Chapter 459 - Who Is the Next?
Chapter 459 Who Is the Next?
“Yu Hualong’s senior fellow apprentice?”
It suddenly occurred to Li Mu that Yu Hualong once said that he followed his master, Li Bai, and his companions to that planet along the ancient Path and encountered a great enemy. Li Bai had to leave his disciples to hide on that planet and bewitched them to fall into a long sleep. Yu Hualong was the last one to wake up from that slumber. But when he woke up, he found that his senior fellow apprentices had all gone.
Could Lord Qu, Jiang Qingluan, be one of his missing senior fellow apprentices?
Only in that way could it be explained why Jiang Qingluan was absolutely sure that Li Mu came from the earth after reading his poems. Back then, he once sent a messenger to Taibai Mountain, inviting Li Mu to go to the Southern Chu. On that visit, his messenger also warned Li Mu that an Earth resident could face dire danger on that planet. Once his identity was exposed, he would be hunted. Unaware of the real situation, Li Mu turned him down right off.
“Seems that you have figured it out, haven’t you?” Lord Qu said with a smile.
Li Mu said coldly, “So, you’ve betrayed your fellow apprentices, betrayed your master, and also your ancestors, haven’t you?”
“I just opted for a truly correct path. As the saying goes, a good bird chooses the best tree to live. I’ve purified my sinned blood and started a new life,” Lord Qu said with a faint smile. “Of course, if you insist on saying that I am a traitor, there’s nothing wrong with it. Anyway, what’s wrong with betraying the darkness and joining the brightness?”
“Well, you don’t want to be a good person but wish to be a pet dog of others. How could you embellish betrayal like that? I do admire your shamelessness. Your brazen face is like the Great Wall that will never collapse.” Li Mu spat, making no effort to hide his disgust and killing intent.
Jiang Qingluan continued to smile. “It seems that you’ve been obsessed with it. Well then, there is no remedy for you but death.”
After that, he took two steps back to stand in the middle of the group of black-clothed men behind him and did not speak anymore. He looked at Li Mu as if he was looking at a dead man, his eyes shaded by faint sarcasm and ridicule.
Fairy Emperor of Light took a step forward. He stared at Li Mu, and said, “Boy, I owe you for your fruits. It’s a personal favor. But the blood of sin is flowing in your body. You’re a sinner. It’s a public grudge. I can’t abandon the public hatred because of personal kindness. But after you die, I’ll bury your body.”
Li Mu sneered and bellowed, “Old dog, don’t say so much hypocritical nonsense. It makes me sick. If I’d known that you are a blood-thirsty murderous maniac, I would rather feed those divine fruits to dogs than give them to you.”
“That’s right, you old thing! What a pity for my bowl of blood! I should have fed it to a dog.” Ming Yue said indignantly.
“Well, you’re seeking death on your own now. I’ll send you to hell right now.” Fairy Emperor of Light’s beard bristled, and his eyes were filled with undisguised killing intent.
Wang Shiyu still wanted to say something, but she was suddenly detained by Fairy Lord of Light. As if being hit by a freeze spell, she was rooted on the spot, unable to speak or move.
“Old thing, you never know who will survive this or not.” Li Mu shouted, wrapped in furious fighting intent. He took out a high-quality Taoist instrument, an ancient long broadsword from his storage space, which he found in the city on the outskirts of the Tomb of the God of Sin. In his body, the Qi of the Wood Emperor, the Earth Emperor, and the Fire Emperor was circulating. Facing Fairy Emperor of Light, Li Mu showed no fear at all.
“Haha, a newborn calf is not afraid of tigers.” Fairy Emperor of Light sneered. “Yet, you can merely be fearless. At the end of the day, the prey is still the calf… I changed my mind. I don’t want you to die so briskly.” He looked at the other people around Li Mu and remarked, “As I said, today I prefer not to get the kill started. People like you are not sinners. You can escape the death penalty. As long as you go away now, I won’t punish you.”
He was making Li Mu be deserted by his supporters on purpose.
“Fu*k you, old thing! You can’t scare us, can you?” Ming Yue hopped to her feet like a provoked hen and yelled, “I am the master of the most powerful Beggar Gang in the world. How can I be afraid of death? If you have the guts, just bring it on!”
Qing Feng did not speak but just rolled his wheelchair and edged towards Li Mu.
Guo Yuqing gave a smile and said, “I don’t expect us to be born on the same day of the same year. I just hope I can die with you on the same day of the same year.” That was the oath he, Li Mu, and Qiu Yin made on the day the three of them became sworn brothers.
Although Guo Yuqing was concerned about his wife and children, he could not abandon his brothers because of that. His wife and children were safe in the Wolf Temple. Later when his children grew up, he believed they would not resent him for making that decision. On the contrary, the decision would only make them even more proud of their father.
That left only the members of the four-man group, all of whom looked embarrassed.
Without looking back at the four, Li Mu shouted, “You four, get lost!”
He directly activated the Taoist magic art and lifted the spell from the four men. Now that the Hun Yuan Sect had been wiped out, the four of them were the last kindling. Although they were also extraterrestrial cultivators, they behaved along the way and did not try to play any tricks. Li Mu could not bring himself to drag them to die with him, so he let go of these four guys straight away.
The hawk-nose, the knitted brows, the lanky disciple, and Changsheng looked at one another in dismay.
They were finally relieved as they felt the spell in their bodies disappear. But, would they just leave like that?
After hesitating for a moment, the hawk-nose’s face suddenly reddened as he stuttered, “We… Well, I won’t leave. Master, I am willing to fight side by side with you.”
The other three darted the hawk-nose with a surprised look, but soon they also came around and chose to stand beside Li Mu.
Because they had no route of retreat.
The Hun Yuan Sect was over. Having been hunted by enemies in the Brilliance Immortal Galaxy, even if the four of them went out of the Tomb of the God of Sin, they would hardly escape from the fate of being hunted and tortured to death. Moreover, the experts of the Heavenly Devil Sect and the Tianyi Palace were eyeing them covetously. Even if they got rid of Li Mu, they would be killed right away by those experts. They just had no way to out.
And to say the least, even if they walked out of the Tomb of the God of Sin alive, they were still branded as sinners because they had served Li Mu, a real sinner. Therefore, they would have no way to survive all the same.
Since there was just no way out, why not fight to death like a hero?
Although Li Mu smashed their Junior Fellow Apprentice Xu with one punch when they first met him, they did not really hate Li Mu for that. Because that Junior Fellow Apprentice Xu had been arrogant and domineering all along, and frequently bullied his fellow apprentices. After the landing, he bossed them around even more and so did not earn them support. By contrast, although Li Mu beat them often, he still gave them Taoist Treasures at the critical moment and set them free in the end. Deep down, they trusted Li Mu and were quite grateful to him.
Man’s motion was just a weird thing.
The four people, in that instant, probably suffered from the Stockholm Syndrome. Anyway, they all chose to stay with Li Mu.
That also took Li Mu by surprise.
Judging by their performance along the way, Li Mu reckoned that the four of them were cowards. However, to his astonishment… they had just risen to the situation.
“Good, very good. In that case, hee-hee,” Fairy Emperor of Light said, his expression cold and stern, a cruel smile playing around the corner of his lips, “then all of you shall be buried here… Anyone who can kill one of them will receive one of the advanced 36 immortal cultivation methods taught by me in person.”
He addressed the last sentence specifically to the cultivators from outer space.
The eyes of those extraterrestrial cultivators lit up at once.
That was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!
“I’ll do it.” A disciple of Tianyi Palace immediately dashed out. He drew out his sword and hurtled toward Li Mu, hoping to kill the sinner and be the first to win the prize.
Li Mu had killed dozens of disciples of the Tianyi Palace with his tactical deployment before. Yet, as there was no tactical deployment at the scene, that disciple of the Tianyi Palace felt reassured and emboldened. After all, he had passed all the deployments and traps on the way unscathed not only because of the help of Sun Ji, an elder in the Soldier Realm, but also his remarkable cultivation.
Swoosh!
The sword light zoomed like a flash of lightning, and a burst of his fierce aura broke out.
That strike was extremely brilliant, demonstrating the essence of the Tianyi Palace’s swordsmanship to the fullest.
However, Li Mu merely sneered. Then, he strode forward, flung the long broadsword in his hand, which instantly shattered the lightning-like sword light and the long sword, as well as the arm holding the sword and the owner of that arm.
Suddenly, blood was all over the place.
Li Mu was drenched in blood. He kicked away the remains of the body on the ground, scowled at the crowd in front of him like a fierce beast, and grinned broadly, revealing his white teeth. Then, he shouted, “Who is the next?”
Half of the several hundred extraterrestrial cultivators who were eager to kill Li Mu immediately shuddered in fear. They were all deterred by the wild madness that Li Mu emitted all of a sudden.
“Humph, it’s nothing more than a struggle of a trapped beast.” Sun Ji, the elder in the Soldier Realm from Tianyi Palace, pulled out his sword and advanced on Li Mu, his face welling with killing intent. “On the way here, you killed dozens of disciples of my Tianyi Palace with some tactical deployment. Now, I will comfort their souls with your filthy blood!”
Zhangsun Changkong, the Demon Broadsword, of the Heavenly Devil Sect, and several people of the Heavenly Deployment Sect, all had scorching eyes. How could they be willing to give such an opportunity to the Tianyi Palace? They were also eager to kill Li Mu and seize the immortal cultivation methods, but Fairy Emperor of Light stopped them and said, “Go get him one at a time.”
He was determined to slowly torture Li Mu in that way.
Li Mu laughed heartily. He stalked forward and said, “Yue Guoxiang, a member of your Tianyi Palace, fed on the blood of the creatures, humans, and devil races in this world. He hunted them with such savageness that he proved that your Tianyi Palace is no decent faction at all. Today, I’ll send you to the underworld to reunite with him!”
A stripe of silky broadsword light rushed out and hacked at the target.
Sun Ji, the elder in the Soldier Realm, sneered. He brandished his long sword and taunted, “You’re weak like an ant. Still want to kill me? Haha, you’re daydreaming…”
But before his voice had receded—
Clang!
A bell rang.
It was the Fallen-soul Bell. With that bell toll, Sun Ji’s soul shook.
He didn’t know the Fallen-soul Bell was in Li Mu’s hands. Being caught off guard, he only felt sick and dizzy, as if his soul was about to fly away and his body was about to break free from his control.
Alarmed, he made to run his Cultivation Method to stabilize his soul. But all of a sudden, he felt a chill in his neck. Then he felt everything begin to shrink and then saw his headless body below him…
Then, the endless darkness completely devoured his last consciousness.
Li Mu withdrew his broadsword and stood bolt up. He kicked Sun Ji’s still standing body to the ground. The blood in the blood groove of the ancient broadsword trickled along the tip and dripped on the ground. Then, Li Mu grinned and said, “What rubbish this extraterrestrial cultivator is? The elder in the Soldier Realm was just like a pig in the slaughterhouse. I can finish them off one strike at a time… Now, who is the next?”
Gasps instantly filled the place.
The rest of the few disciples of the Tianyi Palace were stunned instead.
Sun Ji died so fast that no one had the time to register the event.