The dead silence lasted only an instant.
The old man's cloudy eyes scraped over Zhao Hao, and the corner of his mouth twitched. "...Even a little brat wants to wade into this muddy water?"
Zhao Hao didn't answer. He raised a hand and wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth.
Li Tui held his hand with the broken bone perfectly still and raised his voice slightly. "Young Master Hao came to rid the world of harm."
"Rid the world of harm?" A strange, wheezing laugh rolled from the old man's throat. "You took the fruit of my life's work, and now you're going to rid the world of harm?" His voice turned abruptly sharp. He leaned forward, his withered body spilling a fierce, murderous aura. "Put down the Bodhi, and I'll leave your corpses intact!"
"What if we don't?" Zhao Hao asked hoarsely.
"You won't?" The old man's wrinkles twisted together, and his eyes turned vicious. "Then I'll tear you apart first!"
As soon as the words left his mouth, his figure flickered and shot straight at Zhao Hao like a ghostly shadow! He moved too fast to seem human. His five fingers stretched into long, black claws, and with a gust of rancid wind, they plunged straight for Zhao Hao's heart!
Zhao Hao retreated sharply. The claw wind skimmed his chest, tearing open a gash with a ripping sound. Blood showed through the torn flesh.
The old man's left palm had already silently struck toward his ribs.
A flash of cold light shot in from the side. It was Li Tui's short blade, its tip aimed precisely at the pulse point of the old man's left wrist!
The old man flipped his wrist, his five fingers hooking around Li Tui's wrist in turn. Li Tui's thumb web split open, and he staggered backward.
In an instant, Zhao Hao had regained his footing. Instead of retreating, he surged forward, a faint golden aura gathering along the edge of his right palm. He slashed diagonally at the old man's neck, his palm wind carrying the fierce resolve of someone with nothing left to lose.
The old man met his palm head-on. A muffled thud rang out, and Zhao Hao's throat filled with a sickly sweetness. He stumbled back two steps. The old man only swayed slightly, his eyes blazing with ferocity.
He struck with both palms at once, his left claw going for their faces, his right palm for their chests, sealing off both their escape routes.
The two of them staggered into the well wall before managing to stay on their feet.
The old man stood between them, licked the blood from his fingertips, and sneered. "That's all you've got?"
He moved again, faster and fiercer. His claw wind tore through the air, every move aimed to kill.
Li Tui was forced back step by step, his back nearly touching the Blood Bodhi that hung in midair, still beating.
Just as the claw wind came at his face again—
"Attack his left ribs!" Zhao Hao's low roar burst out.
An inexplicable instinct made Zhao Hao's peripheral vision lock onto the area beneath the old man's left ribs! That was his weakness.
The moment was fleeting; there was no time to think!
At Zhao Hao's words, Li Tui's eyes lit up. Without the slightest hesitation, he kept charging at the old man, but his slick, broken bone abruptly changed direction in his left hand, stabbing with pinpoint accuracy toward the spot Zhao Hao had indicated!
The old man's expression changed wildly!
That strike hit the hidden injury left behind by the backlash of his cultivation years ago!
In shock and fury, his right palm, which had been striking toward the crown of Li Tui's head, abruptly turned back to guard the opening beneath his ribs.
In that instant of hesitation, Li Tui had already crashed into his arms. The broken bone's force was mostly blocked by the gray light protecting the old man, but it still struck that old injury squarely!
"Ugh!" The old man grunted. His ribs felt as if they'd been struck by lightning, and a stream of frigid, poisonous qi was roused from the old wound and surged upward against the flow! His entire aura fell into sudden disarray!
The gray light fluctuated violently, flickering between bright and dim. The foul yin energy at the bottom of the well and the dark red fungal strands sensed the disorder and began to surge about chaotically. Some even curled back and wrapped around the old man himself!
"You little beast... You..." The old man stared at Zhao Hao in shock and fury, as if he were a ghost. Only then did he suddenly realize that this branch-family brat had something extraordinary about him!
Zhao Hao had no time to spare for anything else. After shouting those words, the qi and blood in his chest roiled, and his vision darkened. But when he saw the old man's aura in disarray, he clenched his teeth and forced himself to gather what little strength he could. Following his instincts, he swept his gaze across the well and suddenly fixed on the other side, where the energy of several blue bricks stood out!
There was no time to think. He lunged over, channeling the last of his true qi into both palms and slamming them down!
The bricks and stones crashed apart, revealing the Black Jade Casket beneath.
"How dare you!!" The old man caught sight of it from the corner of his eye, his eyes nearly splitting with rage. Ignoring the poisonous qi surging against the flow within him and the fungal strands wrapped around his body, he forcibly summoned his qi and became a gray shadow that shot toward Zhao Hao. His black claws went straight for the vital point in Zhao Hao's back!
His furious outburst made him even faster. Zhao Hao had just grabbed the bone-chilling Black Jade Casket when the fierce killing intent behind him was already upon him. There was nowhere to dodge!
Li Tui had caught his breath. He threw the broken bone in his hand like a hidden weapon, aiming for the old man's nape, and rasped a warning at the same time. "Zhao Hao!"
Without turning his head, Zhao Hao listened for the wind and judged the attack's direction. He swung the Black Jade Casket he had just seized behind him, using it as a shield to smash into the claws!
Bang!
The black claws slammed hard into the Black Jade Casket. The casket shuddered violently, the twisted patterns carved across it flickering in and out. An even colder, more savage Killing Intent surged back out and spread up the old man's arm!
Caught off guard, the old man's attack faltered when struck by the same source of Killing Intent, now gone out of control. Zhao Hao took the chance to dive forward and roll across the ground, escaping the reach of the claws. He threw the Black Jade Casket back toward Li Tui. "Catch!"
Li Tui caught it in midair. The casket was covered in twisted runes. The moment his fingers touched it, a bone-chilling, intensely bloody Killing Intent burrowed along the meridians in his palm. His arm went numb.
Almost at the same time, the old man went completely mad. He abandoned the Blood Bodhi and ignored the fungal strands curling around his body. The gray light around him flared like a fire doused in oil, surging violently as he transformed into a blurred gray shadow and shot straight at Li Tui! His five fingers curled into claws, their nails black and gleaming, their ferocity enough to tear apart anything in their path. He clearly meant to tear Li Tui and the casket apart together!
The old man's rage-fueled lunge was so fast that he became little more than a shadow. Li Tui had just caught the jade casket. His strength was spent, and he hadn't yet gathered new strength. The black claws were already at his face.
A figure flashed in from the side!
It was Zhao Hao!
He had been struck by the aftershock of the old man's sudden claw attack. Off balance, he came staggering diagonally toward them.
The old man's furious claw had already been aimed at Li Tui's face, but Zhao Hao's collision sent Li Tui just skimming past the edge of its reach.
Thwack!
The black fingertips still scraped Li Tui's left shoulder, drawing a streak of blood. The wound was deep enough to expose bone. Zhao Hao grunted. Pain darkened his vision, and he stumbled.
His ferocity fully aroused, the old man was about to pull back his claws and attack again. In the next instant, both of them would die! But Zhao Hao didn't retreat. Instead, he clamped down hard on the old man's black wrist, which had not yet fully withdrawn and was still smeared with Zhao Hao's blood!
His five fingers locked around it like iron pincers!
Almost at the same time, the Ink Jade Pendant at his neck suddenly grew scorching hot. A heavy, dark glow burst out on its own. It wasn't dazzling, but its dreadful Killing Intent slammed hard into the old man's wrist!
Sizzle!
The dark glow met the foul gray light protecting the old man's body and made a sound like a red-hot iron searing flesh! The gray light around his wrist surged violently, burned open, and let a sharp pain drill straight into his bones!
"What?!" The old man stared in shock and fury.
What unsettled him even more was that the dark glow of the pendant flashed once and quickly faded. Fine, spiderweb-like cracks appeared across its surface. But that sudden interference and stinging pain threw the old man's aura off balance, and three-tenths of his strength drained from his hand!
It was only a moment's hesitation!
Li Tui had just narrowly tilted his head away from the fierce claw wind, which still scraped a bloody line across his cheek. In the corner of his eye, he saw Zhao Hao gripping the old man's wrist for dear life. The pendant's strange light flashed and disappeared, and the old man's body faltered slightly.
Without the slightest hesitation, not even time to regain his footing, Li Tui used the momentum of his sidestep to swing the sinisterly cold Black Jade Casket in a wide arc. He threw every last bit of his strength into smashing it against the hard corner of the well wall beside him!
"No!!" The old man's eyes nearly split with rage as he roared hoarsely and struggled to break free of Zhao Hao's grip. But pain in his wrist and his disordered aura made him half a beat too slow!
Bang!! Crack!
The Black Jade Casket shattered! A dark red, sinister pill rolled out. The moment it touched the air, it gave off a series of soft pops and burst into dense clouds of foul-smelling black smoke!
The black smoke rolled and spread.
At the bottom of the well, a sudden transformation took place!
The dark red fungal strands that had been clinging to the demonic corpse and slowly writhing suddenly stiffened. Then, at a speed visible to the naked eye, they lost their luster, wilted, and rapidly blackened and rotted away, turning into foul-smelling pools of sludge.
The dark red glow that had faintly flowed across the ground flickered violently a few times, like an oil lamp being snuffed out, then faded completely and vanished.
Pfft!
The backlash from the formation breaking struck at the same time as the qi and blood surging against the flow within him. The old man's entire body shuddered, and he spat out a large mouthful of thick black blood. His face turned ashen, his aura withered, and he staggered backward.
He abruptly looked up. First, he glanced at the now-dim, shattered pendant at Zhao Hao's neck, his eyes full of suspicion. Then his venomous gaze, as if steeped in poison, fixed on Li Tui's face. His hoarse voice sounded as if it had been forced through a shattered throat.
"Good... Good..." Each word brought a trickle of black blood from the corner of his mouth. "Brat... The Bodhi is already linked to your qi and blood... I can't take it now, and no one else will ever take it either..."
A strange, wheezing laugh rose from his throat, mingled with bloody spittle. "Take it with you... 'nurture' it well... Let's see when it'll suck your marrow dry. Hahaha... Cough, cough..."
Before the words had even faded, his body convulsed violently, black qi darting beneath his skin. He gave the two of them one last venomous glare. Then his body burst apart with a bang, becoming a thin, foul-smelling gray-black mist wrapped around what remained of his wicked aura. It shot into a crack in the well wall and disappeared.
Only the hoarse, hate-filled echo of his final words drifted through the damp, gloomy air at the bottom of the well:
"Our days... are long..."
Before you continue