Chapter 569: Holding the Sword, Making an Entrance

A deep, resonant hum.

Unlike the massive upheaval on the battlefield, which had been turned completely upside down, the underground pit was filled with trembling sand and mud, and a profound silence descended.

The rock-hard minerals, under the suppression of an unknown pressure, quietly began to crack.

Then, with a few soft pops, they turned into rubble.

The rubble cracked further.

With a hissing sound, they turned into dust.

“What am I doing?”

Xu Xiaoshou’s eyes were bloodshot as he stared intently at the completely crushed Eight-winged Red Dual-headed Dragon-Python on the battlefield.

That wasn’t the Red Dual-headed Dragon-Python.

That was Jiao Tangtang!

Jiao Tangtang was one thing.

After all, this woman didn’t have much to do with him.

Xu Xiaoshou felt that his concern was merely out of sympathy for the weak.

But...

What about Xin Gugu?

Just now, he, who had surveyed the entire scene with his "Perception," could only watch helplessly as the four Minotaurs charging towards the Storyteller were instantly crushed into oblivion by the black hole’s fragmented currents.

Those weren’t just Ghost Beast Minotaurs!

That was Xin Gugu!

“Whoosh!”

Xu Xiaoshou felt his breathing quicken.

“What am I doing?”

He asked himself again.

He clutched his forehead, his palm drenched in cold sweat, and froze.

“Dead?”

“Everyone’s going to die?!”

Looking at the sweat stains in his withered palm, Xu Xiaoshou was so lost in thought that he didn’t even notice the pain from his tightly clenched Chicken Sword, which had bent into a curl.

“Xin Gugu, dead?”

“And I... what am I doing?”

Xu Xiaoshou stopped walking, suddenly bracing his hands against the mud walls on either side.

He tilted his head back, only then realizing he had already traveled from the deep underground pit, through the blood-sea barrier Xin Gugu had summoned.

He was just a step away from breaking through the earth.

“No, I can’t, it’s impossible...”

“Holy Slave, that’s ‘Holy Slave’!”

The Xuyue Grey Palace, that’s the ‘Xuyue Grey Palace’!

“This is a war among Dao-severing experts; if I go, what can I do?”

Xu Xiaoshou desperately pinched his hand, trying to calm himself down.

“Aside from that, even if I completely disregard the Storyteller and the Ghost Beasts, what about the other side?”

A dozen or so Red Coats, just like him, were watching the battle from afar, waiting for an opportunity.

“Above are Red Coats, Night Watchmen, Lan Ling, Yu Zhiwen, and the Heaven-Sealing Grand Array.”

“I’m just a tiny Xiantian ant, what am I thinking?”

“Go out?”

His crimson eyes were filled with a primal urge to destroy, and Xu Xiaoshou’s breathing grew increasingly rapid.

“Whoosh!”

“Whoosh!”

“Whoosh...”

He grabbed a handful of mud and vigorously rubbed it on his cheeks.

He didn't even notice the pain of the sand and pebbles embedded in the broken skin of his deeply wrinkled old face from the immense pressure, letting his face bleed and then repair itself.

Hummm.

The Chicken Sword was desperately suppressing its screams.

Its current terror wasn't from Xu Xiaoshou’s immense grip, which was almost crushing it, but from the Great Demon King’s seemingly insane emotional state.

What’s wrong with this guy?

Is he... having a fit?

Xu Xiaoshou gasped for air.

“Can’t go out, can’t go out.”

“What can I do?”

“At most, I can release Ah Jie, then watch Ah Jie get maimed, killed, and consequently expose my identity.”

“Finally, I’d be beaten to death by the furious and ashamed Storyteller and the Red Coats.”

“What can I do?”

“I have a ‘Passive Fist’ technique that can blow me into serious injury, leaving me with half a body to beg for mercy on the battlefield, ‘Don’t kill me’?”

“What can I do...”

Xu Xiaoshou mumbled to himself, answering his own question: “I can’t do anything at all!”

“If I go out now, it’s a dead end!”

“But...”

He watched Jiao Tangtang unhesitatingly swallow the Ghost Beast Orb, knowing its consequences, and fight wholeheartedly for Xin Gugu.

“What about me?”

Xu Xiaoshou’s mind went blank.

A thought suddenly surfaced in his mind.

Hiding like this underground, even if he survived until the end...

What would he be living for?

“For himself?”

“For selfishness?”

Xu Xiaoshou clutched his chest, a hint of confusion appearing in his bloodshot eyes.

The old him, perhaps, truly only lived for himself.

No one, after having their life ended by illness and then coincidentally gaining another, could truly say they live for the world.

Xu Xiaoshou couldn’t either.

The Wind Cloud Hegemony, the rainy night assassination, the Inner Yard’s Heavenly Xuan Gate, the City Lord’s Mansion framing Zhang Taiying as a Ghost Beast...

When was it that Xu Xiaoshou didn't live for himself?

But along the way, he realized he had changed.

Everyone grows.

No one can truly live ‘just’ for themselves!

But then!

The moment the black hole shredded Xin Gugu and blood rained down from the sky...

The scene that flashed before Xu Xiaoshou’s eyes was the first meeting of two people who should have had no connection.

At the entrance of the Duojin Commerce, that guy was hiding behind Jiao Tangtang.

He forgot if there was any dialogue with him.

Probably, it was just a few sharp exchanges, a role like a passerby whom no one would remember.

But why were these scenes...

Xu Xiaoshou cradled his head, lowering it to hide his face.

Even so, the images continued to play out before his eyes.

After he fainted under Red Dog’s attack, the first person he saw upon waking was the one drooling on his bed.

In the night raid on Zhang Manor, the one who always charged to the front lines.

Under Zhang Taiying’s illusion in the City Lord’s Mansion, the one who silently transformed into a Ghost Beast and stepped forward...

“Xin Gugu, what was he living for?”

“Also for himself?”

Xu Xiaoshou let out a low, sarcastic chuckle.

He felt this answer was absurd.

Any clear-headed person could see it was completely illogical.

Suddenly, a scene flashed before him: Xin Gugu holding a gold card when he bought the large manor in Tiansang City, with a hint of envy in his eyes.

“If possible, leave a room...”

Inside the underground pit, the surrounding mud and rocks suddenly exploded with a dull thud, then were suppressed by an unknown pressure, embedding themselves firmly into the mud layer.

Xu Xiaoshou’s eyes suddenly welled up with tears.

He didn’t understand what Xin Gugu was living for, or why he fought so desperately.

Such a question...

Perhaps even that guy didn’t know!

But suddenly, for a moment, he could empathize.

“If there were no brutal Ghost Beasts, there would be no Red Coats who enjoy genocide.”

“And if there were no brutal Red Coats, these Ghost Beasts, who originally didn’t know what they lived for, wouldn’t have to fight for hatred.”

“If only...”

There is no ‘if only’!

Xu Xiaoshou’s thoughts suddenly halted.

Reality was just that cruel.

‘If only’... would never exist.

Yet, the vicious cycle of cause and effect persisted everywhere!

People aren’t fools.

Everyone knew they were already deeply ensnared in a game; the more they struggled, the tighter they would be bound by external forces.

But not to struggle was death.

Under actions driven by such negative consequences, what one lived for, did it even matter?

Just being alive was good enough.

“But that’s wrong!”

“This kind of world, it’s distorted, isn’t it?”

Xu Xiaoshou suddenly understood everything he craved and sought.

It wasn’t a complex ‘what to live for,’ but simply two pure words: Freedom!

Like a caged bird longing to escape, a pond fish trying to leap into the air, a mountain tiger wanting to leave the forest...

Freedom needs no reason.

But while freedom sounds simple, every step towards it is met with restrictions.

In a trapped beast’s struggle, how does one break out of the cage?

When everything about one’s destiny is neatly arranged, and everyone is like a pawn, rook, or knight assigned rules from birth, how easy is freedom?

Thump.

Xu Xiaoshou collapsed to the ground, letting the mud above him bury him.

He understood that what he had always fought against, rejected, and pursued... was nothing other than freedom!

Night Watchmen, Holy Slaves, including Ghost Beasts...

Every influential figure, every major power that had extended an olive branch to him, their approval seemed to say, “You, Xu Xiaoshou, are the strongest, the most promising; join us!”

But what then?

“I can’t do anything!”

Xin Gugu, Jiao Tangtang...

Under the Storyteller’s immense pressure, one by one, beings he could almost call friends, he could only watch them perish before his eyes.

Xu Xiaoshou, who had witnessed everything... was powerless!

What use was potential?

Everyone knew that if Xu Xiaoshou went out now...

...he’d accomplish nothing but throwing his life away.

But just because of that, should he choose to continue hiding and survive?

“Living...”

“Heh heh!”

Xu Xiaoshou gave a self-mocking laugh.

The surrounding mud was clearly held back by his spiritual energy, creating a spherical survival space.

But at this moment, large clumps of mud and rock still fell, as if from a minor earthquake.

Xu Xiaoshou felt as if even the earth was mocking him.

He lowered his head, looked at the Chicken Sword, which he had clutched out of shape, and loosened his grip.

“Sorry, I forgot about you.”

Little Chicken Xu desperately ‘woo-wooed,’ seemingly trying to make a sound, but its sword body trembled wildly, unable to speak.

Xu Xiaoshou chuckled at the info panel.

He knew Little Chicken Xu was afraid of him, but he never expected it to be this terrified.

Was it really necessary?

“Little Chicken...”

“I remember, I think I gave you your name, didn’t I?”

Xu Xiaoshou felt like he was watching a movie; before him suddenly appeared the amusing scene outside the City Lord’s Mansion where this guy desperately called him ‘Brother.’

“Woo-woo, woo-woo.”

Large chunks of mud shook loose and fell.

The ground trembled slightly, and fine cracks appeared.

“Request received, Passive Point, 1.”

“Not speaking?”

Xu Xiaoshou glanced at the info panel again. Request?

He let out a bitter laugh, stood the Chicken Sword upright, and plunged it into the ground.

“Whap!”

But the Chicken Sword, like a bent straw, simply flopped flat onto the ground with a smack.

“Gone limp?”

“Am I that terrifying?”

Xu Xiaoshou paused, as if realizing something, and said, “Don’t be afraid. I had a plan earlier, and you probably figured it out: the Storyteller and I had the exact same idea.”

Little Chicken Xu’s transformation into the Have-Four-Sword was too realistic, just like a true Have-Four-Sword.

As long as the battle reached a crucial point, when everyone unleashed their full power and wouldn’t borrow the extra power of the Have-Four-Sword...

...the Storyteller would give the Have-Four-Sword to him, and after the swap, absolutely no one would notice.

But...

Xu Xiaoshou mumbled to himself, sighing.

“But living like this, it’s truly meaningless.”

“You’ve been with me for so long; as for pulling off such a grand deception, it’s best just to dream about it.”

“Now...”

Xu Xiaoshou looked up at the tragic scene within the battle, “I truly can’t bring myself to do something like that anymore.”

“Don’t you agree?”

“Woo-woo, woo-woo...”

“Request received, Passive Point, 1.”

“Nonsense!”

Xu Xiaoshou rolled his eyes and gripped the Chicken Sword again.

“Turn into a straw hat.”

“Woo-woo...”

Couldn’t transform.

Little Chicken Xu was almost in tears.

What was going on?

Why did this tiny pit feel as if it were imbued with hundreds of times the normal gravity?

I can’t even stand, how can I turn into a straw hat for you?

“Then forget it.”

Xu Xiaoshou gripped the Chicken Sword tightly and suddenly looked up.

Images flashed before his eyes, as if disordered time and space had been restored, and his murmuring soul returned to his body.

“Second Brother, catch the sword!”

In a flash, within the battle, the Storyteller’s unrestrained voice finally reached him.

At the same time.

And there was the menacing sword, flying through the air, pursued by the gazes of numerous Red Coats!

With a single glance, Xu Xiaoshou cleared his confusion, burst out of the ground, and gripped the Have-Four-Sword.

There was no spiritual energy barrier.

No other qualms remained.

To grasp.

It was truly grasped!

The suppressed emotions, entirely confined within the underground pit, burst forth like a dam breaking when they saw the light of day, surging out and spreading wide.

“Freedom...”

Xu Xiaoshou’s body trembled as he took a deep breath, inhaling the dusty air filled with battle remnants.

Unlike the darkness underground.

Unlike that cramped, narrow space.

The sky, flight—that was the simplest freedom everyone yearned for.

The hidden observation from the darkness had lasted too long.

So long that Xu Xiaoshou had grown numb to himself, singularly focused only on ‘surviving’.

Yet he clearly knew.

If he truly ‘latched onto a strong leg’ and left the Ancient Book Space, how would he escape?

There was no way!

Any strategy that ignored consequences was merely self-deception born from fear of the unknown.

If he could survive, he could live.

If not, then that was his fate!

Then, after the silence of darkness, he should, like the free Cheng Xingchu, bloom with his own moment of glory.

Destiny, sometimes, lies in refusal to compromise, in that glimmer of surprise or turning point that emerges amidst resistance.

“Freedom...”

The moment he grasped the Have-Four-Sword, Xu Xiaoshou suddenly realized that nothing else mattered.

This diseased world wasn’t worth too much thought.

When everyone was fighting for the peak, if he was powerless, then he would grasp the Have-Four-Sword and stand at the peak!

Rumble——

The ‘Swallowing Mountains and Rivers’ he had been channeling throughout the entire battle – Xu Xiaoshou dared not speak of its true power.

The large black hole above the Lijian Grassland had already repaired itself; space had originally returned to normal with the ceasefire between the Storyteller and the Red Dual-headed Dragon-Python.

But the instant Xu Xiaoshou’s aura erupted, space collapsed again for several miles around, and the earth was once more destroyed.

Black holes spread, and Dao mechanisms fell into disarray.

This small Ancient Book Space had already endured too much damage.

Now, it seemed even more as if it would completely shatter; mountains and rivers changed color, and the sky turned dark.

“Freedom...”

Xu Xiaoshou murmured, demonic patterns coiled around his body, and the Have-Four-Sword tilted diagonally in the air.

“Fight! No reason needed!”