Chapter 1362: Woman, You"re At the Wrong Table
The person that had walked out had a head of messy hair and a cold expression. Her eyes resembled black whirlpools and corruption flowed around her. It was Qin Yi"s mother, Qin Lian! Shocked looks appeared on the faces of those in the crowd. This was especially the case for those from the Bloodline of Heavenly Emperor Qin, including Qin Beiming. They could scarcely believe that Qin Lian would be emitting such dense undulations of corruption.
"Hall Master Qin Lian, you... have you been corrupted by a venomous curse?" Qin Beiming"s body had turned cold as Qin Lian"s current appearance was not foreign to him. Shen Yunge had transformed similarly, but the difference was that the corruption coming from her was multiple times more intense.
Furthermore, her inky-black eyes had turned into two black vortexes and were leaking a black substance that ran down her cheeks and dripped onto the ground.
It looked as though the curse that had afflicted her ran much deeper than Shen Yunge"s.
"d.a.m.n it. Why is it that the only ones who have been deeply cursed are from the Bloodline of Heavenly Emperor Qin?" Qin Beiming"s expression turned green. Shen Yunge wasn’t part of the Bloodline of Heavenly Emperor Qin, but the common point between the two corrupted experts was that they had spent time in Abyssal City before they entered the Treasure Domain. Qin Beiming felt like this was a little too coincidental, and he could have never imagined that the instigator of all this was none other than Qin Jiujie himself!
"Mother!" Qin Yi"s face was pale as she looked at the familiar woman with disheveled hair. Her heart ached deeply upon seeing this. Although Qin Lian had often expressed her dissatisfaction with her, they were still mother and daughter. Despite everything, Qin Yi had always done her best to live up to her mother’s expectations. However, Qin Lian"s current state brought great distress and pain to her.
Chu Qing"s expression was also ugly. "Master!" he shouted, attempting to awaken Qin Lian. But it was pointless. As Qin Lian made her way out of the corruption vortex, a wave of terrifying corruption emanated from her body and blanketed the world.
Everyone could feel that the void around them had turned a little sticky and restrictive, as though they were flies trapped in a web. Their bodies felt sluggish in her presence.
"It"s over. How could we deal with a corrupted eighth-grade Duke? Did all of the high-grade Dukes in the Treasure Domain perish?" Lu Shuanglu"s expression was pale and a look of despair could be seen in her eyes. She felt that she was truly very unfortunate. She had entered this place for a little bit of fun, but instead of gaining any benefits, she had been thrown into one disastrous situation after another. First, it was Shen Yunge, but there was at least a faint glimmer of hope after overcoming him. Qin Lian"s appearance, on the other hand, only served to cement their lack of hope.
Zhang Cuicheng sighed helplessly. "It seems like we are about to die here."
Lu Shuanglu then retorted angrily, "Shut up! It"s all your fault, wanting to come here to find Li Luo!"
He pouted in response. How did this have anything to do with finding Li Luo? Wasn"t the reason they were here because she wanted to partake in the action here and thus took on this mission? However, he knew that Lu Shuanglu was impulsive, so there was no need to argue with her. He thus kept his mouth shut, only frowning as he pondered over a way out of this predicament. Everyone else present was in a similar state.
Even Li Luo.
"This is going to be even more troublesome. That crazy woman actually got corrupted," Li Luo said when he saw the ghostly Qin Lian arrive. His scalp had turned numb. Her mind was already warped to begin with, and with the addition of corruption, wouldn"t she be even more illogically frightening?
Most importantly, Qin Lian was an eighth-grade Duke, and the corruption made her stronger. The strongest amongst them was Qin Beiming, an upper fifth-grade Duke. When Li Luo and Jiang Qing"e had combined hands, it was only with the aid of the Heavenly Dragon and Wolf Toxin that they were able to deal with the upper fifth-grade Shen Yunge.
That single strike had drained half of the Heavenly Dragon blood essence within his body, and it would be difficult to strike again any time soon. Furthermore, Li Luo suspected that even the Heavenly Dragon and Wolf Toxin was incapable of threatening Qin Lian.
After all, she was several stages higher than the last opponent! Thus, Li Luo couldn"t help but want to curse at the situation.
“d.a.m.n it! This woman just had to show up at the wrong place!”
All high-grade Duke were meant to be in the depths. They were just a bunch of kids that couldn"t stand up to her even if everyone combined their efforts.
"Qin Lian is both insane and blind!" Li Luo gritted his teeth.
Meanwhile Jiang Qing"e"s beautiful face had turned extremely serious. The situation had gone south once again; Qin Lian"s appearance placed them in unprecedented danger.
She was one of the peak experts on the Heavenly Origin Divine Continent. If one were to exclude the Kings, even ninth-grade Dukes were rarely seen. As a result, experts with her strength were often the peak fighting force of any Heavenly Emperor power. The gap was horrifyingly large, and whether it was Li Luo"s poison or her Ten-Pillar Duke Bergfried, they were all as weak as tofu before Qin Lian. That said, she naturally would not vent the way Li Luo did. Instead, her mind flashed like lightning as she coolly calculated how she could possibly break out of this situation. At the very least, she had to protect Li Luo. Just as everyone was in a panic, Qin Lian"s pitch-black, vortex-like eyes began to shift and her gloomy, hoa.r.s.e voice sounded out.
"The energy pool has been destroyed... Since that is the case, I"ll have to use your flesh and blood to nourish the flower bud."
After she spoke, a giant, blood-red petal descended from the flower bud. To everyone’s surprise, a huge mouth full of fangs and sharp teeth emerged. It seemed to be constantly chewing, letting out terrifying grating noises.
Qin Lian"s deep eyes then glanced around as she asked emotionlessly, "So, do you want to walk in by yourselves?"
Some were so terrified that they couldn"t help but to retreat. Qin Lian was indeed addled in the mind. Who would willingly choose to let themselves be eaten?
Qin Beiming then built up his resolve and said, "Hall Master Qin Lian, please wake up! We are all your people!"
His voice lingered on the word "people," hoping to awaken her.
Meanwhile, the others could no longer suppress the growing terror in their hearts and began to flee in distress.
However, a black light slowly rose from atop Qin Lian"s head and suddenly expanded. In just a few breaths of time, it enveloped the entire area. Dusky flames appeared, filling up the skies and the void. In the end, the whole world seemed to have transformed into a saturnine flame sea.
At the same time, everyone could sense that they had lost all connection to worldly natural energy.
Some within the crowd blurted out, "A Duke"s Worlds.p.a.ce Domain!"
This was one of the abilities a high-grade Duke possessed. They could create a domain around them, controlling the worldly natural energy within that area as they wished. No one else could wrestle that control from them. Thus, one would be weakened within an enemy"s domain.
The only way to resist a Duke"s Worlds.p.a.ce Domain was with another domain. Only then could they compete for hegemony of the world around them. However, the strongest person present was Qin Beiming, and he was quite a distance away from reaching that stage.
Within the void, the saturnine flames formed into chains and began to shoot out like bolts of lightning, wrapping around those who were attempting to flee. They attempted to fight back, summoning their Duke Bergfrieds, but the flames were domineering, instantly incinerating the Duke Bergfrieds and melting them completely.
A series of pained cries rang out.
A first or second-grade Duke was no different from an ant before a high-grade Duke. The saturnine flame chains burned their skin to a crisp, exposing flesh and blood before forcefully dragging them back alive. With a light flick, the unfortunate individuals were thrown into the gaping maw of the blood-red petal.
The giant mouth began to chew, and one could hear the sounds of bones crunching and flesh squelching as blood seeped out. The flower gradually transformed and turned even more red.
To everyone’s shock, the flower bud was expanding yet again.
Li Luo and Jiang Qing"e looked on with ugly expressions. The two began to retreat. They had to group up with the rest and combine their strengths in order to see if they could even muster up a defense.
But just as they moved, Qin Lian"s vortex-like eyes turned to them. This was the first time she had spotted him. Li Luo similarly looked into her eyes, seeing her ghostly visage twist up with an exaggerated smile.
A moment later, a mirthless and venomous laugh resounded through the skies.
"Look what I"ve found! Li Luo! Do you think Li Jingzhe is that impressive? Do you think he can save you now? I"ll let you experience the most painful torment before you die. I"ll then take your bones and form a puppet in your image to send to Li Jingzhe, Tan Tailan, and Li Taixuan!
"Hahahahaha!"