Chapter 36 - Villain is Dead
The Earth Emperor's Mysterious Flame awoke with a wrath that sundered comprehension—a primal force unbound, its golden heart pulsing with the fury of a long-dead god resurrected in fire and ruin. In one searing heartbeat, it erupted, a maelstrom of fiery tongues unfurling like the jagged maw of a ravenous beast, intent on swallowing Qin Ting whole.
The blaze roared with a voice older than time, a cacophony of crackling embers and howling winds that drowned out all semblance of reason or mercy. Its heat was an entity unto itself—a living, breathing thing that clawed at the world with molten talons, leaving nothing but desolation in its wake.
The catalyst for this apocalyptic awakening was Ye Qiu's teal fire petal strike—a deadly bloom of energy, delicate yet lethal, that pierced the Strange Flame's core like a barbed thorn plunged deep into flesh. The strike shattered its fragile equilibrium, a violation of its ancient sanctity that unleashed a torrent of retribution.
The underground palace quaked as the inferno surged forth, its ferocity so intense that the air itself seemed to scream in protest, warping and twisting under unbearable pressure. Ancient stone, etched with the wisdom of forgotten epochs, melted into rivulets of glowing slag that pooled across the cracked floor, steaming and hissing as it congealed into grotesque shapes.
Above the chaos, the treasure pagoda's protective aura flickered—an intricate array of white light that had once stood as a bastion of divine resilience. Now, it strained under the relentless onslaught, its radiant lattice buckling.
For a fleeting moment, it held—a fragile defiance against the tide of destruction—but then it shattered entirely, its sacred glow devoured by the insatiable golden blaze that surged upward with a hunger that knew no bounds.
To the onlookers huddled at the chamber's edges, their breaths stolen by terror, it appeared as though the fire had consumed both man and treasure in its merciless embrace. Qin Ting's silhouette—once a figure of unyielding arrogance and power—vanished into the heart of the golden storm, swallowed by its churning depths.
No cry rose above the inferno's deafening roar, no sign of struggle or resistance; only silence lingered where his presence had once dominated, a void as profound as the grave itself.
The secret chamber trembled under the relentless assault, its walls groaning like a wounded beast in its final throes. The air grew thick with the scent of molten metal, a blistering shockwave tearing through the space with a sulfuric bite that clawed at the throat and seared the lungs.
Debris swirled in a chaotic dance, illuminated by the flickering light of the flames, casting eerie shadows that writhed like specters.
Then came the detonation—a thunderous boom that split the silence like a cannon's retort, its force so violent it seemed to rend the fabric of reality itself. From the epicenter rose a pillar of golden flame, wild and untamed, piercing the heavens in a blinding surge that illuminated the subterranean depths with an unholy brilliance.
The towering blaze vaporized stone and steel in its ascent, reducing centuries-old architecture to ash and vapor. The sky above shattered under its fury, shards of blackened rubble raining down like the tears of a broken god, hissing as they struck the ground, trails of smoke curling upward like the departing spirits of the slain.
The blast's reverberation clawed at the firmament, its tremors rippling outward to shake the ancient foundations of the Lian Yun Mountain Range—a sprawling expanse of jagged peaks and shadowed valleys whispered to cradle the bones of the Earth Emperor himself.
He was a sovereign of legend, a figure whose flames had once forged empires from the raw chaos of the world, only to reduce them to nothing when his wrath turned inward. The mountains bore the scars of his reign, their crags and fissures a testament to a power that had shaped the land and then abandoned it to silence—until now.
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Hundreds of miles away, Backridge City quaked as though stirred by the careless hand of a titan roused from slumber. Its jade-tiled towers—elegant spires that pierced the sky with their gleaming beauty—swayed precariously, their bells tolling in a discordant dirge that drowned out the cries of the city's inhabitants.
Dust cascaded from fractured rooftops, cloaking the streets in a choking haze as the ground shuddered beneath the weight of an unseen force.
"What's happening?!" a merchant shouted from the crowded streets below, his voice sharp with panic as he shielded his eyes from the falling debris. His cart of spirit herbs rattled violently, jars clinking and shattering as the tremors intensified.
The air buzzed with murmurs of fear, a rising tide of confusion that swept through the throng like wildfire.
"An earthquake?" a young woman gasped, her voice trembling as she clutched a splintering railing on a nearby balcony. Cracks spread through the cobblestones below, jagged lines racing outward as though the earth itself sought to tear free from its foundations.
"No—look!" An elder in crimson robes shot skyward, his ascent swift and urgent, propelled by a surge of qi that shimmered around him like a crimson halo.
A dozen others joined him, their forms hovering like startled cranes against the chaotic backdrop of the heavens. Their gazes locked on the distant horizon, where the underground palace had transformed into a hellish void—a relentless sea of fire that devoured all in its path, its glow painting the clouds above with streaks of amber and violet, a palette of destruction that defied the natural order.
"How... how could this be?" one whispered, his voice a fragile thread nearly lost to the inferno's guttural howl. His gnarled hands trembled as he gripped his staff, its tip glowing faintly with protective runes that flickered in the face of such overwhelming power.
His weathered face, etched with the lines of countless years, paled as he stared into the abyss of flame, his mind racing to comprehend the cataclysm unfolding before him.
"The Earth Emperor's Mysterious Flame... has it really come into being?!" he murmured, his voice barely audible, a whisper swallowed by the wind. "This is no mere natural disaster! The legends foretold its awakening only under a master's will—or its destruction beneath a fool's arrogance."
His eyes narrowed, sharp and searching, as he scanned the distant blaze for a sign—any hint of the power stirring within its depths, any clue to the fate of those caught in its grasp.
Far away, in a crooked tower perched precariously on the city's edge, a grizzled alchemist peered through a cracked spyglass, its lens fogged with age and disuse.
His breath hitched, a ragged sound escaping his lips as he muttered to himself, "This phenomenon... it rivals the Earth Emperor's passing, when the skies wept ash for a hundred days and the land mourned in silence."
His fingers tightened around the spyglass, knuckles whitening as memories flooded back—tales etched in the dusty tomes that lined his cluttered shelves, stories of the Earth Emperor, a figure of myth whose flame could forge mountains from stone or reduce them to ash with a single breath.
That power, untamed since his reign faded into shadow eons ago, now seemed to pulse once more, alive and wrathful.
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Within the underground palace's collapsing heart, chaos reigned supreme. The walls groaned under the strain, their ancient runes—carved by hands long turned to dust—flaring briefly with defiant light before succumbing to the heat. The symbols melted into slag, their secrets lost forever to the fire's insatiable hunger, leaving behind only the echo of their once-potent magic.
Desperate to protect himself and his newfound ally, Ye Qiu drew upon the final vestiges of his spiritual energy, his body trembling with the effort. With a strained gasp that rasped against his parched throat, he summoned the Eternal Song Mysterious Flame once more—a fire as teal as the bloom of twilight, its flickering tongues coiling and dancing with an ethereal grace.
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Under his faltering command, it wove itself into a radiant, shimmering barrier, a wall of flame that divided the chamber in two. One half shielded the battlefield where Nie You, Elder Liu, and Jiang Zhongbai clashed in their furious melee; the other contained the Earth Emperor's Mysterious Flame, its golden fury tearing apart Qin Ting's corner of the hall with unrelenting force.
The air thickened with the bitter shroud of charred spirit essence, a stinging miasma that clung to the lungs and blurred the vision.
Ye Qiu's laughter erupted suddenly, wild and jagged, ricocheting off the fractured walls like the shattering of a thousand mirrors. "Hahahaha! Qin Ting's finished! Scorched to cinders—reduced to ash and nothing more! Gone at last, that wretched snake—hahaha!" His voice splintered with raw, manic exhilaration, trembling under the weight of a loathing finally unleashed.
His blood-streaked face burned with a feverish ecstasy, twisted into a grin that bared his teeth like a predator savoring the death throes of its prey. His eyes blazed with the savage thrill of vengeance fulfilled, every fiber of his being thrumming with a dark, intoxicating joy—the best he'd felt in months, a euphoric release as the man he despised beyond reason met his end by Ye Qiu's own hand.
He staggered forward, kicking a smoldering chunk of debris out of his path with a disdainful sneer. His plain white robes, once a symbol of purity, hung in tattered rags, their edges scorched and curling with ash.
"Did you see it, Zhongbai? The mighty Qin Ting—obliterated in an instant! My Buddha's Wrathful Lotus was perfect!" His chest heaved with ragged breaths, his voice drenched in exultation as he basked in his triumph, oblivious to the tremor coursing through his hands.
Beside him, Jiang Zhongbai stood motionless, a cold, serpentine smirk curving his lips. His shoulders relaxed, the burden of years slipping away like a discarded skin—he was free at last, unshackled from the lingering shadow of his waning influence within the sect.
"Indeed," he murmured, his voice a velvet caress laced with quiet malice, "a fitting end for such an arrogant bastard." With a deliberate flick, he swept the ash from his shoulder, as though erasing Qin Ting's very existence. His dark eyes glittered, satisfaction curling through them like smoke, an artist savoring the final, perfect stroke of his masterpiece.
Elder Liu lay sprawled on the ground, his body wracked with agony from Jiang Zhongbai's relentless onslaught. His robes were shredded and frayed, much like the state of his battered form. Fractures laced his bones, internal bleeding sapped his strength, burns marred his skin, and deep gashes oozed crimson.
He was no match for a Divine Platform Realm expert, being a full realm lower. Even with Nie You's support, Jiang Zhongbai had proven an insurmountable foe, armed with countless hidden trump cards.
Yet, as pain gnawed at his broken body, Elder Liu's thoughts were far from his own injuries. His eyes were fixed on the raging golden inferno where Qin Ting had once stood. Dread slithered into his gut like a leaden serpent, constricting tighter with every passing moment.
'Is Nephew Qin... gone? No, it cannot be!' The words echoed through his mind, disbelief mingling with a rising tide of terror, each thought a violent storm pounding his resolve.
Even if Qin Ting had escaped the inferno, the Xuantian Sect's wrath would be unrelenting. To fail in safeguarding both the young master and the Strange Flame was to invite a grim reckoning—banishment to the lightless mines of the Black Hollow, where men withered into husks, crushed beneath the weight of eternal night, their spirits consumed by the ceaseless dark.
Alternatively, a swift blade might find his throat, his blood spilled as a scarlet penance for the Qin Family's dishonor. His jaw clenched, his resolve trembling like a dying ember adrift in the ashes of fear.
On his part, Nie You's mind shattered the moment he saw his young master's silhouette vanish, swallowed whole by the roaring inferno of golden flames. It happened on his watch, the weight of that failure clawing at the frayed threads of his sanity until they snapped.
"You deserve death! Every last one of you—I'll tear you to pieces with my bare hands!" His voice erupted, a guttural bellow that clawed its way up from the blackened depths of his soul, forged in grief and unbridled fury. Each word dripped with rancor, his wrath a living thing, threatening to consume everything in its path.
He hurled himself forward, abandoning all restraint, shadows coiling around his fists as they lashed out in a storm of reckless vengeance. Each blow landed like a shadow burst, cloaked in tendrils of darkness that shook the ground beneath him, his black robes billowing—torn and singed—as ribbons of inky void trailed behind him.
He charged Ye Qiu like a beast unchained, the air thickening with an oppressive, light-devouring gloom.
Elder Liu bared his teeth, leaping into the fray with a feral snarl. 'If I'm to die, I'll carve my name into their corpses first!' His blade slashed through the air, a crescent of silver light born of defiance that burned brighter than the flames licking at the chamber's walls.
The strike collided with a teal energy palm Ye Qiu hurled toward him, metal clashing against qi in a crescendo of screeching sparks. The chamber reverberated with the violent impact. Yet, despite Ye Qiu's faltering strength, Elder Liu was no match.
The clash ended with inevitability as the energy shattered his defense, sending him flying. His fingers, battered by the devastating force, splintered as pain shot through his already frail frame.
Jiang Zhongbai's smirk widened, a glint of cruel delight sparking in his eyes. Qin Ting's death was a blessing—a flawless shroud to conceal his treachery.
His eyes darted to Nie You and Elder Liu, his mind already spinning their downfall. 'With Qin Ting gone, silencing these two will secure my victory. And Ye Qiu? A loose end better cut away, now that his usefulness has run its course...'
His sneer deepened into something predatory as he stepped back, fingers tracing the hilt of a concealed dagger—its blade etched with runes of binding and death, a tool honed for silent ends.