Chapter 487 - 486: The Sword Is Drawn

Chapter 487: Chapter 486: The Sword Is Drawn

Chapter 486: The Sword Is Drawn

This time, Luo Wusheng had indeed made many preparations.

Previously, in Yue Xuanji’s recorded projection, that white-haired loli had subtly left behind some information, which made Luo Wusheng realize what he needed to do.

Among them was a sentence she had said—

[Do you still remember the first divination I performed for you?]

Of course Luo Wusheng remembered it: one was a good luck divination, and the other a calamity-avoiding one.

The good luck divination had manifested on the protagonist group, while the calamity-avoiding one had fallen upon a certain Rat Netherkin.

At that time, having already vaguely guessed who the final enemy he would face on this trip might be, after some thought he chose—while he was still in the Netherland in slime form—to go and meet that unfortunate Rat Netherkin once more.

That Rat Netherkin was one of the very few beings who had had relatively deep contact with the one behind the scenes and was also under their control. Yet the last time, Luo Wusheng had not managed to extract all the information it knew, and the portion he did obtain had lacked sufficient credibility... If that counted as "avoiding calamity," then it clearly hadn’t been avoided very thoroughly.

When Luo Wusheng saw the Rat Netherkin, it was being imprisoned in the Netherland’s prison, looking dispirited and utterly hopeless. Its fur—which had finally been washed clean and made to look somewhat presentable—had turned an even uglier green, and one of its tails was thin and short, as if it had only recently grown back.

Just looking at it made a hint of pity appear in Luo Wusheng’s eyes.

Then he remembered that this ugly little rodent’s current miserable state seemed inseparable from his own actions, and he rather awkwardly began prying every last scrap of information out of it.

The process went unexpectedly smoothly. Partly because the Rat Netherkin itself bore hatred toward the Buddhist Sect; partly because it seemed unwilling to provoke him, the Demon Sect’s Holy Saint, again; and partly because the fellow had apparently come to terms with things and was ready to abandon darkness for the light—hoping to redeem itself with a small merit in front of Yao Ji and thus avoid execution.

Perhaps deep down it was also hoping that, since both were its enemies, the Demon Sect Holy Saint and the Buddhist Sect would smash each other’s heads to pulp... but Luo Wusheng didn’t particularly care about such minor details.

He meticulously extracted everything the Rat Netherkin knew, the most important being what it had done with a certain Buddhist figure at the Daoist Artifact Pavillion before its first defeat... Other statements might be concealed or falsified, but the details of that encounter were genuine and concrete.

Luo Wusheng repeatedly verified and pondered over all kinds of information.

It was then that he learned that the insignificant Pavilion Head of the Daoist Artifact Pavillion back then had not fled out of fear of sect punishment. Instead, half his blood, flesh, and spiritual energy had been siphoned off, after which he was bundled up and taken away by the Rat Netherkin, only to vanish without a trace afterward.

Recalling this, Luo Wusheng realized that when he had previously dealt with that tentacled monster formed from the Buddhist Delusion Attachment, he had recognized one of its main bodies as that very background character.

In addition, he also deduced many key points himself.

The space known as the "Formless Realm" had already been attached to the Rat Netherkin back when it controlled that Pavilion Head, concealing all traces and preventing anyone in the royal city from noticing anything amiss.

But when the Daoist Artifact Pavillion master—Lin Qingfeng—briefly broke free from the influence of delusion amid overwhelming regret, he, who was inside the Daoist Artifact Pavillion enveloped by the Formless Realm at the time, nevertheless "saw" the Rat Netherkin, which should have been without form or appearance.

The Rat Netherkin believed that this was because the plan had failed and concealment was no longer necessary, so the thing hidden inside its body had voluntarily lifted the effect.

While Luo Wusheng thought that was possible, he also instinctively considered other possibilities...

...

’It seems to have had some effect, it’s just not quite the same as what I originally imagined...’

Luo Wusheng had once guessed that this process of breaking the formless and invisible state might be related to Buddhist dharma-forms, or perhaps to the concept of "cognition."

But now, he has used a much simpler method.

Having learned the complete details of the earlier Daoist Artifact Pavillion incident—and with an additional karmic link he had obtained from the former Pavilion Head now on his person—the Dao of Causality gained one more thing it could do.

He imposed upon himself the fate of that moment when the other party had once seen through the formless and invisible.

Thus, he saw the shadow of a small rat, which in the next instant transformed into a human silhouette.

"Karmic link!"

Luo Wusheng suddenly shouted.

The red karmic string in his hand lit up as he once more entered that profoundly mysterious state, seeing the countless karmic threads tangled around his own body.

This time he did not spend any effort distinguishing the various karmic lines—he seized, in an instant, the one that extended toward that shadow.

It was a gray karmic link.

The moment he grabbed it, a figure was yanked out of that silhouette in shock.

This figure wore plain gray monk’s robes; his entire body was shrouded in Buddhist light, his features indistinct, with strange phenomena continuously manifesting behind him.

But that was not the end.

The gray karmic thread pierced through the man’s chest and stretched onward into the void.

Following that karmic line with his consciousness, Luo Wusheng seemed to traverse thousands of mountains and rivers, beholding a stretch of pool water.

Lotus blossoms floated across the surface; the deeper one looked, the larger the lotuses became, until they finally stopped before a mountain.

The jagged stone of the mountain outlined the shape of a Buddha seated upon a lotus.

The karmic thread ultimately coiled around that Buddha-mountain.

His awareness returned to the skies above the royal city, within the transparent space. Though Buddhist light concealed the gray-robed monk who had been dragged out, Luo Wusheng could clearly read surprise from him.

Before the other side could recover, Luo Wusheng stepped forward and, in passing, had his own Little Yuli hand over the Sword Ancestor wooden sword—now that the Sword Ancestor’s power within it had been stabilized—for him alone to wield... mm, the reason the little girl hadn’t directly handed it to him earlier was actually that the Sword Ancestor’s power newly absorbed into the blade had needed her, the Sword Ancestor’s inheritor, to soothe it.

Luo Wusheng didn’t know why this silly, adorably dim girl could still be so meticulous when her episode was acting up.

In any case, right now he could feel surging power flowing all around his body.

But... it still wasn’t enough.

With a reversal of his wrist, the wooden sword that had been pointing at the enemy traced a tricky angle through the air and stabbed into his own chest.

Crack

The sound of shattering rang out abruptly.

Luo Wusheng’s temporary fleshly body began collapsing inch by inch, as if in that fleeting instant ten thousand swords had struck him at once, about to disintegrate this body, so much so that even the spiritual form beneath it developed fissures.

Yet Luo Wusheng’s gaze remained calm.

This was the effect of his second sword intent.

While comprehending the sword within the illusory sword-world created by the Sword Enlightenment Incense, he had pondered for a long time and arrived at an answer.

Since the Buddhist Sect had left an imprint in his very origin, could he not directly use sword intent to sever the part of his origin that had been tainted by that mark?

Injuries to one’s origin were exceedingly troublesome—one misstep could truly reduce him to dust and annihilation—but Luo Wusheng was even less willing to keep a ticking time bomb buried within himself at all times.

Moreover, if controlled properly, there was great hope that he could restore that portion of the damage when he revived.

Thus, during those ten years spent comprehending the sword, Luo Wusheng had basically been doing one single thing.

Using the sword to cut himself.

He had slashed himself with the blade countless times; after years of numbness to the pain, he had finally comprehended this second sword intent within the illusion.

Advancing toward death to be reborn—the sword intent of weaponized release.

What was lost was what was gained. As his body collapsed, the aura around Luo Wusheng surged upward once more, space itself faintly tearing open.

At the same time, the flames of phoenix nirvana ignited upon him yet again.

This sword intent was originally Luo Wusheng’s true trump card. According to his earlier plan, he would rely on this self-severing strike to push himself back into a "dead" state, then slip away and revive while the opponent was caught off guard.

But now, things are different.

With a sweep of the wooden sword in his hand, Luo Wusheng—his body riddled with fractures—pointed the blade toward the Buddhist radiance opposite him.

His mind, tempered through pains he had endured countless times before, remained crystal clear. In his head surged innumerable realizations of the sword-dao, telling him exactly how to deliver this strike for the greatest possible effect.

This was the power of the Sword Emperor-level enlightenment that his wife had transmitted into his mind through dual cultivation of the sword embryo.

Behind him, the golden-glowing scabbard pressed close to his body, its protective power operating at full capacity, slowing the pace of his weapon-release disintegration, allowing him to more delicately seek out the abnormalities within his origin while shielding the normal parts of that origin.

And the spiritual energy transmitted by his own little pink fox allowed Luo Wusheng to successfully rein in the terrifying power in his hands—power that even surpassed the funerary might of an immortal tribulation—while also infusing it with an eerie, dreamlike demonic force.

In addition, Luo Wusheng could feel yet another power within himself quietly stabilizing the convergence of all these forces—the Diabolic Saint Physique, still unfinished in its second awakening, had once again smuggled over a bit of "adhesive" to bind everything together.

At this moment, the gray-robed monk opposite him also made his move.

No longer formless and invisible, and sensing the aura before him, he likewise could not remain calm.

The sword in Luo Wusheng’s hands at this instant gave him pressure no less than that of the Sword Ancestor wielding a blade earlier.

Especially when he suddenly perceived that some connection within Luo Wusheng’s origin was weakening at astonishing speed...

"Amitabha."

The gray-robed monk pressed his palms together. A long river surged forth from around his body, its torrent unending, as if it could wash away everything.

Yet within that river, a small compass suddenly flew out—and shattered.

The river came to an abrupt halt.

That white-haired loli...

Luo Wusheng’s heart stirred.

The river’s pause lasted only an instant, and he did not waste that fleeting opportunity.

The sword in his hand swung.

It looked like an utterly ordinary strike, yet within it were contained countless variations of the Sword Emperor’s power.

"I’d like to see how you block this one!"

His voice boomed like thunder, mingled with the sword’s cry.

The blade passed.

The halted river was shattered into illusion with almost no resistance at all, and endless sword-light flooded the entire space.

...

On the far western side of the Endless Sea—the Buddhist Sect.

All three thousand pure lands trembled, and countless monks were jolted awake from worship and cultivation.

"Th-this... what has happened?"

"The disturbance came from Spirit Mountain Pure Land... could it be that the Chief Buddhist has made another breakthrough?"

"Amitabha—most excellent, most excellent."

The monks conversed among themselves, their faces showing little sign of panic.

Until a message arrived.

"Th-this is terrible! The Chief Buddhist... the Chief Buddhist’s body on the Spirit Mountain Pure Land has shattered, only half of it remains! The ten thousand candles on the Great Buddha Hall’s have all gone out, the waters of the Buddhist Pool have been split in two..."

The monks who had been so calm just moments before forgot their cultivated Buddhist composure after hearing only a single sentence, standing there dumbfounded.

Trouble elsewhere within the Buddhist Sect they could understand, but the Spirit Mountain Pure Land... Which expert was trying to wipe them out?

On this day, the Buddhist Sect was shaken to its core.

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Note: Link to the character Illustration:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1lkIcPnCxeyuyZA4Kkb621dPC05UvWjhD