Despite his resentment and his utter reluctance, Gonggong finally listened to Houtu, put away his trident, and let Meng Zhang and Ao Yue leave.
Seeing that Houtu had stopped attacking and Gonggong had also stayed his hand, Meng Zhang, who had assumed an innate Dao body in the sky, lowered his head to glance at Gungun standing beside Houtu on the ground. Then he turned to Ao Yue and said, "Your Highness, let us go."
"Mm." Purple light flashed over Ao Yue, and the divine dragon a million zhang long transformed into a handsome youth clad in purple divine armor. He, too, glanced down at Gungun before shifting his gaze to Houtu. Bowing to her with clasped hands, he said, "Ancestral Witch Houtu, I have never forgotten your kindness in saving me all those years ago. I, Ao Yue, swear here and now that, unless it is the day of the War of the Liches, I will never initiate an attack against any member of the Witch Race."
With that, Ao Yue lowered his arms and instructed Meng Zhang, "Let us go."
"Yes, Your Highness."
As his words fell, the space around them rippled. Then the two dragons vanished, leaving the area.
Watching this, Gungun, standing on all fours, felt a surge of envy. So this is a Quasi-Saint. When will this baby be able to sever his good corpse and become a Quasi-Saint too? Hmm, that day probably isn't far off.
"Don't even think about it for another five million years," Houtu's voice suddenly sounded beside him.
"Huh?" Gungun froze at her words. What five million years? Could she mean...
"Fourth Brother, Meng Zhang arrived. Both he and Ao Yue are Quasi-Saints who have severed two corpses. Two against two, we wouldn't gain any advantage. If we pushed them too far, they might even take us down with them." Houtu did not respond to Gungun's bewildered exclamation. Seeing Gonggong fly down from the sky, she raised her head and explained.
"Hmph!" Hearing his little sister's reasoning, Gonggong gave a displeased snort. He felt she had underestimated his strength and thought too highly of those two dragons.
Ao Yue was nothing but a dragon whelp whose fuzz hadn't even grown in yet. So what if he was the Ancestral Dragon's eldest legitimate son? Even the Ancestral Dragon didn't want him anymore.
As for Meng Zhang, though he had made something of a name for himself in the Primordial World, he was still only a guard at the end of the day. Even if he had gotten lucky and severed his second corpse, could he really match an Ancestral Witch?
Take us down with them? Those two?
Seeing that her fourth brother still wore a trace of displeasure, which he had only refrained from venting out of affection for her, Houtu sighed. Then she nudged Gungun lightly with her foot and instructed him, "Explain it to my fourth brother. If we kept fighting Ao Yue and Meng Zhang, could we keep them here?"
"Uh..." Still pondering what Houtu had meant by "five million years," Gungun suddenly found himself being kicked a few times and asked such a question. He was rather speechless.
Did this even count as a question? Any creature with a normal level of intelligence would know the answer.
"Gungun?" Hearing Houtu's words, Gonggong followed her gaze toward Gungun. Then he folded his arms across his chest and said in a gruff voice, "All right, fatty, you tell me. Could my little sister and I join forces and kill Ao Yue and Meng Zhang?"
More than a hundred thousand years had passed, yet Gonggong had always called Gungun "fatty." That had never changed.
Gungun had long since become immune to it. Fatty it is, then. At least I'm adorably fat. You, on the other hand, are neither handsome nor cute. Quite the opposite-you're ugly as sin. I don't even know how to express my sympathy for your looks.
Returning to the matter at hand, Gungun knew he could not avoid answering now that Gonggong had asked him as well. After thinking for a moment, he said, "I believe the two Ancestral Witches possess vast divine abilities and boundless magical power. Even against Quasi-Saints of the Dragon Race, you would surely be able to..."
"Enough, shut up, you slippery bear who doesn't even have the courage to tell the truth." Before Gungun could finish, Houtu kicked him again and pressed a hand to her forehead in resignation.
Who says I don't even have the courage to tell the truth? I just can't be bothered!
The answer is so obvious that even an idiot would know it, yet you two still ask me?
If I tell the truth, I'll get beaten.
If I don't, the worst I'll get is a scolding. Wouldn't telling the truth make me even stupider than Gonggong? Hearing Gungun's thoughts, the corner of Houtu's mouth twitched slightly. She no longer knew whether to praise her Gungun for being clever or keep calling him cowardly and slippery.
"Little Sister, why didn't you let this fatty finish? I thought he was speaking very well. We siblings possess vast divine abilities and boundless magical power. Even if Ao Yue and Meng Zhang joined forces, they would never be our match," Gonggong asked Houtu.
"Fourth Brother, you..." For a moment, Houtu was so exasperated that she did not know what she could say to make him face reality. Confidence was good, but too much confidence became conceit.
Conceit simply wouldn't do!
"Ah, let's leave it at that. Just listen to me, and you won't go wrong." Truly at a loss for how to explain it to him, Houtu simply gave up. Rubbing the space between her brows, she closed her eyes and spoke.
In truth, how could she not have wanted to keep Ao Yue there? She had summoned Gonggong herself precisely to cut off Taiyi's right arm and vent the anger she felt at someone trying to poach her own. But things had gone against her wishes. Who could have expected Meng Zhang to arrive in time? She could only abandon the attempt.
Thinking this, Houtu glanced again at the great fat bear beside her, who had actually been putting on an act earlier and made her feel touched for nothing. Then beige divine light rose beneath her feet, restoring the shattered land within a million li around her.
Houtu was the Ancestral Witch of Earth and commanded the law of earth, so this posed no difficulty for her. Yet while closing up the land was easy, bringing dead creatures back to life was far harder.
She turned and surveyed the Softbone Prairie. Scattered across it lay countless corpses-several billion Soft-Bone Rabbits. All of these... had been killed in her and Gonggong's earlier battle with Ao Yue.
At the sight, Houtu's delicate brows knitted, and she felt a pang of pity.
Before attacking Ao Yue, she had not considered that doing so would drag innocents into the disaster. Perhaps... it was because the Soft-Bone Rabbits were simply too insignificant.
Seeing Houtu looking at the corpses of nearly all the Soft-Bone Rabbits not far away, who had desperately fled earlier but could not get far because of their cultivation and had lost their lives when the blasts swept over them, Gungun scratched his head and said in an earnest voice, "I only just sent some souls here to be reborn. They died again after just a few days."
"..." Houtu met his words with silence.
"Hmph." Gonggong snorted, feeling that such a trivial matter was not worth worrying about. They're only Soft-Bone Rabbits. If their whole clan was wiped out, so be it. Let's get back to discussing how my little sister and I could absolutely destroy Ao Yue and Meng Zhang together!
"Hmm? There's a Soft-Bone Rabbit still alive." Gonggong was about to speak to Houtu again when her expression suddenly changed. She vanished from where she stood and appeared elsewhere, then crouched down and picked up a Soft-Bone Rabbit whose essence had been damaged by the explosions, forcing her back into her original form.
"It's her?" Looking at the Soft-Bone Rabbit, Houtu found her familiar. A few seconds later, she remembered. Wasn't this the little rabbit with Profound Immortal cultivation who had been the first to touch Gungun's head and big belly while he slept half a month ago?
Before you continue