Chapter 73 - Corpse Puppets

The battle raged on, growing increasingly ferocious as the bloodshed became more intense by the second. Despite the growing intensity, many people, particularly the Ghu Clansmen, were still hiding their true abilities, refusing to show their strongest skills just yet.

Unless the battle reached a certain level, they would withhold from displaying their hidden abilities; this was the natural caution of a Ghu Clansman. Unlike many other young prodigies, none of these individuals were overly arrogant, nor were they desperate to show off to others. Their ruthless upbringing had taught them that it was best to always keep some abilities hidden from those around you.

“We should head towards the centre, where Aque Li is gathering the other cultivators.” Ghu Lin assessed. He made sure to raise his voice, speaking loud enough that the other Ghu Clansmen could hear him.

When they heard the name ‘Aque Li’, many Ghu Clansmen’s gazes towards the 5th Layer Qi Temple Realm man changed. They now understood how that person was able to rally those around him so easily. Despite it looking like a spontaneous unification on the surface, that was not really the case..

“Aque Clan…!” Ghu Nadda narrowed his eyes. “So Aque Li came this time…are there others from the Aque Clan here…?”

“They should be. They hid themselves well, blending in as lone cultivators this time.” Ghu Lin nodded. “Stay alert, they could even be hidden amongst our own ranks.”

People looked around warily upon hearing this.

For some reason, Ghu Lin’s words caused Yaan to feel an uneasy premonition, but he couldn’t work out why he felt this way.

To be honest, there were simply too many things that he needed to remain aware of right now. He decided that it would be best to maintain his caution, or else he could be attacked by a potential hidden snake.

At this moment, Yaan’s expression changed and he hastily leapt back.

Bang!

Just as he landed lightly on his feet, the ground where he had just been standing a moment earlier exploded. Dirt ignited and shot out in all directions. Most people managed to evade in time, but a Ghu Clan female cultivator was caught in the eye by a stray flaming projectile.

Boom!

The dirt exploded on impact with her face, causing the woman to scream out miserably. However, she was still a Ghu Clansman, she was not a useless person. After gritting her teeth and enduring the agony, she quickly activated a defensive spell to prevent the shockwaves from tearing apart her brain. After exhaling deeply, she managed to quell the violent outburst across her body.

Her face was now completely disfigured, and her expression became ferocious. She turned to face her attackers, only to find…that they were already dead!

Or more precisely, they were corpse puppets.

When he saw the group of five Qi Temple Realm corpses attacking the people on his side, Yaan couldn’t help but smile bitterly.

It wasn’t long before another wave of people charged towards them. At least, they looked like people at first, but upon closer inspection, it became obvious that they were also all corpses!

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Hordes of corpses charged their way, followed by the enemy cultivators who had become more daring with so many powerful corpses surrounding and protecting them. Gradually, with the addition of the corpse puppet warriors, the Ghu Clan’s momentum was halted, and even pushed back!

“Ah…” Nadda muttered, before glancing at Yaan and sharing his bitter expression.

“This was the biggest flaw in our plan…” Nadda laughed wryly. Yaan could only nod silently.

As corpse puppet after corpse puppet charged towards the Ghu Clan side, joined by countless cultivators behind them, Yaan realised that almost all of these corpses were Yuso Clansmen…

Yaan and Ghu Nadda ended up arming their enemies in the 3rd trial.

In their defence, how could they have expected that they would end up engaging in an all out melee against their entire client base? And of course, these people would have simply spent their money elsewhere and procured other offensive means if they hadn’t bought the Yuso Clan corpses…but regardless, it was still depressing to battle against the weapons that they had supplied to their enemies.

Whoosh…

Yaan was startled and glanced to the side. He watched as Nadda brought out 5, 10…12 corpse puppets from his spatial ring!

Nadda’s corpse puppets were all at the Qi Temple Realm and Qi Palace Realm. They all charged forth towards the opposing corpse puppets as soon as they appeared.

Nadda wasn’t the only Ghu Clansman to bring out corpse puppets, but his control was exquisite compared to others! Not only that, but all of his puppets were at the 3rd and 4th Layer Qi Temple Realm! Whilst corpse puppets weren’t as powerful as cultivators at the same cultivation stage, they were still a force to be reckoned with!

Normally, it would be difficult to control four or five corpse puppets at a time. Nadda’s near-perfect control over 12 corpse puppets proved that he was actually an expert in this area!

Yaan knew that Nadda used corpse puppets, but he hadn’t realised that he was so proficient.

After Nadda’s corpse puppets appeared and joined the fray, the other Ghu Clansmen who had been holding back and hiding their abilities until now, realised that they also needed to put in more effort. The battle had clearly escalated to the extent that holding back was no longer possible.

The sudden addition of the Ghu Clan’s corpse puppets gave the Ghu Clan side a massive surge in momentum, causing the tides of battle to be turned back around in an instant! Swarms of corpse puppets began appearing as they were summoned by Ghu Clansmen one after the other, and soon enough, the Ghu Clan side’s numbers increased by five times!

Not all of the Ghu Clansmen controlled corpse puppets, but around half of them did. However, it didn’t really surprise anyone that this notorious demonic clan was so proficient in corpse puppet refinement and control.

Yaan glanced at Ghu Lin, but the unreadable young man showed no signs of changing his methods. He didn’t bring out any corpse puppets, but continued to use his unusual methods to cripple every opponent he faced. He didn’t kill, but he cut tendons, dismembered limbs, and sometimes drained his target’s body of blood, leaving helpless victims on the floor for Yaan to finish off.

But Ghu Lin was very crafty. He never crippled so many that there were too many to keep track of. He crippled at a similar rate that Yaan killed, making it easy for him to dive in and grab the rewards.

Surprisingly, with Ghu Nadda’s corpse puppets joining the fray, the teamwork between Ghu Nadda, Ghu Lin and Yaan became impeccable. Nadda’s corpses arranged into a formation just ahead of Yaan and Ghu Lin, fending off the bulk of the enemies around them whilst allowing only a select few to pass through a narrow channel, all of whom were promptly dealt with by Ghu Lin. Once those cultivators were debilitated, Yaan was able to rush in swiftly, cutting off their dwindling lives before they had the chance to use any recovery pills or healing type spells.

As the battle dragged on, the scent of blood stained the air. Bodies littered the ground and the bloodthirsty expressions seen on the faces of those on both sides grew more and more savage.

For most of the people here, this was their first experience with a battle on this scale. Of course, there were some who had experienced wars between their home sects or clans, but it was rare to have so many powerful cultivators battling it out to the death like this.

The fact that they were trapped within an enclosed space made it feel all the more desperate. No matter which way they turned, there was nowhere to escape from this frenzy.

It had been a long time since Yaan had experienced this sort of feeling. Back when he cultivated Innate Qi, before his dantian was crippled, he used to absorb the Slaughter Aura from those he killed. With his dantian destroyed, he was no longer forced to do such a thing.

Even so, people couldn’t help but feel a sort of slaughterous insanity when blood sprayed all around, when bodies fell to their sides with every passing second, and when a seemingly endless swarm of enemies were crazily trying to take their lives.

He tried his best to keep a sound mind of course. Compared to others, Yaan was more accustomed to dealing with these bloodthirsty emotions, so he was able to retain his rationality to a greater degree. Actually, this trend was seen across the Ghu Clan side as a whole; compared to their enemies, there were fewer individuals with bloodshot eyes, who had completely lost themselves to slaughter.

As time flew by, Yaan’s breathing became heavy and laboured. He lost count of the number of enemies that he had slain…of the number of lives that he had ended.

After being thrust into the midst of this chaotic battlefield, he didn’t have the luxury to care about anything other than progressing forwards, killing in order to survive.

Yaan swallowed recovery pills to keep up his energy, but this battle was more mentally taxing than physically, for him at least.

Images of his slain enemies flashed through his mind unrelentingly. It was difficult to focus on the battle when their screams seemed to echo throughout his psyche, even long after their deaths. He pushed through this pain, but it was without a doubt exhausting, and Yaan wasn’t sure how much more he could take. He didn’t know how long it had been and much longer they would need to endure, but it was clear that neither he nor those around him could keep this up for much longer.

And then, finally, they reached their target. For the first time since the battle commenced, Yaan, Ghu Lin and Nadda all stopped, gasping for breath as they stared forwards with vicious expressions. Ahead of them, the blood-soaked figure of Aque Li stared back with a dark expression.