Chapter 277: The Smiling Demon's Method

Black mist permeated the heavens and earth, and eerie, inexplicable whispers echoed incessantly.

From within the black mist, a continuous stream of Otherkind surged out like a tide, while the Smiling Demon danced and gestured before the mist.

This scene was comical, yet not a single student on the high wall could laugh, for even with their eyes closed, they knew the Smiling Demon was surely brewing something.

But they had no way to stop it; they could only react as the situation unfolded.

Jiang Qing had already issued the order for everyone to maintain the highest level of vigilance.

Outside the stronghold, the demons howled, while inside, it was quiet and oppressive.

Under the nervous gaze of the many students, a moment later, the Smiling Demon's body finally stopped, and the smile on its face seemed to deepen.

Then, it slowly opened a mouth filled with black, jagged teeth.

Pfft, pfft, pfft!

One after another, beams of black light shot out from its mouth, whistling through the air and landing straight onto the clay figures atop the mud platforms.

Hiss!

The black light sank into the clay figures, and then there was silence.

Everything became quiet.

The students waited for a long while, but seeing no strange changes occur, looks of astonishment appeared on their faces—had the spellcasting failed?

Ah!

Yet, before they could feel any joy, suddenly, to everyone's surprise, an anomaly erupted within the stronghold as screams began to ring out.

Everyone turned in terror to see that inside the stronghold, billowing black smoke was suddenly erupting from the bodies of some students; they shrieked as the corners of their mouths tore rapidly, eventually forming that eerie smile.

Thick power of malice, like a tide, submerged their bodies.

Within a few short breaths, these students seemed to be transformed into puppets, and with blood-red eyes, they lunged at nearby students like wild beasts.

The entire stronghold instantly fell into chaos.

On the high wall, Li Luo looked at the chaos within the stronghold, his expression turning exceptionally grim.

"These people are the contaminated ones who weren't discovered before..."

Jiang Qing's golden eyes watched the scene coldly, saying, "The clay figures the Smiling Demon molded from black mud must have formed a connection with the seeds of contamination hidden within them, then directly triggered them, causing them to turn into puppets under its control."

Li Luo's heart felt heavy; although they had already discovered some contaminated students earlier, it was clear those were not all of them.

Perhaps this was also intentional on the part of the Smiling Demon—mixing truth with falsehood to make it difficult for people to sort things out completely.

Duze Honglian's face was also a bit pale; if the contamination in her own body hadn't been cleared, she would likely be the same as these students.

Suddenly, she thought of something and hurriedly warned, "Watch out for Yuan Xiong, Ye Qiuding, and the others. Like me, they came face-to-face with the Smiling Demon; it's very likely they have hidden contamination too!"

Yuan Xiong was her teammate.

Boom!

Just as her voice fell, a stone tower collapsed, and a disheveled figure was sent flying backward, smashing a wall into pieces.

That figure was Tian Tian, who had been monitoring Yuan Xiong and Ye Qiuding!

At this moment, she looked toward the shattered stone tower with a slightly pale face, seeing several figures wrapped in thick, black smoke of malice slowly walking out.

Through the black smoke, one could vaguely see the faces of Yuan Xiong, Ye Qiuding, and the others, torn and bleeding, but their eyes were all scarlet, clearly having had their consciousness controlled.

"Captain, after they were contaminated, their strength increased!"

Tian Tian looked toward the position of Jiang Qing and the others on the high wall and shouted a warning.

Hearing this, Jiang Qing's pretty face was icy, and her calm voice rang out in the ears of every student in the stronghold: "Do not panic. Everyone, join forces immediately to suppress the contaminated students."

"Form a defensive line near the central tower; do not let the contaminated students get close. Their goal must be to destroy the central tower and shake the purification light barrier!"

Within the chaotic stronghold, as Jiang Qing's calm voice reached them, the panic was somewhat quelled. The next moment, everyone erupted with resonant power and began to surround and suppress the contaminated students.

They all understood that if the central tower were truly destroyed in the current situation, they would lose the protection of the purification light barrier and inevitably be submerged by the countless Otherkind.

There would be no way to survive!

Under the threat to their lives, they cast aside their inner fears and began to fight with all their might.

Li Luo, Duze Honglian, Qiu Bai, and others also joined the fray to suppress the chaos in the stronghold.

Only Jiang Qing remained standing on the high wall, her beautiful face calmly watching the stronghold before she turned her gaze back to lock onto the Smiling Demon.

Although the opponent's eerie methods had caused chaos in the stronghold, it was currently within a controllable range, so she needed to keep a close eye on the opponent and wait for an opportunity to act.

Jiang Qing understood that if anyone could pose even a slight threat to the Smiling Demon, it would likely only be her.

However, even she had a non-negligible gap compared to the Smiling Demon, so she needed to wait for an opportunity.

Thus, as the chaos in the stronghold continued, Jiang Qing stood quietly on the high wall. A wind carrying the scent of blood blew by, lifting her long hair, while her hands rested lightly on the hilt of her sword, the tip planted in the ground.

Her golden eyes, like amber, stared at the Smiling Demon in the distance.

Hum!

Li Luo held his twin blades, water-like light swirling rapidly on the edges, the humming sound vibrating in the air.

At this moment, he was exerting all his strength to knock away a contaminated student.

But before he could pursue, his expression sharpened, sensing an extremely vicious power of malice lunging directly at his position.

Li Luo reacted extremely quickly; his resonant power surged, and a light mirror appeared at his side, reflecting the black-smoke-shrouded figure lunging toward him.

Bang!

The mirror surface shattered, and a rebounding force erupted from it, shaking the figure, but it quickly recovered and slashed a beam of black light at Li Luo like lightning.

Clang!

Li Luo hurriedly met the attack with his twin blades, unleashing all the resonant power in his body.

A violent shockwave of resonant power swept out; Li Luo took several steps back, his palms gripping the blades stinging with pain. He looked at the figure that had ambushed him with a solemn expression.

The latter was now shrouded in the power of malice, black smoke pouring incessantly from their nose and mouth. Although their appearance was hard to distinguish, Li Luo still recognized them.

"Ye Qiuding?"

Li Luo frowned. Before being contaminated, this Ye Qiuding had the strength of the third stage of the Resonant Master realm, far exceeding his own. Now, after contamination, his strength had received a significant boost; a direct confrontation was clearly not on the same level.

Heh!

Ye Qiuding's dark red pupils stared at Li Luo, thick power of malice rising in his eyes. He let out an eerie laugh, then directly stirred up fierce power and pursued like lightning.

Li Luo cursed under his breath and hurriedly retreated.

But Ye Qiuding pursued him relentlessly, completely ignoring everyone else, launching one fierce and sinister attack after another, wrapped in the power of malice.

"Do you have such a big grudge against me?"

Li Luo was chased in a rather disheveled state and couldn't help feeling depressed. Ye Qiuding should be in a state of having no reason, yet he was still pursuing him with a specific target; one could only say this guy held a significant amount of hostility toward him in his subconscious.

And the source of this hostility was not hard to guess—it was mostly because of Jiang Qing.

"This bastard, he doesn't even forget to be jealous after being contaminated?"

At this moment, Ye Qiuding's power was extremely strong and his speed was extremely fast. In just a short while, he caught up to Li Luo, his astonishing attacks enveloping him and forcing Li Luo into a very sorry state.

After all, even after the improvement from the Dark Spirit Pool, Li Luo was only at the third pattern of the Resonant Pattern stage, but Ye Qiuding was at the Resonant Transformation stage!

Fortunately, Li Luo was not alone.

Soon, starlight resonant power erupted behind him, turning into a continuous stream of star butterflies that rushed toward Ye Qiuding.

Phantoms appeared out of thin air, swinging blades at Ye Qiuding.

Although Ye Qiuding only needed a slight surge of the malice power outside his body to wipe out all those star butterflies, the one breath of time it bought allowed Li Luo to shake off his pursuit.

At the same time, black resonant power shot out from the shadows like arrows, aiming viciously and precisely at Ye Qiuding's vital points.

Hiss!

However, these shadow-like resonant powers were all neutralized by Ye Qiuding with a casual wave of his hand.

Phew.

Li Luo let out a long breath, his twin blades pointing diagonally at the ground. He glanced at Bai Mengmeng and Xin Fu, who had appeared behind him, and said, "If you hadn't come, you would have had to collect my corpse, Captain!"

"Even if we came, we still can't beat him," Xin Fu said helplessly.

Even with the three of them joining forces, Ye Qiuding was still crushing them on every level; after all, he was a standout among the second-year students and had been boosted by the power of malice.

"Can't beat him..."

Li Luo smiled and said, "Just call for people."

He waved his hand toward a direction, and then Xin Fu and Bai Mengmeng saw a small team pass through the chaotic stronghold and quickly flank from another direction.

Those were three familiar figures.

Yi Lisha, Si Qiuying, and Qiu Ye.

Two small teams, one in front and one behind, blocked Ye Qiuding's path.

Then, neither team hesitated; the six figures shot out simultaneously, beginning their joint suppression of this standout from the second-year students.