Chapter 209
Chapter 209
Thud!
A muffled impact sounded.
The kick from the paper horse with spiritual resonance knocked the blood fiend’s head sideways with a series of cracks.
Silent Gourd had also closed in.
He held a sharp dagger in each hand. Known as Dog-Blood Daggers, both were evil-repelling weapons soaked in black dog’s blood!
Coffin carriers differed from coffin bearers. They did not understand mystical arts, could not develop a sense of qi within their bodies, and were unable to cast spells.
They could only rely on objects that possessed their own evil-repelling properties to suppress corpse-fiends…
The Dog-Blood Dagger was the standard weapon used by coffin carriers when fighting corpse-fiends at close range!
Silent Gourd was ruthless and spoke little. He had actually equipped himself with two Dog-Blood Daggers.
Now he used them against the corpse fiend.
One dagger stabbed its temple.
The other plunged into its chest.
Clang! The Dog-Blood Dagger striking its temple rang like metal against metal.
Shnk! The other entered the inch-and-a-half wound in its chest and pushed a little deeper.
The blood fiend gave another strange cry and erupted with mighty, evil power.
Like the paper figure with spiritual resonance moments earlier, Silent Gourd was blasted backward. He struck the ground and let out a low groan of pain.
Horror rose within me.
After so many ferocious attacks, did the blood fiend still possess so much strength?
It continued to struggle.
Old Cao shouted encouragement.
“The corpse fiend is wounded! Everyone, push harder. Kill it as quickly as possible, or–”
Before he could finish, blood-red light abruptly flared before my eyes and enveloped our surroundings.
The air filled with a dense stench of blood.
At the same time, enormous force surged through my hands…
Caw-roar!
The blood fiend roared and shook its entire body. Amid the thick blood-red radiance, all of us were thrown away.
We flew backward and crashed to the ground.
Snap, snap, snap…
The phoenix ropes belonging to Big Bull, Ergou, and Flat-Top broke again. Old Cao was blasted away too, but his rope remained looped around the corpse fiend’s neck.
He had pulled so hard that the skin of his palms was abraded and bleeding.
Roar-caw!
The blood fiend regained its freedom. Standing on the ground, it used one rotten hand to remove the rope from its neck. As the rope rubbed continuously against its decaying flesh, it produced a sizzle like water hitting boiling oil.
It threw the rope down and glared viciously at Old Cao and me with its blood-red eyes. The two of us had probably hurt it worst, and it seemed intent on memorizing our faces.
Then it actually turned to flee!
“It’s afraid! It’s trying to escape! We have to stop it!”
Old Cao screamed himself hoarse.
Under the combined assault of six people, one paper figure, and one paper horse, the terrifying, powerful blood fiend had finally realized it was outmatched. After desperately casting a formidable evil art to blast us away, it now sought to escape.
“We absolutely can’t let it get away!”
That was the only thought in my mind.
Tonight, at this very moment, we had our best chance to destroy the blood fiend.
If it truly escaped, found somewhere to hide, and slowly recovered its strength… it would be a disaster!
It would unleash a terrifying storm of blood across Lianghe Town and the surrounding area.
But all of us were still sprawled on the ground, not yet back on our feet.
How could we stop the blood fiend already racing toward the courtyard gate?
At the critical moment…
Neigh!
A horse’s cry rang out with a clatter of hooves.
A figure charged from the side and slammed violently into the blood fiend again.
It was the paper horse with spiritual resonance!
At the crucial moment, Old Cao’s paper creation proved thoroughly dependable.
Thud…
It again caught the blood fiend unprepared and knocked it staggering backward.
At the same time, the paper horse kicked its hind legs against the iron gate to the backyard and slammed it shut.
An iron-bar gate could never hold something at the level of a corpse fiend, but something was better than nothing. Even delaying it for a few seconds would help!
The paper horse’s attack clearly enraged the blood fiend completely.
Once it regained its footing, it kicked off the ground and flew at the paper horse.
It wrapped both arms tightly around the horse’s neck.
Opening its bloody maw, it bit down!
At the same time, its sharp claws frantically raked and stabbed the paper horse’s head.
No matter how formidable the paper horse with spiritual resonance might be, or how much qi and will a coffin bearer had infused into it, it was ultimately made from thin funerary paper and bamboo…
Faced with the blood fiend’s tempest of attacks, the horse’s entire head and nearly all of its front half were torn to pieces in the blink of an eye.
Colorful scraps of paper and splinters of bamboo flew everywhere, while the remaining half of its body toppled to the ground.
Almost simultaneously, the paper figure with spiritual resonance charged back into battle from behind.
It wrapped both arms tightly around the blood fiend’s waist, refusing to let it leave the courtyard!
Thanks to the paper horse and paper figure throwing themselves into the fray like moths into flame, Old Cao, Big Bull, the others, and I finally regained our feet, recovered our stance, and rejoined the battle.
I no longer had the luxury of worrying about how much qi I expended. Through my will, I even reached out to my household familiar, Roundy, wherever it might be, and “borrowed” a little more strength.
Both hands now held many of my specially prepared pebbles. After infusing them with qi through a special method, I rapidly cast them in every direction while murmuring under my breath…
“Jia, Yi, Bing, Ding, Wu; Ji, Geng, Xin, Ren, Gui.”
“Ten Heavenly Stems in all, each with its yin or yang place.”
“The odd are yang; the even stand in yin’s domain.”
“Jia and Yi are eastern wood; Bing and Ding are southern fire.”
“Wu and Ji are central earth; Geng and Xin are western metal.”
“Ren and Gui are northern water; true are the stations of the Five Elements.”
“Each phase follows its order, its nature divided into yin and yang.”
“Qimen has passed from ancient times; Dunjia moves heaven and earth.”
“Five-Element Eight-Gate Binding Formation–form!”
As I uttered the final words, every pebble in my hands flew out and landed at different positions across the courtyard.
Sweetness rose in my throat, and I coughed up a small mouthful of blood!
My entire body wilted.
Huff, huff.
I panted heavily, my heart pounding wildly.
My vision blurred and my ears rang.
My legs weakened as well. I swayed on unsteady feet and had to brace one hand against a large tree in the courtyard to keep from collapsing embarrassingly to the ground.
“Old Cao, Brother Big Bull… I’m temporarily exhausted. I need to rest. I’ll have to leave this damned corpse fiend to you for now.”
I had to admit that setting up a Qimen Dunjia formation remained somewhat strenuous for me.
It consumed all the qi left in my body. The special force required to launch the pebbles even left my muscles aching.
That was why Master had always urged me to train my martial arts diligently. Certain Qimen Dunjia methods actually required the support of a strong body.
The instant I finished speaking…
Hum, hum, hum…
A droning vibration filled the air.
Thirteen faint white pillars of light rose from thirteen different places across the broad courtyard. An ordinary person might not have noticed them without looking carefully!
But to practitioners like us, and to every variety of demon, monster, and ghost, the thirteen pillars were glaringly conspicuous.
After rising, the pillars bent inward and converged above, forming a cage like an enormous birdcage!
It enclosed the entire backyard.
Old Cao turned and stared at me in surprise.
“Is this… the Five-Element Eight-Gate Binding Formation from Qimen Dunjia? Not bad, Xiao Wu! You’ve already learned this?”
I wiped the blood from the corner of my mouth with the back of my hand and smiled bitterly.
“Mm. I learned it recently. But using it consumes even more stamina than one attack with my ritual blade. I probably won’t be able to help for a while. Old Cao, I’ve trapped the corpse fiend inside the courtyard so it can’t escape. The rest is up to you.”
Describing all this took some time, but in reality only a few seconds had passed.
The blood fiend had just broken free of the paper figure with spiritual resonance clinging to its waist. It forcibly snapped both the figure’s arms and crushed them into scraps of paper, then charged toward the courtyard gate again.
The iron-bar gate could never withstand such a violent impact.
But…
Bang!
The corpse fiend slammed into a faint white curtain of light that appeared from nowhere and was thrown backward.
Bluish smoke rose where its body touched the barrier, as if its rotten flesh had been corroded. Dark-red, putrid blood quickly flowed out, however, repairing the burned wound.
It raised its head slightly.
Its blood-red eyes swept the surroundings. It had probably seen the thirteen pillars of light, for unmistakable fury appeared on its rotten, withered face.
This was the power of the Five-Element Eight-Gate Binding Formation!
Even something as terrifying and powerful as a corpse fiend could not break through it quickly. Opening a gap would require at least ten seconds.
But Old Cao and the other four would never give the blood fiend more than ten seconds to focus on breaking the formation!
Of course…
We were also fortunate that our long assault had already consumed much of its strength. With my current cultivation, I could set up a Qimen Dunjia binding formation, but a corpse fiend at full strength would probably have shattered it in a single collision.
“Die, you vile monster!”
Old Cao had now flown into a true rage.
Both the paper horse and paper figure with spiritual resonance were effectively ruined, an enormous loss.
The loss hurt his purse.
And his heart!
He drew a sheet of red spirit money from the fur pouch at his waist…
It was divine paper!