Chapter 279: Counterkill

Wang Zhize and Wang Zhitao's silhouettes stood at the edge of the colored ribbon.

That disaster-level aura glided through the tangled streets ahead.

He was very alert.

At each street corner, he used the shadows cast by shop awnings or the reflections in roadside puddles to swiftly scan behind him.

He would even deliberately slow his pace in the densest crowds, brushing past people of the three teachings and nine streams, trying to wash away his trace with the mixed aura.

He thought himself flawless.

"Brother, he's so slow," Wang Zhitao's voice carried a hint of impatience, like a child complaining the outing was too long.

His attention was completely captured by the domineering aroma of cumin and fat from a nearby roasted lamb leg.

"Patience," Wang Zhize's gaze pierced the layers of buildings and disguises, precisely locking onto the target named "Shadow Nightmare," "Good ingredients need a little time to walk onto the cutting board themselves."

Shadow Nightmare, a disaster-level Lower Grade, excelled at mental assassination and illusionary infiltration.

In Wang Zhize's eyes, the opponent's pitiful cultivation and law power were like a flickering candle in the dark—no matter how hidden, absurdly conspicuous.

Wang Zhitao curled his lip, withdrew his gaze from the roasted lamb stall, and refocused on the "prey."

The primal hunger overwhelmed the desire for food.

To him, the roasted lamb leg was a delicacy, while Shadow Nightmare was a …great medicine that could elevate his life's tier!

After Shadow Nightmare's seventh change of direction and slipping into an unremarkable mansion, he finally halted.

The mansion's lintel bore no plaque; the vermilion-painted gate was weathered, exuding the decay of an ordinary household.

But within Wang Zhize's law vision, the mansion inside and out was laced with at least thirty-six Seals and twelve layers of illusion arrays, interlinked into a delicate yet deadly trap.

Any uninvited intruder would be instantly strangled or fall into endless illusion, becoming a lamb awaiting slaughter.

"Brother, it's a nest," Wang Zhitao licked his lips, eyes shining.

"More than one."

Wang Zhize's divine thought flowed like mercury, silently seeping inside.

Inside the mansion, besides the disaster-level aura, five Golden Core‑peak Shadow Guards and a court official with a wavering aura and vacant eyes were hidden.

From the fleeting thought fragments of Shadow Nightmare, Wang Zhize had pieced together his mission.

To control the Deputy Minister of War and obtain the passage token for the sacrificial Heaven ceremony three days later.

"Interesting," Wang Zhize's mouth twitched, "If you want to dig up my furnace core, you must first watch the furnace. These are the furnace's guards."

He raised his hand, gently clasped the air.

"I define: this realm, inside and out, is isolated."

No earth-shaking spectacle, no ripples of law collision.

Yet the mansion, along with the hundred‑zhang space around it, was silently "cut" out of the whole Tianjing City world by an invisible force at that moment.

Those inside the mansion knew nothing of it.

Those outside would never notice a missing piece of the puzzle.

It became an isolated island.

A... grave prepared for Shadow Nightmare and all its companions.

"Go," Wang Zhize said calmly, "Don't let your extra meal get cold."

"Got it!"

Wang Zhitao responded excitedly, his whole body turning into a faint shadow that slipped not through the gate but directly merged into the mansion's high wall shadows, vanishing.

…

In a secret chamber deep within the mansion.

Shadow Nightmare stood before Deputy Minister Zhao, a confident cold smile on its face.

Deputy Minister Zhao's gaze had completely emptied, like a puppet stripped of its soul.

"Deputy Minister Zhao, from today onward, your will shall serve the Lord's great cause."

Shadow Nightmare's voice brimmed with beguiling magic; a strand of black mental energy finer than a hair at its fingertip was about to pierce Zhao's brow.

Once this was done, the highly authoritative Deputy Minister of War would become its most loyal puppet.

At that moment!

A terrifying sense of crisis that could freeze his very soul erupted from behind!

Shadow Nightmare's reaction was supremely swift; its body instantly became ethereal, splitting into dozens of identical phantoms that burst outward in all directions.

"Illusory Void-Realms!"

It was its life‑saving ultimate technique; each phantom contained a fragment of its origin, indistinguishable in truth, enough to confound a disaster-level Lower Grade strongman.

However, the attack it expected never arrived.

In its place came an irresistible, brutally extreme suction!

That suction did not affect its flesh but struck directly at its origin, its law, its soul!

The dozens of phantoms shot out like leaves tossed by a gale, spiraling back uncontrollably, reconverging toward the center.

No, not converging.

It was…being devoured!

In the secret chamber's shadows, at an unknown moment, a "mouth" opened.

It wasn't a real mouth, but a vortex formed purely of darkness and devouring law.

At the vortex's core lay an Abyss that could drive gods and demons to despair.

"No!!!"

Shadow Nightmare let out a horrified, desperate scream; its proud illusion law, before that vortex, was as fragile as a sheet of window paper, easily torn, shredded, and devoured.

Its mental power, its everything, was being forcibly stripped away!

"Who are you!"

"Enemy attack!"

The five Golden Core Shadow Guards stationed throughout the mansion instantly sensed the disturbance, turned into five black silhouettes, and fearlessly lunged toward the secret chamber.

But when they charged into the courtyard where the secret chamber lay, their steps suddenly halted.

The magical energy within them, like a punctured balloon, was wildly leaking out!

The surrounding cosmic laws grew immensely heavy and alien, like an invisible mountain crushing them, suppressing their realms from the pinnacle of the Golden Core down to Foundation Establishment and Refining Qi…

Until, mortals!

Wang Zhize's figure, at some unknown moment, had already appeared beneath the old locust tree in the courtyard.

He gazed at the five terrified, collapsing mortals and calmly uttered his final decree.

"My decree: you, your cultivation is reset to zero."

Puff! Puff! Puff!

The Dantian Qi Sea of the five Shadow Guards shattered simultaneously, their arduous cultivation turning to nothing.

They could not even scream, for the sudden loss of power overwhelmed them, and they fell unconscious.

Meanwhile, in the secret chamber, that one-sided "feast" was drawing to a close.

Wang Zhitao's figure reconstituted from the dark vortex; he let out a satisfied belch, his face alight with lingering delight.

The last breath of the Shadow Nightmare vanished completely from this world.

It was digested cleanly.

Wang Zhize approached the now-awake but terrified, limp Minister of War, his expression indifferent.

"Lord Zhao, that was merely an appetizer."

"Now, let us discuss… the matter of the Heaven Sacrificing Platform."

Minister Zhao trembled violently all over, staring at the young man before him who seemed like a deity and demon; after the terror, a faint glimmer of hope in a desperate situation quietly lit up in his dead eyes.