Chapter 181
Chapter 181
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Translator: Ace
Chapter: [Unknown]
Chapter Title: The Fall of Wu Cang
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For some reason, Wu Cang suddenly felt a chill.
It was like a basin of cold water suddenly poured over his heart, dispelling all his irritability and allowing his originally dust-covered spiritual platform to barely emit a ray of spiritual light.
"Huh? Why did I come here?"
At this moment, the Foundation Establishment True Person's spiritual sense frantically warned him, making Wu Cang subconsciously glance around.
Had his nighttime robbery been discovered?
Even at this point, Wu Cang hadn't realized Lu Yang's threat. He still thought it was his whereabouts that had been exposed. This was certainly due in part to Lu Yang using [Mountain-Embracing] to conceal his causal qi, making it hard to detect.
But was it not also because Wu Cang himself had been tampered with in his qi fortune?
'Take this as a lesson.'
Lu Yang took it all in and silently murmured to himself in his heart. His ability to reach this day step by step hinged crucially on learning from his mistakes.
For instance, he had already resolved that from now on, he would steer clear of Buddhist cultivators.
The reason was simple. Buddhist cultivators were too shameless.
Every one of them was the World Honored One's "I." At the slightest disagreement, the Dao Lord would possess them. It was like a max-level demon king blocking the newbie village right from the start and slaughtering everyone!
Utterly mad.
If not for the [Book of a Hundred Lives] having a status high enough that even the Dao Lord could only vaguely sense it without truly influencing, he would have died ten thousand times over by now.
Drawing on experiences from his previous lives, however, Lu Yang quickly devised a way to evade the World Honored One's gaze. The previous life wasn't the first time he had self-detonated before a Buddhist cultivator to activate the Book of a Hundred Lives.
In the life before that, when he detonated the earth vein to trick Fulong Arhat, he had used the Book of a Hundred Lives too!
So why hadn't it drawn the World Honored One then?
"...Because of the heavenly punishment!"
After pondering, Lu Yang concluded that was the only possibility. Under heavenly punishment, all the merit and qi fortune on Fulong Arhat had been directly zeroed out.
Thus, the World Honored One hadn't descended or noticed.
It was clear, then, that the bizarre possession method relied on merit and qi fortune. That was the flaw in the World Honored One's control over Buddhist cultivators.
A flaw meant a solution.
"If I can fully unravel its secrets and devise countermeasures against the World Honored One's influence on my consciousness, a trip to the Pure Land might not be impossible in the future."
It was a fond fantasy for the days ahead, though still distant.
Lu Yang retracted his thoughts and looked at Wu Cang once more.
Wu Cang now wore an impatient expression. Though he vaguely sensed something amiss, his first impulse wasn't to flee.
It was to settle things quickly.
"Since fellow Daoist won't see reason, don't blame me!"
As the words fell, a colossal tree—reaching to the heavens and rooted to the earth, its branches twisting and interlocking—suddenly unfurled across the vault of the sky.
It was the manifestation of Wu Cang's Dao base.
Amid the canopy, a vermilion fruit sprouted in an instant.
A confident smile crept across Wu Cang's face.
This "Fire in Wood" was the most profound mystery among his innate divine abilities. Paired with his talent divine ability [Not Fleeing South], it incinerated dharma bodies without fail.
Yet the next second, his eyes bulged wide.
Facing the "Fire in Wood" he had cast down, Lu Yang remained unhurried. A beam of black light rose from behind him and swept toward Wu Cang's Dao base.
Whoosh—
In the next instant, the fierce blaze Wu Cang had ignited flickered like a candle in a gale. With a single blink, it was snuffed out in a roar, all divine abilities grinding to a halt!
[Mountain-Embracing]!
With prior experience clashing against Wu Cang, Lu Yang naturally wouldn't grant him space to act again. He smashed forth the newly refined talent divine ability.
The effect was immediate and striking. Within the Foundation Establishment realm, Wu Cang's [Coiling Dragon Divine Wood Dao Foundation] shuddered violently.
Yet a majestic mountain shadow now loomed overhead—illusory, intangible, untouchable—yet generating undeniable suppression. It crushed his Fire in Wood outright!
"...Impossible!"
Wu Cang cried out in shock. Mount Tai seemed to bear down on him. To shatter it required either one's own divine mysteries or vast magical power.
He possessed neither.
In that flash of insight, Wu Cang fully regained his clarity and whirled to flee.
But a blaze of divine brilliance enveloped the surroundings.
[Fixing Kinship and Distance]!
This profound art could shift oneself or one's foes. Had Wu Cang's "Fire in Wood" not been quelled, its divine flames might have broken the influence.
But with the fire quelled, eighty percent of his arsenal was crippled. He was utterly helpless against Lu Yang's spatial shift!
Meanwhile, Lu Yang grasped a gourd.
[Three-Nines Soul-Melting Gourd]!
He uncorked it, circulated his magic power, and gave it a gentle shake. A veil of hazy, chaotic smoke billowed forth.
Soul-scattering, spirit-seizing, god-stealing smoke!
Potent as it was, the smoke was notoriously hard to land—a mediocre tool in combat.
In Lu Yang's hands, however, it shone.
The next instant, divine brilliance flashed.
Wu Cang in midair had no chance to evade. He watched helplessly as he vanished from his spot, only to reappear—tossed straight into the hazy smoke by Lu Yang.
"You...! If you've got the guts, fight me fair and square!"
Wu Cang's enraged shout echoed from the smoke. Even now, Lu Yang showed no intent for direct combat.
He opened with ironclad control, denying any chance of reversal.
Soon, though, Wu Cang's voice grew faint. The soul-scattering, spirit-seizing, god-stealing smoke took hold, his consciousness sinking into deeper torpor.
Yet he knew that true unconsciousness meant no awakening. Desperation sharpened his resolve. Crimson gleamed in his eyes, and three radiant spirit lights appeared in his grasp—three solid lower-grade spirit treasures.
"...Explode!"
Born a loose cultivator, Wu Cang might lack cunning or guile. But to hold ground in the Primal Saint Sect, he had one trait in spades.
Ruthlessness!
In a heartbeat, the three spirit treasures detonated in his hand. The shockwaves tore through the god-stealing smoke, carving him an escape path.
Boom rumble!
Riding the spiritual surge, Wu Cang streaked like lightning, escape light flaring as he bolted from Heaven Mending Peak—sky boundless for birds, seas endless for fish.
The treasures' blast rent Heaven Mending Peak's array veil. Amid the qi tumult, gazes from many True Persons in the Saint Sect turned their way.
These were Wu Cang's shields.
Ruthless as Lu Yang was, he couldn't kill in plain view of so many, could he?
Unbeknownst to him, Lu Yang had watched every move. The Heaven-Scrutinizing Instrument at his brow had long calculated this response.
"Hold the One, guard the center—able to part same from different."
A shout exploded in Wu Cang's ear, laced with scalp-numbing menace. The roiling spiritual tide froze solid!
Another glance, and where was boundless sky or sea? He had fixated on fleeing beyond Heaven Mending Peak, eyes filled with clear daylight.
In a blink, daylight became pitch-black cliff face. His escape light was committed—he couldn't halt.
Bang!
With a thunderous crash, Wu Cang—before all eyes—smashed headlong into the materialized [Mountain-Embracing] and shattered to fragments!
From the sundered dharma body, a soul drifted free.
"Beast..."
Wu Cang's soul quivered with fury, words forming—
—but Lu Yang seized it.
"Senior Wu Cang, it's just a slight defeat in combat. No need for such desperate thoughts. This junior will safeguard your soul now."
Before the words ended, Lu Yang crammed him ruthlessly into the Ten Thousand Spirits Banner.
Only then did Lu Yang face the crowd—shocked, aghast, staring wide-eyed—and offer an amiable smile.
"Fellows, no misunderstanding. You all saw it. Senior Wu Cang lost his composure, sought his own end, and crashed to death on my divine ability of his own accord."
