Moments earlier, within the Void.
Ignoring the words of Weisasi beside her, Bai Qiuyin watched the gaping maw about to swallow her head whole. Her gaze sharpened, and the longsword in her hand slashed out swiftly, cleaving into that enormous mouth.
She had thought that even if this strike couldn’t kill it, it should at least deal some damage.
But to Bai Qiuyin’s surprise, even when her longsword slashed against Zoa Sagg’s mouth, it caused no harm at all. All it achieved was to stall him for a brief instant.
Though caught off guard, that brief instant of stalling was more than enough.
Bai Qiuyin shot the longsword from her hand toward the side, and in the next moment, her figure flickered and reappeared beside the sword.
This was not speed, but spatial displacement achieved through the flying sword.
The instant Bai Qiuyin vanished, the massive maw snapped shut with a grating clash of teeth.
There was no delicious flesh and blood to taste, only the nauseating Void energy to swallow. Zoa Sagg whipped his head around, his tentacled face seemingly fixing a pair of eyes on Bai Qiuyin. Even though she had dodged that bite, he was still tracking her position.
The next moment, Zoa Sagg’s form burst forward, lunging at Bai Qiuyin once again!
His speed was immense, so fast that to Bai Qiuyin’s eyes, there was barely anything but afterimages!
Fortunately, Bai Qiuyin had kept enough distance from him before, so even at that speed, she had time to react.
Zoa Sagg opened his gaping maw. She tossed out her flying sword again, her figure flickering once more to dodge, but Zoa Sagg refused to let up, as if he had locked onto her. Even after Bai Qiuyin evaded, he would charge at her again in the next instant.
After dodging Zoa Sagg once more, Bai Qiuyin frowned slightly, her peripheral vision sweeping quickly over the others’ situation.
Li Xueman was healing, or rather, sustaining the life of that cultivator who had been bitten down to only half his body.
Even for a powerful cultivator, sustaining such an injury would bring them to the brink of death. In fact, if he weren’t a cultivator, he would have died the instant Zoa Sagg clamped down on him.
On the other side, the rest were fighting Weisasi, but with Bai Qiuyin, their main force, missing, they had completely fallen into a disadvantage. Weisasi even had the leisure to explain to them what had happened to the Imperial Capital Guild President.
“Then he helped me complete a series of plans, a fair exchange. We hit it off immediately. I gave him immortality, and he helped me complete a series of plans, a fair exchange.”
“What you call immortality is nothing but turning him into a Vessel of the Evil God!”
The Old Monk’s fist blazed with Buddhist Light as he slammed it into Weisasi.
By now, the Old Monk had transformed into a muscular old man, his exaggerated, explosive muscles enough to put even a champion from a bodybuilding competition to shame.
Taking that punch, one capable of shattering mountains and splitting seas, the Demon Grand Duke seemed completely unfazed, merely smiling, as if mocking the Old Monk’s ignorance.
“So what if he’s a vessel? Do you think becoming a vessel doesn’t count as immortality? His self-awareness still exists. It’s just that his life is forever bound to the ‘Deity,’ allowing him to exist eternally.”
“Any ordinary person who encountered such a situation would make the same choice he did, and gladly so.”
As he spoke, Weisasi kicked the Old Monk away, glanced at Zoa Sagg chasing his prey over yonder, and said, “Do you believe it? If he were given the choice of immortality, he would make the same choice too.”
“Isn’t this the immortality he wanted?!”
He sneered at the gathered cultivators, saying, “You cultivators possess lives that could be called long. What right do you have to refuse others who pursue the same goal?”
“Is it simply because they submit to what you call an ‘Evil God’?”
“Stop twisting right and wrong here!”
The Old Monk was helped up by his companions and shouted furiously at the Demon Grand Duke: “We have never refused others their pursuits, but it can never be in a way that clings to an Evil God!”
“Seems our ideals don’t align.”
Weisasi chuckled, not bothering to continue that line of discussion, and simply kept fighting the others.
Though calling it a fight, from the perspective of Li Xueman, who was healing the cultivator with only half his body left not far away, it looked more like an adult toying with children.
She sighed inwardly. Without Bai Qiuyin, the main force, the others had very limited effect against the Demon Grand Duke.
It was a pity that her own path of practice leaned more toward support and healing, useless in a battle like this. Otherwise, she would have joined the fight herself.
Bai Qiuyin was unaware of Li Xueman’s regret. She withdrew her gaze and looked again at Zoa Sagg, who was charging toward her at full speed.
His speed was still just as fast, and even with her reflexes, she could barely track his movements.
Wherever that gaping maw, covering most of his head, passed, everything was devoured. Whether it was space as small as a bean or a large space the size of a full-grown person, everything along the way was swallowed.
Just as Weisasi had said before, this Evil God’s only instinct was to feed. Just as Weisasi had said, this Evil God refused nothing and would chase its prey.
Bai Qiuyin tossed out her longsword, and with a flicker, she appeared in the distance.
She watched Zoa Sagg speeding toward her once more, pondering a countermeasure.
If this thing only reacted to what it perceived as ‘food,’ could she seal off his perception of the outside world and eliminate that reaction?
Bai Qiuyin thought for a moment, dodged another attack from Zoa Sagg, then dismissed the idea.
Not to mention whether they even had the ability to do such a thing, the Demon Grand Duke nearby would never stand by and do nothing. So that method would be difficult to pull off.
That only left calling for help.
Bai Qiuyin turned her gaze again, but this time, she didn’t look at Zoa Sagg. Instead, she turned to a chaotic, disordered region that looked like a dazzling black, and said, “How much longer are you going to watch? Are you really planning to watch me die?”
As she expected, no response came. It was as if no one was there, and she was just a fool talking to the Void.
Seeing this, Bai Qiuyin took a deep breath, her tone turning slightly cold, and said, “Still pretending, are you? If you don’t come out now, once this incident is over, I will come find you myself. You know, I’m on good terms with several Ghost Kings of the Underworld. They’d be willing to bear the cost of my crossing over.”
The Void fell silent for a moment, then a soft, charming female voice came through, tinged with resignation, saying, “If you want to find me, just find me. No need to threaten to barge into someone’s home.”
Bai Qiuyin glanced at the enchanting woman with red hair and red eyes slowly emerging from the Void: “That’s because you refused to come out no matter what. Are you that afraid of me, Hong Lingyan?”