Batian Martial Soul

Chapter 14640 Killing the Chicken to Warn the Monkey

Ling Bi nodded, no longer hesitating, and clenched her fists tightly.

*Snap*

A crisp sound echoed throughout the heavens and earth.

The crystalline body of the Rock Owl shattered instantly into countless black fragments. Before those fragments could even hit the ground, they were completely shredded by the sword energy contained within the threads, turning into ashes.

Only a faint, dark red light escaped from the fragments, vanishing into the air in the blink of an eye.

The silver threads disappeared as if they had never existed.

The entire battle lasted no more than ten breaths.

A brief silence fell over the desolate land.

Most of the spyers who had been hiding in the shadows, keeping their divine senses locked onto Ling Xiao and his companion, quietly withdrew their divine senses, their presence vanishing without a trace.

The remaining few divine senses also became much more cautious, no longer daring to be the slightest bit presumptuous.

Ling Xiao looked around, a satisfied smile curving his lips: "Not bad, making an example of someone to scare others, the effect is remarkable."

“Rock Owl isn’t exactly a chicken.” Ling Bi withdrew her gaze, her tone calm. “It’s at least a man-eating hyena. But in this Broken Boundary Mountain, hyenas are only considered the lowest of the low.”

As soon as she finished speaking, the void in front of her rippled without warning.

A hunched old man leaning on a cane slowly walked out of the void.

The old man looked even more ordinary than the average rural farmer. He wore a faded, worn-out gray robe, his hair was sparse and gray, and his face was covered with dense age spots. He walked with a shaky gait, as if a gust of wind could blow him over.

But at the same time, Ling Xiao and Ling Bi's bodies suddenly tensed up.

Their pupils contracted sharply, and their breathing became rapid.

When the old man appeared, the surrounding space did not ripple at all, nor did it emit any aura.

He simply "walked" out, as if he had been standing there all along, only that no one had seen him before.

"Young man, don't be so hot-tempered."

The old man hunched over and coughed slowly twice, his voice hoarse like a bronze bell worn by wind and sand. "I have no ill intentions, I just... want to see with my own eyes what the legendary Demon Lord Black Sky Sword looks like."

He slowly raised his head, his cloudy eyes looking at Ling Xiao. In those seemingly dim old eyes, there was an indescribable depth: "May I just take a look and not have the slightest thought of taking it?"

Ling Xiao and Ling Bi exchanged a glance, both with serious expressions in their eyes.

This old man may look frail, but the faint aura emanating from him is more than ten times more dangerous than the Black Crystal Demon Rock Owl from before!

But Ling Xiao grinned and said frankly, "Why not?"

As soon as he finished speaking, he flipped his palm upwards.

hum.

A deep sword cry suddenly resounded throughout the heavens and earth, and the Demon Lord Black Sky Sword, which was pitch black and had faint demonic patterns swirling around its blade, appeared out of thin air in his palm.

The moment the demonic sword appeared, the entire desolate land trembled violently, and ripples spread across the surrounding void. An ancient and domineering demonic power swept out like a tide, and even the spatial rifts in the distance faintly groaned.

The old man's eyes widened suddenly the moment the demonic sword appeared!

Those originally cloudy eyes suddenly burst forth with an astonishing light, staring intently at the demonic sword in Ling Xiao's palm. His withered chest heaved violently, and his breathing became rapid, like a bellows.

His fingers gripped the cane so tightly that his knuckles turned a pale white from the force, and his entire arm trembled slightly.

For a long, long time.

The old man exhaled a long, heavy breath, his voice filled with emotion, yet tinged with an indescribable sense of melancholy:

"So that's how it is... So that's how it is... Demon Lord, back then you roamed the Bai Ze Continent, invincible under heaven, was it all thanks to this sword...?"

He looked at Ling Xiao again, his eyes filled with a complex emotion that seemed to hold a thousand stars in their depths. "Young man, do you know what you are holding in your hands?"

"Just a sword," Ling Xiao said calmly, his tone nonchalant.

“No.” The old man slowly shook his head, his voice suddenly becoming solemn. “It is a curse, but also hope. It is the last straw for this desolate realm…”

He paused, as if he had hesitated for a long time, before asking softly, "You... want to auction it off?"

Ling Xiao nodded, his expression calm: "Not bad."

The old man fell silent, his cloudy eyes gazing into the void, as if recalling something, or perhaps sighing about something. After a long while, he shook his head with a wry smile: "You brat... you're probably going to rip the sky apart."

After saying this, he said no more. He simply turned around step by step, leaning on his cane, and slowly walked into the void behind him.

His figure appeared without any unusual phenomena; he simply and quietly merged into the void and disappeared without a trace.

There was no robbery, no threats, not even a single unnecessary word.

Only after the old man's aura completely dissipated into the world did Ling Bi finally breathe a sigh of relief and ask in a low voice, "Do you know him?"

“I don’t know him.” Ling Xiao shook his head, his gaze fixed on the direction where the old man had disappeared, his eyes deep. “But he knows the Demon Lord Black Sky Sword, no… he knows the Demon Lord from back then.”

He raised his hand and sheathed the demonic sword, the demonic aura around him instantly dissipating. He turned to look at Ling Bi, a meaningful smile playing on his lips: "Abi, I suddenly feel that we've come to the right place."

"Is it because there are people here who know the truth about what happened back then?" Ling Bi pressed.

“No.” Ling Xiao stepped forward, his steps steady. “It’s because here, there are people who dare to know the truth.”

"Let's go find that 'Truth Pavilion'. Since we're going to hold an auction, we need to find a decent venue."

The two walked side by side, continuing their journey deeper into the Broken Boundary Mountain.

This time, no one dared to show up and stop them along the way.

But Ling Xiao could clearly sense that the gazes hidden in the shadows had not decreased, but rather increased and intensified.

Those gazes contained greed, fear, curiosity, and even a hint of... almost desperate anticipation.

It's like a group of people who have been trapped in endless darkness for too long suddenly seeing a beam of light piercing through the long night.

Even if that beam of light is just a fleeting mirage.

……

Half an hour later, Ling Xiao and Ling Bi stopped in front of a "city".

The reason I put the word "city" in quotation marks is because this place can hardly be considered a real city.

It had no towering city walls, no orderly streets, only countless fragments of buildings of varying sizes and dilapidated state, suspended in the dark void in an illogical, gravity-defying manner, barely piecing together the outline of a settlement. (End of Chapter)