Chapter 864 - 852: Poison Pill
One hundred li away from the Moonwort Tree King, countless Demon Monster Strange Beast corpses were piled along the edge of the Invisible Barrier.
Most were killed by the Moonwort Tree during the first wave of attacks, the rest were those that had crashed into the barrier and died over the past few days.
Chen Mu appeared in front of the barrier. He reached out to touch it, feeling as if he were feeling the inner wall of a cold glass cover.
Before he could push outward, the glass cover suddenly vanished, as if he'd passed some kind of verification. Chen Mu's palm seemed to pierce through a layer of cool water membrane and easily reached out through the barrier.
"No obstruction at all to Yin Spirits, yet it prohibits Nether Demon Heaven Demons from passing through?"
"Amazing!"
Bang bang bang...
A string of knocking sounds suddenly rang out.
Chen Mu snapped back to his senses and saw a five- or six-meter-tall Exotic Bird covered in scales pecking at the Invisible Barrier. Its six eyeballs glared fixedly at Chen Mu, clearly treating him as prey.
"Pretty bold." Chen Mu chuckled and shook his head.
Nether Demon Heaven Demons are like this, their heads are filled with nothing but slaughter and fighting.
"Pitiful life. Let me free you from it."
Chen Mu's face was full of compassion as he raised his hand and summoned a man-high Yin Mist Moon Blade, ready to finish the creature.
But before he could strike, the Invisible Barrier before him rippled with water-like patterns.
The six-eyed Exotic Bird sensed nothing, its pitch-black, razor-sharp beak slammed at the barrier again.
The instant it made contact, a surge of Invisible Vigorous Qi suddenly erupted.
Bang!
The Exotic Bird's massive head exploded into a mist of blood in an instant under the Vigorous Qi.
"This barrier can absorb external attacks, trigger a backlash, and kill enemies?"
"Tsk! No wonder there are so many Demon corpses on the ground." Chen Mu understood.
Clearly it wasn't just things killing themselves by ramming it; they were being counter-killed by the Barrier.
"Isn't that just perfect for me!" Chen Mu immediately brightened up.
These Demon Monster Strange Beasts dying against the Tree King Barrier like moths to a flame were the perfect offerings for blood-sacrificing the River of Oblivion.
Chen Mu turned his head and looked into the distance along the barrier.
The entire Divine Soldier Barrier was like a sphere, covering both sky and earth within it, with a radius of nearly a hundred li.
"All the way around, how many Demon corpses must there be?"
"If I collect a full circuit, maybe I can scrape together enough offerings to pay the toll back to the Netherworld Underworld!"
...
Several days later.
At a certain point on the edge of the Moonwort Tree King Barrier, a five-meter-tall gray-white archway stood on an open patch of ground nearby.
Inside the doorframe it was pitch dark, with rippling waves like a black curtain. The depth within was abyssal, as if it led to who knows where.
A Soldier clad in Armor, carrying a pile of Demon corpses as high as a small hill on his shoulder, strode up to the gray-white archway. With a loud exhale and a grunt, he easily threw the huge heap of Monster corpses behind the curtain.
Behind him, many similar figures were lined up. Seen from afar, it looked like a long dragon stretching all the way out beyond the barrier.
"The Great Power Divine Ability might be common as dirt, but it's still a Divine Ability. And you're just using it like some coolie ability?" On one side of the Ghost Gate, Xu Gui was at a loss for words.
"Isn't it great?" Chen Mu didn't care at all; in fact, he was quite satisfied.
With greater strength they can carry more, and gather Demon corpses faster—what a fine Divine Ability.
Ever since deciding to leave Nether Demon Heaven by crossing worlds through the Ghost Gate, Chen Mu had immediately released everyone from White Bird City out of Thousand Lanterns City.
Under the command of the City Defense Camp's Four-direction General, they gathered Demon corpses along the barrier's edge. The Soldiers of the City Defense Camp skilled in Great Power Divine Ability were turned into a transportation corps.
The Tree King Barrier's range was too vast, so to save time, Chen Mu had also set up four Ghost Gates close at hand in the east, west, south, and north.
The Demon corpses gathered by the City Defense Camp could be thrown directly into the Bottomless Pool inside the Five Ghosts Bag via the Ghost Gates.
"We've been making quite a racket these last few days. The crowd gathered beneath the Tree King has already noticed us," Xu Gui reminded him.
"If they've noticed, they've noticed." Chen Mu waved his hand carelessly.
"If they want to come, they follow White Bird City's refugee intake procedures."
"If they don't, we ignore them. We're just ships passing in the night; everyone minds their own business."
"But with so many people, you get all kinds of birds. What if..." Xu Gui said worriedly.
"Hee hee..."
A cold, playful giggle suddenly sounded by his ear.
Xu Gui's whole body went rigid, his head slowly creaking around as if rusted. Then he saw that at some unknown point, a little paper man had appeared on his shoulder.
Noticing Xu Gui's gaze, the little paper man grinned. A cloud of black smoke suddenly billowed into existence beside it.
Within the black smoke, a massive tiger head loomed faintly, and two human-head-sized scarlet eyes, seen through the dense smoke, were looking at Xu Gui with a teasing smile.
Xu Gui shuddered back to his senses and quickly turned his head away, not daring to stare. He really didn't want his clothes torn into rags again.
"Still worried about 'what if' now?" Chen Mu said cheerfully.
Back when he set up the Four Directions Ghost Gate, Chen Mu had already let the Five Ghosts Paper Men out. Accompanying them were the Black Wind Demon he'd previously subdued.
When the forest grows big, it has all kinds of birds, huh?
Doesn't matter, as long as they don't come and interfere with me gathering sacrifices.
Otherwise… I'll just eat them directly!
...
The good mood didn't last two days before the Four-direction General came looking for Chen Mu.
"The barrier is shrinking?"
Chen Mu stood at the edge of the barrier, glanced at it, then turned back toward the Ghost Gate behind him, feeling his heart skip.
Previously the Ghost Gate had been five or six hundred meters from the barrier's edge. Now that distance had clearly shrunk by seventy or eighty meters.
He turned to look toward the horizon. That sky-piercing, earth-linking Shu Wang Dharma Image still stood firm in midair, showing no sign of weakening.
But…
"Even though I knew this shelter wouldn't last, I didn't expect it to start failing so soon."
"The Mist Mirage is, in the end, just the last flicker of the Yama Cave Heaven."
The Mist Mirage is powerful, but it needs the Mist of Confusion to support it. As the Yama Cave Heaven shattered, the Mist of Confusion grew thinner by the day, while attacks from Nether Demon Heaven Demons kept coming without pause.
The shrinking barrier is precisely the omen of the Mirage's power declining.
"Increase the collection efforts," Chen Mu sighed.
He didn't have any better options.
"Mm, maybe we don't have to do it all in one step."
"Just like last time, we can first go to Nether Demon Heaven and hide somewhere secluded for a bit."
"Once we slowly hunt and stockpile enough sacrifices, we'll return to the Netherworld."
Chen Mu's fingers twitched slightly. Three streaks of red light flew from his sleeve, darting away toward the direction far from Mist Ridge in flying escape.
"I want the Vermilion Feather Sword to go scout the way."
...
Wuxiang City.
The secret chamber at the city center.
The secret chamber that had originally been about the size of a basketball court now seemed as wide as a full-sized soccer field.
A massive stone sphere as tall as a seven- or eight-story building floated at the chamber's center. Its surface was covered in uneven, light-and-dark patterns so that, viewed from afar, it looked like a stone eyeball.
At this moment, Wei Wubing was sitting cross-legged within the pitch-black pupil.
"Time to make a choice."
Mo Tong floated in front of Wei Wubing, emitting overlapping layers of crisp, childlike voices.
"Lan Zhang has already lured Mo Nuo into Mist Ridge. It really is time to choose." Wei Wubing sighed.
"I'd actually wanted to drag this out a bit longer, but now it seems…"
"From the moment you came to me, gave me a secret technique, and let me reassemble the Cloud Mirage Pearl, I'm afraid I've no choice left at all." He shook his head with a bitter smile.
"You should know, Lan Zhang has no interest in the Yama Spirit Mechanism. All he wants is the rank of Divine General." Mo Tong spoke in a soothing tone.
"But Mo Nuo General is different. He locked down the Yama Cave Heaven and schemed for a hundred years; he's set on getting the Yama Spirit Mechanism."
"If he learns the Yama Spirit Mechanism has already dispersed into every blade of grass and tree in Mist Ridge, then the outcome…"
Hearing this, Wei Wubing's eyelids involuntarily twitched.
"So, your choice?" Mo Tong looked at Wei Wubing with curiosity.
"As long as Mist Ridge can keep existing, there's nothing I can't accept." Wei Wubing took a deep breath and calmed himself.
"What do you need me to do?" he asked, looking at Mo Tong.
"You don't need to do anything."
"Or rather, just do what you're supposed to do." Mo Tong said with a giggling smile.
"What do you mean?" Wei Wubing was puzzled.
"Reassemble the Cloud Mirage Pearl, refine the Cloud Mirage Pearl, gather all of Mist Ridge's power, and like a hero, lead all living beings of Mist Ridge in a desperate struggle against Mo Nuo General."
"Though being unable to win even after giving your all is your destined ending, that is exactly what we want."
"Only that way will Mo Nuo not doubt the outcome of the battle. Only then will he dare to use the Divine General Imprint and sacrifice the Cloud Mirage Pearl to Nether Demon Heaven."
"As long as the Cloud Mirage Pearl touches the Divine General Imprint, you, already fused with the Cloud Mirage Pearl, will also come into contact with the Divine General Imprint."
"Once you touch the imprint, it's equivalent to Lan Zhang touching the imprint, so…" Mo Tong chuckled softly.
"So I'm actually a poison pill with honey smeared on the outside." Wei Wubing said with a self-mocking smile.
"You're not afraid I'll turn on you and tell Mo Nuo everything?" he couldn't help but retort.
"Could you really bear to see Mist Ridge completely destroyed? This is the homeland that gave birth to you and raised you."
"Tsk! You really do understand me."
"Why do you think we chose you, heh heh…"
"I understand."