The young girl was dressed in a tattered long gown, her bare feet stained with blood. Fresh wounds marred her arms and legs, still unhealed. Her face was delicate and elegant, her large eyes both ethereal and dazed like those of a helpless creature caught unprepared.
Yet the魔裔’s instinct screamed danger—even though this girl had not even reached the rank of Warlord.
In her hand was an enormous battle cleaver, disproportionately large for her small frame. A bulging backpack, nearly half her size, trailed behind her packed with an assortment of weapons sticking part way out: handguns, blades, and even heavy weapons like axes—all a sight chilling and unnerving on sight.
This assembly of armaments exuded terror even from afar.
The 魔裔 clenched his nerves and questioned coldly, voice remarkably tempered for someone of the Highborn of Darkness—for he had barely survived a critical beatdown at Qian Ye’s hands and his usual abilities were still functioning only because he had activated his racial battle arts forcefully.
The girl’s voice was light and soft, almost airy as if carried by distant music, like from afar:”I’m named Bai Kongzhao. I can bet, truly, you don’t want to hear this name.”
The魔裔 shuddered visibly as expected, because that was undeniably his most loathed name now. During the brutal iron curtain battles, she was among the most memorable and dangerous human prodigies to leave bloody marks upon永夜 forces. She followed closely after the Empire’s Twin Stars—Qian Ye and Zhao Jundu—and then宋子宁—then ranked by legend was she.
What rendered Bai particularly horrifying was how efficiently brutal and ruthless she was, achieving carnage and destruction despite being of low rank—without question a devil in the eyes of the Dark Kindreds.
Terror surged as he forced a surge of his remaining power through his body and lunged desperately.
Facing a foe reduced to merely less than a third strength at best and still reeling, Bai Kongzhao evaded effortlessly and brought her monstrous cleaver slicing downward, neatly lopping off his lower leg.
Screaming in utter anguish from his sudden dismemberment, he rolled and fell, freshly reopened his still-mending chest wound spilling forth blood anew.
Bai Kongzhao approached calmly, the cleaver dripping dark blood, her voice echoing her ghostly tone.”I forgot to mention: no matter whether or not either you wish for death, either way it grants me delight all the same.”
“Y— you, what are you seeking?！” the魔裔 stammered through horror. Already betrayed in the face of Qian Ye once—the humiliation easier endured if repeated.
Yet without a hint of remorse or hesitation, Bai Kongzhang took one further deliberate step forward and planted foot upon the severed stump of her adversary’s leg. Screams nearly turned him unconscious in agony again.
Not until the tortured screams dragged on a sufficient moment did Bai remove her bare foot. Only then did she add:”It’s your Clan’s cultivation secrets I seek.”
“My clan techniques?” the魔裔 echoed his bewilderment, truly unable to suspect this wish.
For their secret cultivation arts were essentially ineffective if used by any race aside from their own. They had been passed through their family lineages tied irrevocably for countless millennia to blood powers connected mystically to Totems, shared amongst certain High Families alone. Even for fellow魔裔 from different lineages trying to copy them without success: their effectiveness was halved.
Secrets distinguished powerful Highblooded Lineage from nobodies lesser ranked. Yet they were never considered highly classified due simply to how specialized and inefficient the secrets were for other bloodlines—should leakage occur, uselessness would result anyway, for only specific inherited blood powers truly enabled these techniques to shine in full terrifying force.
The mere consideration the secret could become a weapon against魔裔was even laughable—their Totemic forces were birth-given by primordial Rule governing reality itself. Rules of reality—how can rules themselves be destroyed when such is impossible? Impossible to think the world itself could be cracked and sundered entirely—wasn’t it?
So then why would a human like Bai need them?
But it proved irrelevant; in the situation at that moment, he sought only a reprieve from further agony. He relinquished all he knew regarding the techniques hastily.
Bai Kongzhao pressed with over a dozen pointed questions and then made him repeat the knowledge fully. Many iterations later when sure of its unvarnished truthness, a flick of her deadly cleaver passed—off his head spun cleanly.
“Y—you, deceive me!” His last scream as the severed head shrieked.
Bai Kongzhao gave a guileless, childish smile in reply:“Could you expect otherwise with a girl’s words？”
Thud.
The beheaded魔裔’s skull met the substance-rich floor. Though his mind burned with something yet said, his mouth uttered nothing past ragged wind escaping torn muscles. His pouring lifeblood touched the ground, as if waking the latent monstrous forces buried. It animated the floor, creeping forth, embracing that still conscious severed head.
As Bai leaned to rummage through the headless torso, suddenly her silhouette stood frozen—her body briefly tense. Almost imperceptibly, she relaxed—but it was merely deceptive pliancy. Stooping to crouch low upon ground rather, every muscle coiled predatory like an ambush beast ready to explode.
From beyond the fog appeared暮色’s silhouette emerging like she rose forth from its core, so fluidly blended were the ambient swirling tendrils—perhaps her own.
Meeting Bai head on,暮色allowed only a seductive smile onto her face:“Such a perspective… how well I share in its sentiment. Even our enemies mirror closely one-another. Truly unfortunate a prospect it seems—to kill something with such potential. However…”
Before暮色might finish, suddenly Bai’s head turned sharply behind, her usually composed countenance flashing raw terror at something unseen there.
Smirking,暮色showed absolutely zero attention toward turning behind and simply said:”A cheap ploy suitable for childish displays. Shall not lesser trickery be cast aside? We ought to treat one another with the respect due kindred superior talents.”
Even so, Bai still showed the horror of prey in the presence of predator. It showed no awareness to 暮’s words at all and, despite imminent vulnerability should the slightest wrong motion follow, Bai instead exploded sideways through a swift burst, darting backward, fleeing at a dizzy speed deep through forest shadow.
But for every additional hundred meters distancing her would result in her completely slipping past 暮.
Not letting slip her pray ever,暮色recalled well her long surveillance across time upon the battlefield iron-curtains against this hunter Bai. To herself, within all criteria for dangerous human killers—F Zhao might approach it more so—but Bai’s deadly potential was not so far behind at her deadliest hour.
Mist flowed violently displaced as within blink暮 she traversed tens of meters forward through momentum—racing after Bai, chasing like a hunting feline.
Yet passing through Bai’s previous spot abruptly an instinctual warning flared. She abruptly twisted aside with instantaneous reaction.
Ground rumbled and shot a blazing infernal column upwards from ruptured ground. Shockwave slammed directly into 暮, tearing her sideways through midair before launching impact against tall ancient tree trunks behind. Her body rebounded after impact.
Stumbling with ungraceful landing,暮s head reeled in shock mixed with intense ire. Turning toward the explosion’s source with narrowed eyes, she found scorched terrain and no remains. Even the ever-present substrates of the terrain itself seemed burned out, absent. A crater now filled the space—evidence of an enormous explosion with at least over seven or eight vampire-force explosive cores activated in synchronous destruction buried beneath Bai’s previous standing point—only possible explanation.
Even暮色’s exceptional perception had no idea precisely the moment the sly girl must’ve hidden traps within ground. Reflecting through every action recalled, timing aligned most certainly around when after Bai decapitated the 魔裔while nearing the corpse right as herself appeared—Bai concealed actions from blind spot hidden by bodily positioning that single critical moment passed.
By time 暮色recovered, Bai had long vanished in haze.
A single angered stomp resonated her exasperation—she admitted her underestimating this girl’s venomous and agile nature.咬牙，怒哼: “We’ll have another reckoning eventually—wherever you flee，I can track you!”
Yet another howl reverberated, fierce and powerful. Recognization sparked:威廉声名 as fierce duelist and equal matched with 暮 across years behind 纵横捭阖 iron war curtain. Yet 暮had zero wish meeting such an adversary without that battlefield restraint here now.
She analyzed distances, positions—and reluctantly ceased. Faced with this unavoidable reality she swore:”Fine. This once I let slip your neck out of grace. But that Wolf ahead—test him at your peril.”
论战力，哪怕几十 Bai Kongzhao would struggle matched to just this brute Wolf lord directly. Bai’s combat techniques, sly exterior masking lethal instincts, might however prove a thorn more irritating than manageable—maybe, under strange misfortune, it was the Wolf who’d taste humiliation today.
An image unintentionally painted itself: the Wolf spinning and chasing tail blindly deceived.
A part of她 mind wavered toward resuming chasing anyway.
Then she hesitantly recalled why halting was necessary.
威廉， honorable warrior in certain lights and unbendable moral rigidness often mistaken clumsiness. Yet within this stubbornness lay a terrifying habit—if in presence of暮， regardless what said—if he fancied a mood—fight it’d be. Anger or elation: beat would go forth.
暮 had spent years attempting sincere discussion for change, for ceasefire.门罗家的 Diplomatic approaches always leaned toward moderation, especially under present inner and external stress where they lacked both reason nor desire to prolong conflict against such peaks-elite force as群峰之巅.
Yet 暮自己 never understood where talks broke down repeatedly into unavoidable confrontation, and each conflict she emerged worse off.
Experience dictated after being beaten repeatedly, a better alternative was playing the game of tricks and illusions against his blunt force—yet even one such deception once nearly cost 暮 his life had it not been for a fortunate recovery that shattered even her expectations of Bai’s limits.
From onward, he regarded 暮 with more suspicious intent than ever—last curtain clash he ambushed and nearly destroyed 暮色 entirely, forcing expenditure of one precious life-debt item.
Even some elder vampires spoke how for William, thoughtless maybe yes—but “slow” is mistaken word often: once determined, he became a truly formidable opponent.
Though 暮色herself had heard such words whispered countless times—instinct refused acceptability the Wolf had any mind as sharp sharp as himself.
Right then—meeting with William wasn’t appealing.
威廉represented a force which caused headaches with singular-minded determination combined with terrifying might—the perfect formula for complications.
After sparing a lingering gaze in the howling direction,暮转身离去. Not a hundred strides away when her eyes caught flickers—blue flash at periphery. Instant alarm—turned quickly: over kilometers afar the blue streak flew!
Not ordinary blue. Blade brilliance unmistakably sharp and violent despite the fog-choked terrain. A luminous arc visible at all over kilometers spoke power terrifyingly honed—the kind impossible to match.
Color deserted from mặt暮，her instinct screamed: she knew full certainty she’d have shattered to dust if hit full-on.
The sharp energy bore the signature light-hued dawn energy. It unmistakably belonged to a certain strong Empire figure who’d recently arrived.
She quickly shifted course, departing, her pace now far more hurried than ever.
千米 beyond, where brilliant swords surged anew, appeared an injured spider魔伯爵 staggering backward cradling grievously torn left shoulder. Blood streamed. Arm no longer present. Even shoulder partially sheared clean. Never did time make way for activating Spider-Fom, which might perhaps have minimized his wound marginally.
Before him walked李狂澜从, from tree shadow emerged. With every graceful step toward his trembling adversary emerged predatory aura radiating from her, with those devil-mystique eyes locked into the spider noble predator herself—the eyes held even greater cutting edge than sword tip now raised forward.
A crystalline water-blue blade sang with song and silence all together. Blade clear and transparent as crystal formed from the deepest heart of winter’s essence itself.
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