Chapter 308: Unfinished Role
As if someone had KAMEHAMEHAed, a massive light beam devoured the lich, disintegrating the undead lord into dust.
As for Liu Bian, he didn't have a chance to utter a word. Because of Lu Fengxian, he suddenly could not use his Qi, take out items from his inventory, or ask his dao god sponsors for help. The light slowly burnt him to charcoal.
Ding
[Your sponsor said, "Thank you for completing your role. I appreciate your service. Now, it's time for me to claim my prize."]
["Oh, be a good bait for me. Thanks again for doing business! I won't be seeing you again!"]
Ding
[Kishin Douji has terminated his support.]
[Yuan Hua has terminated her support.]
[Your sponsor has stolen all your Qi!]
[Your sponsor has stolen all LUCK in your soul meridian!]
[Your sponsor has stolen all items in your system inventory!]
[Your sponsor has injected your empty heavenly fate piece with unknown energy!]
[Your sponsor has tried to steal your system!]
[The system has been merged with your soul. Your sponsor failed!]
Ding
[Your sponsor complains, "Ah, you little shit. Why did you have to merge that shitty system with your soul!? Anyway, I'm done with you."]
[Your sponsor has terminated his support.]
"NOOOOOO!!"
Liu Bian's heart sank. At long last, he realized that he was tricked.
It was too late for him to beg Miaomiao and others for mercy. The Star Light Breaker burnt his blood and dantian, slowly disintegrating him into ash.
At the last moment, a hand grabbed Liu Bian's neck and pulled him into a shadow pocket dimension world.
…
Wang Yun pulled the half-dead Liu Bian from his shadow. Then, he glanced at the death knights.
"Order them to stop, and I'll spare your life."
"…"
Liu Bian's consciousness was fading, but he was sober enough to think for his life. He ordered the death knights in his mind.
300 remaining death knights stopped moving. They reformed ranks, standing attention and facing Wang Yun and Jia Shan's group.
Ju Shoufen reverted back to her human form and panted. Then, she glared at the Caucasian man, who had revealed his true appearance during the fight.
"Why are you saving this asshole!? He's the cause of all this!?"
"We can't kill him."
"I GIVE YOU 10 BREATHS TO EXPLAIN! OTHERWISE, WE'LL KILL YOU RIGHT HERE!"
Jia Shan and Ma Ping pointed their weapons at Wang Yun. They, too, had the same question.
Wang Yun frowned and sighed. He decided to reveal his motive, "Liu Bian carries the Liu Hong's bloodline. We need it to unlock the true dimensional portal to the royal clan's treasury."
The elders were surprised. They widened their eyes for a moment before their eyes reddened in anger.
"SO YOU'VE BEEN HELPING THIS SNOTTY BRAT BECAUSE OF THE TREASURES!?"
"Stop yelling, please. Anyway, what if I tell you that it relates to the secrets of Immortal Liu Ji, the patriarch of the Holy Land's Liu Clan?"
Jia Shan and Ma Ping squinted their eyes. They patted Ju Shoufen, stopping her from doing anything drastic.
Ma Ping faced Wang Yun, "What secret? Unless it's worth it, we will kill both you and Liu Bian here."
"Alright, alright. This might take a while. For now, can we leave this plane first? The environment and the death Qi around here is suffocating."
The elders nodded. They escorted Wang Yun and the half-dead boy to the center of the low plain.
…
Meanwhile, Lu Fengxian and Ma Moxi were out of breath. They flew toward the nearest south mountain range and collapsed.
Hua Xiong landed next to Lu Fengxian, watching over his new boss.
Ku'er, who had been observing the battle from afar, rejoined the group. She reverted back to her Loli Miko form and sat next to Ma Moxi.
As for Miaomiao, he flew toward the location where the lich was turned into dust. Then, he picked the green staff that the lich had been using.
It was still glittering in green light.
Without saying anything, Miaomiao stored the staff in his system inventory and regrouped with the boys. As soon as he landed on the mountaintop where Ma Moxi had been resting, the former also collapsed on his back.
"Ugh, I'm fucking tired."
Ma Moxi's face distorted, "You hardly fought today. How come you're tired? I should be the one complaining since I soloed that Lich for several minutes!"
"Try shooting SLB back-to-back as I did. Do you know how many liters of Essence I wasted?"
"No clue. How many?"
"Two freaking billions liters."
"Get outa here. My dantian can store 10 billion liters, but I could hardly gather a billion liters! How the hell did you procure so much essence!?"
"I ate a lot of essence cores."
"You… used essence cores to refill your essence!? Why didn't you use pills!? It's a lot cheaper and more efficient!"
"Because I'm batman."
"…"
Ma Moxi sighed and laid on his back, looking at the starless sky, "Pay to win bastard."
"I'm your boss, and your clan is still working for me. Do you still want your next month's pay!?"
Ma Moxi jumped on his knees and prostrated to Miaomiao, "Your Majesty is rich, handsome, talented, and has big dicks! This lowly idiotic servant begs your forgiveness. Thank you for your afford that we could defeat the evil undead monster with your charismatic and your graceful beam attack. We are forever grateful for your hard work!"
"…"
Miaomiao had the urge to punch Ma Moxi to the face. He didn't know if this assassin was being sarcastic or he was just a shameless bootlicker.
Looking at this comedic duo, Lu Fengxian snickered, "You two are something. I've never seen younger generation geniuses as strong as you two. I'm wondering how many guys in the Holy Land will be shocked to hear that you killed an 8th-stage lich with your current cultivation base."
Hua Xiong also stared at these youngsters, who were still catching their breath. He also admired their strength and believable potential.
Miaomiao ignored the compliment. He inhaled every type of Qi in the air into his dantian to collect a sample. Then, he exhaled the excess Qi out of his body.
Ding
[Your talisman blessing has expired.]
As soon as the talisman buff had expired, the death Qi strand, the shadow element Qi strand, the poison element Qi, and the wind element Qi strand started running amok inside his dantian. Fortunately, Miaomiao only kept one of each, so he easily stored them inside his secondary dantian space.
They would be useful in the future after Miaomiao restored his Life Essence.
"Master, how many liters of life essence do you think I used just now? Don't lump me together with the Holy Land genies. I was cheating back then."
"Cheat?" Lu Fengxian burst into laughter. He had read Miaomiao's mind and understood what the latter meant by cheating. As for Ma Moxi and Hua Xiong, they had no clue what Miaomiao was talking about.
"If having several essence seas and a large dantian capacity is cheating, nothing in the immortal and god realms is fair! Everyone has one or two specialties, trump cards, or unique skills. You are born with a massive pocket dimensional dantian, and you know how to utilize them. I see nothing wrong with that."
"Then, what do you consider CHEATING as a cultivator's ability?"
Miaomiao wondered if Lu Fengxian had a heart devil or fought someone with special abilities. Previously when Miaomiao read Lu Fengxian's memory, he didn't have enough time to explore everything. Moreover, intruding into this protagonist's memory on a whim might offend the dude.
"Cheating, eh? I would say… Time and Space Law. In an ancient legend from one of the god realms I had visited, a great demon practiced the Law of Space and Time. He could control the flow of time and even reverse it."
"…"
The story reminded Miaomiao of Xie Tian. That dead protagonist's final form would definitely be able to stop or reverse time for sure.
"The ability to manipulate time and space, that's the CHEATIEST and DIRTIEST ability that I can think of. If I were to fight a time cultivator, I would have lost 10 out of 10 times. There's no counter to that."
Miaomiao glanced at Killer Queen, who was still draining Lu Fengxian's life essence like a bloodsucking leech. Strangely, Lu Fengxian allowed her to do as she pleased.
Lu Fengxian noticed Miaomiao's sight. He glanced at the katana and chuckled, "Oh, this sentient katana? Yeah, although I said that there was no counter to time-and-space ability, a glutton weapon like her could probably counter it if the time-cultivator was still a mortal. But if she were to fight against an immortal, she had no chance."
"…"
KQ stopped drinking Lu Fengxian's Life Essence. Then, she returned to Miaomiao's side and threw a tantrum.
[How dare he underestimate my outstanding abilities!? The Great Me is beyond the norm! As long as that time-cultivator is in my range, I can easily empty his dantian and disable the time ability!]
"…"
Miaomiao had a wry smile on his face. KQ might have successfully stopped Xie Tian's time-reversal skill in the past, but she might not be able to absorb Essence and Elemental Qi from stronger experts fast enough to deactivate the time skill. After all, most seventh-stage cultivators had more Elemental Qi than him, and they could store their essence in their nascent soul as a backup like how Jia Shan did.
"Anyway, let's go home," Lu Fengxian drank another mouthful of unified hollowed spring water to recover his stamina.
Ma Moxi and Miaomiao did the same. They dragged their tattered bodies toward the exit at the low land.
Nobody could see Miaomiao's deep frown. While Lu Fengxian led the group to the exit, the former was checking his system menu and his system messages.
Dion didn't confirm that Liu Bian had been killed. The campaign quest was still ongoing!
Miaomiao tried to recall what had happened to Liu Bian.
'It definitely burnt him to ash, but how is he alive? Dion, can you confirm if he's alive?'
Ding
[Liu Bian is still alive.]
Protagonists were cockroach-like creatures because of annoying plot armor power, and Miaomiao had enough of it.
Thinking of plot armor, Miaomiao's SECOND brain started questioning why plot armor existed in novels.
Plot Armor, as if implied, was the absolute protection of main characters for the future plots in the story as the character's role had not been fulfilled yet.
When Miaomiao fought against Xie Tian, the latter's role served as a tutorial sandbag for him to beat and learn about the campaign quest's difficulties. After Miaomiao had stripped all Xie Tian's usefulness, the latter became vulnerable and killable.
In Liu Bian's case, his survival might imply that Liu Bian's existence was still useful or impactful enough to continue another plotline, such as a reason for his existence, his role, his influence, or his character's purposes.
'Tsk!'
Miaomiao hated this. He started to hate plot armor and the unreasonable luck of protagonists.
"What you're thinking about, Miaomiao? Your killing intent is leaking."
Lu Fengxian turned around and gave Miaomiao a disapproval look. Their eyes met, and the former read Miaomiao's mind again.
"I see. So you've sensed that Liu Bian is still alive, and you're pissed. Don't worry. I'm pissed, too. But I have a piece of good news for you. It seems that the elders have caught Liu Bian for us. We'll know what they're going to do with him when we return."
Unlike Miaomiao, Lu Fengxian was an embodiment of the alpha and the omega, aka the perfect Gary Stu that knew everything.
When Wang Yun saved Liu Bian, Lu Fengxian noticed it and eavesdropped on their conversation. Yet, he kept the info to himself as he was interested in the treasure trove of Liu Hong, the father of Liu Bian and Liu Xie.
Hearing that Liu Bian had been captured, Miaomiao was relieved. For a moment there, he thought that Liu Bian had used a random teleportation talisman or something.
With nothing to worry about, the group peacefully left the plane.
…
Luo Cheng, Luo Song, Liu Xie, and the succubi managed to leave the realm earlier than Miaomiao and the elder's group. They had been waiting on top of Liu Bian's pylon tower.
When Ma Ping and Lu Fengxian's gangs came out of the portal, they cheered and welcomed their return.
But as soon as they noticed the charred body of Liu Bian, who had reverted back into a boy, they glared at the ex-prince, wanting to tear him into pieces and feed the zombies below the tower.
Wang Yun looked at everyone as he had a lot to explain.
"For a starter, can we go back to the surface?"
Ma Ping and Jia Shan still pointed their weapons at Wang Yun's neck, "Sure. But first, we need to seal your meridians."
"… Fine."
Ma Ping pressed Wang Yun's acupuncture points with his fingers, sealing the latter's Qi circulation channels.
After Wang Yun was sealed, the group dragged the two prisoners to their guesthouse. Hua Xiong, Ku'er, Ju Shoufen, Ma Moxi, and others followed behind the elders as they were curious why they spared these two shadow element users.
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