Defeated

"Boom~"

Beside the gravestone passage leading to Yue Qiluo’s lair, an overgrown patch of ground suddenly erupted with a boom, and a figure shot out at high speed. Before the people who had dug this Gold Mine left, they had sealed off the tunnel, forcing Gu Sheng to spend quite some effort getting out.

"Gu Sheng!"

Liu Daimei had been keeping watch over the surroundings. The moment she heard the boom, she rushed over. Seeing that it was Gu Sheng, she smiled in relief.

"Mei-jie, catch this. Take the item and hide farther away. There’s going to be a big guy coming out soon."

Gu Sheng flew to a spot near Liu Daimei, tossed her the shut Mercury Lamp, then surged forward again and ran toward the hole he had emerged from.

"Whoosh~"

Liu Daimei reacted quickly. After a few darting steps, she turned into a blur and hid in a distant tree, observing everything around Gu Sheng from above. Although she didn’t know why Gu Sheng had given her those instructions, she trusted that he wouldn’t harm her, so she carried them out to the best of her ability.

"Boom~"

Liu Daimei didn’t have to wonder for long. A huge creature nearly five or six meters long charged out. This Insect King was enormous, and black Qi rose from its body beneath the sunlight. However, even the scorching midday sun only slightly weakened its aura and had no other effect on it.

"Just as I thought. This thing isn’t afraid of light—it simply dislikes it. Sunlight affects its condition and combat strength, but it can’t destroy it."

Gu Sheng’s heart stirred as he reached his conclusion.

"Roar~~"

The moment the insect saw Gu Sheng, green light flared in its eyes. It swung its enormous pincers, which glimmered with black Qi and silver light, and charged at him.

"Boom~"

Gu Sheng used the Horizon Strider movement technique to dodge it. He spun aside, narrowly avoiding one strike. The giant pincer smashed into the ground, sending shattered stones flying and leaving behind a pit the size of a human head. Wisps of black Qi continuously seeped out with sizzling sounds, and the cave soon became pitch-black.

A patch of grass nearby was struck by a fragment of stone wreathed in black Qi. Before long, the entire patch of ground had withered and died.

"So poisonous!"

Gu Sheng was genuinely shocked. This amount of poison was nowhere near as terrifying as the lingering poison from a single drop of Jade Azure Serpent Qing Ling’s venom, which could poison ten miles, but it was still frightening. It was no weaker than the venom of the ten-zhang-long green python before it transformed into Jade Azure Serpent Qing Ling.

"Looks like I’ll have to show some real ability!"

Gu Sheng suddenly stopped. Blood Flame surged over his body, and a tiger-shaped glow of Blood Flame appeared around him.

"Take this!"

With a tiger’s roar, Gu Sheng stamped one foot down, shattering the ground. His entire body soared into the air. In midair, the Blood Flame spun around him, transforming him into a crimson giant tiger that pounced downward like a tiger descending from the mountain.

"Boom~"

Caught off guard by Gu Sheng’s sudden attack, the Insect King was instantly stunned. Its entire body was sent flying and slammed into the ground.

"Roar~"

The insect roared angrily, shook its body, and climbed back up. Even Gu Sheng’s strike, which carried more than two hundred thousand jin of force, had failed to break through its shell.

"What a troublesome creature!"

Gu Sheng’s expression turned ugly. That one attack had consumed a great deal of his True Essence. In this world of Wu Xin: The Monster Killer, the activity of the world’s Spiritual Qi was extremely low—only slightly better than in the Sora Demon World. The amount of the world’s power he could draw upon was pitifully small.

Thus, large-scale techniques were practically impossible in this world. Most spells followed strange and unpredictable unorthodox paths, belonging to "technique" rather than "Dao." They had low power and high consumption, so when faced with mortal armies, practitioners sometimes had to retreat.

Gu Sheng’s current situation was actually quite good. Most of his strength came from his physical body rather than the eruption of Innate True Essence. Even if his True Essence was completely depleted, his combat strength wouldn’t be affected too much. At the very least, he could hold on until his True Essence recovered.

"Roar~"

After shaking for a while, the Insect King’s condition slightly recovered. Green light blazed from the compound eyes on its head. Its wings began to beat, lifting it into the air, and countless strands of black Qi spread outward from its body. A massive black cloud hurtled toward Gu Sheng.

"Damn thing."

Gu Sheng’s expression darkened. This thing was quite intelligent. Knowing that he was too large a target, it had directly created an even larger one—a vast, oppressive black cloud. The black cloud produced by the Insect King wasn’t afraid of sunlight, and Gu Sheng had no specific way to deal with it.

"Boom! Boom!"

Two pairs of blade-like legs suddenly flashed out. Fortunately, Gu Sheng dodged in time; otherwise, he would already have taken a trip down the road to the Yellow Springs.

"Hmph. If only I had a suitable weapon on hand… Wait, a weapon!"

Gu Sheng abruptly turned his head. The tree where Liu Daimei was hiding in the distance instantly drew his attention. His eyes swept around, and he hurried toward the woods opposite Liu Daimei.

"Rise!"

Gu Sheng pressed both hands against a nearly twenty-meter-tall cedar and, with a twist of both arms, forcibly uprooted it. He looked just like Lu Zhishen pulling up a willow tree. He had seen this kind of tree before. Back home, it was called a "thorn tree." It was a timber tree that grew quickly, had decent-quality wood, and wasn’t easy to break.

"Boom!"

After being uprooted, the cedar lost its balance and crashed heavily to one side.

"Come on!"

Gu Sheng darted to the treetop, grabbed it, and yanked with all his might. More than half of the trunk was lifted into the air. Then he shouted at the Insect King, which was conjuring an endless storm of black Qi in the sky.

"Roar~~"

The Insect King readily accepted Gu Sheng’s challenge. It roared and descended upon him with a gale and a black cloud.

"Let’s see who loses their nerve first!"

Gu Sheng swung both arms, spinning the thick trunk around and around. With the addition of its momentum, his force of more than two hundred thousand jin became terrifying. The surrounding air roared, and the black Qi that approached was directly shredded by the fierce wind.

"Is this a battle between immortals?"

Liu Daimei didn’t dare even breathe loudly as she watched. Whether it was the Insect King summoning wind and clouds or Gu Sheng uprooting a giant tree and stirring the skies, both had already surpassed the limits of normal creatures. Simply put, neither of them was a normal "human" anymore.

"Boom~"

With one final swing, the ten-odd-meter-long root end smashed directly into the oncoming black Qi. A thunderous explosion erupted in midair. The cedar in Gu Sheng’s hands shook violently before snapping into three pieces, leaving him with less than five meters of trunk.

"Smack~"

At the instant the giant tree broke, a huge object was slapped out of the black mist in midair. It wailed as it crashed into the distant woods, flattening countless trees and leaving ruins all around. As the object was knocked away, the black cloud in the sky gradually dispersed with the wind.

"Thud~"

Gu Sheng breathed heavily, sweat soaking his forehead. That last strike had been his full-power attack. Not only had it consumed a tremendous amount of strength, it had also left him somewhat drained. He instinctively dropped the trunk in his hand, and it hit the ground with a dull thud.