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Chapter 127 - 126: Tower of Flesh and Blood

Liu Shuyue’s reaction was nothing if not swift.

Realizing it was impossible to escape this collapsing area by speed alone, she immediately pulled out a Wind Riding Talisman from her bosom. As the ground began to fall, she was already walking on the wind, grabbing Jiu, who was several meters away, and soaring toward the sky.

On the other side, Fu Jiaolu also held Hua, both embracing a large tree in the yard, as the ground continued to sink downward.

Opposing them, a giant meat pillar composed of flesh, eyeballs, and countless hands protruded from the ground, resembling a newly sprouted tower.

Just a glimpse of this thing made one’s scalp tingle with fear.

And at its "tower tip" was the segment of white bone that had just confining Ji Yanshu at the center of the house.

This was no underground pitfall; Liu Shuyue finally realized that what they had seen was just the tip of the iceberg. The vast majority of it was hidden underground, which is why the Heart Method scanning was intermittent. Now it had broken through the surface, rising upwards, causing the surrounding houses and streets to collapse toward the center, filling the void left by its departure.

Its Qi still presented a scattered state, but because its body was extremely large, the total amount was astonishingly huge.

Is this a Great Demon?

No... not even close; even the Cyan Dragon Vortex couldn’t match a tenth of it!

Surrounding its base were white guts, resembling the root systems of plants. If someone fell in, the consequences were imaginable.

Liu Shuyue had no other option but to throw out a Wind Riding Talisman, "Jiu, take it to your senior brother!"

She had to focus on controlling the wind and couldn’t attend to the falling two.

Fortunately, Jiu instantly understood her intent, summoned the Thousand Thoughts Sword, and flew towards the other two with the talisman paper.

The moment Fu Jiaolu successfully caught the talisman paper, both had already fallen to a depth of forty to fifty meters underground, about to be swallowed by countless intestines.

Neither had been trained in wind riding.

However, everyone knew they didn’t have time to hesitate. The weight a Wind Rider can carry is related to their own body weight; exceeding it too much would significantly reduce effectiveness, so the talisman had to be used by Fu Jiaolu.

"Hold on tight!" he shouted, injecting Spiritual Qi into the talisman paper.

Hua clasped his senior brother’s waist tightly with both hands.

A violent wind instantly spun up from beneath their feet, wrapping around them and propelling them out at high speed!

Initially, Fu Jiaolu could maintain direction, but two seconds later, he found the wind unmanageable—the violent wind pushed him to tilt to one side, gradually turning from ascending to flying level, tracing a parabolic arc. At this rate of descent, they wouldn’t make it beyond two street widths before falling back into the deep pit beneath.

By then, Liu Shuyue had already escaped the collapsing area, placed Jiu on a temporarily safe rooftop, and turned back toward Fu Jiaolu’s direction.

The entire process took no more than ten seconds.

But there was no time left for Fu Jiaolu to wait for the Immortal Master.

Their altitude was rapidly dropping; what had been the pit’s edge they could overlook now required them to lift their heads to see. The undisturbed area appeared as a towering and insurmountable wall ahead.

"Fu Jiaolu!" Liu Shuyue shouted from overhead.

"Immortal Master Lord... I’m entrusting everything to you." Fu Jiaolu lifted Hua single-handedly, throwing her upward with all his might!

"No—!" Hua screamed.

This way, at least one could survive.

Liu Shuyue dove, barely managing to catch the tossed girl, but it was impossible to catch up to Fu Jiaolu again.

She watched helplessly as he plummeted toward the pit’s bottom.

Just then, a Qi Sword appeared out of thin air beneath Fu Jiaolu, piercing through his thigh at lightning speed! What’s more, the Qi Sword continued carrying him upward for a stretch before disappearing when its momentum fizzled. Before Fu Jiaolu could fall again, another Qi Sword shot in, striking the same spot, lifting him skyward once again!

Whose Thousand Thoughts Sword was this?

Although Jiu and Hua had learned this technique, the short duration left them far from mastering it skillfully and freely.

Yet the series of maneuvers before her were evidently and remarkably proficient, not only were the Qi Sword shapes well-conceived—thin blade tips with sword handles for carrying—but each piercing hit the same spot, minimizing additional injury!

It was just like practicing repetitively for years, without a break through all four seasons.

There was only one person capable of this—gaining the ability while simultaneously mastering all the owner’s experience and insights!

"Chen Xuan?!" Her shock turned her around, finding that familiar figure indeed standing at the pit’s edge!

"Sorry to keep you waiting, it took a bit to locate you all." Chen Xuan smiled at her, then used one final Qi Sword to bring Fu Jiaolu back to him.

"Store... Store Manager Lord!" Fu Jiaolu was momentarily stunned, then exclaimed with joy, "What brings you here?"

"Naturally, I came to find you all. You have medicine with you, don’t you? Quickly, treat yourself!" Chen Xuan ordered.

He could have opted for a less injurious method, such as summoning a cylindrical Thousand Thoughts Sword using the blade to catch them, assembling an aerial single bar apparatus for Fu Jiaolu to climb onto. However, this required the latter to be prepared; striking the sword at the moment of contact meant clutching onto the sword’s body, otherwise, he would merely be knocked away. Therefore, to play it safe, he chose to pierce himself, using the Divine Eye Technique to guide the Qi Sword, achieving swift, repeated piercing at the same spot mid-fall without causally wounding the other.

"When did you get inside?" Liu Shuyue landed with Hua, showing both joy and concern, "Those guts at the city wall didn’t harm you, did they?"

"It’s strange to say; there were no obstructions when I entered the city," Chen Xuan recalled the previous extraordinary events. "The eroding boundary was apparent, but I crossed it in one step. Upon reaching here, I realized the boundary was over a hundred meters behind, as if from a single step I crossed a hundred-meter distance."

He only now noticed it wasn’t that fewer people were escaping the city but that everyone was congested on Vermilion Bird Avenue leading to the South Gate, unable to leave, as a barrier of blood and gut blocked their path entirely. These guts demonstrated how they massacred people; aside from direct deaths from fusion absorption, there’s trampling among the crowd, and carriages rampaged through the streets. The scene was tragically unbearable.

Finding his VIP guests, however, wasn’t too difficult.

Chen Xuan expanded his LV4 Celestial Mist Skill’s perception range to maximum, filtering out ordinary people and most cultivators, focusing on the brightest light points, quickly confirming Liu Shuyue’s position. If the entire Chang’an City was a canvas of twinkling stars, she was the brightest star.

"Is this erosion?" Liu Shuyue softly sought verification.

"Yes, one hundred percent sure. Master Jiu is likely a Wanderer; he doesn’t know his peculiarity, but those from another world do."

At this point, the others soon gathered, especially the six who hadn’t gone to the dilapidated courtyard—as soon as the ground shook violently, Xu Xuanling quickly led everyone across two rows of houses, ultimately blanking any harm and bypassing the massive collapse.

"Immortal Master, we’ve found Master!" Hua eagerly announced.

"Where?" Chen Xuan seemed slightly surprised; the enemy should have been controlling the Wanderer all along.

"Atop that tower!" Jiu pointed toward the nearby Tower of Flesh and Blood. "He’s still alive!"

Chen Xuan scrutinized closely, finding indeed a figure hanging aloft there.

But they had larger troubles to solve now.

The sky had completely turned crimson, the rosy clouds swirling within nearly overflowing. At the celestial apex directly above the Tower of Flesh and Blood, a very distinct shadow loomed, seeming as though a giant being had already taken shape, poised to reveal its true form from the clouds.

Reality soon confirmed his premonition was spot on.

As all arms on the Tower of Flesh and Blood extended upwards, the clouds started dispersing, and the shadow gradually sagged downward. Every living soul in Chang’an City witnessed this horrifying spectacle: a massive membrane bubble appeared above the heavens, bordered by veins thicker than men. Inside the bubble, a murky yellow liquid churned, and through the layer, it seemed something continuously quivered within.

Chen Xuan couldn’t help but think of an amniotic sac. When the membrane ruptures and the amniotic fluid spills out, the life it nurtures will birth with cries.