A Living Hell
The moment the clearing came fully into view between the leaves, even Ju Pyo—a grizzled veteran who had survived everything the jianghu could throw at a man—found himself holding his breath without meaning to.
It was a living hellscape, painted by the madness of men.
Atop the massive altar at the heart of the clearing, countless people had been laid out as sacrificial offerings—limbs bent the wrong way, bodies torn to tattered rags. What was most horrifying of all was the impossible truth that they were still alive, still moaning.
"Ghhh……."
"Uungh… hkk……."
"Please… just kill me……."
"Save me… hhnngh……."
Their agonized screams and pleading filled the dank hollow to the brim with a miasma of evil.
Before the altar stood a figure draped in blood-dripping red robes, a grotesque visage carved into his mask, arms spread wide toward the heavens as he droned an incantation no one could understand. Around him, twenty pirates knelt in a ring as if forming his honor guard, bowing to him over and over without pause.
And around the altar, dozens of women were being violated, without a moment's respite, by the beast-like pirates. The women's anguished shrieks tangled with the men's ragged, lust-thick breathing until the noise tore at the ears. The ones who lost consciousness were simply dragged off as they were, their bodies torn open, and laid upon the altar as fresh offerings.
Ouyang Qiangang watched all of it in silence. The last place his gaze came to rest was the enormous wooden cage beside the altar. Inside, twenty-odd boys and girls clung to one another, forced to watch the hell unfolding right before their eyes.
Some of the children had already been driven out of their minds by shock—staring into empty air with unfocused eyes, white drool trailing from the corners of their mouths. Whenever one turned his head or squeezed his eyes shut, the pirates posted in front of the cage would grin and jab at them with the bamboo spears in their hands.
At the sight of that, Ouyang Qiangang's body began to tremble with a thin, needle-fine rage. His eyes turned as cold as a slab of ice.
Plan? Strategy? None of it means anything anymore.
Every rational calculation in his head burned away to ash. Those things… are not human. They are evil—evil with no reason left to live.
What was unfolding before him went beyond any code of the jianghu. It was an atrocity no human being could ever condone.
Doctor, I am detecting powerful waves of dark yin energy and festering resentment from that altar. My assessment: they are attempting something, using the fear and agony of the sacrificed themselves as an energy source.
Akasha's analysis poured fuel on the fire of his rage. Using people as sacrifices? Insane……. His fists clenched hard enough to bleed.
Barely holding down the killing intent boiling up inside him, Ouyang Qiangang asked through a voice clamped tight:
"Old Master… that bastard who looks like the rite's presiding priest—I believe he is the Gang Lord, the Blood Spirit Human Demon. Doesn't it look as though he's performing some kind of ritual?"
"…That's right. It puts me in mind of a story I heard so long ago I'd quite forgotten it."
"What story is that?"
"They say that several hundred years ago, in the Murim of old, there existed a sect called the Blood Demon Cult. They practiced a rite of unparalleled wickedness called the Blood Sacrifice, offering the pain and terror of the living to the Blood Demon God they worshipped. And the accounts of that Blood Sacrifice handed down to us… they match the scene before our eyes almost exactly."
"You're telling me they could be the heirs of that heretical sect—the Blood Demon Cult?"
"It's the stuff of legend. I cannot say for certain."
Ouyang Qiangang's gaze locked onto the figure atop the altar—the man in blood-dripping red robes.
"Whether that is a Blood Sacrifice or not makes no difference. The one conducting the rite on that altar is surely the mastermind behind all of this. I will kill him and whip up as much chaos as I can to draw the pirates in. In that gap, Old Master, you will rescue the people."
At his audacious plan, Ju Pyo's face sank into grim shadow.
"Young Master, more than twenty men are gathered around him. They will be the finest of the Thousand Seas Gang. To charge in there alone is far too dangerous. Instead, let me——"
"Old Master."
Ouyang Qiangang cut him off. Pointing to the children locked inside the wooden cage, he continued.
"There's no time to argue like this. Save those children, Old Master."
At his words, Ju Pyo could say nothing more. And yet a deep unease still hung on his face.
"Once you have the people out, head for the harbor without a moment's delay. If I have not appeared by the time everyone is aboard the ship, depart as planned."
"…And if you do not come back, Young Master? What then?"
"Getting out of this place alone is hardly a difficult feat, Old Master. So don't worry about me."
Ouyang Qiangang's voice left no room for argument. Ju Pyo bit his lip in silence for a long moment, then opened his mouth with gravity.
"This old man would like to see the Young Master alive again."
Instead of answering, Ouyang Qiangang turned toward the hellish altar. His eyes blazed hotter than any flame, and gleamed colder than any blade.
"You will," he said, glaring at the altar.
Akasha—activate Maximum Combat Mode. I'm sweeping every last one of them away.
Understood, Doctor. Maximum Combat Mode activated. Cognitive functions accelerated to 300%. Dynamic visual acuity maximized. Weakness analysis and trajectory prediction modules overclocked. Time remaining: 9 minutes 59 seconds.
In an instant, his field of vision stretched wide, and the world seemed to slow to a crawl—every single movement of the enemies snapping into razor-sharp focus. His heartbeat fell quiet, and his emotions settled, cold as ice.
Unfurling Ghost Shadow Dance, one of the core arts of the Heavenly Void Meteor Divine Art, Ouyang Qiangang shot his body toward the altar like a wisp of black fog.
Ghost Shadow Dance was a technique he had devised by distilling the essence of the Ghost Shadow Divine Art left behind by Gwisu Sintu—a lightness art in which black mist vented from every pore to shroud the body. Carried to its extreme, it reached a realm where one melted into the darkness itself, but with his current internal energy it amounted to little more than scattering afterimages in his wake.
Even that was enough. His shadow flickered like a black phantom as it tore through the very midst of the pirates at a terrifying speed.
Shff!
It was a whisper of parted air fainter than the beat of a butterfly's wings—but there were those who caught it.
"Enemies! Protect the Gang Lord!"
The twenty pirates guarding the altar moved with drilled, seamless precision despite the unexpected intrusion, as though they had known it was coming. Half of them drew blades while the rest spread their fists and palms, raising a wall of iron defense before the masked man in red—the Blood Spirit Human Demon. Madness filled their eyes; killing intent filled their hands.
Ouyang Qiangang did not slow. Defense? There was no such word in his dictionary anymore.
Akasha, I'm leaving every bit of the defense to you. I'm focusing everything on attack.
Yes, Doctor. Nanobot shield deployed. Activating the Active Shock Absorption System. …Please be careful.
Tearing through the center of the chaos at a monstrous speed, Ouyang Qiangang charged headlong into the guarding pirates without a flicker of hesitation. His eyes gleamed cold, and the pressure of his oncoming charge was that of a storm.
A chilling palm strike, heavy enough to grind a boulder into powder, came flying at him head-on.
Shraaa—!
Ouyang Qiangang did not evade. He unfurled the Gale Chain Palm.
Shushushushushushuk—!
Twenty-four palms tore out in a linked chain, collapsing the pirate's momentum and blasting apart a head still full of shock.
Thwack!
As the pirate crumpled in a spray of red, a blade chopped down vertically at Ouyang Qiangang's shoulder.
Shff—
The instant he thought his flesh and bone had been split, a sharp metallic shriek rang out.
CLANG!
The moment the edge touched him, tens of thousands of nanobots coalesced beneath his skin like a silver ripple, swallowing the sword's impact and flinging it back. The pirate who had swung at his shoulder staggered in alarm as the rebound shuddering up his blade threw off his balance.
"Gah—!"
In that very instant, a force like a meteor hammer fused with an iron hammer burst from Ouyang Qiangang's hand and slammed into the man's chest like a bolt of lightning.
Thwack!
It was the Explosive Thunder Flame King Hammer, charged with the Transcendent Peerless Divine Art.
"Ughaaak!"
With a hideous scream, a hole the size of a man's head punched clean through the pirate's heart, and the blood that came gushing out dyed the air crimson.
That was the fuse.
BOOM! BOOM!
The Gale Chain Palm shattered fists, palms, and blades alike at a horrifying tempo, while the Explosive Thunder Flame King Hammer pulped whatever it touched. Akasha's support was absolute. She broke down the enemies' weak points in real time and floated the data across his field of vision, and Ouyang Qiangang wielded that information as though it were instinct.
Another pirate moved to bar his path, rushing in with twin sabers whirling. The man's saberwork flowed as supple as water—but Akasha's trajectory prediction read its every current in advance. Scattering the afterimages of Ghost Shadow Dance, Ouyang Qiangang grazed past the arc of the blades.
Swish!
The sabers cleaved empty air, and Qiangang plunged into the man's exposed flank, snapping his forearm and crushing the bone with the Dragon-Seizing Grasping Hand.
Crrrack!
"Kraaagh!"
The agonized scream shook the forest. The follow-up Gale Chain Palm smashed into his chest and caved in his upper body.
THUD!
At that very moment, two cords of palm force came flying at both of Ouyang Qiangang's shoulders.
Shwiii—!
He did not dodge. He charged straight at them. The palm force slammed into his shoulders.
WHAM!
In a flash the nanobot shield shimmered like a blue ripple and drank in the shock. He escaped any external wound, but that did not mean there was no pain. Agony that rattled him to the bone and churned his organs shook him from within, yet Ouyang Qiangang only gritted his teeth. Wedging himself between the two pirates, he drove the Explosive Thunder Flame King Hammer through their bellies.
THWACK-THWACK!
"Kraaagh!"
Amid horrific screams, the pirates with shattered spines tumbled away across the ground.
Just then, a flying dagger someone had loosed grazed his left arm.
Fweee!
The nanobots knocked the dagger aside, but a red line welled up across his skin. Closing the distance to the thrower with the Spring Flash Step, Ouyang Qiangang seized the man's throat in the Dragon-Seizing Grasping Hand and twisted.
Snap!
The sound of snapping vertebrae sent a shiver through the air.
"Monster……!"
"Blades don't work on him!"
"His external cultivation has reached the Peak!"
Shock and disbelief spread among the guarding pirates like a plague, and their fortress of a formation began to waver. Ouyang Qiangang did not let the opening slip. Closing in on the pirate whirling a massive iron mace with the Spring Flash Step, he blasted the man's head apart with the Gale Chain Palm.
Thwack!
A spray of red burst across the altar. What came next was the Four Symbols Formation, formed by four masters, who poured blades and palm force down on him until the altar quaked with thunder.
BOOM! BOOM!
Unfurling the Nine Palaces Labyrinth Step, Ouyang Qiangang dove straight into the heart of the formation.
Thwack-thwack-thwack-thwack—
The enemy offensive struck home across his body.
Ghhk…….
The nanobot shield kept the wounds from turning fatal, but blood came crawling up his windpipe. Ouyang Qiangang bit his lip, forced the blood back down, and unleashed the Gale Chain Palm at his attackers.
BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM—
Seventy-two palms unfolded in the space of a blink, palm shadows surging up like a tidal wave and sweeping over the Four Symbols Formation.
BAM-BAM-BAM-BAM!
"Aaaaargh!"
Screams burst out one after another as the four pirates, their upper bodies crushed, were flung in every direction. Fear descended over the pirates' eyes—for in Ouyang Qiangang, who cast defense and evasion to the wind entirely, they could feel a madness that chilled even them.
Five left.
Ouyang Qiangang's eyes swept the field in an instant. Just then, the Blood Spirit Human Demon began to chant an incantation no one could understand. The fear drained from the faces of the five remaining guards, and in its place settled a resolve steeped in madness. As though death held no terror for them at all, they hurled themselves at Ouyang Qiangang as one.
Shraaaa—!
Dark-crimson palm force came writhing at him like venomous serpents, and Ouyang Qiangang's eyes glistened with killing intent as he drove head-on into it.
Akasha, you handle the poison!
Understood, Doctor. Toxicity analysis complete. Nanobot defense rate: 88%. Preparing target elimination.
THWACK-THWACK-THWACK-THWACK!
The poison-laden palm force smashed across his entire body. But the price was paid in full. The pirates, who had never dreamed he would simply walk through their attack, stared with eyes gone twice their size—and so, brief as it was, their offensive faltered for an instant.
Pain bored deep into his bones, but Ouyang Qiangang did not let that sliver of an opening pass. Raising his power with every last ounce of strength he had, he unfurled the Gale Chain Palm—seventy-two palms in the blink of an eye, stacked threefold. Two hundred and sixteen palms came whirling down like a typhoon.
WHOOOOSH!
The palm force tore the five guarding pirates limb from limb.
"AAARGH!!"
Their screams burst out in unison like some dreadful chorus, and blood and shreds of flesh soaked the altar red.
Drip… drip-drip-drip-drip—
Ouyang Qiangang's own body was mottled with blood and wounds, but his momentum did not waver in the slightest.
Time remaining: 24 minutes 17 seconds. Target elimination rate: 100%. Internal energy depletion rate rising sharply. The cold qi of your Nine Yin Severed Meridians is increasing. Doctor, further combat is dangerous.
Ouyang Qiangang's breathing turned ragged. From deep within his chest, the frigid qi of the Nine Yin Severed Meridians came creeping upward like a venomous snake, and his vision swayed.
Not yet… it's not a hundred percent. One more… still remains.