Chapter 209: The Purifying Strength of Soul
When the eyepatch that sealed the Purple Demon Eye had burnt to ashes, the eye embedded within the little skeleton’s eye socket once again discharged an eye piercing purple light.
In that instant, that soul wrenching pain once again invaded Han Shuo and the little skeleton’s body. The bone deep pain made both Han Shuo and the little skeleton tremble all over.
Han Shuo couldn’t help but let a growl under his breath, and the little skeleton’s stark white jaw bone also clattered together as the two were invaded by a mysterious power.
Suddenly, the demon infant residing in his abdomen surprisingly generated an enormous suction power. Han Shuo had the sudden impression that the demon infant had turned into a black hole in that instant. His entire body seemed to turn into a great spider web, with the demon infant at the center, and all his meridians had turned into the durable fibers of the spider web.
Thanks to the absorption force, the force that had invaded Han Shuo’s body streamed towards the demon infant along the meridians of the spider web, like streams returning to the ocean.
The heart wrenching pain decreased by quite a bit when his body morphed into this state. The invading power in Han Shuo’s body was sent to the demon infant. Just like how Johnny’s soul had once been digested and absorbed, this power was being turned into nutrients to aid a crazy rate of development for the demon infant.
As the pain in his body slowly came under control, Han Shuo saw that the little skeleton was still rolling continuously on the ground. He struggled to make it to the little skeleton’s side, and aimed the palm of his left hand at the skeleton’s left eye socket, releasing the “Demonic Art of a.s.similation”.
Magical light suddenly sparkled from his left hand as beams of faint purple light flowed into his body through Han Shuo’s arm. They were sent via the meridians to the demon infant, just like the surge of power in his body had been treated.
This was when Han Shuo was certain that the power from the Purple Demon Eye was one of the soul. Judging from the close relation between the forest trolls and their protector Datara, this might very well be the vestiges of soul power left by the demon Datara on this plane.
Compared to Johnny’s soul, the soul from the Purple Demon Eye was even stronger. The violent, rampaging presence held within was met with no resistance from the demon infant. Instead, the demon infant circulated the power from that soul madly, slowly purifying it.
Looking in on the demon infant, Han Shuo could see that the demon infant now looked like a sun burning with black spellfire, sending out piercing magic light in all directions. At the moment, Han Shuo’s body was also glowing with light, as beams of a violent, chaotic, and evil magical aura wreathed his body. From the distance, it looked like Han Shuo had suddenly gained countless black arms that were dancing wildly around him.
After who knew how long, Han Shuo suddenly relaxed as a crisp cracking sound rang out. Something seemed to have broken in the Purple Demon Eye as it suddenly lost its light. A cloud of purple smoke leaked out from the little skeleton’s left eye as the demon infant kept furiously circulating the power from the soul. The power that he’d gained from the Purple Demon Eye was heads and shoulders above the amount that they’d obtained from Johnny a few days ago. When Han Shuo felt that all the power had been absorbed into the demon infant, he gave the little skeleton an order to protect him. After that, Han Shuo sat down crosslegged to enter a meditative state to digest everything.
The power within the Purple Demon Eye had been completely absorbed by the demon infant. The little skeleton sat dumbly on the floor for a while when he was released from his agony. After the mysterious power had vanished, the Purple Demon Eye embedded within the little skeleton’s left eye socket rolled around adroitly, giving the little skeleton a trace of life.
“What’s going on?” Emily and Gilbert detected that black magical aura had exploded out of Han Shuo’s room, and they couldn’t help but come forth to investigate.
The little skeleton had been sitting on the floor when he heard the knocks from outside. He straightened his calf bones and stood up, walking to open the door as his eye rolled a bit.
When Emily and Gilbert saw that a short, white skeleton had appeared in front of them when the door was open, and that there was a purple eyeball in his left eye socket whirring busily, both of them hastily took a few steps back in their fright.
Reaching out to point his left finger at Han Shuo, the little skeleton’s eye rolled in a circle as his hand reached for his mouth and made a shus.h.i.+ng gesture. His meaning for Emily and Gilbert was that, “He needs quiet, don’t disturb him!”
Emily and Gilbert stared dumbly back at this little skeleton that was telling them to be quiet. They instinctively felt that the scene in front of them was too much of a challenge for their minds. A dark creature had made such a human gesture in front of them, and there was even an life-like eyeball rolling around in his left eye socket. All of this seemed unimaginably fantastic.
It was a good thing that it wasn’t Emily’s first day knowing Han Shuo. When she’d fought Han Shuo, she’d come up short against this little skeleton. Thus, when she looked carefully at the little skeleton and noticed the seven bone spurs on his back, she immediately understood that while the bone spurs color had changed, this little skeleton was still the same marvelous skeleton that’d been immune to most dark magic and had relentlessly chased her.
“I think your master must be having some sort of marvelous advancement this time again. We won’t disturb him then!” Taking a deep breath, Emily shook her head at Gilbert and indicated for him to leave with her.
After the earth elite zombie’s sudden rage in the cemetery of death, Gilbert understood that his master’s dark creatures were different than the ones that he knew. If there was a zombie could form a large crack in the ground to attack him just for one sentence, then it wasn’t too difficult to understand a small skeleton that made such human gestures.
“I think it’ll be very interesting to follow such a master!” Gilbert looked at the little skeleton curiously and waved his hand goodbye, turning to speak to Emily after closing the door.
“I think so too, but you must continuously improve yourself, or you might find one day that you can’t even defeat one of your master’s dark creatures!” Emily had learned from Han Shuo that the dark creatures he refined had the unlimited potential to evolve by themselves. She’d been a bit skeptical at first, but was a firm believer now that she’d seen the little skeleton’s performance.
Han Shuo had been wholly unaware of Emily and Gilbert’s visit. The enormous power from the purple eye was making him focus his concentration to the utmost, and he was impervious to all distractions from the outside world.
Some magical cultivators needed to find an exceedingly quiet area to to mediate behind closed doors when training some sort of secret art or refining some treasure. They would also set up multiple layers of heavy defenses, in order to prevent disturbances. So much caution was taken because this was when a cultivator was most defenseless. Not a single bit of distraction could happen during this process, or one would run the risk of a cultivation deviation or waste of previous effort.
Two days and nights pa.s.sed. Han Shuo stayed within his room during this time, and Phoebe, Emily, and Trunks all busied themselves with setting up the mercenary band, or continuing to talk business into selling more of Han Shuo’s jewels.
On that night, the crew was staying within the store and discussing how best to use the gold as well as the most efficient way to handle the mercenary band’s affairs when a member of the Cairo mercenary band suddenly knocked to say that a group of people were on their way over.
The mercenary left immediately after delivering this message, saying that they needed to report this to the chief or vice chief of the Cairo mercenary band. He warned them to be careful, and informed them that their men would arrive in half an hour.
“It looks like the Rainbow Sickle mercenaries are on their way over. Bryan can’t be disturbed at the moment, and we don’t know when he’ll wake up either. We’re in a bit of trouble now!” Emily said with a small frown when the mercenary left.
“We’ll give whoever dares come a thorough beating if they dare trespa.s.s!” Gilbert was obviously not thinking much of this matter as he bl.u.s.tered offhandedly.
“They’re not that easy to take care of. Florida’s experts are as numerous as the clouds, and the Church of Light has sent some reinforcements as well. You may not be able to win even if you turn back into a dragon.” Trunks also said with a deep frown.
“Bryan can’t be disturbed right now. The dark creature is protecting him right now, so he probably can’t leave. We must protect him if he’s here. As long as we can stall things for a bit so that the Cairo mercenaries come, then all should be fine!” Phoebe thought silently for a bit and then responded.
Dull hoofbeats sounded in the quiet night air. One could judge from the sound that the hooves of these battlesteeds had been wrapped by cotton cloth or something soft.
“Be careful, let’s protect Bryan’s room first!” Emily called out softly and said to the others.