Vessel of Worlds

Andy, of course, would never have dared face an enemy head-on with the flying needles as his only card.

He withdrew the needles for the moment and deployed before himself a deep yellow diamond-shaped shield, roughly five chi long and three chi wide, with a mid-grade earth-attribute spirit stone socketed at each of its four corners. This was the Thick Earth Shield—a rank-four mid-grade spirit tool Andy had forged from the back carapace of the Earth-Splitting Crab, a rank-four beast. In pure defensive power it surpassed even the Ice-Fire Shield. And since it ran on mid-grade earth-attribute stones, it looked considerably less extravagant besides.

At the same time, he produced the green-gleaming silver mirror—the Spirit-Focusing Mirror—and deployed it in the air, where it grew to a chi across, striking seal after seal into it.

The mirror spat forth a beam of green light as thick as a bowl's mouth, playing across the black mist. Sure enough, wherever the beam touched, the mist stopped churning and thinned considerably. Andy swept the beam across the entire cloud, and soon the blackness had faded enough to reveal what lay within.

The ugly man sat cross-legged inside, wrapped tight in the triangular black banner's mist, eyes closed, hands shifting through a stream of gestures while he silently mouthed an incantation—clearly preparing some sinister secret art.

Andy had no intention of giving him the time. Two more flying needles stabbed in. But then something truly strange happened: the needles plainly struck the black banner, yet passed through as though meeting nothing at all, emerging from another part of it entirely—utterly unable to harm the ugly man within.

Whatever manner of unusual treasure this black banner was, it possessed the uncanny ability to displace attacks. But Andy noticed something else: the displacement was not limitless. With every strike of his needles, the banner's black mist thinned a little more.

Just as Andy was about to commit more needles to the assault, the ugly man completed his secret art. His eyes snapped open, he sprayed a mouthful of vital blood onto the banner before him, and struck several seals into it. From the banner there gradually drifted forth a blood centipede formed of red mist, over a zhang long and thick as a bowl's mouth, claws bared and fangs snapping as it lunged at Andy.

Andy drove his needles into the blood centipede, punching through it effortlessly and leaving two holes a cun wide. But the blood mist simply flowed back in and sealed them again.

The blood centipede had no true body—which made it a near-perfect counter to his flying needles, rendering his attacks all but useless. Andy was startled anew.

"A rank-four mid-grade spirit tool—worth thousands of spirit stones, surely! And that mirror must be a peak-grade artifact. Who'd have thought you were this rich—a match for the wealthiest late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivators! Heaven truly favors me, Yang, to deliver this many treasures to my door!" the ugly man crowed at the sight of the treasures arrayed before Andy.

Andy said, puzzled: "How strange. You see all these treasures of mine—why isn't your reaction fear? Do you truly believe I lack the power to kill you? Or are you hiding some trump card?"

"Hmph!" the ugly man snorted. "Your offense hangs entirely on those needles. Against anyone else, deadly enough—but running into me, Yang? Blame your own thin fate!"

With that he sprayed another mouthful of vital blood onto the banner. The blood centipede perked up and fell upon the Thick Earth Shield's deep yellow barrier, clawing and gnawing in a frenzy.

Andy shook his head. Greed clouds the mind, he thought. This man is so fixed on seizing treasure that it never occurs to him: anyone who can produce this many treasures is no ordinary early-stage Foundation Establishment cultivator—and might well produce something stronger yet and put him in his grave. Letting a moment's greed swallow one's judgment—truly dangerous. Let this be a lesson to me.

Andy gave a light sigh, recalled all his needles, and slapped his waist with his left hand. White light flashed, and the translucent bone bow appeared in his grip.

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"A mid-grade ice spirit stone!" the ugly man cried out again. A mid-grade ice stone was worth two or three thousand spirit stones—to say nothing of the value of the mid-grade spirit tool that was the Frost Dragon Bow.

Bow in his left hand, Andy drew the string lightly with his right. Freezing air gathered along the bow at once, condensing into seven or eight ice spikes a chi long. He released, and the spikes streaked toward the blood centipede.

Dodge as it might, the centipede took two spikes through its body, punched through with fist-sized holes. The roiling blood mist began knitting the wounds closed—

But Andy never paused. Wave after wave of ice spikes came slicing in, and soon the blood centipede was ragged and torn, barely holding its shape.

Left with no choice, the ugly man gritted his teeth and spat out yet another mouthful of vital blood. The blood mist surged, and the centipede writhed back to vigor. But after three mouthfuls of vital blood, the man's face had gone white as paper.

Andy's draw grew faster and faster, ice spikes falling thick as rain, streaming without pause at the blood centipede and the ugly man himself.

Seeing death closing in, the ugly man at last knew fear. Gathering everything he had left, he spat two final mouthfuls of blood at the banner—then made to dissolve into a ball of black mist under its cover and flee.

"Now that you know my methods, I can't possibly let you escape!" Andy flung out two thick stacks of Fire Serpent Talismans—dozens of them—which became dozens of fire serpents pouncing on the Demon Gate cultivator from every direction. In the same breath, seven or eight flying needles streamed out at tremendous speed, looping around ahead of the man to cut off his retreat.

The Demon Gate cultivator's black banner proved eerie to the last: under so many attacks, it somehow weathered them all. Though the fire serpents' detonations and the needles' punctures scattered the black mist nearly to nothing, the ugly man himself remained well protected—neither serpent nor needle touched him directly.

Under the banner's cover, the Demon Gate cultivator gained another twenty-odd zhang, slipping beyond the reach of Andy's artifacts. Relief flickered across his face, and he even threw back a venomous glare, as if to say: just you wait—one day I'll collect on today's debt.

Unhurried, Andy stepped onto the Wind-Treader Dragon and poured spiritual power into it at full flow. The artifact shot forward with a piercing shriek, half again faster than the Demon Gate cultivator—and in the blink of an eye the gap had closed to within twenty zhang once more.

The Demon Gate cultivator went pale with horror, desperately urging his black mist to greater speed—but with his vital blood and spiritual power both drained to the dregs, it was hopeless. Under his despairing gaze, Andy leveled the Frost Dragon Bow and loosed a storm of shots.

The Demon Gate cultivator gave one last scream, his body punched through with holes by the ice spikes, and his corpse tumbled toward the sea.

Andy darted in before the body struck the water, snatched the storage pouch from its breast, and flicked out a fireball that reduced the corpse to ash.

As for the eerie triangular black banner—it had shrunk back to a cun in size and hung drifting in the air. Andy naturally collected it into his storage pouch as well. He suspected, though, that the banner could most likely be wielded only through Demon Gate techniques—and he wouldn't dare trade it away either. If anyone recognized its origin, word that he had slain a Demon Gate cultivator might spread on its own legs.

Killing the man had not taken long—half an incense stick from start to finish. Andy judged that reinforcements could not possibly arrive so quickly.

He fixed his bearings and flew fast toward Island Five. As for going back to check on Xi Feng's situation—Andy entertained the thought for exactly a moment before discarding it. If Xi Feng couldn't handle his opponent, neither could Andy. And going back carried enormous risk—it would be all too easy to expose the secret of his extraordinary wealth. He had no wish to plunge himself into fire and deep water over it.

Besides, so much time had passed that if the two had truly fought, the outcome was surely decided already. Whether he rushed back or not no longer meant anything.

Whether Di Er, Xun San, or Hongchen would have turned back in his place, Andy honestly couldn't say. In nearly three years together, he had come to feel that the bond among those four carried the genuine flavor of brotherhood. Setting aside all the times they had saved one another in moments of crisis during the hunts, the simple fact that everyone had left all the rank-five cores to Xi Feng showed these were no false-hearted people.

And they had treated Andy well, too. True, he had helped them a great deal—but they had never used his low cultivation as an excuse to shortchange him. Quite the opposite: they had deliberately let him take extra beast materials.

All of it had given Andy real fondness for them. Had the enemy not been beyond his power, perhaps he would not have abandoned Xi Feng and the others.

At the thought, Andy sighed inwardly. In the cultivation world, where nothing counted but cultivation and strength, for someone like him—shallow in cultivation, lucky merely to protect himself—the words loyalty and feeling were a luxury he could not afford.