Chapter 717: Formation

Chapter 717: The Array

With a sharp whoosh, Li Huowang was hurled through the air by Peng Longteng, crashing violently into the midst of the crowd.

A tidal wave of flame erupted outward with Li Huowang at its epicenter, sweeping up everything in its path and turning it all into a cluster of fiercely blazing torches.

At that very instant, Peng Longteng, herself engulfed in roaring flames, charged forward and drove her massive halberd like a juggernaut into the ranks of the Cult of the Dharma.

Her heavy armor had been roasted to a dull, glowing crimson by the fire, making her look like a deity of death carving a bloody path through gods and Buddhas alike.

Though numerous attacks rained down upon Peng Longteng, inflicting what should have been fatal wounds, she simply refused to fall; the final vulnerability of the Military Lineage had been completely mended by Li Huowang’s power.

"Die! Die, every single last one of you motherfuckers!!"

Peng Longteng felt the long-lost thrill of galloping across the battlefield rushing back into her veins; she relished this sensation, loved the thrill of slaughter, and adored the sight of living men being trampled to pulp beneath her horse’s hooves.

It was glaringly obvious that the cultists had been caught entirely off guard by Li Huowang and Peng Longteng’s ferocious onslaught; many, hopelessly ablaze, collapsed to the ground lifeless before they could even react.

Yet despite Li Huowang’s terrifying momentum, these people had clearly come prepared.

"East of the Jade Pool where the celestial crystal gleams, the Sovereign of the Alliance commands the Azure Youth! Flinging fire ten thousand miles into the Kan and Zhen palaces, rain-riders swiftly deploy to summon the Great Obscurity! Mulang and Taiyi stand majestic upon the Three Mountains, thunderclaps shattering rock as the springs burst free! A single cry changes the dim heavens across the four seas, and wherever the rain array reaches, rivers torrentially overflow!"

As three peach-wood swords adorned with purple talismans pointed directly toward the heavens, dark clouds gathered in dense clusters overhead, pressing down until a torrential downpour unleashed itself, drowning the blazing Li Huowang.

Though the sky-rending rain could not extinguish the fire of Ba Hui consuming Li Huowang’s body, it succeeded in suppressing the spread of the flames.

Amidst the heavy downpour, a shamanic official wearing a mask carved with the character for "Witch" emerged from Li Huowang’s shadow, obsidian dagger raised, aiming a swift strike at his calf.

However, at that exact moment, a jet-black tentacle whipped out and tightly bound his wrist. "Don't you dare touch my daddy!"

The shamanic official whipped his head around, only to see even more black tentacles lunging toward him.

The tentacles, slick and glistening under the falling rain, slid effortlessly past the edge of his mask and wriggled rapidly into his seven facial orifices.

The moment Li Sui rapidly adapted to this new body, she spun around, brandishing the obsidian dagger to assist Li Huowang.

Under the combined assault of Li Huowang, Sui Sui, and Peng Longteng, corpses fell one after another, yet Taishan Shi stood in the distance looking entirely unperturbed, his hands folded behind his back as he silently calculated his next move.

As his fingers rapidly pinched and calculated behind his back, the cultists surrounding Li Huowang began shifting their positions in accordance with a precise, underlying pattern.

"It seems Taishan Shi is still the one pulling the strings! To think that after a few months without seeing him, this bastard from Da Qi has managed to climb so high over here as well!" Li Huowang thought to himself, his eyes locked onto Taishan Shi.

"Slaughtering these pawns is useless no matter how many die! I need to kill that guy first!" With that realization, Li Huowang shot a meaningful glance at Peng Longteng.

The battle-hardened Peng Longteng understood his intent instantly and hoisted her massive halberd with both hands, sending the burning, heavy weapon spinning through the air with a series of fierce whooshes toward Taishan Shi.

Seeing the heavy weapon flying his way, an old man standing beside Taishan Shi flicked his sleeve, causing several dark shadows to burst from his own silhouette and leap toward the incoming weapon.

But just as the dark shadows were about to collide with the massive halberd, Li Huowang furrowed his brow from a distance, causing the weapon to instantly shift from reality into an illusion, passing clean through the dark shadows.

The halberd, reverting to a mere hallucination, did not slow down, continuing to hurtle toward Taishan Shi at its original, lethal speed.

And now, save for Li Huowang, no one else could perceive the massive weapon.

The moment the phantom was about to smash directly into Taishan Shi’s face, Li Huowang’s gaze narrowed, forcing the halberd to solidify back into reality.

At such a brutally close distance, not even an immortal from the highest heavens could have dodged; the massive halberd struck Taishan Shi’s body dead-on.

Yet the gruesome fate that had once befallen Jin Shanzhao did not repeat itself here; when the halberd struck Taishan Shi, it produced a dull thud that could never have come from ordinary mortal flesh.

Immediately following the impact, Taishan Shi reached out and steadily caught the massive halberd with his bare hands, gripping the weapon before the staring eyes of Li Huowang and Peng Longteng, and with a sickening crunch, forcibly snapped the bowl-thick weapon clean in half.

Taishan Shi tossed the broken halberd to the ground and looked down at Li Huowang with cold indifference. "Form the array!"

The moment the words left his mouth, the surrounding cultists stripped off their upper garments in unison, exposing the dense, intricate tattoos covering their flesh.

The tattoos were bizarre, bearing no resemblance to ordinary writing, appearing instead like a strange script composed entirely of interconnected large and small circles.

In the midst of the pouring rain, the cultists with the "Witch" masks began contorting their bodies and moving with frantic speed.

Their twisting frames, combined with the tattoos on their skin, formed a massive, living formation of flesh, with Li Huowang trapped dead in the center; unlike the bait in the swamp before, this formation was visibly larger and far more profound.

A series of peculiar chants began to spill from their lips, resembling some form of sacred scripture, yet laced with bizarre sounds that no human mouth should ever have been capable of producing.

"Om na li luo mou duo ma suo he, the Heavenly Gate shall henceforth open; Om ma li duo du du luo suo he, the Nether Gate shall never close; Om tuo su li duo ma ji suo he, flowing eternally to transcend life and death..."

Gradually, these voices began to harmonize, and the faint, ghostly cries of cranes began to weave through the incantations.

Li Huowang had no idea what they were trying to accomplish, but it was painfully obvious that if he did not stop them now, catastrophic trouble was imminent!

The Spine Sword was drawn in a flash, throwing out numerous spatial rifts that sliced into the living array of flesh, severing the cultists who were attempting to dodge into neat halves.

Yet even so, the cult formation remained entirely unaffected; though the men died, their tattoos miraculously peeled away from their skin and remained suspended in midair, maintaining their connection with the survivors.

The indistinct cries of cranes grew clearer in Li Huowang’s ears, and he felt the distinct weight of a gaze bearing down upon him from high above the clouds.

This agonizingly familiar sensation caused Li Huowang’s heart to sink like a stone. "You've got to be kidding me... To deal with me, they're actually trying to summon the God of Yu'er down to earth?!"

Li Huowang remembered all too well the terrifying power of the Yin-Yang Doumu back in the capital of Da Liang, and that had merely been an avatar which even Zhuge Yuan had been powerless to withstand.

If the God of Yu'er truly descended in the flesh, then even as the Anchor of Ji Zai, he would undoubtedly be doomed to die!

Li Huowang knew this, Peng Longteng knew this, and even Sui Sui knew this; they slaughtered the majority of the cultists within the formation with frantic speed, yet the crane cries only grew sharper and more distinct.

Li Huowang raised his sword, slashing at the bizarre tattoos floating in the air; the tattoos severed easily enough, but the moment the blade passed through, they seamlessly knit themselves back together.

"Li Huowang, since you refuse the easy way out and insist on doing this the hard way, today shall be the day you die!" Taishan Shi shouted toward Li Huowang, his expression darkened with malice. "You should feel honored! The true visage of Grandfather Shi Du is not something just anyone is permitted to behold!"

"You think I'll just sit here and wait for death? Keep dreaming your pathetic dreams!" Steeling his resolve, Li Huowang tossed his long sword aside, kicked off from Peng Longteng’s open palm, and leaped straight into the air.

Suspended in midair, Li Huowang hung upside down, using his eyes—turned stark white by the searing heat of the flames—to glare down at the living formation below.

As the saying went, the higher one stood, the farther one could see; from this vantage point, the entirety of the array was laid bare before Li Huowang's eyes, the twisted formation distinctly forming the shape of a massive character for "Dian".

With the crane cries growing deafeningly loud in his ears, a snarling Li Huowang reached out with one hand to grab the upper half of the character "Dian", while his other hand reached out to seize its lower half.