Seeing Each Other Again II

Deep in the grasslands, a filthy girl staggered along atop a red folding fan, flying swiftly toward the distance.

Beside the girl lay a hunched old man. He was unconscious, seeming asleep, yet also seeming like nothing more than a corpse. He did not move at all; not even breathing or a heartbeat could be seen.

The girl lowered her head and glanced at the old man, pain welling up in her eyes.

When she looked up again, her gaze instantly turned cold.

She flew at high speed, her eyes constantly sweeping the surroundings as though searching for something.

Whoosh!

A streak of black light suddenly shot toward her from the sky ahead.

The girl was horrified and hurriedly steered the folding fan down toward the ground.

With a hiss, she, the folding fan, and the old man instantly sank into the earth and vanished.

The black light streaked past above her head and disappeared in the direction from which she had come in the blink of an eye.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!

Immediately afterward, dozens, even hundreds of black streaks densely shot past, likewise flying in the direction behind her.

Only after the black lights had completely disappeared did the girl slowly emerge from the grass, drenched in cold sweat.

"The Black Light Army... That madman actually provoked the Black Light Army!?" Her eyes were filled with shock.

Her grandfather's sect had been destroyed by a single soldier from the Black Light Army.

This was one of the Ten Most Elite Legions among the Two-Horned People. Once deployed, even the vice sect master of the Golden Lotus Sect had once fled at the mere scent of danger, unable to withstand them.

She had heard that madman who had stood by and watched people die transmit his voice across the entire world.

At the time, she had sneered, knowing that the madman would sooner or later lose his life. She simply had not expected it to happen so quickly.

"Once the Black Light Army moves, even Kahill, the Dragon General of the Dragon Crown Realm, can only avoid its edge for now.

Hehe... Serves you right! You stood by and watched people die before. Let's see how you die now!"

If that man had saved her grandfather, perhaps she would have considered informing the Golden Lotus Sect and the Black Lotus Gate. She might even have been able to invite someone at the vice sect master level to act and save him.

But now...

She only felt that he could not die quickly enough!

"Good deeds bring good rewards, evil deeds bring evil retribution!"

After looking toward the direction the Black Light Army had departed, the girl did not spare it another glance. She turned, changed direction, and continued flying, soon disappearing beyond the grasslands.

Outside Heroic Song City.

Lin Xin focused his attention on the Two-Horned Person standing atop the dragon's head.

Judging from her outward appearance and aura, she was vastly, vastly stronger than the Two-Horned People he had seen before. She hardly seemed to belong to the same race.

The source of their power seemed to be the pair of horns atop their heads.

The moment she arrived, she rattled off a whole string of words at him.

He had not listened at all, nor could he be bothered to listen to anything else.

The only thing he cared about was whether there was any news of Hong Ye.

After questioning her and receiving no affirmative answer, he no longer wanted to say anything.

Kahill stood before him, her lips opening and closing incessantly like a goldfish swimming in water. The sight irritated him.

"Annoying thing. Better to kill it."

He slowly extended his right arm, palm facing downward.

Hiss...

An invisible, terrifying force spread from his palm. A ball of white airflow rapidly began gathering in midair beneath his hand.

The airflow spun at high speed, producing a piercing shriek and grinding sound.

"Fool!!" Kahill drew her greatsword with a backhand motion. Knowing that her earlier threats had all been wasted breath, rage surged in her heart.

The space around the blade twisted violently as black spatial rifts tore open hideously and spread outward.

"Spirit Pact!" she shouted lowly. The rippling distortions around her body abruptly surged, becoming even more intense.

Snap!

Lin Xin reached out and gripped the white ball of airflow. With a sharp screech, it burst apart in his hand, firing two streams of white air to either side. The white air condensed into solid form, becoming a white blade ten meters long.

Gently swinging the Qi sword, Lin Xin closed his eyes. Long-forgotten sword techniques from his past flooded into his mind.

Boom!!

A deep-blue bolt of lightning flashed across the sky in an instant.

The electric light shone over Lin Xin's face, reflecting an ashen pallor.

He slowly raised his sword.

"Supreme Divine Wind..."

Countless blue arcs of lightning gathered wildly upon the Qi sword in his hand like flowing water, seemingly without end.

"Zhao Ming!" Lin Xin's eyes snapped open, silver-black galaxies spinning within them.

With a thunderous crack.

The Qi sword's blade exploded in an instant, releasing boundless, dazzling white light like a sun.

That was not white light, but countless terrifying Sword Qi as fine as ox hairs.

Thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions of Sword Qi burst in all directions like the rising sun at dawn, shining with rays ten thousand fathoms long.

"Dragon Soaring Sword Style · Thousand Flame Slash!!"

Kahill raised her greatsword horizontally. As she watched the Sword Qi fill the sky, even she felt some alarm.

The sheer number already appeared to far exceed that of ordinary experts at the same level.

But she was not afraid in the least. Courage, intent, and energy like True Essence were all too fragile to withstand a single blow. No matter how numerous his Sword Qi might be, they were merely paper tigers, broken with one poke.

Invisible flames ignited around the greatsword as Kahill fiercely swept it forward.

With a hiss.

Space shattered. Spiderweb-like black cracks spread in all directions from the sword.

Even the intact space around the greatsword directly warped, like everything in a funhouse mirror being stretched and bent.

Bang!

The greatsword slammed viciously into the white Sword Qi rushing down from all over the sky.

"Useless. Your Sword Qi may look plentiful, but in truth it only has numbers, no—"

Boom!

The greatsword exploded violently, and countless white Sword Qi rushed straight at her.

Kahill's expression changed drastically as she tried to pull back. But it was already too late.

With a hiss, a streak of white Sword Qi pierced out through her chest—from behind.

She turned her head in disbelief, only to see countless Sword Qi filling her vision, curving around and swooping in from behind.

Hiss, hiss, hiss, hiss!!!

Countless Sword Qi also blasted through her from the front. With the greatsword no longer blocking them, her physical body might have been powerful, but how could it withstand the terrifying bonus from Lin Xin's more than forty million points of killing power?

In a single instant, her entire body became like a broken doll, riddled with holes as Sword Qi pierced through her again and again.

Red blood sprayed from her body, front and back alike, raining down in droplets.

The red dragon beneath her feet gave a mournful cry, its enormous body about to charge forward.

But it was already too late. The remaining countless Sword Qi surged in from every direction and drilled viciously into the red dragon's massive body.

Its hard dragon scales offered no resistance whatsoever.

In the blink of an eye, they were pierced straight through.

"This... is not True Essence..." The light in Kahill's eyes was rapidly fading, but deep unwillingness still showed on her face.

She still had her strongest sword technique unused. She had merely lost one move, having guessed her opponent's method of attack wrong.

She had mistakenly used her usual methods for dealing with True Essence against it. The result was self-evident.

Her greatsword had been shattered, and she no longer had a second chance. She perished on the spot.

"Of course it isn't True Essence." Lin Xin dispersed the Qi sword in his hand. His opponent had indeed been quite good. If measured by the standards of the many powerful figures in the void, she was roughly at the level of an Earth Immortal.

That was already strength equivalent to a regional overlord.

Unfortunately, in his eyes, she was still like an ant. If not for his desire to test a new sword move, he could have destroyed her with a single swing of his sword.

Upon hearing his answer, the final gleam in Kahill's eyes vanished completely.

Whoosh...

Her body gradually began turning black. Then, from her feet to her head, it slowly transformed inch by inch into black ash.

Lin Xin could even hear the greedy swallowing and sucking sounds coming from the surrounding space.

The Nether Prefecture was devouring her body.

"The Nether Prefecture..."

Lin Xin narrowed his eyes and suppressed the urge to activate his divine ability, devour it, and seize the corpse. Now was not the time to alert the Nether Prefecture.

"Kill!!!"

Faintly, he heard waves of urgent, fierce battle cries coming from far behind him.

A sharp killing aura condensed into blade-like currents of air and rushed directly at him.

"This aura is aimed at me too?"

Lin Xin glanced at Kahill's corpse and the red dragon, both in the midst of turning to black ash. He seemed to vaguely guess one possibility.

"That is the Black Light Army."

A calm, familiar voice suddenly came from Lin Xin's right.

It was the voice of a middle-aged man, magnetic and carrying an indifferent air, as though nothing in the world mattered.

The instant Lin Xin heard the voice, his pupils contracted sharply, and he swiftly looked to the right.

Hong Ye's familiar yet unfamiliar figure suddenly entered his sight.

"Hong Ye... Senior..."

"It has been many years. It seems you have been doing quite well."

Hong Ye looked at him, examining him carefully, a faint smile on his face.

It had been a very, very long time since he had been this normal.

In one day, he could now remain lucid for six hours.

"Thanks to Senior's blessing, I've been getting by." Lin Xin tried hard to force a smile, but no matter what he did, only a stiff, reluctant expression appeared. Perhaps it was not a smile at all, merely the movement of his facial muscles.

"The Black Light Army is the Quentin Legion among Yuan Zheng's Ten Great Legions. It is fairly strong even by void standards. Can you handle them?" Hong Ye looked at Lin Xin with great interest.

"Senior." Lin Xin did not answer his question. "This time, this junior wishes to fulfill our agreement from back then."

"You really want to save me out of here?"

Hong Ye was slightly moved.

Over the years, he could no longer remember how many seeds he had scattered, how many strands of karma, how many hopes. Yet all of them had left him utterly numb through repeated failures.

As far as saving people was concerned, after sending Lin Xin away back then, he had continued searching for methods and sent dozens of people out of the Nether Prefecture one after another. They were all people who had not been bound too deeply.

The karmic agreements those people received were the same as the one Lin Xin had received back then.

Yet after all these years, there had still been no news at all. Many had learned of the terror of the Nether Prefecture soon after leaving, then lowered their banners and silenced their drums, deliberately forgetting that strand of karma.

As the other end of that karma, with Hong Ye's abilities, he naturally could sense the changes in those karmic ties.

But precisely because he could sense them, he understood and could feel the sincerity and determination in Lin Xin's words at this moment.

"Does this junior look like someone who enjoys joking?" Lin Xin said calmly. "But before that, I need Senior to lend me a hand."

"What do you want?" Hong Ye asked directly. His expression gradually turned solemn from its earlier carelessness.

He could feel Lin Xin's resolute will. The strength and purity of that will moved even him now.