Chapter 715: The Path of Sequence (End)

Chapter 715: The Path of Sequences (End)

Clang!

The black ink blade abruptly halted above the giant god's mechanical heart.

The shattered vambrace revealed an arm thick with bulging veins, boiling blood surging through the sinews, force howling within the bones. Clearly only a hair's breadth separated victory from defeat, life from death, yet at this moment Li Jun could not cross that step no matter how hard he tried.

On the edge of this battlefield of mortal gods, uninvited guests appeared one after another.

They held aloft banners in the name of dominion, issuing commands with the power of strategy and alliance. Forces belonging to different sequences converged here, weaving into an invisible net that tightly enveloped Li Jun.

"By His Majesty's sacred decree, slay the rebels!"

The roar came like a mountain roar and a tidal wave. In an instant, illusions bred before Li Jun’s eyes. His already nearly exhausted strength was crushed, unable to move, and the piercing pain in his lungs seized the moment to run riot.

Splash!

A wave of molten rock hot enough to melt metal crashed over, flinging Li Jun away.

"Cease this meaningless struggle of pride! Cleanse all enemies who obstruct my throne. When the time comes, naturally someone will sing praises for the War Sequence—you need not concern yourself!"

A figure in bright yellow dragon robe hovered above the giant god’s head, head slightly bowed, his cold gaze stabbing straight into Zhu Pingxu’s empty eye sockets.

Crackle!

Two green-red flames reignited in the eye sockets, but Zhu Pingxu shifted his gaze, daring not to meet the eyes of the one above.

The tide of mist surged, swallowing his body.

Zhu Pingxu pushed himself up from the ground, his fingers slowly tracing a huge crack across his chest. The broken mechanical bones were rapidly repairing themselves, but the relief and lingering fear of a narrow escape from death still left his heart churning.

"Solitary Martial Sequence…"

Zhu Pingxu murmured in his heart, sighing endlessly. Through the blurry white mist, his complex gaze fell on a figure in the distance, now shrunk to less than a zhang tall, kneeling on one knee.

The ink armor was battered and broken, his body covered with wounds.

The entire city’s weight of rank and karma pressed down, as if a mountain of ten thousand jun rested on Li Jun’s shoulders, preventing him from standing or raising his head.

"Old Li, it looks like the song is really about to end this time…"

Ma Wangye’s teasing laughter rang in Li Jun’s ears.

"But two Sequence Thirds almost killing a Sequence Second head-on—that’s a feat worthy of worship no matter where you are. Even if we leave our lives here today, we won’t have lost out."

Li Jun’s knee, pressed against the ground, lifted inch by inch with difficulty. The exposed muscles twitched one after another, and from the ghastly wounds no more blood could flow.

Despite such devastating injuries, Li Jun’s voice still carried a faint smile.

"I’m not dead yet—can you stop talking such damn doom and gloom?"

Ma Wangye let out a 'heh'. "Kid, you’re still young, not experienced enough. The closer you are to certain death, the more miserable you have to make yourself look. Who knows, maybe you’ll hit rock bottom and bounce back, and a miracle might just turn things around."

Li Jun curled his lip. "Is that how you made your way through the Bright Ghost Realm—by playing the pitiful card?"

"Impossible. I, Ma Ye, roamed the Bright Ghost Realm on my legs."

"What legs?"

"Two legs of absolute loyalty and guts, plus one leg that stands tall as a pillar!"

"Hahaha…"

Li Jun threw back his head and laughed. "If you put it that way, I’ve got two legs too."

"And what legs are those?"

"One leg tough enough to defy fate, one leg fierce enough to spit in death’s face!"

As the words fell, the ground beneath Li Jun’s feet exploded into dust as he lunged forward. The net of strategic forces covering him, which should have been formless, was forced into a blurry shape by his violent power.

Like a dragon charging through a torrent, like a fighting fish tearing through a net.

Li Jun closed in on Zhu Pingxu rapidly, reaching him in the blink of an eye, so close that Zhu Pingxu could clearly see Li Jun’s unruly eyes and the still-burning killing intent within them.

But what could he do?

The abyss was deep beyond measure, the net layered a thousandfold.

Struggling desperately was useless.

The giant god submerged in the misty tide raised a hand slightly. Within the fire domain covering a square mile, magma surged and erupted, blasting Li Jun into the air without any surprise.

A mountain-like shadow loomed down, but a violent wind pressure rushed up from below.

Li Jun’s face, corroded and mangled by molten rock, still bore a heroic smile. He twisted in midair, clenching the five fingers of his right hand, spreading his back like drawing a bow, and punching out like a swift arrow!

Boom!

Two fists of vastly different strengths crashed together—yet there was no earth-shattering sound.

Only four words could describe it: a mantis trying to stop a chariot.

Li Jun’s right arm snapped, bones and tendons shattered. Stark white bone shards pierced straight out from behind his shoulder, and dark red blood sprayed freely between his gritted teeth.

Zhu Pingxu lifted his foot and stamped heavily. An ancient bronze giant spear rose from the flowing magma, its tip glowing with crimson light, then shot forth!

Clang!

The suppression of strategic forces seeped into every pore. No matter how Li Jun struggled and dodged, he could not avoid the massive war spear flying toward him. It struck him head-on.

Boom!

The crimson light exploded into a vast sea of flames. The bronze spear howled back in a spin, caught by Zhu Pingxu’s hand.

He raised his head. A pair of fiery eyes flickered in the white mist, gazing at the black-smoke-wreathed figure falling from the sky.

He was not the only one watching. At this very moment, countless people, countless eyes in Jinling City, also saw this scene.

Zhang Siyuan stared blankly, his trembling pupils filled with desolation and despair.

"Ha…"

Suddenly, a soft laugh echoed in his ears.

Snapping back to his senses, Zhang Siyuan lowered his head, but saw only a still-erect figure receding.

"Warriors of the Heavenly Tower, one after another…"

Shen Li radiated an extremely dangerous aura. Each step he took left a bloody footprint on the ground.

Like a flickering flame in a gale, blazing with the hottest temperature before it dies out.

"An eye for an eye, blood for blood…"

Roar!

In the dying sea of fire across the sky, Mo Qijing raised his head and bellowed with rage. Standing on his back, Zhao Qingxia was already drenched in tears. He gripped a tiny sword tightly in his palm, the blade cutting into his flesh, blood dripping freely.

"Senior Brother…"

Zhao Qingxia wiped his face with his hand and spoke softly: "Tell those old men—I’m not leaving this time."

"The sky is truly dark…"

Yang Baize’s pale face was swallowed by the night. He grinned, gently laid down the old man’s corpse in his arms, and stood up leaning against the mottled city wall.

"But this time, I really am not afraid anymore."

The bone-chilling wind howled through the city reduced to ruins, carrying countless fragmented whispers past Li Jun's ears.

But when he, already a flickering candle in the wind, mustered the last of his strength to listen, all he heard in the wind were the clamors of abuse, curses, slander, and threats.

Boundless as a black ocean, they drowned Li Jun's consciousness.

Suddenly, the myriad noises faded away, and a deathly silence so profound that even the drop of a pin would be audible froze time. Li Jun's falling figure hung suspended in midair, and a splash of brilliant yellow leaped into his dim vision.

‘Do you hear that, Li Jun? In this world, no one needs you.’

Above the old imperial city, the dragon robe rustled in the wind. The young emperor, looking down from on high, surveyed the defeated rebel chieftain.

‘The wrath of a common man can only spill blood three feet around. But my dominion stretches across a vast expanse of ten thousand miles.’

Zhu Yiyan smiled lightly: ‘So what use is your solitary journey in the end? Still, it cannot change this world.’

‘What kind of bullshit dominion is that?’

Li Jun's dim eyes still held untamed wildness: ‘What does it matter to me whether this world changes or not?’

‘Indeed, it has nothing to do with you. Starting from Chengdu Fu, to the Japanese territories, into the barbarian regions, and then here — your entire journey has been nothing but deception, and everything you have done has been coerced by so-called loyalty and righteousness.’

Zhu Yiyan laughed: ‘Caught up in the world, helpless to determine your own fate, yet never being yourself — truly pitiable.’

‘Ridiculous?’

Li Jun said disdainfully: ‘You don’t understand.’

Zhu Yiyan seemed deeply stung by these three words; his placid expression suddenly turned exceptionally ferocious.

A force of overwhelming might swept in, snatching Li Jun's body into the air.

‘Kneel!’

Colossal power pressed in from all sides; the dominion of the entire city bore down upon one man.

Li Jun's body slowly sank, and the sounds of bones cracking joined into a continuous chorus.

‘Kneel!’

The angry shouts came from the emperor’s lackeys throughout the city, from the Zhu family's dominion across the Two Capitals and Thirteen Provinces, from the towering giant god standing firm with its spear, gathering and roaring to the heavens!

‘A man of the Paoge brothers — how could he ever back down?’

‘A mere body three feet tall born between heaven and earth, how dare I retreat by half an inch? Li Jun, where the wind and rain are fiercest, our hearts and livers shine like snow!’

‘Li Jun, walk the path you want to walk, kill the ones you want to kill!’

‘Brother Jun, the Way and the Martial — when have we ever knelt to live?’

‘Master Li, stand up.’

‘Li Jun, stand up!’ Just as Li Jun's legs were about to buckle, voices of summoning suddenly resounded.

Zhao Ding, Yan Bahuang, Su Ce, Chen Qisheng, Zou Sijiu, Yuan Mingfei — no figures appeared, but it was as if they were echoes welling up from the depths of Li Jun's heart.

Yet Zhu Yiyan could also hear these voices clearly. He looked around in alarm; though the night was pitch black, he saw countless flames flaring up everywhere, already turning into a prairie fire within his dominion.

‘I originally thought that the ritual of the Lone Walk's Second Order was to “overthrow the sovereign,” to kill every single one of you. But now it seems I was still mistaken.’

In a hopeless death trap, he rose to fight back, never retreating half a step until death.

Zhu Yiyan followed the voice and lowered his head; his pupils suddenly constricted, trembling without cease.

‘So from beginning to end, the ritual of the Martial Order is nothing more than two words: resistance.’

Thump!

The bent spine straightened inch by inch, the cracking of bones like a rusted brass lock torn apart, or like a tightly shut door kicked open!

A terror-inducing aura beyond description spread out. Though he was still within his dominion of might, Zhu Yiyan at this moment felt as if he were utterly alone, with a blood-soaked warrior standing close before him.

His genes screamed in panic within his body; Zhu Yiyan instinctively flew backward, blood streaming from his seven orifices, the drops glaringly bright against his yellow robe.

Clang!

A circular wave of flames exploded on the ground, and a bronze giant spear flew in, with a momentum like a thunderbolt across the sky.

‘Do you think martial is inferior to soldiers? Then try again.’

Li Jun slowly raised his right hand; flesh and blood rapidly regrew over white bones, restoring it in an instant.

He raised a single finger and met the spear tip!

Boom!

The giant spear shattered inch by inch, turning to ashes in the air.

‘Heaven’s Deception.’

Li Jun murmured to himself.

In the next instant, his figure completely vanished from the dominion that enveloped the entire city of Jinling.

The flag-bearers of the Cross Order, having lost their target, looked bewildered and panicked.

‘Conquer the Enemy.’

Limitless power crushed down, effortlessly extinguishing their lives.

‘Edge of Sharpness.’

As the words fell, the limbs of the bronze giant god were instantly severed. The edge of sharpness interwove into a domain, cutting Zhu Pingxu’s entire mechanical skeleton into pieces like a death by a thousand cuts.

‘Crushing Momentum.’

Among the piles of mechanical fragments, a heart forged like gold trembled violently.

In a final, utterly despairing shriek, it blasted apart into a rain of blood.

‘The dominion of rivers and mountains, the wrath of a common man.’

Zhu Yiyan, hair disheveled, looked like a demon possessed.

‘My Zhu family’s millennium of dominance — how could it be inferior to yours...’

His shriek had not yet ended when a fist shadow arrived.

The lord of a vast domain, with grandiose ambitions, dissipated in the wind above the old capital.

The courtyard door creaked open, and a figure walked in and stood before the withered tree.

‘It’s over?’

‘So sure that I would win?’

‘Of course.’

‘No backup plan, really?’

‘There is. If you had lost, I would have entered the Yellow Millet Dream and fought another round with his Zhu family’s dominion.’

The old man smiled: ‘But now it seems I can finally let go of this breath.’

‘Since entering the Yellow Millet Dream means you can live, why must you let go?’

‘I must die. I was once afraid I would be reluctant to leave, so I needed you to hold the blade. But now that death is near, it seems not so hard to accept.’

Li Jun smiled upon hearing this: ‘Old Zhang, you really aren’t good at arithmetic.’

I have said it many times, but no one is willing to believe.

Their eyes met, and both were mute without a word.

“Why would you help me?”

After a long silence, Zhang Fengyue was the first to break it, asking softly.

“Because I can understand you.”

Li Jun sat down on the ground, so the old man no longer had to raise his gaze.

“When did you see it clearly?”

“From the moment you asked me whether I wanted to be a god or a man.”

“You trust me?”

“Because I could kill you.”

The unexpected answer made the old man laugh heartily.

“You reckless brute.”

Zhang Fengyue’s eyes dimmed: “If I could have been like you, perhaps so many people wouldn’t have died.”

“There are still many alive.”

Li Jun asked: “You leave behind such a broken world and go. Who will clean up this mess?”

“Who can achieve perfection? I have done my part; the rest will naturally be done by others.”

Zhang Fengyue shook his head gently: “Yang Baize, Zhao Qingxia, Chen Qisheng, Zou Sijiu—so many people, sparks of fire everywhere. Why would they need this withered bone of mine to light the way?”

“Not me?”

“Would you care?”

Li Jun was taken aback, then laughed to himself.

Yes, how could he possibly care?

“You have been a thug, a tyrant, a kindler, a revolutionary. At this point, shouldn’t you become a king or an ancestor? What is the second of the Solitary Sequence called, the common master of the world?”

“Common ancestor?”

Li Jun gave a wry smile: “I cannot bear that title.”

“Yes, neither of us has the qualification.”

Li Jun’s gaze trembled, and he saw that old man’s expression was half a smile.

“Old man Zhang, you’re really no good, damn it.”

“How could a good person have lived until now? Only the wicked have the right to stink through the ages.”

Zhang Fengyue’s eyes were fading: “My story has ended, yours has just begun. Where will you go next?”

“Beyond the Great Ming.”

Li Jun seemed to have the answer ready in his heart.

“Is your jianghu there too?”

“Where there are people, there is jianghu.”

“I wish I could go there with you, but there’s no chance now.”

Zhang Fengyue nodded with a smile: “Then we say goodbye?”

“Until we meet again.”

Li Jun nodded as well: “Give my regards to all those old fellows.”

“We have been watching you all along.”

Zhang Fengyue’s eyes suddenly flashed with light. He raised his head and gazed afar, letting out a long cry: “The bleak autumn wind blows again, but the world has finally changed!”

Li Jun whirled around; the distant sky was growing bright.

The night receded, and the sun rose again as always.

(The End of the Book)