Chapter 1061: Chapter 598: The Heart Demon Reveals Itself (Special 3-in-1) (Part 2)

In an instant, his hand loosed the bowstring, and the arrow was already off the bow and gone.

No need to see, no need to listen, even less need to draw again and nock another arrow. Blind Arrow simply strode up the steps as though entering no-man’s land, his foot had just lifted when, suddenly...

Bang!

Metal and stone rang together like a dragon’s roar, a clear, piercing note that shook heaven and earth. The arrow exploded, turning to dust.

Chen Yi, with all his strength supporting his body, slowly raised his head.

Between drifting fine rain, a one-armed woman held a sword in her hand, standing in front of him.

.........

Lightning suddenly flashed, clouds and peaks trembled, the world went white for that instant, illuminating Zhou Yitang’s face. Blind Arrow could not see it, but he could hear the sound of the wind.

The wind was speaking, speaking of that woman’s origins, speaking of how that woman had only one arm, speaking of that woman’s restrained, razor-sharp aura.

Perhaps it had been too long since he’d seen someone whose Martial Arts List ranking was below his own; Blind Arrow had never treated her as a junior of the Martial Arts world. The top ten under heaven did not share the same Jianghu as most of the world. Here, regardless of gender or age, all of them stood at the summit. None could be underestimated, none were unworthy of awe.

Only the True Heavenly Person Xu Qi could afford to look down on the remaining nine.

That he would run into Zhou Yitang on this trip didn’t surprise Blind Arrow; that much had been within expectation. What truly surprised him was the Sword Armor ranked ninth under heaven before his eyes...

Unworthy of the name.

Blind Arrow narrowed the eyes that held only turbid whites. He did not know whether Sword Armor was hiding her strength, or had always been unworthy of her reputation, or had only become unworthy later. Judging only by her aura, she was nothing more than a Peak of Second Grade.

He was in no rush to make any big moves. Instead he nodded in greeting first, sensing that the two of them were about to speak, perhaps to talk about matters behind them. So he waited. Having lived seventy, eighty years, he still had patience.

Chen Yi braced his body and struggled to climb up, his voice hoarse as he said, "Master, you..."

His gaze lingered on the Ruoque Sword in Zhou Yitang’s hand. The blade was crimson from tip to hilt, raindrops falling on it and sending up rolling white steam, as if it had just been smelted and not yet quenched.

"The Ruoque Sword is still unfinished," her gaze fell on the wound on Chen Yi’s shoulder as she said, "We can’t wait any longer."

Chen Yi fell silent for a moment. The searing pain in his shoulder came late, crashing down on him. After a while he forced a bitter smile and said, "It’s that I wasn’t enough..."

"No need for useless talk," she said.

Zhou Yitang tapped the ground with her sword, the rainwater at her feet surging aside, leaving a patch of open ground. She used the sword tip to draw a sigil; golden light flared up, wavering like flame. She picked a mote of golden light up on the sword tip and stabbed it toward the center of her brows.

"Come." 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

A single short word, no need for more. Chen Yi sheathed his sword, took a deep breath, and his whole body quickly shrank, instantly disappearing into the space between her brows.

In the blink of an eye, he headed toward the Heart Lake.

Noticing Chen Yi’s sudden disappearance, Blind Arrow frowned, rain running down his long eyebrows. Just as he was about to speak—

The one-armed woman came at him with a sword, chopping down right at his head!

His grandmother, this master and disciple are exactly the same!

No concept of Jianghu etiquette at all!

......

Re-entering the Heart Lake, everything in sight was frozen in decay.

Chen Yi drew a rough breath. Before he could so much as pause to rest,

up ahead,

a mass of black, swarming Obsessions crawled up from the ground, surging in with a terrifying momentum to besiege him.

Out of the dragon’s pool, straight into the tiger’s den.

Chen Yi’s lips twitched up at the corners.

Before facing Blind Arrow, Chen Yi and Zhou Yitang had already made a plan: he would first delay Blind Arrow’s advance; Zhou Yitang would wait until the Ruoque Sword was reforged and out of the furnace, then she would fight Blind Arrow, while he entered Zhou Yitang’s Heart Lake and continuously dispelled her stray thoughts in the process.

Only this way could their chances of victory be maximized.

In fact, at the start, Chen Yi’s plan had been for the two of them to join forces. But Zhou Yitang had bluntly told him that duels between those in the top ten under heaven were not something a Third Rank could interfere in. Even if Chen Yi managed not to drag her down, the help he could offer would be no more than a drop in the bucket. Rather than that, it was better to send him into the Heart Lake.

Dispelling stray thoughts—though not a lifesaving fire in the snow—could at least add flowers to brocade.

Since that was the case, there was no need to dawdle.

He sealed his acupoints to stop the blood pouring from his left shoulder and charged toward the human sea. In an instant, his sword edge stood tall.

The Sword Intent World unfolded in a flash, covering several zhang around.

In this moment, he shot into it like a bolt of rushing thunder.

His figure spun a few times and then plunged into the Obsessions, piercing straight through them, ripping open a path of crisscrossing Sword Qi. Then he pulled his sword back and turned, returning the way he had come, circling around that dense mass of Obsessions.

Back again. Compared to the last time, when he’d been so desperate he wanted to curse aloud, Chen Yi’s state of mind now was very different, far more at ease.

Rampaging Sword Qi crisscrossed, like Crossbow Arrows firing from all directions. Their terrifying penetrating power churned this heaven and earth into a haze of yellow sand, the desolate Cangwu Peak split apart by Sword Qi.

Chen Yi was like a threader of needles, precise to the extreme. His strikes were incredibly fast and utterly reckless, as if dancing on the tip of a blade. If before he had been a skiff in stormy seas, now he was a flying fish darting through the ocean.

But even so, the Obsessions did not weaken under Chen Yi’s seven in-and-outs. On the contrary, as he slaughtered, their momentum grew more and more massive.

Gale winds howled. When his sword point pierced through the seventh Obsession, Chen Yi’s circling tactic began to fail. The Obsessions suddenly, in unison, brought their swords horizontally before their chests. The first two ranks sank at the knees; under the pull of their collective Sword Intent, three hundred strands of Sword Qi wove into an iron net that dropped down.

Chen Yi had no time to be startled by this change. He used sword against sword, Sword Qi tearing back and forth. Seizing his chance, he kicked off broken stone and shot into the sky; the spot where he had just stood exploded in Sword Qi.

As he fell, he suddenly twisted his waist. The sword move that should have cleaved straight down turned into a horizontal slash, and two gray, murky heads were sent flying by the Sword Qi. But this time there was no room to retreat; three strands of Sword Gang simultaneously stabbed toward his left thigh.