Chapter 102: First Steps on the Demonic Path (14) |
"Damn it… bastard!"
Rage boiled inside Zhou Hao.
A century of meticulous planning had been on the verge of success—only for the old Saint King of White Cloud City to interrupt at the critical moment. He had suffered grievous wounds, lost the sacred land's last Saint King ancestor, and even the Saint King weapon had vanished.
And now, someone else had reaped the harvest he had sown. A hundred years of scheming, reduced to nothing.
Suddenly, Zhou Hao frowned.
The outside world had fallen eerily silent.
"Who dares sneak into the Sun-Devouring Sacred Land and cause trouble!"
The grand hall's doors were gently pushed open.
A figure shrouded entirely in black robes stepped inside slowly. The black-robed man lowered his hood, revealing a face both familiar and strangely distant.
"Zhou Chen… you really didn't die! Excellent… excellent! So you were never controlled by the Slave Seal Pill at all!"
Looking into Su Chen's calm, indifferent eyes, Zhou Hao finally understood—he had been thoroughly played. His voice turned icy. "The divine physique of White Cloud City… you killed him on purpose, didn't you? You deliberately used White Cloud City's power to wound me severely."
Su Chen did not deny it. He merely gave a faint smile. "The Sacred Lord is truly perceptive. So… please, Sacred Lord, allow me to send you on your way."
Su Chen gripped the Heaven-Questioning Blade. The ancient saint artifact's power awakened within him.
Facing an opponent armed with a saint artifact, Zhou Hao showed no surprise. His gaze remained cold. "A single saint artifact—that's your reliance? How naive. Even gravely injured, this seat is not something an ant like you can shake!"
Zhou Hao unleashed his full saintly might. Though Su Chen wielded a saint artifact and had reached the peak of the Nirvana realm, he still appeared insignificant before Zhou Hao.
Yet Su Chen showed no fear. He charged straight toward Zhou Hao.
At the same moment, the once-silent Sun-Devouring Sacred Land erupted with terrifying auras. One after another, they surged toward Zhou Hao. Every figure burned with desperate momentum and self-detonated without hesitation.
A single Nirvana realm cultivator's self-explosion could never harm Zhou Hao at his peak.
But the Zhou Hao of this moment was already heavily wounded, his strength reduced to less than a tenth. He faced Su Chen's saint artifact—and now the suicide blasts of one Nirvana realm Venerable after another. Even someone as ruthless as Zhou Hao felt his heart bleed at the sight.
These Nirvana realm cultivators were the backbone of the sect. Raising even one required immense resources. Now they were being expended like disposable tools.
Zhou Hao's fury reached a boiling point. He resolved to kill Su Chen at any cost.
The Sun-Devouring Sacred Land had become a scene of utter devastation.
Facing Zhou Hao's iron determination to end him, Su Chen quickly fell into a disadvantage. Only by relying on the saint artifact did he repeatedly snatch his life back from the brink.
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Su Chen evaded Zhou Hao and positioned himself at the very center of the sacred land. Beneath his feet, blood-colored patterns spread outward like a spiderweb, rapidly covering the entire Sun-Devouring Sacred Land.
"Blood Sacrifice Technique!"
Zhou Hao's expression changed dramatically. He cried out in shock. "How do you possess the Blood Sacrifice Technique? No… this is bad…"
His rock-solid confidence wavered as Su Chen's aura climbed higher and higher. He knew he had to kill Su Chen immediately. If Su Chen broke through to the Saint realm, it would be his death.
The Blood Sacrifice Technique originated from the Gu clan. Only direct bloodline descendants could use it. That was why Su Chen had spent years secretly slaughtering and devouring the direct descendants of countless powerhouses during the prodigy conflicts. He had been waiting for precisely this moment!
The Heaven-Questioning Blade fully awakened. In the sky above, the phantom of an ancient Saint materialized. His gaze burned with fierce clarity as he charged straight toward Zhou Hao.
Zhou Hao gritted his teeth. Burning his life essence, he poured every last drop of strength into clashing against the ancient Saint's phantom.
Two terrifying waves of saintly might collided and swept outward.
Yet at this moment, the vast majority of the Western Regions' powerhouses were stationed at the front lines against the Northern Desert. The few who remained simply watched with folded arms, content to observe the Sun-Devouring Sacred Land's tragedy unfold.
Zhou Hao forced the Heaven-Questioning Blade back and lunged toward Su Chen, intent on stopping his breakthrough.
But the instant he tried to draw upon the power of heaven and earth, his expression changed drastically. Horror flooded his face. He violently coughed up a mouthful of pitch-black blood. The inky droplets fell upon mountains and rivers, instantly turning vast stretches of land into lifeless wastelands.
"When… when did you poison this seat?"
Zhou Hao stared in utter disbelief. He could feel the strength draining from his body. His indestructible saintly physique began to age at a visible pace. Deep within his soul, the toxin had already taken root—a terrifying poison even a Saint could not expel.
Seeing Zhou Hao's incredulous expression, Su Chen threw his head back and laughed.
"Zhou Hao—today is the day you die!"
While Zhou Hao had been drawn to the Northern Desert battlefield, Su Chen had slipped back into the Sun-Devouring Sacred Land unnoticed. Using an improved version of the Slave Seal Pill, he had quietly taken control of the pill hall's personnel. Every single healing pill in the sacred land had long since been swapped by him.
He had gambled that Zhou Hao would be targeted by the old Saint King of White Cloud City. And he had won. Zhou Hao had indeed been forced into desperate flight by the old Saint King. He had survived—barely.
But those healing pills had already been laced with colorless, tasteless, undetectable poison. In his urgency to recover, Zhou Hao had never bothered to inspect them carefully. Now, after successive brutal battles, the toxin had finally penetrated deep into his soul.
Zhou Hao let out a miserable laugh. "Zhou Chen… this seat underestimated you. You truly are ruthless—far more ruthless than this seat ever was! But do you think this battle is over?"
He coughed violently. "Zhou Chen… you will die. You will die in the most miserable way imaginable. Hahahaha… from the very beginning, you and I were both fish on the chopping block!"
Su Chen frowned. "Zhou Hao, what are you talking about?"
Zhou Hao suddenly exploded with violent motion. With his last remaining spiritual Qi, he unleashed the sacred land's ultimate killing move.
"Devour Heaven, Annihilate Spirit!"
Su Chen had been prepared. He hurled the Heaven-Questioning Blade forward and immediately retreated from the Sun-Devouring Sacred Land.
The entire sacred land was swallowed by the terrifying killing technique. Space shattered. The sacred land itself disintegrated along with everything inside it.
The shockwave caught Su Chen. His body cracked like porcelain on the verge of shattering. He hurriedly stuffed a large handful of healing pills into his mouth.
"A Saint's corpse… gone just like that!"
Su Chen cursed inwardly. Zhou Hao truly deserved to be called a hegemon. Knowing death was inevitable, he had chosen in his final moments to drag the entire Sun-Devouring Sacred Land down with him rather than let Su Chen benefit from his remains.
Though he had not obtained Zhou Hao's corpse, Su Chen's gains were still immense. Amid the sacred land's destruction, he had sensed a fleeting trace of the path to becoming a Saint. Riding the tidal surge of qi released in the collapse, he prepared to seize the moment and achieve sainthood.
Suddenly, he sensed a new presence beside him.
He turned.
A woman in a black dress sat quietly on the edge of a sheer cliff, gazing at him in silence. Her ink-black pupils radiated an indescribable nobility.
"Hanchan…"
The familiar face brought a flood of memories from a hundred years ago rushing back into Su Chen's mind. Ever since he had left the Western Regions for the Northern Desert all those years ago, he had never seen Zhou Hanchan again. He had assumed she died inside the sacred land. Yet here she was—alive, unchanged, and watching him with those deep, unreadable eyes.