Stirring the Seas—The Corpse Fiend

Chapter 415: Stirring the Seas—The Corpse Fiend

Han Li’s thoughts were interrupted as his expression suddenly shifted. He and Qu Hun halted their escape light.

The space ahead, which had been empty a moment ago, began to twist and blur. With a scraping sound, a humanoid monster crawled out from within it.

“This is…” Han Li held his breath.

The creature was a lurid green all over, clad in a suit of pitch-black, gleaming iron armor. It was bare-handed, with inch-long, razor-sharp claws and a mouthful of yellow, jagged fangs. It grinned at the two of them with savage malice.

“A Corpse Puppet?” The thick, foul odor of corpse qi carried by the wind allowed Han Li to recognize the monster’s true nature at a glance. His heart tightened.

Judging by its appearance, this was no low-grade puppet like an “Ironclad Corpse.” It was most likely a specially refined creation of the Extreme Yin Ancestor himself.

With this thought, Han Li raised his hand. The Green煌 Sword transformed into a several-zhang-long green flood dragon, shooting forward with ferocious power. At the same time, Qu Hun, without a word, flicked his finger. A thin streak of blood light flashed out, arriving before the dragon—the Blood Essence Diamond that Qu Hun had painstakingly cultivated.

Pfft.

The Blood Essence Diamond struck first, piercing a tiny hole in the Corpse Puppet’s chest. The monster looked down in some bewilderment.

Han Li’s spirits rose. The green flood dragon, driven by his power, slammed into the creature a moment later.

Green light exploded in every direction. The monster was sent flying back several zhang, but it let out a low roar and immediately steadied itself, its eyes gleaming with ferocity as it glared at Han Li.

“Damn! This thing isn’t afraid of ordinary magic tools?” Han Li hurriedly recalled the Green煌 Sword, his heart sinking.

The corpse had taken his full-powered strike without a scratch, and even the tiny hole was visibly healing at an alarming rate.

Han Li’s expression darkened. He suddenly pulled Qu Hun along, merging their forms into a single long rainbow that shot off at an angle, trying to bypass the corpse and escape to the side.

It wasn’t that Han Li feared he couldn’t handle this Corpse Puppet. He was terrified of being delayed long enough for the Extreme Yin Ancestor to free himself and give chase. If he could avoid the fight, he would.

A quick glance around confirmed his fear. Cultivators fleeing in other directions were all being intercepted by identical Corpse Puppets. How many of these things had the Extreme Yin Ancestor refined?

His heart cold, Han Li pushed the long rainbow to even greater speed, driving it with all his and Qu Hun’s power. They were about to flash past the Corpse Puppet.

But the monster’s eyes flashed green, and its form blurred, vanishing from its spot.

Seeing this all-too-familiar technique, Han Li reacted on instinct, pulling his sword light to one side. Five claw-like streaks of black light shot through the space he had just occupied, howling past before dissipating a full ten zhang away.

Han Li sucked in a cold breath. He turned his sword light around. Sure enough, the Corpse Puppet was standing not far behind him, its claws wreathed in flickering black light.

Such terrifying speed! The creature had crossed a distance of several dozen zhang in an instant.

This was almost as uncanny as the teleportation-like movement he achieved on the ground with his Smoke Step. But to do it in the air? That was simply absurd!

Han Li’s face turned ashen.

He knew now that he couldn’t escape without dealing with this Corpse Puppet. This was likely why the Extreme Yin Ancestor could watch their flight with such leisurely indifference.

Realizing this, Han Li steeled himself. He slapped his storage pouch.

Instantly, over a hundred streaks of green light and two beams of red light shot out, spreading out densely around him. As the light faded, they revealed two Blood Jade Spiders and over a hundred giant green apes. Each ape, with its wide mouth and jagged fangs, stood two zhang tall. The moment they appeared, they raised their hands, and ten finger-thick beams of green light shot from their fingertips in a torrent, smashing toward the Corpse Puppet from all angles.

Faced with a bombardment from which there was no escape, the monster’s eyes blazed with violence. It spat out a cloud of black qi that surged forward against the tiny green beams. Then, crossing its arms in front of its chest, it charged forward through the cloud.

The black qi canceled out most of the green beams, but the remainder struck the Corpse Puppet directly, sending green smoke and sparks flying everywhere. The monster simply bared its fangs and took a few savage strides into the midst of the giant apes.

A series of cracking sounds rang out. Several apes nearby were sliced into pieces by the black light of its claws.

Seeing this, Han Li frowned. Qu Hun, at his side, immediately released a pillar of blood light, a dozen zhang high, that condensed into a massive blood-colored blade. The blade hurtled down, slashing viciously at the Corpse Puppet’s head.

Clang.

The blood-colored blade clashed against the monster’s skull with a clear ring of metal, failing to cut into its body at all.

The strike seemed to enrage the Corpse Puppet. It reached out with one hand and grabbed the massive blade, then seized it with the other, as if trying to destroy it to vent its fury.

Seeing this, a flicker of delight passed over Han Li’s face instead of worry.

As Qu Hun made a hand seal, the blood-colored blade instantly transformed into a roaring tide of purple flames. The flames spread across the Corpse Puppet’s body in an instant, burning fiercely. The monster shrieked in panic, batting at the fire with its hands in utter helplessness.

Soon, however, the Corpse Puppet realized that while the purple flames were hard to extinguish, they weren’t actually hurting it. It could simply ignore them. Relieved, it began searching for its tormentor once more.

But the moment it raised its head, two pristine white nets descended silently from above, wrapping it completely before it could react. These were the enormous spiderwebs spat by the Blood Jade Spiders.

The Corpse Puppet struggled with all its might in alarm, but at the same time, the purple flames coalesced into a thick, bowl-sized fire serpent that coiled tightly around it.

Caught in the dual binding of the spiderweb and the fire serpent, the monster was temporarily unable to free itself.

Seeing this, Han Li didn’t hesitate. He turned his form back into a long rainbow, collected his spirit beasts and puppets, and fled at top speed without looking back.

If he had heard correctly, a third cry had come from the direction of the Extreme Yin Ancestor.

If he didn’t take this chance to escape, he really would be caught and enslaved by that old demon.

Han Li and Qu Hun fled a full hundred li in one breath, changing direction several times along the way and making sharp turns, before finally finding an unnamed island.

The two landed immediately and sank a dozen zhang deep into the earth. Han Li then took out the light gauze meant to conceal their aura, draped it over them, and began to circulate his nameless oral formula.

Even after doing all this, his heart was still unsettled. He had no idea if he could fool the divine sense of the two old demons. After all, the spiritual perception of a Nascent Soul cultivator was surely far beyond that of an ordinary practitioner.

Poor Han Li had no idea that a hundred li away, the Extreme Yin Ancestor was standing in place with a leisurely expression, showing no intention of continuing the chase.

Beside him now stood a large man in a red robe with a purple face, as well as over a dozen Corpse Puppets of the same lurid green. The middle-aged man was floating unconscious in the air in front of the Extreme Yin Ancestor and the Turkey-Faced Elder, several eerie blue needles embedded in his body.

As for Elder Zhao and the others, they were standing behind the two, trembling with fear, not daring to breathe loudly. Where was the arrogant pride of Core Formation cultivators now?

“Who would have thought that girl Ziling would slip away after all! I had intended to capture her and present her to Fellow Daoist Chihuo. It seems I’ll have to look for another opportunity,” the Extreme Yin Ancestor said calmly.

“Senior Wu is too thoughtful. While Ziling agreed to provide ten top-quality furnaces as payment for my intervention, what I actually had my eye on was her person. But I see that your grandson also seems quite interested in her, so I will yield her to him,” the purple-faced man said with a laugh.

“Then I thank Fellow Daoist Chi! When I return, I will send twenty female cultivators with proper foundations to Tortoise Island as compensation. Speaking of which, your master is practically a senior to us. Please extend my regards to him,” the Extreme Yin Ancestor said, showing a rare trace of a smile.

“I haven’t seen my master in quite some time either. If I do, I will certainly pass along your message!” Chi Huo replied with elaborate politeness. But after a moment, his eyes flickered, and he continued:

“However, now that Ziling has escaped, she will probably seek out the Star Palace. Could this cause any trouble?” Chi Huo showed a hint of concern.

“The Star Palace? Hmph, there’s nothing to worry about,” the Extreme Yin Ancestor said with a dismissive, cold laugh.

“As far as I know, several of the Heavenly Star Palace’s elders are currently in seclusion and won’t bother with such trivial matters. And as for the Twin Saints of Heaven and Star, those two old undying ones inexplicably took it upon themselves to cultivate a ‘Magnetic Divine Light’ technique. As a result, they are now limited to leaving Heaven Star City for only a few fixed days each year, or else their cultivation will regress significantly. It seems that the next trip to