Chapter 157: Shatter the Scholar, Slay the Master!

"Charge! Kill him!"

"We are invulnerable to blades and protected by divine power, what is there to fear from him?"

"Together! Kill him! Even if we die, it doesn't matter. It will just release us from the cage of the flesh and set our souls free!"

Although frightened, the people inside the wizard temple quickly recovered, clamoring as they rushed toward Shang Lu, intending to drag him off his horse and kill him.

They could see that Shang Lu was formidable, but they were not afraid.

According to the Master, death was a form of liberation for them.

That being the case, what was there to fear about death?

With nothing left to fear in death, how could these government constables, no matter how powerful, be of any concern?

Seeing this, Shang Lu raised an eyebrow.

He knew these people were deeply bewitched by the Master, and ordinary rebukes or reasoning would be utterly useless.

Instead, he went along with their words and shouted loudly, "Are you truly unafraid of death? Being killed by others will not free you from the cage; you will only be imprisoned forever, never to attain release!"

"What?"

"Is there such a thing?"

The people inside the wizard temple paused in unison, unsure whether to believe Shang Lu's words.

Taking advantage of this momentary hesitation, Shang Lu leaped from his horse's back, vaulted over the heads of the crowd, and hurtled straight toward the main hall.

"Whoosh—"

"Whoosh, whoosh—"

At that very moment, several sharp arrows suddenly came hurtling toward Shang Lu.

Not only were they extremely fast, but the force contained within the arrows was also immensely powerful, forcing Shang Lu to draw his saber in mid-air to parry them.

"Clang, clang, clang, clang..."

Shang Lu struck several times in succession, knocking down all the arrows aimed at him, but his forward momentum was halted, and he landed outside the main hall.

The one shooting arrows at him was none other than the Confucian scholar guarding the entrance of the main hall.

Confucian scholars practiced the Six Arts, and archery was one of them.

The scholar guarding the hall was not only proficient in archery but also deeply studied in mathematics and calligraphy.

Shang Lu keenly noticed that as the scholar shot his arrows, his fingers kept twitching, calculating his speed, trajectory, and various possible counter-measures.

The arrows previously fired by the county soldiers had also been completely blocked by this scholar.

The method he used to block the arrows was not shooting arrow against arrow, but rather employing a large net.

A net formed of black ink!

Shang Lu had seen it clearly. The moment he forced his horse through the gates, the county soldiers' arrows had arrived before the hall.

The scholar had drawn a brush from his bosom, the ink upon it gathered from his own cultivation. As he flourished his brush and poured out ink, he rapidly wrote the character for "Net." The ink flew into mid-air, transforming into a giant net that intercepted the soldiers' arrows.

Even now, that ink net still hung over the hall entrance like a spider's web, making it difficult for subsequent arrows from the county soldiers to penetrate.

Only Feng Nan's arrow had pierced through the ink net, but unfortunately, its force had already been spent, failing to injure the Master.

"Whoosh, whoosh—"

Without pausing, the scholar loosed several more arrows at Shang Lu.

Not only did they seal off his evasive routes, but they also anticipated his potential counter-attacks.

Shang Lu found himself hard-pressed for a time, and was even struck by an arrow.

Fortunately, Shang Lu's protective vital blood was strong enough not only to deflect the arrow but also to shatter it, preventing any injury.

Entangled by the scholar, Shang Lu was temporarily unable to charge into the main hall.

The other people inside the wizard temple surged forward once again at this moment.

The Master's voice echoed in their ears: "As long as you die before me, even if you are killed by others, you will still attain liberation!"

Such an absurd statement was actually believed by these people.

Without any reservations, they launched themselves at Shang Lu in suicide charges.

Fortunately, Tu Pi and the others arrived in time, working together with the official mounts to help block these frenzied individuals, sparing Shang Lu from being attacked from front and rear and stretched to his limits.

Even so, the situation remained dire.

The people of Yunxi Town had been so thoroughly deceived that they felt no fear of death.

Worse still, the burning of their life force through evil fires made them invulnerable to weapons and granted them explosive strength in the short term.

Meanwhile, Feng Nan and the others held back and could not fully unleash their power when facing these ordinary citizens.

For a moment, the stalemate appeared deadlocked, but it was extremely disadvantageous for Shang Lu and his men.

Only by subduing the Master as quickly as possible could they turn the tide.

Shang Lu let out a furious roar and charged toward the hall doors once more, unleashing the Chaotic Wind Saber Technique. The blade light whistled out like a gale.

"Clang, clang, clang, clang..."

The continuous arrows shot by the scholar were all deflected and shattered by Shang Lu.

Seeing that he was close enough, his left hand suddenly whipped a beast-hide lash from his waist, striking toward the scholar with lightning speed.

The scholar's fingers were twitching continuously—almost to the point of cramping—yet he had not calculated this development.

Seeing the lash whip toward his face like a venomous snake, the scholar was greatly startled and could only use his bow to block.

As the beast-hide lash wrapped around the long bow, a formidable force transmitted from the tip of the whip.

The scholar let out a sharp cry and refused to yield, channeling his strength to resist.

His strength was by no means small, and he even attempted to wrench the whip away.

Unexpectedly, the strength in Shang Lu's left hand turned out to be inferior to that of the scholar.

After all, the Confucian scholars in this world were not weak scholars with no strength to truss a chicken; they were stalwart scholars capable of roaming the ends of the earth with a sword, and if words and theories failed, they would draw their swords to reason!

However, Shang Lu still had his right hand.

He drove his ox-tail saber into the ground, gripped the beast-hide lash with his right hand, and exerted a sudden burst of strength.

The strength of his right hand was several times greater than his left, and its explosive power was astonishing.

"Boom—"

The scholar's long bow was actually snapped clean in half.

The bowstring lashed across the scholar's hand like a blade, slicing open a deep wound down to the bone as blood spurted wildly.

Before the scholar could cry out in pain, Shang Lu seized the ox-tail saber from the ground and executed the Tiger-Stamping Technique, simultaneously visualizing a white tiger in his mind.

Bolstered by the White Tiger Movement Method, Shang Lu's figure became even swifter and more ferocious, instantly closing in on the scholar.

Terrified and too late to retrieve his brush, the scholar bit the tip of his tongue and spat blood at Shang Lu to use as ink.

This mouthful of vital tongue-blood condensed into the character for "Rain" in mid-air.

Immediately afterward, it transformed into a shower of blood droplets, sweeping toward Shang Lu like a torrential downpour.

Shang Lu employed the Chaotic Wind Saber Technique once more, his long blade dancing wildly. Though he struck the blood droplets, he could not destroy them, merely splitting each into two, which still retained their lethality.

The scholar grinned maniacally, believing Shang Lu was about to fall victim to his technique.

To his shock, the next instant, the vital blood on the saber blade burst into blazing flames!

The blood rain spat by the scholar was instantly burned to ashes.

"How can this be?"

The scholar could not comprehend why Shang Lu's vital blood was capable of burning.

Even less could he understand how Shang Lu dared to let his vital blood burn?! Wasn't he afraid of destroying the vital blood he had cultivated with such immense difficulty?

Little did the scholar know that vital blood was the one thing Shang Lu lacked least!

Nor could he possibly know that within Shang Lu's body resided a Five Viscera Temple, where the fire of anger originated from the liver spirit, instantly igniting his vital blood!

This was a technique Shang Lu had figured out through sparring with Siniang and Uncle Huai.

Originally intended to deal with paper figures and similar oddities, he had not expected to test it out so successfully against the scholar's blood rain.

Having failed his strike and lacking time for other reactions, the scholar was closed in upon by Shang Lu using the Tiger-Stamping Technique.

A fierce slash struck squarely across his chest.

In his haste, the scholar could only cross his arms in front of his chest to protect himself.

"Boom—"

The formidable force erupting from this slash directly blasted the scholar backward, leaving his life or death uncertain.

With the scholar no longer blocking the way, Shang Lu rushed into the main hall like a whirlwind, the tip of his blade pointing directly at the Master shrouded in shadows.

The Master remained unmoved, not even attempting to dodge.

He merely stared at Shang Lu, his eyes flashing with a bewitching and otherworldly radiance, while continuing to wag his glib tongue in an attempt to captivate Shang Lu:

"You and I are not enemies. Lay down your weapon, listen to a lecture from me, and you shall know the truth of this world..."

The Master had immense confidence in his ability to bewitch minds.

Shang Lu was only at the Marrow-Washing realm and had never tempered his state of mind; it was utterly impossible for him to resist his bewitchment!

After hearing his words, Shang Lu would surely obediently throw down his long saber, kneel before him, listen to his teachings, and fall under his spell...

Yet the very next instant, the expression on the Master's face shifted drastically.

Not only did Shang Lu not throw down his saber, but he also accelerated, the tip of his blade pointing straight between the Master's eyebrows!

The Master could already feel the sharp stinging sensation radiating from the center of his brow.

This brat wasn't swayed by my words at all?!

A rare flash of terror appeared in the Master's eyes.

At the same time, Shang Lu's blade pierced his flesh.

A streak of scarlet blood trickled down from the center of the Master's brow, making him appear even more eerie.