Chapter 422 - Roiling Grudge

Xiao Chen groaned, his gaze lowering to see blood flowing unstamped from where Li Muxue’s hand was planted into him. He managed a weak smile and made no attempt to strike nor push away the Desecrated Li Muxue. Gasps and cries of shock chorused from behind him. But no one else was more startled by Luo Shangyan and her companions. Yu Yifeng was lurching with distress and anxiety, but he did not dare come closer. “Lil Chen! Come back here!” He cried.

If Xiao Chen had heard him, he made no sign of it. He merely raised a head to look at everyone around him; the frightened eyes of the now-daunted invaders, the concerned and worried looks from his companions of the Jade Qing Sect, but he did nothing. He did not make any move to defend himself nor did he channel any of his spiritual powers, afraid that he might in turn injure Li Muxue. Whoever she was, Hua Weiyang or Li Muxue, he would never be able to raise a finger against her.

With a stare so blank and lost that she almost seemed like trapped in a distant dream, the Desecrated Li Muxue gasped huskily, “W-why… Why did you… not defend yourself?”

Xiao Chen smiled. His hand, the outstretched one, reached for Li Muxue’s face and caressed gently on the smooth skin of her cheek, feeling only a tinge of coldness.

Li Muxue hardly flinched nor winced; she held Xiao Chen in her hollow stare, her gaze like an innocent little child as she continued in her sweet and soft voice, “I-I recognize not… not the name you say… B-but… there’s a force in you… a force that I wish for… Can you… can you give it to me?”

Amidst the consternation and trepidation all around them, the Great Immortal and Ye Wuxin heaved a sigh of relief, sharing the very same thought, What a relief. So she is only after the powerful Malicious Grudge in Xiao Chen… The primal urges as a Desecrated… Like the Walking Corpses’ thirst for blood…

“Whatever you want,” Xiao Chen breathed, still wearing a benign smile, “I’ll give it to you. Whatever you want. My powers, my life. Everything.”

A crooked smile broke across Li Muxue’s face. A smile that mirrored his. “T-thank you… Thank you…” She spoke. As soon as she was finished, Xiao Chen could feel his powers roiling inside him, flowing through his wound and into her arm.

With his powers, so went his life force. Li Muxue continued her ingestion of Xiao Chen’s power and life, right before the terrified and alarmed looks of Yu Yifeng and the rest of the invaders and even Su Lianyue, from her hiding spot, drew a deep, long, and anxious breath.

Xiao Chen felt the fatigue slowly taking its toll as more of his life force was sapped away. His eyelids weighed like lead and he felt like collapsing into deep sleep. The Desecrated Li Muxue asked softly, “A-are… are you in pain?”

His lips were as pale as the cheeks of his, as white as curdling milk. He smiled and shook his head. Li Muxue smiled at him like a child, “I-I… I thought you are in pain… That’s why I had not tried harder…” Then he felt her hand moving when she had finished, burrowing deeper into him with more blood leaking out profusely.

Xiao Chen groaned. A drizzle of blood escaped the edges of his lips and the loss of his life force made him more and more tired. This must be death, he reflected, It was the first time he felt this way; he had never once felt life ebbing swiftly from him no matter how badly wounded he was in the past. Perhaps the end was coming for him.

“Take my powers, take my life. But please. Kill no more. Please…” Xiao Chen begged with his hand still feeling the cheek of the woman before him. He was still dour by the blood she spilled and the lives she had taken. Hua Weiyang or Li Muxue, he would never want either of them to become a mindless abomination capable only of killing and slaughter.

Li Muxue peered at him. Gingerly, she said, “A-are you dying? I don’t want you to die…” But Xiao Chen shook his head, “It’s fine… I have the Undead Body… I will never die…”

“B-but I get the feeling that you’d die once I’ve finished absorbing your powers… I don’t want you to die…”

No one could hear them. No one knew what they were talking about. There were only curious and dubious stares from both sides of the battlefield, watching the pair of man and woman in a tender moment at the center of the chaos. Yu Yifeng could see that Xiao Chen’s health was failing. Making several hand seals, he turned himself into a bolt of lightning that zipped across the distance towards Xiao Chen. But before he could come near, Li Muxue’s sleeves flapped like banners in the wind and she sent a magical bolt that slammed into Yu Yifeng and he crashed off several yards away.

A mouthful of froth and blood poured out of Yu Yifeng’s mouth as he yelled with all his might, “WAKE UP, LIL CHEN! THAT’S NOT MUXUE!”

But Xiao Chen merely smiled, making no signs of having heard Yu Yifeng’s words. Then he heard himself muttering, “Ofttimes flowers have petals of five, with the exception for the bloom of snow, which is known as Weiyang (Yet-ending flowers)… This is what you told me before… Do you remember these words…”

“The bloom of snow… Yet-ending Flowers…” Li Muxue murmured delicately as if searching through her mind for a long, distant memory. Xiao Chen grinned, “That’s what you told me. You love Yet-ending Flowers. Do you remember this?”

“X-Xiao Chen… Is that you…” The look on Li Muxue’s face looked more bewildered than she was seconds ago and her hand slowly drew out. The Great Immortal and Ye Wuxin standing opposite yelped with surprise, “What in the world?! Something must have gone wrong!”

“I-I… I’m…” Li Muxue held her head, her footsteps wobbling as if she was feeling thousands of needles pricking at her mind. Xiao Chen extended an arm to hold her, keeping her still. Softly, he whispered, “We should leave. Leave all this behind. Whatever they want, whatever the world wants, I won’t even care. Why should we even care?! Come, let us leave.”

In a throaty voice, each and every word heaved from his throat as if they weighed like iron. His heart was as much as dour as the words that passed his lips; he would not have even batted an eye for whatever these people do. But why!? He almost wanted to scream aloud. Why involve Muxue into all these?! At this very moment, bringing Muxue away from all the senseless killing and slaughter was the only thing he wanted to do, vengeance and fury be damned. To distance her from the many distractions of this world and to protect her from the cruel barbs of reality.

“Leave this place… All right… I’ll go with you…” The Desecrated Li Muxue nodded and touched at the blood-sodden wound on Xiao Chen’s chest. “A-are you… are you still in pain? I-I’m… I’m sorry.”

Xiao Chen smiled. With a shake of his head, he slowly led her away. With one step after another, they slowly limped away from the center of the square, leaving everyone else staring with shock and incredulity. “Damn it!” The Great Immortal from Hell spat and Ye Wuxin beside him no longer placid and composed.

They moved as one, breaking from the formation of the defenders and lunged at Xiao Chen with all the speed they could muster. Xiao Chen sensed them approaching and stopped in his tracks. He was too weak to defend himself, nevermind another companion. But Li Muxue merely muttered, “D-don’t worry…” With a flail of her sleeve, she sent forth a magical bolt that struck both men in the chest and they crashed several yards away, vomiting mouthfuls of blood.

The defenders began reeling with fear. No one could believe what was happening. The Divine Corpse was operating against the wishes of its masters!? They were still coping with the panic of losing their most powerful instrument when they heard a dull groan that sounded like a monster snarling. It was the Corpse King! It was shuddering violently, as if trying to free itself from the influence of its masters too! “Dammit!” Ye Wuxin cursed, “Are they all running out of control now?!” He slapped a runic talisman on the forehead of the Corpse King and finally it calmed down.

Xiao Chen and the Desecrated Li Muxue slowly hobbled away from the battlefield, under the dubious but silent stares of both armies of defenders and invaders when suddenly, a powerful aura, cold as death and as powerful as the breaking of a dam, flooded the entire Ridge. Li Muxue jerked her head in its direction and cried, “Oh no! The Mistress is summoning me!”

Xiao Chen felt it too. It was Red Sleeve! “Calm down,” he cried, “Come with me! You don’t belong here! Not to them or to anyone else!”

“I-I’m sorry… I cannot… I cannot go with you.” Li Muxue shoved him aside and darted back to the sarcophagus. As she clambered once more inside, Xiao Chen cried, “Muxue!” With his Immortal-override Steps, he raced as fast as he could towards her, but to no avail; the green sarcophagus slammed its lid shut and took off into the sky before he could reach her.

It sped across the sky, finally becoming a single dot in the distance before it completely vanished. Xiao Chen let loose a feral howl, his eyes bulging to the point of bursting and his hair lashing over his face.

“RED SLEEVE! AND YOU LOT OF THE CORPSE REFINERY SECT!”

His thunderous roar echoed across the battlefield, bouncing off whatever structures still standing that no one could miss the anger, frustration, and hatred in his voice. The Malicious Grudge in him swelled and his left eye turned red again. On his flank, the army of invaders was all but beaten; their morale was so low that they could no longer mount another assault. Suddenly, before they knew it, the air turned blood-red around them; a scarlet mist had shrouded the battlefield.

The scarlet mist covered the entire battlefield and in the blink of an eye, hundreds of Corpse Puppets, all still greasy with blood dripping off their limbs, appeared out of the thick air! The sudden appearance of the Corpse Puppets in their midst took the invaders of the Orthodox Path by surprise. These were hardly the common Corpse Puppets they have been fighting against, but Blood Corpses, one of the more formidable killing contrivances of the Corpse Refinery Sect.

The Blood Corpses stood in the path leading down the slopes of the Ridge, barring the invaders’ way of retreat; the grisly sight of their rotting flesh and flayed skin only made them all the more grotesquely hideous under the bright sunlight.

Even in the daylight, the atmosphere at the Ridge was cold. Not because of the altitude, but because of the deathly aura gave off by the hundreds and thousands of Corpse Puppets looming menacingly around the invaders. Their Rancorous Qi swirled everywhere like ghost-like apparitions sending shivers down the spines of the mages that some cowered behind the backs of their Elders and leaders.

But amidst the restless angst and confusion, no one realized what was happening to Xiao Chen. His breathing grew erratic and his right eye too slowly turned red. Would that anyone saw the flow of the Rancorous Qi emanating from the Blood Corpses, they would have been able that the foul and evil aura was flowing nowhere else, but roiling into Xiao Chen through his opened chest wound.

The battle broke out again, only this time it was the mages of the Orthodox Path taking heavy losses. Banners fell and men crumbled, bloodied and battered. Fueled and enlivened by their rich Malicious Grudge, the legion of Blood Corpses decimated the ranks of the invaders. These were former disciples, students, and acolytes of the Corpse Refinery Sect forcibly doomed to be Corpse Puppets alive, either by just punishment or wrongful judgment. The process of being turned into these mindless abominations alive was so painful that they incurred the feeling of rage and hate so strong that their Malicious Grudge was richer and thicker than common Corpse Puppets. This made them so powerful that they could easily kill a mage with the Nascent Soul Realm with a lift of a finger.

The invaders were all locked in gritting battles. Not for taking the Ridge, but their own survival. Elders, Mentors, and Leaders of the Orthodox Path fared better than their younger counterparts. Extensive battle experiences worth much more than promising and remarkable talent in the face of battle. Zuoqiu Yang swung and pierced at every enemy that crossed his path. Yet none of his strokes seemed to work; the enemies just would not fall. And with each blow he dealt, Zuoqiu Yang felt his confidence dipping by one bit.

Even with her Autumn Water, Xiaoyue could do no more than to kill only one or two of these Blood Corpses. The worse could be said for Su Zimu’s Heavenly Thirteen Swords which could hardly even penetrate the strong and sturdy hides of these Blood Corpses. At another corner, there was Yu Yifeng, desperately defending himself with the Dance of the Arcing Rainbow. He was locked in a stalemate against a pair of Blood Corpses trying to strike him down, but he was tiring and his enemies were not.

In the chaos of the battle, no one save for Su Lianyue, still perched on her hiding place amongst the trees, was looking at Xiao Chen. A dark smog hung over his face like a many-layered mask of death and he lowered his head, sniggering devilishly like a deranged man being possessed by a demon.

A Blood Corpse saw him and lunged at him. Still giggling vilely, he hardly paid any heed to it. But when it reached before him, there was the sickening crunch of bones and flesh and the spattering of blood. He had lanced his arm through the chest of the monster like how the Desecrated Li Muxue had done to him earlier.

Immediately, the body of the Blood Corpse began to wilt like a dead plant with its life completely bled dry. In mere seconds, it became a dry, blackened husk. A parched and shriveled mummy.

Xiao Chen tossed aside the dried husk like he would a handful of filth. Then he snickered again in evil glee, his hand raising towards a faraway Blood Corpse and magically drew it to him before he speared his arm through it again. Several heartbeats later, this too became a dried and shriveled mummy.

This continued with the killing of more than a half-dozen of Blood Corpses only people began to realize what he was doing. Ye Wuxin saw the dried husks lying ignominiously on the cobblestones of the square like pieces of dried wood and debris that were formerly his prized Blood Corpses and gasped frightfully, “IMPOSSIBLE! How…”

“Heh heh heh heh…”

Everything stopped; the clangor of battle, the cries and howls of anguish, and all other noises came to a rest. A dreadful and cadaverous silence lulled across the square as the fighting came to a sudden halt. Everyone stopped in their tracks and the Blood Corpses all paused at once. There was only the chilly and macabre sense of death lingering in the mists that shrouded the battlefield aside for Xiao Chen’s sinister cackle ringing through the fog like the bells of death…