CHAPTER 145: 145 - FRAGMENTS

"Shit, we’re too late!" Juechan stopped his steps, his eyes brimming with anger as he gazed at the sea of corpses piled up on the snow.

The entire guard had been massacred along with a large part of the local population.

Qingyi entered the village, his eyes scanning the surrounding massacre.

"Qingyi... I’m sensing something." Ruxue’s sweet, mature voice echoed in his head, making him stop. "I think it might be one of my fragments."

’A fragment?’ His eyes widened.

’Where exactly? We need to get it right now!’ His voice suddenly died as a thought popped into his mind.

’Ruxue, you said that demons only exist in the celestial heavens. But it’s still possible to summon them to the mortal heaven, right?’ He asked.

"Yes, but that would require a powerful vessel and an absurd amount of souls-..." Ruxue froze, finally understanding what he meant.

Her fragment in a perfect container, an item from the heavenly sky that had already been bathed in the blood of countless demons.

Apart from the container, all they needed was thousands of sacrifices.

The handsome young man gritted his teeth and raised his head.

"Can you detect the location of your fragment?"

"Yes, it’s not far away."

Qingyi turned to Juechen. "Senior brother, I have a detection skill that might allow me to see where they’ve gone. What do you say we try that?"

"Hm... I don’t think we have many better options." Juechen shook his head, drawing a smile from Qingyi.

"If you had that ability, why didn’t you use it in the very first village we passed through? What proves that you’re not leading us into a trap?" Ruhu asked in a voice laced with venom.

"The attack there wasn’t recent enough. My technique follows trails of Qi, which disappear quickly. If you don’t want us to lose this one, you’d better move quickly."

"Don’t you dare give me orders-"

"Enough!" Juechen raised his hand. "Lead the way, Qingyi. We need to move fast if we want to find anyone alive."

Qingyi just nodded, activating his lightning steps and following Ruxue’s directions.

They ran for almost an hour until Ruxue finally instructed him to stop.

"It’s below us..." Qingyi spoke, crouching down and touching the icy snow.

"Below us? I can’t detect anything-" Juechen’s words were interrupted by a deafening crash.

The ground beneath his feet shook as the snow gave way.

"Damn it, I told you it was a trap!" Ruhu shouted as the four of them were swallowed up by the snow.

"Shut the fuck up and focus on surviving this!" Qingyi growled, already fed up with Ruhu’s complaining.

The man of little beauty shut up, gritting his teeth.

Soon, they found themselves falling into an obscure cave, their bodies sinking into a lake.

"Ugh... What kind of fucking water is this?" Huntao was the first to swim to the shore, using his fire Qi to form a small flaming ball on his finger.

He regretted it the next moment, his eyes filling with terror as bile rose in his throat.

"Fuck..." Qingyi plunged an arm into the liquid, grabbing something in the depths and pulling.

It was a man with a decomposing face, emerging briefly from the water before Qingyi pushed him down again.

"That’s a fucking lake of blood!" He shouted as everyone rushed out of the lake.

"Look up," Huntao’s trembling voice echoed as he pointed to the ceiling.

There were at least a hundred corpses hanging there, a small stream of blood running down the rips in their necks and dripping onto the floor.

From how fresh they were, they were probably the abductees from the last attack.

"I very much doubt there’s anyone alive here..." Qingyi stood up on the shore of the lake, forcing firmness into his voice.

Suddenly, they heard thousands of sharp whistles cutting through the air.

They were throwing knives, each covered in putrid demonic Qi.

"DEFEND YOURSELF!" Juechen roared, realizing the danger and activating his defense skills.

"Shit..." Qingyi grunted as he activated his draconic eyes and, under his clothes, the black scales covered just enough to protect his vital organs.

The world around him slowed down and he only needed an instant to map all the knives coming towards him.

Calming his breathing, he began to swing his sword.

Each impact was powerful enough to make his arms tremble, but never enough to slow his momentum.

Even with so many knives at once and at such speed, that was only a fraction of what he needed to defend himself against his master’s attack.

The Heaven-Defying Thunder Sword turned into a brilliant blur, its thunderous lightning taking over everything around it as the sword Qi cut the knives in half.

After more than thirty seconds and hundreds of knives piling up at his feet, they finally stopped coming, the last one falling onto the pile with a metallic clang.

His breathing was panting, but not a single cut could be seen on his already blood-soaked robes.

He turned his face, looking at the other three who were not in such good condition.

They had managed to protect all their vital points, but their bodies were still covered in horrible wounds.

Fortunately, that wasn’t much for cultivators of their level.

Having suffered no damage to their meridians, they only needed a good healing pill to recover completelly.

"Ah..." A long, aged sigh echoed, followed by a high-pitched, crazed laugh.

"Look at the little gifts that came to me... bodies of such quality, with so much vitality..."

Heavy footsteps echoed and a figure appeared on the horizon, her Qi of the third stage of the Iron Body realm exploding.

It was an old woman, her body covered in hideous tumors, her hump rising more than two meters high while her long neck curled in on itself as she sniffed the air.

Qingyi couldn’t help but shudder at the sight, but it wasn’t the woman’s appearance that caused him to react.

It was what she carried in her hands: a piece of purplish silver blade, powerful and covered in thunderous patterns.