Lu Kangnian Is Captured

Meanwhile. Lu Kangnian stood suspended in the void. Though his expression remained calm, his eyes flickered incessantly with unease. Just as stray thoughts troubled his mind, a streak of blood-red light suddenly plummeted from the heavens! A terrifying coercive pressure instantly inundated the void. In a single clash, the Great Xia Sword Sect's sect-protecting grand formation shattered into pieces! The spiritual swords hovering above the seven peaks erupted in fury! Clad in a black robe, Duan Xian sneered coldly. With a casual wave of his hand, he conjured a colossal blood-colored palm, crushing every last spiritual sword to dust. "Petty parlor tricks." A glint of cold resolve flashed in Lu Kangnian's eyes. Raising his hand, he drew his sword and slashed out violently! "Mountain-Cleaving Wild Slash!" A vast, earthy-yellow sword radiance surged from the ground without warning, fast as lightning. Yet in the eyes of Duan Xian, a cultivator of the Tribulation Transcendence realm, such an attack was nothing more than a mantis trying to stop a chariot. Duan Xian merely lifted a finger, and a beam of blood-red light pierced clean through the oncoming sword radiance. With unstoppable momentum, the bloody beam punched straight through Lu Kangnian's shoulder. Power flooded his entire body, causing him to instantly stiffen! His pupils trembled. Lu Kangnian realized in terror that he had completely lost control of his body in that single instant! Duan Xian chuckled coldly. "A mayfly attempting to shake a giant tree, utterly blind to its own folly." His form dissolved into a river of blood, instantly swallowing Lu Kangnian whole! Yet the very moment the river of blood engulfed him, a sharp gleam flashed through Lu Kangnian's eyes! Inside the blood-colored domain, bloody welts split across Lu Kangnian's skin as blood-red rays bound him tight. The ropes formed of surging blood contracted relentlessly, and soon, Lu Kangnian's bones began to groan under the unbearable strain. Finally, sickening snaps rang out one after another. Lu Kangnian's eyes became bloodshot as all four of his limbs were broken, leaving him collapsed on the ground! Buzz! A mysterious spatial ripple spread. His stature as short and stunted as a dwarf, Duan Xian appeared before Lu Kangnian in his black robe. Looking down at Lu Kangnian on the ground, cold glints danced in Duan Xian's eyes. Ever since his own limbs had been broken back then, he had crawled on his belly across the earth for years on end. Because of that, even when he later chanced upon an inheritance, his body could never be restored. Duan Xian slowly pulled off the black robe covering him. A grotesque, deformed body was laid bare! The bones of his four limbs had grown out of alignment, stretching his skin tight over crooked skeletal ridges. Just a single glance at those twisted arms and legs sent a chill running down the spine. His hunched back was also the result of a broken spine. In those years, he had been only in his teens, right when his body was still growing. Yet the Great Xia Sword Sect's disciplinary punishment had been brutal, causing his spine to heal crookedly. He had once considered possessing someone else's body. However, he could not bear to part with his blood fiend spiritual root, and thus he had ended up in this wretched shape. He grabbed Lu Kangnian's head, forcing him to get a better look at him. "Sect Master Lu, does opening the sect treasury still rely on the sect master token?" Lu Kangnian stared at the man before him, momentarily speechless. This man with such a ruined, battered body possessed a handsome, dashing face that seemed meant for someone tall and imposing. Such contradiction and injustice gathered within a single person felt thoroughly discordant. This was precisely why Duan Xian harbored such deep-seated hatred toward the Great Xia Sword Sect! He hated it! He hated this sect's rules and discipline! Duan Xian asked in a chilling tone, "Come, tell me—what is the Great Xia Sword Sect's creed?!" As he spoke, the man drew out the suppressing power lingering within Lu Kangnian's body, finally allowing him to speak. A flicker of agony crossed Lu Kangnian's eyes. His origin spirit was now imprisoned, rendering him unable to muster even a sliver of power. Yet his eyes glared unwaveringly at the man as he slowly recited the Great Xia Sword Sect's creed: "The sword in hand points not at the weak; the sword in heart fears no mighty foe! "Right the wrongs under heaven; slay those under heaven who deserve to die!" Hearing Lu Kangnian's words, Duan Xian instantly fell into a raving frenzy! He gripped Lu Kangnian's head and slammed it violently against the ground! Thud! "The sword points not at the weak?!" Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud! "Slay those under heaven who deserve to die?!" "Hahahahaha!" Again and again! The bluestone pavers of the ground were smashed to pieces, pounded into a deep crater. Duan Xian hauled Lu Kangnian's head back up. By now, Lu Kangnian's face was drenched in blood, his nose caved in, his flesh lacerated and mangled beyond recognition. Breathing heavily like an ox, Duan Xian panted as he glared at Lu Kangnian. He caressed Lu Kangnian's cheek with his right hand, then hooked his right thumb over Lu Kangnian's eye socket and pressed down firmly! Squelch! "Aaaargh!" Lu Kangnian's left eye was gouged out and popped, the thumb plunging directly into the socket! Duan Xian slowly rose, dragging Lu Kangnian forward by nothing more than his thumb hooked inside the eye socket. Limp as a dead dog, Lu Kangnian let out agonized groans. Excruciating torment washed over him, causing his whole body to shudder uncontrollably, while even the man's voice beside him seemed to grow faint and distant. "They were merely mortal ants! If they died, they died! "Why did you all have to cling to it so relentlessly?! "The sect creed? Heh... Now I am also one who deserves to die—so come and kill me!" The man's frantic roars echoed, but Lu Kangnian could only catch broken fragments of his words. Sneering, Duan Xian brought Lu Kangnian to the edge of the blood pool. Within the pool, many of the imprisoned disciples whose consciousnesses were drifting caught sight of Lu Kangnian in this horrific state. Instantly, expressions of anguish and fury twisted the faces of many disciples. With his remaining eye, Lu Kangnian looked at the disciples beside him and finally understood why their life force was steadily draining away! What Duan Xian was doing amounted to bleeding them all dry while simultaneously using the power of the blood pool to devour their life force. Emotions roiled within Lu Kangnian, and he cursed through gritted teeth, "You... are truly... a beast!" Hearing this, Duan Xian's eyes flashed with venomous malice, and he stomped Lu Kangnian down into the blood pool! Unable to channel his primal energy or divine sense, Lu Kangnian was now no different from a mortal, entirely incapable of internal breathing. Foul-smelling, putrid blood flooded into his nose and mouth, the viscous fluid churning his stomach. As suffocation set in, his consciousness grew increasingly hazy. The corrosive blood eating away at his skin made him look utterly wretched. Most of his flesh dissolved away, for the blood within the pool was like potent acid; the torment was no less agonizing than having one's bones scraped and soul wrenched out! Duan Xian watched this coldly before finally dragging the fading Lu Kangnian back out. He forcibly pried open Lu Kangnian's storage ring and retrieved the sect master token from within. Extending his palm, he casually drew over a young disciple, seizing the Great Xia Sword Sect disciple by the neck with his left hand while hoisting Lu Kangnian with his right. Yet this scene appeared rather grotesque and comical... Duan Xian's height reached only to Lu Kangnian's waist, so both the disciple and Lu Kangnian were left semi-collapsed on the ground. Blood-red light flared brilliantly in Duan Xian's palm, and a surging river of blood instantly enveloped them both! Blood seeped into their bodies through their seven facial apertures. "Blood Puppet: Congeal!" Boom! A violent surge of power swept outwards. Duan Xian's aura fluctuated wildly, and a spine-chilling, agonizing shriek burst from the disciple's lips. Soon after, the thick blood coating the youth vanished. The revealed youth had completely transformed into Lu Kangnian's likeness. Not only in appearance—even his aura, spiritual root, and every other facet were identical! Yet in just two breaths' time, the blood puppet's fingers had already begun to melt. Tossing Lu Kangnian back into the blood pool, Duan Xian handed the sect master token to the blood puppet and commanded, "Open the sect treasury!" And that puppet, right before the shocked eyes of the semi-conscious Lu Kangnian, actually began to slowly form hand seals! Before long, all three thousand wondrous peaks and eight hundred scenic waters across the Great Xia Sword Sect shook in unison!