Chapter 427: The Holy Lord

The three Heaven-Human experts of the Yellow Spring Tribe went briefly blank, clearly not immediately grasping what the blind man meant.

But they did not let up for an instant, every one of them running with everything they had. They were now mere steps from the Yellow Spring Tribe, their only chance at survival.

Young Master Jinchuan's expression was dark and unpleasant, but the look he shot back at the blind man behind him was filled with undisguised killing intent, as though he were already certain the man could not actually kill him.

Just then, the blind man suddenly stopped, slowly raising the blood-soaked bamboo staff in his hand and pointing it toward Young Master Jinchuan and his group as they fled ahead.

This movement of the blind man's carried no apparent disturbance of martial true qi, and no killing intent radiated from him at all.

Yet at that very moment, just as they arrived before the imposing gate of the Yellow Spring Tribe, believing they had finally reclaimed their lives, all three Heaven-Human experts suddenly froze where they stood.

Then expressions of profound disbelief and terror spread across their faces, and almost in unison all three lowered their heads to look at their own chests.

There, at some unknown point, a bloody hole had appeared.

And at that moment, they could clearly sense an intangible, lethal aura sweeping outward from their chests like a storm, destroying their cores and heart meridians in almost an instant, draining every trace of life force from their bodies.

At this point, Young Master Jinchuan finally seemed to sense something was wrong and snapped his head around to look.

He saw, with his own eyes, the three Heaven-Human experts' bodies shatter silently and collapse, scattering into a heap of broken flesh on the ground.

At the same time, the blind man, pointing the bamboo staff toward Young Master Jinchuan from a distance, let his hoarse voice drift slowly into the man's ear, "I knew you had some means of saving your life. Before, I didn't have full confidence in it. But here and now, it's enough to kill you."

At those words, an inexplicable chill, as though plunging into a frozen cellar, seized Young Master Jinchuan's heart.

In the next instant, the true qi of heaven and earth around his body surged like a tide, the void trembling. A square bronze token shattered his clothing and floated up, suspended in the air.

The square bronze token bore intricate patterns carved across its surface and erupted with a steady glow of dark yellow light. In the blink of an eye it absorbed all the true qi of heaven and earth in the surrounding area, transforming it into a vast yellow spring river that encircled and protected Young Master Jinchuan within.

At the sight, Young Master Jinchuan felt both shock and fury, while a trace of lingering fear surfaced in his heart at the same time.

The square bronze token was called the Divine Works Shield Decree, said to have been forged personally by the founding patriarch of the Divine Works Hall, with fewer than a hundred ever passed down to this day.

The Divine Works Shield Decree was crafted with extraordinary, almost divine skill, capable of transforming into a thousand forms, and it possessed the marvelous ability to absorb and store martial techniques.

This item had come into the hands of the Yellow Spring Tribe's Rakshasa Holy Lord through a stroke of fortune. After embedding within it a means of saving a life, he had gifted the Divine Works Shield Decree to his beloved son, Young Master Jinchuan, to ensure he would have a way to survive in a critical moment.

This was also why Young Master Jinchuan, even with the blind man's killing intent locked onto him and having witnessed firsthand the man's near-effortless slaughter of a Yellow Spring guardian and a host of Heaven-Human experts, had remained certain the man could never actually kill him.

Even so, the Divine Works Shield Decree activating on its own left Young Master Jinchuan with a lingering chill of fear.

Because it meant that just moments ago, the blind man had already dealt him a fatal blow, completely without a sound.

Had it not been for the Divine Works Shield Decree saving his life, he would likely already be just as dead as the three Heaven-Human experts beside him.

"I told you, you can't kill me."

Protected within the yellow spring river, Young Master Jinchuan fixed his eyes hard on the blind man not far away, the shock and fury in his heart gradually replaced by endless rage and killing intent.

He had now successfully reached the Yellow Spring Tribe and stood on undefeatable ground. From here on, it was the blind man who should be the one to die.

But what caught Young Master Jinchuan completely off guard was that the blind man's lifeless eyes, fixed on him now, allowed a barely perceptible curve to surface on his scarred face.

"Good. Another task completed successfully."

The blind man's hoarse voice drifted lightly into Young Master Jinchuan's ear. Just as he was puzzling over the meaning, in the next instant he looked over and his expression changed sharply.

The yellow spring river formed by the Divine Works Shield Decree, suspended in the air, was protected not only by the token's own uniquely sturdy material, but also by a powerful defensive technique embedded by one of the Yellow Spring Tribe's Five Holy Lords.

Both together protected Young Master Jinchuan as solidly as iron. Even all nine of the Yellow Spring Tribe's guardians working together would struggle to so much as shake this supreme martial defensive treasure.

And yet now, this treasure that should have been more than enough to save Young Master Jinchuan's life was collapsing at a visible, rapid speed, the vast and weighty yellow spring river on the verge of breaching.

What was more, Young Master Jinchuan now found himself surrounded by densely overlapping shadows of bamboo staves, countless silhouettes piercing through the void like a torrential rain of arrows from the sky, like dark clouds bearing down on a city, threatening to swallow him whole.

At the sight, Young Master Jinchuan, who only moments before had believed himself standing on undefeatable ground, went deathly pale.

There was no question that if those staff shadows were allowed to fall, his body would be riddled with countless holes. Dying without an intact corpse would be the lesser outcome. He would likely be reduced to nothing more than minced flesh.

Just then, a sharp cracking sound rang out. Young Master Jinchuan snapped his head up to see the Divine Works Shield Decree, teetering on the brink of complete collapse, and his soul nearly left his body in terror.

"Father, save me."

Young Master Jinchuan let out a terrified roar.

At the same time, the Rakshasa Holy Lord, sensing the Divine Works Shield Decree activate and worried for his son's safety, appeared above the gate of the Yellow Spring Tribe in what seemed like the blink of an eye.

Behind him followed a host of martial experts from the Yellow Spring Tribe, rushing to the rescue.

"You're courting death."

The Rakshasa Holy Lord's voice rang out with furious authority, and an enormous palm wreathed in churning malevolent energy struck out first, slamming down toward the sky full of bamboo staff shadows about to engulf Young Master Jinchuan.

"You're too late."

The blind man's pale, lifeless eyes held no flicker of expression as he spoke evenly to the Rakshasa Holy Lord above.

In the next instant, the blind man's figure, which had been suspended motionless in the air, vanished, and when it reappeared, only a single afterimage of the staff swinging down remained, having flashed past Young Master Jinchuan's body in an instant.

At the same time, the yellow spring river formed by the Divine Works Shield Decree shattered into fragments of light, the true qi of heaven and earth it had gathered collapsing like a crumbling mountain.

At the same moment, Young Master Jinchuan, his face still frozen in terror, was swept up by the collapsing true qi, and his entire body split cleanly in half, falling to the ground like a heap of mud.

This was clearly a death Young Master Jinchuan had never expected, his attention still fixed entirely on the sky full of staff shadows.

"I told you, your life belongs to me."

At this point, the blind man's hoarse voice sounded once more, his figure reappearing already in full, rapid retreat.