But just before the lightning struck.
Two blue spatial rifts lit up around Mechanical Xi Zi's body and slammed shut. The massive mechanical body was instantly crushed into scrap parts, which shot in all directions through the sky.
But Xi Zi's bolt of lightning still came down.
It struck Liu Di's palm, covered in Fluid Metal. Violent sparks flashed across Liu Di's body for an instant before everything fell still.
The rescued residents stared wide-eyed at the scene.
He was faster than lightning.
Then.
Liu Di slowly turned around. Faint red veins had already appeared in his eyes.
On the ground not far away.
The half-grown child who had been picking apples had been severed at the waist and was long dead.
His grandfather's neck seemed to have been grazed by some kind of blade. A wound three fingers deep had opened there. At first glance, only half his head remained connected to his neck.
Yet the old man had not breathed his last. He clamped a hand desperately over the wound and crawled across the ground, inching closer to his dead grandson.
Liu Di stepped forward, picked up the old man, and placed him before his grandson. The old man looked at Liu Di, his throat moving, but he could no longer speak. Then, looking at his grandson's body split in two, he let out a choked, mournful wail!
Liu Di slowly raised his head.
At the end of the street.
Stood a hulking, muscle-bound figure. It had no head; its savage features grew from its belly. Its limbs were as thick as barrels, and it held a great axe and shield.
"Mechanical Xing Tian."
Liu Di forced out the words through clenched teeth. This fellow was also the "deity" that had abducted the Tian Jue Hao crew!
Liu