Chapter 427: The sky has changed

"What a strange body technique!"

Watching the battle between the man and the monkey, Long Lao's expression grew increasingly grave.

He had originally wanted to force out Long Xuan's trump cards, but he hadn't expected this youth to be able to fight this monkey to a standstill without using Gu, and even hold a slight upper hand.

However, this probing was not without its gains; being able to contend with a spirit beast without using Gu was, in itself, an exposure of his terrifying combat power. If he was like this without Gu, how strong would he be if he used it?

The Gu Kings within the secret realm whose cultivation had been suppressed would likely be no match for this youth. Long Lao immediately gave this assessment in his heart, and he couldn't help but feel a threefold increase in wariness toward Long Xuan.

At this moment, the battle between the man and the beast finally reached a conclusion.

Long Xuan leaped into the air, his body inverted, and he brought a palm down heavily upon the golden monkey below.

"Tathagata Palm!"

The golden monkey raised its iron staff with both hands to block, yet the moment the staff made contact with this palm, it felt as if it were bearing the weight of a mountain.

Such weight was simply not something it could withstand. Under the immense pressure, it immediately fell to one knee, its knee striking the ground heavily and kicking up a cloud of dust.

At the same time, Long Xuan kicked down with his right foot, striking it heavily in the chest.

The top-grade spirit armor, which should have been able to defend against most attacks, seemed to fail at this moment.

The golden monkey only felt an immense force ignore the barrier of the spirit armor, penetrating directly through its surface defense to strike its internal organs.

"Pfft!"

The golden monkey vomited a mouthful of blood, its body flying horizontally through the air. The staff in its hand also flew high up, finally crashing heavily into a tree before rolling to a stop on the ground.

It scrambled up in a sorry state, its gaze toward Long Xuan filled with horror, and it turned and ran backward at extreme speed, not daring to fight him again.

"Quick, chase! Root out the evil! Monkeys are very vengeful!" Long Lao reminded him loudly at this moment.

However, Long Xuan's Heavenly Mechanism Eye saw from a great distance away that a Fourth-Rank spirit monkey was driving a spirit tool chariot, flying toward them at extreme speed. How could he dare to waste time chasing that golden monkey now?

"Hurry and go!"

Long Xuan's expression changed, and he turned and ran in the opposite direction.

There was no time to explain; if Long Lao listened to him, fine, but if he didn't, he couldn't care about that much anymore.

Seeing his panicked expression, Long Lao, though unaware of what had happened, guessed it was certainly nothing good. He didn't bother to ask and obediently chased after Long Xuan as they ran far away.

At this time, the group of onlookers had not yet recovered their senses, each of them staring blankly. This person had actually defeated that divine monkey, which was wearing a full set of spirit gear, with his bare hands; they simply couldn't believe their eyes.

However, just as they were stunned, a Fourth-Rank spirit monkey driving a chariot-type spirit tool flew toward them from the horizon at extreme speed.

"Who exactly injured my son!"

A deafening, furious roar came from the horizon, and everyone's expressions changed immediately.

"How is this possible? Isn't the Fourth-Rank spirit monkey currently in a chaotic battle with the human Gu Kings? How could it appear here? We can't be this unlucky!"

"Not good! Run!"

The crowd was shocked, their faces turning pale. How could they dare to stay here any longer? They turned to run.

However, they were ultimately one step too slow; just as they turned around, a sheet of lightning rained down toward them.

Except for a young girl who teleported away in an instant and a young man whose body suddenly turned into water and escaped beneath the soil, this entire group was blasted into smithereens by the incoming lightning, with not a single survivor.

"Son! Quickly see if the culprit who injured you is among them!"

Looking back over his shoulder and seeing that the fourth-rank spirit monkey was not in pursuit, Long Xuan finally let out a long sigh of relief. That was close; heaven knows why a spirit beast would be riding a war chariot that only humans possess, and it had arrived in the blink of an eye.

He was also fortunate that his reaction was fast enough to distance himself from the range of its soul perception early on; otherwise, the consequences would have been unimaginable.

"What happened? What exactly did you see just now to make your expression so panicked and make you run so fast?" asked Shui Lao, puzzled.

After all, he lacked Long Xuan's keen eyesight; even with a Gu King's soul perception, Long Lao had failed to detect that spirit beast in the first instance.

Long Xuan did not answer his question, but instead turned his gaze toward a patch of ground displaying progress and immediately spoke up:

"Who's there? I see you, come out!"

As his words fell, a pool of water flowed out from the ground, slowly condensing into the figure of a person.

Seeing this figure, Long Xuan could not help but have a strange expression; who else could this person be but Shui Juanyun? He had not expected that the two old acquaintances would meet again; what fate.

This face was exactly the face of the person Shui Juanyun had possessed; he still remembered it vividly, but he had not expected that he had not died in that battle with the Teng family. His luck was truly good.

He was recognized by Long Xuan at a glance, but Long Xuan was using a different face while out and about, so Shui Juanyun truly did not recognize him. Seeing that his tracks had been easily discovered by someone, he was slightly startled in his heart, truly unable to figure out how he had been exposed.

"The two of you, don't misunderstand. I didn't intend to follow you two; it's just that the direction I chose while fleeing happened to coincide with yours, and neither of us changed direction halfway, so we ended up walking together."

The person before him made him extremely wary, and he dared not offend this person, so he hurriedly explained.

"Do you know what exactly happened in Huiyue City, and what is the deal with that spirit beast draped in spirit tools?"

"I have never seen a spirit beast that can use spirit tools; it's simply absurd."

Shui Lao's curiosity was much heavier than Long Xuan's; unable to suppress the curiosity in his heart any longer, he immediately spoke up to ask.

"I only just found out about this matter upon arriving here, and I don't know much."

"I only know that a monkey beast named Qi Chi learned human artifact refining techniques and even honed them to a peak level. No human genius artifact refiner was a match for it, and in the end, it, a spirit beast, even won the championship of the artifact refining competition."

"After this monkey learned artifact refining, it was no surprise that it immediately refined a massive amount of spirit tools to arm its own tribe."

"A monkey's body is similar to a human's, making it the spirit beast most suited to using spirit tools. Once that group of monkeys possessed spirit tools, their combat power soared instantly, at least tripling overall. In the very first battle, they instantly wiped out Huiyue City."

Shui Juanyun revealed a wary expression and said solemnly: "A spirit beast that can refine artifacts is too great a threat to humans. If artifact refining techniques were to blossom everywhere in the spirit beast world and leave behind a permanent inheritance, the consequences would be simply unimaginable."

"Even if those transformed Demon Kings each possessed a life-bound spirit tool, it would be a tremendous threat to humans."

"Anyone with a brain knows the severity of this matter, so all the major forces in the Western Regions united immediately, dispatching a massive number of Gu Kings to encircle and suppress this Qi Chi."

"The number of Gu Kings gathered for this event far exceeds your imagination; even many demonic cultivators and loose cultivators who wanted to seize the divine artifact, the Prison Heaven Staff, came uninvited."

"It is no exaggeration to say that the number of Gu Kings gathered by the Demon Slaying Order doesn't even amount to a fraction of this event. The strongest humans are sparing no cost to eradicate this Qi Chi as quickly as possible; they can't sleep soundly if it drags on for even one more day."

"There will be a spectacle to watch for some time to come. Even if Qi Chi is successfully eradicated, its Prison Heaven Staff, hailed as the third divine artifact of the Gu World, will set off a bloody storm. Who knows how many people will die in the process of fighting over this divine artifact."

Shui Juanyun said with a very excited expression, fearing only that the world would not be in chaos.

Upon hearing this, Long Xuan revealed a look of shock. He had not expected such a major event to occur in the Huiyue Empire, and he had happened to run into it. He was going to stay in the Huiyue Empire for a period of time, and he did not know if he would be caught up in this event.

His gaze suddenly became thoughtful. A spirit beast that could refine artifacts—he thought of the spirit beast that had come to his shop to trade for alloy bug armor that day. Could it be him?

Could that Prison Heaven Staff, ranked third among the divine artifacts of the Gu World, have been refined using his fourth-grade alloy? Could it be? His expression became strange.

Meanwhile, Shui Lao's expression became incomparably ugly, his face as black as it could be. He did not care how chaotic this world was, nor did he care how many people would die; he was thinking of another problem at this moment.

This event had caused a massive number of Gu Kings to gather in Huiyue City, and the dates of the Tea Tasting Assembly and the Wine Tasting Assembly happened to be very close to this event.

Once the tea and wine assemblies begin, will those Gu Kings see that the River God Secret Realm is very close to them and drop by to take a look?

How many Gu Kings will gather in the River God Secret Realm by then?

As soon as this thought appeared, he felt his scalp tingle.

Big trouble. This time, the River God Secret Realm will likely be flooded with a massive number of Gu Kings, and the danger level will likely increase tenfold.

Originally, he had absolute certainty about the trip to the River God Secret Realm, but with the appearance of a large group of Gu Kings, huge variables had now appeared, and the situation had completely slipped out of his control. (End of chapter)