Translator: Ninetales Editor: DarkGem
There was a ruin in the desert. More than half of the earth yellow palaces had collapsed and only some crumbling fences and dilapidated walls were left. Flames were burning a bit more furiously over there than in other places.
The space that the ruins occupied was very vast, the size of several thousand fields. Flames blazed around the sand giant, and its body was scarlet from them. The giant had no legs, but it could still travel extremely fast along the great streets and small alleys of the ruin.
Below the body of the sand giant was violent sand that kept spinning upwards, thus even though it had no legs, its speed was still very fast.
At that moment, the sand giant was chasing after Qin Mu and Pangong Tso. The two of them were being attacked often, and loud thumps rang out continuously. Every strike from the sand dune giant was incomparably heavy, and when they landed on the desert, sandstone would shoot out like swords!
Yet the sand giant didn't damage the ruin at all. When it encountered broken fences and dilapidated walls, it would flood over. After it flowed past, the ruin would be left perfectly fine.
The divine arts of West Earth was different from those of Eternal Peace, and the path they took was that of all things having soul. Even sandstone could be changed into a giant to fight, and one strike from a sand giant could split mountains. Its power was unblockable.
If Qin Mu and Pangong Tso got struck, just the terrifying energy alone would be enough to heavily injure the two of them!
Even so, they were still trying to kill each other while doing their best to avoid the attacks of the sand giant.
Pangong Tso's broken arm impaired his movements. Qin Mu could control eight thousand swords, but no matter how intricate his sword skill was, it was still hard for him to injure the sand giant. Even if he sliced one of its arms into pieces, this giant would return back to normal in a few moments, retaining no injury.
Its body technique was extraordinary, and the attacks of the sand giant were incomparably overbearing. However, since it only used its fists to attack and not spells or divine arts, it wasn't much of a threat to them.
However, what was weird was that the sand giant seemed to only be attacking Qin Mu. It paid no attention to Pangong Tso.
"Spell of True Heaven Palace!" The dragon qilin looked around and asked, "Where is the spellcaster hiding?"
"That's a guardian of the desert. It's not a divine art." Xiong Qi'er climbed onto his head while pulling on his mane. She took a look at the situation and said, "My mom said that there are many ancient ruins in the desert, and they are places where the gods who guarded the desert lived. When they had to go, they left behind some guardians to look after the desert. Any person from Great Ruins will be attacked by the guardians.
Suddenly, red sand churned in the ruin and another sand giant stood up, rushing quickly at the youth.
Qin Mu stretched his hands out and numerous scarlet red sand dragons whizzed forward, rushing at the sand giants. While chasing after Pangong Tso, his vital qi had been circulating more and more furiously, and the power of his divine art becoming stronger and stronger. At that moment, his battle power was at its strongest!
The dozens of scarlet sand dragons tore apart the sand giants.
"Eh?"
Qin Mu was astonished, for he felt the magic power in his divine art being absorbed. When the sand dragons passed through the bodies of the sand giants, the magic power inside them completely vanished!
Pangong Tso saw a good moment and rushed over with the huge cauldron on his head. The two sand giants behind him who had absorbed the magic power the divine art as well as the dozens of sand dragons grew drastically and attacked Qin Mu as well.
Qin Mu formed firsts and straightened his thumb, using a punch to fight against Pangong Tso's punch. Pangong Tso immediately felt that his attack had no power, but that there was a concaving power in the fist that was pulling him in.
The straightened thumb made Pangong Tso shudder.
'The power in that punch of his lies in that thumb!'
He struggled to break free, having just realized that Qin Mu's move was not a fist skill at all. Instead, it was a sword skill in which his thumb was the sword. If Pangong Tso didn't break free and the thumb pressed down on him, the sword power would definitely slice him in half!
'How did this fellows battle technique improve so fast and become so terrifying? It hasn't even been a year since the last time we fought, so how did his abilities improve so fast?'
Pangong Tso used all his strength to break free from Qin Mu's fist. The moment he did so, the sword light in Qin Mu's thumb increased exponentially. His vital qi transformed into a thread which was like fine swords coiling together. The sword light sliced down when Qin Mu pressed his thumb down!
Pangong Tso suddenly changed into a black shadow which fell and stuck to the sandy ground. He then quickly left into the distance.
Qin Mu raised his hand and pressed down, causing a huge handprint to appear on the ground. Pangong Tso let out a sigh of relief. 'This guy missed.'
Yet the next moment, the sword lights that were hiding in the sky and covering the earth hummed and shot down altogether. The area they covered was extremely vast and made it impossible for him to avoid them.
Suddenly, a third sand giant stood up from beneath Qin Mu's feet, and the sword rain falling from midair grew disordered. Pangong Tso broke out from his shadow and transformed into a human to leap out from the desert. He flashed along the way to avoid the sword lights, escaping out of the ruin.
He turned back to take a look, only to see Qin Mu being drowned out by the three sand giants. His life and death could not be determined.
'When this guy gets severely injured, it would be the best time for me to kill him!' Just as Pangong Tso thought that, he saw the dragon qilin sprinting over and sneered. 'Even an animal like you dares to make a move on me?'
He then bowed and shouted sternly, "Fatty Dragon!"
A huge sacrificial altar appeared behind him and the devil god on the sacrificial also bowed.
The dragon qilin ignored him, and Pangong Tso grew slightly flustered. He bowed once more in a hurry. "Dragon Qilin!"
The dragon qilin was already near him, flames spreading out from his mouth.
Pangong Tso vomited blood. His injuries were not light, and the divine art which paid respect to the soul was extremely exhausting to his vitality. Paying his respects twice drained a lot of his vitality.
"Qingqing!" Pangong Tso gritted his teeth and paid his respects once more.
Xiong Qi'er grabbed the mane of the dragon qilin and climbed onto the head of the fat behemoth to look curiously at the youth before them.
Pangong Tso spat out a mouthful of blood as a beam of fire from the dragon qilin's mouth emanated with blazing flames, sweeping at him across a dozen miles. Everywhere the beam passed, the dunes were razed to the ground!
Pangong Tso hurriedly hid in the great cauldron and listened as the loud banging sounds went into the distance. The cauldron was then swept into the air and tumbled dozens of miles away.
The dragon qilin sprinted over where the cauldron had landed, but only saw a sand pit with bloodstains. It was obvious that Pangong Tso had escaped into the ground.
"My abilities actually couldn't stop him? Those who can live for ten thousand years are indeed all remarkable. His ability to escape is even superior to that of Cult Master!" the dragon qilin exclaimed in admiration.
A loud explosion suddenly came from the ruin, and the dragon qilin turned back to look. Over there, he saw a fourth sand giant rising from the ground. It was a hundred yards tall and comparable to Great Thunderclap Monastery's Ten Thousand Buddhas Pagoda. It moved incomparably fast and chased relentlessly after Qin Mu.
"I can't let Cult Master be harmed!"
The dragon qilin immediately sprinted over, and he saw Qin Mu's body suddenly vanish. The next moment, he appeared in front of him and floated in midair. His whole body was covered in strange flames and teleportation runes circulating rapidly.
Qin Mu hurriedly extinguished the flames on his body, his face already black from the burns. Luckily, his clothes were tailored by Yu Zhaoqing and other strong practitioners of Heavenly Feather Race, so they weren't destroyed in the flames.
Various sounds rang out behind him, and Qin Mu turned back to take a look. The sand giants actually flew out of the ruin and rushed over aggressively.
"Fatty Dragon, fall back!" Qin Mu waved his hand and stopped the dragon qilin who was rushing over.
The sand giants were extremely fast and soon rushed in front of Qin Mu. They then swayed and separated into two groups, launching a pincer attack on him from the right and left.
Just as they were about to pounce on him, the teleportation runes around Qin Mu's body lighted up and his body vanished once more!
The sand dune giants collided and sand filled the air. Soon though, they took shape once more and hurried back toward the ruin in a frantic rush. Before they could return, however, they suddenly crumbled and transformed back into dunes that piled one onto another.
The dragon qilin hurriedly ran over to where Qin Mu was floating in midair. Below him was a palace that was more than half collapsed. Inside it was a shrine with a wooden god statue that was covered in strange markings. Its head was on the floor.
Qin Mu raised his hand, and Carefree Sword flew into it. He looked at the head of the wooden god statue with a grim face.
When he had lured the sand giants out just then, he had returned back to the ruin and surveyed it with Cinnabar Heaven's Eyes. He discovered then that there were strange markings flowing continuously on the wooden god statue, so he had sliced off its head in one strike!
Once he did that, the markings which were originally glowing slowly dimmed.
A terrifying brainwave had rushed out from the god statue toward Qin Mu. However, it was blocked by the jade pendant hanging from his neck.
"How strange…" Qin Mu turned his head back and asked, "Qi'er, are there gods in your West Earth's West Heaven Palace?"
Xiong Qi'er shook her head and replied, "I've never heard about that before."
Qin Mu gripped the jade pendant and said in a low voice, "There's a consciousness hidden in this god statue, and it even attacked me when I cut off its head. The owner of this god statue should still be alive."
"Cult Master, Pangong Tso escaped," the dragon qilin said.
Qin Mu didn't mind it. "He has been escaping for ten thousand years and has long perfected the art of it, so it won't be easy to get rid of him in one go. Didn't he also escape when Eternal Peace Imperial Preceptor surrounded Rolan's Golden Palace? What makes my heart throb is that there might be a living god in West Earth's True Heaven Palace…"
He raised his head to look to the west. The wooden statue could actually gather sand to form giants. This showed that it was using the ultimate art of True Heaven Palace.
It was called Ten Thousand Spirit Nature Technique and was suitable for women to cultivate. Even though Xiong Xiyu had imparted it to Qin Mu, his gains weren't great.
'Imperial Preceptor went to True Heaven Palace, so he's probably going to be out of luck. 'Qin Mu pulled away his gaze and thought to himself, 'I hope that god's ability isn't too great, for otherwise…'
He shook his head.
"What worries me even more is why did this god of True Heaven Palace leave behind this ruined palace? The sand giants are clearly for killing the abandoned people of Great Ruins. How exactly did True Heaven Palace look like originally?'
He jumped onto the dragon qilin's back who rushed toward the west. Soon, they covered over ten miles.
The ruin was silent, but after a moment, a rustling could be heard, and the markings on the two pieces of wood gradually lighted up. The head suddenly flew up and landed on the neck of the wooden statue.
Its markings grew brighter and brighter. The sculpture actually slowly began to change, its wooden body turning into flesh and blood!
What was even more terrifying was that the statue actually twisted its head to the back of its body. Its eyes slowly opened and looked in the direction of Qin Mu.
The wooden statue opened its mouth and spoke in a hoarse voice. "A noble of the abandoned people, I…"
Swoosh!
A sword light broke through the air after having stayed close to the ground, piercing the head of the wooden statue that was changing into flesh and blood. The sword light then flashed, slicing the wooden god statue into countless pieces!
Sometime later and twenty miles away, the sword light returned to Qin Mu's sheath.
"God, I've also killed some of your kind before." Qin Mu folded his arms as he stood on the dragon qilin's head. His body rose and lowered along with its movement.