Hard to Kill

The lake wind howled, startling flocks of ducks into flight. They landed on the water, stretching their necks from afar as they watched the commotion by the shore.

Chen Jue stepped onto the coarse gravel, his perfected Six Directions Saber Art's true intent spreading outward. His momentum merged with his body, blooming into an aura of extreme danger.

The pig demon transformed from the Room Fire Cult priest instantly noticed him.

"Who are you?!"

"No... who am I?! Room Fire God... priest..."

One hand clutching its head as it tried to recall its past, the pig demon gripped a flexible sword in the other. A vast amount of true qi flooded into it, pulling the blade taut and straight, like a red-hot steel ruler.

Chen Jue narrowed his starry eyes.

It was exactly this feeling.

Once the followers of the Room Fire Cult transformed into demons, another consciousness would awaken within them.

Only, this Room Fire Cult priest had taken the pill too recently. The pig demon's consciousness had not yet had time to digest the memories of its former self.

Wasn't this another form of body-snatching?

Chen Jue took a step forward, moving as swiftly as the wind and instantly arriving before the pig demon.

His long saber tore through the air like a spear, leaving an afterimage as it suddenly pierced the pig demon's left chest at blinding speed.

Blood burst forth. The pig demon's eyes flew wide, the confusion in its gaze instantly turning ferocious.

"You're an enemy! Enemies should be torn to pieces!"

The pig demon stretched out a furry black hand and seized the saber lodged in its left chest. The taut flexible sword in its right hand flashed coldly as it sliced toward Chen Jue's head.

Chen Jue snorted coldly. The Five Elements true qi within him erupted as he twisted his saber, instantly slicing open half the pig demon's palm and easily pulling the blade free from the bloody wound.

At the same time, he executed the perfected Wandering Dragon Body Technique. With a slight sideways lean and backward tilt, he barely avoided the flexible sword sweeping across him.

Whoosh! The air shrieked.

When its first strike missed, the pig demon swung another sword slash with its backhand.

Having been infused with too much true qi, the blade was already blazing hot. A strange blood-red tinge ran through its sword light, as though it might explode at any moment.

Chen Jue brought his saber back to block. With a clang—

It was as if he had been struck head-on by the force of nine oxen and two tigers. His soles plowed furrows through the gravel as his body was forced back more than ten meters.

This pig demon is absurdly strong!

Chen Jue was shaken. Ever since his vitality and blood value had begun rising steadily, apart from Meng Liang, whose realm had fallen when they met, he had never once been at a disadvantage in a contest of strength.

Of course, the two could not be mentioned in the same breath.

After all, when he encountered Meng Liang, his vitality and blood value had still been far from 200%.

Tonight's pig demon, meanwhile, had been a late-stage True Qi Realm martial artist before swallowing the Room Fire Demon Pill.

The gap in their combat strength was simply too great. They were no longer on the same level.

Realizing he could not crush it through brute force, Chen Jue immediately changed tactics.

Taking advantage of the pig demon's massive build and inferior agility, he abandoned the frontal clash and switched to hit-and-run basic attacks.

His saber technique was so practiced it had been carved into his bones. As he fought and evaded, every slash landed with precise, vicious timing. The spirit markings on his arms repeatedly charged and flashed, continuously strengthening the power of each blow.

The pig demon was hard-pressed on every side. After being slashed more than a dozen times, it seemed as though all the blood in its body was about to drain away.

Yet it showed no fear whatsoever. It even gave up defending entirely, swinging its overheated flexible sword and chopping and smashing at Chen Jue as though playing whack-a-mole.

Chen Jue moved with the perfected Wandering Dragon Body Technique, his figure elusive as a shadow, dodging every deadly chop from the pig demon.

As for some of the wildly unpredictable attacks that he truly could not evade, he could only take them head-on.

After just a few exchanges, his arms had already been numbed by the impacts.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

After several consecutive clashes like hammering iron, Chen Jue gradually sensed that something was wrong.

This berserk pig demon before him was like an unkillable cockroach. Though its entire body bore more than twenty wounds, it remained full of vigor and possessed boundless strength.

Only after carefully observing it amid their struggle did Chen Jue discover that not only was the pig demon covered in a faint layer of blood flames, but beneath its skin and flesh lay a faint red, resilient membrane.

Every one of his saber strikes hit their mark, breaking through the blood flames and flesh, yet they struggled to penetrate that pale-red resilient membrane beneath.

No... it was not that it could not be broken.

Rather, every time it was broken, those red membranes gathered again like the surface of water after being cleaved apart. Beneath its body riddled with wounds, they formed another layer of highly durable defense.

There was no need to think about it. Repairing that red membrane definitely consumed a massive amount of energy.

But the bizarre thing was that the pig demon, having swallowed a pill across realms, lacked nothing but energy.

It was like two bugs had stacked together and suddenly started running.

Chen Jue even wondered whether the pig demon could not be killed as long as those membranes remained.

"Looks like I can only grind it down slowly..."

Chen Jue once again tangled with the pig demon, using it as a target to hone his saber technique as he carefully experienced every swing.

Ever since he had comprehended how to unite the strength of his entire body into one, his external Three Harmonies technique had already reached its utmost limit.

Only the internal Three Harmonies—heart, intent, and qi—had never reached perfection or scaled the peak.

Now that even his saber technique had reached perfection, when he turned back to examine the internal Three Harmonies, it was like seeing lofty mountains after the clouds parted. He could only marvel at their majesty, realizing that beyond the heavens lay yet more heavens.

He slowly integrated the vague fragments of true intent he had accidentally grasped when his saber technique had first reached mastery and then perfection.

His spiritual platform grew ever clearer. Gradually seeing through falsehood, he finally united "heart, intent, and qi" into one, transforming them into a "true intent of self" capable of commanding both within and without.

Chen Jue named this saber true intent: "The Eight Wastelands and Six Directions—let 'I' reign supreme."

With this saber true intent upon him, Chen Jue's Six Directions Saber Art began to become "mind-driven."

That was to say:

If he wanted to strike an enemy, his saber true intent would lock onto their qi mechanism, making them difficult to evade.

If he wanted to severely wound someone, his saber true intent would determine how much true qi was needed based on the difficulty.

So long as he had enough true qi, once he struck, he would inevitably inflict the corresponding damage.

This seems a little powerful...

Seizing the fleeting opening after the pig demon's savage chop, Chen Jue shifted and swayed into its blind spot. The spirit markings on his arms drew in the spiritual energy of heaven and earth, combining it with Five Elements true qi as he unleashed five consecutive slashes.

Strength, true qi, and spiritual energy layered atop one another. A huge hole was blasted through the pig demon's waist. Blood mist exploded, and the pale-red resilient membrane within was completely destroyed. When it formed again, its color had already faded by a third.

"Damn! What kind of freakish defense is this? That one attack actually used up thirty strands of my Five Elements true qi!"

After that strike, Chen Jue's heart ached. He swiftly retreated.

Then, with a bang!

A sudden gust struck his face. A shattered streak of sword light shot straight for Chen Jue's face, and he hastily swung his saber to knock it aside.

The pig demon had become even more frenzied after being injured. In its violent backhand slash, the sword light had not even reached the ground before the blade exploded with a thunderous blast.

"Roar!"

After the weapon in its hand shattered, the pig demon, enraged beyond all measure, seemed to have triggered its third stage.

The blood flames covering its body surged wildly. Blood-red true qi, solidifying into tentacle-like substance, burst out one strand after another from the wounds covering its body, its savage might soaring to the heavens.

Chen Jue was not like those three wanderers from before, who would stand by and watch the pig demon "transform" without doing anything!

He moved with blinding speed, dodging the blood-red tentacles reaching for him. When he was only three steps from the pig demon, he raised his firearm right at its face and fired.

Boom!

Firelight flared!

Countless steel needles three inches long descended over the pig demon's face like pear blossoms in a storm, instantly destroying its pair of scarlet eyes.