Decaying World Chapter 221

Chapter 221

Mist Zone. Yanshan Ruins.

Whoosh!

A sharp screech split the air. Propelled by a trailing sonic boom, a white streak tore through the Mist and drove into the remnants of Tianzhan Cliff.

Boom!

The ground buckled, collapsing into a bowl-shaped crater dozens of ters wide as fractures spread outward in a web of cracks.

At the crater's center, Lin Hui drew Ruyi with a clean shua.

Most of the blood had already left the blade mid-flight.

Clutching the massive, ragged hole torn through his waist, Su Yaping's face was twisted with pain—but his pale blue eyes burned with sothing closer to exhilaration.

"Is this your true strength!?"

"Are those your dying words?" Lin Hui replied, his tone a perfect mirror of the other man's. He raised Ruyi and wiped away the last trace of blood.

A fast enough blade could pass through flesh without catching a drop. But the sword had been fully subrged just now, and a faint sar of filth remained.

"Don't misunderstand—I've already broken with Xingdao City!" Su Yaping flinched, knowing full well what happened when his mouth lagged behind Lin Hui's blade. He pressed on without waiting for a response. "I joined the Wanhua Sect on a temporary basis. Finding you was my only purpose."

The provocation had been deliberate—a test. He'd needed to confirm whether this man truly held the path forward he had spent so long searching for before making his next move. But if he spoke too slowly and genuinely irritated a powerhouse of this caliber, dying out here would be a profound waste.

"Find ? Why?" Lin Hui paused.

"I want to trade intelligence for instruction—teach the path beyond the current limits of martial arts!" Su Yaping kept his voice low and pressed on without waiting for a reply. "I've cultivated in Xingdao City for over a hundred years. I've reached the absolute ceiling—Luminous Extre Grandmaster. And I held back just now. I didn't activate my Ultimate Martial Form. That is my sincerity."

"Oh?" Lin Hui's expression shifted slightly. "How did you know I'd reached a higher state?"

"You haven't fused with an Imitation Evil Weapon or an Insect Canon—I can sense that much. You're not a Trueblood Noble, and you're not a Called One," Su Yaping said, his voice asured. "Called Ones can rise no higher than the Palace Master realm. Martial artists cap out at Luminous Extre. Those are the hard ceilings of both systems.

"The Call and martial arts are the two great paths. The Call demands a asure of innate aptitude; martial arts is open to anyone. But at their respective peaks—Palace Master and Luminous Extre—both arrive at the sa dead end. The only way forward belongs to Trueblood Nobles who awaken their Evil Energy and step into the Blood Ancestor realm."

"So your reasoning goes: I'm not a Trueblood Noble, I haven't fused with an Evil Weapon or Insect Canon, and yet I suppressed you without effort—therefore I must have broken past that ceiling." Lin Hui gave a quiet laugh.

"Isn't that exactly the case? At our level, no Palace Master and no Luminous Extre should be able to dispatch a peer this cleanly. Between equals, you'd need to probe each other, read each other's flaws, and wait for one decisive opening. That exchange alone takes hours under normal circumstances. What just happened to shouldn't be possible," Su Yaping said.

"Your logic is sound," Lin Hui said, still smiling. "But what makes you believe I'd take you in and teach you anything, rather than simply kill you here?"

"Because I'm bringing you critical intelligence. Information of genuine value." Su Yaping's expression turned grave.

"What information?"

"Soone is moving against you. An Elder of the Taisu Primal Disk—from inside Tuyue's Moon Tower." Su Yaping's words ca quickly.

"...An Elder? Which one?" Though Lin Hui had anticipated this, the confirmation still landed with weight.

"The Judge of Tuyue—Han Sanmian."

…

Tuyue Inner City. High within the cloud-piercing white expanse of the Moon Tower.

Brilliant sunlight fell across an endless sea of mist far below.

Inside a vast, opulent flat decorated in white and gold, a slender white-haired figure took shape in midair—shifting from translucent to solid as it descended.

He landed without a sound. White boots traced with gold set down on the mirror-polished floor with a precise clack, his reflection captured whole in the tiles beneath.

It was the sa handso, white-haired man who had previously intercepted Fox in the Extre Desire Heaven, blocking the submission of the Benevolent Heart Sect's roster.

His features were flawless—every proportion exact, every inch of skin unmarked. His hair was the color of fresh snow, utterly without impurity. At the center of his dark pupils, flecks of white-gold burned steadily.

A multi-colored crystal glowed on his forehead: the mark of an Elder, the physical manifestation of their mind-spirit.

"Excellency." A burly humanoid figure clad head to toe in black armor stepped forward and knelt. "Combat has broken out in the Outer Ring. The primary attackers are Hongyin Empire forces—generals of the Tianyan Army—with elents of the Wanhua Sect, Benevolent Heart Sect, Mystic Eagle Sect, and White Child Sect operating in support."

"What are the Prefect's arrangents?" Judge Han Sanmian asked, his voice unhurried, his manner undisturbed.

"The Prefect has already gone to the Extre Desire Heaven to assess the situation. The Pacification Corps and the Black Army both fall under the Extre Desire Heaven's authority; our response will follow their orders."

"Of course. Most administrators here are simply dispatched officials. Real local authority still rests with the Extre Desire Heaven," Han Sanmian said with a slight nod.

"And Your Excellency's own intentions? I need clear instructions to bring back to the Prefect."

"I'm a Judge. Co to for imprisonnt and trials." Han Sanmian smiled faintly. "The front lines are outside my purview."

His aning was plain enough. The situation was already deeply suspicious, and the Extre Desire Heaven was more than equipped to manage it. There was no reason to drag a non-combatant of his function onto a battlefield.

"Understood. This subordinate takes his leave." The black-armored figure bowed, flashed, and was gone.

Alone in the empty flat, Han Sanmian was unmoved. Solitude had been his condition for too long to feel like anything at all. He kept no attendants, no maids—his quarters stripped of excess in a manner that seed incongruous with both his rank and his standing within the Moon Tower.

He raised a hand. A broad tide of white Internal Force expanded outward, washing through every corner of the surrounding space.

As it spread, the Internal Force scoured the impurities from the air and dissolved into drifting motes of light, bathing the vast flat—tens of thousands of square ters—in pale radiance.

Only his own Internal Force remained. The possibility of outside surveillance had been cleanly eliminated.

Satisfied, Han Sanmian withdrew a golden sphere from his sleeve and let it fall forward.

It floated in midair, its surface cracking open along hairline seams of white light.

Staring at those fissures, the calm smile on Han Sanmian's face eased into a slight frown.

"Xiao De," he said softly.

"Present." An elderly voice surfaced from sowhere beside him without a discernible source. "Ancestor, your orders?"

Han De—the sole descendant of his bloodline brought from the main family—was the linchpin through which Han Sanmian held his network of subordinate factions across Tuyue.

"What is the current situation in Xinyu Town? And the Clear Wind Temple?"

"Xinyu Town has largely fallen, Ancestor. The Clear Wind Temple and the Lin Manor you were previously observing are withdrawing toward the Mist Zone."

"Are they being pursued?"

"Yes. Several Wanhua Sect experts are in pursuit. None at the Palace Master realm," Han De answered.

His intelligence had clearly not yet caught wind of Su Yaping's involvent.

"Good." Han Sanmian nodded.

"Ancestor—conditions outside are deteriorating. Should we consider withdrawing from Tuyue?"

"Not yet. They won't push this too far. Not a single Marshal from Hongyin has co in person—this is a probe, nothing more," Han Sanmian said. "As for the Outer City... that small fruit growing in the Clear Wind Temple has finally ripened."

"Understood. I'll make the necessary arrangents at once."

"Block communications for fifteen minutes. That's all."

"Yes, Ancestor."

He ended the transmission and put the golden sphere away. He drew the surrounding pale radiance back into himself in a single breath, and stepped forward—and vanished.

A kiloter away, he reappeared high above the Mist and plumted. Another flash, and he was a further kiloter on, cutting through the Mist layer and entering the airspace above the Inner City. He moved in this fashion—flash and fall, flash and fall—crossing the Inner City in monts, sweeping over the abandoned headquarters of the Clear Wind Temple, and driving on into the Mist Zone beyond the walls.

To anyone below who caught a glimpse of his blurred outline, he was simply a large bird crossing the sky at speed.

By now, the city itself had descended into carnage. Units of the Pacification Corps and the Black Army had deployed across the Outer City, locked in brutal, churning engagents against the Wanhua Sect, Hongyin Empire generals, and the other invading forces.

Each collision of Internal Force and Void Force detonated in bursts of white light, warping and fracturing space—and the shockwaves gutted wide swaths of the Outer City indiscriminately.

Civilians had long since fled. Those who couldn't make it in ti crouched in cellars, asuring out whatever fate remained. When the buildings above them caved inward, the rubble swallowed their screams whole.

The Outer City had beco a ghost town.

In the streets below, the Pacification Corps' black-armored soldiers battled the Tianyan Army's blue-armored troops, and the Pacification Corps was visibly losing—casualties mounting with each exchange. Enemy generals cut down their counterparts in duels that shook the ground, their shockwaves carving the battlefield into isolated pockets. Overhead, Moth Carriages seized by Hongyin forces dove repeatedly into Tuyue's own aerial units. Toxic moth powder drifted down in slow, steady clouds, and every so often a crippled carriage peeled away and fell.

Han Sanmian swept his gaze across the carnage without pause. Finding no sign of the Clear Wind Temple's convoy among the chaos, he drew the golden sphere out again and tossed it lightly forward.

It floated and split open, white light bleeding through the cracks.

He read what the fissures showed him, tucked the sphere away, and launched himself toward a precise coordinate deep within the Mist Zone.

Whoosh.

He entered the Mist Zone in a straight line and held his speed. This ti he didn't jump—just flew, direct and unhurried.

He hadn't covered ten kiloters before his expression darkened. He pulled up short, holding position in midair as he registered an intensely powerful presence surging up from below on a direct collision course with him—moving along his exact intended path.

The mont he sensed them, they sensed him. Both ca to a simultaneous halt.

Their converging auras swept the Mist clear between them. Separated by roughly a hundred ters—one above, one below—they locked eyes.

"You?" Han Sanmian's brow drew together the mont recognition ca. "Grand Elder of the Nine Dreams Sect?"

Yun Xiazi. Widely regarded as the absolute ceiling of strength below the Blood Ancestors—a fanatic who had paid, and would continue to pay, any price for power. Sothing of a known quantity within the Moon Tower.

Yun Xiazi had been driving hard toward the Clear Wind Temple's convoy. She hadn't expected to find Judge Han Sanmian standing in her path.

A cold premonition settled in her chest.

"Elder Han—rather than holding the line at the Taisu Primal Disk against the foreign invaders, what brings you all the way out here to the Mist Zone wilderness?"