Chapter 1076: Chapter 1070: This Was My Trade
“I couldn’t learn it. What was I supposed to use to learn?”
As gazes fell upon him, Fei Heng, residing within a monster’s body, looked incredibly desolate amidst the wind and sand.
His hoarse voice carried a sense of the vicissitudes of time.
He seemed to finally understand why the Li family members hadn’t saved him in the Dusheng Nunnery.
Perhaps everything he had done over these years had already been unearthed by them.
Formulating a strategy before making a move—this truly was the method of operation of the Azure Cloud Li Clan.
“I thought about everything too simply. I believed that as long as I followed the vision in my heart, the world would develop exactly as I imagined. But the imperial court is complex.
I don’t know how many eyes were staring at me. I couldn’t command the Grand Tutor, and I couldn’t command the State Preceptor.
Almost everyone in the Imperial Capital was paying lip service while secretly acting against me.”
“I encountered assassination attempts time and time again. Even the remnants of Crown Prince Sheng were a threat to me. I could never compare to Fourth Prince in Duskwild Prefecture.”
“But at that time, Min Tiange sought me out.”
The corners of the Li family members’ mouths twitched. This Min Tiange was a lingering ghost that refused to disperse, simply a malignant tumor upon the dynasty!
“To inherit the world, I had to come to the Western Frontier. I had to personally lead an expedition against the Wu tribe and establish peerless merit.”
Crown Prince Fei Heng lowered his head, looking at his thick, pustule-covered hand—the hand of the Corpse God from the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems.
“The number of cultivators loyal to me would gradually increase. The soldiers guarding the territory in the Western Frontier would all serve me.
And the facts proved this to be true; the Shadowfell Prefecture and Sunreach Prefectures of the Western Frontier all came under my command.
Given time, it would have become an existence equal to the Northern Frontier.”
“This was what Li Tianyue taught me. To control these great prefectures and an army of a hundred battles would be more than enough to serve as my bargaining chip to ascend the Human Emperor’s throne.”
“But she was just as naive as I was at the beginning. It wasn’t enough.”
Li Wei said calmly, “Was that when you cultivated the Corpse-Stitching Art?”
The Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems hadn’t been destroyed that long ago, but Min Tiange had controlled it and the Grand Tower for tens of thousands of years.
The secret arts passed down through generations in the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems would naturally be delivered into Min Tiange’s hands.
Fei Heng knew of the existence of the Corpse-Stitching Art far earlier than the Li Clan and the rest of the world, cultivating the demonic art in the Western Frontier while hiding it from everyone.
“Yes. Every year, there was a massive number of corpses and souls in the Western Frontier.
When Min Tiange placed the Corpse-Stitching Art in front of me, I hesitated. But how could I resist such a temptation?
With my strength, how could I suppress the entire Western Frontier, let alone the Imperial Capital?
I was afraid. I was afraid that the Western Frontier would become just like the imperial court.”
An even denser aura of corpses surfaced from within Fei Heng’s body.
The injuries he had previously sustained while resisting Nun Dairou’s Buddhist Dharma were actually recovering at a speed visible to the naked eye.
His face turned sinister and cold. “Human desire is endless. I never expected that even I would be like this.”
“The Corpse-Stitching Art… Every part of my body comes from a different corpse. I can take their techniques, their strength, and even their conceptual intent and use them for myself.
In a short period of time, I felt the power. I saw the hope of returning to the Imperial Capital and suppressing the world with absolute might.”
After hearing these words.
Zhou Chengli had his mouth wide open.
“Crown Prince, you are the Crown Prince! Do you know how many people died because of the Wu tribe’s surprise attack? How many commoners had their families torn apart?”
“That was my Void Refinement opportunity.”
Fei Heng no longer cared about how others viewed him; his vacant eyes stared at his own hand.
“The corpses and blood of countless people, combined with the divine blood of the Three Corpses of Ling Tian, along with years of comprehension, were enough for me to reach the Void Refinement realm.”
“Of course, I know that countless people lost their lives for my Void Refinement opportunity, but they forged my Dao Foundation!”
“This was my trade with Min Tiange.”
Dao Foundation!
At this moment, the expressions of everyone present changed, even the two Body Integration experts, Nun Dairou and Perfected Qinghe.
To break through to the Body Integration realm, they had all done some unsavory things to varying degrees.
Nun Dairou had Dharma Master Hongzhen break through by absorbing an unknown amount of faith power from living beings, yet even that was nowhere near this psychotic and deranged.
“Your Dao Foundation… the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems.”
Li Wei let out a long breath.
The family had investigated for many years.
Min Tiange allowing the Wu tribe into the Central Plains… sacrificing the Grand Tower and the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems… everything finally connected.
“Yes, the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems.”
At this time, Fei Heng’s Spiritual power surged.
The crowd looked around in horror and saw countless streams of blood welling up from beneath the ground across Shadowfell Prefecture, transforming into beads of blood in mid-air.
“Roar!!!”
The corpse dragon let out a sharp, agonizing shriek. Its body actually began to continuously decompose into chunks, fusing bit by bit into Fei Heng’s body.
“Oh no!” Feng Tu, the City Lord of Highsun City, cried out in alarm.
“Dao rhythm! He’s breaking through! No, he already opened his Dao Gate long ago!”
Before the crowd could even make a move, they saw those beads of blood and the soul of the corpse dragon being absorbed into Fei Heng’s body.
A fleshy sphere gradually formed, and this mass of flesh continued to grow larger as it gathered and fused with the blood and corpse chunks, its aura rapidly climbing.
Without hesitation, Feng Tu launched a technique at Fei Heng, only to be counterattacked by countless beads of blood, shattering his technique as if it were as fragile as foam.
“You can’t stop him.” Li Xinnian’s Yun-Slaying Saber unleashed a blood shadow, slowing the speed of the blood beads.
The giant hand of his Blood Spirit Dharma Body pulled Feng Tu back.
He said expressionlessly, “He pretended for hundreds of years and had so much assistance. He simply has no reason to disguise himself anymore.”
Li Xinnian understood this blood better than anyone.
It was the blood shed by countless living beings in Shadowfell Prefecture, which had seeped into the ground during the war, yet it had also become a part of Crown Prince Fei Heng.
He had refined this blood long ago; he was merely waiting for the right moment to reclaim it into his body.
Everyone looked around at this blood energy, their expressions heavy as they stared at the Fei Heng on the ground, who was neither human nor ghost.
The fleshy sphere grew larger and larger, gradually condensing into a terrifying existence.
Li Wei took a deep breath. “You let Min Tiange invade the Central Plains, and he personally delivered the Corpse God of the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems to you.”
“Correct!”
On top of the massive fleshy sphere, the upper half of Fei Heng’s body squirmed out. His bare torso looked minuscule atop the hideous mass of flesh.
Something seemed to be beating inside the sphere, gradually emitting the roar of a dragon.
Crown Prince Fei Heng was covered in viscous blood, yet he continued to stare at his increasingly powerful hand, his gaze growing ever more resolute.
“You all thought the appearance of the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems was simply the discovery of the Three Corpses of Ling Tian, the discovery of an ancient faction.”
Fei Heng’s voice was hoarse.
“With Min Tiange’s methods, he wouldn’t be so careless, and the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems wouldn’t be so easily discovered unless… he intentionally revealed a flaw.
To him, both the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems and the Grand Tower are existences he can discard at any time. What we wanted was the Corpse God.”
“You thought you gained an advantage, but his true objective was merely to borrow your hands to destroy the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems, which was trying to slip from his control.”
“The greatest benefit of the Corpse-Stitching Art is the ability to turn corpses into a part of oneself.
The Corpse God inherently became a Body Integration existence through the Corpse-Stitching Art. He and his dragon are the absolute finest delicacies for me.”
Fei Heng licked his lips. He felt the power of the Body Integration realm; that was the Dao belonging to the Corpse God!
“You cleared out the small fry for him, and he delivered the corpse of the Corpse God.
What a pity… the Corpse God and Holy Monk Yidian seemed to have noticed something was amiss as well.
They stopped before going too far, preventing Holy Monk Yidian from becoming a part of my body.”
Watching Fei Heng’s fleshy sphere gradually undergo a metamorphosis, actually transforming into a blood-colored corpse dragon, a hint of dread flashed in Nun Dairou’s eyes.
The Bodhisattva of Rebirth let out a majestic yet slightly anxious shout: “Benefactors, this person belongs in the eighteenth layer of hell!”
But the Li family members remained unmoved, while Perfected Qinghe’s eyes darted around rapidly.
“Then what about Shadowfell Prefecture? You already obtained the opportunity to break through to the Body Integration realm. Was it still not enough?” Li Wei maintained a calm and breezy appearance.
“Enough? Hahaha!”
Fei Heng laughed heartily up at the sky, yet it sounded somewhat sorrowful.
“I can’t turn back anymore. I want to comprehend the Dao, I want to integrate with the Dao, I want to reach the Mahayana realm! Just one Corpse God is far from enough.
He is merely my Dao Foundation. The Wu tribe’s entering the Central Plains was also just the beginning!”
“The cultivators of Shadowfell Prefecture had already discovered clues. Therefore, I had to let the Wu tribe breach the pass.
I know Bi Shihu, the Yun Clan, and the Dusheng Nunnery like the back of my hand.
I sent a letter to Yun Manlou; he values his family above all else. He indeed started planning his escape.
Ultimately, the Shadowfell Prefecture could only be fractured and torn apart.”
“The territory of Deston Prefecture is incredibly important; the dynasty was bound to defend it. It would inevitably lead to a fight to the death, resulting in the situation we see today.”
“I thought no one would ever suspect me.”
Nun Dairou’s face turned pale.
Such a person… she had captured him and brought him back to the Dusheng Nunnery, where he had disguised himself right under her nose for decades!
Nun Dairou’s voice practically squeezed through her teeth. “You intentionally let me find you? As the Crown Prince, acting in such a manner, you are no different from a beast.”
Li Kuanghua clenched her fists tightly.
Back when she fled carrying Fei Heng on her back, Fei Heng had taken a Breath-Concealing Pill, and by not utilizing any Spiritual power, she was no different from a mortal.
They fundamentally shouldn’t have been found by the Dusheng Nunnery.
It turned out that the decades of captivity were all orchestrated by Fei Heng!
“I was a missing Crown Prince, captured by the Dusheng Nunnery. Who would ever connect these events to me?”
Fei Heng sneered. As the fleshy sphere gradually transformed into a dragon of flesh, it was incredibly massive even as it coiled on the ground.
He looked toward Nun Dairou’s Bodhisattva of Rebirth. “I also know exactly what kind of things you all really are.”
“Amitabha.” Nun Dairou struck her wooden fish.
“Every single one of you claims to be aloof and pure.
Yun Hongcai said Shadowfell Prefecture was his root, the homeland the Yun family could not abandon, yet the Yun Clan was the very first to flee.
Bi Shihu considered himself the undefeated marshal, exhausting every scheme and calculation, but in reality, he was just a coward who didn’t dare to bear the responsibility of defeat!”
Fei Heng’s expression was full of mockery.
“As for you, a demoness leading a group of fiends to eat people, yet you think of yourself as the Dao, as the Buddha.
Your so-called ‘peace for the world,’ your claim that you would have defended Shadowfell Prefecture to the death if not for accidents—it is entirely a pack of lies.
Even if you had held Shadowfell Prefecture, you still would have used me to spread Buddhism to the world, eating the people of the world to forge your Mahayana Dao!”
“You speak nonsense!” Nun Dairou struck the wooden fish at a faster pace.
“Since you are a Bodhisattva, how could you not know human nature? This is your true nature!”
Fei Heng said coldly.
“Otherwise, why would you have fled? The fall of Shadowfell Prefecture’s border was absolutely not a dead end; there was still a sliver of hope for survival.”
“Perfected Qinghe, members of the Li Clan, the Crown Prince has descended into demonic madness. Strike quickly, now!!!”
Nun Dairou shouted sharply. With so many experts and Perfected Qinghe surrounding her, exposing Fei Heng was her only chance of survival!
Yet Fei Heng showed not the slightest bit of anxiety. He simply stared coldly at Nun Dairou.
“If you hadn’t fled and had instead resisted the Wu tribe, how could Shadowfell Prefecture have ended up like this? Why would I have fled?” His cold interrogation gradually turned into a sigh.
“This was my backup plan. If there had been a great victory that day, the ones in Shadowfell Prefecture’s current predicament would be the Wu tribe.”
“But now, none of us can turn back.”
Fei Heng looked around at the experts in all directions. His gaze lingered on the faces of the Azure Cloud Li Clan for a moment before finally landing on Perfected Qinghe.
“Perfected Qinghe, you know how to choose.”
Hearing this, Perfected Qinghe’s face turned exceptionally ugly.
A Crown Prince is ultimately the Crown Prince. Even if he had done the most conscienceless things imaginable, he was still the direct superior of his direct superior.
The Crown Prince’s scandal… if Fei Heng were only at the Void Refinement realm, or even the Half-Step Body Integration realm, it would be manageable. But a Body Integration Crown Prince…
“What a sin.”
A cold glint erupted from Perfected Qinghe’s eyes. The nine-headed dragon phantom hissed and charged toward Nun Dairou. “Demoness, face your death!”
“As for you all.”
As the two Body Integration experts resumed their battle, Fei Heng—whose upper half emerged from the top of the corpse dragon’s head—looked toward the members of the Azure Cloud Li Clan.
“We can still be like before.”
—
Donate on Ko-fi ➡️ [] ⬅️
Get Early Access to 90 Chapters: Search for “Dark Tea” on Ko-fi (Explore tab) and join my membership to read ahead!