Chapter: 851 (1/2)
AST 851 – Nine Yang Golden Body, Confounded Retreat
“Grand Elder, today’s the lucky day. We have finally found the man with the legendary ‘Nine Yang Golden Body’,” The woman named Huang Wu said to the old man in a respectful tone.
Qing Shui, on the other hand, quickly raised his cautiousness and carefully observed the old man. He couldn’t pinpoint the old man’s exact age but the geezer was certainly old, as evidenced by his withering appearance. The old man was also wearing a full set of plain clothes – the simplest, most common clothes in the market – over his moderately thin body. In spite of his appearance, the old man’s eyes were gleaming with a bizarre mannerism – it was weird and perplexing.
When Qing Shui saw the old man’s cane, he froze. That was the Dragon-Headed Cane, if not very similar to the one kept in the Realm of the Violet Jade Immortal. There wasn’t any obvious difference in terms of their appearances, so for Qing Shui, the canes were of the same kind.
The old man snapped his attention to Qing Shui and revealed a grin. His eyes were transfixed on Qing Shui as he said, “Haha, this is great. I’ve been searching for 300 years for the legendary Nine Yang Golden Body and was about to give up, until you showed up to our doorstep. Thank the Heavens for treating me so well.”
“Nine Yang Golden Body?” This was the second time Qing Shui heard of this term that was supposedly a type of special constitution of a human body. However, he was extremely bewildered because he had heard two different terms to this constitution. In the case of the Marionette Sect, it was the ‘Nine Yang Golden Body’. For the outsiders, it wasn’t the Nine Yang but the body of ‘Nine Yin’ Instead.
Qing Shui was essentially a marionette to this old man – a marionette that could potentially become the Nine Yang Marionette King.
The lower levelled marionettes were more or less walking corpses but they were not dead entirely, as their bodily functions, like the heart, were still intact – all except the brain. In other words, the brain was dead, thus rendering the marionette the incapability of utilizing the basic cognitive functions. Marionettes of lower levels would always display such behavior and as such, the chances of retaliation would be extremely low.
The ‘Nine Yang Golden Body’ was said to be the strongest constitution amongst the other types of constitution for a marionette in the Marionette Sect. Moreover, whoever could obtain such person of said constitution would be able to reach the top level with just the control of the Body, thus achieving the greatest dream a marionette master could strive for. Should they achieve the process of nurturing a marionette to become the Nine Yang Marionette King, the influence and power of the Marionette Sect would never be underestimated ever again.
The old man maintained his gaze on Qing Shui while shivering with an overwhelming sense of excitement.
Qing Shui’s first instinct was to escape quickly as he clearly had no confidence in winning against this old man. In the presence of absolute power, everything was futile. He feared that he wouldn’t be able to kill his opponent even with the deadly forces of his Primordial Flame Ball and Poison Weapons. So the only realistic way was to run when he had the chance to.
Fortunately for Qing Shui, he wasn’t as helpless as he was during the time he faced the woman in the crystal coffin. Last time, his powers and body were confined and restricted, so he wasn’t able to retaliate or move his muscles. So while he had the freedom to move this time, he decided to think of ways to escape this predicament as soon as possible.
“Enough. Don’t even think of escaping, because you can’t. If you try anything, I will make sure you suffer the consequence of doing so,” said the old man as he curved a sly smile on his face.
“Such confidence? Then this Octagon Inn must be the front of your Marionette Sect!” Qing Shui laughed.
“And you’re still able to laugh? You’re right, this Octagon Inn is one of the many outposts of the Marionette Sect. All these years, this outpost had acquired a lot of decent marionettes for our sect.” The old man spoke with pride, as if using the Octagon Inn as a bait to capture potential marionettes was the greatest idea the Marionette Sect ever had.
Qing Shui gathered up all his power within the body and raised his spiritual energy to the maximum. His hand shivered for a moment, then with a quick movement, he shot out ten poisonous Ten Thousand Coldsteel Needles toward his opponents instantaneously!
Petal Rain Under The Skies!
At the same time, Qing Shui exerted his force on his feet and released the Mighty Elephant Stomp!
In a mere second, Qing Shui instantly fell to the lower floors – from the ninth floor to the ground floor – like an ‘atomic bomb’ of a tremendous force. He was able to escape swiftly in the midst of chaos in the Octagon Inn.
Nine Continents Steps!
After Qing Shui had managed to escape through the use of the Nine Continents Steps, the entire Octagon Inn began to collapse instantaneously, killing the unfortunate souls unwittingly caught in the crumbling of the building. The patrons were consisted of men from the supreme aristocratic clans and wealthy merchants, so Qing Shui didn’t feel pity when most of them had died. Those who were able to escape were people of martial cultivators. While some of them were fine, most of them were injured from the falling debris.
The thought of using the 10,000 Years Coldsteel Needles to inflict heavy damage on the old man didn’t cross his mind but the needles were sufficient to block against the Grand Elder’s assault, allowing a small window of time to escape from the predicament.
The old man and the woman quickly dashed outwards, hovering in mid-air as they scanned the area below with attentive eyes. However, no matter where they looked, they just couldn’t seem to find the silhouette of that young man. Realizing something was wrong, they quickly glanced at the heap of debris below their feet.
“He should be here. Why can’t I feel his aura?” The old man ordered his men to remove the debris with haste. Even if they had to dig up the soil below three feet, they must find him – dead or alive.
Unbeknownst to the old man, Qing Shui had already escaped ten thousand li away from the scene through his Nine Continents Steps. He immediately mounted on the Fire Bird without hesitation and flew as far as he could. This incident in addition to the one with the woman in the crystal coffin had made him realize the great disparity between his power and that of his opponents. The road to the top of the martial arts world was still quite far.
He could initiate a split-second kill if he were to fight against martial warriors of the same level. But in the scenario against a higher levelled opponent, it would be difficult as the disparity of strength was too great. If he were to combat against the old man alone, he might be able to land a few hits. However, that thought immediately vanished when he sensed a tremendous amount of strength emitting from the old man’s body. He wouldn’t be able to win anyway, so without a second thought, he chose to escape.
Against the old man alone, Qing Shui might have half a chance of winning, especially if he used the Thunderous Beast’s Violet Lightning Strike and his own Divinity Protection. The Divinity Protection may prove to be ineffective should he clash with the old man but if the Violet Lightning Strike was able to show an effect, then the old man would surely die.
Power, he needed to gain more power!
At that moment, Qing Shui found himself wanting more power, his desire grew stronger the more he felt helpless. If he could break through the Seventh Heavenly Layer of his Ancient Strengthening Technique, killing the old fool would be a piece of cake…….
Qing Shui hads currently reached an area of wasteland that stretched toward the path of the Eastern Victory Divine Continent. He finally felt at ease as he rode on his Fire Bird, despite the subtle nervousness during his focus to escape the grasp of the old man. He wasn’t too worried, because he knew he could escape for safety and destroy the Octagon Inn at the same time.
………