Chapter 172

"How many times must I say it? This move of yours is pointless. No matter how much you shout, it is useless. Weak and lacking self-awareness, yet arrogantly attempting to challenge the strong—this is your greatest hubris." Black Fiend frowned, growing somewhat impatient.

Although Tao Xuehai had nearly lost consciousness, he still struggled to prop himself up. Clutching his broken sword, his dilated pupils stared dead at Black Fiend.

He struggled, wanting to call out again, to get a response from his partner. But his body was too weak; he could no longer even mobilize the power of the wild wind.

It felt as if a knife were stuck in his throat—searing pain, a blockage, nearing suffocation.

"Foolish!" Black Fiend unclenched his fist and walked over slowly. Since recruitment was impossible, he would simply let him sleep forever.

But in the next instant, his steps faltered. His expression shifted slightly as he looked behind Tao Xuehai.

Without him realizing it, a figure in black clothes wearing four masks had appeared behind the boy.

The black-clothed figure stood quietly behind Tao Xuehai, bent his knees, and grasped the broken sword in Tao's hand, holding it together with Tao's own hand.

"Mas... ter..." Tao Xuehai sensed something and dazedly tried to lift his head, but his immense weakness made even this simple action impossible.

"I saw everything," Lin Hui said softly. "You did very well. You walked a path I had never trodden, beheld a scenery I had never seen."

In truth, at the beginning, he had only nurtured Tao Xuehai as a tool, a facade for future appearances. But later, this kid respected his teacher and revered the Dao, taking Lin Hui into account in everything he did.

Humans are not made of grass or wood; who could truly be without emotion?

He had gradually begun to take this master-disciple bond—despite their small age gap—seriously.

Only just now, when the sudden disturbance in the airflow startled him, and he had rushed over at extreme speed, did he witness Tao Xuehai comprehending his own Wild Wind Sword Technique.

Instead of treating the wild wind as a sharp blade, as Lin Hui did, the boy regarded it as a partner—merging into it and becoming its very incarnation.

At the very moment he witnessed this scene, his own Body Tempering progress in the Typhoon Sword Technique inexplicably surged. He estimated that, before long, he would be able to break through to a new realm yet again.

He took Tao Xuehai’s hand and helped him to his feet.

A dim red light flashed across Lin Hui’s eyes.

"Do you remember what I taught you?"

"That was my own comprehension of the wild wind. You could never truly learn it, no matter what. Looking at it now, that path belongs only to me, not to you."

He held the broken sword horizontally and stared at the grim-faced Black Fiend. The opponent seemed to have already sensed something. He raised both fists, condensing massive dark blue Internal Force around them as black patterns surfaced and flowed across his upper body.

"The same move again? Pointless." Black Fiend recognized Lin Hui’s opening stance—it was the same posture Tao Xuehai had just used. A flicker of impatience crossed his eyes.

Lin Hui did not reply. He merely lowered his eyelids and gazed at the blade.

"Wind."

No shout, no plea.

Only an order.

Boom!!!

In the next instant, a wild wind far more violent than before screamed and howled, rotating explosively around them.

The surrounding mist within a radius of several hundred meters rotated in that instant, transforming into a massive white vortex.

Every creature within it was swept up against its will, thrown off balance.

Withered trees shook violently and were ripped up, exposing their roots.

Soil and gravel rose with the wind, merging into it.

Dried weeds and branches snapped and shattered, merging into a gray-black vortex that coiled around Lin Hui.

That seemingly sluggish rotation was merely an illusion—born from speed so great that the eye could not follow.

"What martial art is this!!?" Black Fiend's Internal Force was buffeted like candlelight about to be extinguished. He had to divert a significant amount of Internal Force just to stabilize his figure and not lose his balance.

Witnessing the exaggerated scene around him, akin to a natural disaster, even someone who had lived for hundreds of years felt his composure cracking.

He had seen many martial arts or Divine Methods with exaggerated areas of effect, but none could shock him as much as this one.

That inexplicable aura, as if commanding a natural disaster to use as one's own, gave him a massive sense of oppression that made it hard to breathe.

This was a completely different domain from the Time Sense domain at the Palace Master level. It was also another extreme compared to the Luminous Extreme's ultimate strengthening of the self and Internal Force.

It wasn't just him; Tao Xuehai also saw this scene, this exaggerated spectacle akin to a natural disaster.

The surrounding mist was swept up, wrapped, and violently rotated around them by the wind.

The pressure made it so that nothing around them could lift its head.

Even the previously arrogant Vice Sect Master of the Clear River Sect, Black Fiend, could only solemnly try to stabilize his body, struggling to avoid losing balance in the wild wind.

His eyes widened. The drowsiness from moments ago seemed to be injected with a stimulant by the scene before him, and his consciousness became clear again.

"Little Hai, watch closely."

Lin Hui lowered the broken sword.

"The ultimate goal of the wild wind is cessation."

This was his realization, and also his cultivation insight regarding the Wild Wind Sword and Typhoon Sword.

Gripping the broken sword tightly, Lin Hui waved it gently.

Chi!

In the next instant, he vanished from his spot.

The rotating wild wind assisted his instantaneous acceleration, reaching the maximum, the fastest, the strongest!

Puchi!!

In the next instant.

A silver light flashed across Black Fiend's chest like a silver lightning scar.

Immense, terrifying power, stacked atop sword speed pushed to the extreme, unleashed the ultimate destructive force.

Black Fiend was still frozen in his boxing stance. Before he even had time to strike, a sharp pain lanced through his chest.

A massive bloody gash seemed to grow out of his body from thin air. In just the blink of an eye, a sword mark as wide as a fist appeared on his body.

The sword mark completely severed his torso from chest to back; through the gaping wound, one could even see the Mist behind him, likewise cleaved open by the blade.

Lin Hui’s figure materialized behind him like a phantom. The broken sword in his hand crumbled soundlessly, turning into powder that drifted away on the wind.

When he looked back, he saw Black Fiend’s body likewise dissolve into the gale, disintegrating into countless black motes that vanished.

"Another Imitation Insect Canon fusion?"

His body shifted, instinctively wanting to pursue along the opponent’s now-fragile aura, but after a single step, he halted.

He turned to Tao Xuehai, who had collapsed and fainted yet again.

With a quiet sigh, he flashed over, grabbed the boy by the belt, and, carrying him, quickly disappeared into the Mist.

…

Clear River Sect Headquarters.

Bang!

Black Fiend smashed heavily onto the ground from mid-air, half-kneeling. He then stood up, straightened his robes, and walked toward the empty seat where Sect Master Situ Ye usually sat.

"Isn't this Brother Black Fiend, who went out to lead a team to capture someone?" Suddenly, a sarcastic female voice came from a stone door behind him.

A fair-skinned woman with shoulder-length black hair walked slowly out of the door.

The woman wore a luxurious black robe with gold trim, and on her forehead, she wore a golden ornament shaped like an eye. Her face was bewitchingly beautiful, her figure voluptuous and curvy; even her gait carried an inexplicable charm that involuntarily turned one's thoughts to carnal matters.

"It looks like you're injured? And not lightly? Who in the Outer City could injure our respected Vice Sect Master Black Fiend?" The woman said with a smile.

"Aren't you supposed to be serving your Mist God? Did you run over here just to watch me make a fool of myself?" Black Fiend Cao Xianzhong said coldly.

He never had any good feelings toward these lunatics who served the Mist God. Although he wasn't exactly normal himself, compared to these crazy people who tortured and sacrificed their own kind at the drop of a hat, he was practically a saint.

"I came here naturally because there is a reason," the woman said with a faint smile.

Black Fiend huffed coldly and didn't pick a fight. The two of them, one ahead and one behind, soon arrived behind Sect Master Situ Ye's stone throne.

Seen from behind, Sect Master Situ Ye was always shrouded in a thin film of purple-black light.

Anyone who mistook his stillness for carelessness and tried to launch a sneak attack would be courting death.

This purple-black veil was the manifestation of a special Divine Method cultivated by Situ Ye. It stored power day after day, endlessly accumulating it. Once triggered, it would release all of that gathered force in an instant, obliterating any would-be assassin.

"You've arrived?" Situ Ye sensed the two auras at this moment.

He stood up slowly and turned to look at them.

The moment he saw them, his gaze suddenly focused on Black Fiend Cao Xianzhong.

"You're injured? And heavily?"

"I received word that the Mystic Eagle Sect’s Protector, Mystic Sword Wuhai, secretly went to the Clear Wind Temple. I was rather interested in that Mystic Sword brat—his talent is outrageous. I thought that if I could recruit him into our sect, he would definitely..." Cao Xianzhong trailed off as Situ Ye cut him short.

"So you couldn't beat Mystic Sword?"

"Of course not. That Mystic Sword brat may have astounding talent, but he’s still young—dealing with him was as easy as swatting a fly. The real problem was his master, who arrived afterward. That sword speed was countless times faster than his disciple’s.

I let my guard down for a moment, didn’t pay close enough attention, and then…"

"But it shouldn't have injured you this heavily, right?" Situ Ye frowned.

"I'm not sure either, but I did feel a scorching power rush into the wound at the time, burning away quite a bit of my Insect Mist," Cao Xianzhong recalled. "Originally, I planned to keep fighting, but that single strike injured me too severely. My condition was unstable and wouldn’t recover, so I had no choice but to withdraw first."

He believed that even if he had stayed, he most likely wouldn't have been able to defeat that person—but if he made himself sound too useless in front of his own people, it would be troublesome.

"As long as you understand. Don’t let your personal grudges interfere with our main mission," Situ Ye reminded him.

"Rest assured." Cao Xianzhong nodded. His chest felt hot and itchy, but he assumed it was just a lingering aftereffect of the injury—or an illusion.

…

Clear Wind Temple, Rear Residence.

Lin Hui stood quietly before the window, gazing at the gloomy, profound Night Mist surging outside. His fingers rubbed the Relic—the Silencing Stone—he had just obtained from his disciple.

Suddenly, a painful groan came from the bed behind him.

Tao Xuehai slowly woke from his coma. His entire body was in severe pain, but fortunately, his body had already recovered and grown back completely.

He slowly propped up his body. The first thing he saw was his teacher, Lin Hui, standing with his hands clasped behind his back in front of the window.

Instantly, the series of scenes that had just occurred flooded into his mind like a breaking dam.

The chain of images finally froze at the moment his teacher held the broken sword and reformed his figure behind Black Fiend.

"You're awake?" Lin Hui turned around and looked over.

"The injuries on your body are fine; everything has recovered to normal. As expected of an Imitation Insect Canon, it is indeed extraordinary."

"Master..." Tao Xuehai looked at Lin Hui now and instantly felt that all his previous speculations had been confirmed and connected.

He had suspected from the start that Lin Hui couldn't just have the strength of the Circulation realm. Someone who could create a martial art as powerful as the Wild Wind Sword Technique couldn't be just an ordinary Circulation realm artist.

And the scene that just happened undoubtedly confirmed this point.

His teacher was fundamentally a super-strong Grandmaster martial artist who had been hiding all along.

How strong was the Clear River Sect's Vice Sect Master, Black Fiend? He had experienced it firsthand. That was a top-tier level, a large cut above ordinary High Divine Officers, separated from the Palace Master realm by only a thin line.

Yet even an expert like that became incredibly frail in front of his teacher.

Recalling the scenes that had just occurred, the emotions in Tao Xuehai's heart became increasingly intense.

That kind of sword, that kind of wind... it had shown him the extreme power of another direction of the Wild Wind Sword Technique.

"Wait, Master, the medicine! My medicine is still in the Mist Zone! The new one I found!" Suddenly, Tao Xuehai remembered something.