Way of the Devil

Peacock Mountain? The sect of the mighty Shu Xian?

All three of them were guessing in their hearts, not knowing just what was Lu Sheng walking over there for.

“Brother Zhan, Hongsheng.” At this moment, Fang Tan hurriedly approached, having come to the attic from downstairs. “It just finished over there, so I came to see how Brother Zhan was doing.”

Zhan Kongning had an ashamed expression. “Sorry, Brother Fang…. I didn’t make it out this time… I’m ashamed of myself.”

Fang Tan raised an eyebrow, not caring at all.

“It’s because of Yuan Ba, right? That guy has quite some strength, and he even recently broke through to the seventh vein. Brother Zhan probably lost to him, right?”

“That’s right.” Zhan Kongning nodded.

“Elder Brother Fang, you’re just in time. Take a look, the one surnamed Lu from the Prime Devil Sect is going to challenge Bai Qingtang from Peacock Mountain. How many blows do you think Lu Sheng can endure?” said Zhan Hongsheng suddenly in a loud voice after he saw what was happening on the field.

“Oh? Lu Sheng?” Fang Tan paused for a moment, then suddenly remembered that Lu Sheng was the one that had annoyed Zhan Hongsheng earlier. He then looked towards the direction of the distant audience.

“Bai Qingtang… Shu Xian’s junior apprentice sister, huh. I don’t know how strong she is, but as the second seat of Peacock Mountain, she should be fairly strong. As for this Lu Sheng…” He looked carefully at the man in the field as blue light flashed faintly past his eyes.

“Having hidden some of his strength, his ability’s pretty good. But against Bai Qingtang, he probably won’t make it past 30 blows,” he said indifferently. “Furthermore, this person doesn’t know when to advance or retreat; should he offend Peacock Mountain, the Prime Devil Sect won’t be able to advance past this segment.”

***

“I am the first seat of the Prime Devil Sect, Lu Sheng, here to challenge Peacock Mountain’s Bai Qingtang,” said Lu Sheng loudly and clearly as he directly approached the disciples from the Peacock Mountain.

Bai Qingtang, who was speaking to a nearby junior apprentice sister at that moment, was dressed completely in white. A pair of curved blades hung on her waist, rubies embedded in their white handles. Her smooth and silky hair, as black as ink, was cascading down to one of her sides. Her well-proportioned slender body was resting languidly on a rattan chair, accentuating her enchanting curves.

“The Prime Devil Sect? Challenging me?” Hearing Lu Sheng, Bai Qingtang was bemused. While in theory, one couldn’t reject a challenger, she could easily attack mercilessly and cripple the opponent, resulting in a huge loss to the opposing sect’s fighting ability.

So, apart from the strongest ones like Shu Xian and Yuan Ba, it was almost impossible that someone would come issue a challenge on their own.

It wasn’t like it was forbidden, but no one had the guts to do that. Even if one managed to win, so what? The junior apprentice brothers and sisters of the loser would all besiege the winner, challenging them one by one. In the end, victory or defeat, it scarcely mattered—both would end badly.

Bai Qingtang lazily got down from the chair, displaying her perfectly shaped and slender legs. Part of her legs was uncovered, revealing skin that looked like the finest ivory and boasted a jade-like luster.

“You want to challenge me? Are you sure, Junior Apprentice Brother Lu of the Prime Devil Sect?” She stood up and stopped the junior apprentice sisters next to her who wanted to make a move.

“I’ll give it a shot,” Lu Sheng said seriously. He only used a sixth vein black membrane now, and his opponent was also at the sixth vein. However, being at the peak of the sixth vein meant being a top-level expert who was strong in all aspects.

Should he use only the Prime Devil Sect’s secret arts, he wouldn’t have much of a chance to beat her. At this level, the power and speed from the Yin Extreme Mode wouldn’t be enough to decide the match, so he could only say that he was giving it a shot.

As for He Xiangzi who followed him, she was already dumbfounded. She never expected Lu Sheng to walk over ostentatiously and challenge Bai Qingtang right away like that.

“The Prime Devil Sect… I heard that it’s the sect ranked last, about to fall out of the Hundred Lineages. I haven’t heard of the name ‘Lu Sheng’, perhaps he’s a disciple whose existence has never been revealed before,” said a junior apprentice sister next to Bai Qingtang in a brief introduction.

“Then come,” said Bai Qingtang indifferently. “I was idle anyway.” She lazily stretched a bit, and walked out from among the disciples of the Peacock Mountain to stand in front of Lu Sheng.

The space around the two was quickly cleared out.

“Please advise me.” Bai Qingtang swiftly pulled out her curved blades with a tinkling of small bells. The light reflected off the blades shone next to her like flowers for a few moments. Her speed was so fast that others could only see afterimages.

Lu Sheng didn’t say another word and covered his body with black membrane, then leapt towards her as he pushed off the ground with his foot.

“Hoo!”

A large quantity of black Qi surrounded Lu Sheng like tentacles, shooting towards Bai Qingtang from all angles. In an instant, lumps of Devil Qi counted in tens struck at Bai Qingtang from all around her.

“Pu, pu, pu, pu!”

A large amount of Devil Qi was easily set on fire by her two blades, unable to approach.

No matter if it was from the front, back, left, right, above, or below, no Devil Qi could get within half a meter of Bai Qingtang’s body. She walked forward with a relaxed expression, and even had the leisure to spare to look at the battle between Shu Xian and Yuan Ba ongoing in the distance.

“Hoo!”

Suddenly, Bai Qingtang’s expression changed slightly. She momentarily focused all of her attention here and jumped to the left gently.

“Boom!”

The ground where she had been standing just moments ago suddenly turned into a huge hole a few meters in diameter. A large amount of gravel splashed outwards like bullets, headed for the people nearby.

Caught off guard, quite a few Peacock Mountain disciples suffered minor injuries.

“Impressive power and speed!” Bai Qingtang dodged quickly, evading Lu Sheng’s unceasing wild barrage.

It was a battle of speed versus speed—even the ordinary Peacock Mountain disciples weren’t able to see them clearly. However, their sensitivity towards the flow of air was extremely high. Most of them were of the airflow category bloodline, so they were all able to figure out the situation from the changes in the air around them.

Lu Sheng used his arms like blades to hack, chop, cut, slice, smack, hit, pound, and smash. He kept on using all kinds of attacks one after another, even fiercer than a hurricane.

Bai Qingtang was also extremely fast. Quickly evading all of Lu Sheng’s attacks, the twin blades next to her seemed to come alive, automatically igniting the Devil Qi around them.

There was nary a crack in her defense.

“You’re strong, but it is useless if you can’t land a hit.” In a second, Bai Qingtang suddenly struck out with her fingers, her hand reaching forward in a grabbing motion.

Between her eyebrows, a dot of blue light flashed.

“Hoo…”

Between her fingers, a large gust of wind burst out. The white air was like smoke, completely enveloping her palm.

“Secret Technique: Fog Out.”

“Boom!”

Lu Sheng pulled back at the same time, facing Bai Qingtang palm with his own.

White Qi and Devil Qi tangled up with each other immediately. Soon, the Devil Qi was mostly blown away by the white Qi. At the same level, the Devil Qi from the Prime Devil Sect obviously couldn’t rival the other sects’ secret techniques.

In the end, Devil Qi, which was borrowed from outside, was a far cry compared to the likes of the white Qi, which mainly came from one’s own bloodline. Furthermore, it was far from being as flexible.

Although Lu Sheng used the same six-vein black membrane and Devil Qi, the latter was still completely suppressed in the air by the white Qi.

The two fought for quite a while, and more and more of the white Qi gathered around Lu Sheng. The white Qi had extremely low temperature, and concealed within some kind of special aroma, which had hallucinogenic effects.

“Boom!”

Lu Sheng got hit once on the chest with a palm, which made him stagger a few steps backwards.

“Your excellency is quite strong, this Lu concedes,” Lu Sheng said with cupped fists. He had delayed Bai Qingtang for this long; Li Xiuying should be satisfied.

Li Xiuying didn’t mention that he had to win. That could not have been guaranteed. He simply needed to delay Bai Qingtang for a while to keep his promise.

“The strength of Junior Apprentice Brother Lu is impressive, Qingtang won by a fluke.” Bai Qingtang looked at Lu Sheng’s chest, a hint of wariness in her eyes. Apart from the clothes being torn where she hit him, there wasn’t a single mark left on his skin.

‘This guy… has tough skin…’

Anyway, Lu Sheng successfully completed his goal, delaying her.

Not too far from them, the fight between Yuan Ba ​​and Shu Xian was also concluded. Shu Xian looked pale—as Lu Sheng was stalling Bai Qingtang, she was hit once while Yuan Ba emerged unscathed.

Instantly realizing the ins and outs of the situation, Bai Qingtang snorted coldly as she glanced at Lu Sheng.

“So this was your real goal.”

“Someone asked me to,” Lu Sheng replied casually. “Let’s go, Senior Apprentice Sister He Xiang.” He turned to go back to the Prime Devil Sect’s previous position. [1]

“Oh… okay…” He Xiangzi looked puzzled, still confused as to exactly what had just happened.

The second phase of the internal fighting was simply a messy free-for-all, except that everyone subconsciously adhered to the principle of first seat fighting against first seat.

At this level, the strength of the first seat was far too superior to that of the other disciples. In this second phase, the numbers didn’t have much significance. Only the experts really counted.

Because Lu Sheng delayed Bai Qingtang, Yuan Ba won. So, it could be said that Li Xiuying helped Yuan Ba win against Peacock Mountain.

The second phase quickly ended. Bai Qingtang was raging due to her humiliation, and swept all the other sects with Shu Xian.

The top three winners were the Haishu Sect, Peacock Mountain, and the Myriad Maple Valley.

The first seat of the Haishu Sect was Yuan Ba, Peacock Valley was represented by Shu Xian and Bai Qingtang, and the Myriad Maple Valley had Shen Youyou.

As the Prime Devil Sect didn’t win any challenges, they tied with four other sects for last place.

After the end of this phase of messy battles, the Taoists from the Heaven Lotus Sect began to count the numbers of wins and losses. All the other spectators from different sects also poured into the square.

The wounded were taken away to recover. The sects who won were each given a token to participate in the next stage.

The other sects that didn’t make it into the top three were given a spectator token.

When the Fine Garden Sect and the Jade Sound Clan’s people came to look for the Prime Devil Sect’s Lu Sheng and his senior apprentice sister, Li Xiuying and Yue Shengya from the Ice Valley also happened to come.

“Brother Lu, thank you very much. After exiting, one of our disciples will deliver the thing we promised.” Li Xiuying grinned from ear to ear, cupping her fists at Lu Sheng.

“It’s nothing,” Lu Sheng replied calmly.

Yue Shengya stood aside, smiling. Looking at Lu Sheng, her beautiful eyes revealed deep appreciation.

“Does Brother Lu have any plans after this?” she asked softly.

“I’ll probably continue to spectate the battles and leave together with teacher after he returns,” Lusheng answered simply.

“After the end of the Meeting, I need to handle some affairs in the White Bell City. How about I join you guys at the end?” Yue Shengya said in a relaxed, natural manner.

“Of course—” Lu Sheng said, but was interrupteed.

“Brother Lu!” Zhan Kongning and a few others also arrived.

While He Xiangzi and those on her level were overjoyed, Kong Zhanning and Chen Yunxiang both looked worried instead.

“He Xiangzi, you guys are in trouble now! Peacock Mountain isn’t a normal sect. Shu Xian is extremely strong, and holds grudges for years. Since you guys provoked her and your sect master isn’t here, things might get dangerous…” said Chen Yunxiang in a low voice.

“What?” He Xiangzi was shocked, her complexion changing.

“Brother Lu and He Xiangzi, you guys should come with us when we leave. Since we have brother Fang with us, even Shu Xian won’t be able to do anything too drastic,” Kong Zhanning suggested.

Fang Tan and Zhan Hongsheng also just arrived. Hearing this, they raised their eyebrows.

“I don’t care, a few more people won’t be a problem.”

Lu Sheng looked at this person. “No, we’ll arrange it on our own.” He had his own plans and didn’t want to change them.

“Do you think that due to the rules of the Hundred Lineages Meeting, Shu Xian won’t go too far?” Fang Tan smiled. “Naive…”

Lu Sheng narrowed his eyes, feeling that Fang Tan seemed to have something against him.