Chapter Eighty-Three: Drastic Measures

Boom!

At that deafening blast, I was almost without the slightest doubt hurled backward at once by a surge of corpse aura that came crashing straight toward me.

Cough, cough...

My body was thrown clear out of the courtyard and slammed hard into a flowerpot inside the yard, striking my waist so painfully that I could not get back up for a long while.

“You all must die! All of you... must die...”

Li Lina stepped out of the house one pace at a time, still clutching the bloodied lower half of Zhang Hansheng’s body. Why call it the lower half? Because that burly, broad-shouldered Zhang Hansheng had been completely drained dry by her by then, and before that his head had already been snapped off by Li Lina with one brutal twist. The fingers that were still growing sharp nails were already stained red with blood.

Li Lina’s appearance terrified everyone present. The Zhou family huddled together in a corner, shaking in terror, shrieking and howling nonstop. Damn it, two of the women simply fainted on the spot.

Seeing so many people at once, Li Lina’s eyes immediately blazed with a blood-red glow, flickering wildly.

Just as I managed to struggle to my feet, Li Lina seemed drawn by the earlier screams from those women. She threw the severed remains of Zhang Hansheng to the ground and charged straight toward the people in front of her.

“Xiyue, stop her now!”

Before I could even finish speaking, Xiyue had already transformed into a streak of white light and slammed Li Lina back.

At that very moment, the air above the entire courtyard began to tremble with a buzzing hum, and Tu’s voice rang out.

“Master, I can’t hold on much longer!”

I really was putting Tu in a difficult position. This entire space had been sealed off by my Tu Blood Array Chart. Just as Tu said he could not take it anymore and wanted to withdraw the array chart, I felt my vision blur and cold sweat break out across my forehead.

To be honest, from the very beginning I had never imagined things would come to this pass. Now even Li Lina had become a troublesome foe.

“Retract!”

I raised my hand, and at once the Tu Blood Array Chart flew back into it. I gripped the Sword of All Beings and charged at Li Lina again. While Old Master Zhou was unable to move, I had to bring Li Lina under control first. Chen Chuyi had told me to hold out for an hour; I figured that should not be a problem. Could Xiyue and I not handle one Li Lina?

Xiyue stood before the others and did not pursue Li Lina. I knew she had expended a great deal of vital energy in the earlier battle and could no longer unleash her full strength even under the moonlight, so the burden of slaying Li Lina still had to fall mainly on me.

Sizzle...

I brought the Sword of All Beings down in a slash, and Li Lina actually reached out and caught the blade barehanded. Instantly, one flash of Buddhist light burst forth.

Ugh... ugh...

The sound of dissolving corpse aura mingled with the shrieks of a wraith, drawing another wave of terrified cries from the courtyard. Needless to say, those screams came from the Zhou family.

While Li Lina was forced back repeatedly, I suddenly sprang forward, snatched up a talisman, and was about to slap it onto her ghost gate. But Li Lina seemed to have anticipated it long ago. The instant I moved to press the talisman onto her forehead, she lifted a leg and kicked me straight in the groin.

Aaaah!

For heaven’s sake, that was the most vulnerable part of a man’s body. Even a single kick there could leave a man writhing on the ground, let alone one delivered by a stiffened corpse—there was no difference at all from smashing straight into a rock.

“Jie jie jie jie... die!”

Good Lord, I was utterly miserable then. The pain was so fierce I was about to crouch down just to ease it, when Li Lina let out an evil laugh and stretched out that hand bristling with sharp nails, reaching toward me again. At that moment, I was almost completely stunned.

I had no strength to resist. The pain in my groin was so intense I nearly passed out. If Tu and Nie Xiaoke had not been bickering in my head the whole time, I probably would have fainted then and there.

“Xiao Dong!”

It happened in the blink of an eye. Just as those sharp nails were about to rake across my head, an aged voice rang out. Then I felt a golden flash pierce straight through my forehead, and my body was yanked violently away.

Chen Chuyi extended a hand, and the coin sword flew instantly into his grasp.

“Damn it, how did two of them end up appearing, and both of them are this fierce?”

Chen Chuyi looked at Li Lina, drenched in blood, and at Old Master Zhou standing motionless as a stone. He immediately roared, “Hurry and get everyone out of here! These two are not simple!”

Clutching my groin and bent over double, I turned to Zhou Ming and said, “Get everyone out of here, fast. When you leave, lock the courtyard gate!”

By then Zhou Ming was shaking so badly his legs could hardly hold him up. I was speechless. A moment ago he had been spouting Marxist atheism and insisting that there was no such thing as zombies in this world—how had he become this frightened all at once?

“Xiyue... I’m going to have to trouble you.”

Xiyue nodded, walked up to me, and softly asked if I was all right. I gave a bitter smile and shook my head. I checked myself just now; nothing broken, but it was probably swollen. I would need a few days to recover.

“Fiend, die!”

At that moment, Chen Chuyi, who stood before me, suddenly roared. With a lightning step forward, he flung the coin sword from his hand almost instantly, sending it first toward Li Lina’s eyes.

What I had not expected was that after becoming a ghost, Li Lina was still quite clever. Her body tilted slightly to the side, and she narrowly avoided that terrifying sword aura.

Chen Chuyi then suddenly pulled a black staff from the cloth pouch at his waist and struck hard toward Li Lina’s waist.

Slash!

Ah!

At such close range, there was no room to dodge at all. Li Lina was struck by the black staff and screamed miserably as waves of corpse aura were instantly scattered.

Having taken that blow, Li Lina retreated swiftly, but Chen Chuyi did not give her any chance to evade. Biting through the tip of his middle finger, he drew a Soul Binding Talisman in the air. The blood-red talisman shot into Li Lina’s retreating body in an instant. Her whole frame violently convulsed, and her howls grew even louder. The corpse aura surrounding her body was as though being roasted by raging fire, while streams of black smoke rose straight into the sky...

“Die, all of you must die!”

“Hmph. A fiend is a fiend. Go!”

This time Chen Chuyi moved even faster, wholly out of keeping with his age. His footwork now was that of a man in his early twenties. He lifted the black staff in his hand and brought it crashing down toward Li Lina’s shoulder.

Ugh, ugh...

Li Lina’s cries were like the desperate struggle of something trapped in the netherworld. She thrust out her sharp claws and seized the black staff with one grab.

Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle...

In an instant, the flesh on Li Lina’s hand was stripped away at high speed, leaving only white bone behind.

“Now!”

The moment Li Lina caught the black staff, Chen Chuyi lowered his head, and the coin sword shot forth like lightning, sinking deep into Li Lina’s right eye.

Aaaah!