# Chapter 809: Facing the Beautiful Female Ghost King
Zhang Ruochen put on the Meteor Invisibility Cloak, concealed his aura, passed through the Space Gate, and once again appeared in the cold, dark underworld.
Countless huge cracks had appeared on this stretch of land. In some places, the rock had melted, turning into crimson lakes; in other places, areas spanning dozens of miles were completely frozen.
A evenly matched battle at the Saint level had completely destroyed this entire region.
The battle had long since ended, yet residual waves of ghostly qi and Buddhist qi still lingered in the air.
"A battle at the Saint level is truly terrifying. Without a hundred years of recovery, the terrain here probably won't be able to restore itself," Zhang Ruochen sighed inwardly.
In the Kunlun Realm, if a prolonged Saint-level battle broke out, it could turn an area spanning hundreds of miles into a century-long forbidden zone. Any mortal or low-level martial artist who barged in would immediately be killed by the residual Saint qi waves.
He wondered who had ultimately won this battle.
The surroundings were extremely quiet. Only the sound of gusts of yin wind crashing against tombstones could be heard. The Beautiful Female Ghost King and the Heart Technique Buddhist Master should have already retreated.
Zhang Ruochen activated the invisibility power of the Meteor Invisibility Cloak, concealed his aura, and used his movement technique to once again arrive at the shore of the Blood Lake.
This place was the center of the battle, and the residual battle waves were also the most intense here.
Zhang Ruochen looked toward the lake and saw that on the surface of the crimson water, there was actually a blood-colored moon imprint.
Slowly, he raised his head and looked upward.
"How strange. The entire underworld is dark and sunless, with no day or night. How could there be a blood moon?" Zhang Ruochen wondered.
That blood moon was an unknown distance from the ground.
At the very least, Zhang Ruochen was certain that with his current cultivation, he absolutely could not fly that high.
Even stranger was that its light only fell upon the lake surface and did not illuminate anywhere else.
"Whoosh!"
Just as Zhang Ruochen was lost in thought, a freezing cold yin wind blew over from the lake surface.
A hissing sound came from Zhang Ruochen's body. A thin layer of ice formed on his skin, completely encasing his body.
The invisibility power of the Meteor Invisibility Cloak was naturally broken as well.
At a glance, it looked as if a human-shaped ice sculpture had suddenly appeared by the lake.
At some unknown time, a female ghost had appeared on the surface of the Blood Lake. She stood silently on the water, emitting extremely powerful ghostly qi that condensed into a patch of dark red ghost fire clouds.
The female ghost's long hair hung straight down, swaying in the wind. Her blood-colored robe was tattered and torn, revealing her snow-white skin on her chest, abdomen, back, and arms.
That was right.
She actually had skin identical to a human's, not an illusory undead spirit.
Although she was a female ghost, she had an exceptionally beautiful face. Her torn blood robe barely covered her buttocks, leaving her two long, slender jade legs exposed—smooth, round, and firm.
Such a seductively beautiful yet eerie and sinister female ghost was constantly stimulating Zhang Ruochen's nerves.
However, Zhang Ruochen had no lustful thoughts toward her. He had only one thought.
Escape.
Escape as fast as possible.
Because she was that Beautiful Female Ghost King.
Who would have thought she was still near the Blood Lake?
"Chi!"
A powerful fire attribute power surged from within Zhang Ruochen's body. His entire body was enveloped in flames, quickly melting the ice.
The Fire Spirit Treasure Body among the Five Elements Treasure Bodies came in handy at this moment.
When encountering a Ghost King-level existence, one must never delude oneself into thinking of fighting her. Using the power of the Sacred Edict to escape was the only way to survive.
But just as Zhang Ruochen grasped the Sacred Edict in his hand, before he could activate the sacred power within it, his wrist was already entangled by strands of black thread.
No, not black thread—it was the Beautiful Female Ghost King's hair.
The strands of hair carried a chilling ghostly fiendish aura, sharp as blades, cutting through Zhang Ruochen's skin. They continuously tightened, embedding themselves into his flesh.
As soon as blood gushed out, it was immediately absorbed by the strands of hair.
Zhang Ruochen felt a piercing pain in his arm. His blood was continuously being drained, and his wrist felt as if it were about to break.
"How can this be? Don't undead spirits only devour souls? How can they also absorb blood?"
What Zhang Ruochen didn't know was that ordinary undead spirits indeed could not absorb blood. However, a Ghost King could absorb trace amounts of blood to refine their ghostly body.
The higher the quality of the blood, the greater its use to the Ghost King.
The next moment, the Beautiful Female Ghost King had already appeared before Zhang Ruochen, only an inch away from him. A pair of cold, deep, and fierce eyes stared at him from close range.
"Summon Sword."
Zhang Ruochen gritted his teeth, mobilized his sword intent, and summoned the Abyssal Ancient Sword. He executed the Sword Summoning Art, dragging a pitch-black sword light as he slashed toward the Beautiful Female Ghost King.
"Whoosh!"
She merely extended two fingers and caught the Abyssal Ancient Sword. With a casual flick of her arm, the Abyssal Ancient Sword flew toward the Blood Lake, falling onto a small island in the middle of the lake with a loud boom.
"Although your cultivation is a bit low, the quality of your blood is excellent. That means your soul should be quite delicious as well."
The Beautiful Female Ghost King stared at Zhang Ruochen as if she were commenting on a delicious dish, showing no other emotion.
At this moment, Zhang Ruochen was completely suppressed by the Beautiful Female Ghost King's power. He couldn't even mobilize his Saint qi or spiritual power, let alone use the power of time and space.
"Whoosh!"
The Beautiful Female Ghost King's five snow-white fingers became extremely sharp. She pressed them against the top of Zhang Ruochen's head and began to extract his Martial Soul.
At that moment, the image of the old clan leader of the Xu Holy Clan having his Saint Soul extracted by her flashed through Zhang Ruochen's mind, filling him with intense unwillingness.
"No, I absolutely cannot die. I absolutely cannot die here. I still have to return to Ming Emperor City to pay respects to my mother. I still have to take revenge on Chi Yao. I still have to find the truth of eight hundred years ago. How can I die here?"
"I refuse to accept this!"
Zhang Ruochen let out a loud roar.
At that moment, the Divine Mark of the Gods in his Qi Sea violently trembled. It flew out from between his eyebrows, emitting a brilliant divine light that struck the Beautiful Female Ghost King's ghostly body.
"Boom!"
The blood robe on the Beautiful Female Ghost King's body instantly turned to dust. She let out a low, muffled groan and was sent flying backward.
In midair, her ghostly body shattered into pieces, turning into a mass of black ghostly qi.
Immediately afterward, the Divine Mark of the Gods flew back into Zhang Ruochen's Qi Sea, once again imprinting itself on the wall of his Qi Sea and falling silent.
Zhang Ruochen felt as if he had just walked through the gates of hell. He knelt on one knee, supporting himself with one hand on the ground, gasping for breath.
Before he could completely relax, the ghostly qi floating in midair began to rapidly condense again, reforming into the Beautiful Female Ghost King's ghostly body.
The Beautiful Female Ghost King still had her long hair flowing, but she was completely naked, standing in midair without a stitch of clothing.
What?
She still wasn't dead.
Although the Beautiful Female Ghost King had reformed her ghostly body, the aura emanating from her had dropped significantly, nowhere near the overwhelming power she had displayed earlier.
"To think you have the protection of the Divine Mark of the Gods. I underestimated you earlier."
The Beautiful Female Ghost King's ghostly body appeared crystalline and translucent. Every inch of her skin was snow-white and flawless. She was absolutely a breathtaking beauty capable of toppling cities. If she appeared in the Kunlun Realm, she would surely become a goddess pursued by countless heavenly prodigies and outstanding talents.
However, Zhang Ruochen had already witnessed her terror. Even seeing her naked body, he dared not harbor any lustful thoughts.
Zhang Ruochen tightened his grip on the Sacred Edict, fully mobilizing the sacred power within it.
He did not immediately flee because he could sense that the Beautiful Female Ghost King's power was extremely weak, not much stronger than his own.
A bold thought arose in his mind: "If I could capture this Ghost King, I could definitely extract some valuable information from her. For example, the location of the fallen god, the secret of the resurrection medicine, and perhaps even the whereabouts of Qiangu Nüdi?"
The secrets that Wu Chang didn't know, the Ghost King might very well know.
This was a high-stakes gamble. If he could capture her, the rewards would be immense.
If he failed, Zhang Ruochen still had a good chance of escaping. After all, the Beautiful Female Ghost King was not in her strongest state right now but in her weakest.
Zhang Ruochen took a deep breath, dispelling the negative emotions in his heart. He stared at the Beautiful Female Ghost King again and smiled, "If I'm not mistaken, you were already severely injured when you fought with the Heart Technique Buddhist Master of the Dead Zen Sect earlier, weren't you?"
Although the power of the Divine Mark of the Gods was formidable, Zhang Ruochen was still unable to actively mobilize that power. Therefore, the Divine Mark of the Gods could only provide passive defense, and the power it could unleash was very limited. It was impossible for it to disperse the ghostly body of a Ghost King.
There was only one possibility:
The Beautiful Female Ghost King had suffered extremely severe injuries before this.
The reason she wanted to devour Zhang Ruochen's Saint Soul was also to recover from her injuries.
The blood-red moonlight shone upon the Beautiful Female Ghost King's ghostly body, casting a layer of enchanting red over her snow-white skin. Every line of her body was soft and beautiful, enough to take one's breath away.
The Beautiful Female Ghost King's voice was extremely cold. "If he didn't have that kasaya, with ten thousand Buddhist artifacts on it simultaneously unleashing powerful Buddhist power, how could he possibly be my match?"
Zhang Ruochen was secretly shocked. Could it be that the Heart Technique Buddhist Master had brought the Ten Thousand Treasures Kasaya into the underworld?
This was definitely not good news.
The Heart Technique Buddhist Master's cultivation was already monstrously powerful. With the addition of the unmatched Ten Thousand Treasures Kasaya, who could still fight against him?
The Dead Zen Sect's entry into the underworld definitely had a major purpose.
"This human boy has the protection of the Divine Mark of the Gods. His soul must be extremely special. If I can devour his soul, I can definitely recover from my injuries."
"If I can refine the Divine Mark of the Gods within his body, my ghostly body will become even stronger, enough to withstand the next ghost tribulation."
Seeing Zhang Ruochen lost in thought, the Beautiful Female Ghost King's deep eyes emitted two clusters of cyan ghost fire. She turned into a blurry afterimage, extending a pair of lotus-root-like snow-white arms, and attacked Zhang Ruochen once again.