Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
The sound was almost constant, and the Snake-Bone Masked One had heard it many times during these days of flight.
She knew it was the sound of the young man's feet hitting the ground.
It was the collision of flesh and earth, the sound of pure force striking the earth.
The earth was the drum, his feet the drumsticks.
One step, one sound, never ceasing!
Hearing this sound meant the young man was drawing near again.
The small pits his feet stamped into the Yang Kingdom's soil formed a long line, stretching from beyond the border of Yuezhang County in Rizhao to here in Chiwei County.
The Snake-Bone Masked One had to admit it was a difficult path.
Jiang Wang's perseverance moved her.
The hatred embodied in that perseverance frightened her even more!
She would never allow this fear to be seen, so she stood up.
Jiang Wang's condition wasn't good, but it wasn't too terrible either.
This pursuit had certainly consumed a vast amount of Dao Essence reserves, to the point where his nine Great Star River Daosuan plus the Entangled Star Spirit Snake couldn't keep up. But the continuous operation of the Four Spirits Body Tempering Art had instead strengthened his physical body—he had never tempered his flesh in such a way before.
Compared to swordsmanship and Dao arts, he had actually spent the least effort on physical cultivation, due to his planning of his own combat system.
He once had the illusion that he could run until the end of time—in reality, that would only run him to death.
Now stopping here, both his stamina and Dao Essence greatly depleted, not in his strongest state, but he still had confidence in defeating his opponent.
This confidence hadn't come overnight.
It was earned through battle after battle, victory after victory.
The fact that the other party turned and fled as soon as she confirmed he had killed the Pig-Bone Masked One showed she couldn't possibly be stronger than the Pig-Bone Masked One.
And he, Jiang Wang, had never stopped working hard, nor stopped improving.
The Jiang Wang who killed Xi Munan was even stronger than the Jiang Wang who killed the Pig-Bone Masked One!
...
Just as Jiang Wang leaped from the forest and saw the woman in the conical hat rise from the clearing, he "heard" the bell.
He quickly realized.
The sound didn't enter through his ears—it arose from within his heart.
He felt a bit dizzy, his forehead burning.
His body was very itchy... he wanted to scratch through his skin!
But this sensation lasted only an imperceptible instant. The four spirit phantoms on his body's surface converged, and his mind cleared instantly.
The long sword rose vertically!
Ding~
A very faint, very thin sound.
But it was the Snake-Bone Masked One's palm blade approaching his face, stopped at the last possible moment by Everlasting Longing!
The Snake-Bone Masked One took short steps forward, attacking again with her palm blade.
After Everlasting Longing's blade was pushed aside and bent, Jiang Wang simultaneously raised his knee to strike forward.
The Snake-Bone Masked One shifted her palm from a vertical blade to a flat push, one hand pressing against Jiang Wang's sword blade while the other hand, still holding the human sinew, gently shook—the bell rang again.
The Plague Bell rang, and pestilence was born.
Ordinary plague could only kill ordinary people, but when fully driven by the Snake-Bone Masked One, it could already harm transcendent cultivators.
As the Snake-Bone Masked One pushed flat with her palm, Jiang Wang顺势 drifted backward. While retreating, his hands, which had never been idle, completed their seal formation, and the Sea of Blossoms was already spread out.
Jiang Wang returned to the state of being troubled by pestilence, while before the Snake-Bone Masked One's eyes appeared a beautiful scene of flourishing flowers.
Both parties were confused, but the body forged by the Four Spirits Body Tempering Art and the Azure Cloud Sheep once again bought Jiang Wang time.
Before the Snake-Bone Masked One could penetrate the Sea of Blossoms, he broke free from the pestilence first and lunged forward!
The piercing killing intent and the swirling wind provided the Snake-Bone Masked One with his location.
She immediately twitched her fingers, and the pestilence spread again.
At the same time, with a thought from Jiang Wang, Binding Tiger was unleashed.
The Plague Bell shook.
The Dao art Binding Tiger.
The two engaged in fierce battle both paused strangely for an instant.
As if time and space had frozen—stopping, then moving again.
The Snake-Bone Masked One opened her cherry lips, slightly protruding her delicate tongue, and a cold light shot out explosively, instantly cutting through the veil covering her face and piercing straight at Jiang Wang.
The Serpent Tongue Sword, transformed from the White Bone Dharma Aspect.
The veil was her grass, this sword her fang.
This was her killer move.
But the Serpent Tongue Sword struck empty air.
Jiang Wang appeared at her side, half a body width away, overlapping with her.
He directly raised his long sword, cold light shooting forth, and actually sliced off her tongue!
This was already the third time pestilence had affected Jiang Wang. His body had grown accustomed to it, and it was no longer as unbearable as at first. He reacted half a breath earlier.
And where the Snake-Bone Masked One thought he was was merely the misdirection given by the Sea of Blossoms.
"Ah! Ugh!"
The Snake-Bone Masked One screamed in agony, arching her body, but because her tongue had been cut off, even her scream was incomplete.
Jiang Wang struck without hesitation, punching her abdomen. Dao Essence surged wildly, searching for the location where her Heaven-Reaching Palace's dragon coiled through her Dao Meridian, then precisely pierced with his sword, destroying her Heaven-Reaching Palace!
After the Dao Meridian's soaring dragon, the Heaven-Reaching Palace had shifted position, no longer staying in the spinal sea but roaming in the torso sea.
And only at this moment did a thin, sharp sword fall behind Jiang Wang!
It turned out that although the Snake-Bone Masked One had been cut off and was in agony, the pain she displayed was both an outlet and a disguise—to conceal the return strike of the Serpent Tongue Sword.
But Jiang Wang was faster and more decisive than her, leaving her not even this chance.
Only when the dust had settled did Jiang Wang sheathe his sword and quietly watch the Snake-Bone Masked One roll in agony on the muddy ground.
The veil had been cut away by herself, revealing her beautiful face completely.
Her figure was shapely, rising and falling like mountains, writhing and screaming like a beautiful serpent.
Though her mouth was now full of blood and she was in unbearable pain, there was a kind of cruel beauty to it.
Jiang Wang waited until she was too exhausted to scream or struggle, then half-knelt before her: "Now, shall we talk?"
The Snake-Bone Masked One looked at him with venomous eyes.
Jiang Wang lightly tapped his forehead, as if suddenly remembering: "Sorry, you screamed so miserably that I forgot—you can't speak anymore."
The Snake-Bone Masked One summoned her remaining strength to lunge at him, seemingly wanting to bite him.
But she was held firm by a single finger from Jiang Wang.
Jiang Wang's index finger pressed against her forehead, leaving her unable to move.
"Don't look at me with those eyes. No matter how miserable or painful you are, it won't soften my heart. I've heard even more painful sounds... those sounds... they appear in my dreams every time."
"That's why I don't dare to sleep."
Jiang Wang shook his head slightly, self-deprecatingly: "Why am I telling you this?"
"Let's make a deal." He perked up: "You answer my questions, and I'll give you a swift end. You're from the White Bone Dao—you should know better than me that there are many ways in this world to make life worse than death. Even people like you wouldn't want to try them, right?"
"If you don't speak, I'll take that as agreement."
Jiang Wang ignored her hateful gaze, swept his palm to clear a patch of ground, then picked up her Serpent Tongue Sword and placed the hilt in her hand.
"Don't try to kill yourself—you know you can't do it in front of me. Now I ask, you write. How about that?"
"Putting answers in writing is well-considered speech. It gives you time to think. You can choose to be more specific and truthful, or you can choose to lie to me."
"I know some questions might make your death even more painful, like asking about the White Bone Dao's Twelve Divine Aspect secret techniques, so rest assured, I'll ask with discretion."
"Of course, since I'm being so discreet, you can't brush me off. If you brush me off even once, I'll consider you unwilling to cooperate."
He said softly: "Then the deal is off."
He didn't say what would happen after the deal was off, because there was no need to repeat the consequences.
A wind blew past.
Summer wind still carried warmth, but blowing through the forest branches to this place, for some reason it had a chill to it.
Perhaps because they had traveled too far?
In this uninhabited wasteland.
There were wild grasses growing wildly, unknown summer flowers.
There was a handsome young man asking softly, and a beautiful woman covered in blood.
Lewen