Chapter 628: Crimson Light to the Skies (1/2)

Tomb keepers!

Lu Yun could clearly identify that the emperor’s daughter had turned Zhao Chong and his men into tomb keepers. Though alive, their souls had been sealed into zombie flesh. Moreover, after the ghost king’s destruction, Zhao Chong had inherited its role of nurturing hellfire. His attack contained the full strength he’d achieved in life, the power of a dao immortal with one aether dao fruit.

For Lu Yun, an attack of that level was an immense threat; the fiery blade was keen enough to end his life. With Sacred Origin Runes as core and hellfire as blade, the strike fell with world-ending momentum.

Clank!

Dark red light flashed in front of Lu Yun and shattered the blade strike. Sent reeling by the collision, Zhao Chong crashed heavily into the wall behind him and slumped to the ground in a daze.

Diexi’s fluttering shortsword hovered in front of Lu Yun like a shield before darting back into her hand like a bloody butterfly.

“Zhao Qing, I won’t mind killing you again if you try to stop me.” Her voice could freeze one to the bone. Once made of downy-yellow silk, her dress was now woven with coarse, washed out fabric. It looked old-fashioned, yet also very neat. Even her long hair, normally black as night, had turned grey.

Dense corpse energy emanated from her figure and kept the fearsome yin energy in the vicinity at bay. Two dots of scarlet light roamed in the depths of her eyes, her bloody gaze giving rise to innumerable mountains of corpses and a boundless ocean of blood.

……

“This isn’t Diexi, it’s her sword!” Lu Yun inhaled sharply when he realized something was amiss with the zombie king. The strength she now wielded didn’t come from herself, but from the shortsword in her hand.

He opened the Spectral Eye to look upon her. But as he did so, she imperceptibly glanced in his way and sent a sharp pain through his eyes. Hastily turning his gaze away, he realized with great shock that she’d now exceeded the ghost king and reached an entirely new level of existence, just like the woman sitting on the imperial throne.

Zhao Qing, the emperor’s daughter, quietly observed Diexi and ultimately heaved an inaudible sigh. Meanwhile, Zhao Chong took his men with him and returned to the palace coffin after getting back on his feet.

Rumble!

The palace coffin’s gates shut with a resounding bang, and the world returned to darkness.

“A corner of hell… it’s the three coffins in front of the throne!” Lu Yun mumbled to himself as he studied the darkness in front of him. “If I can obtain these coffins, I can take back this fragment of hell!”

“You won’t be able to.” Diexi’s voice reverberated inside the darkness like a phantasm. “The three coffins are one with the throne coffin. This throne coffin is carved out from the core of a star, and to budge it with just the few of you is beyond impossible.”

“Are you Diexi, or someone else?” Qing Yu looked back. Two beams of light, as blue as the firmament of the world, shone from her eyes and pierced the darkness.

Seeing Qing Yu’s gaze, Diexi couldn’t help but frown.

“Diexi, you say? Is that what I’m currently called?” She looked down at the short sword in her hand and sighed gently. “Let’s go, I’ll help you take the three coffins.”

Disregarding Qing Yu’s question, she turned her head to the side and studied the palace coffin’s vague outline in the darkness.

“You’re the spirit of the sword,” Lu Yun suddenly said in astonishment. “Diexi was created from the body of an ancient zombie and the spirit of a sword, then nurtured into a zombie king!”