Chapter 57: Azure Thunder Becomes Fire

Suddenly, a flash of azure light tore across the heavens, rending the sky apart and in an instant, it slashed down toward Qin Chuan.

A sharp and delicate cry rang out as Wantong, her robes snapping fiercely in the gale, lifted her four-foot talisman sword high despite her pallid face. “Hound of Night, Behold the Abyss!”

She brought the talisman sword down upon the void, and as she did, the threads binding heaven and earth began to snap one after another. With each thread that broke, more blood spilled from Wantong’s lips, and when the last was severed, all light vanished from the world—thunder included.

Within the Law-Talisman Mountain, an old Daoist with hair and beard as white as snow was deep in meditation when, abruptly, darkness fell. In the next heartbeat, light returned as if it had all been an illusion. At first bewildered, he was then struck by terror. He sprang to his feet, gazing toward the distant borderlands, and muttered beneath his breath:

“Unexpected—so you’ve mastered even this forbidden art. Should you return, let there be amends… but there will be no more chances. Perhaps, this time, I truly was wrong…”

For the first time, his adoptive daughter Wantong truly entered his sight, entered his heart.

In the absolute darkness, the lightning was snuffed out, not even a whisper of thunder remaining. Wantong, blood and tears streaming silently down her face, let them fall upon her Daoist robe and cloth shoes, unaware.

Her eyes were void and sightless, the light forever gone. The corners of her lips curled faintly as the heavens seemed to spin, and her balance failed. She collapsed backward, caught by those behind her.

Had anyone pressed their ear to her lips, they might have heard her words, murmured like a dream: “At last, I have done something… I hope I have not disappointed Father. I wonder if he saw me now, what expression he would wear.”

“Pity I cannot see it. I truly cannot see anything anymore…”

Qin Chuan had no idea what had just transpired. It was as if darkness had swept across the world, the thunder overhead vanishing along with the pillars of light that shattered in the gloom.

Voices, anxious and urgent, called out behind him, hardening his resolve.

Shanglu, seeing her first strike fail, drew a deep breath, her spiritual and earthy energies surging wildly. She raised two fingers and pointed sharply at the sky with a low incantation: “Heaven-Smiting Thunder Tribulation, Second Stage!”

The vortex of clouds, which had begun to scatter, regathered now more dense than ever. The second stage of the Heaven-Smiting Thunder Tribulation—her strongest blow yet!

“Faster, I must be faster!” Qin Chuan’s eyes reddened. Under the looming cloud vortex, his scalp tingled in terror. If there were no miracle, he would not survive.

In the blink of an eye, the two-zhang distance vanished. Qin Chuan launched himself forward, diving into the swirling black and white mists, escaping everyone’s sight.

Just as Qin Chuan entered the fog, the second tribulation thunder struck down with blinding might, igniting the mists with dazzling blue-green light.

A bestial roar rang out, only to be instantly drowned beneath the sound of burial and silence.

“Why aren’t you dead yet!” Shanglu, seeing that the cloud vortex above remained and was now slowly moving toward the heart of the black and white mists, grew ever more ruthless.

This second thunder strike—let alone Qin Chuan, even if everyone present faced it together, survival would be uncertain. Its might chilled all who watched, making their hearts pound in dread.

“With my strength, who knows how many more times I can summon this. But if I am to die, I’ll drag you down with me!” Shanglu’s gaze was icy as she stared into the mists, as if someone truly stood there.

As for Wantong and her companions, she disregarded them entirely. Unless Qin Chuan was destroyed, all her efforts with the soul-blood would be wasted.

Gritting her teeth and enduring pain that climbed to its peak, she growled: “Heaven-Smiting Thunder Tribulation, Third Stage!”

Qin Chuan’s body was shielded by a battered armor of yin energy. His back was a mess of scorched, mangled flesh, his Daoist robe long since blasted to rags.

The burial of dust had birthed a thousand blood lotuses upon him. The green thunder, though weakened by the fog, still nearly tore his body apart as it struck his back.

Fortunately, the gray currents born from the black energy were still under his control, forming the yin armor that barely blunted some of the damage, though not enough.

A flash of insight surfaced in his mind, his eyes suddenly bright. He took out two yin-yang thunder pearls from his storage pouch, along with two strands of gray thread from his hair.

He would refine a pill.

He would use these black and white energies to forge a great elixir!

No cauldron, no fire—what then? Use the body as the furnace, green thunder as the flame!

At that moment, the black and white energies in the area seemed drawn, slowly flowing toward his center.

Had Shanglu seen this, she would have been horrified. Qin Chuan’s hands moved in dazzling patterns—palms, fingers, seals—striking at thirty-six vital acupoints across his body: Baihui, Shenting, Taiyang, and more.

It was the very forbidden art Shanglu herself had used! He even swallowed the thunder pearls and gray threads, which could not be consumed by ordinary means.

Just then, a third bolt of green thunder struck, cleaving straight into Qin Chuan. Its force coursed through his meridians, melting the pearls and threads within him!

He felt the gates of his abdomen fly open, his dantian linked to the heavens and earth. Energy flooded into him, boundless and wild, lifting him three feet above the ground—his state now rivaling Shanglu’s.

Even the embryonic pill within his dantian was now exposed to the outside world!

Meanwhile, in an inconspicuous corner, a shadowy serpent with two horn-like protrusions on its head sensed the outpouring force from the exposed embryo. Its expression grew feverish.

The cold glance in its eyes was suddenly ablaze. “What is that scent? What… what is this…?”

Its eyes burned with greed, and its shape flickered, transforming from black mist into a middle-aged man. He had two small horns on his brow, his face androgynous and strangely, strikingly beautiful.

“Damn brat, I haven’t left the world in ten thousand years, and things are already this wild? Is that boy really trying to refine himself into a pill?”

“And that embryonic elixir in his dantian—what is it? If I could seize it, a million years sealed would be worth it, ten million not a loss!”

“Too bad—if not for that old bastard Sword-for-the-Fallen, I’d have escaped a thousand years ago!” With a hateful glance, he eyed the magic sword planted atop the mountain.

“But with Sword-for-the-Fallen dead, only the sword remains, forged from all his cultivation and sword intent. Unless provoked, it should not hinder me.” He let out a breath of relief.

Before Sword-for-the-Fallen died, he had forged this magic sword, imprinting it solely to seal this serpent.

Thus, the need for a puppet to collect nine thousand nine hundred ninety-nine drops of soul-blood to form the Reversal Sacrificial Array. If he acted himself, the sword would intervene.

But just as he was about to make his move, his body froze abruptly.