Chapter 710: Master of Flesh and Blood (2)

Chapter 710: Chapter 338: Master of Flesh and Blood (2)

The First Elder exhaled deeply; You Su was not a complex and incomprehensible person. The First Elder, who had seen through countless people, trusted him precisely because of this understanding.

As soon as these words were spoken, boundless curses erupted below. Some even directed their anger toward the Celestial Technique Venerable, accusing him of possibly colluding with evil forces. Otherwise, how could someone of the Celestial Technique Venerable’s power not see through an evil spirit right under his nose?

They clamored for Zhengyang, the True Immortal, to show mercy and allow them to fly to the immortal island to save people; some glared angrily at the Celestial Technique Venerable, as if wanting to vent their anger for losing loved ones on the old man.

The proud Zhengyang, the True Immortal, ignored the clamor below altogether. He merely waved a hand lightly, and the images in the light screen abruptly stopped, bringing sudden silence to the world.

The two confronting elders and the noisy crowd seemed to be in two different worlds, unable to hear each other’s voices.

“If it’s done, it’s done. Is the Celestial Technique Venerable trying to excuse his disciple?” Zhengyang, the True Immortal, asked with a smile.

The First Elder, hearing this, instead looked directly into Zhengyang’s blazing eyes.

He gazed like this for a long time before finally withdrawing his sight, closing his eyes as if pricked, and sighed:

“Those are truly eyes one cannot look directly at… But I once read in a street book that the backside of the sun is black, for the sun revolves around us, creating the alternation of day and night. The sun brings not only extreme light but also extreme darkness.”

“That theory is wrong.” Zhengyang, the True Immortal, after listening carefully, confidently replied, “When you reach the Celestial Awakening Realm, you’ll discern that it’s actually we who revolve around the sun. The backside of the sun is not black; it’s a massive fireball, millions of miles away from us.”

“But the point is right.” The First Elder calmly answered.

Zhengyang, the True Immortal, was momentarily stunned. He understood what truth the elder referred to – that this ‘sun’ he embodied was bringing not light, but boundless darkness.

“You are very wary of me.” Zhengyang, the True Immortal, remained composed.

“What exactly do you intend to do to that child?” The First Elder furrowed his long brows deeply; he might die, but he absolutely did not wish for that child to perish.

Zhengyang, the True Immortal, was silent for a moment, as the dazzling light in his pupils seemed to dim slightly:

“Unspeakable.”

The First Elder nodded as if having expected this, he cast his gaze far away, looking at the peaceful immortal island shrouded in a curtain of rain over the distant sea, and sighed softly:

“I hope he won’t suffer too much.”

“The Celestial Awakening Immortal Ancestor left a four-word maxim for future cultivators…” Zhengyang, the True Immortal, said with a smile.

“Bitter first, sweet later?”

The First Elder responded promptly, a hint of a bitter smile appearing on his haggard face. He felt such words were completely a deceptive lie, used to make the deranged cultivators of the Nanyang Continent find joy amid suffering.

Zhengyang, the True Immortal, nodded slightly, like a senior somewhat approving of a junior remembering ancestral teachings. Yet, the First Elder looked far older than he, who had broken into the Celestial Awakening.

The First Elder shook his head, looking up at the sky, rain pouring from the dark canopy overhead.

“The sky is so dark…”

The First Elder murmured softly, as if returning hundreds of years in time, murmuring to his father while gazing at the pitch-black sky.

That, in reality, was an evil spirit shaped like a manta ray, which flew in the sky, blocking out all light, descending suddenly upon the village where the First Elder had grown up as a child. His parents wrapped him up layer by layer, making him the sole survivor of the entire village. Later, he made it his mission to kill that evil spirit, but he searched in vain for it for hundreds of years.

It was only when he was near death that he found it.

But this time, it wasn’t in the sky; it was in the pitch-black sea.

Zhengyang, the True Immortal, burst forth with blinding light like an actual sun, allowing people to see the terrifying sight —

The giant whales that had silently towed the immortal island waited in the water, now emitting piercing, desperate cries, as if the world itself was trembling. Something more powerful than the whales was gnawing at their flesh underwater, turning the sea blacker.

Just as everyone’s attention focused on the sea, an unforgettable scene unfolded —

The inky sea split open, revealing an unprecedented demon. Its body resembled a towering mountain of flesh, with bulging, thick blood vessels under crimson skin. These vessels connected to the manta ray beneath it and extended into the dark sea.

It resembled no creature, more like an enormously fresh heart.

The hundred-meter-long manta ray spread its wings in the viscous sea, stirring up boundless waves. Something in the water surged along with the waves, with bizarre evil spirits clinging to the underside of the manta ray like parasitic snails, but they truly parasitized the heart carried by the manta ray.

The First Elder seemed insignificant as dust before this mountain of flesh, yet he trembled with excitement.

He knew what it was — it was the Master of Flesh and Blood.

Zhengyang, the True Immortal, ascended into the sky, spreading his arms as if to embrace this turbid world. His mouth curved into a smile filled with the satisfaction of a wish fulfilled:

“Shatter! And then rebirth!”

…

Ji Xueruo’s eyes became utterly hollow.

She could hardly believe that the Snake Ancestor her family worshiped and revered for thousands of years was not the ‘mother’ of all snake demons, but a demonized entity that had lain dormant for millennia, choosing its offspring only to devour them.

She never should have trusted a monstrous entity long past its time, especially one with which she didn’t even share a common language. Yet, she naively believed this giant snake must have goodwill towards its descendants.

What urged her to approach it?

Was it the call of shared bloodline? Or an unfounded hope in her heart?

If the Snake Ancestor of the Snake Race still existed, then returning to Star Shining Divine Mountain would be inevitable for the Snake Race. Such a snake demon, with at least a five-thousand-year lifespan, would be invincible.

And she would leap from a diligent clan leader slowly steering her tribe towards revival to the second-in-command of the strongest demon race in Dngying.

“I am not fit to be your clan leader at all…” Ji Xueruo lamented in her heart.

Since her birth, her mother’s blood feud and the revival of their race naturally became her lifelong mission. As the older sister, she accepted it all and gradually grew into her role.

But now, reminiscing about the past, she realized that the image of the strong, diligent, serious, mature young girl was merely a shell she couldn’t shed. She was just an ordinary person who often thought of taking a break or slacking off.

Perhaps her younger sister would make a better clan leader… She often fell into such dilemmas, then shook her head to convince herself to persist.

But this time, she couldn’t resist the temptation of complacency. She could accept using her life as the price for a lazy attempt to slack off, but she could not accept her tribesmen dying because of her.

The greed in the snake’s eyes sent Ji Xueruo into the depths of despair with just a glance.

In her hazy consciousness, Ji Xueruo vaguely saw someone confronting the Snake Ancestor.

Had someone come to save her?

That person was flung away repeatedly yet returned again and again.

Could it be… You Su?

On the delicate, pale snake face, rain streamed down; You Su’s anger, sadness, and other emotions seemed to transmit to her heart through an invisible thread of kinship.

Why did this fool turn back!!

Ji Xueruo recalled everything after entering the island, realizing that she had always escaped danger with You Su’s help. This was a vast change from when they were at the Jade Ring Pool, where she thought they were evenly matched, but now, it seemed that wasn’t the case.

Ji Xueruo’s pride seemed to be her last strength, seeping from her broken snake bones and merging into her flesh.

The girl felt she was being reborn; this feeling of transformation made her snake body tremble with excitement.

But at that moment, a delicate jade hand touched her forehead.

“You carry the blood of sin.”

Ji Xueruo glazed over, staring at the purple-robed girl standing on the Snake Ancestor’s body. She was sure she had never seen her before, yet the girl’s gaze seemed to know her well for a long time.