Chapter 326: Godly Power
Xu Qing looked up into the dome of heaven. Few people would notice the clues, but given what Xu Qing knew of the Seventh Peak and Master Seventh, he had long since come to the realization that everything happening this day was playing out according to a complicated plan devised by his Master. He had seen with his own eyes how much Master Seventh blamed himself for the death of Master Sixth. And thus, Xu Qing knew that what was happening today... was simply his Master probing Torchlight for more information.
As Xu Qing was thinking about that, Master Seventh took action. Rocketing up into the sky, he joined Sir Bloodsmelter and Guru Eastnether. Using the power of the Seven Blood Eyes taboo treasure and the Soaring Cloud Sword Sect blood tree, they created a massive sealing power that settled down onto the corpse with his godliness.
Master Seventh’s goal was to capture this thing Torchlight had made, and use it as a research subject. With it, they could learn more about Torchlight, and also prepare a way to destroy the organization.
As Master Seventh took action, Sir Bloodsmelter looked up and clasped hands to the sky.
“Thank you for your trouble, Swordsage Court. Seven Blood Eyes requests permission to handle this corpse on our own. After the fighting is over, we’ll send sixty percent of its flesh and blood to you. Furthermore, we’ll wait to hear back from you before doing our research.”
In response, a voice boomed like thunder.
“Request granted!”
Because the Swordsage Court had joined the mission along with the Eight Sect Coalition to provide assistance, it was required to get their permission before acting alone. Clearly, Seven Blood Eyes’ actions, especially the way their plan had been carried out, had won the approval of the unseen watchers from the Swordsage Court. It wasn’t just the Swordsage Court that approved. Seven Blood Eyes, despite being a relative newcomer to this part of the world, was acting admirably in the eyes of the major powers.
Similar scenes were playing out in the other three sanctuaries. All of them had been similar to the corpse in the Young Arbiter Sect. All released explosive fluctuations of godliness, and all were the outworking of Torchlight’s attempt to fabricate a god. Obviously, all of them had been pieced together and then left to mature. Unfortunately for them, the attack carried out by the Eight Sect Coalition interrupted that maturation process.
Before the godly power could reach its potential, the chaos of battle erupted.
The people from Seven Blood Eyes had no idea what items had been used to create the corpses the other three sects were dealing with. But when it came to the corpse they were dealing with, it was obvious that the foundation of his intelligence was that tongue.
“It’s Master Shengyun’s tongue!” Xu Qing called to the sky.
When Master Seventh heard those words, his final bit of supposition was confirmed.
Just as I thought. The corpse was pieced together from different parts. The torso is from an ancient corpse. The arms and legs are from nonhumans. The head is from some plant-based species. The blood within it is from a godly entity. It has no internal organs, only powerful mutagen. And there’s a concave spot on its skull where something was supposed to grow....
It must relate to some rite or ceremony. The tongue was a way to give the godly corpse intelligence. Later, Torchlight could have taken Master Shengyun’s will and inserted it inside. And in that way... Master Shengyun would have had a new life. Was this an experiment of how to turn someone into a god? Sadly, its intelligence was its weakness. They failed in that regard, as the intelligence was destroyed by the godliness. And because of that, it lost any sense of will or identity.
As Master Seventh contemplated these things, the suppressed corpse released terrifying howls. He sensed that he was being restrained, and thus, the godliness within him erupted, creating wild, chaotic fluctuations that rolled out everywhere. This corpse was no god, but the powerful godly fluctuations had pushed him to a higher level of life. Because of that, this corpse was capable of unbelievable levels of strength.
For example, though all he could do was howl, those howls caused wild colors to flash in heaven and earth, and distorted everything around him.
It wasn’t just the physical space around him that was affected. The surrounding Seven Blood Eyes disciples trembled visibly, and felt the impulse to drop to their knees in worship. They were unable to control themselves or resist the urge. They were like mortals who had run into some terrifying being, and couldn’t control their own bodies.
All the Seven Blood Eyes disciples in the canyon, as well as all the Young Arbiter Sect disciples, collectively dropped to their knees, trembling. It was as if that was the only action that could allow them to think clearly. Even still, after they were on their knees, they still shook violently. What was more, mutations began to appear within the disciples. And those mutations... made them start to look like the corpse. The corpse was the source of the mutation, as if it could force all living beings to transform into its own image.
The only ones not forced to drop to their knees were Sir Bloodsmelter, Guru Eastnether, and Master Seventh.
And Xu Qing.
Xu Qing also trembled, but he didn’t drop down. He kept his chin up, and he stared at the corpse with raw killing intent.
He had looked into the eyes of the broken face of the god. Twice. To him, some paltry being pieced together with some bits of godliness wasn’t something that could force him to bow his head. As for the mutations, they appeared on him, causing fleshy tentacles to start growing from his skin.
But then the violet crystal within him glittered, and his shadow greedily began absorbing the mutagen. As a result, the mutations on Xu Qing quickly faded away.
However, the effects of the corpse’s godliness weren’t limited to all that. As the godliness erupted and everyone struggled to resist it, the corpse threw his head back and howled. Trembling, he sloughed off the restraints binding him and shot up into the air.
There, he looked down at everything below, extended his right hand, and pushed it down. That movement caused the ground to shake. Also, everyone present, including Master Seventh, Sir Bloodsmelter, and Guru Eastnether, suddenly saw numerous images of themselves, superimposed on their bodies.
They appeared to be images of those individuals’ past and future. Collectively, they were like a book that a person could flip through to see everything about someone. It was bizarre to the extreme. In those image books, the scenes from the past were very clear, whereas the scenes from the future were blurry, as if the numerous possibilities they contained led to countless variations.
However, those countless variations were now mixing together to form one image. And that image showed everyone in the valley dying! In every single image and every single book of images, everyone was dead. Including Xu Qing.
Xu Qing’s mind spun and he trembled from head to toe. He could see his own past, and the countless futures stretching ahead of him. And one of those future images was being extracted by some indescribable force, and forced to be made a reality. It was an image of him dying. Of the corpse’s power filling him and causing him to experience mutation and die. This was a power that surpassed Xu Qing’s level of comprehension.
However, he knew it was a moment of deadly crisis. Gritting his teeth viciously, he forced his right hand up and then waved it. Instantly, beetles flew out, thrumming with the power of the taboo poison pill. The moment they flew out, they landed on Xu Qing and started tearing into his skin.
Xu Qing shivered as he began to rot away. Suddenly, the future image of him rotting to death started to interfere with the image of him dying from the power of the godliness. It created a force of resistance. The two images fought back and forth, changing position over and over again.
“So this is godliness!” Master Seventh said, his eyes flickering with understanding. He also had to deal with the images of the future, and had come up with a similar method as Xu Qing to deal with them. By using another possible death, he replaced the future extracted by the godliness of the corpse. “Patriarch, I have the godliness I needed to complete the first step of my plan. You may now continue with the sealing!”
The Seven Blood Eyes taboo treasure and the blood tree caused crushing power to fall onto the corpse.
Master Seventh’s hand flashed in an incantation gesture, causing clouds to spring forth. They took the shape of various wild beasts, each of which contained crushing power. More than a thousand appeared, and as they superimposed with each other, they transformed into an astonishing black cat. This cat had no past or future, and was so huge it contained the corpse within its mass.
Meanwhile, Sir Bloodsmelter sent out countless blood threads, each of which thrummed with terrifying fluctuations as it wrapped up the corpse. Those blood threads also lacked any past or future.
As for Guru Eastnether, her eyes glittered as she waved her hand... causing a huge flag to appear in the sky. It was none other than... the War Banner of Humankind! Most outsiders would assume that this item belonged to the coalition. But the truth was that it was Guru Eastnether’s. She had only loaned it to Seven Blood Eyes to use in their various conflicts. The banner caused bright colors to flash and the wind to scream. [1]
Among the numerous drops of blood that stained the War Banner of Humankind, there was one golden drop that shone with scintillating light. And then a finger emerged which pointed toward the corpse.
The corpse trembled and howled, and his extended right hand couldn’t stand up to the force. He wanted to escape, but was powerless to do so. He could only release his godliness. He was being suppressed by Master Seventh’s black cat, wrapped up by Sir Bloodsmelter’s blood threads, sealed by the Seven Blood Eyes taboo treasure, locked down by the blood tree, and... crushed by the godliness from the War Banner of Humankind.
He was being fully sealed.
Moments later, the sealing was accomplished and everything went back to normal. The disciples below coughed up mouthfuls of blood. They had been seriously hurt, but weren’t dead. The images of their past and future vanished. That said, the mental blow they had sustained was significant.
The images around Xu Qing vanished. As for the poison from the beetles, the power of the violet crystal quickly dealt with them. Looking at the corpse, Xu Qing felt battered by waves of shock.
“Is this... a god?”
1. The War Banner of Humankind previously appeared in chapters 122 and 219. ☜