Chapter 1450: As If a Lifetime Has Passed in the Mountain Night, Returning Home to Find Everything Changed

Release type, Che Shen Nian!

In the most primitive way, he released the accumulated essence of Fa Shen Xing Jie that had built up over more than twenty years all at once.

This was different from the oppressive mental shock.

Release type meant the purest output, the most unbridled venting!

“One breath, and I'll smash them to pieces.”

Cao Er Zhu steeled himself, flexed his arms, and pulled the two people in his hands through the air with a whooshing sound.

Around him, a vast sea of thunder exploded, shrouding the sky, and behind him, the wild energy coalesced into a blurry image of a Lei Shen.

Under the moonlight, the people in his hands were yanked by his pull...

And slammed viciously into the ground!

“Boom!”

Space tore open black marks.

The stone pool embedded the figures.

The air pressure splashed high waves of water.

As blood began to spread, the Lei Shen image behind Cao Er Zhu shuddered, and the thunder sea in the sky was about to pour down...

But at that moment, a trace of clarity returned to Cao Er Zhu's eyes.

He suddenly realized that if he continued with the release type Che Shen Nian, these two would be done for.

Whether in terms of physical body, soul, or will.

Yet, all the fond memories he had shared with his grandfather and Ba Yue would vanish along with the rampage of Fa Shen Xing Jie.

“He just laughed at me once...”

Was that really a crime deserving death?

Cao Er Zhu then recalled that when Xi had tried to act earlier, Yu Zhi Wen had shouted, “Don't hurt anyone.”

Well, let's consider that as a favor.

The poisonous woman was a poisonous woman, and the venomous snake was a venomous snake, but those were just descriptions, not their true essence—they were people, not wild boars, after all.

Cao Er Zhu wasn't a killing maniac. Acting first to kill out of fear of the unknown and to eliminate future threats went against his sense of righteousness.

As these thoughts flashed through his mind...

The Lei Shen image behind him unleashed thousands of thunderbolts, like a heavenly tribulation hurtling toward the stone pool on the ground, already halfway through.

“Back!”

Cao Er Zhu shouted sharply.

The thousands of thunder punishments, like arrows loosed from strings, were drawn back into his body, along with the Lei Shen image behind him, vanishing completely.

—Complete control!

The void returned to silence.

Under the silver moon, only Cao Er Zhu's massive silhouette remained.

The saying “spilled water cannot be gathered” didn't seem to apply to him, because his father had been extremely strict.

Any skill that wasn't refined to perfection or mastery was considered unlearned and forbidden for Cao Er Zhu to use.

Thus, whatever he could perform, he could also retract at will.

However...

The death penalty could be forgiven, but the living one could not be escaped.

For these two, Cao Er Zhu had a clear idea of their punishment.

He simply raised his hand, stirred his qi sea, and his spiritual energy transformed into a massive thunder palm behind him.

“Go!”

With a boom, the large palm slapped down on the stone pool, driving Xi deep into the ground.

Purple lightning, like snakes, borrowed a fraction of Fa Shen Xing Jie's aura and turned into crackling electric chains, sealing Xi in the depths of the stone pool.

“Ugh... ugh...”

Xi awoke in pain, his body convulsing all over, feeling as if he had just brushed past the gates of hell.

Once he regained his senses, he barely remembered what had happened moments before.

“Bang!”

A fist as big as a sandbag descended from above, landing squarely on Xi's face.

His nose twisted, and his vision turned bloody, but he could clearly see who the attacker was.

It was unmistakably Cao Er Zhu!

Xi's head jerked to the side with the force, his consciousness fading.

Before blacking out, only one doubt lingered in his mind...

“Am I really that weak?”

Being caught by Shen effortlessly, with no resistance, he could understand and accept.

Being blasted away by Kui Lei Han's single thought and then choosing to play dead—he was used to it and thought it natural.

Now, in the wilderness, he encountered someone his own age.

Yet, he couldn't even react in time, didn't even summon Bai Nie Yan Lord, and was sent flying...

Though that big guy had the element of surprise, and he himself had been careless, in the end, they were just excuses for defeat.

Xi didn't like making excuses; he reflected deeply:

“Is this my problem, or...”

Xi's doubt remained unresolved.

Cao Er Zhu pressed down on the rock and delivered a second punch.

The figure in the deep water of the pool went still, only the unconscious muscle twitches under the electric seal remaining.

“Huff...”

“Knocked out.”

Cao Er Zhu let out a long breath.

Then he frowned and looked at the pretty-faced girl beside him, ultimately deciding not to strike her harshly.

“Stop pretending to sleep.” He easily saw that Yu Zhi Wen had already been jolted awake by his spiritual energy.

“Mmm...”

Yu Zhi Wen's eyelashes fluttered, and she opened her starry eyes, feeling as if her entire back had been shattered.

Struggling in the deep water, she spoke with difficulty: “Cao Er Zhu, you misunderstood me...”

She had fully activated her Zhu Ji Xing Tong, and her spiritual thoughts were linked to the sacred blood.

If there was even the slightest chance she might end up like Xi, her preparations would trigger automatically, and the Qing Yuan Shan great array would teleport her in her unconscious state to a hidden underground array eye that no one could find.

One must always guard against others.

Yet, even now, with some leisure, Yu Zhi Wen had no intention of striking first against Cao Er Zhu.

Because this was truly a misunderstanding!

“I just wanted to tell you that Xu Xiao Shou has trouble, and if you can, could you help...”

“My father told me!”

Cao Er Zhu didn't want to hear the witch's words and unusually, rudely interrupted her.

Yu Zhi Wen pressed her lips together, and the pain in her back intensified in the water and electricity, amplified by the silence.

Cao Er Zhu lowered his fist and sighed softly:

“Nothing.”

He had his four principles of not killing.

But with this stranger he had thought could be a friend, it was all irrelevant now.

Naturally, he had no desire to explain.

He grabbed the girl's slender arm and lifted her out of the water.

After all, from the beginning, only Xi had been malicious toward him, not Yu Zhi Wen.

He tossed her onto the shore, averted his eyes, and turned to head down the mountain.

“Stop for a moment, then save him.”

“I'm going down the mountain. Don't force me to act again.”

Yu Zhi Wen silently watched the big guy's retreating back and suddenly realized that this person might not even know Xu Xiao Shou.

Neither enemy nor friend.

Between them, it was that kind of complete strangeness, perhaps just a single encounter, or even just a distant acquaintance.

Naturally, there was no question of helping or not.

Thinking that from a piece of paper with “Xu Xiao Shou” written on it, she could get someone to help—it seemed more likely that she had been assuming too much.

Yu Zhi Wen let it go.

She shook her spiritual energy to dispel the water stains from her skirt, glanced at Xi, and didn't act rashly right away.

One quarter of an hour...

She would wait.

Upon second thought, it was indeed ridiculous.

Dragging someone into the conflict out of nowhere—from Cao Er Zhu's perspective...

“Am I really that bothersome?”

Sorry... Yu Zhi Wen's expression darkened as she completely abandoned the unethical idea of pulling others in.

She waited obediently, lost in thought under the night sky.

But in the midst of this idle counting of time, her starry eyes suddenly trembled.

The world before her, different from that of ordinary people—the heavenly mechanisms that only Tian Ji Shu Shi could see—suddenly buzzed to life.

Their brilliance was so dazzling it nearly blinded her.

“This isn't something an ordinary Tian Ji Shu Shi can achieve. Even I can't reach this level. It's the Dao Hall Master!”

Yu Zhi Wen suddenly thought of something. Her red lips parted as she sent a voice transmission, while rising and using her spiritual thoughts to probe the distance.

Cao Er Zhu's footsteps were unhurried as he descended the mountain.

He had said one quarter of an hour, so it would be exactly that. He had no intention of rushing.

Suddenly, Cao Er Zhu sensed something and stopped, looking puzzled at the night sky.

The night sky was clear, no different from before.

But it seemed a bit off, though he couldn't pinpoint what was wrong.

“Run!”

“Cao Er Zhu, run fast!”

The witch's voice suddenly echoed in his ear, full of urgency.

Cao Er Zhu furrowed his brow, feeling displeased. They had agreed not to interfere anymore, so why was she transmitting again?

But he didn't turn back to attack; that would be too impulsive.

He simply continued down the mountain at his own pace.

As soon as he lifted his foot...

The trees, rocks, flowers, and grass around him lit up with faint starlight, forming a special teleportation channel right under his feet.

“Witch!”

Cao Er Zhu was furious.

He reacted swiftly and, in the nick of time, pulled back from the teleportation channel.

But the witch seemed to anticipate his retreat and manifested a flash of starlight gate right at his position.

“Don't come back!”

Cao Er Zhu only heard this in his ear before he was hit.

As he silently cursed himself for not being ruthless earlier, which led to being struck first, the light and shadows before his eyes shifted.

“This is...”

At the foot of Qing Yuan Shan!

He had actually descended the mountain?

Cao Er Zhu whipped around, his spiritual thoughts flaring out.

He saw that the entire Qing Yuan Shan—every flower, blade of grass, tree, and stone, even the wind—bore traces of the Dao, exuding a profound aura.

They were all glowing!

Qing Yuan Shan had transformed into a special pattern, bright as day, isolating inside from outside.

This pattern, with its power scaled down a million times, felt just like the “handshake” mark that strange uncle had left on him.

“Tian Ji Shu...”

“Tian Ji Shu Shi...”

Cao Er Zhu murmured silently, still not understanding why Yu Zhi Wen had rushed him out of Qing Yuan Shan.

“Boom!”

A thunderous roar came from the mountain's night sky.

The Tian Ji Dao patterns sketched across the nine heavens, converging and manifesting into a force even more majestic than the Qing Yuan Shan array.

This power made even Cao Er Zhu feel awed!

“Sacred power?”

The sacred power of a Tian Ji Shu Shi sketched out a dazzling scroll, like a miniature of the five domains' firmament.

In the next instant, Cao Er Zhu faintly heard a low laugh from afar:

“None of you can escape...”

“Da Nuo Yi Shu!”

The space at the horizon shattered in response.

One figure after another plummeted toward the mountain.

Some were burly, some middle-aged, some wielded swords, some carried blades...

Without exception, they all wore white robes.

Mixed among these white-robed figures, Cao Er Zhu vaguely spotted a few out-of-place shadows:

Two women, one man, and half a...

“Ah? Half a person?”

“Is that even a person? It looks like... a puppet?”

A sense of invisible crisis swept over Cao Er Zhu, and he suddenly understood why Yu Zhi Wen had urgently sent him away.

Was it to help him escape the battlefield?

“But isn't she a bad person?”

“And I just beat up her friend...”

Cao Er Zhu scratched his head, truly baffled by the people of the Ling Lian Realm and what they were up to.

“Anyway, it's none of my business.”

He lifted his foot to head back to the town to check on his father, but felt that leaving like this was a bit odd.

He paused, pulled out the piece of paper Ba Yue had left him from his spatial ring.

“Xu Xiao Shou.”

It was exactly those three elegant characters.

The words Yu Zhi Wen had tried to say before he interrupted her also surfaced in his mind.

The protagonist in her words was the same three characters:

“Xu Xiao Shou.”

Cao Er Zhu scratched his head again, feeling that everything happening tonight was connected to this Xu Xiao Shou.

But...

“Who is Xu Xiao Shou?”

Cao Er Zhu murmured, putting away Ba Yue's note.

For him, the name Ba Yue sister had left might or might not be the answer to his last question.

That strange witch left a neither good nor bad impression, like a passerby. Whether the Xu Xiao Shou she wanted him to help was the same as the one on Ba Yue's paper was also uncertain.

Cao Er Zhu hesitated.

Since he was already down the mountain, maybe there was no need to go back?

He stepped toward Chang De Town, remembering that Uncle Yang and the others wanted meat, and he hadn't hunted it yet.

A lot had happened today.

He had only gotten the deer meat his father wanted.

“Xu Xiao Shou” popped into his mind again! Cao Er Zhu turned back to look at the Qing Yuan Shan array—that must be what they called a formation.

Cao Er Zhu continued down the mountain.

He thought about how powerful Fa Shen Xing Jie really was, with its six forms, beating those two without them even reacting.

So, the Ling Lian Realm had novices like Yu Zhi Wen and that ancient sword cultivator. That was a happy realization.

At least, if he entered the Ling Lian Realm, he wouldn't be at the bottom among the young generation.

“Xu Xiao Shou” popped into his mind again!

Cao Er Zhu looked back at the shattered space in the mountain sky—that had to be a space black hole.

He suddenly had a premonition...

The mountain and the foot were two different worlds.

Going up or down would lead to different choices and different lives.

Cao Er Zhu kept walking down.

This time, his steps weren't firm; he looked back every three steps.

In his mind, he even recalled his father scolding him—if he went home a month early this time, he'd definitely get beaten to death!

But if he really turned back up the mountain...

For over twenty years!

The farthest Cao Er Zhu had ever been from home was Qing Yuan Shan!

Aside from his fear of the unknown, what worried him more was that if he went up and, as the premonition suggested, entered the Ling Lian Realm because of his choice...

What about his father?

Who would take care of him?

The town had exploded so many times today—what had happened there was important; who Xu Xiao Shou was didn't matter at all!

“The Ling Lian Realm or whatever, I don't care about it...”

Cao Er Zhu pouted and broke into a run toward home.

For the first time, his steps were messy, leaving traces on the ground that any hunter could easily track—he wouldn't normally be so careless.

“Xu Xiao Shou” appeared in his mind again! He shook his head, flinging the thought away...

Xu Xiao Shou ran firmly toward home.

After some time, when he stood on the mound at the village entrance of the town, his mind and eyes full of Xu Xiao Shou as if possessed, Cao Er Zhu finally regained his senses.

He gazed at the devastated battlefield—cracked everywhere, buildings collapsed, dust still settling—and his head buzzed with a strange ringing.

“I took the wrong path...”

Cao Er Zhu forced a smile, patting his head to clear his mind.

He turned back, trying to run the other way.

But the path into the mountain...

Was only one!

This familiar one!

From this small mound, the forest looked just like this!

“I didn't take the wrong path...”

Cao Er Zhu had to turn back and confirm, but glancing back, he saw the battlefield that no longer resembled a town.

“I must have taken the wrong path...”

He spun like a top, turning back again to see the familiar scenery leading into the mountain.

The big, sturdy Cao Er Zhu suddenly felt his knees go weak and collapsed to the ground.

The Yan Gui Wang hadn't scared him, people falling from the sky hadn't scared him... but this several-hundred-pound man was now powerless.

“Boom!”

In the distance, Qing Yuan Shan lit up completely.

The mountain's night sky was illuminated by starlight, followed by distant explosions.

At this distance, the explosions sounded just like the strange noises from home that he could hear while meditating by the waterfall at noon.

But it shouldn't be like this!

Why wasn't everything fine as usual?

“Ah!!!”

Cao Er Zhu clutched his head and let out a sharp cry.

He scrambled desperately toward the “battlefield,” tears blurring his vision.

“Father!!!”

The town was completely ruined.

Everyone lay there, as if asleep.

Even though the streets were destroyed and houses collapsed, Cao Er Zhu could find his way home with his eyes closed.

He charged like a mad wild boar, forgetting he could turn into lightning and arrive in an instant.

On hands and knees, sobbing and sniffling, when he reached a pile of rubble where the walls had been blown away...

“Tap.”

Cao Er Zhu stepped on something.

Looking down, it was a plaque full of cracks, inscribed with “Shi Jiang Pu.”

“No father, no father...”

Cao Er Zhu hugged the half-plaque of his family's blacksmith shop, wiping his nose as he laughed. He hadn't seen his father!

At a time like this, not seeing his father was the best news.

Maybe he had gone out, though he never did.

Maybe he was sleeping in the cultivation room; that underground space could withstand Fa Shen Xing Jie, so it could serve as a shelter, even if his father's size meant he couldn't fit.

Maybe...

Cao Er Zhu suddenly focused and noticed that in what used to be the backyard of the ruined blacksmith shop, a large wine barrel remained.

This wine barrel was intact!

“Weird...”

Cao Er Zhu wiped away his tears and chuckled as he crawled over to the barrel, spotting a pattern on it.

A very familiar “handshake” pattern!

Cao Er Zhu's simple smile froze. He reached out with trembling hands and pried open the thick lid of the large wine barrel.

A familiar wine scent wafted out, though faint.

More prominently, there was an overwhelmingly pungent smell, like the blood of a dead wild boar.

Cao Er Zhu's mouth twitched, his eyelids spasmed, and gripping the rim of the barrel, he leaned in for a closer look...

“Ah!!!”

Cao Er Zhu's pupils shook as he screamed in horror.

In his blurred vision, rippling like water, it wasn't wine—it was blood, and a head...

His father's head!