Chapter 237: 230 Dusk

Thunder light, like a pillar supporting the sky, shot up from the roof of the tile-roofed house.

Countless fragments were blasted apart by the thunderbolt, flying outside the perimeter of the house and spreading toward the surrounding residential buildings, yet they immediately struck an invisible wall and fell to the ground.

This spectacular explosion did not even affect the neighbors.

But the sound and the sight were truly eye-catching; although there was a city lockdown order in place, many heads still poked out in the surroundings to watch the excitement. There were many large households nearby, and many gatekeepers in the gatehouses even ran out to watch.

Jiang Shenyi, flying in the air, shouted loudly: "The Land Inspection Division is on official business, bystanders move aside!"

This shout was very effective, immediately achieving the effect of clearing the street, and one head after another retracted.

Jiang Shenyi watched the collapsed house quietly, not letting down his guard—there was still someone inside!

Boom!

The ruins were pushed up, and a huge white shadow rushed out!

Jiang Shenyi had been at a high altitude, looking down at the ground, but that white shadow actually rushed straight toward the sky, its speed faster than a firework launch.

Jiang Shenyi failed to react in time, only slightly turning his body, and that white shadow slammed hard into his wing; the wind wing was struck with a large hole, and after the white shadow passed through, it turned and landed on the ground, making a "thud" sound.

With the wind wing broken, Jiang Shenyi lost his balance, falling like a kite with a broken string, tumbling as he descended; before he could balance his body in mid-air, he pointed a finger, and a bolt of thunder light split from the Thunder Wing, striking toward the white shadow.

Boom—

The Heavenly Thunder struck the top of the white shadow's head, the lightning causing a fire, and a burnt smell filled the air.

At the same time, the wind wing gradually recovered in the air, and Jiang Shenyi, a few zhang from the ground, barely adjusted his balance and flew up again.

At this moment, he saw the appearance of the attacker clearly and shouted: "What kind of monster is this?"

Only to see, amidst the thunder light, stood a figure about a zhang tall, covered in white fur, with knotted muscles, extremely fierce; the head, face, and body were three parts human and seven parts beast. Because it had been struck by lightning, the white fur on its body was scorched black and curled, but it seemed to have no major damage; it was truly thick-skinned and sturdy.

"It really is the Demon Sect."

This was the first time Jiang Shenyi had seen such a monster, but he had once heard Tang Zhao mention that the Demon Sect had such a thing: the transformation into a Fierce Beast, not knowing what evil energy they borrowed, turning people into half-human, half-beast monsters.

Although it looked ferocious, after a few exchanges, Jiang Shenyi felt confident—

This wolf-man was indeed thick-skinned and extremely fierce, harder to deal with than an ordinary Fierce Beast, but it had no other remarkable methods and was not difficult to handle.

After all, relying only on the body to resist, could a human compare to a Fierce Beast?

Jiang Shenyi was not afraid at all; half of his Thunder Wing flashed with thunder light, and he even guided electric snakes in his hands, countless bolts of lightning striking downward.

Although the wolf-man was fine after taking one bolt of lightning, it did not mean he was willing to be struck by lightning again; he was wary of so many bolts of lightning, so he ran back and forth on the ground to dodge. However, the surroundings had long been set up with Fu Array Art Tools, and he often bumped into invisible walls, limiting his range of movement.

Jiang Shenyi was releasing lightning from above like flying a kite, feeling very comfortable, when suddenly the sound of wind arose; he hurriedly turned to dodge, and a roof tile grazed past him.

It turned out the wolf-man was unwilling to be beaten continuously and grabbed the rubble from the ruins on the ground to throw at Jiang Shenyi. He was strong and sturdy, and the tiles flew extremely far, their momentum undiminished by the time they reached the sky.

Jiang Shenyi dodged sideways repeatedly, and the wolf-man kept grabbing rubble from the ground to strike, but of course, he couldn't hit him; however, as he kept flying, his accuracy with the lightning was lost, and he kept missing the target on the ground. The two fought and struck blindly, circling all the way, but only spinning in a small circle.

Suddenly, the wolf-man shrieked, his body swelling by another circle, blood vessels all over his body bulging and seeping blood, and his scorched black fur was stained with a layer of red.

He lowered his head, scooped up a large pile of rubble, and threw it toward Jiang Shenyi.

At this moment, his strength had clearly surged, and those tiles flew extremely fast, forcing Jiang Shenyi to dodge in a flurry in the air.

Jiang Shenyi lowered his head to avoid the rubble, when suddenly his vision blurred; the wolf-man had actually leaped up again, arriving right before his eyes.

This time the wolf-man leaped almost as a desperate gamble, howling, his fist the size of a human head striking toward Jiang Shenyi's face like lightning.

Jiang Shenyi could no longer dodge in time; while tilting his head, in a single thought, his whole body was covered in brilliant light—

Gang Qi!

Within the Gang Qi, thunder light shone; that was the lightning energy absorbed from nature, the Heavenly Gang within the Gang Qi!

Tang Zhao's Gang Qi was the powerful Gang Qi from the Great Sun Divine Carriage Scripture, almost possessing the aura of the sun, resembling Heavenly Gang, but it was not Heavenly Gang after all. Jiang Shenyi's Gang Qi was the true Heavenly Gang, filled with violent lightning power; in terms of accumulation, it was even above Tang Zhao's!

That huge fist hit the Gang Qi and immediately slowed down, but relying on inertia, the momentum remained rapid; countless thunder lights wrapped around the fist, crackling, and under the obstruction of the lightning, it grazed past Jiang Shenyi's jaw and finally missed!

Although it only grazed him, Jiang Shenyi's head and neck were still bright red; taking advantage of this force, he flew backward, pushing several zhang in the air.

The wolf-man could not turn in the air relying only on the jump; after a slight pause, he fell down.

He was thick-skinned and sturdy, not afraid of falling, and in the air, he had already assumed a kneeling posture for landing, just waiting to land and jump again.

However...

A moment later, he still had not landed.

Immediately following, the wolf-man's body began to rotate uncontrollably.

In the wolf-man state, his reason was reduced, and he was instead bloodthirsty and irritable, but at this time he also discovered something was wrong; looking around, he found—the surroundings were all wind?

Countless winds rotated around him, like a tornado; the wolf-man's body in the air was out of control, being swept into the whirlwind, spinning crazily and howling loudly.

"The air is my home turf, you idiot!" Jiang Shenyi wiped the wound on his neck, which was not bleeding, and smiled through gritted teeth, "Since you've come, don't leave!"

The whirlwind spun in place like a top; Jiang Shenyi waved his hand, and streaks of thunder light from his wings rolled into the whirlwind, forming a dazzling two-colored wind-thunder scroll. One could only hear the crackling of thunder and the roaring of the wind; even the wolf-man's screams could not be heard clearly.

He no longer cared about that wolf-man, but instead pondered to himself.

At that time, there seemed to be several people in the sect; why did only this one wolf-man come out?

Where were the others?

Were they electrocuted to death?

Jiang Shenyi did not believe it and hurriedly landed to check.

The house that had been blasted through by the thunder light had nothing left; most of it had been blown into the sky, and only some rubble was piled up on the spot. Jiang Shenyi came down and pushed aside the largest piece of broken wall, discovering a tunnel entrance.

The tunnel entrance had already been collapsed, and wanting to clear it out would not be a matter of a moment.

Jiang Shenyi let out a breath, understanding in his heart that the matter was already obvious: that wolf-man had come out to buy time for his accomplices, and the other Demon Sect members had taken advantage of their battle to crawl into the tunnel and escape.

"Really, Junior Brother told me that Demon Sect people often dig tunnels, and I forgot all about it."

"Young Hero Jiang."

Jiang Shenyi was hesitating whether to dig open the tunnel and pursue them when he saw Mai Shiyu had already arrived.

Suddenly seeing Mai Shiyu, Jiang Shenyi felt a bit embarrassed.

This morning, Mai Shiyu found Tang Zhao, saying she wanted to kill two birds with one stone and set a trap to lure the snake out of its hole, asking Tang Zhao to help her capture the traitor of the Land Inspection Division. It just so happened that Tang Zhao was devoted to researching the Empty-Type Demon Cave and could not free himself, so he entrusted the matter to Jiang Shenyi. Mai Shiyu saw that he could fly and fight, and could easily monitor those leaving the government office from the sky, so she was very impressed and enthusiastically invited him to help.

Jiang Shenyi was both enthusiastic and young and competitive, so he immediately took full responsibility, not just for surveillance and tracking, but even for the capture as well.

As it turned out, while he had found the people and captured a monster, the main force had escaped, which meant he had botched half the job; being proud and thin-skinned by nature, he couldn't help but feel sheepish and apologetic.

After listening to him recount the process, Mai Shiyu nodded and said, "The young Knight-Errant has already done very well; you truly found their lair as soon as you started looking. The enemy is indeed cunning. But righteousness shall prevail over evil, and in the end, they will not be able to escape."

Jiang Shenyi said, "Let us pursue them now; if we follow the tunnel, they surely cannot have gone far."

Mai Shiyu shook her head slightly and said, "No need to rush; I have another plan. Let them jump about for a short while longer. Let us first attend to the matter of the Dongjun Temple."

The corners of her mouth curled up: "I hope they are not simply fleeing, but are instead going to find a bigger fish."

Outside the city.

Outside Xun City, there are no large mountains; apart from the Pingyuan on three sides, there is only a small hilly area to the southwest of the city.

After years of adjustments, the villages in the Yunzhou Pingyuan have long since been merged into large villages and towns, each with a scale of over ten thousand people, and they have built fortresses for protection; at the very least, they have powerful Knight-Errants stationed there, with households registered and mutual security groups linked, resulting in an orderly state.

However, due to the obstruction of the hills, the Earth District might still have scattered natural villages, which are also the most suitable places for filth to hide.

The Town Guardian led over a hundred men from the Land Inspection Department into the hilly area under the pretext of investigating a Demon Cave.

But as soon as they entered the hilly area, the Town Guardian proposed "splitting the troops."

The highest-ranking officer accompanying them, Thousand-Household Fan, felt this was improper the moment he heard it; if they had an army of thousands, it might be one thing, but there were only a hundred or so men in total, and all were experts at the level of Heavy Swordsman or above, with no logistical pressure, so why split the troops? Moreover, the hills had many strange and dangerous terrains; wouldn't dispersing just be handing themselves over to the enemy?

However, the Town Guardian insisted on splitting the troops and wanted to take a portion of the men to sneak along a small path as the vanguard. This proposal was even more absurd, and Thousand-Household Fan opposed it again, saying how could a general abandon his troops to advance rashly with a light cavalry? Yet, as the saying goes, a higher official crushes those below him, not to mention that the Town Guardian was more than one rank higher than a Thousand-Household. In the end, Thousand-Household Fan could only watch helplessly as the Town Guardian took his own trusted followers, a group of thirty or forty men, and disappeared into the hills first.

After marching for the better part of the day, by evening, the Town Guardian and his team of confidants arrived at a mountain col and ordered everyone to stop and form ranks. He stood in front of the group, silent and wordless.

Everyone had assumed he was going to set up camp and even wanted to persuade him that the Demon Sect's base was right before them; they were all elites and not afraid of night battles, so taking advantage of the night to launch a surprise attack would surely lead to a great victory, so why let the night bring more complications? They did not expect that the Town Guardian would not issue any orders, but instead stand in the col, watching the Sunlight set bit by bit.

Suddenly, he turned his head, his white hair and white beard dyed as if by fire under the Sunlight.

He raised his fist high and shouted, "The Moon God descends from heaven!"