Chapter 97: The Master Is Dead – 64K Subscription Plea, Second Update Slightly Delayed

The Great Shang Dynasty has long been rich in martial virtue; even in the final Battle of Muye, as the "decisive battle" that ended the Shang, the remaining Shang forces still inflicted heavy losses on the anti‑Shang coalition.

And this village, defended by a retired soldier of the former South Province army, even after being breached by the demon tide, still stubbornly resisted, which well demonstrates the military prowess of the Yin people.

Well trained, highly organized, and ferociously powerful in combat.

These village militia are merely "militia reserves" trained according to the provincial militia system, not even proper militia.

The slaughter outside the stronghold continues, filled with the maniacal, extreme laughter of former compatriots who have already become demons.

The death of comrades only excites them further; as long as their sight is filled with death, their ears with others' screams or laughter, their desire is temporarily satisfied.

Although after this brief satisfaction comes an even stronger emptiness, that emptiness is the source of all their frenzied actions.

Through endless atrocities, they obtain that fleeting satisfaction.

But as time ticks by second by second, finally the massive death snaps some of the demons fixated on attacking the stronghold back to their senses; they all turn toward the places swallowed by golden light.

The death of comrades excites them; that's how it should be.

But at this moment, aside from the final maniacal laughs of the demons killed before death, the remaining demons fall into a state of "bewilderment."

A strange bewilderment.

Stupor, sluggishness.

Demons do not feel fear; when they see no flesh flying and their desires unsated, they fall into a period of stupor and bewilderment.

That is exactly what happens now.

They stare blankly at Wang Wu's slaughter, showing no reaction, no matter how many bodies his blade slices or how many people his fists pulverize.

Yet the splattered limbs contain no flesh, and the flesh already devoured by golden light, when it strikes them, evokes an instinctive revulsion.

Diamond Demon‑Subduing; the Geng‑metal qi has a natural restraining effect on these monsters.

Soon, when Zhu San Niang and her group rushed into the town—less than two minutes after Wang Wu—Wang Wu was already about to finish killing the demons surrounding the stronghold.

But Zhu San Niang's target was not here; some demons were still roaming the village, and those were her target.

At this moment, the spherical underground fortress also moves toward the village, aiming for the exact center of the stronghold, then expands the Diamond Demon‑Subduing Formation's radius to protect the entire stronghold.

"Demon, monster!!!"

Through the stronghold's firing port, many village militia, exhilarated by Wang Wu's appearance, naturally saw the long worm rampaging in the village and the huge spider.

They all shouted in surprise, but the next moment, Wang Wu, hearing their cries, said:

"No need to worry, everyone; that's a monster I raised at home, grown up with me since childhood, it won't hurt anyone."

With those words, the people inside the stronghold instantly felt reassured.

"Th‑thank you, Immortal Master, for coming to rescue!!"

Inside the stronghold, Sun Zhen's father, the retired soldier Sun Hu who served in the former South Province army, stood on the wall and gratefully shouted down to Wang Wu:

"Immortal Master, your great kindness, we are truly infinitely grateful!!!"

Wang Wu gave no reply, for he needed to continue his slaughter.

Soon, no demons remained outside the stronghold; they would not flee, only stand dumbly here, allowing Wang Wu to slaughter them.

Demons killed by Geng‑metal true qi cease emitting demonic energy, even though the ground is littered with charred skeletons and black smoke.

Aside from the foul stench, they cause no further effect on the villagers inside the stronghold.

Having exterminated the demons outside, the Heavenly Demon Eye swept a circle; after it passed over the stronghold, Wang Wu's gaze instantly turned ominous.

He leapt onto the wall; village chief Sun Hu hurried forward, ready to thank Wang Wu properly, but found Wang Wu staring at a spot inside the stronghold.

"In your village," Wang Wu pointed to the area where women and children are housed, "someone there has already been tainted by demonic aura."

Instantaneously, Sun Hu's complexion changed. Wang Wu had no intention to continue speaking, and rushed straight into the stronghold, threading through corridors until stopping in a spacious room.

The room was where the women and nursing infants stayed; Wang Wu's intrusion startled all the women.

Even though Wang Wu possessed a celestial‑like appearance, to these women his unfamiliar face still made their hearts freeze instantly.

Wang Wu's gaze swept over the women and quickly fixed on five of them.

At that moment, Sun Hu, followed by several warriors from the town, came over.

They happened to see the women scream as Wang Wu approached; some even grabbed nearby objects and hurled them at him, then shouted:

"Don't be afraid! Everyone, don't be afraid!! These are the cultivators sent by the court to rescue us!!! Don't be scared!!!"

Sun Hu's shout quickly took effect; the screaming crowd gradually calmed under his soothing, leaving only the infants' wails.

Wang Wu passed through the women whose gazes were on him, and approached one woman.

"Is she from your village?" Wang Wu pointed at the woman on the ground, asking the surrounding women.

One woman glanced and shook her head; another did the same.

Four or five more did likewise, until a middle‑aged woman finally said, "Immortal, Immortal Leader, this little girl was just taken into our village a few days ago…"

"Splash"

Before the middle‑aged woman could finish, the woman Wang Wu pointed at was engulfed by golden light and fell to the ground.

Then Wang Wu moved toward another target, repeating the process.

The second, third, fourth, and up to the last—when Wang Wu faced the woman, he hesitated a bit.

At this moment, just after entering the room, Sun Zhen, who had just witnessed Wang Wu kill the first two women, saw the face of the woman that made Wang Wu pause again, and his complexion instantly changed.

Immediately, he shouted:

"Immortal, Immortal Master!!"

Wang Wu turned his head toward him, but still grabbed her and pulled her out of the crowd.

Seeing the woman in Wang Wu's hand, Sun Hu's expression was also complicated, but as village chief he knew that even if he still felt reluctant, it would be of no use now.

Being killed before the transformation might, for his daughter‑in‑law, actually be a release.

"Your daughter‑in‑law has already been infused with demonic aura and is about to fully transform," Wang Wu said.

He let go, his face ashen, never struggling; the very cooperative woman, addressing village chief Sun Hu, said:

Sun Hu glanced at his own daughter‑in‑law, then at Sun Zhen, who was kneeling before Wang Wu and pleading incessantly, his expression bitter.

"Immortal, Immortal Chief, Immortal Chief!!"

Sun Zhen's face was wet with tears; he clutched tightly onto Wang Wu's pant leg—still clean and tidy even though the crowd surged back and forth, limbs were torn apart—begging:

"My wife—she's still pregnant!! Immortal Chief!!!"

"Please, please save her, save her...!!!"

"Immortal Chief, Immortal Chief!!!"

Unlike the previous four women, Sun Zhen's wife was evidently on good terms with many of the village women, or rather, the women all knew her.

When they heard Wang Wu mention Sun Zhen's wife, a number of low sobs came from behind.

The infant, unaware of what had happened, kept wailing nonstop from the moment Wang Wu arrived until now.

"I have no way." Wang Wu shook his head and sighed.

A demonic cultivator can be saved; a demonic cultivator draws demonic energy into the body and then cultivates, overcoming the corruption of body and mind to forge the body and gain great power.

Therefore the cultivation requirements for demonic cultivators are very low, even negligible.

But the reality is not that simple; otherwise the Great Zhou Dynasty could not even turn a blind eye to demonic cultivators. As the former Yin‑Shang land, Nan Zhou should already be teeming with them.

The woman before me is just an ordinary person; perhaps her physique is excellent, but she is still just ordinary.

"If you have anything to say or any instructions, say them while you still have the chance," Wang Wu said, looking at the woman.

"Do not fear for your husband; I have set a demon‑suppressing formation outside the fort, so demonic energy will no longer harm them."

The four women Wang Wu killed earlier caused no stir in the crowd; some even sensed that something was amiss.

Because the four women Wang Wu killed had only moved to the village recently.

The woman nodded, then looked at Sun Zhen, who was holding her and sobbing, patting his back and soothing him softly.

After a moment, the woman pushed her husband away. Sun Zhen tried to embrace his wife, but his father seized him.

"Sorry to trouble you, Immortal Master."

The woman stepped before Wang Wu and gave a gentle nod.

"Alas." Wang Wu sighed, extended a finger and pressed it to her head.

Golden light engulfed the woman again; she slowly fell to the ground, and soon transformed into a skeleton tinged slightly with black.

The five women's skeletal remains each bore a different hue: the first was the darkest, almost entirely black; the second and third were lighter; the fourth was darker than the second and third.

The fifth, however, was the lightest.

Yet even so, over sixty percent of her bones had turned black.

"Th‑thank you, Immortal Master..."

Seeing his daughter‑in‑law's skeleton, Sun Hu's eyes shed a few hot tears. He sniffed, then bowed solemnly to Wang Wu.

"I didn't do much either," Wang Wu waved his hand, then said, "Besides, I'm not a court cultivator. I came here tonight from He Dong Xian."

Having said that, Wang Wu walked toward the outside. Sun Hu followed behind, and the group soon returned to the fort's wall.

Wang Wu looked toward the distant village residential area; the slaughter there had ended quickly, leaving only broken corpses.

Zhu San Niang and the second lady did not follow Wang Wu into the fort, as the aura of the demon‑repelling stone disgusted them.

After clearing the remaining demonic beings from the village, the two women transformed back into human form and went to bathe and disinfect.

Although their resistance was stronger, monsters naturally loathe demonic creatures, so even if no issues arose, they still cleaned thoroughly to eliminate any hidden danger.

They likely won't interact with Wang Wu for at least the next three days, as this brief slaughter has already made them feel nauseous for several days.

Wang Wu stood on the fort's wall, surveying the surroundings.

This is the village's high point; from the wall one can see far. Looking outward, Wang Wu saw many torches drifting over the wasteland, and two nearby villages, now reduced to raging flames.

This is the only one that survived among the nearby villages.

Seeing the devastation of the two nearby villages, Wang Wu felt a heaviness in his heart.

"Immortal, Immortal Master," Sun Hu, standing beside Wang Wu, suddenly asked.

"What is it?" Wang Wu asked, not turning his head but staring at Lin Dong County's defenses.

There, too, a great many flames gathered outside the county seat.

Only that the flames could be seen clearly diminishing.

The county seat's defensive strength far surpasses that of the surrounding villages, even though Lin Dong County is a small county with only a few hundred thousand residents.

"Is it, is something big about to happen?" Sun Hu asked, stammering slightly.

"A few days ago, a spacecraft was shot down over He Dong Xian. You must have heard the news," Wang Wu said, turning his gaze from the distant county seat toward him.

"We only know that a big incident occurred in He Dong Xian a few days ago, and since winter began, troops have frequently been dispatched there. We thought, we thought the stationed army had gone to Wang Gu Lin to dig graves again."

"I don't know whether it's a major event," Wang Wu said, looking again at the distant county seat, "but a disaster is indeed imminent, and it's not just a natural disaster, there will be human calamity as well."

Having finished, Wang Wu suddenly looked up, his gaze fixed on the sky. Sun Hu noticed his change, quickly looked upward and raised his hand to signal the nearby village militia to prepare for battle.

But the next moment, he was stunned.

Because a figure was rapidly descending from the sky, hovering a short distance above their heads.

"It's you?"

Wang Wu looked at the person appearing before him, a bit surprised.

"You..." Zheng Shuang had naturally seen Wang Wu long ago; looking at the blackened skeletons below the fort and the corpses in the village residential area, he immediately understood what had happened.

"Thank you." Zheng Shuang stepped onto the wall, clasped his hands and solemnly said to Wang Wu, "Thank you, sir, for saving their lives."

Although he had many prejudices against Wang Wu beforehand, he still felt a bit uneasy now—after all, that was himself... cough cough. Nonetheless, respect and gratitude were undeniable.

"I am a cultivator sent from Lin Dong County to assist here," Zheng Shuang said, glancing at the village militia on the wall, then at Sun Hu: "You must be the village chief?"

"Immortal Master," Sun Hu bowed slightly, "I am Sun Hu, village chief of Sun Jiawan."

"How many villagers were lost?" Zheng Shuang asked.

"Thanks to that immortal master's timely rescue, only twelve village militia were lost." Sun Hu's tone was somewhat heavy; for a village, the most important thing is this youthful labor force.

Every village militia is a treasure of the village, and the more village militia a village has, the higher its standing in this region naturally.

Whether modern or ancient, in another world or on Earth, village battles are always a classic staple.

In the old home, ancient village battles were hundred‑person melee fights, modern ones are mortar corps engagements. Here, they can field a whole bunch of heavy cavalry equipped with armored riding gear.

Sun Jiawan does not breed horses, and the few villages near Lin Dong County are also of modest strength.

It is He Dong Xian that has several villages dedicated to horse breeding; because they have horses, their sphere of influence is especially large, and they enjoy a distinct advantage in village battles.

The authorities have never interfered in village battles, unless they become excessively violent.

Even when outside villages stage heavily armored infantry smashing armored cavalry gear, or armored cavalry gear charges through infantry ranks, there are still people who go specifically to watch.

As for the dead, it's not unusual; no village goes a year without a few deaths.

"Other villages…" Sun Hu looked at Zheng Shuang, whose complexion brightened noticeably upon hearing that Sun Jiawan suffered little loss, and asked cautiously.

"They're all dead." Zheng Shuang glanced at Wang Wu and Sun Hu, his tone heavy. Then he pointed toward Lin Dong County:

"Did you see those flames? They've turned into those things, roaming the wilderness outside the city, killing anyone they see, devouring anyone they see."

At that point Zheng Shuang sighed, then paused briefly and continued: "Lin Dong County has requested aid from nearby county towns, He Dong Xian has responded, and tomorrow a cavalry unit will be dispatched from the city to encircle and eliminate these scattered demons."

"The prefectural government will no longer send troops, because there are also irregularities occurring over there."

"Now the prefectural government and the Imperial Court have ordered that all county towns go on full alert from today, and the major sects should immediately send cultivators to station in the villages under the county towns."

"At the same time, the Demon‑Subduing Army under the Nan Zhou Demon‑Subduing Office will set out immediately to all parts of the prefecture."

At this moment, Wang Wu asked curiously, "What about the people of Sun Jiawan?"

"I will report to He Dong Xian shortly and have them send another contingent tomorrow to bring these people to He Dong County town," Zheng Shuang replied upon hearing Wang Wu's question.

"I will also report this to Lin Dong County; if Lin Dong County can resolve the issue quickly, perhaps tonight a force will come to escort these people away. But I think that's unlikely; they'll probably still end up under He Dong's jurisdiction."

"Is this kidnapping?" Wang Wu's complexion turned odd at this point, because it inevitably made him think of that matter.

"It is indeed a kidnapping," Zheng Shuang nodded. "He Dong Xian has already seized several villages from Lin Dong, and villages that formerly belonged to Lin Dong County have now been reassigned under He Dong County's administration."

After hearing that, Wang Wu said nothing more.

Fine, population does seem truly important, important enough that two county towns would fight over it.

After a brief chat, Wang Wu sat cross‑legged on the city wall, closing his eyes to rest his spirit. After watching him for a while, Zheng Shuang went to order village chief Sun Hu to begin setting up the array.

By now the grand array surrounding the village had long been destroyed, leaving only the array inside the fortress. Its effect is indeed good, but it still requires careful inspection and reinforcement.

However, as soon as he entered the fortress's perimeter, Zheng Shuang sensed something unusual about the interior.

It was as if he were standing in spring, almost giving him the illusion of bright sunshine and pleasant weather.

Though it was night, the sky was as black as ink, and the surrounding temperature was only just above zero degrees.

Nan Zhou lies in the southern frontier, but its winters are no warmer either.

"The environment inside is actually quite good—thanks to the cultivator's effort?" Zheng Shuang asked Sun Hu while arranging the array.

"Yes, indeed." Sun Hu nodded. "That immortal master set up a Vajra Subduing Demon Array in our fortress, saying that as long as you're inside, you'll be completely safe."

Zheng Shuang nodded and said nothing more.

About an hour and a half later, Zheng Shuang finished inspecting and reinforcing the array, as well as laying out a new array.

He returned to the city wall; Wang Wu was still seated there, unmoving.

Walking to the opposite side, Zheng Shuang suddenly noticed that Wang Wu's expression had become extremely sorrowful.

"Fellow cultivator, what's wrong?"

At that moment, a deeply sorrowful Wang Wu heard Zheng Shuang's voice beside his ear; he turned his head toward him, choking out:

"I—I… my master, my master is dead…"

The time was about two minutes ago.

【I am the World's Number One Assassin: (video) (video)】

【I am the World's Number One Assassin: Haha, I've sent him to heaven (emoji) (emoji)】

That was in a small group that Sha Shou Ge had pulled him into; feeling a bit heavy‑hearted and also bored, Wang Wu opened the chat group to see what was new today.

Soon after entering, Sha Shou Ge posted a video.

Clicking it, the first clip showed Sha Shou Ge holding his master Qin Xiang's blood‑splattered head, flashing a "V" to the screen.

The second clip showed the master's buttocks facing the sky as his head was smashed into the ground by Sha Shou Ge.

Sha Shou Ge is a handsome man, not much different from him.

He has a strong build, the same "ape‑back, bee‑waist" type as Wang Wu. Dressed in a black trench coat, he sports a long plait whose end bears a pink bow.

By contrast, his master Qin Xiang is even more massive—at least two meters tall—a middle‑aged man with a shaved head, a full beard, white hair, and eyes of a golden‑red hue.

He usually wears a plaid vest, loose camouflage combat pants, and black military boots.

The moment he saw the video, Wang Wu was completely stunned.

Because he had finally managed to raise his master's favor that high, finally become the Direct Transmission Disciple of the sect head of the Jitian Jinguang Sect, finally…

But the result, the result was…

He felt like crying but had no tears.

So he forwarded the video to his Moments, adding a very sorrowful caption:

【Shan Ding Dong Yaoguai: (video) Master is dead】

【Wu Shuang (Senior Sister): (emoji) Haha】

【I am the World's Invincible (Second Senior Brother): Huh? Master died?】

【Low‑price purchase of Jitian Jinguang Sect supplement D for me: Master, master! Why did you die?? You still haven't sent me the last batch of supplements!!!】

"Ah, this, this…" Seeing Wang Wu's mournful expression, Zheng Shuang was at a loss for words; after stammering for a moment, he prepared to say something comforting.

But at that moment, a rapid ring of a bell sounded, instantly cutting him off.

Then, he saw Wang Wu, his face full of grief, pull out a glowing crystal box from behind, his expression instantly shifting from grief to surprise.

Watching Wang Wu press that little box to his ear, immediately afterward, an ear-splitting roar rang out from inside:

"Fuck! You little bastard, what the fuck are you posting on your Moments!!?? Delete that shit right now!! Delete it!!!"

Now Zheng Shuang knew what this thing was — a long-distance communication artifact.

As for the angry voice ringing out from the artifact, this should be the master Wang Wu had mentioned earlier, the one who had already "died."

Although Zheng Shuang had no idea what "Moments" meant, it did not hinder his comprehension.

Or rather, under the influence of some kind of power, he simply ignored the "Moments" thing altogether.

(End of this chapter)