Chapter 19: End of the Story

After Xie Tianshu's Jiao-like aberration, his body's defenses became incredibly strong, and he quickly got back on his feet.

However, his body was numb, and his muscles ached and felt weak.

"Whoosh!"

Not giving him time to fully recover, Li Weiyi was already upon him.

A yellow sword light streaked through the air, slashing towards his abdomen.

Xie Tianshu instinctively swung his claw to block.

"Rip!"

The sword, with an unstoppable force, severed his scaled claw and left a deep wound on his abdomen.

Blood gushed out uncontrollably.

"Ah..."

Trembling in pain, terror, and confusion, Xie Tianshu retreated quickly, letting out a sharp shriek.

This agony surpassed the pain of his right arm being severed earlier, filled with despair. Despite his immense strength and transformation into an incredibly powerful demon, he had still suffered a crushing defeat.

Just moments ago, the sword in Li Weiyi's hand couldn't even penetrate his black scales.

Why had it suddenly become so incredibly sharp?

His claw was severed as if cutting through tofu.

He would never know that the Yellow Dragon Sword, when empowered by the scorching hot energy, was a completely different weapon from its normal state.

Because his strange, uneven head had already been severed by Li Weiyi.

"Thud!"

The head hit the ground, and the body collapsed.

Suddenly, the entire world seemed to fall silent.

Li Weiyi watched the thick blood continuously pouring from the neck of the headless giant corpse on the ground. He then looked around at the bloody scene of carnage, where only Zhao Meng and Chen Hong, with their severed legs, still lay.

The other expedition members had long since fled after Xie Tianshu's Jiao-like transformation, watching timidly from a distance.

It was unclear if they feared him or the numerous corpses littering the ground.

This gory scene was terrifying to those who had never experienced slaughter! All their nightmares combined from childhood to adulthood could not compare to this.

Gradually, the murderous intent ignited by resentment and rage within Li Weiyi dissipated, as if all his strength had suddenly been drained. His blood-soaked hands trembled uncontrollably, and he could barely hold the Yellow Dragon Sword.

A wave of nausea and physical discomfort, as if his stomach wanted to empty itself, washed over him.

This was his first time killing, and he had killed so many.

The internal impact on him was greater than when he first fell into the bronze battleship.

Li Weiyi's heartbeat was like a rapid drumbeat. His mind was sometimes blank, sometimes blood-red, as he absently sat on Xie Tianshu's corpse's chest. His eyes met Xie Tianshu's head on the ground, though his pupils were not focused at all.

Qi Shanshan walked up to him, squatted down, tugged at his sleeve, and gently called, "Weiyi, Weiyi, don't scare Sister Shanshan. What's wrong with you...?"

"Weiyi... It's me, Sister Shanshan..."

Li Weiyi's emotions recovered. He slowly exhaled a turbid breath, then performed the Jade Void Breathing Technique. His eyes gradually regained their focus as he looked at Qi Shanshan's beautiful and delicate face, close before him: "I'm fine, it's just for a moment..."

"Don't say anything else!"

Qi Shanshan held a finger to Li Weiyi's lips, a gesture of excessive intimacy, and gently comforted him, "We know they deserved their deaths. Don't carry any psychological burden."

Li Weiyi felt that Dr. Qi's behavior was very unusual, even somewhat lacking boundaries; she had never been like this with him before. In the past, she used to refer to him and Gao Huan as "Heaven-impaired and Earth-deficient."

Soon, more and more expedition members gathered around, all concerned about Li Weiyi's safety.

They weren't afraid of Li Weiyi; they were only afraid of Xie Tianshu, which was why they had hidden at a distance.

What if he had killed people?

Li Weiyi had risked his life to act because he was saving them.

In times of national crisis, heroes are revered; in moments of personal danger, deities are prayed to.

Li Weiyi was certainly no deity, but he was the one who led them out of darkness during their most dangerous and helpless moment.

Unaccustomed to being surrounded by so many people showing respect, awe, flattery, and subservience, Li Weiyi quickly got up and fled, as if escaping, to check on his senior brother's injuries.

Qi Shanshan, wearing her doctor's uniform, followed him like a shadow, a faint scent accompanying her, staying close by his side.

It was as if she had decided to stick by him.

Zhao Meng had been carried into the medical tent and lay flat on the medical bed. He had already fainted from pain, his face as pale as gold leaf, his breath barely perceptible.

"Senior brother, senior brother..."

Li Weiyi's fingers gently touched Zhao Meng's swollen, purplish-red legs. At the knees, exposed bone was visible in the wounds. His shoulder injury was just as bad, with severely dislocated bones, a truly horrifying sight.

He quickly looked at Qi Shanshan and pleaded, "Dr. Qi, please save my senior brother."

"Leave this to me for now!"

Then, as if remembering something, Qi Shanshan added, "Weiyi, Sister Shanshan knows you're only concerned about your senior brother's safety right now, but you must first collect those immortal artifacts. They are rightfully yours. Don't let those who did nothing take them. Otherwise, they might eventually presume to have extraordinary power and become the next Xie Tianshu, the next Kong Fan."

Old Liu and the other loyal members who followed Zhao Meng, gathered around the medical bed, all nodded vigorously. Now, they looked to Li Weiyi as their leader.

They felt that Dr. Qi was truly remarkable. She always knew what needed to be done immediately and could foresee what might happen in the future. This required extreme rationality and calmness!

As for them, they had not yet fully recovered from the terror of the recent upheaval.

Two female researchers were left in the medical tent to assist Qi Shanshan.

Old Liu and the others stepped out of the medical tent and immediately began punching and kicking Chen Hong, who lay heavily wounded on the ground, to vent their inner rage.

The soft armor, the "corpse-garment," originally belonging to Zhao Meng, was naturally stripped from Chen Hong's body and given to Li Weiyi for safekeeping.

Li Weiyi noticed that after this battle, everyone was extremely respectful towards him, a level of deference even Captain Gao had never received. He didn't even have to lift a finger; people voluntarily removed the silver-thread gloves, scripture belt, and dragon-patterned thumb ring from the corpses and brought them to him.

Three expedition members even carried the ten-foot-long black spear outside the medical tent and placed it at his feet.

Li Weiyi was truly dumbfounded, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Was he being "enthroned" now?

A research team leader even instructed Qin Ke to stay by Li Weiyi's side and do whatever she could to help.

"Brother Weiyi... just call me Keke."

Qin Ke was Professor Xu's student and a classmate of Gao Huan.

Among the expedition team, besides Cai Yutong and Qi Shanshan, she and Liu Ying were the youngest and most attractive. However, she was very timid; she didn't dare to keep the shotgun she was given, throwing it directly into the sea.

Li Weiyi found the Dao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish, very close to Han Qin's corpse.

After wiping the Dao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish clean, he put it back around his neck. He then squatted down to examine Han Qin's head. Where he had been struck by the Dao Ancestor Tai Chi Fish, his skull was fractured, and a hematoma was bulging.

He was no longer breathing.

"To be able to kill someone from thirty meters away... It seems I should keep some pebbles, metal shards, or throwing knives on me from now on. They could perfectly replicate a handgun."

With his current strength, the most crucial factor for killing someone with a pebble would actually be accuracy.

And with his eyes nourished by the scorching hot energy, his vision was extraordinary. Coupled with the flying needle technique he had learned in his sect, accuracy would be no problem at all.

Xie Tianshu, Chen Hong, Kong Fan, and even the security team members were all too weak. That's why Li Weiyi's long-range sword throws often succeeded. However, against a true master, casually throwing or abandoning his sword would be a grave mistake.

Director Yang lay curled on his side on the ground, his body shriveled like a bag of bones due to massive blood loss.

His hair had turned completely white, and his eyes were murky and lifeless, clearly a man on the verge of death.

He saw Li Weiyi walk up to him.

Using his last breath, he clutched Li Weiyi's pant leg tightly, straining his neck, and struggled to lift his head, as if trying to say something.

Li Weiyi helped him sit up. Seeing his miserable state, Li Weiyi was filled with emotion. In just seven days, how had he become like this? It truly felt as if an eternity had passed.

Director Yang clutched Li Weiyi's wrist tightly, his voice hoarse with pleading: "Go back to Earth... go back quickly. You must take the Buddha's sarira to Ganlu Temple's underground palace as soon as possible... you must... otherwise..."

The strength in his fingers vanished, and he passed away.

"What does he mean? Why go to Ganlu Temple's underground palace...?" Li Weiyi checked his pulse; he had stopped breathing. He gently lowered Director Yang back to the ground.

Qin Ke, standing nearby, said, "It is said that the Buddha's sarira was found in Ganlu Temple's underground palace."

Li Weiyi believed Director Yang's insistence on retrieving the Buddha's sarira and his fervent desire to return to Earth might be related to this. So, he went to question the two researchers from Lab 705 who had been subdued and tied up.

However, the two of them knew very little and were not aware of the situation at Ganlu Temple's underground palace.

Returning to Earth now was completely beyond their control, so Li Weiyi had to temporarily set this matter aside. There were many more important things on the ship.

The Ghost Bear Emperor at the stern of the ship, and the White Bone Demon from the grave mound.

They were far more dangerous than Xie Tianshu, Kong Fan, Director Yang, and the others!

Moreover, there were still many unanswered questions about this disturbance.

Gao Huan and Old Liu, along with over twenty young and strong expedition members, armed with various weapons such as protective shields, tasers, rebar, and cleavers, entered the eerie mist to search for the escaped Xie Jin and his four companions.

Li Weiyi entered the medical tent just as Qi Shanshan finished performing basic disinfection, hemostasis, bandaging, and orthopedic fixation on Zhao Meng's wounds and bones.

But Zhao Meng's eyes remained tightly closed, his face deathly pale, and he had not woken up.

Li Weiyi looked at the fine beads of sweat on Qi Shanshan's forehead and said, "You've worked hard..."

"Take off your clothes."

Li Weiyi was stunned.

Qi Shanshan turned around, speaking with a mix of reproach and concern: "Are you only worried about your senior brother's injuries? You're injured yourself but haven't said a word. Are all you men so chauvinistic?"

"They're just minor injuries; it's nothing."

Li Weiyi's injuries were on his left shoulder and right wrist.

His left shoulder had sustained severe skin damage and carbonized clothing from a small amount of lightning released by the Black Iron Seal, and it was indeed very painful.

His right wrist had been cut by the edge of the ice coffin at the bottom of the grave mound. It had already scabbed over, but it reopened when he wielded the heavy black spear. That spear was too ponderous; even with Li Weiyi's current strength, using it was a great strain, injuring his own muscles and bones while harming others.

For Li Weiyi, who had cultivated the scorching hot energy, these injuries were indeed insignificant.

He would be mostly recovered in less than a day.

But Qi Shanshan insisted repeatedly, so Li Weiyi had no choice but to take off his clothes and let her bandage his wounds.

As Qi Shanshan bandaged his wrist, Li Weiyi observed her face and eyes and asked, "I heard that before the unrest broke out, Sister Shanshan took Sister Cai away. Where is she now?"