Chapter 82: Brocade Wrapping the Snake
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Crouching in the grass, Xu Yan helplessly watched the golden little snake moving at turtle speed.
“They took the walnut shell and left, leaving the walnut meat behind with no one wanting it. All this fighting and killing, aren’t they tired?”
After grumbling about both the righteous and evil factions, Xu Yan didn’t want to miss out on the walnut meat. He reached out to touch the blurry golden little snake, only to see his finger pass straight through the golden shadow. Not only could he not touch the snake spirit, but he also frightened the little snake into curling up motionlessly.
Indeed, it was similar to ginseng spirits.
Xu Yan nodded. This wasn’t the first time he’d seen such a spirit body. In the deep mountains of Old Grave Mountain, mountain spirits and strange creatures would occasionally appear. Xu Yan would stay far away from overly clear spirit bodies, but this kind of blurry little snake spirit posed no threat—it just couldn’t be caught.
“What use could a spirit body from the demon snake’s silver crown have…”
Muttering to himself, Xu Yan thought of the ginseng spirit’s effects, so he concluded that the silver crown taken by the Ghost King Gate guardians had already greatly diminished in effectiveness. As for whether to go tell those guardians that they’d dropped something, Xu Yan didn’t even consider it.
Before long, the curled-up little snake began crawling away again, and Xu Yan stood up accordingly.
He could see the golden little snake but couldn’t catch it. He now regretted not bringing some red string when he left.
Ginseng spirits could be trapped in old ginseng with red string, so this kind of independently existing blurry spirit body should also be catchable with red string. If red string wouldn’t work, red cloth should do.
Thinking of red cloth, Xu Yan’s eyes immediately lit up.
Returning to where he’d been playing dead and watching the excitement, Xu Yan tore open Eight Fingers Wang’s clothes and, under the man’s horrified and resentful gaze, pulled out the belly band called red brocade.
“Brother Yan, what are you doing!” Covering his chest with both hands, Eight Fingers Wang was about to cry. “I’ve been wearing this red brocade since I was fifteen—haven’t taken it off for almost twenty years. You can’t do this…”
No wonder there was a foul wind hitting his face. Xu Yan frowned and said without looking back, “Twenty taels of silver for your red brocade. I’ll pay you later.”
“Twenty taels!” Eight Fingers Wang changed his expression like flipping a page. “Actually, I have seven or eight more. If you like them, I’ll sell them all to you!”
Who would like a grown man’s belly band? Xu Yan forced himself to suppress his disgust, found the golden little snake, covered it with Eight Fingers Wang’s belly band, then wrapped it up.
Sure enough, the red cloth was effective. Whether the golden little snake was suffocated or truly could be trapped by red cloth, it curled up in the fabric and stopped moving.
Tying a tight knot, Xu Yan tucked the golden little snake into his chest. Something that nearly ten thousand people had fought over must be valuable.
Having picked up a bargain for nothing, Xu Yan blinked and thought that this time he should have earned back the money for buying a horse.
The shouting and killing sounds from the distant forest grew louder, as if the righteous and evil sides had reached a critical moment in their battle. Xu Yan looked around at the terrain and decided to go observe the life-and-death struggle between the righteous and evil factions again.
“Brother Wang, let’s go watch the excitement!” Xu Yan called out. Eight Fingers Wang, who had been lying on the ground this whole time, shook his head vigorously from a distance.
What was good about watching righteous and evil fight? Eight Fingers Wang didn’t want to join that excitement. Couldn’t he see that he was diligently practicing his divine art of playing dead?
Since Eight Fingers Wang wouldn’t go, Xu Yan walked toward the bamboo forest depths alone. Passing by a green bamboo, he casually picked up several appropriately sized stones as a precaution.
Soon, Xu Yan finally saw countless people fighting at the foot of the mountain. The righteous faction had already retreated step by step, breaking out toward the west, while the other directions were all filled with Ghost King Gate people. The forest was scattered with hundreds of corpses, missing arms or legs, making this battlefield look even more tragic than the great battle with the snake demon.
Xu Yan saw the Azure Cloud Pavilion master leading his subordinates in fierce battle with several Ghost King Gate hall masters, while Jade Sword Gate’s Yu Ruyi desperately blocked the evil faction’s encirclement from several directions. Nearly a thousand righteous martial artists looked utterly bedraggled.
Although the righteous faction was in dire straits, the Ghost King Gate people couldn’t complete their encirclement for the moment, because someone was covering the righteous faction’s retreat—that martial artist with the light gauze face mask.
A long sword danced like a phoenix soaring through nine heavens. The masked person covering the retreat fought one against many, single-handedly blocking more than ten Ghost King Gate guardians plus several hall masters.
Zhuo Shaoyu’s expression could no longer be called gloomy—it was ice-cold. At his feet lay two corpses, the eleventh and fifteenth ranked guardians. Adding the fifth and sixth guardians, the masked person had actually killed four guardians!
With all eighteen guardians deployed and four lost in one battle, such losses could be called devastating.
No guardians had died fighting the snake demon, but Zhuo Shaoyu hadn’t expected that dealing with Qi Nation’s righteous faction would cost him four brothers.
Although the four guardians were merely adopted sons of the Ghost King Gate master and Zhuo Shaoyu’s sworn brothers, they all had at least three-meridian innate strength. Each one taken individually could single-handedly fight the Azure Cloud Pavilion master or Jade Sword Gate master. To die so inexplicably at the foot of this barren mountain meant Ghost King Gate had completely lost face.
“Five-meridian innate…”
The ice-faced Zhuo Shaoyu muttered under his breath, his hands clasped behind his back already clenched into tight fists.
With his discernment, he had long seen that the masked person’s strength was actually above his own. He had four-meridian innate cultivation, so the opponent should have five-meridian innate strength. A master of this caliber definitely wasn’t from Qi Nation’s righteous faction.
Because Ghost King Gate wouldn’t allow Qi Nation’s righteous faction to grow strong. If Qi Nation’s righteous faction really produced a five-meridian martial artist, Ghost King Gate’s protectors would personally act to eliminate the threat early.
“Great Pu’s righteous faction dares to run wild in my Qi Nation!”
With a cold shout, Zhuo Shaoyu finally leaped up and joined the battle. As soon as he made his move, the masked person, who was already struggling, became even more hard-pressed, flying backward to avoid Zhuo Shaoyu’s full-strength sword strike.
Having killed four guardians, the masked person’s battle record was remarkable. However, the righteous faction was weak in numbers. Seeing Ghost King Gate’s main force surrounding them, Azure Cloud Pavilion and Jade Sword Gate immediately decided to retreat. To cover both factions’ withdrawal, the masked person had fallen into the encirclement of more than ten guardians. Now that Zhuo Shaoyu had joined the fight, even with five-meridian innate strength, the masked person found it very difficult to cope.
The disadvantage of being too young was the inability to sustain prolonged combat.
When Xu Yan reached the vicinity of the battlefield, he happened to see the Grand Guardian leading his remaining brothers in besieging the masked person. At the same time, several hall masters flew in from left and right. This group of Ghost King Gate leaders was actually preparing to trap this black-clad person to death. As for small sects like Azure Cloud Pavilion and Jade Sword Gate, it didn’t matter if they escaped.
A bit too overconfident…
The girl with the light gauze face mask sighed softly in her heart. She struck out forcefully with her sword, deflecting the combined attack of two guardians, then leaped up, stepping onto a nearby green bamboo.
Tap, tap, tap—three steps out, her lithe figure flipped backward, avoiding the slashing of more than ten long swords, actually taking the opportunity to land outside the encirclement.
“What a graceful figure!”
In the distance, Xu Yan, who was standing on his tiptoes to watch the excitement, couldn’t help but exclaim in admiration. This kind of lightness skill not only required years of practice but also needed one’s body to be naturally light and agile. Seeing that the bad-tempered girl was about to escape the encirclement, a relaxed expression appeared on Xu Yan’s young face.
