Zhang Shun closed the door, turning to look at his brother curled up in the hospital bed, his heart feeling as if it had been violently struck.
He knew it was because of his cries for help that his brother had suddenly woken from his coma.
Human potential is truly immense; a gravely injured mother will awaken at her child’s call, a wife saving her husband will suddenly erupt with the strength to lift a car, and people will risk their lives for those they truly wish to protect. This is an unimaginably terrifying power.
In that instant, Zhang Shun recalled Chu He’s plea—“Can you… return Mahā’s life… to me?”
Who was Mahā? Countless doubts swirled in Zhang Shun’s mind, but he was also certain of one thing: if Chu He truly wanted it, he would sacrifice everything to fulfill his wish.
Li Hu’s words were resolute, but her arrival was slow; more than an hour passed without any news. Zhang Shun tried to make an internal call, but the signal seemed to be cut off, leaving only a busy tone. He could only stare at the door with trepidation. Just when he thought Li Hu would never come, a distant explosion suddenly echoed through the hospital building.
Zhang Shun’s pupils constricted, hearing the sound rapidly approaching, followed by a resounding “Bang!” as if a heavy object had been violently thrown against the door!
Zhang Shun stood up abruptly. “Li Hu? Li Hu, is that you?!”
“Don’t open the door!” Li Hu’s desperate shouts came from outside. “Whatever you do, don’t open the door!”
“Are you okay?! What happened to you?!”
“I’m fine—agh!!”
Li Hu suddenly let out a shriek that sounded inhuman. Young Master Zhang hadn’t even had time to ask when he heard her trembling voice: “Don’t… don’t open the door. Stay with your brother. Don’t come out… Aaaah—!”
Zhang Shun had never seen a woman suffer like this in front of him. Just as he was about to rush out, he heard a deep, cold male voice from outside the door—a voice that sent shivers down his spine just by listening: “Forty-nine demon-suppressing nails. Let’s see how long you can live.”
With a sharp whistle through the air, Li Hu’s distorted scream instantly erupted: “Feng Si! Feng Si, I know you’re in there! Wake up, you motherfcker—! Aaaah!!!”
With an earth-shshattering boom, Zhang Shun could no longer hold back and pulled the door open! The next second, an icy aura surged like a tide. Zhang Shun didn’t even realize what was happening before a tremendous force in his chest instantly sent him flying!
With a crash, Young Master Zhang hit the wall and then scrambled up. In his intense pain, he saw a tall man in a black robe enter through the doorway, holding Li Hu by the throat—the woman was dressed in red, it was hard to tell if her clothes were originally red or if she was entirely stained with blood. Her long hair was dishevelled behind her, and her feet were trembling frantically; judging by the frequency, she probably only had a minute or two left to breathe.
Zhang Shun’s blood instantly rushed to his head. He picked up a broken chair leg from the shattered floor and, with a roar, charged forward! But then, the black-robed man raised his crimson eyes and looked at Zhang Shun—
Zhang Shun was immediately frozen by an boundless, bone-chilling aura, rigid as if his blood had frozen. The chair leg clattered from his hand.
It was in that instant that he recognized the man; he had seen this person before—the night of the haunting, after Chu He arrived in his room, the evil spirit vanished, and this man’s image suddenly appeared in the corner of the room.
At that time, he had given Zhang Shun a cold glance, said nothing, and then vanished into thin air. At that time, Zhang Shun thought he had hallucinated, or that this man was also a ghost, but at this moment, an understanding suddenly dawned on him: “You, you, you—you are—”
Li Hu’s throat made a terrible gurgling sound. The man, while tightening his grip, casually looked at Zhang Shun.
Zhang Shun was incredulous: “You’re my brother’s—boyfriend?!”
Man: “…”
Li Hu: “…”
The man in black seemed to have suddenly heard something extremely amusing. In that instant, Zhang Shun even saw him actually smile, and then he changed his mind about killing Li Hu, casually tossing the woman aside like a sack.
“Boyfriend,” he repeated, finding it very interesting.
With a thud, Li Hu fell to the ground, disheveled and frantic, clutching her neck and coughing violently, her voice hoarse and teeth clenched. “Demon Lord Fan Luo…!”
“As expected of a fox who has cultivated a ninth tail, that gate-keeping formation was quite interesting. It’s a pity this simpleton inadvertently broke its core,” the Demon Lord said, examining Zhang Shun with interest. “Young man, if you had truly managed to resist opening the door, I wouldn’t have been able to get in even if that fox had died… What a shame.”
Zhang Shun angrily asked, “Who are you? What do you want?”
The Demon Lord did not reply, only walked towards Chu He on the hospital bed. Li Hu, who had been coughing as if on her last breath, suddenly sprang up as if injected with adrenaline. “Let go, you can’t escape! Zhou Hui is already on his way!”
The Demon Lord said, “So?”
“You can kill me, but can you also kill Zhou Hui?!”
The Demon Lord answered his words with action—he directly picked up Chu He from the hospital bed and walked towards the door. “Even Zhou Hui, tracking the scent of that zombie servant to the Yin-Yang Master’s hiding place, then discovering that Japanese guy was a decoy, and finally rushing here, it would still take at least two shichen. Do you think two shichen is enough time for me to turn you from a fox into a fox fur stole?”
Li Hu’s face instantly turned ashen, and she stared at Chu He, asking, “You’re just going to watch your paramour threaten me like this?”
Chu He was unconscious in the Demon Lord’s arms, of course unable to answer him.
The Demon Lord chuckled, “Just now you called me a boyfriend, and now I’m a paramour. Speaking of which, you two constantly mock each other, yet you’re willing to fight so fiercely for each other. It’s a very strange relationship…” As he spoke, he turned and walked towards Li Hu. Even Zhang Shun could tell by his posture that the phrase “fox fur stole” was not a joke!
“Nine-tailed fox of Yunnan’s Sixth Group,” the Demon Lord slowly said, “I’ll take revenge for the siege of the Underworld today, starting with you.”
He carried Chu He with one hand, and extended the other hand towards Li Hu, who was coughing repeatedly at his feet. In mid-air, countless eerie red patterns suddenly appeared on that hand, followed by dazzling, serpentine electric currents! Li Hu’s eyes instantly widened. This woman was also fierce; the next second, she rapidly retreated, roaring, “—Feng Si!”
Chu He still didn’t react, but the Demon Lord’s figure appeared out of thin air behind her like a phantom, striking her heavily in the back with a punch!
Li Hu spat out a mouthful of blood, her body flying back and crashing heavily into the stunned Zhang Shun, creating an entire web of cracks in the hospital room wall! The Demon Lord landed, walking steadily forward. Li Hu, amidst the pervasive wall dust, trembled as she tried to get up, trying twice and falling back down. In desperation, she grabbed Zhang Shun and bit him fiercely on the part connecting his back of the head and neck.
“Ah!” Zhang Shun screamed, feeling as if his flesh was being torn off. “What are you doing?”
“Screw your sister!” Li Hu trembled. “Go! Go quickly! Don’t let him take your brother! If your brother falls into depravity, the Heavenly Dao is finished!”
“But I…” Zhang Shun didn’t finish his sentence when he suddenly felt he could move. It seemed Li Hu’s bite had indeed hit some pressure point. He frantically scrambled up and charged forward—after two steps, he was dumbfounded again. “I, I, I, what do I do if I can’t do anything?!”
Li Hu roared hysterically, “Are you stupid?! Your brother returned that Buddha’s breath to you! That means he’s telling you to help him fight the Demon Lord!”
As soon as her words fell, Zhang Shun saw the Demon Lord’s expression change—though the change was very subtle, almost imperceptible amidst the smoke and dust, Zhang Shun keenly sensed it. He had almost no hesitation, as if guided by instinct, he charged forward, blocking the Demon Lord with one hand and snatching his brother with the other!
Everything happened in a flash, dazzlingly fast like a movie on fast-forward.
The moment Zhang Shun’s hand touched the Demon Lord, a golden swastika flowed from his palm, clashing with the Demon Lord’s red, eerie patterns, emitting a series of teeth-gritting explosions. At the same time, the Demon Lord grabbed Zhang Shun, casually throwing him aside. Young Master Zhang’s flying body then crashed onto the barely-standing Li Hu, almost sending this fox to meet the Buddha directly.
Li Hu: “You motherfcker—”
The next second, the golden Buddha seal overpowered the demonic pattern, and the Demon Lord’s entire arm skin burst open!
—To be fair, this injury was by no means fatal to someone of the Demon Lord’s Asura King level, but it truly caught everyone by surprise, even Zhang Shun himself was momentarily stunned. Blood mist erupted like a geyser, instantly painting the Demon Lord crimson, looking as if he had just emerged from hell!
“…As expected of…” Demon Lord Fan Luo slowly said, his narrow eyes looking at Zhang Shun. “As expected of the Buddha relic…” He lifted his foot and walked towards Zhang Shun, seemingly amused. “Little brat, I should indeed start treating you like a man.”
It was then that Zhang Shun realized that, at some unknown point, a door had appeared in the void behind him. Black mist swirled around the door, and eerie white bones protruded. As the Demon Lord walked closer, the door slowly opened in mid-air, and the incomparably shrill and tragic cries of ghosts emanated from within. Li Hu, while spitting blood, grabbed Zhang Shun. “Run… run, hurry!”
“My brother! My brother’s still with him!”
Li Hu’s eyes were red with urgency. “Your brother won’t die unless he messes around, let him die! The Demon Lord is about to summon his Asura King Dharmakaya ahhhhh—!”
At that very instant, the Demon Lord stretched out his hand into the void. A bolt of lightning, bright enough to scorch one’s retina, transformed into a long sword, carrying destructive electrical light as it struck towards Zhang Shun’s back—
At the same moment, Chu He opened his eyes. He reached out and gripped the Demon Lord’s strong wrist, looking up, his face ashen, but every word he spoke seemed forged in ice: “Who gave you permission to lay a hand on my brother?”
With a sudden, loud whoosh, a fierce wind rose from the ground. Zhang Shun turned back in astonishment!
He saw that with Chu He’s feet as the center, wind blades swirled like a massive vortex, and his figure in the eye of the wind rapidly transformed. His white robes swept to the ground, his long hair flew, like a phoenix soaring from the nine heavens. With a shake of his sleeve, his slender arm was revealed, holding a string of green prayer beads in his left hand and a long spear in his right, which he brought down with thunderous force upon the Demon Lord!
—Boom!
Zhang Shun was swept sideways by the air current generated by the clashing weapons, crashing against the wall behind him with a thud, almost spitting out a mouthful of blood in mid-air! He managed to scramble up with difficulty, only to see Li Hu lying beside him, struggling to pull out a phone from her pocket and start recording.
Zhang Shun: “???”
“Aren’t you going to record?” Li Hu coughed blood as she spoke. “Your brother’s Dharmakaya is known as one of the Ten Great Scenic Views of the Heavenly Dao. It’s very rare.” She then laboriously opened WeChat and started posting to her Moments.
Zhang Shun: “…”
Li Hu opened a WeChat group and shakily typed a few sentences. After a while, a reply chimed in. Zhang Shun glanced over, but the angle was too off to see what was written on the screen, though he seemed to see several different people replying. The light from the phone screen made Li Hu’s face look a bit eerie. She looked up at Zhang Shun with a faint, unsettling gaze.
Young Master Zhang felt a chill down his spine from that look. Fortunately, after that glance, Li Hu ignored him and said hoarsely into her phone, “Don’t joke around, Feng Si is gambling his life out there. What do we do, Boss Zhou is still on his way?”
A voice message came through with a Cantonese accent. Li Hu was too weak to lift the phone to her ear, so she put it on speaker. He heard a voice say, “You’re the one joking, Fox Six. I just spoke to Beijing. Zhou Hui has been guarding the Qiankun formation under the Great Hall for three days now, okay?”
Zhang Shun saw Li Hu’s face instantly turn ashen, and she trembled, “What did you say?!”
On the other side, the long spear and sword edge clashed, making a chilling, clattering sound. The Demon Lord narrowed his slender eyes, a movement that made him appear even colder and more ruthless. Suddenly, with a flick of his wrist, he forced Chu He back several steps!
Zhang Shun cried out, “Brother!”
Zhang Shun stumbled forward, not even feeling the intense pain from his dislocated elbow as he moved, but then his brother raised a hand, abruptly blocking him. Chu He was still facing away from him, the exposed side of his cheek beneath his temple hair was almost bluish-white, and he was breathing rapidly as if on the verge of collapsing.
The Demon Lord stared at Chu He’s face, saying word by word, “Your true body is now destroyed, your primordial spirit exhausted, and your vital blood almost gone. Yet you still dare to fight me with your Dharmakaya. Do you want to die that badly?”
—The Demon Lord was clearly truly enraged. Chu He gasped for a while before barely managing to steady himself, then straightened up and looked at him, saying tiredly, “Then come and kill me.”
Even Zhang Shun could hear the despair in his words. He instinctively wanted to say no, but then he saw the Demon Lord turn to him, revealing a very obvious cold sneer. “Why would I kill you? But the life of this Buddha relic, I’ll take it today.”
Zhang Shun immediately felt a bad premonition. In a thousandth of a second, he considered whether to turn and run or face the challenge, when he saw ten thousand bolts of lightning descend upon them, reaching them instantly!
Everything happened so quickly that Zhang Shun didn’t even have time to react before he was pushed away with great force, sent flying. Then, a person flew behind him, catching him in mid-air and landing heavily on the ground, pressing his head down to the ground!
The next second, a stream of fire, like a dragon’s breath, swept past the back of his head with a roar, instantly charring the broken bricks and rubble behind him!
Zhang Shun’s hair at the back of his head was completely scorched. He knew that if he had been a hundredth of a second slower, his entire head would have been incinerated. He coughed up a mouthful of hot, acrid blood, feeling excruciating pain in his ribs and unable to move. He turned to see that the person who had caught him in mid-air was Li Hu, and the one who had pushed him away was his brother.
—Chu He took the final blow, crashing heavily into the wall. The force of the push was so strong that his slender body actually bounced back, and then he directly spurted out a mouthful of blood!
With a thud, Chu He fell to the ground, his cheek pressed against the floor. He tried to get up several times but failed.
The Demon Lord walked forward, looking down at him.
“How pathetic…” he muttered, seemingly with a smile, then bent down and grabbed Chu He’s chin.
From Zhang Shun’s angle, the Demon Lord’s strong back blocked his brother’s face. He could only see the crumpled white robe and long hair intertwined on the ground, his brother’s face slightly tilted upwards, presumably held up by the Demon Lord’s grip on his chin.
Although Zhang Shun would be an idiot to still think this man was his brother’s “boyfriend,” the action and angle still gave him a strange and ambiguous feeling.
“I know you don’t want to die, otherwise you wouldn’t have come to me, borrowing my power to avoid heavenly tribulation.”
The Demon Lord leaned into his ear and whispered, “I’ll give you two choices now. First, come with me. Although I can’t revive Mahā for you, I can at least keep you alive. As long as you’re alive, anything is possible. Second, kill your brother.”
Chu He’s face was pale and bloodless, his eyelashes lowered, breathing with faint, painful gasps. It was truly rare for such an expression to appear on this face that had always been as cold and emotionless as an ice sculpture. The Demon Lord admired it for a while before smiling into his ear, “I advise you to make a decision quickly… if I watch you gasp like this for much longer, I’ll get hard.”
Chu He stiffened slightly, stopping his breathing. It was incredibly difficult for him to do so; his throat was choked with blood several times before he finally managed to swallow a mouthful of blood-tinged saliva and said, “I…”
“He’ll definitely choose the first option,” a lazy voice came from the doorway. “But I’ll choose the third option for him.”
Chu He suddenly squeezed his eyes shut tightly, and after a moment of blankness, Zhou Yi laughed, turning back to ask, “What’s the third option, Zhou Hui?”
Zhang Shun, enduring the severe pain in his ribs, abruptly turned his head.
At the same moment, he felt Li Hu let out a long sigh of relief, her entire body almost instantly slumping down.
Standing at the door was a young man in a motorcycle jacket, tall and lean. He took off his sunglasses, revealing an extraordinarily handsome face with his usual slightly rogue, nonchalant smile.
Zhang Shun used to find that smile annoying, but at this moment, it was so reassuring, making that handsome face seem infinitely more pleasing.
“The third option is for him to stay, his brother to live, and you to go back to the Asura Path. Don’t think that just because I came alone today, I can’t kill you. I just exhausted too much energy dealing with that Yin-Yang Master’s little beauty earlier, so I don’t really feel like playing with you today.” Zhou Hui said, waving to Zhang Shun, and asked very sincerely, “How is it, now that you’ve seen your brother’s boyfriend, have you realized that I’m still better?”
“…” Zhang Shun asked, “Can you maintain your pretentious pose for two more minutes?”
The Demon Lord laughed, effortlessly picking up Chu He with one hand.
From beneath his black robe, adorned with bone chains, his other hand raised a sword, its blood-dripping blade pointed at Zhou Hui, and he said mockingly, “Your esteemed wife is excellent in every way, but his taste in men is truly… There are few people who can watch their own flesh and blood be obliterated by heavenly tribulation and remain unmoved. You are truly unique among the six realms.”
Whether it was Zhang Shun’s illusion or not, he felt Zhou Hui’s spine stiffen. But Zhou Hui controlled his expression well, showing no abnormality, only his gaze shifted to Chu He.
Since he had entered, Chu He hadn’t made a single sound or movement. His face was buried in the Demon Lord’s arms, so his expression couldn’t be seen. But from the caked blood on his robes and the five fingertips that were dripping blood, it was clear he was truly at the end of his rope.
Zhou Hui’s breathing became deep and heavy. Demon Lord Fan Luo chuckled, “I choose the first option. Do you want to try and see if you can stop me?”
As soon as his words fell, Zhou Hui took a step forward, and a fierce wind suddenly erupted beside him without warning!
This wind, unlike the tight spiral of the phoenix Dharmakaya just now, was extremely unrestrained and wild, crushing the entire hospital room within seconds! Zhang Shun, holding onto the dying Li Hu, quickly retreated to the corner of the room, only to see the floor where he had just stood instantly crumble. Zhou Hui manifested his ten-foot-tall golden body out of thin air, wielding two fearsome swords, and struck down at the Demon Lord like the sky itself collapsing!
—Boom!
Half of the hospital building collapsed easily and completely, like dominoes. Amidst the torrential downpour of large bricks and stones, Zhou Hui’s Dharmakaya, like an ancient divine beast propping up the heavens and earth, opened its massive, blood-red maw, large enough to swallow the sky, and devoured the Demon Lord—
And behind the Demon Lord, the Hellgate, suddenly ten zhang taller, opened, and countless vengeful ghosts and souls, accompanied by vast seas of blood, rushed straight into the sky!
Zhang Shun gripped the edge of the broken wall, his pupils dilated with extreme shock. “This… this is Zhou Yi…”
“This is Boss Zhou’s Heavenly Dao Dharmakaya,” Li Hu said weakly. “Don’t you think it’s extremely terrifying, completely different from Feng Si?”
Zhang Shun didn’t know what to say, and nodded.
—Chu He’s Dharmakaya was entirely human. The Demon Lord was still half human. But Zhou Hui, though called the Heavenly Dao Dharmakaya, was completely a terrifying monstrous creature from ancient myths that dominated heaven and earth. Its ferocity and cruelty were such that even tens of thousands of people before it would be nothing more than a plate of flesh and blood on the vast earth.
“The Heavenly Dao Dharmakaya, it can transform in countless ways according to one’s will. A complete Dharmakaya is a thousand times larger than this,” Li Hu said tiredly. “I had a terrible day running into the Demon Lord. Someday when I have energy, I’ll show you my true form. My true form is… Wait, what is this?”
Li Hu suddenly stood up, stumbling towards the floor that was broken in two, revealing countless steel bars, and facing the mid-air.
Zhang Shun turned in astonishment, only to see Zhou Hui’s massive Dharmakaya suddenly pause in mid-air, as if frozen, then rapidly shrink back into a human.
The wind and rain ceased, the ghost cries ended.
Zhou Hui stood on the devastated ground, his expression indescribable, only his body strangely trembling. Chu He stood opposite him. Chu He had retracted his Dharmakaya, returning to his familiar appearance, one hand gripping Zhou Hui’s blade.
Blood flowed from his arm like a cut water pipe, drenching his entire body, but he didn’t even move, looking at Zhou Hui, his face indifferent, without a trace of emotion.
—He stood in front of Demon Lord Fan Luo.
