Chapter 843: Is It Too Late?
Time rewound to a slightly earlier moment.
Deep within the shadowed, ancient expanse of the Qinling Mountains.
"The Yin-Yang Array Flag is finally complete."
Chen Yuhua slowly opened her phoenix eyes. She gazed down at the palm-sized standard resting in her hands, its fabric woven from pure black and white threads that thrummed with esoteric energy. A delicate, satisfied smile graced her lips.
With this artifact in her possession, combined with her current cultivation base and mastery over formations, she had exactly what she needed to crack the seventh-grade Yin Wind Spirit Devouring Array guarding Baiwu Mountain Valley. Her creation was undeniably inferior to Shen Anyu's Inverted Five Elements Array Flag, but it would suffice.
Beside her, Lin Qingqing practically had stars in her eyes. The petite girl watched the final stages of the artifact's refinement with unblinking awe, her pink lips chattering a mile a minute.
"Master Chen, Master Chen! I want to learn artifact refining too! That was so cool!"
Qingqing's watery eyes brimmed with absolute anticipation. If she could forge something like a high-tech combat suit, wouldn't she be unstoppable?
Despite standing at a petite meter and a half, Qingqing harbored zero interest in frilly magical girl shows or dark fantasy tropes. Her heart belonged entirely to tokusatsu heroes and armored justice. She wanted to summon the legendary Snow Mastiff armor, not settle for the clunky Earth Tiger variant!
Yuhua chuckled softly. Having awakened the memories of her past life, she wasn't some disconnected ancient ascetic; she knew exactly what pop-culture fantasies were running through the teenager's head. She reached out, gently patting Qingqing's hair.
"You can learn, but your own cultivation is the foundation. Do not put the cart before the horse."
"Mm-hmm! I will definitely cultivate super hard!" Qingqing pumped her small fists in the air, practically vibrating with youthful vigor.
Yuhua's smile softened further. In this life, she was only twenty-four—a mere six years older than the eighteen-year-old Qingqing—yet she looked at the girl entirely as a junior. Part of it was her naturally mature disposition; even Yu Guannan had always called her 'Elder Sister' in the past. The rest stemmed from the thousands of years of memories layered within her mind.
For a moment, this tall, traditionally aloof woman radiated a warm, deeply maternal aura.
Then, in the span of a single breath, that warmth vanished.
Yuhua's smile flatlined. Her phoenix eyes sharpened into twin blades, and her presence shifted from gentle to terrifyingly unapproachable. She snapped her gaze toward the distant horizon, locking onto the exact coordinates of Baiwu Mountain Valley.
Even separated by dozens of miles of rugged terrain, the violent shift in the world's natural laws was unmistakable.
She did not panic. She rose slowly to her feet. Standing tall, her incredibly long legs accentuated a slender, graceful waist that swayed with a lethal, calculated elegance.
"Qingqing. We are leaving."
"Huh? Master Chen, did something happen?"
"The grand array protecting Baiwu Mountain Valley has just been shattered," Yuhua said, her voice entirely devoid of inflection.
"What?!" Qingqing's jaw dropped, her eyes widening into saucers.
The grand array was broken? Her master had just finished explaining that it was a seventh-grade Golden Core formation—something a modern nuclear warhead would struggle to scratch.
Who could possibly break it?
A specific image of a young, devastatingly handsome man flashed across Qingqing's mind. "Could it be... Handsome Older Brother?"
Yuhua's eyes narrowed. Anyu?
Impossible. That was a Golden Core killing array.
She discarded the useless speculation. She would know the truth once she saw it with her own eyes. Grabbing Qingqing by the back of her collar, Yuhua's figure blurred into a phantom afterimage. She tore through the air, accelerating toward the valley at a blistering pace.
They crossed nearly a hundred miles in a matter of minutes. A dense, aerodynamic layer of spiritual power shielded Qingqing the entire way, preventing the supersonic winds from flaying the skin from her face.
"The array really is gone!" Qingqing gasped as they arrived. The towering wall of dense white mist that had previously connected the earth to the sky had completely dissolved.
Yuhua stepped forward, her gaze sweeping over the chaotic scene.
Just outside the valley entrance stood Murong Jieyu, Liu Ruyan, and Zhong Lingyin. The three women were pale, their eyes glassy with unshed tears and raw anxiety.
Inside the valley, the earth was tearing itself apart.
Anyu was locked in a brutal, world-shaking deathmatch with a terrifying enemy. Boulders the size of houses were being pulverized into dust mid-air.
'Am I late?'Yuhua's sharp gaze bypassed the combatants for a fraction of a second, sweeping over the dozen acres of spiritual fields. The heavy, intoxicating scent of rare herbs still hung in the air, but the soil had been stripped bare. Every single plant was gone. Her delicate brows furrowed.'He actually possesses such deep mastery over formations?'
She was genuinely astonished, forced to reevaluate the young man entirely. Anyu's method of breaking the array was identical to the theoretical model she had just planned to use: using the Yin-Yang Five Elements to invert the Yin Wind Spirit Devouring Array upon itself. It was the only way anyone below the Golden Core realm could bypass a seventh-grade lock.
Of course it was identical. He had literally copied her inherited memories.
'The prodigious talents of this era truly are as numerous as grains of sand...' Yuhua watched Anyu trade blows with Elder Qinghong, a highly peculiar, calculating glint flashing in her eyes.
...
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The valley floor buckled.
Every single clash between Anyu and Elder Qinghong was a catastrophic collision of pure, unadulterated kinetic force. This was a brutal, close-quarters brawl. Terrifying shockwaves exploded outward from their fists, flattening the surrounding geography and sending deep, violent tremors through the bedrock for miles in every direction.
The ground rippled like water. Massive fissures tore open, exposing the dark depths of the earth.
"This is insane..."
Ruyan, Lingyin, and Jieyu were forced to retreat further up the ridge, shielding their faces from the concussive blasts of displaced air. They watched the devastation with a sickening mix of dread and absolute awe.
Were these even humans anymore? They fought like ancient gods, ripping the landscape apart with their bare hands while overlapping sonic booms deafened anyone close enough to hear them.
"Handsome Older Brother is actually this strong?" Qingqing stood frozen.
She had always believed her Master Chen was the absolute pinnacle of power in this world. But watching this? Anyu was matching a monster blow for blow. She had seen him fight Zhang Zhiyun, but that previous skirmish looked like child's play compared to this apocalyptic violence.
This was the absolute zenith of combat below the Golden Core realm.
[Ding! Detected Lin Qingqing, the Destined Heroine, favorability +3, plundering +9000 destiny value!]
...
The Inverted Five Elements Grand Array had completely sealed off the ambient spiritual energy in the area. Neither combatant could draw upon the world to fuel their techniques. Their internal reserves drained with every movement, forcing them to rely almost entirely on the raw, terrifying density of their physical bodies.
Anyu and Elder Qinghong moved at speeds exceeding Mach 5. Ordinary supersonic fighter jets would appear entirely stationary next to them.
They were nothing more than a blinding sphere of white divine light and a howling green hurricane, violently tearing into one another.
To the women watching, it was a clash of immortals. But inside the storm, Elder Qinghong was suffocating under a rising tide of absolute terror.
'How is this brat's physical body this tough?!'
The Elder's Nascent Soul was shattered. He had drained his own blood essence to feed his Dao Artifact, causing his cultivation to plummet off a cliff. He was running on fumes, possessing less than one percent of his peak strength—barely hovering at the edge of a pseudo-core state.
Yet, this withered, damaged vessel was still a genuine Nascent Soul Dao Body. Even broken, it was a physical structure that Qi Refining or Foundation Establishment cultivators could never hope to scratch. He should have been able to shatter treasured artifacts with his bare knuckles!
But every time his fists met Anyu's, his bones screamed in agony. He was actually losing the physical exchanges. After a dozen high-speed collisions, the ancient cultivator no longer dared to meet the boy's strikes head-on.
How could a mere Qi Refining brat possess a physique like forged star-metal?
'As expected of a divine-grade technique. Steel Body is putting in the work.'
A cold, predatory smile curved Anyu's lips. Divine-grade skills evolved alongside their user. When he first acquired Steel Body, it provided the durability of a standard Celestial Being. Now, using this ancient fossil as a testing dummy, he confirmed it had hardened to the level of a High-Grade treasured artifact.
He was practically indestructible.
Only his internal organs lagged slightly behind; otherwise, he would possess the exact physical parameters of a Golden Core body-refining specialist. And he was still only in the Qi Refining realm. Once he broke through to Foundation Establishment, the sheer density of his flesh would be beyond understanding.
'Yuhua is here. Time to put this old dog down.'
Anyu's peripheral vision caught the arrival of a distinctly voluptuous, mature silhouette standing at the edge of the valley. He shifted his stance, his aura spiking as he prepared the killing blow.
[Akarin's Note: "Snow Mastiff" and "Earth Tiger" refer to the armor suits from Armor Hero (铠甲勇士), a very popular Chinese tokusatsu franchise similar to Kamen Rider or Super Sentai. The Snow Mastiff is a fan favorite, while the Earth Tiger is often joked about for being the weakest or least cool.]
[Akarin's Note: "Old dog" or "Laodeng" (老登) is a disrespectful Northern Chinese slang term used to insult an older person, similar to calling someone an "old geezer" or "old fossil."]
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