Desolate Devouring Art - Chapter 1442 - Kneel and Bark
Chapter 1442 – Kneel and Bark
No one felt even a shred of sympathy for the Divine Alchemy Sect’s trio. Cultivators from the Spirit Martial Astral Domain scrambled to cozy up to Liu Wuxie instead and even began pressuring the Divine Alchemy Sect.
Those who had already signed purchase orders with the Divine Alchemy Sect started canceling them outright, willingly forfeiting their deposits to turn and side with the Heavenly Dao Society.
Forces from the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain quickly joined the outcry as well. They hated Feng He and his two disciples to the bone. If not for those three, the Heavenly Dao Society’s pills wouldn’t have become famous so quickly, and the other sects would still have managed to make at least a few sales.
Now, every customer was rushing toward the Heavenly Dao Society’s booth and couldn’t even be bothered to glance at anyone else’s wares. Naturally, everyone vented all that frustration on the Divine Alchemy Sect.
“Kneel and bark!” the Nine Dragon Palace’s disciples yelled, jeering loudly as they urged the trio to fulfill their side of the bet. They had never seen an Earth Immortal kneel and bark like a dog before and were eager for the spectacle.
“That’s right! Kneel! A loss is a loss!” more people shouted, adding their voices to the chorus pressing Feng He and the two disciples to honor the wager. Thousands of cultivators took up the cry, and the pressure became so overwhelming that the Heavenly Dao Society’s people didn’t even need to say another word.
“Liu Wuxie, can we end this here? Our Divine Alchemy Sect is willing to acknowledge our loss. As long as you can forgo the bet, we can agree to any condition you name,” Feng He said at last, bowing his head in humiliation.
“No,” Liu Wuxie replied, his voice cold and decisive. He slowly raised his right hand and pointed toward the sky, ready to summon heavenly tribulation.
Once that tribulation descended, it would reduce the trio to ashes; even if they survived, inner demons would chain them for the rest of their lives, as they had sworn their oath with their souls.
The Divine Alchemy Sect would never show him mercy if he were the loser.
“Liu Wuxie, we won’t kneel and bark like dogs even in death!” Zhang Li snarled. In his mind, if they knelt today, the Divine Alchemy Sect wouldn’t be able to sell another pill in the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain ever again.
Who would still trust the pills from a sect whose elder had kneeled and barked like a dog in public?
“Since that’s the case, you can all take your own lives,” Liu Wuxie said. If they chose to kill themselves, he wouldn’t force them to fulfill the wager, and he left the decision squarely in their hands.
Feng He’s group of three found themselves in an impossible dilemma, staring at Liu Wuxie as he refused to yield, no matter what they said.
“You three had better fulfill your side of the bet. It’s only for a day, and you’re not going to die from it,” urged elders from the other sects, pressing them to get it over with.
They were all in a hurry to place their own orders with the Heavenly Dao Society, and the more time the Divine Alchemy Sect wasted, the more they hated them.
If the trio knelt and barked, the matter would end here, and the trade could resume.
By now, all transactions had ground to a halt because of these three, and many people were already deeply displeased with the Divine Alchemy Sect.
If they continued to resist, the crowd wouldn’t hesitate to “help.” Dozens of Earth Immortals began releasing their auras, pressing down on the trio like a crushing weight.
Zhang Li and Wang Lai’s knees buckled first, and their kneecaps cracked under the pressure. Feng He still gritted his teeth and resisted with everything he had, but a dozen Earth Immortals stepped forward and added their auras on top of everyone else’s aura, making him feel as if a mountain had fallen on him.
In the end, even Feng He couldn’t withstand the combined pressure and crashed to his knees. The three of them knelt in a row, a rare and shocking sight—three Earth Immortals on their knees.
“Move the booth over,” Liu Wuxie said.
The Heavenly Dao Society promptly shifted their booth so that it stood directly in front of the kneeling trio, forcing them to kneel facing the stall. It was blatant humiliation.
If they had been kneeling off to the side, it wouldn’t have been as bad, but Liu Wuxie deliberately dragged the booth over to them. Since their feud had already escalated to a life-and-death grudge, he had no intention of going easy on them.
“Let’s hear a few barks!” the crowd howled, unafraid of stirring up trouble as they continued to heap pressure on the trio. If the three refused, no one would mind crushing them to death with their aura. With so many forces involved, the Grand Unity Sect would have no grounds to object later.
The Grand Unity Sect was powerful, but they weren’t powerful enough to stand against the entire world.
The trio ground their teeth, and blood trickled from the corners of Feng He’s lips.
Under the oppressive might, Zhang Li and Wang Lai’s spines bowed as they trembled uncontrollably. The other elders from the Divine Alchemy Sect stood at a distance. Their faces were dark with rage, but none dared to step forward.
“Stop! I’ll do it!” Wang Lai finally broke. His soul felt like it would tear apart if the pressure continued, and he had no desire to die here.
“Woof, woof, woof…” A string of barks spilled from his mouth.
Feng He let out a long, shuddering sigh as he watched that scene. The fury on his face slowly faded into grief, then into hollow despair.
“Woof, woof, woof…” His voice was barely louder than a mosquito’s buzz, yet each bark drove a nail into everyone’s hearts. It was bitterly ironic to see a dignified Earth Immortal kneeling and barking like a dog, but the trio only had themselves to blame.
Zhang Li was the last. He forced out a few barks. Then, rage overwhelmed him, and he collapsed to the ground. However, losing consciousness was almost a mercy; at least he didn’t have to see the mocking faces all around him.
Many people pulled out Memory Talismans to record the entire scene. It was easy to imagine that news of the Divine Alchemy Sect’s elder kneeling and barking like a dog would spread through the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain like wildfire.
When trading resumed, each person was still limited to two hundred pills. Even so, the sales were staggering. Within just two hours, the Heavenly Dao Society sold six thousand Soul Pills. More and more buyers flocked to their booth, and even cultivators from the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain bought pills in hopes of studying them.
If they could reproduce the Soul Pills, they would probably be able to carve out a share of the profits.
However, when they brought the pills back and analyzed them, they discovered that the ingredients were extremely ordinary, not even worthy of a fifth-grade spiritual pill.
The actual value lay in the wisp of pill rune contained within, and it was something none of them could replicate.
Yet such a pill sold for one astral crystal apiece, a price that broke all previous records. The ingredients and refining method used for the Soul Pills were simple enough that an ordinary alchemist could refine thousands of them in a single day.
A thousand pills required only a few hundred thousand astral stones, equivalent to ten astral crystals, and the disparity in value between astral stones and astral crystals was clear to see.
Liu Wuxie had burned through millions of astral stones to break through to the pinnacle of the Primal Origin Realm, but he needed only a few dozen astral crystals to reach the Void Realm. The difference in value spoke for itself.
Everyone could foresee that if this trend continued, it would only take a few years before all the astral crystals in the Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain flowed into the Heavenly Dao Society’s hands.
There would be none left for other sects to scramble over.
The Indigo Bamboo Astral Domain spanned a vast territory, but its annual output of astral crystals was pitifully small, and every sect had been fighting tooth and nail over them for countless years.
However, the Heavenly Dao Society earned six thousand astral crystals in just two hours.
Some alchemists tried to imitate the Soul Pills and refine their own version, but the results were drastically inferior. Their pills not only failed to strengthen soul energy but also damaged one’s soul sea upon consumption.
The sale continued for six hours, and the crowd before the Heavenly Dao Society’s booth still hadn’t thinned by nightfall.
By then, the Heavenly Dao Society had sold out all ten thousand Soul Pills they had brought, and they spent the remaining time taking orders.
The cultivators who had successfully obtained Soul Pills left Nightmare City one after another, no longer interested in lingering.
The event hadn’t even lasted three full days, yet it had effectively ended ahead of schedule. Nothing like this had ever happened before. In just a few days, the Heavenly Dao Society received orders totaling several hundred thousand Soul Pills.
“The Heavenly Dao Society is insane! They promised delivery in a month with so many orders? How are they going to fulfill it? It’s impossible to refine that many pills even if they don’t sleep and rest for the next few months!” Complaints echoed all around.
Tens of thousands of cultivators had come from the Spirit Martial Astral Domain, and together, they ordered several hundred thousand pills.
Those who had placed their orders later assumed they would have to wait at least a year for their pills to arrive, but Liu Wuxie reassured them that they could collect their orders from the Heavenly Dao Society in just one month.
Moreover, they signed a contract stating that if the Heavenly Dao Society failed to deliver on time, they would refund the deposit threefold. Only then did the cultivators from the Spirit Martial Astral Domain feel reassured enough to leave.
As disciples of the Heavenly Dao Society, none of them believed that Liu Wuxie would dare default. In the worst case, they could always visit Hua Feiyu to demand justice.
With a heaven-defying treasure like the Universal Gourd, Liu Wuxie had no reason to worry about production. With the True Samadhi Fire as his flame, he could refine thousands of pills in a single batch, and refining tens of thousands in a single day posed no problem at all.
The last day gradually turned dull in Nightmare City as the city fell quiet.
A few more cultivators from the Spirit Martial Astral Domain arrived occasionally, but they headed straight to the Heavenly Dao Society to place their orders.
The other sects’ goods went practically unsold, and many packed up their booths and wandered the city instead. The trade fair that was supposed to last half a month ended ten days early.
Feng He had already left with his two disciples on the second day, fleeing back to their sect.
“Brother Liu, shall we take a walk around the city as well?” Qiao Bian and Han Feizi came over, clearly eager to join the other cultivators in exploring the city.
“That was exactly my plan,” Liu Wuxie said. Even if they hadn’t mentioned it, he had already intended to venture deeper into Nightmare City. For some reason, ever since he stepped into the city, he had been feeling a mysterious force trying to draw him somewhere, and that sensation had never once faded.
He arranged for everyone else to remain at the booth. He refused Xu Lingxue and the other women when they asked to follow him. Nightmare City was too bizarre, but with experts from the Heavenly Dragon Sect stationed nearby, he didn’t have to worry about their safety.
The trio left and headed down another street. The city was enormous, and they couldn’t even see its boundaries. For so many years, no one had been able to determine its actual size. In previous visits, everyone had been too busy trading to explore, but thanks to the Heavenly Dao Society’s overwhelming success this year, they finally had the leisure to wander around.
The plaza quickly emptied as well. Disciples from the various sects fanned out to explore the city, while the Earth Immortals stayed behind to guard the booths and give their juniors a chance to temper themselves.
“Elder Feng, should we follow and kill Liu Wuxie?” a few elders from the Divine Alchemy Sect asked quietly, turning to look at Feng He.
“He has an expert protecting him; we can’t kill him right now,” Feng He replied with a weary shake of his head. He had sensed Elder Jian’s presence long ago, which was why they had never planned to attack Liu Wuxie directly.
Instead, they had chosen to fight with schemes and wagers, but who could have imagined that they would lose the bet?
As Liu Wuxie’s group of three crossed several more streets, the surroundings became deserted. They still followed Zhuge Ming’s warning not to wander into dark areas and to return before nightfall, or the city would become extremely dangerous for them.
“Don’t you find it strange? If this is a city, why do the shops here look the same? They have the same size and architectural style,” Qiao Bian asked, glancing between Liu Wuxie and Han Feizi.
“It is strange indeed. The shops should be designed for different kinds of goods, so it makes no sense for them all to look the same. That’s what makes this city feel so strange,” Han Feizi replied with a nod. He had long noticed this detail as well.
