Hungry, that's what I don't like about Li s.h.i.+min; he was too power-hungry, who did not have any scruple in murdering his own family. Now, before any of you attack me for this statement, yes, I do know he was one, if not the greatest, emperor of China, and yes, I do know that's how politics is. But still … DongBin, Ysabel, Jaya, HPC, Spy, Chua, you are welcome. Xiaohu, ahem … please don't get me wrong, I am not mad at you, and I understand you were joking, but I do find joking about one's parents is kind of inappropriate. Maybe I am too conservative, but I still value family. CFT, Sky, maybe the feeling was mutual? Akolaw … you and your ranking system … Xu Xiong, nah, Kou Zhong is too bra.s.sy for both s.h.i.+ girls. Oldhat, don't worry, the Lord's willing, I am going to finish this. Plus, the length is not my problem, Huang Yi's style is.
Book 20 Chapter 9 - Utterly Vicious Extremely Evil
Wearing nightwalker outfit, Kou Zhong hid on the top of an ancient towering tree, watching for any activity at the Zongguan Mansion from a distance.
From this point of view, if anybody was escaping from the Mansion, that person absolutely would not escape his sharp eyes.
All the trees in the Mansion were comparably shorter than the tree he was on, they did not obstruct his line of sight at all.
The search operation was still going on like wildfire, torches and lanterns projected their light to the sky, making it as bright as day.
And then silence descended, apparently their work was to no avail.
Kou Zhong was greatly disappointed.
The reason he was so confident that Yang Xuyan was still inside the Mansion was that Yang Xuyan must be aware that he had suffered internal injury, only he must not have guessed that Kou Zhong would be able to recover that quickly. Therefore, reasonably speaking, he would seize this golden opportunity to attempt the a.s.sa.s.sination for the second time.
Another strong reason that after fighting hand-to-hand with Kou Zhong twice, Yang Xuyan must have had clear understanding that within this short period of time, Kou Zhong's power has advanced boldly. Even if he was an expert in using his weapon, it would still be difficult for him to succeed easily. If it were someone else, he would definitely rush to slaughter Kou Zhong before he would be incapable to subdue him; the earlier the better.
Even harder to come by, Kou Zhong was protecting his people, hence he had no choice by to stay nicely inside the Mansion.
But Kou Zhong was mistaken.
The torches, lanterns, in the Zongguan Mansion went off one by one, from busy it returned to quiet.
Kou Zhong sighed inwardly. He was about to leave, suddenly he heard a gust of wind from behind.
He quickly looked back, and saw a dark shadow came at an incredible speed from the back of the roof ridge of a nearby building, darting toward his big tree.
※ ※ ※
The sound of footsteps could be heard clearly, coupled with the startled bats flapping their wings. All kinds of noise hit the cave wall and reverberated everywhere, making the atmosphere even graver.
Xu Ziling could not help feeling strange, because the footsteps sounded sluggish and heavy. And then he had a sudden understanding. Just now these four were fighting over the fake 'Demonic Emperor's Relic'; the fighting must be intense, with n.o.body willing to yield to another, so much so that none of them did not suffer injury.
He also thought that s.h.i.+ Qingxuan was both wise and brave; planning first, execute later. First she used the fake Relic to weaken the four people's strength, and then lured them into this cave to wipe them out. Worst case scenario, she would die while they perished.
He was only wondering: was the mechanism in this cave designed and built by Lu Miaozi?
Sudden gust of wind; the four people appeared in the cave, leaving only a two zhang distance between them and Xu Ziling. Every one of them looked suspicious; evidently they knew this was not a good place. Xu Ziling quickly donned the Yue Shan mask again.
Lowering his voice, Ding Jiuzhong said, "I have a very ominous feeling, we'd better withdraw first and think of another way."
You Niaojuan, who was p.r.i.c.king his ears to listen carefully to the enemy's whereabouts, laughed coldly and said, "Don't play trick, you just want to deceive us to leave first, and then you'll pounce back in to capture her! Humph!"
Ding Jiuzhong was too angry to retort.
Jin Huazhen said, "That little s1ut must be hiding nearby; let's spread out to find her."
You Niaojuan hatefully said, "Don't even think that I will believe you, this wh0r3; if you succeeded, do you think you will wait for me?"
Zhou Laotan angrily said, "You believe, fine, you don't believe, fine. There are danger lurking on every side in this cave, if we don't work with a common purpose, you will die and rot thoroughly without even knowing what's going on. Just look at these ghost bats; they say that they are nocturnal, and now it is night, how come they are still here? Something is really strange here."
Ding Jiuzhong said, "Fortunately we heard the noise they made because they were startled, otherwise the little s1ut would escape from the other exits and we are still in the dark."
Before he even finished, a burst of flapping bats' wings rose up from the direction of the cave s.h.i.+ Qingxuan entered just now.
Instantly the four made their move; they bolted toward the cave entrance. Most of the bats hanging on the cave ceiling were startled and scattered in all directions, following their circling and gliding flight path, densely packed, flying wildly around the cave, yet not two of them clas.h.i.+ng against each other. Under the dim, strange colored light inside the cave, it was such an impressive sight, and those who saw it had their hair stood on its end.
Lightning fast, Xu Ziling swept out. Under cover of the sound of the flapping wings, he silently launched palm strike toward Ding Jiuzhong, who was walking at the rear. Everywhere he moved, the swarm of flying bats indeed avoided him.
He curbed his palm strength and did not unleash it at once, and then when his right palm was only about three cun away from the opponent's back, he started to violently release his true power.
'Bang!'
On the surface, his palm strike seemed to be so strong that even the Jade Emperor himself would breathe his last.
But Xu Ziling was well aware that it was not so.
When his palm was only about a cun away from the middle of this Emperor's back, the opponent reacted; he flashed slightly to the left, evading the attack to the vital acupoint on his back, so that Xu Ziling's strike fell on his right shoulder blade.
Based on Xu Ziling's current skill, because the opponent received the strike first, no matter what, the shoulder blade would have been shattered by the attack; who would have thought that the instant Xu Ziling's palm touched his clothes, somehow, in a way that was hard to believe, Ding Jiuzhong's entire shoulder blade, along with his arm, suddenly 'collapsed' into his thorax cavity, while at the same time he generated a powerful opposing force, which neutralized most of Xu Ziling's palm power.
Ding Jiuzhong let out a miserable grunt and staggered forward, but his leg flew backward toward Xu Ziling's genitalia. The counterattack was fierce, violent, fast and nimble; it was completely beyond Xu Ziling's expectation.
You Niaojuan and the others looked back and saw the two were already engaged in close combat. Unexpectedly Jin Huanzhen laughed tenderly and said, "Let Da Di deal with this man!"
Just like that, the three continued moving forward; they was not even interested in giving the two half a glance.
'Bang!'
After wiping his cold sweat, Xu Ziling bent his knees to meet Ding Jiuzhong's backward kick; with great delight he decided to meet force with force. Like a torrential flash flood his vortex of power attacked this demonic man, who had been abandoned by his companions.
It was only this moment that he realized why s.h.i.+ Qingxuan had the intention of sacrificing herself to perish together with the enemies; because these four demonic people were indeed too formidable. Even under such a favorable situation, killing Ding Jiuzhong was still so difficult.
'Ah!'
Ding Jiuzhong fell facedown forward, while spurting a mouthful of fresh blood. Knowing his own fist and kick skill could not match the enemy's reaching-perfection skill, Xu Ziling pursued closely; the edge of his palm chopped horizontally across to strike the Zhenyao acupoint on Ding Jiuzhong's back. [Translator's note: there are several missing/gibberish characters here, this part might not be translated properly.]
Ding Jiuzhong rolled on the ground, with the intention of turning around … [again, missing/gibberish characters] This demonic man let out a howl, his face turned blood-red, and then opening his mouth, he spurted out a column of blood, straight toward the pit of Xu Ziling's stomach. Unexpectedly, although he moved later, his attack arrived first.
This was the first time that Xu Ziling encountered such a desperate consummate demonic skill.
Xu Ziling realized that if he was unable to deal with this situation as quickly as possible, he would not be able to help s.h.i.+ Qingxuan dealing with the other three vicious people, including You Niaojuan, whose skill was the strongest. And if he dodged the attack, he would give the opponent the opportunity to take a breather and pulled his weapon, and then Xu Ziling would have to waste a lot of time to take care of him. Therefore, he decided to take a risk.
This moment he threw his entire body forward, and rolled to the right side in an unexpected move, and then using the tip of his toes to support his entire weight, he bent his body in bow shape. When the arrow of blood flew past, missing his chest by only a hairbreadth, he suddenly rolled back to return to his previous offensive stance to continue his attack, only his entire body suddenly twisted down.
With continuous squeaks, dozens of bats were hit by the arrow of blood; all had their bones crushed and their wings broken, and fell like rain on the cave bed.
Ding Jiuzhong had never expected that the enemy would have such an astonis.h.i.+ng and strange move; not only he could generate power from his feet to firmly sucked the ground as he suddenly flipped over sideways that he was also able to evade the attack that Ding Jiuzhong was so sure would kill him, he was also able to return to his original stance and continue the attack, so that although Ding Jiuzhong had thousands and hundreds demonic skill and secret moves, he did not have time to unleash them.
'Pow!'
The edge of Xu Ziling's palm, like a lightning, hacked his forehead, while Xu Ziling himself flew over him and went deep into the cave.
The back of Ding Jiuzhong's head crashed heavily against the ground, and he died on the spot; the emperor crown fell off his hat and rolled to the side.
There is indeed only a little difference between life and death.
※ ※ ※
