Decaying World Chapter 224

Chapter 224

Han Sanmian held nothing back. With enmity now forged between them, an absolute kill was the only recourse. The power condensing between his fingers swelled, blazing brighter by the second. He raised his hand high.

"Devouring two at once is a bit much—but who told you to show up and provoke at a ti like this?"

In truth, simultaneously suppressing both Yun Xiazi and Han Xiaoyue placed enormous strain on him—particularly the latter, whose body housed a consciousness that was wildly chaotic and barely contained.

Swish! He brought his hand down in a fierce slash toward Han Xiaoyue.

In that instant, Han Xiaoyue's massive body didn't evade, didn't move—it detonated. She blew apart into hundreds of densely packed grayish-white fragnts that scattered through the air, and for a breathless mont, the world seed to hold still.

Then every fragnt sprouted tendril-like spikes at once. Chi! Hundreds of long, slender barbs drove through Han Sanmian's body in an instant, pinning him in midair. Blood poured from the wounds in torrents. His three-headed, six-ard Ultimate Martial Form buckled and withdrew, reverting to his human body.

"You... are courting death!"

The multicolored crystal between his brows erupted with a ring of arcing electricity. Crack! The hundreds of fragnts Han Xiaoyue had split into shattered simultaneously, dissolving into white smoke. Only a single piece fell to the ground, rapidly lting and reshaping itself into human form.

On the other side, the second arc caught Yun Xiazi full-on. Her body convulsed, and she coughed up a mouthful of blood.

"Damn it!" Han Sanmian's face had gone pale—not from the blood he'd lost, but from the blood Han Xiaoyue had just devoured.

This ti, he was truly injured.

"Die—both of you!"

The multicolored crystal blazed for a third ti. Having devoured a portion of his blood, Han Xiaoyue snatched up Yun Xiazi and bolted. Freed from the Ti Domain's restrictions, her speed returned to its natural rate—over a hundred ters per second.

In Han Sanmian's eyes, it looked like slow motion.

"Go!" His eyes bulged. The colored light contracted, condensed—then erupted.

Chi! Silence.

The anticipated arc never ca. Instead, a slender silver blade punched through the back of his skull, driving straight through the center of the multicolored crystal. Han Sanmian hung suspended in midair, blank-faced and motionless.

"Since... when? Why didn't my Divine thod sense anything?" He struggled to turn his head toward whoever had ambushed him. Even without his Divine thod's domain unfurled, it was impossible for anyone to approach this closely without detection. Within a ten-kiloter radius, he could sense the trembling of a single blade of grass. Even here in the Mist Zone, where his range shrank to a tenth, it still covered a full kiloter.

Why had he sensed nothing?

"Naturally, because I hadn't arrived yet when you were sensing." A low, indistinct voice ca from directly behind him.

He had simply moved too fast. The entire sensory periter was crossed in an instant, placing him at Han Sanmian's back before the man could register his presence.

Before Han Sanmian could process it, the blade was already gone, trailing blood. A clean puncture mark appeared between his brows, and his body dropped like a bird with snapped wings.

Bang! He hit the sandy ground and left a shallow crater. His aura extinguished.

Lin Hui stood in midair, lightly flicking his blade.

"You've both worked hard." His expression relaxed as he sheathed Ruyi.

Only now did Yun Xiazi slowly co back to herself. Looking up at Lin Hui, her body went soft—she lacked even the strength to pull free of Han Xiaoyue's grip.

Han Xiaoyue twisted her head a full hundred and eighty degrees to look back at him. A flicker of bewildernt crossed her eyes. For a mont, she barely recognized him. She had long sensed that Lin Hui concealed his true depths, but nothing could have prepared her for strength sufficient to cut down a Blood Ancestor in a single stroke.

She had simply been passing by. Seeing Yun Xiazi being beaten, she had stepped in—because Yun Xiazi was Lin Hui's disciple and an expert aligned with the Clear Wind Dao.

But what was this? Wasn't Lin Hui an Internal Force martial artist? He wasn't even at the Circulation Realm. She had confird this ti and again. Though she couldn't cultivate martial arts herself, she was intimately familiar with these systems. Having spent so much ti at his side, there was no way she could have misread whether he was a Circulation practitioner or a Called One.

"Who are you?" Han Xiaoyue stopped and stared. There was only one possible answer: this was not the man she knew.

"Dao Master—had you arrived any later, Miss Han might have survived. But I would not have seen another sunrise..." Yun Xiazi said weakly.

"I was waiting for the right mont," Lin Hui said with a smile.

"Good thing you ca, or it would have been catastrophic. Still—for the Moon Tower to lose an Elder... this is an incident on a scale unlike anything before." Yun Xiazi said as she landed.

"Who told you the Moon Tower lost an Elder?" Han Xiaoyue's voice dropped. "Surely you don't think that single strike could kill a Blood Ancestor?"

Both Yun Xiazi and Lin Hui froze. They turned back toward where Han Sanmian lay. The corpse was still there, motionless.

Just as the two were about to ask again, Lin Hui's eyes narrowed. He raised his head and looked upward.

Hundreds of ters above, buried within the high-altitude Mist, a mass of dark red blood was swiftly gathering and reshaping itself into a human form. Between its brows, a multicolored crystal blazed with brilliant light.

Han Sanmian.

"As long as my Divine Intent is unextinguished, I am immortal!" Han Sanmian spread his arms. The blood pooling around him gathered and hardened into black-and-red robes that cascaded like flowing ribbons. "Your sword strike, however, did manage to damage a portion of my Divine Intent. That peculiar power of yours—it dissolves everything it touches..."

His gaze settled on Lin Hui. That strike still left a throbbing ache deep in his skull. Were it not for that, he would have restored his body the very instant he was killed—he wouldn't have needed to wait this long at all.

"So we have to go another round?" Lin Hui frowned.

"To be precise—if you cannot completely crush his Divine Intent, you'll need to kill him at least a dozen tis before he stops reforming," Han Xiaoyue said gravely.

"How troubleso," Lin Hui said.

"That is exactly why they are called Blood Ancestors. A city produces perhaps a dozen of them across over a thousand years." Han Xiaoyue sighed.

"You two leave. I'll handle this." Lin Hui said nothing more. He rose from the ground, ascending slowly until he stood level with Han Sanmian.

He loathed drawn-out fights—which was precisely why he had chosen to ambush Han Sanmian at the mont of greatest vulnerability. To stop him from reforming, he had even employed the power of his Wind Disaster Bloodline. Yet for all that caution—targeting the head, driving the blade clean through his forehead—the man still refused to die.

Truly outrageous.

"I thought I'd found a mont to breathe. I didn't expect a real fight after all." He drew Ruyi once more.

"No matter. Think of it as giving the chance to learn a little more about you before the al," Han Sanmian said with a smile. "Understanding the history and origin of one's dish—that is the most basic etiquette."

"Quite confident," Lin Hui chuckled.

"Not confident—happy," Han Sanmian replied. "The thought that your mysterious power will belong to by day's end... it fills with genuine joy."

"Judging by what I've seen so far, you're still a bit short of the mark," Lin Hui said flatly.

"Before, naturally. But I suspect you don't know the reason we are called Blood Ancestors."

"Why?"

"Because," Han Sanmian grinned, "at this very mont—this form of mine, composed entirely of blood—this is our truest strength."

"You talk too much." Lin Hui sighed. "I'm growing tired of it."

"Arrogant! Then let devour you in one—"

Clang! Han Sanmian's vision lurched. The impact struck like a thunderbolt—a burst of silver light detonated in front of him, and he was hurled backward through the air.

"What kind of speed is this?!"

His expression collapsed in shock as his Ninefold Divine thod deployed all its domains at once. Chi-chi-chi! In an instant, nine domains seized the sensory nerves and cognition of every living thing within several kiloters.

Nine domains: Ti Sense, distance, area, color, hardness and softness, touch, speed, temperature, and texture.

The nine domains took form simultaneously, each becoming a translucent mbrane layered one over the next, enclosing the surrounding space like the skins of an onion.

"Co—everything you see will—"

Before Han Sanmian could finish, a streak of blue light shot toward him. The mbranes were punctured one by one, popping like soap bubbles, offering no resistance whatsoever. A distance of over a thousand ters was crossed in the blink of an eye. Han Sanmian was still locked in the post-activation lag of his domains—he had no ti to react.

Swish! The second ti.

Lin Hui's sword drove through the multicolored crystal between Han Sanmian's brows, skewered his skull, and slashed sideways in one fluid motion. The head split cleanly in two.

The hair flowing behind Lin Hui had transford entirely into translucent blue channels of Wind Disaster energy. A pinpoint of colored light pulsed between his own brows. Three twisted golden characters hovered behind him. Without hesitation, he activated the Clear Source Law Seal, rging the three seals into one, and erupted at terrifying speed—felling Han Sanmian in a single strike once more.

His Wind Disaster Bloodline tore through Han Sanmian's Divine thod domains almost instantaneously, rendering him immune to all cognitive interference.

"Damn you to hell!"

For the third ti, Han Sanmian descended from a distant high point. Even in flight, he unleashed his Ultimate Martial Form—three heads and six arms materializing, True Force surging, the multicolored crystal unleashing arcs of Divine Intent. Holding absolutely nothing back, he drove straight at Lin Hui.

"The weak always believe anger improves their odds."

Lin Hui had long since raised his longsword horizontally, his eyes blazing with deep blue light. He unfurled the Typhoon Sword Technique in full. The Mist above them churned, swiftly gathering into a colossal, slowly rotating vortex. A vast, crushing pressure locked onto Han Sanmian mid-lunge, cutting his speed by more than half in an instant.

Both his body and the multicolored crystal between his brows were weighed down by the celestial pressure, growing sluggish and dim.

"What is this?!" Han Sanmian's expression shattered. "Using the heavens as one's intent—the heart of heaven as one's own—no! What is this?!"

His personal Divine Intent was nothing before the celestial will summoned by the Typhoon Sword Technique. With a single crushing press, every arc of Divine Intent was snuffed out.

"Farewell." Lin Hui's figure slowly vanished.

Chi! In a single second, streak after streak of silver sword light pierced through Han Sanmian's body more than a hundred tis. The man himself was invisible—there was only the flashing of light.