Book 12: Chapter 1: The One Who Died Was Instead Me?

Someone appeared in the plains outside the small town’s ruins.

This was an old divine robed elder whose face and body were all covered in a bit of ashes.

There were many factions in this world, for example, Yunqin’s priests and Tangcang’s buddhist temples that were acknowledged by all in the royal court. There were many different temples and shrines, which was why there were also many people dressed in divine robes. However, only those dressed in divine robes with a flame mountain on the chest could truly match these clothes and the words ‘Divine Judge’. It was because they were the apostles of Purgatory Mountain, representing mysterious and powerful cultivators. Moreover, even in this entire dynasty, they didn’t have to obey the indications of any royal court influential figure, their statuses above the royal court. They only had to listen to Purgatory Mountain’s commands, only had to listen to the orders of the devil god they believed in. They were the true officials of their god.

This Purgatory Mountain apostle, this old Divine Judge, was normally only in charge of examining the water quality of some cold springs. He didn’t have much interest in roaming the world either, nor did he wish to get involved in secular affairs. However, a nephew of his died under Lin Xi’s assassination, so after some elders passed down the patriarch’s intentions, he also left Purgatory Mountain and crossed Thousand Sunset Mountain, starting to search for Lin Xi together with the numerous other Great Mang cultivators who entered South Tomb Province through various means.

While looking at this abandoned small town ruins not far in front of him, the wrinkles on this old Divine Judge’s face gradually unfolded, his calm eyes revealing a type of relieved and reconciled expression.

Even though Lin Xi and Gao Yanan’s movements were extremely secretive, the amount of land a cultivator could cover in a day was still limited. In other words, every single cultivator had a maximum range of activity each day, the only difference being that the higher the cultivation level, the greater the radius of this area of activity. If this was on a sand table, the last location the cultivator appeared at would be the center, and then a circle would be drawn around the greatest distance that could be covered. After doing this a few times, this cultivator’s current whereabouts would gradually become more and more clear.

After the intense battle that happened two days ago, this travel-worn Purgatory Mountain old Divine Judge was already sure that he was getting closer and closer to Lin Xi. Meanwhile, today, when he saw the small town ruins left behind after an army passed by, he felt a strong intuition that the Lin Xi he wanted to kill was definitely inside this small town.

Since this Purgatory Mountain Divine Judge was an existence who was above normal royal court officials, he already obtained Lin Xi’s detailed information  after crossing Thousand Sunset Mountain, including the detailed circumstances of Lin Xi’s battle against Xu Qiubai. In his opinion, if Xu Qiubai decided not to use a bow and arrow from the start, deciding to just fight Lin Xi head on, in a situation where Xu Qiubai didn’t exhaust so much soul force, the one who died should be Lin Xi, and not Xu Qiubai.

That was why he was confident that he could kill Lin Xi.

…

This Purgatory Mountain old Divine Judge whose wrinkles were calmly unfolding silently closed in on the edge of this small town.

This small town was completely made up of single-story houses, while the outside farmland was overgrown with weeds, so there were no high vantage points at all. This mean that the people inside and him had their line of sight on the same level, moreover, the people inside suffered from the obstruction of the buildings, which was why even though he was only openly approaching this town, as long as there were no irregular sounds or movements, it would be extremely difficult for the other party to detect his arrival.

The town was still extremely quiet, only some hollow sounds of winds blowing past bundles of grass and holes in walls could be heard.

However, the moment this Purgatory Mountain Divine Judge had just entered a house’s shadows, his expression suddenly changed. He felt an extremely powerful feeling of danger!

His eyes instantly released divine radiance. His right leg’s toes tapped against the ground. The ground instantly produced many spider web like cracks, there were even wisps of heat and fiery light that rushed out from within the cracks . The powerful opposite force made his body instantly rush forward to the left.

At the same time, precisely in the wall of the roof in front of him, a fist-sized hole suddenly appeared. A streak of white comet-like sword radiance shot out from the hole, brushing his flying body, making a cut on his tattered divine robes.

Another white comet-like arrow radiance penetrated a roof, shooting out and targeting the head of this old Divine Judge whose robes had just been cut through, his body still rapidly accelerating.

The old Divine Judge’s expression froze slightly. His left toe tip suddenly reached out, tapping the ground. The surface beneath his feet completely began to ripple out like water, and then his body that was still rapidly accelerating suddenly changed directions, making the second arrow only hit his head’s afterimage.

However, a third arrow already descended in front of his face.

The space between the old divine official’s brows completely furrowed into a 川 shape. A black and red colored burning banner flew out from his sleeves, sweeping up the third arrow, and then flinging it back out.

White arrows continuously smashed through that roof in the town, relentlessly chasing after him. In that instant, that house’s roof already completely shattered.

The old Divine Judge’s leather shoes ruptured into countless fragments, his bare feet continuously tapping on the ground, turning his entire body into a crazy black and red gale. His brows were always deeply furrowed, just finding this hard to understand… since arrows continuously shot out from that room, then there was no question that Lin Xi was inside it. Only, there was no way his opponent could see his initial position from inside that house, so why could Lin Xi’s arrows immediately lock onto his position with so many walls between them?

Moreover, right now, the speed at which these arrows shot out was completely like an archer shooting mechanically with his eyes closed, the rhythm and timing precise to the extreme. This made it so that he who originally only wanted to rely on soul force control and pure reaction speed to dodge the arrows couldn’t do this at all. He couldn’t preserve soul force at all either, only able to rely on tremendous soul force exhaustion, using a soul four weapon to forcibly send these arrows away.

Fortunately, the other party was already not that far from him. His soul force should still be enough once he arrived in front of his opponent.

While his body was closing in on the house Lin Xi was in with the fastest speed, this old Divine Judge who was always trying to decrease his soul force exhaustion as much as possible for close combat didn’t walk the simplest direct line, but rather instead randomly chose a curved line in his approach.

It was because he knew that Gao Yanan, this type of Green Luan Academy heaven’s choice student was together with Lin Xi, perhaps she was at Lin Xi’s side right now, or maybe she was waiting within a house to ambush him. If she was at Lin Xi’s side, he didn’t need to feel a trace of apprehension, because Gao Yanan’s cultivation still couldn’t pose any threat to his body’s surging soul force, one more or one less cultivator like her didn’t make a difference.

That was why he only had to ensure that he wasn’t ambushed by Gao Yanan or that Three-Tailed Black Foxcat.

Meanwhile, by closing in on Lin Xi in this curved manner, moreover only having these single-story houses that didn’t provide much cover around them, there was no way Lin Xi could approach him through these ruined houses without him noticing.

That was why in this old Divine Judge’s perspective, Gao Yanan and that Three-Tailed Black Foxcat not being at Lin Xi’s side was instead even better. It would then be even easier for him to first kill Lin Xi, and then kill Gao Yanan and that Three-Tailed Black Foxcat.

…

The old divine robed official was already only a hundred steps away from the completely tattered house Lin Xi was in.

When his bare feet landed on a straw house’s roof, the roof’s thick grass was already ignited by the scorching heat and sparks. However, the instant his left toes landed on the already burning roof, a wave of astonishing vital energy condensed inside this small house with terrifying speed. Then, under the push of another wave of vital energy that erupted at the same time, it blasted through the roof.

The burning roof instantly froze, white icicles piercing upwards one after another.

The sharp white icicles were like arrows, stabbing through the old Divine Judge’s bare feet. Under a light crack noise, they penetrated his sole, drawing a blast of blood. Even more so, everything was directly frozen by the biting cold air, the old Divine Judge’s entire sole surface was directly frozen into a gray and black color.

The old Divine Judge’s eyes were instantly filled with an expression of disbelief.

He was sure that while moving forward, no one could move to the thatched hut below him that fast.

This meant that there was only one possibility: the other party was always hiding in this hut.

However, how could there be this type of coincidence? He exhausted quite a bit of soul force to make this detour, but just happened to move across this thatched hut the enemy was hiding in?

There were countless paths of advance. The other party didn’t hide in the paths that had the highest chance of him moving across, they instead hid here?

Could it be that the other party was just this sure that he would definitely move through this path, pass over this thatched hut?

Intense pain and horror made this old Divine Judge open his mouth, about to release a vicious howl of pain like a wounded beast. At the same time, soul force surged crazily from the bottom of his feet, blasting the entire hut to pieces. Under this explosion of power, the countless pieces of straw, turned into a barrage of descending arrows. At the same time, his entire body also borrowed the collapse of the roof to quickly descend.

However,right at this instant, Lin Xi’s figure was also already like a Stone Catapult Cart, crazily jumping out from under the smashed roof.

One arrow shot out, but unlike the arrows before that were shot upwards, it directly blasted through the clay walls of that thatched hut, once again aiming at that old Divine Judge’s body.

The instant the old Divine Judge fell, his line of sight was already blocked. Moreover, his soul force was rapidly erupting, so when he saw the earth wall in front of him suddenly produce a hole, an arrow rushing out from within it, he already didn’t have any time to react.

Chi!

The white comet tail like arrow instantly passed through his chest, producing a fist-sized hole in his body.

His body felt as if it was struck by a hammer. He wanted to forcibly stabilize his body and try to kill Gao Yanan who was currently carrying Lucky, trying to use her back to smash through the clay wall on the other side. However, another arrow already penetrated the wall in front of him, landing on his body.

Chi!

The arrow penetrated his body again, the power it carried preventing him from stabilizing his figure, sending it flying backwards. With a light pu noise, this powerful old Divine Judge was nailed to the clay wall behind him.

Then, a moment later, this clay wall also collapsed. The old Divine Judge also followed this clay wall, falling in chunks of debris.

“I came to kill him, yet the one who died was instead me?”

The old Divine Judge’s eyes couldn’t close. This was the only thought in his head before his death.

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