God-Tier Villain

Chapter 81: Chapter 81

"Things just rarely go the way you want, and I don’t want to carry the infamy of murdering my teacher."

"So, Master, please take back everything you taught me."

Basil dropped into a whirlpool of hesitation.

He’d trusted Emperor Grant completely, how could a proud Upper-Tier Human Emperor do such things, fawn over Soren, agree to be his claw and betray humanity?

But this disciple of his never lied. No one understood Lysara better than Basil.

"Palace Master Basil, why aren’t you fighting at full strength?"

"With your cultivation, beating Lysara should be nothing!"

"Don’t tell me you can’t bring yourself to cut down a traitor to humanity?"

The voices came one after another from behind Neal.

Losing patience, Neal bowed slightly toward the old man in the conical hat on his left. "Master Caspar, please act."

"Soren has to be eradicated."

A faint, almost invisible smile hung at the corners of Neal’s mouth, tilting toward sinister.

Caspar cut him a sideways glance and let out a snort too quiet for the others to catch, some disdain in it toward Neal. But in the end he stepped into the void.

The Demon-Subduing Pestle in his hand began to bloom with golden light. "Demon Emperor, surrender quietly."

"This old man may spare your life."

Soren felt like he’d just heard a joke, he uncrossed his arms, demonic energy coiling around him. "Interesting."

"Spare my life?"

Caspar lifted the conical hat off, revealing a face of transcendent, immortal bearing. His face and forehead were covered in intricate golden runes that flickered in time with the pestle. With every flicker, a unique holy energy came off it.

The ripples of that energy could actually suppress the demonic might pouring off Soren.

Soren found the fluctuation familiar, scenes flashed through his mind and froze on the six divine maidens of his Six Paths Form Diagram.

That was it, the fluctuation matched the one coming off the six Dao Lords.

Only, the divine power off Caspar’s pestle was less than a ten-thousandth of what a single Dao Lord gave off, maybe lower.

For a human, drawing out holy divine power through a special artifact was already impressive.

Caspar held the pestle in one hand and formed a seal with the other, looking at Soren calmly. "Indeed."

"I need only trap you inside the Demon-Subduing Pestle."

"You will listen to my preaching to cleanse your heart, wearing down your sharp edges and your murderous intent."

"Once I judge you thoroughly reformed, I’ll release you."

He wanted to trap Soren in there and make him listen to chanting every day until his soul was purified before letting him out.

"If you refuse to surrender quietly..."

"...I also know a bit of martial arts."

This old guy really loved to put on airs.

"Master Caspar, why waste words with him?" Neal urged.

Caspar could see Soren had no intention of surrendering, he let out a sigh, his voice echoing as if from an ancient era.

"The Great Dao is boundless. There is always a heaven beyond the heavens."

"Heed my advice and keep your life."

"Resist stubbornly, and justice will be done. Go!"

Caspar threw the pestle into the air.

It hung high overhead, spinning fast, mysterious golden energy unfurling across heaven and earth to a radius of ten thousand miles.

The spread did the human cultivators no harm. It only suppressed the aura coming off Soren.

Caspar charged.

In the very first clash, Soren drove his fist straight into Caspar’s wrist.

The berserk force felt like it shattered bone, Caspar grunted, nearly cried out, and retreated fifteen, twenty meters, arm trembling.

The crowd behind Neal went dead silent.

Soren’s punch wasn’t flashy, but the shock landed hard, Caspar was the legendary Domain Protector, and he’d come off worse in the very first exchange.

"This fiend... he definitely isn’t a Middle-Tier Demon Emperor, is he?"

"Could our intelligence be wrong?"

"But his realm’s clearly only Middle-Tier."

"He might be hiding his real strength."

Soren nudged his demonic energy up a notch, and the pestle’s holy power lost its grip entirely.

No reason to flash his Upper-Tier Demon Emperor cultivation. He didn’t like dragging fights out and would rather steamroll every one of them flat, but he had his own reasons, and now wasn’t the time to cut loose.

On the Strategy Encyclopedia, text woven from Great Dao energy took shape. Soren skimmed it and pulled a few key lines.

[Caspar.]

[Upper-Tier Human Emperor.]

[Eighteenth-generation Domain Protector of the Moonveil Human Domain. Lived in seclusion in Azure Stone Village, on Little Green Mountain, approached by Neal seven days ago.]

[Caspar had a granddaughter who was once attacked by a Witch Beast. Her internal organs were ruptured, leaving Witch Poison in her body. She survived only on specific pills and spiritual fluids. The poison could not be eradicated.]

[Witch Beasts differed from ordinary beast tribes, each one’s toxin had subtle variations, absolutely unique to that beast.]

[To cure the Witch Poison, you had to track down the exact Witch Beast that inflicted the wound and harvest its gall-blood for the antidote, blood from any other beast only worsened the poison. To this day Caspar had never found the one that bit his granddaughter.]

Soren dug through his inherited memories.

The tribe was a strange one, not much combat strength, but every inch steeped in lethal poison.

The poison corroded organs and served as a main ingredient for the Emperor-Severing Incense Poison, most people who encountered a Witch Beast avoided it or killed it from range. Get bitten, and the aftermath never ended.

[Neal had offered Caspar a method to neutralize the Witch Poison and regenerate the ruptured organs.]

[It required a Forbidden Pill. Only Neal held the formula, a forbidden item obtained together with the formula for the Emperor-Severing Incense Poison.]

[The refining cost was astronomical, and Neal used it as a bargaining chip.]

[As long as Caspar emerged from seclusion and served him, Neal promised to refine the pill once Soren was suppressed.]

What a massive coincidence.

Caspar’s granddaughter gets bitten by a Witch Beast, and out of nowhere Neal happens to have a pill formula that neutralizes the poison and regrows organs.

Soren swept the dense sea of data for one thing in particular, he found it fast, and let out a cold snort.