Chapter 380: Heavenly Blood Jiangshi (2)
"Hehehehe."
The Blood Cult Leader cackled like a madman as he shook the staff in his hand with wild abandon. The cursed bells strung along the staff rattled and chid with every swing, their eerie ringing bleeding into his cackles to create an incredibly grotesque and unsettling atmosphere.
The Blood Cult Leader was having the ti of his life.
‘As expected, the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi is invincible!!’
The Heavenly Blood Jiangshi under his control was completely dominating six absolute masters at once. Their strikes couldn't pierce the corpse's hide, and every ti it swung a limb, all they could do was grit their teeth and endure the internal damage just to stay standing.
And on top of that, there was another piece of good news.
‘To think there are this many vessels to make new Heavenly Blood Jiangshis!!’
Only the refined physiques of elite warriors who had achieved Overhaul Body Transformation and reached the Realm of Truth were qualified to be used as base materials for a Heavenly Blood Jiangshi.
And yet, standing right here on this very battlefield, there were a whopping seven of those premium materials just waiting to be harvested.
That was the count, even without including the corpse of Cheok Pae-myung since every last drop of his blood had been completely drained from him to forge the current Heavenly Blood Jiangshi. The body itself was already reduced to the withered husk of a mummy.
Not that Blood Cult Leader felt any particular regret over that.
With the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi on his side, he could win this battle and then slaughter all of the martial artists present. He could then use their blood and bodies to forge seven new Heavenly Blood Jiangshis from the carnage. That glorious fantasy refused to leave his mind, forcing never-ending giggles to bubble up from the Blood Cult Leader's throat.
Then, sothing sliced through his good mood like a blade through silk.
Slick!
"GAAAAAAH!!"
The chilling sound was then followed imdiately by a bloodcurdling scream.
The Blood Cult Leader turned his head and saw one of his sorcerers crumpled on the ground in two pieces.
The man who'd cut the sorcerer down was carving through anyone in his path without hesitation.
He was the seventh and final vessel capable of being used as a base for a Heavenly Blood Jiangshi.
The Head of the Namgung Family, the Sword Venerable.
"Tch."
With his pleasant daydream evaporated, the Blood Cult Leader clicked his tongue and lowered the staff he'd been gleefully rattling.
"KRAAAAAAAH!!"
At that instant, the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi that had been moving under its master’s direct command to entangle with the six absolute masters unleashed a roar and began thrashing its limbs around like a completely deranged beast.
The thing was, just because the Blood Cult Leader wasn't controlling it didn't an the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi would stand idle like a wooden doll.
The Heavenly Blood Jiangshi was a monster forged entirely out of vile curses, bitter resentnt, and pure murderous intent. If it were to be left to its own devices, it would slaughter every living thing in its vicinity without distinction.
In reality, the Blood Cult Leader's thod of control was closer to giving it a sense of friend and foe than to controlling it step by step. If you wanted to be generous, perhaps nudging it to fight with slightly better combat efficiency was the absolute extent of his puppeteering.
'I suppose I might have to give up a few vessels.'
Without his control, the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi might very well tear those six masters into ten thousand pieces.
Even the Blood Cult Leader couldn't use a body that had been ripped to shreds as raw material. And even the mighty Blood Cult Leader couldn't forge a new Jiangshi out of a corpse that had been entirely shredded into at paste.
Knowing this, the Blood Cult Leader quickly slipped a talisman out from his sleeve and began chanting a spell aid directly at Namgung Jin.
He needed to eliminate the Sword Venerable as fast as possible so he could re-establish his ntal link with the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi.
If he didn't, not only would the rest of his precious vessels be destroyed, but there was a very real chance the berserk Jiangshi would turn around and start slaughtering the Cult Leader himself and all of his sorcerers.
The Blood Cult Leader finished his chant and hurled the talisman.
It was a talisman crafted from human skin using the Blood Cult's twisted thods, and the jagged red characters painted on it were drawn with human blood refined through their sorcery.
“By the power of the laws!”
With that final shout, a blurry, blood-red face erupted from the talisman like a vengeful wraith and lunged straight for Namgung Jin.
"How dare you use your vile tricks on !"
Namgung Jin deployed the Sword Form of the Emperor once more, but the Blood Cult Leader's sorcery refused to buckle under the force of his will and kept bearing down on him.
BOOM!
A deafening explosion rocked the air as the wraith stretched its grotesque maw wide open as if trying to swallow Namgung Jin alive and crash head-on into Namgung Jin's Azure Heaven Sword.
Despite colliding with a legendary sword radiating with Force Qi, the spell didn't imdiately shatter.
Under normal circumstances, the Blood Cult Leader's magical power wasn't anywhere near this potent. But since the human skin talisman itself was saturated with Blood Qi and bitter resentnt, it synchronized perfectly with the Cult Leader's magic and drastically amplified its destructive output.
But Namgung Jin couldn't care less.
He just kept swinging the Azure Heaven Sword at the wraith with the sa look soone might give a disgusting insect.
BOOM!! BOOM!!
Every clash between the wraith and Azure Heaven Sword sent shockwaves ripping through the air, and the wraith was visibly fading after several exchanges.
But while Namgung Jin was busy dismantling that sorcery, the Blood Cult Leader had already reached into his sleeve and pulled out a new ritual implent for his next spell.
"Hehehe. Let's see how long you can keep this up."
Because the Blood Cult Leader had staked everything on this grand battle, he had brought along an arsenal of cursed artifacts he had spent the last several decades ticulously preparing. These cursed artifacts were crafted from the lives of many innocent commoners and martial artists and served as amplifiers to his spells.
"How dare a pathetic insect like you act so high and mighty?"
Namgung Jin's words dripped with contempt, but the relentless barrage of powerful sorcery the Blood Cult Leader kept throwing at him made it impossible to close the distance.
While Namgung Jin was stuck parrying spell after spell, soone else lunged at the Blood Cult Leader from the side.
"DIE!!"
It was Taoist Master Cheongmok.
But sothing was off about him.
The aura of serene clarity that usually defined the old Taoist was nowhere to be seen. Gone too was the look of anguished contemplation he'd worn during the affairs with the Maitreya Luminous Cult and the Ei Sect, or when he'd learned the truth about the Maitreya Luminous Cult.
‘Even if it costs my life, I will kill that bastard with my own hands!!’
His eyes were bloodshot, and despite the fact that he was executing an elegant Taoist sword art, his strikes were completely saturated with nothing but raw killing intent.
The Blood Cult.
The perpetrators behind the Sichuan Massacre.
Because of them, dozens of Qingcheng disciples had been dragged into the nightmare of slaughtering one another. And as if that hadn't been enough, they had just forced his disciples to reenact that sa nightmare on this very battlefield today.
It would've been strange if he hadn't lost his mind.
Unfortunately, reality dictates that rage and emotions alone aren't enough to solve everything.
BOOM!!
Taoist Master Cheongmok's sword slamd straight into the blood-red barrier that had ford in front of the Blood Cult Leader.
"I'll tear you apart!!"
Taoist Master Cheongmok scread and kept slashing relentlessly, but the Blood Cult Leader just sneered and reached for another ritual implent.
"Spirits of Blood Vengeance! Spirits of Wind's Madness! Chase the Souls and Arrive! By the Origin of the Blood Curse, Manifest Upon This Land As Is the Laws!”
He shook a blood-dyed bell and chanted the incantation.
A blood-red gale erupted and howled straight toward Taoist Master Cheongmok.
"RAAAAAAAH!!"
Taoist Master Cheongmok roared and swung his sword like a madman, but he couldn't deflect the entire blood-soaked wind.
He was blasted back roughly twenty feet in an instant, his robes shredded in multiple places and blood was seeping through the gaps in the torn fabric.
BOOM!
At that mont, Namgung Jin shattered the Blood Cult Leader's latest spell and launched himself forward with a powerful stomp.
Lightly clicking his tongue in annoyance, the Blood Cult Leader whipped out yet another cursed artifact and cast another spell to intercept Namgung Jin.
But while he was too focused on Namgung Jin, a spine-chilling sound of sothing cutting through the air rang out, and a short spear ca screaming at him at terrifying speed.
TWANG!
The Blood Cult Leader startled and hastily threw up a barrier with his sorcery, barely managing to deflect the spear.
BOOM!!
The short spear then clattered onto the ground, followed by the Blood Cult Leader’s shriek.
"How dare you, you wretched bitch!!"
He'd nearly died from a surprise attack he never saw coming, and the fury ca pouring out as he chanted a new spell aid at Jeong Hyeon.
The fresh talisman he flung resonated with the incantation, and a massive blood-red lightning bolt ford in the air before crashing down toward her,
BOOM!!
In response to that, Jin Hayeon moved to Jeong Hyeon’s side in advance and conjured a wall of ice, and sohow managed to withstand the devastating impact of the bloody lightning.
It was only then that the Blood Cult Leader actually took in the state of the battlefield.
With the sorcerer threat vastly reduced, the warriors whose hands had finally been freed up were now aggressively swarming toward the Blood Cult Leader one after another.
‘What about the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi?’
Feeling a sudden spike of anxiety, the Blood Cult Leader desperately wanted to look over in the direction where endless explosions had been ringing out for a while now, but he didn't have the luxury of turning his head.
BOOM!!
Because the mont he did, Namgung Jin shredded another of his spells and charged at him again.
And Namgung Jin wasn’t alone.
"BURN IN HELL!!"
Completely drenched from head to toe in his own blood, Taoist Master Cheongmok madly charged straight at the Blood Cult Leader once again.
***
While the Blood Cult Leader was being battered from all sides by Namgung Jin, Taoist Master Cheongmok, Jin Hayeon, and Jeong Hyeon,
Zhuge Mun watched from behind and bellowed, pouring internal energy into his voice toward the back line.
"The Blood Cult Leader is about to fall! Hold on just a little longer!!"
It was ant to rally the spirits of those holding the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi at bay, though it didn't seem to do much.
"Goddammit."
"It's a literal, walking nightmare."
The six absolute masters facing the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi all wore the sa look of exhaustion and barely contained fury.
"This is no ti for comntary!!"
The only one who still looked genuinely furious was Yangmuja, who bellowed and swung his sword wrapped in Extre Yang Qi.
He did that not to attack the corpse, but to block the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi’s sudden punch.
BOOM!!
"Son of a bitch!!"
The split-second created by his sacrifice provided windows for the other five to attack the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi from all angles.
Hwangbo Ak's fist slamd into the corpse's back. Il-mok's Ascension Sword drove toward its abdon. The Supre Ultimate Sword Immortal deployed the Taiji Sword Art to intercept the corpse's second attack aid at Yangmuja. And both the Beggar King and the Buddha Venerable thrust their palms at the corpse's left arm and head simultaneously.
BOOM!!
Explosions rang out all at once.
"KRAAAAAAAGH!!"
The Heavenly Blood Jiangshi let out another howl thick with foul Qi, forcing all of them back a step or two.
Ironically enough, every single master who had just landed a direct hit on the monster now had a fresh trickle of blood leaking from their lips. It didn't matter whether you were blocking the corpse's attacks or landing your own; the damage always ca back on you.
Forget about actually killing the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi; they were honestly just fighting for their lives to stall for ti.
Their only hope was to hold on and wait for the Blood Cult Leader to die, just like Zhuge Mun had said.
But Il-mok had a nagging feeling that stalling wasn't going to change anything.
'Its movents changed from a certain point on.'
He could feel it in his gut. The Jiangshi had already broken free of the Blood Cult Leader's control.
And yet, seeing as how it was still aggressively hunting them down without missing a beat, it was highly likely that killing the Blood Cult Leader wouldn't actually stop this thing at all.
The only reason Il-mok kept his mouth firmly shut despite realizing this horrifying fact was because blurting it out would instantly tank the group's morale straight into the gutter.
It was a bleak situation, but Il-mok didn't let go of hope. And it wasn't just because he was blindly clinging to foolish optimism without a concrete plan, either.
BOOM!!
For a brief mont, the six experts and the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi mingled once again.
Clang!!
Seizing the right mont, Il-mok thrust his Ascension sword straight into the Jiangshi's abdon, accurately hitting the exact sa spot he'd struck before.
The mont the Ascension Sword and the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi's hide made contact—
Vwooom!
The Ascension Sword in Il-mok's grip let out a fierce resonant hum, as if it were vibrating in harmony with the Jiangshi's own energy.
The Heavenly Blood Jiangshi responded by snapping a sudden kick with its left leg at Il-mok.
Likely because it was no longer being consciously piloted, the kick felt far more like the erratic, purely instinctive reflex of a wild beast.
Il-mok quickly pulled his sword back to block the kick, but he couldn't fully absorb the force and was shoved back a full ten feet.
His internal injuries flared up even worse than before, causing a fresh stream of dark blood to spill from his lips.
‘As I thought.’
But rather than despairing, Il-mok's eyes lit up as he stared at the Heavenly Blood Jiangshi.
On the Jiangshi's abdon, right where the Ascension Sword had grazed past, there was a tiny hairline scratch.
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