The Dream of Flying Immortals

From the pinnacle of the ruins, Xu Yuan shot forth like an arrow loosed from the bow. The entire ruin trembled violently, beginning to show signs of collapse.

In almost an instant, he closed in on the terrifying bronze corpse. Xu Yuan raised his dharma sword. Now that its damage had been restored, it could fully bear Xu Yuan's power, and with the extraordinary quality of a mid-grade dharma artifact added to the mix, the might of this strike far surpassed the one before.

Below, Nan Yun, who had just suffered two tremendous upheavals in succession, finally hesitated for a moment. Only when Xu Yuan neared the bronze corpse did she seem to awaken from a dream and issue the order to defend. Sadly, it was already too late.

The lightning in Xu Yuan's eyes grew ever brighter, while his hand trembled faintly, as though enduring some kind of pain.

Yet his speed did not diminish in the slightest. Pressed by such a perilous situation, he even became thirty percent faster.

Bang!

The dharma sword came straight down. In his haste, the bronze corpse could only raise one arm. Its terrifying zombie body collided with the dharma sword, and Xu Yuan, who had been at a disadvantage until now, finally reversed the gap between them.

The dharma sword, seeming to be wreathed in flames, easily severed the outstretched arm. Xu Yuan stepped forward again and swung his sword at the bronze corpse's throat.

"Stop!"

Nan Yun, who had seemed to have everything firmly in hand all this time, finally changed expression. She desperately urged the bronze corpse to counterattack. The huge monster's only remaining right hand swept out fiercely, striking at Xu Yuan's chest and abdomen.

At the same time, she repeatedly activated her own spell, condensing the pink smoke into a dharma arrow and shooting it at Xu Yuan's forehead.

At this moment, Nan Yun did not seek to turn the battle around. She only hoped to make him retreat in the face of difficulty and buy herself a brief chance to catch her breath.

Yet Xu Yuan's answer remained just as resolute.

Retreat? Your bronze corpse's life is already beneath my sword. How can you make me retreat?

The dharma sword abruptly accelerated by another fraction. The lightning in Xu Yuan's eyes surged once more, and faintly, the sound of thunder could already be heard.

The Bright Thunder Body-Tempering Art had reached perfection. At the same time, he had comprehended a method: lightning from the eyes and thunder from the mouth, to intimidate one's enemies.

After mastering this method, Xu Yuan had estimated that it should be effective against those at the third layer of Qi Refinement or below, though its effect on mid-stage Qi Refinement cultivators would likely be greatly diminished.

But during his battle with Nan Yun just now, faced with her interference, he suddenly thought of a solution. If this thunderous sound was useless against the enemy, what about against himself?

If he used violent thunder to bombard his own internal organs and heart-sea, keeping himself constantly in the pain of being cowed by thunder, could that allow him to avoid being dragged into that illusion to some extent?

The facts proved that he was right.

The dharma arrow formed from the spell struck the back of Xu Yuan's head. As his whole body trembled slightly, he showed no sign whatsoever of being pulled out of the illusion.

His sword remained steady. Xu Yuan met the bronze corpse's gaze. At this moment, the latter seemed to have already seen its own end. Just as its left fist landed on Xu Yuan, two streams of bloody tears suddenly flowed from its eyes—unspeakable pain, and also liberation from life.

The next moment, sword-light flashed. That savage, terrifying head flew violently into the air. Filthy blood rained down like a fountain behind Xu Yuan, yet he seemed not to care at all, merely walking down from the ruins step by step.

After several fierce battles, even though his Spirit-Martial Unity conserved spiritual energy relatively well, he had spent most of the time relying solely on the powerful physique of the Martial Dao Sacred Embryo. By now, he was already close to running on empty.

And the bronze corpse's final counterattack before its death had nearly caved in his chest. More than half of his internal organs had ruptured, blood seeping out from them.

But when Xu Yuan landed on the ground and looked at Nan Yun, clad in bloody robes before him, there was not the slightest trace of fear in his eyes. There was only an air of looking down upon all beneath him.

His longsword pointed at the ground as Xu Yuan walked toward her step by step. With every step Xu Yuan took, Nan Yun's trembling body retreated one step.

From fighting a baleful corpse alone, to breaking the formation by force, to beheading the bronze corpse she had relied upon atop the ruins—no matter how highly she had repeatedly estimated this junior brother, she realized she had never truly seen through Xu Yuan at all.

That feeling of things slipping beyond her control, coupled with the ever-approaching sense of death, finally shattered her psychological defenses.

"Why?"

Xu Yuan asked.

"Why? Yes... why?" Nan Yun gave Xu Yuan a bleak smile.

"Junior Brother, this is merely the appearance I gained after cultivating an evil art. My bone age is already thirty-eight. If one does not enter the inner sect by forty, Foundation Establishment is hopeless in this lifetime. I merely wanted to make one final gamble."

How could she not have known how terrifying Xu Yuan's Spirit-Martial Unity was? One wrong step, and her end would surely be miserable.

How could she not have known of the two backers behind Zhu Zihua? Even if she succeeded and returned to the sect, she would still have to face the pressure of Zhu Zihua's blood relatives.

But compared to a future without a glimmer of hope, how could she not take a gamble?

She had come here as a maid accompanying her mistress, yet unexpectedly, she herself had been the one to enter an immortal sect in the end. When she saw the mistress who had once ordered her about and berated her looking at her with envy and longing, that was the moment she felt as though she had truly begun to live.

So she entered the Desire Immortal Pavilion without hesitation, cultivating all manner of wicked arts for entertaining guests, all to earn spirit stones as quickly as possible.

So she cultivated evil arts, found the Corpse Transformation Pill within a damaged secret manual, squeezed every last bit of her potential in formation arts, and developed that illusion formation.

She had gone down the mountain with others several times, and only today had she finally found such a perfect opportunity.

But... but she had still failed...

She raised her eyes and looked at Xu Yuan's cold gaze. An intense feeling of powerlessness spread through her entire body.

Yet Xu Yuan still did not strike. His eyes remained fixed on her as he asked again, "Why?"

Staring blankly at Xu Yuan, Nan Yun did not know what he was asking about. A moment later, she suddenly came to her senses, and a terrifying, absurd thought rose in her heart-sea.

"Could it be... you are asking why I killed those mortals and used an entire village as a blood sacrifice?"

She looked at Xu Yuan with utter disbelief. Seeing the cold yet certain look in his eyes, Nan Yun's face suddenly twisted, and then she cursed hysterically.

"You stupid, arrogant, ignorant thing! You are also an immortal cultivator of the Hidden Moon Sect, yet you can ask such an absurd question!"

"We immortal cultivators, we Daoists, are meant to use this great world as sustenance, to pave the Great Dao with the bones and blood of all living beings! Everything in this world is nothing more than firewood for us!"

"If we do not kill mortals, where will the flesh and blood come from? If we do not kill mortals, where will the resentment come from? If we do not kill mortals, how can we raise this bronze corpse?"

"Xu Yuan, I thought you were asking how I dared ambush the two of you. I never imagined you would dare ask why I slaughtered this village! Have all the immortality and Dao you cultivated in the Hidden Moon Sect been cultivated into a dog's body?!"

Her expression twisted further and further. For a moment, she even forgot that the enemy was strong and she was weak. Rage blazed in her eyes as she raised her dharma sword and actually charged at Xu Yuan as if unable to endure such humiliation.

"You vile bastard, give me your life!"

Expressionless, Xu Yuan raised a hand and seized her dharma sword. Seeing Nan Yun still trying to attack him with her claws and teeth, Xu Yuan grabbed her head and twisted fiercely.

Crack!

Another headless, bloody corpse was added to this place.