Chapter 113 - 75: Slaying Chongyun, Daoist Lang Gan

Chapter 113: Chapter 75: Slaying Chongyun, Daoist Lang Gan

Bathed in the enhancing glow of the Divine Escape Talisman, Daoist Chongyun sped frantically into the distance.

He was truly panicking this time.

That man was not an Array Cultivator or a Sword Cultivator. He was a Magic Cultivator!

When he had detonated his body into a mist of blood just moments ago, it was because he realized it would be far too difficult to break out of those Trapping Arrays right in front of Li Yinsheng. Thus, he resorted to another Magic that could only be cast while fused with his Lifebound Gu.

This Magic consisted of two parts.

The first half was self-detonation. The explosive burst of power could help him escape or counter extremely powerful attacks. However, the cost was exceptionally severe. It caused an instant, massive loss of vital blood and left his body severely weakened.

The second half, however, allowed him to form an Incarnation of tens of thousands of blood insects after the detonation. These insects could absorb the blood of surrounding Cultivators, demonic beasts, and other living creatures to heal his injuries and reconstruct his flesh body. Although the lost vital blood was not easy to replenish, as long as he absorbed enough Cultivators and demonic beasts, he could at least temporarily return to his peak condition.

Furthermore, while the individual blood insects were weak, their overwhelming numbers made it nearly impossible to eradicate them entirely. Once the surviving insects scattered, it wouldn’t be difficult to gather enough fresh blood to reform his body.

Then, he had watched in horror as this supposed "Array Cultivator" enveloped the entire mountain with a Wind Technique, sweeping up every single blood insect he had created. Immediately following that was a Fire Technique, which incinerated them all. At the very last moment, he managed to gather a small portion of the blood insects to reform his body, barely surviving the ordeal.

The price he paid was being reduced to his current size. His fusion with his Lifebound Gu was also on the verge of collapsing, and his head had already reverted to its human form.

After that exchange, he had completely lost the will to fight Li Yinsheng.

Although he still had a few powerful tricks left unused, his abysmal condition meant their power would be drastically reduced, making it highly unlikely that he could threaten that man anyway. As a result, he decisively abandoned his Mother Insect and Magical Treasure, activated the Divine Escape Talisman he had prepared beforehand, and turned tail to flee for his life.

While fused with his Lifebound Gu, he could already execute an incredibly fast Escape Skill. Coupled with the Divine Escape Talisman, which multiplied his Escape Speed several times over, surviving this ordeal shouldn’t have been a problem.

"Bastard! The heavens are truly cursing me today, making me run into such an insidious Orthodox Dao Daoist!" Chongyun gnashed his teeth. "I’ve lost at least twenty or thirty years of Cultivation! Once I flee back to Thousand Insects Valley, I will investigate this man’s origins. If I don’t avenge this, I—"

"You what?" someone asked from beside him.

Chongyun’s pupils contracted violently. Without even glancing to the side, he pushed his Escape Speed up by another thirty percent. "How did he catch up? Does he have a Divine Escape Talisman too? And why didn’t my Divine Sense detect him at all?!" he thought frantically.

BANG!

Chongyun suddenly felt as if he had crashed into a mountain. The glowing aura of the Divine Escape Talisman surrounding him completely shattered, and he was sent hurtling backward at a speed even greater than his flight.

It wasn’t until this moment, his mind spinning dizzily, that he finally heard the overwhelming, earth-shattering roar of whistling wind trailing behind him.

Li Yinsheng shook his hand. What kind of bug was this to fly so fast? He had almost failed to catch up. To be precise, he had almost failed to catch up using only his Flesh Body.

Under the state of Soul Emergence, Chongyun’s speed wouldn’t be considered fast at all, as a pure Soul was vastly quicker than a Flesh Body. But without relying on Soul Emergence, he truly had almost lost his target.

Fortunately, the sheer dominance of a Body Cultivator wasn’t just reflected in high attack and defense. Body Cultivators could also run exceptionally fast through the air. It was just a little loud.

Li Yinsheng glanced over his shoulder. A violent gale blew past him from behind—the lingering disturbance of his flight. Because he was so fast, all the noise and turbulence had been left in his wake until he finally stopped.

His figure flickered, catching up to the Daoist Chongyun he had swatted away.

Daoist Chongyun had absolutely no idea what had just happened. He simply assumed that Li Yinsheng possessed some profoundly advanced Escape Technique, and that his sudden obstruction was merely the result of a brilliant Magic.

Now that his Divine Escape Talisman was shattered, surviving today would require a monumental price.

"You forced my hand!" A ruthless glint flashed across Chongyun’s face. Enveloped in a dark light, his size swelled rapidly, returning to the height of an average man and fully reverting to his previous half-human, half-insect state.

Although his current size was vastly smaller than his initial twenty-foot form, he looked far more hideous. Every inch of his Insect Armor exuded an indestructible aura, his presence even more imposing than when he was twenty feet tall.

"You forced me to burn my vital blood and the lifespan of my Lifebound Gu! Now you will repay me with your own vital blood!"

As he spoke, Chongyun swung a claw at Li Yinsheng. His claw had morphed into a scythe-like appendage resembling a mantis, its surface glinting with a cold, deadly light.

A savage sneer flashed across Chongyun’s insectoid face. This man was simply too young and lacked experience in Magical Combat. A Magic Cultivator and half-baked Array Cultivator actually dared to let an enemy get into close combat so easily!

He had drained almost the entire lifespan of his Lifebound Gu in exchange for a physique that could briefly rival a Body Cultivator! The scythe-claw blurred, closing in on the space between Li Yinsheng’s brows.

Then, Chongyun felt a gentle breeze brush against him. "What kind of magic is this wind? It feels so strange..." he wondered.

It was incredibly weak, like a breeze drifting through willow catkins. Yet, just like a willow catkin, his body was torn into shreds in the wind.

Chongyun’s final memory was his Divine Sense sweeping over himself and Li Yinsheng. Li Yinsheng was retracting his fist, and he himself had been reduced to countless fragments by the sheer force of a punch’s wind.

"After all this time, it turns out you are a Body Cultivator," he realized in his final moment.

Li Yinsheng raised his hand, plucking a delicate, walnut-sized circular metal cage and a Qiankun Bag embroidered with snakes and scorpions from Chongyun’s remains. Even though Chongyun had been fleeing in a miserable state, he hadn’t left a single one of his treasures behind.

This was the main reason Li Yinsheng had chased him down. He had been hoping Chongyun would drop another Magical Treasure. Unfortunately, judging by how Chongyun had resorted to close combat earlier, the man likely only possessed that pitch-black Command Flag as his sole Magical Treasure. Besides, he was someone who played with bugs, and raising bugs couldn’t be cheap.

Li Yinsheng rummaged through the man’s Qiankun Bag. True to his assumption, there were no Magical Treasures, though there were plenty of bizarre items, many of which he didn’t recognize. Had he kept Chongyun alive, he could have had the man explain them to him personally.

Using Chongyun’s Qiankun Bag, Li Yinsheng scooped up Chongyun’s fragments, hopped onto his Talisman Crane, and flew back toward Huang Bamboo Temple.

By the time he touched down on Bamboo Forest Peak, Liang Qiwu hurriedly bowed in greeting. "Paying respects to Elder Li!"

He was someone who had weathered great storms before. After taking a moment to compose himself, he had recovered most of his composure—at the very least, he wasn’t standing there dumbfounded and lost anymore.

"Fellow Daoist Liang, there is no need for such formalities," Li Yinsheng said, waving his hand.

"Elder... did you catch up to that man?" Liang Qiwu asked cautiously.

"He’s in here." Li Yinsheng shook the Qiankun Bag.

Liang Qiwu froze completely. "You stuffed a Daoist into a Qiankun Bag? Is this something I’m allowed to hear?" he thought.

"Oh, it seems the Daoist of your temple has arrived. He got here quite fast!" Li Yinsheng remarked, looking off into the distance.

Within the range of his Divine Sense, an incredibly fast aura was approaching from the direction of Huang Bamboo Temple. It was so fast that it was nearly on par with the fleeing Daoist Chongyun.

"That should be my temple’s Ancestor Master Lang Gan!" Liang Qiwu quickly explained. "Ancestor Master Lang Gan’s Major Cultivation is in Wind Techniques. His Escape Speed ranks among the very best of all Daoists."

Li Yinsheng wanted to say that he also knew a bit about Wind Techniques, but upon thinking about his own Wind-Gathering Skill, he was too embarrassed to mention it.

As they spoke, a speck of green light appeared on the distant horizon, growing larger and brighter as it rapidly closed the distance. Liang Qiwu hurriedly bowed toward the green light to welcome it.

The green light descended, revealing a middle-aged Confucian Scholar in his thirties or forties. His Daoist Robe closely resembled scholar’s robes. Floating by his side was a scroll painting. The canvas depicted countless swirling bamboo leaves, though not a single bamboo stalk was drawn. The leaves seemed to dance madly in a violent gale, as if the painting wasn’t actually of bamboo leaves, but rather of a raging storm using the leaves as its medium.

After paying his respects, Liang Qiwu quickly explained the situation to his Ancestor Master.

Even though he didn’t fully understand what had transpired himself, the fact that a Heterodox Daoist had attacked and been slain by Li Yinsheng was easy enough to explain. It just wasn’t very easy to accept.

Daoist Lang Gan knew of Li Yinsheng. He had known about him long before this. As the Deputy Temple Master of Xuanzhen Temple, Li Yinsheng had always possessed a reputation that completely mismatched his Cultivation.

So, when Daoist Lang Gan heard his Vice Temple Master claim that "the Deputy Temple Master of Xuanzhen Temple is actually a profoundly powerful Daoist, and he slew a Heterodox Daoist in an incredibly short amount of time," his first reaction was to feed the Vice Temple Master two mind-clearing Elixirs.

He could sense that the young man in the Black Silver Silk Robe standing before him was indeed a Daoist. He also believed that this young Daoist had slain a Heterodox Daoist and helped protect Huang Bamboo Temple’s Cloud Bamboo. Furthermore, he was profoundly grateful to this Daoist for his righteous intervention and was already contemplating how to properly reward him.

But he absolutely refused to believe that this Daoist was Li Yinsheng.