Chapter 664: Autumn Kill
By the stream beside the Old Temple in Xining Town, the starry sky was obscured, leaving everything dark and silent.
The Divine Soul of the Heavenly Sea Saintess hovered between heaven and earth, the occasional stars that peeked through seeming like ornaments on her sleeves. She looked down from on high at the monk in the stream, her expression indifferent, as if gazing upon an ant.
The stream bank was quiet. The solitary peak in the mist was also quiet, now nearly deathly still.
On the surface of the still water, fragments of burning blood lotuses floated. The monk’s body was also covered in many blood lotus fragments. His robe was torn, his flesh split, and holy light bloomed like flowers.
An indescribable divine might descended from the heavens, crushing the holy light radiating from the monk until it was no brighter than a firefly.
Amid the fading holy light, the monk’s expression grew increasingly serene. Severely wounded by the Divine Soul of the Heavenly Sea Saintess, he was drenched in blood, his face covered in it. Yet in his calm eyes, there was no other emotion—only pity.
Who was he pitying? This world he had not returned to for so long? That distant foreign continent? His people?
No. At this moment, he was looking at the Heavenly Sea Saintess. The pity in his eyes was for her.
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In Luoyang City, the Calculation Daoist was also looking at the Heavenly Sea Saintess.
The night was filled with mist everywhere, like a fairyland or a realm of the dead. There was no trace of her figure.
Her supreme Daoist art manifested within the mist, taking the form of a phoenix that tore through the void.
The mist phoenix’s talons landed on his Dao sword, and its beak, like lightning, pecked at his face.
Countless lines covered his face, each line representing a principle of the world.
As the mist phoenix’s sharp beak descended, a sound tinged with fear echoed from the highest reaches of the night sky.
Clear light scattered, Daoist arts shattered, and the lines on his face twisted like wrinkles, like old wood. Blood emerged from the void and splattered into the night.
The Calculation Daoist looked at this mist phoenix, his face expressionless—no vigilance, no pity, only calm.
This extreme calm was terrifying, for he looked at it as if it were already dead.
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Outside the Heavenly Book Mausoleum, the southern part of the capital had become a vast expanse of water. Countless debris, trash, and corpses floated on the filthy surface.
His Holiness the Pope stood in the accumulated water, letting the filthy liquid soak past his knees and wet his sacred robe. His face was pale, almost transparent, and the wrinkles on it made him look especially sorrowful.
Holding that pot of green leaves, his gaze crossed the sea of lotuses surrounding the mausoleum and landed on the figure atop the peak.
The vast starry sea in the Pope’s eyes dimmed rapidly from shock, then grew even more sorrowful.
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By the stream beside the Old Temple in Xining Town, the starlight suddenly brightened by several degrees. The stream water brightened as well and began to flow.
The treetops on the bank swayed in the gentle night breeze. Blood lotus fragments fell from the monk’s body onto the stream’s surface, continuing to burn before slowly turning to ash.
Everything shifted from stillness to motion, starting from the moment the starlight suddenly brightened.
There was still not much sound between heaven and earth. The countless lives within the solitary peak in the mist prostrated themselves on the ground, trembling, not daring to look toward the stream bank. Naturally, they did not know why the starlight had grown brighter.
The starlight brightened because a crack had appeared in the figure spanning heaven and earth, allowing some of the hidden stars to emerge.
The crack was enormous, large enough to hold several peaks. Seen from the ground, it looked as if a great gash had been torn in the night sky.
Starlight spilled out from that great gash, looking like blood.
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In Luoyang City.
The Daoist temple had been reduced to ruins.
The Calculation Daoist stood before the ruins. The countless lines on his face were now bent or even snapped, making him look like a ruin as well.
His face still showed no expression. He simply gazed quietly at the phoenix appearing in the mist.
The mist phoenix’s wings were fully spread, spanning two long streets. As they fluttered, eaves shattered and stones flew, then everything stopped.
The lightning in the night sky vanished without a trace. The phoenix’s beak left the Dao sword. In its eyes, a hint of fracture could faintly be seen.
Perhaps it was because a great gash had appeared in the center of the mist phoenix’s body, beneath its two wings.
White mist, scorching mist, freezing mist—all slowly flowed out from that great gash, looking like blood.
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Atop the Heavenly Book Mausoleum peak.
That green leaf left the surface of the Heavenly Book Stele, slowly and heavily retreating into the night, like a bird severely wounded and unable to fly.
Only a very few could see that the green leaf was grievously damaged. Two-thirds of its surface had shattered, held together only by thin veins, looking utterly pitiful.
No one looked at the green leaf. Everyone was staring at the Heavenly Sea Saintess, shocked into silence.
The Heavenly Sea Saintess gazed toward Xining Town, ten thousand miles away, then toward Luoyang City, and finally toward the capital. A faint trace of bewilderment appeared in her stunning phoenix eyes, then shifted into a hint of pain.
Her black phoenix wings had already spread, slowly swaying behind her.
That sea of lotuses, those flowers, that ancient aura—all had surged toward her moments ago, only to be swept beyond the nine heavens by her black phoenix wings.
Even at that moment, when she was unleashing her most powerful techniques to counter the strongest attacks of three saints, she had still held back a trump card, refusing to give her enemies any chance to exploit a weakness.
But she had not expected that the couple Bie Yanghong and Wuqiong Bi, who had struck with the resolve to die, were still not the enemies’ final move.
More precisely, she had not anticipated who the final enemy truly was.
The faint bewilderment and pain in her eyes vanished in the next instant, leaving only indifference.
She looked down at her own body.
An iron spear had pierced through her, tearing a great gash in her abdomen.
The iron spear looked ordinary, its surface unadorned, pitch black.
Naturally, this was no ordinary iron spear—how else could it have pierced her body?
Blood gushed from the great gash, like mist, like starlight.
The iron spear began to burn, scattering countless intoxicating star fragments while emitting a profound, killing intent.
The Heavenly Sea Saintess looked down at the iron spear piercing her body and said, “Is this Autumn Kill?”
Without waiting for an answer, she continued with a hint of emotion, “It’s been many years since I last saw it.”
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Whether it was the Heavenly Sea Saintess atop the Heavenly Book Mausoleum or everyone below, all knew that this iron spear was the Frost Remnant Divine Spear, the foremost of the Hundred Weapons.
What the Heavenly Sea Saintess called “Autumn Kill” was naturally not the spear’s name.
It was the spear technique of the Frost Remnant Divine Spear, the supreme divine art that Emperor Taizong had wielded when he dominated the world.
After Emperor Taizong returned to the starry sea, the Frost Remnant Divine Spear had been hidden in the imperial palace. As for Autumn Kill, it had never again appeared in the mortal world.
Until tonight, finally brought to light in Han Qing’s hands.
So it turned out that this iron spear of life and death had not gone to the depths of the lotus sea, nor between the green leaves, nor to the ancient temple in the old capital, nor to that old temple ten thousand miles away.
The iron spear had gone to the top of the Heavenly Book Mausoleum.
To kill the Heavenly Sea.
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(I have to go out tomorrow and won’t be able to write until very late, so the update will come in the deep night. I’m informing everyone in advance.)