Phantoms and Lies

Boom! Endless crimson surged forth like an ocean tide, spilling from the Bashe's colossal body, sweeping outward to dye the mountains in blood. The evil creature hissed and writhed madly, then, as if unable to bear the indignity any longer, exploded with a deafening roar! Furious, searing radiance surged outward in waves of rolling flame. Yet immediately following, at the very epicenter of the blast, blood welled atop that single fish scale. Granulation tissue sprouted, swelling and growing anew until it once again assumed the form of the Bashe! No matter how many times infinity was divided, it remained infinite. No matter how many pieces life was severed into, it was still life! Even a trifling scale shed from the abomination of the White Manor still embodied the boundless vitality and immortality belonging to the fish itself! In fact, after yet another metamorphosis and rebirth, it grew all the more savage and frenzied. Countering it was the Nether Sea Worm, which had finally manifested physical form amidst the clasping and shifting of giant hands! Only, compared to its eerie appearance of the past, its entire frame now seemed cast from quicksilver—shimmering with silver light, ever-shifting and fluid, no longer bound to its original visage. Instead, it continuously transformed among numerous colossal creations. At times it stood like a tower bridging heaven and earth; at others it plunged as an iron fist falling from above; at others still it dripped with the virulent poisons of corruption and aberration, shaping itself into blades and swords! Blades slashed and swept back and forth, then abruptly shattered apart only to reform into a cannon-sized gun barrel pressed flush against the Bashe's brow—pulling the trigger! "In the end, I still took a shortcut after all." Amidst the battleground where behemoths tore into each other between heaven and earth, Ji Jue gazed at the spectacle and sighed softly. Putting aside how his centuries of simulations had given him enough mastery and understanding of the worm to reproduce this calamity using external media, the worm's true nature was a stitched-together monstrosity born from the deaths of countless calamity beasts and abominations. Ji Jue had simply gone with the flow, using the Soul-Calling Bell to reconstruct and reorganize it. Compared to the original monster that had once eroded the entire Present Realm, this reborn worm shared almost nothing in common except for its underlying principle and fundamental nature. Not only was it constrained by Ji Jue's own upper limit—rendering its subtler, profound depths impossible to replicate—the Calamity of Blood Rain serving as its vessel was merely a broken fragment, far from rivaling the boundless Nether Sea. The comprehension of the worm's essence freeloaded from the Tower of Myriad Phenomena; the Illumination revelation scrounged from Kanemoto; the Great Sin divine marrow picked up beneath the Vortex; the ready-made shell and materials seized from the Calamity of Blood Rain... Ji Jue had simply run all these parts and mechanisms through his own factory for a final assembly, rolling out a brand-new worm like a fresh car off the assembly line. Even the on-board system—the theory and creation of a spiritus beast—was lifted wholesale from his teacher, an outright copy-paste job. Bootlegged from head to toe, it really didn't boast any genuine highlights beyond the minimum necessary technical know-how. Moreover, rather than calling it the Nether Sea Worm, it was more accurate to say that he had turned the entire world cloaked in blood rain into his personal workshop! And compared to the drafty, low-budget workshop Ji Jue had cobbled together himself, its degree of completion was shockingly high. The only pity was that it pointed not toward Sovereign Virtue: Embers, but toward Great Sin: Stagnant Rot! Bound by his theory and inexperience, he had wasted so much time and still hadn't subdued a mere Bashe. Had Isis been here, things would certainly have been far simpler. At the very least, he wouldn't have to micromanage everything with so much trouble— Boom! "Piss off." Without looking back, Ji Jue flicked his finger. A flesh tendril creeping up from the ground exploded violently. A giant hand materialized out of thin air, reaching down to wrench the tendril up by its roots. Then, Solid Alchemy sealed and transmuted it, consuming spiritus from within the worm. Reconstruction commenced, and an incomplete Sword of Pan Ying manifested once more between the five fingers. It drove straight into the shifting mountain of flesh once again! Since the spiritus was freeloaded and the workshop had cost him nothing, wasting materials caused him no heartache. Ji Jue shamelessly used the fight for target practice, happily grinding his proficiency. One incomplete or mutated Sword of Pan Ying after another was forged by constantly draining the vitality of the fish scale and the Bashe, only to be plunged right back into the writhing serpent's body. Even if they lacked blessings and fine details, they were more than sufficient as single-use expendables! As for the siphoned vitality, even if he couldn't put it to immediate use or if it was unfit for major purposes, he could at least dump it into the Calamity of Blood Rain to corrupt and mutate it anew, filling the void and repairing himself! How the hell was this an enemy? This was clearly an oversized power bank delivered right to his doorstep! As if terrified the worm would collapse on its own once the Calamity of Blood Rain was depleted, it had arrived specifically to top off Ji Jue's health bar. Ji Jue was almost reluctant to kill it! Another earth-shattering blast erupted. The Bashe self-destructed. Yet after this explosion, as it reassembled, it seemed to have grown wiser. Under covert guidance and control, it split into countless masses of tissue and buds of flesh. The spilled, writhing crimson grew rapidly, even latching onto broken skeletons and remains to catalyze an immense swarm of aberrant spawn. Breaking down the whole into parts, they hissed and scurried across the mountains and valleys in a frantic charge. While Ji Jue focused on controlling over a hundred giant hands sweeping, swatting, and annihilating them, a massive, burly silhouette slowly emerged from the deepest reaches of the bone-strewn field. Under the convergence of countless stones, earth, and steel, the outline of the Giant of the Desolate Ruins gradually took shape. Yue Chen! Only, his original appearance was completely gone. His Regeneration Form manifested: a headless giant covered head to toe in sharp crystals and ore. No face could be seen, let alone an expression, bereft of the slightest human hesitation or unease. The exposed crystal on his chest pulsed ceaselessly like a heart. Merely standing there, he seemed to set off infinite tremors. The ley lines shook; the mountains resonated. One shackle of light after another binding his body shattered in succession, unleashing the power sealed within him over the long years in full fury. The hyper-dense matter that put Ji Jue on high alert gathered once more. Now, within that pitch-black spear, specks of burning lava-like light surfaced and expanded rapidly. The hyper-dense matter, collapsed to its utmost limit, suddenly surged—only for the outburst to be bound and compressed once more. In the end, the spear's outline could no longer even be discerned; there remained only a wisp of cruel, searing light surging back and forth like a fluid. Ignoring the slashes of numerous Swords of Pan Ying, letting his body be impaled, The giant roared at the heavens. The bizarre substance formed from the turbulent agitation of countless particles—a spear resembling a stellar core—flew from his grasp! Ji Jue's expression changed abruptly. The moment the spear of light left the giant's hand, giant palms manifested from the void one after another, trying to suppress and contain it. Yet the interference of alchemy and the suppression of the Nether Sea Worm seemed like mere illusions. In a flash, massive material interference surged out of thin air from the blood rain. The void solidified into iron walls, contracting and stacking ahead to steadily exhaust the horrific kinetic force within that blazing light. He had no attention to spare for anything else. Yet within the splattered, bursting gore and the drifting crimson haze, a bizarre reflection quietly surfaced. Like a formless wolf, the Wolf Sin concealed itself within the blood, flashing continuously, leaping across the blood of countless cannon fodder... Just like that, it crossed the final distance. In this critical fraction of a second, the blood-stained wolf materialized from the blood rain, appearing out of nowhere right behind Ji Jue. Its maw remained pulled back into a silent, manic grin. Mere inches away! The bloodied hand transformed, reared back, and thrust forward! Yet from start to finish, Ji Jue did not even bother turning around to glance at him. He received the threat of death with icy indifference, utterly unperturbed. At that instant, a dreamlike glimmer manifested once more before everyone's eyes. Like brilliant spring sunshine, a sweet summer shower, red leaves fluttering from branches at autumn's onset, or glistening, translucent flakes of ice amidst swirling winter snow. All the beauty of the mortal world emerged from the light, then dissolved away. Like the morning dew, the days gone by are full of bitter grief. Life is bitter and fleeting, nothing more than a succession of instants. And within one unremarkable instant among those countless many, all things shone bright, youth blossomed in full splendor, and then—withered. In a single morning, youth fades and spring grows old. Such was the transience of Bitter Day: by the time one realized it, all had irrevocably reached its end. Beneath the shattered armor, the slumbering Hunter awoke from her long dream. Urged by instinct, she opened her eyes once more and, without hesitation, pulled the trigger! In a flash, the radiance dissolved. The instant that dreamlike, crystalline wisp of light left her grip, it had already pierced straight into the wolf's heart and soul. Beyond the field, An Neng and An De raised their brows, scowling. A burst of wild, hysterical laughter rang out from the blood rain—beneath the Wolf Sin's rapidly crumbling body, right in front of its soul and life, a lump of writhing flesh had already been impaled by Bitter Day. It was a heart! The Bashe's heart! Under the impact of Bitter Day, the heart withered instantly. Within it, that crack-covered scale snapped in two right down the middle—crack! Countless aberrant spawn suddenly wailed in agony, swiftly withering and shriveling into husks. Like wheat cut down at the waist beneath death's scythe, they collapsed without a sound. Amidst the Wolf Sin's mad laughter: Who ever said the heart inside one's chest had to be one's own?! Besides the heart of the Bashe, what could be better suited to withstand this long-prepared Bitter Day and its Extreme Realm Projection?! Behind the armor, a stream of bloody water welled out of thin air, and the true Wolf Sin emerged. Grinning wide. And then, he met a pair of eyes. Gazing at him in utter calm. Within those pitch-black pupils, moonlight seemed to shimmer—so clear, so bright, distant and full of sorrowful pity, like a White Stag looking back to gaze upon the wasteland of eternal slaughter. Under the glow of the illusory moonlight, the dying girl seemed to fade like a bubble, exquisitely crystalline. Beneath the glimmer of that bubble stood the slender yet poised silhouette of a White Stag. The two overlapped, making it impossible to tell which was real and which was phantom— Regeneration Form: Shadow of the Jade Horn! In that final moment, what the wolf saw were the eyes of the deer. Aloof and serene, looking down upon all birth, death, and slaughter, bearing witness to the end of yet another rogue wolf that preyed upon the flock. The Wolf Sin froze, his lips instinctively parting, yet no sound came out. Why? Why do you still have strength? Why hasn't the Wolf Sin poison corroded your soul? Why... Do you still have a Flying Light?! "Sorry, I lied to you." An Ning smiled with apparent regret, as if out of pity. "After all, lying is my favorite thing to do." A soft wisp of light drifted forward, striking the wolf's soul dead center. Obliterating everything. Snap! The last trace of bloody water collapsed silently, dispersing and evaporating until nothing remained. Only a single curved, blood-stained canine tooth dropped from within, falling into An Ning's palm. Her fingers closed slowly around it as she whispered a prayer: "With this quarry, I pay homage to the White Stag." When her fingers opened, the wolf fang was gone. Only within the overlapping Regeneration Form did that dreamlike silhouette of the White Stag seem all the more vivid and alive. As your heart acts, Sovereign Virtue knows. The long hunt had finally reached its end.