Yellow Skinned Taoist Master

Chapter 151: The Life-reaping Ghost Awakens

Chen Huangpi did indeed know how to deal with that paper man and the City God within this painting.

The world within the painting was the paper man Imperial Envoy's divine ability.

If one were to really calculate it, the City God was actually stronger than this paper man. It was just that he was caught off guard for a moment and fell into the trap.

Therefore, as the paper man and the City God fought each other, even if they fought until the scenery within the painting scroll was erased, fought until the sky turned dark and the earth grew dim, they would still inherently be completely helpless against that City God.

And with Chen Huangpi slashing out a single stroke.

Although the Void-Piercing Sword didn't kill this paper man and the City God.

He realized that the paper man and the City God similarly couldn't kill him, because he was now also a tiny person within the painting. Even if his body was blown apart or cracked by divine abilities or vigorous qi, all he needed to do was reach out his hand, scoop it up, and stick it back together.

What remained was nothing more than comparing sizes.

The City God was very big, and the paper man was also very big.

Therefore, wherever they passed along the way, they could erase all the surrounding scenery."Huang Er, watch closely!"

Chen Huangpi laughed loudly, sheathed the Void-Piercing Sword behind his back, and then fiercely clapped the palms of his hands together.

In the next second.

Above this massive painting scroll.

A towering Magic Tree towering into the clouds surfaced from behind Chen Huangpi.

It was the Magic Tree.

Just its thick tree trunk alone firmly occupied one-tenth of this painting scroll.

Furthermore, this was only when it had just stretched out.

Clatter, clatter...

Accompanied by the trembling of the Magic Tree's countless branches, that canopy which blotted out the sky and covered the sun instantly spread outward into the painting scroll centering around Chen Huangpi.

In the blink of an eye, one-third of the painting scroll's expanse became Chen Huangpi's territory.

The Magic Tree was inherently extraordinary to begin with, and after returning from the dead, it had become a Calamity.

It was subsequently taken into the Kidney Temple by Chen Huangpi and nourished day and night by the black smoke.

Although such a short amount of time was insufficient for it to become a Misfortune.

The Magic Tree's vicious flames surged monstrously to the heavens.

Its vitality was even more tenacious to an outrageous degree.

Naturally, it could clash head-on with the City God and the paper man within this painting scroll.

Chen Huangpi drove the Magic Tree, pointed at that paper man and the City God, and said, "I'll leave that dog hole for you to drill through. Although I am not a human, I am also not a dog. How could I walk through a dog hole?"

How could the City God and the paper man possibly reply to Chen Huangpi?

In their eyes, Chen Huangpi, without wearing the Life-reaping Ghost's skin, was clearly a human.

Evil spirits didn't need to reason with humans.

The paper man and the City God, these two evil spirits bordering on Misfortunes, cast aside their mutual slaughter without even thinking, and joined forces to charge towards Chen Huangpi without the slightest hesitation.

The world within the painting was the paper man's divine ability.

As this paper man merely waved its two hands, a dark clump of ominous clouds appeared within the painting, looking as if they had just been painted on.

Within those ominous clouds, thunder and lightning were brewing.

With a cracking sound.

A long, narrow zigzag bolt of lightning instantly boomed onto the canopy of the Magic Tree.

Along with it, the earth beneath Chen Huangpi's feet began collapsing.

Water, fire, wind, and lightning all took their turns joining the fray.

Then there was also that City God.

The City God was even more ferocious. The gray fog surrounding its every movement, which could confound space, spread towards Chen Huangpi like a flood gate being opened to release water.

"Two against one, you are shameless!"

Chen Huangpi said, boiling with anger, "Paper man, the City God wants to kill you. Wouldn't it be better if you and I joined forces to deal with him?"

The paper man remained silent without uttering a single word.

It just silently mobilized this world within the painting, using every possible method to target Chen Huangpi.

The Magic Tree was a tree.

Without soil, how could it take root?

Without water, how could it be nourished?

Moreover, there was wind ravaging its branches.

There was fire scorching its canopy.

And there was lightning aiming to extinguish its vitality.

Chen Huangpi's complexion was pale.

He couldn't help but mutter, "Is this the reasoning written in books, that when a person acts too arrogantly, heaven will naturally punish them?"

"But I am not a person? On what basis is it punishing me?"

Saying so, Chen Huangpi looked back at the City God and persuaded earnestly with good intentions, "Lord City God, this paper man caused you to become an evil spirit, and then pulled you into its divine ability. I can't stand to watch it."

"How about you and I join forces to destroy this paper man first?"

"Become one with me, merge with me!"

The City God grinned crazily, and that endless gray fog had already spread to right in front of Chen Huangpi.

The gray fog possessed the trait of confounding space.

If one were tainted by it, they truly wouldn't be able to get out.

Fortunately.

Chen Huangpi was not without other methods.

He put his fingers together into a sword gesture.

The countless branches of the Magic Tree simultaneously slashed out streaks of sword qi.

Those streaks of sword qi converged into a wall.

Within this painting, it acted like a natural chasm. The fog was blocked by that wall and could only spread towards both sides.

At the same time.

That paper man suddenly erupted, stretching out a hand to point at that wall.

Rumble...

A bridge suddenly appeared above the wall.

The fog then followed that bridge to cross over the wall.

Chen Huangpi repeatedly employed his methods, and the paper man did the same.

On the contrary, the coordination between that City God and this paper man grew increasingly seamless and intimate.

The situation also presented a lopsided posture.

The brass oil lamp said despairingly, "Chen Huangpi, originally we could have discreetly drilled through the dog hole and escaped, yet you insisted on flaunting your prowess against them. Now that we've been caught red-handed by them, we don't even have a dog hole to drill through anymore."

Chen Huangpi bit the bullet and said, "Drilling dog holes stunts your growth; I want to be a great man."

Though he said this.

He also knew that if he continued staying in this painting, he definitely wouldn't be a match for the paper man and the City God.

These two evil spirits didn't possess a shred of a sense of shame.

Chen Huangpi couldn't outplay them.

Therefore, Chen Huangpi fought while retreating towards the area where that dog hole was located.

"Didn't you say drilling dog holes stunts your growth and that you want to be a great man?"

"A great man knows when to yield and when to stand tall."

Chen Huangpi stiffened his neck and said, "Furthermore, I'm not the only one drilling through this dog hole. If those fat and thin cultivators can drill through it, why can't I, Chen Huangpi, drill through it?"

Hearing these words, the brass oil lamp mocked, "Can two petty thieves who are greedy for life and afraid of death be compared on the same terms with you?"

"Huang Er, I forbid you from slandering them." Chen Huangpi said without blushing or his heart skipping a beat, "They are also great men just like me."

But right at this moment.

A sinisterly cold, familiar voice, as if having just awakened from a long dream, sounded.

"Contract Master, Huang Er, where have we arrived?"

The Life-reaping Ghost said blankly, "This place doesn't seem to be the Pure Immortal Temple, right? Don't tell me we are still in the Underworld Yellow Spring and haven't gotten out?"

"A Gui! You're awake!"

Chen Huangpi was overjoyed beyond expectations, "We left the Underworld Yellow Spring a long time ago. Right now, we are in Xuzhou City. I was just about to drill through a dog hole with Huang Er."

"Xuzhou City, drill through a dog hole?"

The Life-reaping Ghost's tone was extremely astonished.

Ever since it forcefully merged into another copy of the Soul-Hooking Manual in the Underworld Yellow Spring, combining it as one with Chen Huangpi's copy, it was left with only a single breath; one could say its divine soul had completely broken down.

Therefore, it had been sleeping inside the Soul-Hooking Manual the entire time.

It wasn't until after Chen Huangpi entered the city and killed many cultivators, whose souls entered the Soul-Hooking Manual, that the Life-reaping Ghost instinctively devoured them, managing to awaken perfectly right at this moment.

Only, upon waking up.

These words from Chen Huangpi suddenly gave it an extremely ominous premonition.

Spreading its mind out past the Soul-Hooking Manual.

The Life-reaping Ghost merely took a single glance at the scene outside before being thoroughly stupefied.

"A City God about to transform into a Misfortune, and a paper man bordering on a Misfortune..."

"Contract Master, I must still be dreaming, right?"

Chen Huangpi bit his finger and then said, "It hurts a lot. You are not dreaming."

"Hahahaha..."

The Life-reaping Ghost laughed in release.

And then, it roared furiously, "Huang Er! Is this how you look after the Contract Master?"

"You think I wanted this?"

The brass oil lamp said despairingly, "Earlier in the Old Temple, he even provoked a Chi Xie that was far more terrifying than these two things. If there wasn't something wrong with that Chi Xie's brain, Chen Huangpi would have been done to death long ago."

"The situation right now is already considered good."

"..."

The Life-reaping Ghost was left speechless, choking on its words.

As the saying goes, comparing goods makes you want to throw yours away, and comparing people makes you want to die.

Although this situation was dangerous, if one genuinely compared it, it could indeed be considered good.

At the very least, Chen Huangpi was still alive.

But the moment this thought popped up.

A wave of ripples instantly surged through the world within the painting.

As if an earth dragon had rolled over.

The Magic Tree beneath Chen Huangpi trembled, unable to maintain its stability anymore.

The paper man stepped on the gray fog, aimed a single finger at the sky, and ruthlessly drew a stroke towards the Magic Tree.

This stroke descended from the heavens, and everywhere it passed was split entirely into two halves.

The Magic Tree was no exception.

Fortunately, Chen Huangpi was standing on the other side of the Magic Tree and wasn't slashed apart.

The branches of the Magic Tree squirmed, intertwined with each other, and were about to close up immediately.

But right at this moment.

That City God descended from the sky.

The paper man had drawn countless stairways leading up to the heavens for him.

Consequently, the City God remained hidden within the gray fog and approached the top of Chen Huangpi's head without making a single sound. As he charged down from above right now, he carried a hair-raising momentum like Mount Tai crushing an egg, seeking to thoroughly swallow Chen Huangpi whole.

This unexpected shift occurred too abruptly.

Chen Huangpi gritted his teeth and simply retracted the Dharma Image of the Magic Tree back.

This Magic Tree was transformed by his power. It wasn't the true body within the Kidney Temple, so it could come and go quickly.

In the next second.

Chen Huangpi gripped the Void-Piercing Sword in his hand.

Whether it was the power squeezed out from the Magic Tree by his Kidney Temple, or the quintessence qi continuing to forge his Liver Temple, all of it was mobilized by him at this moment, pouring into the Void-Piercing Sword along a bizarre route.

The Calamity Eye whimpered miserably.

The sword blade trembled, and even the scabbard was unable to conceal the absolute extremity of the resplendent sword light.

This sword strike was accumulating momentum, waiting to be unleashed.

It was the strongest sword strike Chen Huangpi could execute.

However, before this sword could be slashed out.

The Life-reaping Ghost abruptly opened its mouth and said, "Wait, Contract Master. This City God isn't charging toward you."

"What?"

Before Chen Huangpi could even process it.

He saw that City God, who was originally above his head and intending to kill him, suddenly vanished without a trace.

Furthermore, in the instant before he fully vanished.

The paper man, stepping on the gray fog—who had just been cooperating with the City God flawlessly and assisting each other—suddenly realized something was gravely wrong and fiercely fled upwards.

Though it was stepping on the gray fog.

The two of them hadn't come into any contact.

Yet at this moment.

A gigantic pair of arms drilled out from the gray fog beneath its feet, grabbing the paper man in a single grasp.

Upon the City God's purplish-black body, endlessly many ashen human faces were squirming and roaming about.

At this moment, all of those ashen human faces acted like a disturbed swarm of insects, instantly crawling all over the paper man's body. Every single ashen human face was spewing gray fog.

Upon slight contact between the gray fog and the paper man, corrosive fizzing and sizzling sounds rang out.

The paper man struggled frantically.

It realized what this City God was attempting to do.

He wanted to make it a part of himself.

Even if he killed Chen Huangpi, the City God might not necessarily be able to devour him, because this was the world within the painting; the one most likely to succeed was actually the paper man.

But if he ate the paper man first.

Would that Chen Huangpi still be able to escape?

This scene played out too quickly.

It was so fast that even though the paper man was somewhat on guard, it still couldn't withstand this City God's ironclad determination to devour it.

Accompanied by a series of wails and a series of chewing sounds.

This painting scroll was entirely occupied by the gray fog.

Followingly, a pair of evil and greedy eyes unscrupulously radiated outward from within this gray fog.

The entire painting scroll was shrinking unceasingly.

The City God had succeeded; he had successfully devoured the paper man.

Furthermore, he even gained the paper man's divine ability.

At hand, Chen Huangpi was the only one left.

Only, by the time the City God went searching for Chen Huangpi, it abruptly discovered that Chen Huangpi's figure was nowhere to be found within the entire painting scroll; he had long since taken advantage of the time it took to devour the paper man to escape through the dog hole.