Chapter 59

Pei Ye instantly woke up.

This was a premeditated, targeted ambush, aimed squarely at Black Chi; though unknown how they had planned it, the facts lay before them.

Black Chi instantly bore a horrifying wound.

The blade sliced into its glass-hard body, tracing along the spine toward the tail; jade-like scales shattered in sequence before the edge, and crimson blood gushed forth like a waterfall, the once-smooth, exquisite body now shattered and ragged.

A sharp, grating screech emanated from Chi’s body—the sound of the blade scraping against the spine.

Pei Ye’s heart clenched tight, blood squeezed from his ventricles, qi and blood surging to his skull; without time to think, his body drew its sword and charged forward.

But the next instant, a violent explosion erupted in the forest, the expanding heatwave hurling him bodily through the air.

[Bing Fire], this devastating technique struck simultaneously with the blade, detonating upon Black Chi’s body.

Without Zhu Gaoyang’s protection, the residual shock sent Pei Ye reeling, as if struck squarely by a giant hammer, bones and sinews seeming to dislocate.

As for Black Chi’s condition at the epicenter—how mangled its flesh had become—Pei Ye could not see it, and dared not imagine.

Pei Ye crashed to the ground, immediately forced himself up, gasping as he clutched his chest and abdomen, gritting his teeth to look ahead.

Yet trees were charred, stone and soil exploded, all obscured by dust and smoke.

Amid the smoke, Black Chi remained as calm as ever despite the sudden turn.

Feeling the searing pain in its body, it did not turn back, but pressed forward with even greater resolve.

Even as a bloody chunk was torn from beneath its neck, it held fast and ripped off half of Qiongqi’s wing.

Then, terrifying heat erupted behind it—the extreme temperature drew near, and its scales seemed to shrink and melt.

Yet Chi’s head circled its neck, its emerald eyes calmly looking back; the heat clinging to its body instantly became docile sheep.

Simultaneously, its body used the momentum of its assault on Qiongqi to surge forward, letting the blade carve deeper into its flesh, head raised as it ascended into the clouds.

For Pei Ye, two breaths stretched into unbearable eternity. Finally, he saw a vortex churn at the edge of the smoke—a familiar slender black shadow roared forth—and he finally relaxed.

The wound, deep to the bone and cleaving more than half of Black Chi’s body, was horrifying—but no traces of scorching marred its flesh; Pei Ye guessed it was due to its [Chi Fire] power.

The same passive defense Jing Ziwang had faced against Qiongqi now replayed here, only the roles reversed—Zhu Shi Sect now stood on the ground.

Even wounded as it was, who could claim they could capture this celestial hunter, equally endowed with divine marvels, in the sky?

Yet Black Chi’s aggression proved even fiercer than Qiongqi’s that day; no sooner had it ascended than it whirled its head back.

Where its gaze fell, the suppressed heat erupted instantly.

Black Chi’s command and manipulation of this heat was far superior to the purple-robed man’s; [Bing Fire]’s terror lay in its violent, concentrated explosion and scorching heat—but its application was crude, like a martial artist’s thunderfire pill: simply thrown at a fixed point, indiscriminate, affecting all within range equally.

But now, under Black Chi’s control, the heat became a parasitic curse—precise, agile, utterly obedient; it could drop to harmless low temperatures as it passed through trees, leaving no trace, then explode instantly into flames stretching several zhang wide.

It could coalesce into one mass, or split into dozens of clusters, swirling around enemies like bees drawn to honey.

To Black Chi, flame had always been a docile servant.

Thus the purple-robed man failed to notice these deadly little things approaching—until Black Chi’s emerald gaze locked onto him, and suddenly dozens of thunderfire pearls detonated against his body. Even as he frantically summoned qi to shield himself, his body, already weakened by Zhu Gaoyang’s [Shooting Star Dragon Light], could no longer endure.

His body, seemingly without vital points, was blown into many ragged fragments; he staggered, sat cross-legged on the ground, immobilized.

When discussing Zhu Gaoyang that day, Black Chi’s words, “not entirely unbeatable,” were not bravado—they were a serious conclusion.

Back then, Qiongqi, though terrifyingly strong from its divine seed, was no match for Black Chi, who had wrestled with such power for days on end; the two were gods clashing.

When the decisive [Bing Fire] failed and was turned against them, the tide began to slip out of control.

Pei Ye, watching this, grew puzzled—why were their timing and location so precise, yet their knowledge of Black Chi so utterly blind?

If they hadn’t had time to investigate, how could they know Black Chi would appear here and now?

It felt like… a last-minute assignment?

Before he could ponder further, Black Chi launched another assault—Chi Fire lashed straight at the seated purple-robed man, determined to kill him outright.

The sword-wielding purple-robed man instantly sidestepped, his left arm moving slowly yet swiftly to trace a half-circle; thick xuan qi coalesced along the arc into the shape of a flowing stream.

The stream seemed immensely heavy, subtly depressing the air around it; all the flaming blossoms in the sky were drawn toward it, forming a magnificent flow of fire, only to be extinguished one by one within.

But Black Chi paid no heed to this scene; the instant its Chi Fire left its body, it shot toward the lone Qiongqi.

Qiongqi, inherently a beast of uncontainable ferocity, would never retreat now, facing a wounded Black Chi; it spread its wings and lunged, the two beasts clashed in an instant, and Black Chi pinned Qiongqi to the ground once more.

Pei Ye exhaled in relief—he hadn’t expected Black Chi, fighting three at once, to hold such dominance; the dread he’d felt at first seeing the three surround it finally eased.

Yet at that moment, a sudden alarm prickled his mind; Pei Ye whirled his head—and saw the purple-robed man who had neutralized the Chi Fire turning toward him, his ghostly mask staring coldly at him.

He chose not to aid Qiongqi, for Black Chi could break off combat and fly away at any moment—but Pei Ye, the vessel, had no such escape.

In fact, this had been the lingering question in Pei Ye’s mind since earlier—why had they been chasing him relentlessly before, yet now rushed en masse at Black Chi, abandoning the divine-seed host entirely?

Pei Ye immediately prepared to leap backward—but then he changed his mind, and lunged toward Black Chi.

After all, he could never match the purple-robed man’s speed; moving toward Black Chi gave it a chance to rescue him—this was a perfectly reasonable choice.

Black Chi, sharing his thoughts, immediately abandoned Qiongqi and surged toward him.

The purple-robed man appeared before Pei Ye in a blink; the icy chill of his blade reached his skin—Pei Ye tensed, but the man suddenly twisted his blade, slashing backward at the roaring Black Chi.

Yet Black Chi treated the blade as if it were nothing; its body twisted to evade most of the slash, letting the remaining force carve another horrific wound into its flesh, while it pressed straight toward Pei Ye.