Chapter 38, Trapping a Golden Core’s Avatar

Translator: Tamon

 

Hei Huang saw it working and pushed. “Xu Hei, he roasted your hogs, your goats, your mountain, and your ducks! Where’s the hatred? Where’s the anger?

 

“Are you going to be a stray all your life?” Hei Huang poisoned him, raising his voice.

 

Xu Hei glared. “You’re the stray!”

 

“You get the idea. Now are you going to get revenge or not?” Hei Huang instigated.

 

Xu Hei said, “The odds are too low.”

 

Hei Huang smiled. “That was if I went alone. With you, they’re higher.”

 

Xu Hei pondered. He took out a dark golden scale from the storage bag. “And with this?”

 

It was a scale Xu Hei pulled from his tail and he kept it in the storage bag. As time passed, the scale lost its spiritual nature and sharpness. Only the freshly pulled ones were the toughest.

 

They were sharp weapons all the same. Even this one that he pulled out yesterday was now at half-strength.

 

Hei Huang took it and pricked his paw, drawing blood.

 

“Seventy, no eight percent!” Hei Huang was excited.

 

“I’ll add more depending on the circumstances.” Xu Hei said.

 

“Then it’ll be ninety.” Hei Huang laughed.

 

… 

 

Xuan Yangzi gave the Valley of Serpents a Divine Sense scan and his eyes lit up with interest.

 

“A ten, no, over! The perfect snake breeding ground!”

 

“What could possibly be a better snake attraction than this valley which draws all serpents a hundred miles around each spring?” Xuan Yangzi was thrilled.

 

He gave it a thorough examination as he recorded his analysis in the jade slip, giving it a full score.

 

“Time to send the jade slip. I’m sure to be pleased.” Xuan Yangzi beamed.

 

He suddenly shot backward. “Humph, I thought I was mistaken, but someone is definitely following me!”

 

Xuan Yangzi reappeared on a mountain.

 

The terrain was flat, with a clear engraving of an array. It was incomplete, yet he still detected it.

 

“Playing around, are we?”

 

Xuan Yangzi huffed as he stomped and the ground cried out in pain. The earth exploded to reveal a black dog slamming into the ground.

 

“Eh? A mongrel? Where’s your master?”

 

Xuan Yangzi squeezed his fingers and the dog floated over with the power of Attraction.

 

The black dog snickered.

 

Bang!

 

The dog exploded in a shower of blood and gore. 

 

“Bewildering array?” Xuan Yangzi winced, noticing he was caught in an illusion the array made.

 

The incomplete array was part of that illusion.

 

His Divine Sense was blocked from sensing any auras, proving it was indeed a bewildering array.

 

He was decisive though, throwing a jade slip into the air, shooting into the horizon at insane speeds. 

 

This avatar’s purpose was to survey the area and gather info. Death was of no consequence.

 

The enemy’s bewildering array twisted true and false to such an extent that he couldn’t make sense of anything. It only proved the enemy was strong.

 

“You thought that was an illusion?” A voice reached his ears.

 

Xuan Yangzi narrowed his eyes, witnessing the blood and gore splattered about stitching together to reform the black dog.

 

This time he held a dark golden scale.

 

Pff!

 

A cold flash and Xuan Yangzi’s head was looped off, his eyes wide in shock.

 

[The dog exploding was real!]

 

Hei Huang grinned.

 

Xuan Yangzi’s headless body stood out of nowhere and squeezed the dog’s neck to an inch of his life. 

 

Hei Huang grimaced, glancing at the head of the ground as it stared back with a creepy smile.

 

“Removing an avatar’s head won’t kill it. I give you six points for your effort, barely passable.”

 

Xuan Yangzi’s head grinned. The place where it was cut off showed no blood, only the texture of wood.

 

Pff!

 

Xuan Yangzi’s grin froze on his wooden face.

 

More dark scales came and split the head in two, the hands in four, and the legs in three. The remnants slowly turned back into wood.

 

“Fireball!”

 

Xu Hei spat a black ball of fire at the firewood, earning a scream from the burning Divine Sense.

 

As the Divine Sense faded away, the wood burned to nothing.

 

Hei Huang slumped in a coughing fit, paling and cursing. “What a blunder. It’s the ridiculously expensive wood avatar. And the fool wasted it on scouting the land!”

 

Xu Hei sent another Fireball, removing the ashes.

 

“Fireball!”

 

And another to turn the earth into lava, certain nothing could come back from that.

 

“Stop, it’s dead!” Hei Huang cussed.

 

Xu Hei listened.

 

He swallowed the scales and said, “You call that eighty percent? How come it crumbled from one blow?”

 

Humph huffed. “I had to fork out a fortune to seal his Divine Sense through the array. Why do you think your sneak attack worked? I also kept the jade slip from leaving.

 

“Furthermore, I could’ve handled him without your help.”

 

Hei Huang complained as Xu Hei looked into the horizon.

 

The flying jade slip was stuck in the air, returning at Hei Huang’s urging.

 

It contained information about the avatar’s journey and its encounter with the demons. The info was sure to stir more trouble.

 

Xu Hei scanned it and crushed it to dust.

 

“This settles it, right?” Xu Hei asked with worry.

 

“Not yet. He’s still a Golden Core cultivator and knows its avatar crumbled here. He’ll come to check the area himself,” Hei Huang said.

 

Xu Hei vanished before he finished.

 

Hei Huang: “…”

 

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