[V6C41 – Sorrow of a Silent Parting]
The girl was barefoot and wearing a tattered skirt with unhealed injuries on her legs and arms. She possessed exquisite facial features and a pair of vacant but ethereal eyes. She was just like a helpless little creature at a glance.
But the demonkin’s intuitions were screaming! Moreover, this young girl wasn’t even a champion yet.
The little girl had a giant, sinister looking blade in her hand that was grossly disproportionate to her body, and was carrying a backpack half a head taller than her. There were all kinds of weapons stuffed within the bulging pack with many parts sticking out of it—guns, blades, and even an axe.
Merely seeing this bag of weapons made one’s hair stand on end.
The demonkin forcibly calmed himself down and asked, “Who are you?”
As a noble son of darkness, his attitude at the moment could be considered quite good. Although the girl wasn’t a champion, he had been beaten to half-death just now and only managed to move normally after utilizing a secret art.
The girl’s voice was soft, gentle, and ephemeral, akin to music drifting over from afar. “I’m called Bai Kongzhao. I dare say you didn’t want to hear this name.”
The demonkin was completely shaken. It was just as she had said—it was one of those names he was most unwilling to hear at the moment. Those who had left the deepest impression on the dark races during the bloody battle included the twin stars of the Empire, Qianye and Zhao Jundu, Song Zining, and then Bai Kongzhao.
She was notorious for the savagery with which she had killed people despite being of a lower level. In the eyes of the dark race scions, this little girl was a demon through and through.
The demonkin circulated his origin power in desperation and pounced at Bai Kongzhao.
The demonkin had less than a third of his usual strength at this moment. The girl only sidestepped the attack as the giant blade in her hand flickered and slashed off a part of the demonkin’s calf!
The demonkin cried out in misery as he fell to the ground, and the unhealed wound on his chest opened up once more.
Bai Kongzhao dragged the blade, dripping with blood, as she approached the demonkin. “I forgot to tell you that no matter what you do, you'll eventually fulfill my wishes.”
“Y-You, what are you doing?” the demonkin cried out in alarm. He had already surrendered once to Qianye, so the second time was much easier for him.
Bai Kongzhao stepped forward and stepped onto the demonkin’s wound as though it were an accident. The pain almost caused him to fall unconscious.
She pulled back her foot after the demonkin had screamed for a good while, then said, “I want your family's secret cultivation art.”
“Secret cultivation art?” The girl’s demand came as a surprise.
But, not to mention a human, even the other dark races couldn’t utilize demonkin cultivation arts. Moreover, every clan’s art was closely related to its bloodline ability and family totem—they were inheritances passed down through the myriad years. The effects would be greatly reduced even if another demonkin clan was to cultivate it. For instance, a Masefield scion cultivating the Jeruson clan’s secret arts would not be able to produce the special effects of the bloodline totem.
These secret arts were the key difference between famed demonkin families and commoners. However, they were less secretive about them due to the harsh restrictions involved. Even if these arts were leaked, without the appropriate bloodline, it would take the cultivator twice the effort to obtain half the results.
As for others studying it for a method to counter them, that was even more of a joke. The demonkin believed themselves to be the sons of darkness—their totemic powers stemmed from the laws of the world, and their powers were stratified by strength. How could the laws of the world be broken? Who could shatter the entire world?
Bai Kongzhao was clearly a human, so what would she want with their cultivation art?
However, that wasn’t a problem the demonkin had to consider. What he needed to do was distance himself from the blade in the girl’s hands. Hence, he quickly revealed his clan’s cultivation arts.
Bai Kongzhao asked him a couple of questions and then had him repeat the art once more. This went on several times until she had confirmed that there was nothing wrong with the secret art. Then, Bai Kongzhao brought the blade slashing past him with a shake of her hand—the demonkin’s head flew into the air immediately.
“You lied to me!” a wretched demonkin head cried out those final words.
Bai Kongzhao smiled innocently. “Who told you to trust a woman?”
The head fell onto the purple substance with a dull thud. He wanted to say something, but nothing but air came from his throat. The blood that had sprayed onto the substance seemingly awakened a demonic creature. The surrounding substance became active and quickly extended over to envelope him.
Twilight’s voice suddenly emerged as Bai Kongzhao was bending down to search the demonkin’s headless body. “I agree with these words.”
Bai Kongzhao’s body tensed up somewhat but quickly eased up again. She didn’t stand up. Instead, she turned back to face Twilight in a crouched posture, like a dangerous beast that would go wild at any moment.
The environment here was Twilight’s home ground. There was no way to tell if the mist lingering around her originated from her body or the surroundings.
Twilight revealed a charming smile as she glanced at Bai Kongzhao. “Actually, we have the same views and even the same enemies, so it’s somewhat of a pity to kill you. But…”
Twilight’s words hadn’t even ended when Bai Kongzhao shot a glance toward the former’s back with a terrified expression.
Twilight laughed coldly and had no intention to glance back at all. “Please stop these childish tricks! Both of us can be considered geniuses, so do maintain a fitting level of dignity.”
But Bai Kongzhao’s expression was still one of terror. It was as though she didn’t hear Twilight at all, and neither did she take into consideration the fact that she might be attacked the moment she moved. In this manner, she leapt out all of a sudden and ran away like a little creature. Twilight would lose track of the girl completely if she allowed the latter to put a couple hundred kilometers between them.
How could Twilight let Bai Kongzhao escape? While following and observing the latter under the Iron Curtain, she realized that in terms of pure assassination abilities, the danger posed by this girl wasn’t too far off from Zhao Jundu.
Twilight took a step forward and rushed out several dozen meters as she gave chase. However, a great sense of alarm emerged in her heart as she flitted past Bai Kongzhao’s previous location. She immediately changed her direction and flashed away horizontally.
The substance on the ground bulged up and spat out a pillar of flames so powerful that even Twilight was flung away. The impact sent her crashing into a large tree before bouncing back.
Twilight staggered as she landed on the ground and almost failed to gain a steady footing. She was both shocked and furious as she glanced toward the area in question. The place had been scorched black, and even the widespread purple substance was no longer present around the deep, newly-formed pit. Judging from the explosive power, Bai Kongzhao seemed to have hidden seven or eight vampire origin grenades and ignited them at the same time.
Even Twilight’s eyesight failed to see when Bai Kongzhao had hidden those grenades. She thought back in detail and realized that the girl must’ve hidden them just as she approached the corpse and Twilight appeared. There was a blind spot in Twilight’s vision where it was obstructed by Bai Kongzhao’s body, so she had failed to see the latter’s small movements.
Twilight glanced at the surroundings, but how could she find Bai Kongzhao? The girl had long since vanished into the white mist.
She stomped in hatred as she realized how she had underestimated this young girl—she was as venomous as a snake yet as agile as a fox.
She was just about to give chase when a tyrannical wolf howl emerged from the front. As old rivals under the Iron Curtain, Twilight had a deep impression of William’s voice. She immediately realized that he was fighting with someone, and that the battle was extremely fierce. But they weren’t under the Iron Curtain at the moment, and Twilight had no wish to bump into him without the curtain’s restrictions.
She had no choice but to halt her steps after calculating the location and direction. “Consider yourself lucky! I’ll let you off this time, but the one in front of you is William. Let’s see if you can deal with that stupid dog.”
Even several Bai Kongzhaos added together wasn’t a match for William in terms of combat strength. However, her deceiving appearance, her malicious heart, and instinctive combat style made her an extremely troublesome opponent. The one taking a loss might even be William if the two were to run into one another.
Twilight’s imaginations were quickly filled with scenes of William being tricked repeatedly.
She couldn’t help but want to go after them, but in the end, she still halted her steps with a wry smile. William was a principled werewolf, and his excessive persistence sometimes made him look stupid. But the most terrible part was that his principles happened to include a certain clause, and that was to not listen to anything Twilight had to say. He would only decide whether or not to fight her depending on his mood.
Normally, he would fight her when he was in a sour mood to let off steam. He would also fight her when he was in a good mood just to celebrate.
Twilight had always wanted to talk to William and perhaps change this terrible situation. In truth, the Monroe clan had always been moderate in their external policies. This was especially true in recent years with all the trouble from both within and outside the clan—they had no wish to go to war with a power like the Summit of Peaks without any profit involved.
But even Twilight herself had no idea wherein lay the problem. Whenever she tried to initiate a conversation, things would always end with a fight. Moreover, it so happened that William’s combat strength was inversely proportional to his brains, and it would never end well for Twilight in a confrontation.
After suffering several times, Twilight changed her strategy and made William go around in circles with her schemes. There was one time when she almost pushed him into dire straits, but William erupted with unexpected strength and passed through the ordeal unharmed.
From then on, William would almost always attack Twilight on sight. Last time, he tricked Twilight under the Iron Curtain without the slightest bit of hesitation, causing her to waste a life-saving trump card.
Some vampires had said before that William was not stupid at all; he was merely too lazy to think. They claimed that it would be a terrifying matter once a serious enmity had been developed. Twilight had naturally heard such words, but she instinctively refused to accept that a werewolf could be intelligent.
At present, however, Twilight wasn’t willing to run into William. Sometimes, a stubborn yet extremely powerful fellow like William truly made one feel helpless.
Twilight gazed deeply in the direction of the howl before turning to leave. She hadn’t gone very far when a blue light flashed past the corner of her eyes. She immediately glanced back in alarm, only to find that the blue light was coming through from a thousand meters away.
Twilight was shocked out of her wits! That blue glow was a peerlessly sharp sword radiance. However, the current environment was filled with hazy mist. Just how powerful was this brilliance to have extended over a thousand meters?
Twilight’s expression shifted rapidly. She realized the moment she saw this sword radiance that she wouldn’t be able to block it at all. If it were to strike her head-on, she would be gravely injured if not killed outright.
This sword radiance was emitting unmistakeable daybreak origin power fluctuations. Apparently, a certain human expert had arrived, and Twilight was certainly not willing to run into him, either. She immediately switched to another direction and moved away rapidly.
A thousand meters away, where the sword light had originated, an arachne count was staggering backward while covering the wound on his left shoulder. His countenance was suffused with alarm, anger, and deep apprehension. He hadn’t even managed to assume arachne-form when he suffered a sword strike that took off his entire left arm and shaved off half his shoulder. His injuries were grave to say the least.
Li Kuanglan walked out with gradual steps from the opposite side, his charming gaze fixed upon the arachne. He wore a spurious smile, but the sharp sword intent in his eyes was even more vigorous than the blade in his hands.
The edges of that aqua-blue sword were almost translucent like crystal.