In robes the color of weak sunlight, with coarse boots and a black sash cinching his waist, his hair whipped by the gale, the Corpse Emperor narrowed his sharply gleaming eyes. In his left hand, he throttled Elder Wu by the neck; in his right, he delivered slaps at a steady, rhythmic pace. Slap. Slap. The crisp impacts rattled Elder Wu’s head back and forth; soon his cheeks were hugely swollen, and blood spattered from the corner of his mouth.

With every strike, a wisp of green mist permeated Elder Wu’s face, gradually turning his flesh and eyes a ghastly, uncanny shade of verdigris. A heavy miasma of death began to emanate from within him.

“Hand over the counter-spell and antidote for the Three Witches’ Blood Draining Curse, and cleanse them of all curses and antidotes upon their bodies. Otherwise, the Corpse Toxin I injected into you will erupt. Heh heh!” The Corpse Emperor sneered, his voice cold and sinister. Elder Wu’s complexion turned exceedingly ugly.

Another heavy slap descended, and a piece of flesh flew from Elder Wu’s face, scattering a large splash of pale green, poisonous blood. Elder Wu grunted in pain, his body involuntarily twitching.

The five fingers gripping his neck tightened abruptly, and Elder Wu convulsed, nearly suffocating and losing consciousness.

With a furious howl, a streak of blood-red light erupted from Elder Wu’s core. The blood tumor between his eyebrows slowly spread outward, and a three-inch-long, blood-red eye gradually opened. A vast cloud of ghostly energy surged upwards, accompanied by wails of ghosts and howls of wolves that made the very soul tremble. Three blood-red, flickering eyes stared intently at the Corpse Emperor, just as the skin all over Elder Wu’s body simultaneously burst into dust.

Countless scraps of skin and splattered blood mixed together, and under the illumination of the bloody eye in his brow, they congealed into a viscous, glue-like, disgusting paste. As piercing incantations filled the air, the volume of this foul, blood-colored paste grew, finally erupting with blood-curdling shrieks—a massive banner, a hundred zhang wide and high, rushed forth from within. The flag’s texture was exceptionally bizarre, seeming woven from fine threads drawn from human skin, then lacquered with a thin coating of blood. Countless fist-sized black characters floated across the banner, all twisting and shifting violently like demonic faces.

“Corpse Emperor, you have insulted me too deeply! This elder will fight you to the death!” Elder Wu roared, driven to frenzy. From the bloody eye in his brow surged a fountain of blood, thick as a thumb and thirty-six feet long. Hovering above this fountain was a ball of crimson light, three feet in diameter, within which nested a cluster of nine blood-red vines. Vast tendrils, writhing like human blood vessels, sprouted from the vines, blooming into six twisted, hideous blood-colored lotuses and six constantly wriggling lotus leaves.

In each blood-red lotus, a naked maiden, no bigger than a palm, yet exquisitely beautiful with clearly defined features, tilted her face skyward. Standing upon the six writhing lotus leaves were six similarly naked youths, exceptionally handsome with fair skin. As the dreadful cacophony of ghostly cries filled the air, the naked youths cheered, leaping from the leaves and tumbling onto the maidens within the lotuses.

Scenes of vibrant, suggestive beauty unfolded before the eyes of the onlookers. Strangely, though these twelve figures were minuscule, those hundreds of meters away—including Gu Xichen—could clearly discern their every movement, even the fine curls obscuring the private parts of the twelve tiny forms. Faint moans drifted from the mouths of these twelve flesh-worms, like the gentle drizzle of a spring night, igniting the hidden desires deep within Gu Xichen’s core. A fierce nether-fire blazed up from his Yongquan point.

Xin Jia and Zhao Yi gasped in alarm. Xin Jia seized Gu Xichen’s head, while Zhao Yi’s hands moved like wind, trailing arcs of golden light to instantly strike all one hundred and eight major acupoints on Gu Xichen’s body. The remaining ninety-nine subordinates of Xin Jia formed a Nine Palace Eight Trigram formation, surrounding Gu Xichen and continuously chanting sutras of Purity and Demon Suppression.

A pure Yang true fire from within Xin Jia poured from his Tianling point into Gu Xichen, instantly grappling with the nascent Yin fire. Large plumes of foul, fetid exhaust smoke drifted from the area where the two flames wrestled. This noxious vapor tried to penetrate Gu Xichen’s five Zang organs and six Fu organs, seeking entry through his meridians like mercury seeping into sand. However, all of Gu Xichen’s major acupoints and channels were sealed by Zhao Yi’s suppressive spells. The foul air battered his system like a surging Yangtze tide, but it could not advance an inch.

The sutras of Purity and Demon Suppression transformed into faint golden light, continuously flowing into Gu Xichen, purifying the intensely toxic exhaust until it gradually turned into gray mist expelled from his body.

While Gu Xichen was being aided by his loyal subordinates to overcome danger, Siren and Aredia collapsed to the ground with a soft thud. Their faces were flushed crimson, and their bodies writhed on the earth. It was clear they had been consumed by the desire summoned by the Six Desires Demonic Entities upon the blood lotuses; the Yin fire surged toward their internal organs, threatening to burn their life essence to depletion.

Elder Wu, Jie, laughed menacingly. He completely disregarded the Corpse Emperor choking his neck, focusing only on chanting his strange, evil incantations. The actions of the Six Desires Demonic Entities on the blood lotuses grew increasingly violent and indecent; their moans became increasingly base and shameless. The bizarre banner, transmuted from Elder Wu’s skin and blood, spun continually around the Corpse Emperor, stirring up gusts of eerie, wicked wind. This wind, colored blue and red, carried a heady fragrance, within which the indistinct forms of countless naked men and women mingled with innumerable venomous beasts and monsters. Gradually, countless tiny, mustard-seed-sized poisonous insects began to form in the wind. These insects, seeming endowed with intelligence, swarmed toward the Corpse Emperor, boring into the pores covering his body.

“A bit interesting,” the Corpse Emperor said coolly. “A mere fledgling at the peak of Qi Refining into Spirit dares to run rampant before this venerable one! No wonder my disciple was openly schemed against by you.” He glanced at Gu Xichen, shielded by his subordinates, and the struggling Siren and Aredia, then stated indifferently, “It has been a long time since I’ve exercised my might. Our Nine Nether Dao’s treasured artifact is also quite hungry! The Six Desires Demonic Entities? Such utmost Yin and evil entities of heaven and earth are perfect as an appetizer.” He raised a finger, and a plume of gray, eerie light shot upward from his fingertip. Within the beam of light, an object rapidly spun, instantly becoming a strange Great Seal that roared down amidst a sky full of spectral cries.

This massive seal was wholly composed of countless tiny human skull fragments, each no larger than a soybean. Every skull grinned, baring its teeth, with continuous streams of mournful, somber mist spewing from its seven orifices. It was hard to imagine how many trillions of skulls it took to form this Seal, which spanned thirty zhang in height, width, and depth. The Great Seal slammed down fiercely upon the blood fountain ejected from Elder Wu’s brow-eye. A sheet of gray Corpse Qi jetted from the Seal, transforming into a massive maw lined with terrifyingly sharp teeth, which promptly devoured the blood fountain, the crimson light, the blood lotuses and leaves, and the Six Desires Demonic Entities seated upon them, in one gulp.