Against the Gods

Chapter 2035: Reusing An Old Trick

Thanks to his ability to imbue his divine perception on abyssal dust, Yun Che’s perception range far exceeded even Hua Qingying’s, a peak Divine Limit Realm profound practitioner. That was why he could vaguely sense Hua Caili even from such a distance.

After finding a sufficiently big black stone and scanning the surrounding abyssal beasts, Yun Che sat down beside the rock, withdrew his aura, and waited.

When he closed his eyes, he recalled the amazing attack Hua Caili had executed. As he replayed it over and over again in his soul sea, Li Suo suddenly said, “That’s the Heaven Breaking Sword.”

Yun Che opened his eyes and exclaimed in surprise, “You know it?”

Mo Su, the young man in Ni Xuan’s memory fragment, had once brought up the “Ninety Nine Heaven Breaking Swords”. Naturally, it reminded him of the Heaven Breaker Kingdom of God immediately.

“Mo E had created a good number of sword arts.”

Li Suo said slowly as her memories grew clearer with direction, “The Heaven Challenging Sword… the Heaven Subjugation Sword… the Heaven Controlling Sword… the Heaven Breaking Sword…”

“And finally… the Heaven Punishing Sword.”

Yun Che’s pupils contracted a little. He was shocked not because that the Heaven Breaking Sword the Heaven Breaker Kingdom of God cultivated really was the sword art Mo E created, but because their names… antagonized the heavens every step of the way.

All four Creation Gods were bestowed a mission by the Ancestral God. The Creation God of Life was responsible for creating and protecting life, the Creation God of Order kept the order, and the Creation God of the Elements maintained the balance of the elements. In that case, what about the Heaven Punishing God Emperor?

Was he given the mission to “punish” the heavens?

“Mo E is the only one who can cultivate the Heaven Punishing Sword as it was the pinnacle sword art bestowed by the Ancestral God herself,” Li Suo explained. “As for the four sword arts I mentioned, they are all created by Mo E.”

“The scene you replayed in your head just now is the first technique of the Ninety Nine Heaven Breaking Swords, the First Sword. Its form is acceptable, but its essence is less than one-hundredth of the real thing. That said, mortals are much inferior to gods, and for one to successfully cultivate even a sliver of its essence is deserving of praise.”

“Say,” Yun Che probed, “would you happen to know… the Heaven Breaking Sword as well?”

A short silence later, Li Suo replied, “Xi Ke preferred to be alone, so I rarely made contact with him. Ni Xuan, Mo E and I are very close, and we never hid anything from each other. As soon as Mo E finished creating the Heaven Breaking Sword, he immediately taught it to Ni Xuan and me. He claimed that it was because peer review is important, but in reality he just wanted to brag about his achievement.”

Mo E was too upright and outspoken, and Ni Xuan and Li Suo knew him too well. They could literally guess what he was going to say or do just looking at his expression.

“However, I don’t get involved with powers that kill, and Ni Xuan didn’t like the Way of the Sword. Therefore, he memorized it but never cultivated it.”

Yun Che’s mouth twitched. That was what Li Suo thought, but not only did Ni Xuan master the Heaven Breaking Ninety Nine Sword, he even used it to make a bet with Mo E.

It was that bet that finally convinced Mo E to set aside his pride and entrust Mo Su to his hands.

“Do you still remember the sword art?”

“No.”

Li Suo’s answer was expected yet disappointing. However, she added, “I can only recall… the First Sword.”

“That’s all I need!” Yun Che’s eyes immediately lit up again. “Tell me now. And if you remember any other sword art, don’t hesitate to imprint them into my soul sea immediately.”

Li Suo advised, “To learn the Heaven Breaking Sword, you must first master the Heaven Challenging Sword, the Heaven Subjugation Sword, and the Heaven Controlling Sword. But you—”

“I’m not bound by the limits of others,” Yun Che interrupted her rudely, “and mastering the Heaven Breaking Sword isn’t my goal.”

……

Four hours later, Yun Che finally sensed Hua Caili rising back to her feet.

Although she was exhausted, her injuries weren’t actually that severe. Add to the fact that she was given the best healing and recovery pills a Kingdom of God could afford, she had regained almost half of her profound energy already.

Yun Che finally opened his eyes as well.

It’s time to begin.

He summoned the Heaven Smiting Devil Slayer Sword and struck the ground, shaking the earth and sending rocks flying everywhere.

The surrounding abyssal beasts were immediately alerted by the loud noise and charged him instinctively. Roars immediately filled his ears.

Multiple abyssal beasts were approaching him from multiple directions, but instead of sending them away like he normally did, he actually lowered his protective profound energy and allowed them to strike him with their power of destruction.

Shred! Boom!

An abyssal beast’s claws were probably one of the scariest weapons in this world. As a result, they easily cleaved through Yun Che’s flesh. At the same time, his back was struck by a blast of destructive energy.

Yun Che was wounded and covered in blood in just the blink of an eye.

There was a loud boom as Yun Che was sent skidding across the ground. His feet left behind a pair of deep gouges, and he earned yet another horrifying-looking wound.

Boom!!

It was only then that Yun Che activated Hell Monarch and sent the abyssal beasts flying. After the Heaven Smiting Devil Slayer Sword flew back into his hand, Yun Che stopped holding back and crushed all the abyssal beasts who attacked him. Every time he swung his sword, the earth would shake, and blood and gore would spill everywhere.

When everything had returned to silence once more, this dead zone had transformed into a bloody hell.

Yun Che was covered in blood. Half of it belonged to himself, and half of it belonged to the abyssal beasts. His whole body was covered in horrifying wounds as well.

Surprisingly, Yun Che muttered, “This isn’t nearly enough,” and spread out his divine perception. He quickly commanded more abyssal beasts to charge toward him.

Half an hour later, Yun Che was resting his back on a piece of broken rock and sitting atop a pool of dark blood. He was surrounded by dozens of broken corpses, and the area itself looked like it had been struck by a calamity. There was literally nowhere in the area that was intact. A vermillion sword was stabbed into the ground and shining a piercing light.

“Sss…” Yun Che gasped a little. He hadn’t tried to control the abyssal beasts, and their suicidal, berserk way of fighting made him suffer more injuries than he had anticipated. Thankfully, his face wasn’t hurt so badly that it was unrecognizable.

“You’re reusing an old trick,” Li Suo said quietly. She had been silent since her initial gasp of surprise.

No one knew better than her that Yun Che’s external injuries were far, far worse than his internal injuries. He was planning to use the same tactic he had used on Helian Lingzhu when he first arrived in the Abyss.

“There is no better and faster way to get someone to lower their guard or get close to you,” Yun Che grinned widely despite his pain, “than to have them save your life one time.”

“You are sure she will come to your aid?” Li Suo asked.

“She will,” Yun Che replied without any hesitation, “because I saved her twice.”

Li Suo didn’t question his answer. Previously, Yun Che had “rescued” Hua Caili earlier only because it seemed like a good opportunity; one that would pay great dividends in the future. But now, he was absolutely setting Hua Caili up for his objectives.

“And how can you be sure that she will come here?”

Yun Che said slowly, “She just survived a harrowing battle with serious injuries and deep exhaustion. Even with her pills, there is no way she will venture further into the Endless Fog. I’m certain that she will remain in the periphery for the moment, but she won’t be moving with a clear direction in mind. After all, it doesn’t matter where she goes so long as it’s safe, right?”

“When a person moves without a clear direction, they will instinctively obey their senses and instincts, just like any living being in the dark will subconsciously move toward the light.”

“I’m secretly manipulating the speed of the abyssal dust of the area she’s in so that one side will be thinner than the other. It’s very minor, but it should be enough to lead her toward me. She won’t suspect a thing.”

If it was too obvious, Hua Qingying might notice something amiss. But if it wasn’t enough, then Hua Caili wouldn’t be affected by his manipulation.

If he was too far away, then he wouldn’t be able to manipulate the abyssal dust with his divine perception. But if he was too close, then Hua Qingying would easily notice his scheme.

One could say that Hua Qingying’s existence had increased Yun Che’s pressure by more than a hundred fold. His planning and his execution had to be flawless to fool the number one peak Divine Limit Realm profound practitioner in the world.

His injuries, his aura when he was seriously injured, the distribution of the abyssal beasts’ corpses, the traces he left behind while fighting for his life… he had considered everything.

In the Abyss, no Divine Master had ever thought to fool the Sword Fairy’s eyes and ears, much less tried.

Li Suo fell silent and mulled over Yun Che’s words carefully.

In the past, she, the Creation God of Life, was the pinnacle of holiness, beauty, and goodness.

After she awakened, she was like a piece of white paper that was slowly filling in the blanks as time passed.

Li Suo once said that her soul was pure white when she initially awakened. Not only were her past memories and experiences blurry, but she was completely detached from them. Even when she recalled them, she felt like a different person peering into another person’s memories.

Despite this, Yun Che hadn’t really taken her words to mind. He… and perhaps Li Suo herself believed that she would eventually return to the former Creation God of Life she was when her memories and experiences had cleared up completely.

Neither of them realized that Yun Che’s experiences affected Li Suo’s newborn soul far more than her previous memories and experiences. One might say that everything he said and did affected Li Suo’s personality, common sense, and understanding of the world far, far more than the memories she had already distanced herself from.

No one could say what the former Creation God of Life would become under Yun Che’s unwitting “tutelage”.

Meanwhile, Yun Che was concentrating on Hua Caili’s movements. He could tell that she was moving closer and closer to her, and that she was following the invisible path he had laid out for her almost perfectly.

He turned his perception toward the abyssal beasts in the surrounding area.

The timing of their appearance must be perfect…

Suddenly, a flash of inspiration entered his mind.

No, I think I have a better option.

He raised his hand and summoned a big abyssal crystal. It was a priceless treasure to profound practitioners exploring the periphery of the Endless Fog because the chances that a Divine Sovereign abyssal beast would carry one was less than one in a hundred, and less than one in fifty for a Divine Master abyssal beast. Moreover, they usually weighed one or two catties at most.

The abyssal crystal Yun Che was holding easily weighed over thirty catties. Even a Half-God would have difficulties procuring an abyssal crystal, but for Yun Che, it was all too easy because he could sense exactly which abyssal beast had an abyssal crystal in them.

All he needed to do was to command all abyssal beasts that carried abyssal crystals in them to his side. Then, he could just rip them right out of their bodies. The abyssal beasts wouldn’t resist or perish. Even their breached bodies would heal swiftly thanks to the abyssal dust.

This was why there was a literal hill of abyssal crystal in the Sky Poison Pearl. His hoard had grown to the point he couldn’t even be bothered to procure an abyssal crystal that had taken form naturally.

He dropped the abyssal crystal between the severed halves of a gigantic abyssal beast and made sure that it wasn’t tainted by the blood. It shone a strange, grayish light as it lay quietly on the ground.

He exhaled slightly, and the blood started draining away from his face. His aura had also become exceptionally weak.

Hua Caili was walking very slowly. Her nerves were still as taut as a string because she hadn’t recovered from the harrowing experience from before.

She didn’t think that the danger would increase so dramatically just because she had ventured a little deeper into the Endless Fog.

For the past half a year, the greatest number of abyssal beasts she had triggered at the same time was seven. But this time, she had triggered over twenty abyssal beasts in one go.

If it wasn’t for Yun Che, she might have perished already.

No wonder her aunt told her to never act beyond one’s competence.

That said, it was thanks to the fatal crisis that she managed to glimpse a wisp of the Heaven Breaking sword intent and unleashed the First Sword.

It was at this moment that the air entering her nostrils changed a little. She could smell not just abyssal dust, but also the blood stench of an abyssal beast.

Sword lights appeared in her eyes immediately. The Glass Cloud Sword was already standing by her side.

Blood, bone and gore were everywhere. There were also signs of massive destruction.

Judging from the abyssal dust dissipating from the corpses, it had only been a while since they had died. Clearly, a terrific battle had just taken place here a while ago.

Hua Caili withdrew her aura completely and slowly continued forward. It was at this moment she caught a glimpse of vermillion.

It was a massive sword that was stabbed into the ground. Hua Caili immediately recognized it as the sword Yun Che used to save her earlier. Its vermillion glow was so distinct that it was impossible not to remember it.

Could it be…?

Her heart clenched, and she broke her concealment and rushed forward.

When she got close to the Heaven Smiting Devil Slayer Sword, she saw a bloodied silhouette slumped against a piece of jagged rock. His pale, scarred face caused her to hold her breath.

It is him…

Is he… dead…?

She was in a daze when the vermillion sword abruptly let out a metallic shriek and flew to Yun Che’s side. At the same time, Yun Che opened his eyes. The light in his eyes was weak, but it was sharp like the glint of a hungry eagle.

When he saw Hua Caili though, he froze for a second before relaxing completely. The arm he just barely raised fell back to his side as he rasped, “It’s… you…”

“Are you alright?” Hua Caili let out a small sigh of relief when she saw that he was still alive.

Yun Che didn’t answer her. Instead, he asked in a weak voice, “You… weren’t following me, were you?”

It had only been less than six hours since they last met, and the Endless Fog was a vast, vast place. His suspicion was perfectly reasonable.

Hua Caili hurriedly shook her head. “No! I was just passing through as I was heading back to the periphery. I promise!”

A smile flickered across Yun Che’s bloodless face seeing how serious she was. “I was just kidding.”