Chapter 365 - Returning Underground
The disciples of the Green Vine mountain staggered backwards. They all turned around and scattered at the same time.
Yu Shukuang was the first one to flee. The Green Vine mountain was already done for. He had no plans on going down with it, but he felt very despaired inside. Even the three elders could not stop him, so just how long could they flee for?
Standing up high, Li Qingshan looked down over them. No matter how quickly they fled, no matter how far they had fled, killing them would only take a single stroke.
His blade was raised, but he never swung down with it, as he saw a familiar person or two among them. He smiled and placed the blade down.
“He’s vanished.” Xiao An emerged from the ruins.
“Are you certain?” Li Qingshan raised an eyebrow.
“Yep,” Xiao An nodded.
“f.u.c.king h.e.l.l. He can escape even when he’s bisected. That old b.a.s.t.a.r.d must have been playing dead earlier. I have to start defiling corpses in the future!” Li Qingshan cursed.
After the original battle, the Green Vine Elder, who should have been laying on the ground, had actually vanished. Needless to say, he must have used this opportunity to escape.
Now that he thought about it, even regular people would toss around for a bit after they had been bisected. The Green Vine Elder had collapsed like two pieces of wood; he was even better at playing dead than Milliped. Just who was the daemon in this case?
Li Qingshan had used his mirror image to distract the three elders, while the Green Vine Elder had used these two “old friends” of his to distract Li Qingshan.
“Let’s go! We’ll go hunt down that actor!” Li Qingshan sniffed the air and dove back into the hole. According to the smell of blood, the Green Vine Elder had fled through the hole he had created. It would be troublesome if he ran into that simpleton Milliped.
Xiao An tilted her head in thought. What’s an actor?
Within the pitch-black, narrow hole, the Green Vine Elder clutched his abdomen that had been split open completely as he lay on his enlarged vine staff, flying off. The shaking from above gradually grew further away, but he did not relax at all. The terror of the blade was firmly embedded in his heart; he remained shaken.
From the moment Li Qingshan had stabbed the Green Vine Elder with his blade, the Green Vine Elder could feel that it was impossible to emerge victorious from this battle.
This was because he understood something very well; it was not because he was completely unprepared, but because the blade had arrived far too swiftly and viciously. Unless he used a protective technique and called out his protective spiritual artifact beforehand, it would be impossible for him to block it. Dodging would be even less possible.
The unbelievable strength and speed, combined with the extraordinary destructive power, was the bane of cultivators. As a result, he chose to play dead without the slightest hesitation in that moment.
Green vines wrapped around his waist, joining the two parts of his body together. Subsequently, the vines emitted ebbs of green light in an attempt to heal the terrifying wound. However, the residual daemon qi prevented the green light from working. It did not heal after quite a while, but at least his life was no longer in danger anymore.
As the strongest out of the three elders, the Green Vine Elder was not exactly suited for battle, but his recovery ability was probably unmatched. His life force was endless, just like green vines.
Milliped was currently idling around in the hole. When he saw the Green Vine Elder rush over, he immediately lunged over threateningly, spitting out a pink gas.
The Green Vine Elder’s eyes coldened, and he waved the staff in his hand. A Daemon General might be beyond my capabilities, but what about a mere daemonic beast?
At this moment, his heart shuddered. The auras of the Golden Pheasant Elder and the Lone Grave Elder had vanished!
How did it happen so quickly?
Based on his belief, even if two mid Foundation Establishment cultivators could not defeat him, they could still escape, or at worst, they could last a little longer. The situation was much worse than he had imagined it to be. The red-haired Daemon General did not give off any daemon qi at all. He moved around without a trace, like an a.s.sa.s.sin hidden in the darkness, as if he could appear at any moment and cut him down.
The Green Vine Elder was stricken with fear. He raised his hand and knocked Milliped aside before flying away quickly.
Actually, Li Qingshan had yet to realise he had gone missing back then.
……
Li Qingshan followed the scent in pursuit. He saw Milliped, who had curled into a ball, and smiled. “You sure are lucky!”
Arriving at the exit at the foot of the mountain, a beautiful scenery of the wilderness unfolded before him with a gentle breeze and a bright moon in the sky.
The enchanting fragrance of flowers filled the air. Spring was the time when mountain flowers bloomed.
Li Qingshan sniffed. The scent had become very faint, and it was not only because of the smell of flowers. The Green Vine Elder must have stabilised his injuries and then used some sort of method to hide his smell.
However, Li Qingshan did manage to find a distinctive scent, the scent of humans. Like a thin stream, its trace led off into the depths of the Boundless mountains.
Li Qingshan leapt up and arrived on a hill before him. However, the scent vanished there. He could not help but frown.
If his gaze could pierce through obstacles, then he would have spotted a nervous, old face hidden within an ancient cypress a hundred paces away.
The Green Vine Elder had used a wood technique to merge into the bark. Although he temporarily managed to avoid Li Qingshan’s senses, his nervousness and fear did not lessen at all. Instead, it spread. At the same time, he experienced an indescribable sense of sorrow. He, the mighty sect master of the Green Vine mountain, had actually been forced into such a state by a pursuing Daemon General.
Li Qingshan circled around a few times in the dim forest. Suddenly, he sneered. “I can see you!”
He had learnt this trick from Han Qiongzhi, and sure enough, it utterly frightened the Green Vine Elder. He had to hold back the urge to flee.
Li Qingshan casually swung his ice blade, kicking up sharp, violent winds that swept past the towering trees and cut them down. They rolled down the side of the mountain with a rumble. From above, a large swathe of trees had collapsed in a single moment.
However, he failed to find the Green Vine Elder.
Li Qingshan called out, “Green Vine, no matter where you flee to, there will be a day when I kill you!”
Kill you… kill you… kill you…
His voice that sounded like thrumming metal echoed through the mountains.
This made the Green Vine Elder’s heart tighten. Pulling his body together tightly, he rolled down in the cut-down trees, only stopping after colliding against a huge boulder in the end. He felt like his back was close to breaking.
The forest fell silent once more, but he did not dare to move. Who knew whether Li Qingshan was hiding in the darkness or not, waiting for him to appear so that he could kill him.
Even when the sun rose, he remained exactly where he was. It was said that people became more afraid of death with age, and he truly verified this with his actions. As long as the slightest possibility of danger continued to exist, he would remain in hiding.
Three days later, he finally emerged from the bark slowly and gradually, only letting out a sigh of relief after confirming that Li Qingshan was indeed gone. Gazing at the mist-shrouded Green Vine mountain in the distance, tears suddenly began to run down his face. If it were not for this wood technique, he almost would have died. He was obviously too afraid to return to the Green Vine mountain now. All he could do was seek a.s.sistance from the Daemon Suppression alliance if he wanted a chance for revenge.
Actually, Li Qingshan had directly left after saying that. If he could not kill him today, then he would just kill him in the future. He did not have the patience or motivation to waste time crouching around in the forest.
After this battle, he could feel signs of breaking through to the third layer of the tiger demon. He was looking for some people to cause trouble with so that he could have another battle.
Li Qingshan, Xiao An, and Milliped, the three daemons, moved through the dark underground. The familiar environment made Milliped extremely excited. He scurried away eagerly, heading towards that “huge bed” of his.
Li Qingshan sat on a huge skull that a Skull Prayer Bead had transformed into. He had a set of scarlet robes draped over him and a scarlet band around his waist, covering his crotch conveniently. The ice blade hung from his waist too. He seemed to be in high spirits, br.i.m.m.i.n.g with vigour.
He had transformed the cloak from his hair. This was a simple trick for Daemon Generals, and wearing it brought no discomfort either. Finally, he had avoided the predicament of walking around naked.
The hundred treasures pouches of the Lone Grave Elder and the Golden Pheasant Elder had been shoved into his chest. He still had not looked through them yet. If he wanted to look through his spoils, he obviously had to take them out and admire them one by one at home in peace. Only then would it be particularly delightful.
After travelling for a few hours, they had already ventured deep underground.
Home was near!
Xiao An sat in Li Qingshan’s arms, refining the corpses of the Lone Grave Elder and the Golden Pheasant Elder. The bodies of Foundation Establishment cultivators were just a few dozen kilograms of flesh, but the life force hidden within even surpa.s.sed ten thousand regular people. This was akin to the difference between Qi Gathering pills and Virtue Acc.u.mulation pills. It was a difference in quality.
The reason why Xiao An could undergo the heavenly tribulation so soon was closely linked to Wei Zhongyuan’s corpse. Very soon, she had refined the two corpses, and she could feel that her cultivation had taken another step forward.
Li Qingshan rubbed her skull. “This time, there’s no need for you to fight.”
The cavern was right before them. Suddenly, there was a tremor, and a tremendous object burst out of the earth, opening its gaping mouth and lunging towards Milliped. The two pairs of fangs were even longer than swords.
Li Qingshan was completely unfazed. With how obvious the daemon qi was, even if it was hidden within the earth, how could it fool him?
Flying over, he pressed down on the daemon’s head. However, the part he touched was as hard as a boulder.
Li Qingshan smiled. I knew this daemon qi seemed familiar. So it’s it!
As it turned out, the tremendous object was the huge head of a snake, except it was a rocky grey, which seemed like a stone sculpture no matter how he looked at it. The boulder viper had been an extremely powerful daemon soldier under Li Qingshan’s command in the past. It had only yielded when he mentioned Milliped, but it had never truly accepted Li Qingshan as the leader of the daemon soldiers.
But right now, the last thing Li Qingshan was afraid of was rock. He casually emitted a vibration through his hand.
The boulder viper felt a vibration spread from the top of his head to the end of his tail. Its impenetrable rock armour immediately cracked. It felt the world spin as its body grew numb. It was pulled out from the earth helplessly, completely in shock.
Li Qingshan said, “Boulder viper, do you still recognise me?”
The boulder viper shook its head and recovered from its dizziness. It raised its head and met a familiar pair of scarlet pupils before seeing the horns and the scarlet hair. “You’re… leader!”
Li Qingshan smiled as he patted its head. “Daemons are still the ones with better insight!”
“Vice leader.” The boulder viper then saw Xiao An and finally Milliped. “Great king Milliped!” He had burst out of the earth because of this daemon qi, launching a sneak attack. It had failed to sense Li Qingshan and Xiao An’s existence at all.
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“Y- you’ve returned!”
After two years, they had returned underground once more, to take back everything that belonged to them!
Li Qingshan asked in confusion, “Why did you attack us?”
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