seals mechanically. One shattered magic artifact after another on the earth responded to the summons, all flying back into their "owners'" hands.
After these purple flowers parasitized them, they not only ensured the corpses would not rot—they could even control them, and preserve some of the techniques the bodies had used in life.
A corpse of a Nascent Soul mighty figure gripped a longsword and slashed straight down toward the densest part of the crowd on the ground.
"Watch out!"
Chen Sanshi flashed forward, arriving in front of Zhou Weizhen and the others. At the same time, he formed seals and cast a spell, condensing a Thick Earth shield before him.
Rumble—
The sword strike fell.
The Thick Earth shield shattered into four pieces. Chen Sanshi himself was blasted backward; he drove Dragon Abyss Sword into the ground and slid back 100 steps before he barely steadied himself.
After death, if no special secret art has been prepared in advance, most cultivation will disperse. Yet even so, a single strike from a Nascent Soul ancient corpse carried such terrifying might!
"Your Majesty!"
Dongfang Jingxing and Qi Cheng hurried over. "How is Your Majesty? To think we need Your Majesty to protect us instead—this servant/this subordinate deserves ten thousand deaths!"
"Save it. Move, now!"
Chen Sanshi yanked his sword free and stood.
At the same time, the other corpses attacked in unison, and a second slaughter erupted with Tianyong City.
The Nascent Soul ancient corpses were frighteningly powerful, but they had a weakness: without the protection of a realm, their flesh was extremely fragile. A few spells were enough to destroy them completely.
But the ancient corpses of the "Shenwu Sect" martial cultivators were a far bigger problem!
One Golden Body Realm ancient corpse after another climbed up. They snatched weapons at random and charged toward wherever living aura could be sensed—
And Chen Sanshi quickly found himself surrounded.
These ancient corpses possessed monstrous strength. Purely in terms of physical power, each was comparable to a martial artist at the middle stage of the True Force Realm. There were so many that even he couldn't hold them all off!
Most crucially, even if Chen Sanshi found an opening to land a blow, it was hard to destroy the Golden Body bones hidden beneath their armor!
"Sima Yao, Wang Zhi—you two stay with me and cover the rear!"
Chen Sanshi tossed the "Guardian Envoy" wooden plaque into the eunuch's hands and barked, "Everyone else, get out of this secret realm, fast!"
"This servant obeys!"
Dongfang Jingxing knew staying would only drag them down. He put away the Ten-Thousand Souls Banner, took the wooden plaque, and rose into the air. At the highest point of the dome-like barrier, he opened a breach.
The Tianyong City officers began to break out and retreat.
"Ah!"
"Save me!"
"General, save me!!!"
.....
But during the process, many were still stopped by the ancient corpses. They let out agonized wails, then died under a chaos of blades, their blood quickly absorbed by the purple flowers.
Boom—
Chen Sanshi gripped the flame-burning Dragon Abyss Sword with both hands and chopped at a vicious angle into the neck of an ancient corpse before him. After the blade tore through flesh, it jammed hard against the bone.
Before he could gather strength for another strike, more Golden Body ancient corpses surged in. He could only switch to the Dragon Gall Silver Spear and sweep it in all directions.
But that only forced the corpses back—it couldn't inflict any effective killing, because… they were already dead!
Sima Yao, in the form of a vicious wolf, soon became exhausted.
Wang Zhi was careless for an instant and took a sword through the back. Blood quickly soaked his spine, and he could only grit his teeth and hold on.
Fortunately, nearly all the other Tianyong City officers had already withdrawn.
Chen Sanshi ordered, "You two leave as well!"
"Your Majesty, since when does a ruler cover for his subjects?!" Sima Yao shouted.
"Less talk. I can still hold!"
Chen Sanshi was not acting on hot-blooded bravado. In this situation, someone had to cover the rear—otherwise, not a single one of them would get away!
And only he had enough strength to delay for time.
"Brother Chen!"
Deng Wuchang leapt in, arriving behind the white robe to help relieve the pressure.
Only after Sima Yao and Wang Zhi left did Deng Wuchang rise into the air and depart as well.
"Many thanks, Brother Deng."
Chen Sanshi roared and unleashed a full-power strike, like a brutal fire dragon, forcing the densely packed ancient corpses back half a step. Then he stepped onto his flying sword and used Aerial Control, intending to leave this place.
But right at that moment, an ancient corpse wielding a mountain-splitting giant axe suddenly shot into the air. Runes flowed across the surface of its flesh, and the might it erupted with was even stronger than ordinary Golden Body ancient corpses.
Boom—
The axe fell. Chen Sanshi raised his spear to block—and was smashed from midair into the ground, leaving a massive crater.
When he lifted his head again, he was already surrounded once more.
"Your Majesty!"