Chapter 72: Pouring Oil on the Flames Part 1

Wang Ya, plummeting downward, swiftly formed hand seals with her hands, intending to forcibly tear open the Yellow Springs mid-air to escape. However, she never expected a force like a hurricane to suddenly surge up and slam into her body, hurling her away. Dazzling light stabbed at her eyes, making them impossible to open, and that inexplicable power from who-knows-where left her dizzy and disoriented. She heard Zhang Qingshui’s shout: “Magic Array!”

What magic array? Trapped in weightlessness and impact, Wang Ya felt her head spinning. In her daze, she heard countless chaotic, shrill screams and sensed an endless bloody stench, followed by roars and howls she had never heard before, along with countless terrifying auras.

Suddenly, her waist tightened as a rope wrapped around it, dragging her toward somewhere. Because of that night, she utterly loathed being bound by ropes. Then she felt someone hug her from behind, her back pressing against something soft and full—seemingly a woman. Was it Ye Zi or Zhang Qingshui? Just as she tried to break free from the arms holding her, a red light streaked toward her forehead with thunderous momentum. Wang Ya had no doubt that if it hit her head, it would explode it in one strike. The red light was so fast that by the time she “saw” it, it was already upon her. Her mind only managed one thought: How can I see it with my eyes closed? Then came a boom, her mind went blank, and she knew nothing more.

When she regained awareness, she found herself soaking in a sea of corpses and blood. Skulls, shattered bones, and severed limbs floated in the blood sea. There was no sky, no earth—only corpses underfoot. She couldn’t see her own body; she could only “see” the surroundings filled with undead. Countless undead crammed the corpse mountain blood sea—some mostly intact, others left with just an arm or a leg, some mere wisps of wandering souls. They drifted, cried, struggled, and roared. All she smelled was the aura of the dead; there was no life, no hope here. And she was one of them. Soaking in this world of death, she inhaled deathly aura and felt the breath of death. She saw countless aimless drifting limbs, fragmented bodies, and incomplete skulls; she saw the undead wandering purposelessly. No one paid her any mind. She tried speaking to the limbs, skulls, and souls, but they ignored her too. Some undead seemed freshly dead and relatively whole; others long dead, weakened to the point of dissipation. She even watched one dissipate right before her eyes. She felt herself drowning in this world of death, that she had died, and one day she too would slowly become incomplete, fading bit by bit until nothing remained. She wanted to leave; she didn’t want to soak in this world of death until she vanished.

Wang Ya sank back into darkness. When consciousness returned, she vaguely heard voices speaking. The aura of death seemed to have drifted away; she clearly felt herself alive. She was still alive—how wonderful. But the sensations from that death world lingered vividly, weighing heavily on her heart and making it hard to breathe.

It hadn’t felt like a dream; it was as if she had truly experienced it. In a haze, she felt she had soaked in that death world for a long time, enduring for ages, with fragmented memories in between. She wasn’t sure if they were illusions or real recollections, but she knew later she had become a flower, and even now many of her roots remained embedded in that death land, drawing soul power and energy from those undead. She felt as if she had climbed upward step by step over their corpses, clawing her way out of that world. She never wanted to go back.

Wang Ya lay motionless, utterly exhausted, as if after a nightmare.

Not long after, she couldn’t resist the darkness and fell asleep again.

In a half-dreaming, half-awake state, she sensed someone drawing near. She wanted to open her eyes but was too heavy and drowsy; darkness clung firmly to her.

Wang Ya felt she had slept for a very long time, drifting in and out of various dreams. When she finally opened her eyes, she discovered she was in a tent, with Zhang Qingshui curled up nearby, kneeling and staring blankly.

Wang Ya coldly swept her gaze over Zhang Qingshui. As she rose, she realized her whole body ached, her joints rusted like old hinges. Her head felt foggy and heavy; forcing herself upright made her vision swim, nearly toppling her back down.

Zhang Qingshui sat lost beside Wang Ya, staring blankly at her.

Wang Ya endured the pain, crawled out of the tent, and at once stared dumbfounded at the cramped space before her. She cursed inwardly: Fuck! What was this? She scanned around, even carefully feeling with her hands. Finally, she howled: “Zhang Qingshui, what the hell happened?” All around were sheer mountain walls; she was in a cave barely ten square meters.

Zhang Qingshui’s lifeless voice replied: “As you see, we’re trapped.”

Wang Ya shouted: “Explain it clearly! What happened?”

Zhang Qingshui let out a light scoff, revealing a nearly desolate smile, and countered: “Don’t you know what happened?”

Wang Ya blanked, thinking: How the hell would I know!

Zhang Qingshui cried: “Of course you don’t! My Fourth Uncle, Second Uncle, Zhang Min, Zhang Zheng… all seventeen lives of my Zhang Family died by your hand, their bodies obliterated, divine souls extinguished!” Tears burst forth, blurring her vision. Those hellish, gruesome scenes replayed before her eyes. Trembling, she buried her head in her knees!

She hated herself—hated why she had saved the gravely injured Wang Ya amid the mountain collapse, why she hadn’t let the falling boulders crush her! Zhang Min was only twenty, just three days past his birthday! Zhang Zheng was twenty-two. Her Fourth Uncle’s family of four lost three in one night. If Wang Ya had triggered the magic array and let it shred them, she wouldn’t resent her—only blame the Zhang Family for lacking skill to break the Feng Family’s Ultimate Killing Array. But they had broken it; they sealed back those Dark Creatures surging from the abyss through the Bronze Pillars, straight from the Nether Hell.

As the mountain collapsed, everyone abandoned the chase and fled the labyrinth. Yet Wang Ya pursued relentlessly. Blood mist filled the air, decayed bones littered the ground. Aside from her and Old Tang, every living being in the entire Illusory Sea Labyrinth died by Wang Ya’s hand. Living people turned to blood mist and dry bones in an instant, one Yellow Springs Other Shore Flower Seal Formula after another blooming, devouring one after another!

A demon, a man-eating demon—no better!

Wang Ya, gravely wounded from battling those Peak Experts to the death, could have been ended with one palm strike. Zhang Qingshui needed only to walk over and smash her head to end her sinful life. Yet she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Wang Ya, slumped on the ground, stared up with sad, bewildered eyes, like a lost, helpless child.