Translated by: Hypersheep325
Edited by: Michyrr
The dark silhouette lunged at Zhuang Shen and bit down on his arm.
Though the Godhead Armor possessed formidable defense, it only protected the torso. It did not protect the limbs in any way.
Zhuang Shen took the full brunt of this bite, lightning flowing through his body. And while the Godhead Armor was powerful, it was weakest when defending against lightning attacks. Zhuang Shen’s body went numb all over, and he froze for a moment.
He was finally able to see that what had bitten him was a wolf puppet.
“A combat puppet?” Zhuang Shen cried out. “How can you control it without the Spirit Guidance spell?”
“Guess!” Tang Jie called out as he threw aside his sword!
Giving up his sword to use his fists!
He savagely punched Zhuang Shen right on the Godhead Armor, leaving his chest in immense pain.
Zhuang Shen immediately knew that the situation had turned against him.
After all, this Godhead Armor was only of spell weapon grade and wasn’t very effective at neutralizing lightning and strong impacts.
Tang Jie had a sword but wasn’t using it, instead resorting to his fists, indicating that he was ready and knew to target the weakness of the Godhead Armor.
Those three years he had spent avoiding Godhead Palace had made him understand a lot about it. Godhead Armor was the most renowned product of Godhead Palace, so he naturally understood how to deal with it.
Zhuang Shen tried to jump away, but Tang Jie was hot on his tail, attempting to elbow Zhuang Shen in the face.
If this blow made contact, Zhuang Shen’s face would be pulverized.
Zhuang Shen shouted and once more thrust his hand into his bag. He took out some rope and tossed it into the air. The rope moved like a snake and coiled around Tang Jie, bringing him crashing to the ground.
Seeing that he had succeeded, Zhuang Shen laughed. “What about this Immortal-Binding Rope? Tang Jiye, hand over the Martial Mirror and save yourself the pain of Soulscour!”
“The Soulscour spell?” Even though he was tied up tightly, Tang Jie didn’t panic. He looked jeeringly at Zhuang Shen. “But do you actually know it?”
“I naturally can’t use it, but I have this.” Zhuang Shen took something else out of his bag.
A Soulscour talisman.
Zhuang Shen smugly said, “The Eagle Master requested this from Godhead Palace precisely to be used against people like you. A Violet Palace Titan personally refined it, and it’s quite expensive. Your time on this world is worth it since you’re able to experience it.”
Tang Jie smiled upon seeing the talisman. “This Mustard Seed Bag is truly a bag of one hundred treasures. They really gave you quite a lot of good things. The Violet Flame Sword, the Mustard Seed Bag, the Godhead Armor, the Immortal-Binding Rope, and now this Soulscour talisman. Though they’re all at the spell weapon level, the effects are pretty good. Oh, and there’s also that isolation formation diagram. They’ve really made quite the investment. However…”
Before he finished speaking, the wolf puppet suddenly lowered its head toward Zhuang Shen. Thunk! Thunk! Thunk! Three bone-piercing needles shot toward Zhuang Shen.
Alarmed, he dodged away, and two of the needles struck the Godhead Armor and dropped limply to the ground, while the last one brushed past his arm.
It was just a scratch, but Zhuang Shen found that he couldn’t circulate his spiritual energy anymore.
“Spirit-Closing Powder?” Zhuang Shen was shocked. The wolf puppet howled as it charged at him again, ramming him with its horn.
Zhuang Shen stopped hesitating and once more pulled out a small talisman from his bag. He waved it in the air, and the talisman immediately began to swell, turning into a wolf that lunged at the wolf puppet.
“A refined beast?” Tang Jie was surprised at the appearance of this wolf, his eyes going slack.
This was the specialty of the Beast Refining Gate: capturing wild beasts and refining them into combat beasts. The Beast Refining Gate had good relations with Godhead Palace, so it wasn’t strange for Zhuang Shen to have a refined beast.
But now that one person was bound up by a spell weapon while the other was suffering from Spirit-Closing Powder, the battle had become one of puppet versus refined beast—a rather strange development indeed.
But though Zhuang Shen had been hit by the Spirit-Closing Powder, he could still move. A moment later, he took out a pill from his bag and swallowed it. The effect of the Spirit-Closing Powder began to dissipate.
An antidote!
Tang Jie rolled on the ground and disappeared.
Zhuang Shen saw the world turn upside down, and he could no longer tell where he was.
“An illusion formation?” Zhuang Shen yelped in alarm.
“Correct!” Tang Jie’s voice resounded out of the fog. “Yiyi, come here and untie me!”
A little person flew out of the puppet. It was none other than Yiyi.
It was no wonder Tang Jie could control the combat puppet without using the Spirit Guidance spell. It turned out that this little creature had been inside, controlling it.
Without Yiyi, the puppet immediately stopped. Fortunately, the refined beast was also confused by the illusion formation, so it wouldn’t be causing him much of a problem. At the same time, Zhuang Shen turned around and slashed at the source of the sound, but he hit empty air. There was nothing behind him.
Tang Jie’s voice once more rang out. “Your Eagle Master Gu is pretty good, but he made two mistakes. The first mistake is that he forgot who Xu Muyang was.”
“Xu Muyang?” Zhuang Shen was shaken by the mention of this name.
“Yes. Big Brother Xu, a formation master… He gave me the Martial Mirror, so why couldn’t he pass onto me his Dao of Formations?” As he spoke, a sword thrust out, aimed at the back of Zhuang Shen’s head.
Zhuang Shen reacted quickly, lunging forward. The sword tip scratched against his back, creating a trail of sparks against the Godhead Armor.
Zhuang Shen immediately reversed his sword and thrust backward, and the Violet Flame Sword unleashed a gout of flame. An energy barrier appeared in front of Tang Jie’s chest, blocking the strike.
Zhuang Shen pointed at the air. “Return!”
The Immortal-Binding Rope automatically returned to Zhuang Shen’s hand, causing Yiyi to shriek in alarm. Zhuang Shen threw out the rope again, causing it to bind Tang Jie once more.
Tang Jie had no choice but to jump back into the fog, where Yiyi hurried to untie him again, all the while shouting, “I hate you! Hate you! Can you not get tied up so quickly by him!?”
“Then can you not let him get back the rope?” Tang Jie brusquely replied.
“It’s pointless. That’s his, so unless you can remove his mark on it, he can just cast a spell to bring it back, you big idiot!” Yiyi said, stomping her feet.
The two combatants had gone at it for several rounds, using their trump cards one by one.
Zhuang Shen had various spell weapons, and Tang Jie had also used various tools. For a moment, they were in a stalemate. Tang Jie was once more untied, but he was reluctant to come out again.
Zhuang Shen savagely looked around while shouting, “Tang Jie, get out here! If you’re a true man, you’ll properly fight me!”
“Shit, that’s a nice one. If you’ve got the guts, why not fight me without using all those spell weapons?” Tang Jie continued to hide in the fog, momentarily at a loss.
Yiyi curiously asked, “But didn’t you say it was better the more treasures he had?”
Tang Jie rolled his eyes. “So long as he can’t beat me first.”
He had to admit that Zhuang Shen excelled in both combat strength and adaptability. He must have been trained by Godhead Palace, or else he would have never been able to fight so decisively at his age.
If it weren’t for the fact that he couldn’t learn the spells of Godhead Palace because he needed to infiltrate Basking Moon Academy, Tang Jie really might not have been able to beat him.
Just like how Zhuang Shen had underestimated him, he discovered that he had underestimated Zhuang Shen.
Who could have imagined that Zhuang Shen would be both flexible and well-equipped? His view had been that Godhead Palace would give Zhuang Shen just two or three spell weapons.
But it appeared that he had been too narrow-minded. It was clear that spell weapons were expendable to Godhead Palace. If Zhuang Shen’s strength hadn’t been limited, preventing him from using all his tools to their full potential, Godhead Palace might have even given him a few art relics.
Seeing that Tang Jie was continuing to hide, Zhuang Shen’s eyes gleamed with killing intent. “You think this shabby formation is enough to keep you hidden?”
He took out a small bottle and took a pill from it. A moment later, Zhuang Shen’s body began to swell.
He had originally been fair and lean, but after taking the pill, his body groaned and bulged with muscle. He turned from a refined and cultured boy into a savage and muscular man.
He punched at the ground, sending out a massive shockwave that scattered the fog of the illusion formation.
Tang Jie scowled as he muttered, “A demonblood pill… Just how many treasures does he have?”
He was truly beginning to think that this fellow was too well equipped.
Demonblood pills were pills refined from the blood of fiend beasts, and they could temporarily grant the user the strength of the corresponding fiend beast. It was just like Li Yu’s golden scale, though it had been refined into a medicine that allowed cultivators to absorb the blood essence directly.
Zhuang Shen had taken a demonblood pill that was made from the blood of some powerful great fiend, and his body exuded a mighty aura.
Although this illusion formation was easy to create, it was still the lowest rank of illusion formation, so it could be broken with brute force. Zhuang Shen didn’t understand formations, so he chose the most direct method, punching again and again. As the shockwaves rippled out, the illusion formation was jolted apart, revealing Tang Jie.
When he saw Tang Jie, Zhuang Shen laughed. “Let’s see where you hide now!”
He elected to not use the Immortal-Binding Rope, just grabbing at Tang Jie with his bare hands.
Tang Jie thrust his sword, but Zhuang Shen grabbed it, ignoring its sharp edge and allowing the sword to stab him. Clang! His constitution had become even stronger than Tang Jie’s.
Tang Jie had no choice except to abandon the sword and retreat. Zhuang Shen roared, “I can’t believe you forced me to use the Blood Refining Beast Pill! Once I catch you, I’ll have to torture you long and hard to vent my anger.”
The Blood Refining Beast Pill was the lowest level of demonblood pill with the most obvious increase in strength, but it had severe side effects. Once its effects had passed, he would be extremely weak.
According to the plan, this demonblood pill wasn’t meant to be used for capturing Tang Jie. Rather, after he had captured and interrogated him, he would take the pill to flee Basking Moon Academy. But to his surprise, a puny Spirit Spring Tier was very hard to deal with, and not even three spell weapons were enough to deal with him. And with all his spell weapons, he was actually using much more spiritual energy than Tang Jie. He had already used several spells, so he didn’t have much spiritual energy left. He had no choice except to use the demonblood pill.
He could only now hope that after getting the confession, he still had a chance to escape. Otherwise, he would probably be dead.
He naturally had no idea that Godhead Palace was already prepared to make him a sacrificial lamb whether he succeeded or failed, an offering to the Basking Moon Sect. All he was thinking about was the great merit he was about to achieve and what sort of reward Godhead Palace would give him.
Unlike the other spies of Godhead Palace, Zhuang Shen really was a Sageheart native, but he had been born in poverty and had no chance to cultivate. Godhead Palace had found him and promised him that if he worked for Godhead Palace, he would have the chance to cultivate Immortality.
He naturally understood how risky it was to infiltrate the Basking Moon Sect as a spy of Godhead Palace, but fame and riches were found in danger. In order to stand out, he naturally didn’t mind taking this gamble.
Using the strength provided by the Blood Refining Beast Pill, he cast aside his sword and shield. The refined beast, deprived of its opponent, wanted to charge over and help him, but he called it back to the talisman and charged at Tang Jie.
With the current state of his body, he no longer needed to rely on anything else.
Tang Jie met him head-on. The Aqualight Shroud immediately shattered and his body was sent flying. He crashed to the ground and vomited blood, and for a moment, he wasn’t able to get up.
Yiyi took control of the puppet and tried to get it to bite Zhuang Shen, but Tang Jie called out in alarm, “Yiyi, no!”
Boom! Zhuang Shen punched the puppet, cracking the Electro Wood torso. Yiyi was thrown out of the puppet’s body and immediately dropped to the ground and began to cry.
Zhuang Shen laughed as he stalked toward Tang Jie. Tang Jie could only sit on the ground, unable to move. Seemingly at the end of his rope, he grabbed a broom and threw it at Zhuang Shen.
Zhuang Shen swept the broom aside. Tang Jie grabbed a fistful of dirt and flung it at him.
Zhuang Shen simply closed his eyes a little to avoid the dirt. He heartily laughed. “Is that all you can do? Come on; didn’t you say that you were going to kill me? Didn’t you say you wanted me to have a lot of treasures so you could take them all? Come on; the Violet Flame Sword is right here, and so is the Godhead Armor. I’m waiting for you to come and take them.”
Tang Jie grabbed a flower pot—the pot holding the root carving that he had brought from the Wei Estate with Yiyi.
Grabbing the top of the root carving, he lifted the pot and coldly said, “Like I said, your Eagle Master Gu made two mistakes. The second mistake is that he was only focused on the Martial Mirror, forgetting about…”
Without finishing his sentence, he raised the pot and swung it like a meteor hammer at Zhuang Shen.
Furious Sword Form!
“A pointless trick,” Zhuang Shen said, curling his lips in disdain. He casually raised a hand to block the pot.
But at this moment, a beam of azure light emerged from that root carving.
“This is a…” The azure light filled Zhuang Shen’s field of vision, rapidly expanding.
Before he could say “sword beam”, there was a splash of blood, and his arm went flying off his body!
“Aaagh!” Zhuang Shen howled in pain. This sword beam had sliced off his arm and had also deprived him of all the power of the demonblood pill. His entire body crumpled, so weak that it could no longer stand.
In a shower of wooden debris, Tang Jie now held an azure longsword.
“Forgetting about the Azure Light Sword!”
Tang Jie finally finished his sentence.
The pot crashed to the ground and broke into pieces.
A bronze mirror flew out, spinning around on the ground a few times before stopping.