Chapter 125 — Heartbreak

The child trembled from head to foot, watching the black demonic staff in Ming Li's hand flare bright in an instant, flashing with a blood-devouring, greedy, uncanny light. In moments, a dozen or so Li warriors nearby who had been hunting down women and children were, in their instant of shock, torn apart by invisible demonic force; countless streams of blood burst up into the sky and gathered there like a flood, swirling wildly around that despairing, maddened figure, and then were gradually drawn into the Blood-Devouring Bead in Ming Li's hand.

Everyone on the battlefield stopped short in astonishment, staring at this devil-like figure, their eyes filled with nothing but terror.

The Blood-Devouring Bead grew brighter and brighter. The familiar chill no longer merely coursed within his body; now, having drained the essence blood of more than a dozen in an instant, the bead was as though reborn, its demonic power surging. The strange red light grew ever brighter, mirrored in Ming Li's eyes like ghost fire.

Xiaobai stood at a distance, staring blankly at that figure growing ever more bloody and mad. Suddenly she turned her head away, unwilling to look any longer. In the night wind and bloody rain, it seemed she gave a soft sigh.

The long-vanished savagery, the cry buried deep in the heart, the defiance that had once flashed and vanished since ages past—all at once rose up again.

He howled!

Heaven and earth answered.

The flames in the sky and the red curtain on the earth trembled together.

Within that bloody light, there was a grin that seemed to come from the underworld itself.

One step, taken!

The stench of blood filled the air in an instant. Countless people scattered and fled, unable to understand how this man who had come to save them had suddenly become a demon.

Only, only—the sweetness of that fresh blood lay right before him, so intoxicating that he could not restrain himself. He drew deep breaths, gasping heavily; within the madness, was there still a trace of pain...

Lonely because mad?

Or mad because lonely?

The Blood-Devouring Bead was right at his hand, keeping him company, never leaving his side—only its flickering red light seemed to mock the world of men.

Sink, sink away!

All things are as ants and worms,

And life is loneliness itself!

He reached out to seize—blood drops slid from the edges of his fingers. Beneath his palm the mute boy trembled, unable to move, watching a curtain of red come veiling sky and sun. Was this, then, the hour of death...

...

"Zhang! Xiao! Fan..."

Across the horizon, that voice suddenly came—like ice split and snow cut, like the phoenix crying to the nine heavens, bearing endless fury, bearing unending grief!

Lu Xueling, white-robed as snow, came cleaving through the air amid the bloody light. The Tianxuan in her hand flashed from its sheath, its blue radiance shining upon her face, her eyes, her fury and her sorrow.

Red light flared up to meet it head-on. Thunder crashed; in an instant the earth for ten zhang around split asunder, and the river not far off, its waters already dyed red with blood, was driven surging up into the sky, setting the whole heavens ablaze.

Amid the spray of blood, in the distance the great shaman could hold out no longer. The red curtain gradually weakened, and great fireballs began to pierce through it, crashing down upon the ground of Qili Tong. Amid roaring and screams, the flames blazed—like a hell on earth.

Within the sea of fire, red and blue clashed and then parted. The woman in white descended slowly, not a trace of color left in her face.

Before her stood the panting figure, wreathed in fierce light and bloody flame, the one who held the blood-devouring demonic staff...

A hot wind stirred her robes and her hair. In the firelight, her body was visibly trembling.

Only the hand that gripped Tianxuan did not move at all, so tightly was it clenched.

With a sharp hiss, Facheng, Li Xun, and the others came down one after another, landing behind Lu Xueling—yet among them all, Shangguan Lue's figure was nowhere to be seen. They saw before them that devil-like Ming Li, his whole body drenched in blood, his face savage and cruel; all who had known him before were aghast. Li Xun bore it somewhat better, but a pain that could not be wiped away flitted through Facheng's eyes, and his body seemed to tremble as he softly intoned the name of Buddha.

"You—you..." The expression on Lu Xueling's face could no longer hold to her accustomed coldness; there was only grief and fury. At this moment she could not even speak.

Li Xun stood beside her, taking in her expression. What a clever man he was—he would never imagine that Lu Xueling had lost her composure merely out of indignation.

"Zhang Qingyue!" Li Xun shouted, his expression solemn and furious. "These southern border folk have never had any dealings with the Central Plains. What grudge do you bear them, that you should take such pleasure in killing?"

Ming Li and Lu Xueling both shuddered almost at the same instant.

Ming Li, shrouded in the red light of the Blood-Devouring Bead, slowly looked around. The Miao and Li had fought long and bitterly; the two peoples were already enemies to the death, and this was a battle to the last breath, merciless in every stroke. Corpses lay strewn across the ground in every direction, most too horrible to look upon, their deaths cruel beyond words. Worse still, the great crowd of Miao women and children who had just been driven from their hiding place by the Li warriors now lay dead and wounded in heaps.

The hatred between Li and Miao was irreconcilable; they spared not even women and children. The scenes of carnage, together with the blazing flames all around, made a hell on earth.

And Ming Li, drowned in blood—at this moment, in whose eyes was he anything but the murderer who had caused it all?

He stood like a blood-devouring demon king, fierce and cruel, upon this slaughterhouse ground.

Greedy and wicked, violent and mad!

And perhaps, buried deep, a trace of despair.

The mild, harmonious yang energy that came too late, as though pinned motionless by the demonic power of the Blood-Devouring Bead, only now began to seep out drop by drop, offsetting little by little the chill that had coiled around his heart.

But he suddenly gave a bitter laugh. Perhaps he would rather never wake.

Through the blazing flames, the grieving gaze of the woman in white pierced through every barrier in the world—straight into whose heart?

She slowly raised the sword in her hand; Tianxuan's radiance was like autumn water.

"Zhang, Xiao, Fan..."

A faint, faint voice came low from beyond the blazing flames. She had bitten her lip; she had shed tears.

Tears mingled with drops of blood fell softly upon the blade of Tianxuan, quietly, sliding down; by the time they touched the ground, they had become water and blood.

Who was it, that broke whose heart...

"Ah!"

Ming Li howled to the heavens. In the sea of blood and fire, his heart was clear, yet the man was mad.

Break it off! Break it off!

Let the past be severed clean with a single stroke!

He grinned savagely in the firelight, cloaking his pain in madness. The Blood-devouring Bead surged with boundless crimson radiance, accompanying its master as he charged toward the side of righteousness!

Someone, far away, sighed softly—but in the end, no one could hear it.

That figure of despair seemed faintly as it had once been. The righteous cultivators shouted in fury and braced themselves, and it was that figure which was mirrored in the bright eyes of Lu Xueling.

Her lips trembled slightly, and she murmured low to herself—that man charging forward in his madness...

"Zhang Qingyue..." In a voice no one could hear, quietly, for the third time, she called his name.

Then she charged forward with her sword, white robes like snow, like a lily in the flames—haggard, and yet still so beautiful.

Zheng!