"So you turned to the Demonic Dao and started eating people?" Ding Rou said coldly, her voice like ice. Her beautiful face was covered in a frosty chill. Zhu Fugui’s eyes gleamed with a hint of madness as he sneered, "That’s right! Don’t think you’re the only ones blessed by destiny, I had my own immortal fortune too! I obtained a jade slip that revealed the secret to immortality. And that secret... is eating people!" Zhu Fugui burst into unrestrained laughter. "With every person I eat, I gain more strength. The jade slip described the methods in great detail. I only consumed half the bodies of five people, and my cultivation improved by leaps and bounds! What faster method of cultivation could there possibly be!?" Li Yanchu’s gaze turned icy. "If we let you walk free, you’ll become a monstrous demon wreaking havoc wherever you go!" Zhu Fugui replied calmly, "Though we haven’t interacted for long, I’ve already gotten a decent grasp of your character, Daoist Master. If I truly become a demon, there's no way you'd let me live." At this point, Zhu Fugui paused for a moment, then continued, "That’s why... unless you die, I’ll never have peace of mind!" The moment his words fell, a dense wave of demonic qi surged from his body! His skin began to split and crack, peeling off layer by layer. A massive, hideous wild boar’s head tore through the human face and emerged in full view. He looked utterly grotesque and ferocious! Sharp, thick tusks jutted from his mouth. And on his back were bristle-like quills, which were hard as steel. "Daoist Master, prepare to die!" This monster, once enlightened by a great monk and known for keeping the precepts in his cultivation, had ultimately chosen the wicked path of devouring humans in pursuit of immortality. It was a lamentable fall. Zhu Fugui suddenly stomped the ground. A deep fissure instantly split open beneath their feet, threatening to swallow both Li Yanchu and Ding Rou whole! Li Yanchu moved in a flash, nimbly evading the chasm. But in that moment, his perception of Zhu Fugui’s strength was entirely changed. A figure shrouded in flames lunged forward in a deadly charge, and they were completely engulfed in immortal fire! Through the flames, one could faintly make out the form of a Daoist. His facial features and skin bore clear signs of having been scorched, evidently burned by unimaginably fierce flames! “It’s him!?” Li Yanchu was suddenly struck with realization. It was the Daoist who had been at Mount Mao by Hong Baiwei’s side, the one skilled in fire techniques and had cultivated the Southern Heaven Crimson Flame. For some unknown reason, he and Zhu Fugui had ended up joining forces! The moment the fire-wielding Daoist saw Li Yanchu, a deep, burning hatred surged within him. He hated him to his very core! This young Daoist had ruined him! If he hadn’t cultivated a Visualization Method to astral project and manifest a Dharma form, his physical body would’ve long since been reduced to ashes. Even so, he had become a creature no longer human! "Good! So the one that slipped through the net has come knocking after all!" A fierce killing intent surged from Li Yanchu's body. The rightful source is novel{f}ire.net He struck out with a powerful palm! Divine Astral Hands! The Daoist engulfed in flames formed hand seals, and a massive fire python roared as it charged forward. The pure, forceful Divine Astral Hands strike collided head-on with the fire python formed by the Southern Heaven Crimson Flame, and a scorching shockwave burst outward in all directions. It was like the detonation of one of the Kingdom of Qian dynasty’s divine siege cannons; it was thunderous and overwhelming, shaking the earth and sky! Meanwhile, Zhu Fugui, now fully evil, ferocious and brimming with demonic qi, charged straight at Li Yanchu with savage force. The mountain path buckled under his feet, leaving a trail of deep craters in his wake. The ground itself seemed to sink from the sheer weight. Thud! Thud! Thud! Like a giant beast from the wilds barreling down, his momentum was suffocating. Facing the combined assault of two powerful enemies, Li Yanchu’s eyes were cold, and he maintained his composure. "You're the one who’s courting death!" Without even drawing his sword, Li Yanchu met Zhu Fugui’s wild charge head-on with nothing but his sheer physical might. His figure stood tall and immovable like a mountain, but Zhu Fugui’s massive body was violently knocked backward by the collision. Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud! Thud! Zhu Fugui stumbled back several steps. Each step left a deep imprint in the solid stone path. By the time he stopped, half of one leg had sunken into the ground. In his half-human, half-demon form, Zhu Fugui’s eyes showed clear shock. He had underestimated this Daoist Master Yanchu! To clash with the brute force of a powerful demon beast like himself using only his physical body? "Such a physique actually exists in this world!?" Zhu Fugui was stunned. With a thunderous roar that shook the heavens, he completely shed all remaining traces of humanity, transforming into a terrifying, tyrannical Boar King with his blazing arrogance surging sky-high. He looked to weigh at least two thousand jin. His body was massive, his tusks sharp, and his skin gleamed with a metallic sheen. As the saying went, “The boar ranks first, the bear ranks second, and then the tiger ranks third[1]!” In the wild mountains and forests, even the tiger, often hailed as the king of beasts, was no match for the thick-skinned, tough-fleshed, iron-boned wild boar. At this moment, Zhu Fugui had completely become a savage beast of the wilderness as he lunged ferociously at Li Yanchu. Off to the side, the strange Daoist wreathed in Southern Heaven Crimson Flame suddenly abandoned his charred and ruined flesh, transforming into a six-zhang-tall flaming giant. The raging fire around him baked the ground beneath his feet into a rock-solid surface. “You fool, today, I’ll show you what it means for there to always be someone stronger!” the Daoist shouted coldly. Ding Rou’s expression was icy as the horsetail whisk in her hand gleamed brightly, its edge razor-sharp. But Li Yanchu said, “You don’t need to make a move. Just stand aside and watch.” “Vermin like these dare bark wildly in front of me?” Li Yanchu’s voice rang out like a thunderclap. He chanted a Daoist mantra, and in that instant, the evil qi in the surrounding air froze. His blood and qi surged to a boil; they were pure, potent, and ablaze with righteous might! He struck first, aiming directly at Zhu Fugui. Since Zhu Fugui believed that falling into the Demonic Dao and eating people could increase his power, then Li Yanchu would let him see what it meant for the Dao to rise a foot higher, and that when the righteous path rose one chi, that chi towered over a hundred zhang of the Demonic Dao! Clang! The Jiaoslayer came crashing down with full force! The towering Boar King, shrouded in demonic flames, was immediately halted by the slash of that saber. One of his sharp, rock-hard tusks was cleanly severed, and that tusk had been a fearsome weapon capable of tearing through anything. Zhu Fugui’s heart trembled. He immediately unleashed a deadly divine technique, determined to kill Li Yanchu on the spot! “If I eat him, I might break through to the late stage of the second realm in one go, and even glimpse the threshold of the Third Realm!” Zhu Fugui had completely lost his mind! Li Yanchu moved like the wind. Not only was the Jiaoslayer incomparably sharp, but his fists and kicks carried tremendous force that was strong enough to split mountains and shatter stone. In just the blink of an eye, the ferocious Boar King that Zhu Fugui had transformed into was severely injured. “To hell with you, you damn beast! I’ll break every last unbreakable bone in your body!” Li Yanchu leapt high into the air, descending like a meteor. Thousand-Jin Drop! The savage Boar King was stomped straight into a deep pit, his bones shattered and his body mangled, barely clinging to life! He couldn’t even put up a fight! Even though Zhu Fugui had stumbled upon an immortal fortune and devoured several cultivators from the celestial mountains, he was still crushed by Li Yanchu like dry weeds and rotten wood! Hovering above, the Daoist cloaked in Southern Heaven Crimson Flame was visibly stunned. It wasn’t just that Li Yanchu could defeat the Boar King with raw physical might. What shocked him even more was that his Southern Heaven Crimson Flame couldn’t harm him at all! It was as if Li Yanchu possessed one of the ancient Daoist arts, Flame-Sitting Art. “Blades and spears can’t pierce him, and fire and water can’t touch him!” The Daoist’s expression twisted in alarm. Meanwhile, Li Yanchu’s eyes were icy as he said, “Old dog, there’s no escape for you today!” The Daoist sneered, “You arrogant brat! What, you think you can fly now? You really think you’re some cloud-riding, mist-soaring immortal!?” 1. This is a saying in Northeast China, it means that in terms of aggressiveness, boars rank first, bears second, and tigers third. In the eyes of seasoned Northeastern hunters, a fully grown wild boar is considered even more dangerous than a tiger. ☜