“Stand up…”
His voice was hoarse as if he was murmuring in pain.
Luo Hong reached out his hand at Di Shan’s headless body like he was performing some mystical ritual.
The coquettish woman suddenly felt chills go down her back. She turned around stiffly and looked at the headless body.
However, nothing but an eerie breeze whistled, causing Di Shan’s ball-like head to budge an inch.
As Luo Hong’s hand froze, the air suddenly felt awkward.
“It failed?! Why am I not surprised?! This lousy cultivation art!”
Luo Hong’s mouth twitched helplessly. Phantom Shadow could be used to summon the shadow of the dead, but it had a certain percentage of failure.
After all, Luo Hong only managed to learn an incomplete version of the cultivation art, and he was forcing himself to summon a dead martial cultivator of the Eighth Grade. It was beyond his league. The higher the state, the higher the chance of failing.
While the ominous yin energy in his dantian got lesser, his face turned paler. He felt weak as if his energy was being sucked away.
“What the hell?!”
The woman showed a ferocious gaze, and her black hair tightened around Luo Hong’s neck as if it was the strongest steel wire.
Luo Hong’s little fiasco scared her. Because Di Shan was an Eighth Grade cultivator even though he was dead, the woman had had to plan meticulously and spend a ton of effort to take his life.
She really thought that Luo Hong was able to bring Di Shan back to life.
The hair around Luo Hong’s neck got tighter, cutting through his skin and causing him to bleed.
The bloody aura around the woman rumbled fiercely. It ought to corrupt Luo Hong’s consciousness.
“Stand up!” Luo Hong curled his fingers into a claw again and pointed it at Di Shan’s headless body, shouting energetically.
All the ominous yin energy that he stored in his dantian was released.
It was a gamble that he bet his life on!
The woman ridiculed Luo Hong with her teasing gaze.
Luo Hong’s futile struggle in the face of death somehow aroused her for whatever reason.
The pure and bright moon was hanging over the dark sky, shedding its tender brilliance over Di Shan’s headless body and stretching his shadow to a ridiculous length.
It was then that the shadow moved!
As the shadow stirred, something moved under the ground where the shadow was cast. It was a blob of black shadow.
Di Shan’s head swiftly crawled over to his body like a maggot and merged with the shadow from the body.
The shadow suddenly turned solid and materialized. Then, it stood up and transformed into a shadow with physical properties!
Two lines of scarlet beams burst from the head. It was like something evil that had been slumbering in the darkness was opening its bloody eyes.
The shadow stood up!
A pressuring presence emanated from the shadow.
Luo Hong looked at the erected shadow. The ominous yin energy in his dantian was completely exhausted.
‘I…did it!’ His eyes shone brightly.
The woman stared at Di Shan’s shadow dully as it got onto its feet.
“What technique is this?!”
Despite being an evil cultivator, the woman felt chills on her back. She had seen many techniques from her fellow evil cultivators, but none had been as creepy and strange as Luo Hong’s.
She sensed the grieving soul in the shadow.
‘His technique is vicious, wicked, in fact! Who am I to call myself an evil cultivator? He’s the real evil cultivator! Luo Hong told the truth! The man of justice from Anping county? The elegant and easy-going young lord? All those titles were just a cover for his evil cultivations!’
The woman believed she had stumbled upon a huge secret.
Luo Hong was delighted by her reaction.
“You are the first person who’s discovered the real me. I’m impressed.” Luo Hong grinned feebly.
Bam!
Di Shan’s shadow moved with extreme speed. It was so fast that the woman’s eyes failed to capture its movements. By the time she realized it, a huge hand had grabbed her hair, ripping it away from Luo Hong’s neck.
The hair around Luo Hong’s neck was torn and ripped to shreds violently by the shadow.
Then, the shadow launched a lightning-fast elbow strike at the woman, hitting her head with the full strength of an Eighth Grade Steel Bone martial cultivator.
The woman’s face was heavily deformed upon impact, causing blood to spew from her mouth.
Luo Hong was finally freed from the hair’s constrict, allowing him to catch a breath.
Di Shan’s shadow seemed to have accumulated all the hatred he had for the woman for having killed him. It slowly walked towards the coquettish woman, who had fallen to the ground
The shadow reached out its hand to grab the woman’s fair ankle, but before it could, the woman bolted up. The hair that the shadow had torn regrew in an instant and transformed into a myriad of sharp blades, perforating Di Shan’s shadow.
Di Shan’s shadow was torn to shreds!
The woman grinned coldly and tapped on her heaving chest. However, before she could catch a breath, Di Shan’s shadow returned to normal and grabbed her by her fair ankle.
Then, it swung the woman around like a spinning windmill. The loud smashing noise was accompanied by the painful squeals of the woman.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Even Luo Hong felt the pain just listening to the loud noises.
Di Shan’s shadow smashed the woman on the ground ceaselessly, venting his grievance, and taking revenge on her for lying to him.
After a long while, Luo Hong spoke feebly, “Stop…”
The shadow continued smashing the woman.
“Huh? I said stop!” Luo Hong raised his voice.
The shadow paused for a moment. Its scarlet red eyes looked confused, but after stopping for two to three seconds, it continued battering the woman left and right.
‘This shadow isn’t a bright one…’
“I said stop!” Luo Hong siphoned the tiny bit of ominous yin energy that he quickly gathered at his dantian and bellowed.
The shadow finally responded. It stopped smashing the woman around and then tossed her in front of Luo Hong.
As she bled ceaselessly, the streams of blood from her body converged into a tiny river, flowing on the ground.
The woman’s body was badly damaged. She was half-dead but not entirely. Her eyes were out of focus. She moved her neck stiffly and pushed her deformed body up, which somehow made her look like a certain ghost climbing out of an old well.
Her eyes were filled with fear.
“My young lord…spare me please.” Blood spewed from her mouth as she begged in fear.
Luo Hong got up on his feet, but he could hardly balance himself.
“Please spare me. I’m willing to do anything for you,” said the woman as she tried to plead for her life.
Covered in blood, Luo Hong stared at her with a calm expression.
“Remember this. I’m a bad guy.”
Right after his words subsided, he gave the signal with his hand.
“End her.” His soft voice circulated in the air that reeked of blood.
Di Shan’s shadow lifted its leg without a second thought and stomped on the woman’s head as it was told.
The woman’s head burst like a watermelon.
Splat!
A black amulet of sorts fell out from the woman’s body and landed beside Luo Hong’s blood-stained shoes.
Di Shan’s shadow then shrunk into a black line as if its energy had been depleted before merging with Luo Hong’s own shadow.
Luo Hong felt empty and weak as if his life energy had been sucked out. His head felt heavy and started to spin, causing him to fall on his backside.
…
Outside the Heiyun Stockade, Zhao Donghan was leaning beside a huge tree trunk with his sword in his hand. With his eyes closed, it seemed like he was resting.
The night breeze carried the scent of blood in the air.
Zhao Donghan opened his eyes all of a sudden and quickly climbed up the tree. He landed on the robust branch and looked towards the Heiyun Stockade.
He tried smelling the air to find out which direction the blood came from.
The scar on his face started to twitch while his fierce aura exploded again as he jumped down from the tree like a fearsome tiger.
…
On the other hand, Xin Wei and Fang Zheng were sitting on a giant rock.
The two of them also picked up the scent of smell, hence they opened their eyes as well. They exchanged a nervous gaze and both of them reacted bitterly.
“Did something happen?”
Without further ado, Xin Wei and Fang Zheng jumped off the rock and sprinted towards the Heiyun Stockade like an arrow let loose.
…
Zhao Donghan ran into Xin Wei and Fang Zheng in front of the dwelling at the Heiyun Stockade.
He would have greeted the emissaries from the Court of Judicial Review, but since it was an emergency, he did not even utter a word to them.
He looked at the shut gate of the stockade before he decided to climb the walls, moving swiftly like an agile lizard.
Xin Wei and Fang Zheng were not bothered by Zhao Donghan’s rude attitude either. They also jumped on the wall and climbed up with their outstanding lightness skill. The two of them got to the top of the dwelling, joining Zhao Donghan who was already there.
The trio looked down at the Heiyun Stockade from the vantage point, but all they sensed was the thick scent of blood in the air.
There were dead bandits everywhere and blood spilled all over the place. Soon, streams of blood converged and formed a bigger puddle of blood. With the moon shedding its brilliance over the bloody scene, it looked extremely eerie.
Gasp!
Xin Wei and Fang Zheng gasped nervously.
“Evil beings!”
The two of them looked pale as they quickly related the scent to the evil beings.
They were too late! It was negligence of their duty!
Young Lord ‘Long Hoe’ might already be dead!