Chapter 228 — The Wish to Return Home

Halfwit Monk and the others felt their scalps go numb. Even as they fled headlong, they saw the mountain shudder violently, countless stones whirling through the air; and out from among those stones drilled black tentacles, one after another — the root-feet of the Withered Silence Ridge Root Demon. The Nether Demon Cult had pinned her root-feet down beneath demon-suppressing black stone steles; and the many black steles by the lake and around the withered trees were what pinned down her head.

Now that the steles over her head had been toppled by Halfwit Monk and his companions, the root demon could bring her power to bear, and it was fearsome past all telling, setting the whole range of mountains trembling. As her strength went abroad, the steles that had pinned her root-feet flew up one after another and were shattered by her dreadful force.

"What common tree demon has strength like this? " Halfwit Monk blurted out.

"Did the Nether Demon Cult pin this tree demon down here on purpose, to do men harm?

" Suddenly several thick roots came coiling toward them, and hanging before each root were beautiful women, who giggled: "You want to leave?

You saved me, and I have yet to repay you.

Best stay, and become one flesh with me! " Qiu Yue flicked her sleeve, and countless insects flew out and hurled themselves at the roots. The insects swelled on the wind to a zhang and more in length, and fastening on the roots they gnawed with a crunching, grating sound — but every one of their sharp-toothed mouths was shattered, and they could not bite through at all.

Qiu Yue was startled. Then she saw that from the navels of the women hanging on the roots grew fine little rootlets that pierced one gu worm after another clean through, and in an instant nothing was left of the gu worms but empty shells, the flesh and blood within all gone. "The gu worms I raise can bite through even Yuan Soldiers," Qiu Yue cried, "and these roots are harder than Yuan Soldiers!

" One root came round behind them. Yuan Shan leapt up, sword pellet in hand, and stabbed as he sprang, running the woman on that root clean through; the blade spun and sheared off her head. The woman's head fell to the ground and at once withered into a lump of black charcoal shaped like a skull — but on the root, the headless woman grew herself a new head.

Yuan Shan was startled too.

He tried to cut the root in two, when suddenly another root stabbed at him like lightning and ran him through from behind, piercing his back and entering his body. Yuan Shan hastily urged his sword pellet, meaning to sever the root behind him; but all at once his body shriveled, and in an instant the flesh was gone from him, leaving only a skin.

The others had meant to go to his rescue; at the sight they fled in panic toward the mouth of the canyon. Behind them, above Withered Silence Ridge, numberless black tentacles waved without cease, and root after root seized hold of the peaks on either side and hauled her true body up from beneath the earth.

It was a monstrous thing, a vast tangle like a ball of thread, with countless roots trailing down beneath it. Its stirring was so violent that it roused the Xuanji ballistae on the mountains to either side.

The ballistae sensed the demon's aura, wound their own strings, and two enormously thick bolts of arrow-light came flying through the air and struck the Withered Silence Ridge Root Demon, which looked like nothing so much as a huge black ball. The demon gave a shrill, miserable scream, like numberless voices piled one atop another, and the sound set the surrounding mountains to avalanching without end.

Long Jiaonan and the rest were nearly overtaken by the tentacles; luckily the ballistae's attack hurt the demon, and she drew her tentacles back, letting them escape calamity. "These Xuanji ballistae can shoot even Heavenly Men dead," they said, "so they are sure to finish this demon! " Everyone breathed easier — when suddenly they saw the Withered Silence Ridge Root Demon swing its tentacles at the ballistae on the peaks.

With a thunderous boom, one of the ballistae was smashed to powder, and its massive bronze arm went tumbling down the mountain. Then the ballista on another peak was likewise smashed to powder by the Withered Silence Ridge Root Demon. Long Jiaonan and the others went ashen. They scrambled onto the back of the great red snake Long Jiaonan had reared and fled madly forward, and at last got clear of Withered Silence Ridge.

Looking back, they saw countless roots in the canyon crawling toward them like black pythons, and from the valley came a heavy, rolling sound.

Plainly the dreadful Root Demon's body was too large and too heavy to fly; she could only use her roots to grip the cliffs and drag her enormous body forward. The creature was so immense that as it moved its body struck the mountains on either side and set the peaks swaying.

"The Nether Demon Cult truly has much to answer for, rearing such a monster to do men harm!

" Halfwit Monk, whether shaking with rage or with fear, stormed: "How many people must they have killed to rear this demon to such a size! I hate that my strength is so shallow that I cannot vanquish demons and guard the Way! " The others knew that it was he who had loosed the demon, and felt guilty, and so they laid the blame at the Nether Demon Cult's door.

No one pointed it out.

Instead they all said, "At least it is a piece of luck that we have drawn the demon into the Barren Ruins, so that it has not ravaged the people of Jingping. " "Those in the Barren Ruins are all cast-offs and wicked heretics driven past their last resort; if this monster goes on the rampage there, it is a kind of demon-quelling and Way-guarding too. " Halfwit Monk's face eased. "The Nether Demon Cult's Hierarch made that din on purpose to lure us into the canyon.

I fear he meant to borrow the demon's hand to destroy us. We good folk have Heaven's protection and have escaped with our lives; how disappointed he must be!

" He had barely spoken when the Withered Silence Ridge Root Demon's enormous body squeezed out of the canyon as well and came rolling down from the heights, its countless roots dancing without cease.

Everyone hastily sprang into the air.

The scholar Lan Yu said in a low, steady voice, "This demon cannot fly, so you may all set your minds at ease. .

. " At that very moment a bird's cry came, a fierce wind struck their faces, and a great golden-winged bird flew up like lightning, its two talons closing on Lan Yu's shoulders and carrying him off. The scholar Lan Yu's shoulders hurt; both shoulder blades were pierced through by the bird's talons.

He was about to use his arts to save himself when the golden-winged bird lowered its head and pecked once at his skull, shattering it to pieces, and bore his headless body off into the depths of the vast forest. The Barren Ruins.

They had arrived. A wild land beyond all law. The strange beasts here cared nothing whether you were a disciple of some famous sect; in their eyes there were only two kinds — the edible and the inedible.

Qiu Yue cried in alarm, "Don't fly in the sky! Go by ground!

" Everyone hurried to land.

Behind them the Withered Silence Ridge Root Demon came hunting them, and they ran for their lives. Passing a pool, a great fish suddenly leapt from the water, seized one man and shook him this way and that, biting the young master to death and dragging him down into the water.