Kill the Drooping-Ear Monk

The instant they collided, the Drooping-Ear Monk's pupils constricted violently.

With his Tenth Layer of Meridian Opening cultivation, unleashing his full strength gave him nearly six thousand pounds of force. Let alone a person—even an iron billet could be smashed into powder!

Yet the man before him stood immovable like a divine pillar rooted in the earth. In their contest of strength, the monk had even fallen into the disadvantage.

But what cultivation did this man have?

A chill rose in the Drooping-Ear Monk's heart. An Eighth Layer of Meridian Opening cultivator had actually overpowered him in a contest of strength!

Where had this monstrous freak come from?

Boom!

As his thoughts churned, the explosive clash of metal shook dust from every beam and pillar in the hall, sending incense ash whirling through the air.

The Drooping-Ear Monk's tiger's mouth split open, scarlet blood pouring wildly through his fingers. Both arms had gone numb, and his blood and qi roiled without end.

He gripped the still-unformed Withered Evil Halberd tightly, his eyes completely filled with shock.

Eighth Layer of Meridian Opening!

A mere Eighth Layer of Meridian Opening cultivator had forced him, a Tenth Layer of Meridian Opening expert at Half-Step Astral Condensation, back step by step through brute physical strength alone!

Through a thousand years of martial history, when had such a heaven-defying freak ever appeared?

He could tell that this man cultivated a body-tempering art, but even a superior body-tempering martial art should not possess such power!

"Madman! Just who are you?!"

The Drooping-Ear Monk roared sharply. The fear in his heart had already overwhelmed his killing intent.

He had roamed the martial world for decades, encountered formidable foes, slain evil creatures, and never met an equal within his realm. Even against someone newly advanced into Qi Solidification, he had the power to contend.

Yet today, his proud, immense strength and solid martial foundation were like children playing before this blood-soaked youth in black—utterly vulnerable to a single blow!

Lu Li's expression remained cold, without the slightest ripple in his eyes. By now, the blood qi throughout his body had already surged to its peak. His seven thousand pounds of strength had been fully activated, while Intransigent Qi hung heavily around him, protecting every bone and organ, leaving him unbroken and unharmed.

He could not be bothered to answer.

For a demonic monk who had committed every evil and forged evil armaments from the flesh and blood of infants, even one extra word was unnecessary.

The next instant, Lu Li's Blood Speed movement technique erupted beneath his feet. Layer upon layer of afterimages appeared as he suddenly closed in!

The force of the Second Layer of Heart-Breaking Buddha Body gathered entirely in his palm. The black palm print carried a suction force that seemed capable of devouring all things, its tyrannical might bolstered by the Eighth Layer of Poison Blood Hand as it shot straight toward the Drooping-Ear Monk's chest!

Close-quarters combat had always been Lu Li's absolute domain!

"Arrogant!"

The Drooping-Ear Monk shouted through gritted teeth, forcibly suppressing his churning blood and qi. The Withered Evil Halberd in his hand spun out a sky full of cold gleams. Crisscrossing halberd shadows formed layer after layer of defense as baleful energy surged, attempting to corrode Lu Li's inner qi and flesh with the evil armament's malign aura.

Though the Withered Evil Halberd was not fully formed, its baleful energy was already sufficient to rot the flesh and meridians of Meridian Opening martial artists. If an ordinary cultivator so much as touched it, his blood and qi would weaken and his flesh would wither.

But when it landed on Lu Li, it produced only faint sizzling sounds.

Intransigent Qi locked down the foundations of his body, impervious to all methods and untouchable by every evil!

This bit of baleful energy was not even enough to scratch an itch!

"Useless effort."

Lu Li spoke coldly, and Xuandu Treasure Artifact swept horizontally. The blade light was sharp as autumn water cutting through a river, forcibly splitting apart the sky full of halberd shadows.

Crack!

A piercing sound of breaking suddenly exploded!

The Withered Evil Halberd, which the Drooping-Ear Monk had relied upon, was split open by that strike. Its black Baleful Yin Steel body shattered inch by inch. The weapon that had accumulated the blood malice of a thousand people lost most of its power in an instant!

"No!!"

The Drooping-Ear Monk's eyes nearly burst from their sockets as his heart shook violently.

This was an evil armament! Even if it had not been fully refined, no ordinary Treasure Artifact should have been able to break it!

In the instant his mind faltered, Lu Li's black Poison Blood Palm struck precisely into the center of his chest.

Pfft!

A dull sound of collapsing flesh rang out.

The Drooping-Ear Monk's burly body stiffened abruptly. The blood and qi racing through him froze in an instant, and his meridians felt as though they had been tightly locked by an invisible hand.

The Erosion Essence Scripture activated!

A tyrannical—utterly tyrannical—devouring force erupted!

Visible streams of blood-colored qi seeped from every pore of the Drooping-Ear Monk's body like countless tiny crimson snakes, surging madly into Lu Li's palm before flowing through his meridians and spreading into every limb and bone.

The color drained rapidly from the Drooping-Ear Monk's face. His skin visibly shriveled and wrinkled, while his once powerful, solid frame swiftly withered away. The pure blood and qi he had cultivated for decades at the Tenth Layer of Meridian Opening was being forcibly extracted and drained dry!

"Y-you... this is an evil art!!"

The Drooping-Ear Monk's throat made a rattling sound, his eyes filled with boundless terror and unwillingness.

He cultivated the Bodhi Heart Sutra and considered himself part of Buddhism's orthodox lineage. He performed sacrifices and forged evil armaments, yet claimed to be saving all living beings. But only now, upon witnessing this incomparably tyrannical devouring art, did he understand what true ghostly and godlike methods were.

Lu Li lowered his eyes indifferently, adding another thirty percent of force to his palm and completely sealing off all the monk's life force.

"When you slaughtered children and forged weapons through sin, why did you not speak of good and evil?"

As his words fell, the final strand of blood-colored qi was completely drained away.

Boom!

The Drooping-Ear Monk's tall body collapsed heavily to the ground. He had become a dried corpse of skin stretched over bones, his eyes wide open in death.

Not a trace of life remained in the great hall.

Lu Li slowly withdrew his palm and closed his eyes, focusing his mind as he allowed the surging blood qi to wash through his meridians and acupoints.

A warm, vast flood of blood and qi raced endlessly through his body. It was far purer than the energy of eight hundred ordinary Buddhist Soldiers, drawn from the deep and utterly pure foundation of a peak Tenth Layer of Meridian Opening martial artist!

The immense blood qi accumulated from slaughtering the eight hundred Buddhist Soldiers merged with the lifelong cultivation foundation of the Drooping-Ear Monk, completely filling every cultivation bottleneck in Lu Li's Eighth Layer of Meridian Opening.

The cultivation barriers that had blocked him for years shattered and dissolved layer by layer. His blood and qi condensed, his inner qi transformed, and his meridians expanded!

A vast power far surpassing anything before continuously surged from the depths of his limbs and bones.

After a long while, Lu Li opened his eyes. The sharp light in them receded, and his aura became steady and boundless.

Ninth Layer of Meridian Opening!

The immense blood qi had directly broken through the barrier of the ninth hidden meridian.

"No wonder upholding justice feels so good. Excellent—this path of chivalry must be maintained!"

Feeling the power within him filled to the brim, Lu Li could barely conceal his delight.

This trip to the Thousand-Eyed Bodhisattva Temple had been an absolute windfall.

Not only had he harvested an immense amount of blood qi, but he could also exchange the Drooping-Ear Monk's head for a superior blade technique afterward!

He bent down and grabbed the Drooping-Ear Monk's dry topknot, then twisted his wrist. A flash of cold light passed.

Thud.

A bloody head rolled free, and Lu Li casually picked it up by the hair.

Outside the great hall, the battlefield in the peach grove had already descended into a fierce melee.

Peng Shan, Yan Dan, and Liu Qi had led the experts of the Hidden Heroes Alliance, Righteousness Gang, and Heavenly Righteousness Society into the battlefield, clearing out the remaining Buddhist Soldiers who had slipped through the net.

Although the hundred or so surviving soldiers had lost more than half their elites, their formation remained tight. Fearless of death, they relied on their armor and combined attack techniques to stubbornly entangle the martial artists.

The group fought with extreme difficulty. Many brothers from the gangs had been wounded. Even with Peng Shan's mechanical crossbows supporting them, the Buddhist Soldiers' desperate fighting style still forced them to retreat step by step.

These Buddhist Soldiers modified by the Myriad Life Sect felt neither pain nor fear. They knew only slaughter, making them the most troublesome kind of death warriors.