Chapter 1588: Dragon Swims in Shallow Water to Pull the Shrimp Line, Tiger Falls on the Plain and First Strips Naked

"Be careful!"

Shui Gui instantly became alert, quickly put away the half-saint rank, and sent his sheng nian sweeping in all directions. "Someone is targeting us!"

The several half-saints nearby, each responsible for a different area, became vigilant upon hearing the warning.

But it seemed that after Tai Zai Ci had fallen and the Shi Yi Sheng Jun had also been devoured, there was no one left in the vicinity?

"So sensitive..."

Xu Xiaoshou saw this and silently ordered the doll to stop. Thinking about it, this wasn't fair to Shui Gui, so he had the imprint of the Da Shen Jiang Shu demonstrated directly on Shi Jin Zhi Kui itself.

In this area, even with two half-saints wielding great mysteries, anyone branded with Dao Qiong Cang's mark would likely be unable to escape.

Although Dao Qiong Cang couldn't come here now, once they left the Shen Zhi Yi Ji and returned to the Sheng Shen Continent, this could become a hidden threat.

"Demonstrating it on someone about to die is the best choice!"

The doll, which only knew how to babble incoherently, didn't understand refusal at all. As soon as Xu Xiaoshou spoke, it complied.

The imprint was applied.

Behind the white-clothed, barefooted Dao Qiong Cang doll, rivers of memory belonging to either Tai Zai Ci or Shi Jin Zhi Kui appeared.

On them, two "handshake" patterns emerged—one faint and old, the other newly formed. The former wasn't from this imprint; it had existed for a long time!

"Two of them?"

Xu Xiaoshou couldn't help but ponder. "Tai Zai Ci became Dao Qiong Cang's backup plan long ago?"

This seemed like a terrifying realization!

Bei Huai had used Tai Zai Ci for ghost beast experiments, and failure was one thing, but success would make this body Bei Huai's escape route.

If Bei Huai were cornered and chose to seize it, Tai Zai Ci would become Bei Huai—shortened to Tai Zai Huai.

In that scenario...

If Tai Zai Huai and Dao Qiong Cang ended up as enemies, the latter could unleash Da Shen Jiang Shu to strike at the root and deliver a decisive kill.

"Uh!"

Xu Xiaoshou shuddered with a chill.

The essence of Da Shen Jiang Shu was tied to memory, impossible to find or break easily. He didn't dare wait any longer:

"Show me how to remove the imprint or undo Da Shen Jiang Shu."

"Eh eh eh..." The Dao Qiong Cang doll responded without hesitation, forming a seal with its hands using heavenly mechanisms, forcing out a drop of Shi Jin Zhi Kui's essence blood and a drop of soul blood, supplemented by unclaimed sheng force, and invoking the principles of intent.

"Why is Kui moving?"

Outside, Cen Qiaofu noticed the anomaly and stared warily at the Shi Jin Zhi Kui, which was being soul-searched, as a blood mark slowly formed on its head.

Was Xu Xiaoshou controlling it?

Or something else?

Before Cen Qiaofu could think further, the vague mark had just solidified before turning ethereal again, vanishing into Shi Jin Zhi Kui's intent and disappearing.

In the soul-reading state, Xu Xiaoshou saw a line of twisted, worm-like characters appear before him.

The text hovered in front of the doll, held up by its palm.

"Eh eh eh..."

And then nothing more.

"Keep going!"

Xu Xiaoshou urged anxiously, but the doll suddenly stopped moving, just holding the characters quietly, as if everything was finished.

Could this undo the Da Shen Jiang Shu imprint? Xu Xiaoshou leaned in closer, trying to make out the twisted characters:

Was it like the ancient martial arts of Si She, something that could only be understood, not explained?

As that thought flashed through his mind, the unrecognizable characters trembled and reconfigured, suddenly bursting with golden light and enlarging.

This time, Xu Xiaoshou saw it clearly, and his pupils contracted:

"Shen Zhi Yi Ji, Xu Xiaoshou sees."

"Received fright, passivity value, 1."

You damn Dao Qiong Cang... Xu Xiaoshou nearly shut off the soul-reading in shock, forcing himself to calm down. When he looked back at the doll, its face had become eerily strange.

It was still Dao Qiong Cang's face, but half was calm like the doll, with a faint smile, while the other half was grotesquely twisted, its mouth grinning up to the ears.

Xu Xiaoshou stared at it, and it stared back at him.

Suddenly!

"Hee hee hee..."

A baby's laughter echoed from the depths of memory.

The part of the doll's expression with the eyes contracted sharply, and blood tears streamed down.

"You son of a bitch!"

Xu Xiaoshou's hairs stood on end in an instant.

What soul-reading, what Bei Huai's secrets, what ghost beast experiment successes or failures...

Why had Dao Qiong Cang left a signal like "Shen Zhi Yi Ji, Xu Xiaoshou sees" long before becoming the palace master?

Why could his doll body mutate in Shi Jin Zhi Kui's memories, developing that out-of-control smile?

Xu Xiaoshou wasn't curious about any of it anymore!

He cut off the soul-reading connection directly, lifted a finger toward Shi Jin Zhi Kui, and a faint ghostly light flickered.

"Huan Mie Yi Zhi (Accumulated Power 146.12)."

Screw Dao Qiong Cang, real or doll!

All of you, die!

"It's that finger!"

Shui Gui and the others clearly hadn't expected the situation to escalate like this.

Xu Xiaoshou, who had been soul-searching Shi Jin Zhi Kui, suddenly extended his finger, attempting to annihilate its soul.

And the power of that finger was unprecedented!

Though the force felt different—more restrained and even more terrifying—Shui Gui still recognized it...

This was the finger that, on Void Island, had erased even the intent of the Wang Ze Sheng Di, leaving Rao Yao Yao's soul scattered beyond revival.

"Huan Mie Yi Zhi!"

As Xu Xiaoshou roared fiercely,

Shi Jin Zhi Kui on the other side also moved, and a voice—impossible to identify, but extremely reverent—emerged:

"Da Shen Jiang Shu!"

Crack crack—

A massive crack opened in Shi Jin Zhi Kui's forehead, and from it stepped a normal-sized human figure: a black-haired, extraordinary-looking Dao Qiong Cang.

As soon as he appeared, he faced Xu Xiaoshou's Huan Mie Yi Zhi head-on.

Though his body tensed with a sense of impending death, Dao Qiong Cang didn't panic.

He believed in Xu Xiaoshou's judgment of the situation and thought he wasn't Xu Xiaoshou's enemy right now.

We are friends.

So, Dao Qiong Cang's lips curved slightly, and with a teasing smile, he said:

"Let's have some fun..."

Fun your ass!

Xu Xiaoshou's eyes were bloodshot, with no intention of joking. His finger trembled slightly, then:

With a soft sound, souls shattered like waves.

Dao Qiong Cang's pupils quaked, and as the Cang Qiong scroll unfolded beneath his feet...

"Time—freeze!"

Xu Xiaoshou gripped the Shi Zu Shadow Staff in his left hand, his sweaty palm barely holding it steady.

After freezing time, he promptly activated the space dao disk.

"Space—freeze!"

What are you doing? I'm your friend; we're not enemies right now... Dao Qiong Cang's face paled, and a torrent of Sheng Zu force erupted from him as he tried to resist.

"Time sequence—reverse!"

With four swords descending from the sky in a single strike, the surging Sheng Zu force was forcibly pressed back into Dao Qiong Cang's body.

Dao Qiong Cang's face finally showed terror. The long-prepared Tian Ji Thirty-Six Styles on his body activated on their own:

"Da Bi..."

Shut up!

Xu Xiaoshou stepped into the air, closing the distance in an instant, and thrust Huan Mie Yi Zhi straight into Dao Qiong Cang's throat as his mouth opened slightly.

"Hmm?"

The world went quiet.

Sang Lao, Shui Gui, and the others turned back in stunned silence, unable to process the lightning-fast battle.

Dao Qiong Cang caught a glimpse of Xu Xiaoshou's profile as he brushed past, and then nothing else.

Boom!

A storm from the soul exploded at the fingertip, instantly blackening Dao Qiong Cang's entire head.

The shockwave rolled back from the distance like waves, sweeping out in a distorted fan shape, obliterating everything above and below.

Finally, the compressed, frenzied soul energy, with nowhere else to go, erupted as a towering pillar of soul light, piercing through tens of thousands of li in all directions!

Rumble rumble...

In the distant sky, after Sang Shui, Cen Bai had fled to safety and watched in horror as the soul storm obliterated Dao Qiong Cang and half of Shi Jin Zhi Kui.

A sheng nian sweep into the storm's center revealed Dao Qiong Cang and Xu Xiaoshou still frozen in place, maintaining that bizarre finger-in-throat pose.

"What is this?"

Sang Lao vaguely felt the distortion was familiar...

But no one knew what had happened, not even Dao Qiong Cang himself.

Only Xu Xiaoshou, seeing the Huan Mie Yi Zhi's power exceed 100% and explode, felt a long-lost joy as Dao Qiong Cang's body turned completely black.

"You're strong."

"But it's useless now."

At such close range, with space and time frozen, even reversed.

This was Xu Xiaoshou's first time seeing someone react and resist so many times in a sure-death situation.

If it were his sister Dao Xuanji, she would have fallen the moment she appeared.

Even so, with his entire body blackened, it meant Dao Qiong Cang's whole soul had been destroyed.

One could only say...

The dao rises one foot, but the adversary rises ten.

The grudge from that night at Qing Yuan Mountain—I've avenged it for you all!

"You three, come closer."

In the Shen Zhi Yi Ji, first level.

A certain Dao Zhan realm intelligence agent under Yue Gong Li's command had been resting under a tree but suddenly stood up and called to his three companions.

"What is it?"

The three Dao Zhan companions flipped up, alert to their surroundings as they approached the center.

The one who called them drew a black knife and swiftly beheaded the three, extinguishing their souls with a palm. Then, kneeling on one knee, he offered his hands upward with utmost reverence and shouted:

"Da Shen Jiang Shu."

His body cracked open, and no figure emerged, only a misty consciousness infused with sheng force floated out.

The mist expanded rapidly, engulfing the intelligence agent's entire body.

"Urgh urgh urgh..."

After struggling in agony for a long time, he emerged from the mist with an incredibly sinister expression, immediately casting a glow on himself.

"Da Bi You Shu."

Dao Qiong Cang quickly repaired this newly seized body, his gaze distant, his mood complex.

"What happened?"

Indeed, even now, Dao Qiong Cang still didn't understand what had occurred.

He had entered from the Ran Ming ruins passageway, daring to face the situation alone without fear of the Zu Shen Ran Ming.

Upon reaching the Shen Zhi Yi Ji's first level and quickly passing the entry scene, Dao Qiong Cang sensed someone spying on Tai Zai Ci from the eighteenth level.

Correct, from the first level, he could clearly see the out-of-control Tai Zai Ci, the dying Shi Jin Zhi Kui, and Xu Xiaoshou pondering Da Shen Jiang Shu.

He couldn't resist playing a joke on Xu Xiaoshou...

Dao Qiong Cang was a romantic person.

He had played many such jokes before; it wasn't strange.

And in reality—it wasn't some premeditation decades in advance; it was just improvised responses after careful planning.

Including the last time he entered the Xing Jie through Long Xing from Shen Nong Drug Garden.

Dao Qiong Cang had only remembered he could do that, turning it into a coincidental joke, a small surprise, not foreknowledge from the first time he saw Long Xing that Xu Xiaoshou would exist.

This time, he did the same.

When Xu Xiaoshou tried to peek at the secrets of Da Shen Jiang Shu, Dao Qiong Cang mixed reality and illusion, giving the kid a heavy psychological blow.

From "Void Island sees" to "Ran Ming ruins sees," to "Shen Zhi Yi Ji sees"...

Dao Qiong Cang was a master of psychological suggestion and pressure.

With a little trick, he believed Xu Xiaoshou's courage would shatter, and he'd vomit bile right in front of him!

But who would have thought...

The kid used to run away when scared.

Now, he retaliated with a soul attack?

And it was as if he'd rehearsed it in his mind thirty-six thousand eight hundred times—impossible to defend against!

"My soul... was killed?"

Dao Qiong Cang paced back and forth irritably on the three corpses beside him, his eyes still full of disbelief.

He had hidden his true self for over thirty years.

He had fantasized countless times about retiring from his position as the Sheng Shen Hall's grand palace master, hiding in the world and manipulating fates like a terrifying puppet master.

He had even met Ba Zun An in the South Domain and planned to enter Xu Yue Hui Palace, but then the game changed upon entering the Ran Ming ruins...

Only to have someone thrust a finger down his throat and blast his soul apart?

All his soul defenses and treasures were useless, not even buying a split second!

Was this any different from Ba Zun An hiding his sword for decades, only for a lazy Shuo Shu Ren to fail as a guardian and let some innate assassin succeed?

—Absolute nonsense!

"But if not for my hidden backup..."

"If this consciousness could only wander the eighteenth level, could Xu Xiaoshou really find and kill me in the Shen Zhi Yi Ji?"

Dao Qiong Cang thought it over and over, calculated and recalculated with his fingers...

"It's impossible!"

"How could I be forced to this point by him?"

Something that should have zero probability had happened so unbelievably...

Was this the variable?

Was this the curse?

"Was this disaster fated for me?"

Dao Qiong Cang even forgot to leave, sitting blankly under the tree with his mind empty for a while before suddenly remembering...

"Oh no!"

"My true body is still on the eighteenth level. They won't mess with it, will they?"

"You killed Dao Qiong Cang?"

On the eighteenth level, Shui Gui swooped in from afar, clutching his head in disbelief, not even realizing he'd pushed his half-golden beast mask up to his forehead.

Utter shock!

"Just destroyed his soul..."

Xu Xiaoshou pulled his finger from his mouth and wiped the saliva on the flashy old daoist's body. Afterward, he felt something was off.

How strange!

Did I just get this fierce?

He frowned, hardly believing it, and reached out to pinch Dao Qiong Cang's blackened face.

Soft...

Not a Tian Ji puppet; it had flesh and warmth...

"What happened?"

Cen Qiaofu approached in a daze and, seeing the scene, reached out to flick Dao Qiong Cang's forehead hard.

Really no reaction?

What kind of world is this? I just flicked the palace master's head?

Though it was someone else's head being flicked, Cen Qiaofu's own felt dizzy—such a magical feeling!

"Hmm?"

Bai Zhuo hung back, not daring to act rashly at first.

But seeing their strange expressions after touching Dao Qiong Cang, he couldn't resist his curiosity and reached out to pinch Dao Qiong Cang's chest muscle.

An indescribable feeling wellled up.

Bai Zhuo seemed to lose the ability to speak, his red lips moving for a long time without words. In short, his eyes lit up—bright, dazzlingly bright!

"Better not touch it recklessly!"

Sang Lao was the only one with exceptional self-control. Seeing this, he advised, "From what I know, this flashy old daoist can leave marks through contact for some extremely bizarre possession."

Everyone pulled back their hands simultaneously, recalling the "Da Shen Jiang Shu" scene, and turned to Xu Xiaoshou with eyes full of curiosity.

What exactly happened? We're dying to know!

"I don't know..."

Xu Xiaoshou shrugged, knowing he didn't have much time to explain.

Dao Qiong Cang must have been scared.

He feared that after his soul was destroyed, his consciousness would enter the body, and Xu Xiaoshou might have follow-up plans—though he did, they weren't fully set.

He probably fled elsewhere to resurrect, but he should return soon!

Dao Qiong Cang's body had once withstood the Shen Yu Blue Stone's power on Void Island head-on...

Thinking of that, Xu Xiaoshou didn't waste time explaining. He simply reached out and tore open Dao Qiong Cang's clothes.

"Ah?" Cen Qiaofu was shocked.

"You!" Shui Gui's eyes narrowed, and he stepped back half a pace.

"This... isn't right, is it?" Bai Zhuo inhaled sharply and quickly added, "Need me to help with anything?"

Xu Xiaoshou manifested his Wu Xiu · Chi Jiao Hand and thrust it fiercely into Dao Qiong Cang's chest.

Boom!

A terrifying wave of Sheng Zu force exploded.

The others were all blasted away, and even Xu Xiaoshou was forced to retreat step by step, sliding for a long time before steadying himself.

As expected!

This body held an earth-shattering secret!

Compared to Dao Xuanji's, Dao Qiong Cang's was even more captivating!

After being blown back, the surrounding half-saints realized Xu Xiaoshou wasn't just acting on impulse; he must be investigating something.

They all turned back, regrouping around Dao Qiong Cang's manipulable body, their eyes gleaming brightly.

"Need me to help with anything?" Bai Zhuo swallowed, his hands clenched in front of his abdomen, his bright eyes fixed on the faint Tian Ji dao patterns on Dao Qiong Cang's jade-white chest muscles.

Xu Xiaoshou nodded, first using a weaving technique to examine Dao Qiong Cang's body, only to find...

This guy's clothes could block any Tian Ji-like spying methods.

He didn't hold back and waved his hand, instructing:

"Strip him naked!"