Chapter 349

Chapter 349: A One-Sided Beatdown

The black-robed cultivator reacted extremely fast. He didn’t understand why the environment had changed or how a blond knight had appeared in front of him, but he adjusted instantly, trying to trigger secret arts and activate his treasures.

Nothing responded.

All his treasures were gone. Even the flying sword that had been in his hand a moment ago had turned into a plain, bare stick.

He stared at the stick, blank. In a daze, he remembered it—the wooden practice sword his master had tossed him when he first entered the immortal path.

The knight had no intention of letting him reminisce.

Footsteps sounded in the gray wilderness. Silent as stone, the golden-haired knight raised her holy sword and charged.

Flames surged along the blade, releasing a power that felt like it could burn the soul itself. The black-robed cultivator had no time to think. He forced spiritual power into the stick and met her head-on.

Pain and vertigo tore through his mind, as if his senses had been split in half.

He saw another scene layered over this one.

He was standing in the sand-covered Otherworld again. In front of him, the steel automaton trapped under the binding mirror shuddered in midair. She slowly broke free of the restraint, then leapt with dance-like lightness. Claw-sharp fingertip blades shot toward him in a straight line.

The black-robed cultivator’s heart jolted. His body felt sluggish beyond belief. He barely moved his legs, narrowly dodging the blades—

But in his other layer of vision, the blond knight swung down. He raised the stick in a desperate block, only to watch it rot and weather the instant it touched the flame-wreathed holy sword, crumbling into dust on the wind.

In the gray wilderness beneath the inverted Nether River, he lost an arm in a single strike.

Terror seized him alongside soul-rending agony. He turned and ran.

On the sand-covered battlefield, his arm suddenly dropped limp. There was no external wound, yet black smoke rose from it as if burned by an unseen force, shrinking and collapsing into a charred stump.

He stumbled back in horror. At the same time, his companions finally noticed something was wrong.

Another black-robed cultivator wearing a deep red mask charged in from the flank, trying to ambush Luna as she hung in midair. Halfway through, Luna snapped her head around as if she had eyes in the back of her skull.

In that instant, the deep red mask cultivator felt all color drain from the world. That smiling, pale face became the only thing that existed, filling his entire vision.

Then he felt a chill.

A fingertip blade sliced across his shoulder, nearly severing his arm at the root.

He let out a muffled grunt and crashed down in panic—

Only for the yellow sand to vanish in a blink.

The endless gray wilderness slammed into him. Twelve hollow sets of brass armor stood among the wild grass. A bone-cutting wind swept past. The bronze knights raised their blades in perfect unison and closed in without a sound.

Two black-robed cultivators collapsed one after another in the yellow sand, dying so abruptly that almost everyone on both sides failed to react in time.

One of them had only lost an arm.

The other had never even been truly struck by the artificial saintess.

Some invisible flame burned through their bodies in the span of a few breaths. Black smoke rose. Two extremely strong cultivators became two curled lumps of charcoal.

One of them seemed to understand only at the moment of death. He struggled to lift his head toward the nearest companion, eyes blinking, mouth opening as if to speak—yet only hoarse noises rattled out. His body thought it was still alive, but it was only a brief illusion lingering for a few seconds after death.

The remaining black-robed cultivators who had been attacking Foxy and Yu Sheng were stunned by the grotesque scene. They stopped instinctively, all gazes locking on Luna. Then they unleashed everything at once—protective treasures, lethal techniques, whatever they had—pouring it down on the steel doll.

Luna only bent slightly at the waist, crossed her legs, and raised both hands like a dancer ending a performance. Ten blades flashed a chilling light through the air.

When she lifted her head, every enemy’s perception tore into two halves.

In the spirit world, a gray wilderness descended beneath the inverted Nether River. The blond girl raised her holy sword toward them.

And behind her gathered a squad of bronze knights.

Yu Sheng stood on Foxy’s head, staring in a daze at the eerie battle.

He watched Luna move with light, elegant steps through the enemies. Her fingertip blades fluttered like butterflies. She was nothing like her usual slow, clumsy self.

He watched the black-robed cultivators stagger and jerk, as if their minds and bodies were being violently separated. Some stood there in confusion, like their souls had been yanked elsewhere. Even when blades struck them, they didn’t react.

Some fell under Luna’s blades.

Others were never touched at all—yet they still collapsed. They stood stiffly for a moment, then dropped into the sand with a dull thud, bodies burned into charcoal by invisible flames, as if they had been killed in another world.

The two Irenes on Yu Sheng’s shoulder stared, wide-eyed. One of them watched for a long moment, still not understanding. “…What’s going on? C Buckle didn’t have this move before, right?”

Yu Sheng only frowned, silent.

Then, suddenly, he seemed to see it.

A connection built by blood fed him Luna’s view of the world.

Reality overlapped with the soul’s world. The gray wasteland laid itself over the yellow sand. In the artificial saintess’s deadly dance, the blond knight led the bronze squad in a hunt, chasing bewildered, helpless souls.

“…Two-front combat,” Yu Sheng murmured.

Irene didn’t get it. “What?”

Yu Sheng waved a hand. “Forget it for now. Finish these people first—then we’ll talk. Luna! Xuan Che! Try to keep one alive!”

As his words fell, Foxy lunged at the nearest black-robed cultivator.

There weren’t many enemies left.

The last two or three could see the tide had turned. In this endless Otherworld, there was nowhere to run or hide. One by one, they gritted their teeth and brought out near-suicidal resolve.

Not far away, Xuan Che leapt into the air and chopped a palm down at his foe.

“Medical Dispute Mediation Palm!”

In front of Yu Sheng, a black-robed cultivator moved like lightning, slipping straight through the ring of foxfire around Foxy. Several small cauldrons appeared behind him out of nowhere, rising to block Irene’s scorching ray barrage. The treasures shattered under the beams, but they bought him enough time to close the gap to Yu Sheng. He swung his sword down.

Yu Sheng didn’t dodge.

He raised his tetanus staff—already soaked through with his blood, reinforced countless times by Foxy with foxfire and dark iron—and met the strike head-on.

The immortal sword and the brutal spiked club collided with a thunderous crack.

Then black silk threads exploded outward beside Yu Sheng. In the instant the cultivator stiffened, Irene wrapped him from head to toe, sealing him tight.

The enemy—bound into a black cocoon—dropped straight to the ground. Foxy hurried forward and stomped down with a front paw to pin him.

The next second she yelped, jerked her paw up, and started rubbing it furiously in the sand, whining as she scrubbed.

Irene burst into loud laughter. “Silly Fox! I call you dumb and you really are dumb, huh? Why are you touching my silk threads?”

Foxy kept rubbing. In the span of a few breaths she’d already dug a pit half a meter deep. “I was just worried he’d get away…”

Irene pouted. “You’re underestimating me.”

As she spoke, the battle ended.

The last black-robed cultivator collapsed in front of Luna, dying in the desert with a dull, final thud.

At last, everything went quiet.

Yu Sheng jumped down from Foxy and saw Xuan Che walking over, regret on his face.

“I wanted to keep someone alive, but the last one used a mutual-destruction method at the end. I didn’t expect he carried a soul-ignition treasure. By the time I noticed, I couldn’t stop it.”

Luna came over as well. The moment the fight ended, she returned to her slow, slightly dull state. She lowered her head toward Yu Sheng, struggled for a long moment, then finally spoke. “Died. Tried. Hold back. Too weak.”

Irene gave Luna a strange look, then started chattering. “How are you even stronger than before… Did you hide something last time… You were clearly my defeated opponent…”

Luna shook her head. “New move. Useless on you. You have no brain.”

Irene paused, thinking.

Then she exploded with fury. “…C BUCKLE!!!”

“Alright, alright. You two can fight later.” Yu Sheng stopped Irene from launching herself into a tantrum, then looked down at the black-robed cultivator on the ground, still wrapped in silk and curled in pain from bone-deep cold. “It’s fine. We still have one alive. Irene’s ability is great for taking prisoners.”

Irene’s mood flipped sunny in an instant. She grinned smugly. “Of course. Who do you think I am~”

Yu Sheng smiled and patted her head, letting her preen. Then his gaze settled on the bound black-robed cultivator.

Now they could finally find out where these people had come from.