Chapter 418 - 394: I Have a Move: Heavenly Thunder Descends

Yun Chong’s face stiffened slightly, but she insisted, "What other choice is there? Fairy Song still hasn’t appeared, and your normal messages can’t get through to her. If she doesn’t show up soon, if we wait any longer, this will be a humiliation that reaches all the way to the Nine Celestial Demon Countries!"

Liu Siye just said in a deep voice, "I don’t know what you call humiliation. I only know my duty, and I must abide by it. Fairy Song’s lease on the cave-dwelling has not expired. No matter what has happened, even if the sky itself were to fall, I cannot possibly ring the bell!"

Yun Chong grew anxious. "You blockhead, you’re so inflexible! If she doesn’t show up, it’s not just our Human Race that will lose face. To put it bluntly, we are both of the Human Race. When something like this happens, even if we are inevitably mocked by the Demon Race, what real harm does it do to us?

She’s the one who will suffer the most humiliation and pain, don’t you see? If your stubbornness makes her miss Gu Peng’s challenge today, she won’t be grateful when she comes out. She might even resent you for not forcing the message through!"

As she finished speaking, Yun Chong’s hand moved. Using some strange technique, she suddenly tore through space and reached for the Official Seal at Liu Siye’s waist.

Her fingers touched the Official Seal!

The Official Seal, however, suddenly trembled on its own. A majestic power erupted from it, striking back at Yun Chong with a powerful backlash.

Yun Chong grunted. The Magic Robe on her body suddenly expanded, and Red Silk shot out from within her clothes, wrapping tightly around her like armor.

Liu Siye gripped the Official Seal at his waist and took a step back. A Fountain Pen materialized in his other hand, and he pointed its tip at Yun Chong.

The two exchanged a single blow within a hair’s breadth of space. Although Liu Siye’s cultivation level was lower, the Official Seal protected him automatically.

He said angrily, "Chief Historian Yun, although you are an official of the Prince’s Mansion, you are still registered on the Court’s official rolls. As a fellow official, you are knowingly breaking the law by trying to seize an Official Seal! You..."

Before he could finish, Gu Peng, in the center of the plaza, finally seemed to be growing impatient.

He stood thirty feet tall, and his voice, like muffled thunder, boomed through the air, "Song Zhao, three quarter hours have passed! Are you still not showing yourself? Are you truly afraid to fight? If you are, that’s fine too. You need only appear now and admit to all the living beings in the world that you are not my equal, and voluntarily give up your tenth-place ranking on the Celestial Pride List. If you do, what’s the harm in me letting you go today?"

At this point, he suddenly laughed.

His laughter was as coarse and loud as his voice. "I am not a demon without any grace. You only need to admit your inferiority. I won’t even require you to kneel and beg for mercy, or to kowtow and bow your head, HAHAHAHA!"

His long laughter echoed across the sky above Cyan Feather Mountain, and even spread throughout the entirety of Guangling City.

At that moment, the skies over the vast Guangling City were filled with nothing but the laughter of the Golden Lion Demon Gu Peng.

Such words. He claimed he didn’t require Song Zhao to kneel and beg, but in terms of humiliation, wasn’t this even worse than kneeling and begging?

"HAHAHA!"

The laughter echoed, inciting the howls of the assembled Demons. "That’s right! Just admit defeat! We of the Demon Race have our own sense of grace! We won’t make you kneel and beg!"

"Song Zhao, admit defeat!"

"Song Zhao, admit defeat!"

"OOH OOH OOH! Admit defeat!"

"HAHAHA!"

"HEE HEE HEE..."

The Demons shrieked and howled, dancing about with wild abandon.

The Human Race Cultivators all had ashen faces, their rage so great they could not speak.

Yun Chong was so anxious sweat beaded on her forehead, and her fight with Liu Siye had drawn True Flame. Yet she was helpless to snatch the Official Seal from his hand. To avoid causing a major commotion, though their tempers were real, the scope of their battle was very small.

There was only the back-and-forth of their exchange, perilous within a hair’s breadth.

「In the State Mansion of Guangling City,」 a man in the Crimson Robe of a Second Grade high official kneaded a pair of Jade Balls in his hand, looking up at the sky in silence.

In the void all around, there were figures invisible to the naked human eye. Some were shrouded in a grim Yin Qi, others were dignified and solemn, some peeked and pried, while others were locked in a standoff...

But all eyes were focused on Cyan Feather Mountain.

Gu Peng was seen holding his long spear, his twin wings beating slowly behind him, as if he intended to leave Cyan Feather Mountain at any moment.

Gu Peng was heard to speak again. "It is only natural for the Human Race to cherish their own bodies. This is the nature of humans. It is not like us of the Demon Race, who know from birth that the weak are prey for the strong, and that to get something you must give your all to obtain it. Your Human Race sits upon the rich lands of the Nine Provinces, born with far too much, and so you’ve lost your nerve. Heheheh..."

Before his laughter faded, some Human Race Cultivators at the edge of the plaza were already about to leave in indignation.

At that very moment, a female voice, cool and clear as flowing water, drifted down from the summit of Cyan Feather Mountain. "Our bodies, hair, and skin are gifts from our parents. What fault is there in cherishing them? Only the Demon Race, who devour raw flesh and blood—some even needing to consume the flesh of their own parents to be born—would view self-preservation as a disgrace.

Do you not know? If a person does not love themself, all things will forsake them. If all things forsake you, how can you even speak of seeking the Dao through Cultivation? This is true for all living beings in the world. But you of the Demon Race cannot comprehend the love that exists in our Mortal World, much less the Dao of heaven and earth."

She let out a soft laugh and added, "However, while there is no fault in cherishing oneself, you, a frizzy-maned lion, are not enough to make me, Song Zhao, feel the need to."

Her words, neither rushed nor slow, also drifted across the sky above Cyan Feather Mountain.

In terms of volume, Song Ciwan’s voice was of course not as loud as Gu Peng’s. But in a debate, it’s not as if the person with the loudest voice is automatically right.

Although Song Ciwan’s voice was not loud, it possessed the clarity of a stream in an empty valley. It echoed in the ears of every living being, causing all who heard it to be momentarily lost in a daze.

Even Gu Peng found himself unconsciously nodding for a moment as he listened.

Only after nodding three times did Gu Peng snap back to his senses. ’Wait, that’s not right. Wasn’t I here to insult her? How did she get me nodding with just a few words?’

The moment he came to, Gu Peng was suddenly alarmed. ’This is bad, I’ve fallen for her trick!’

’What kind of Divine Technique is this? This Song Zhao is so strange!’

Gu Peng naturally didn’t know that although Song Ciwan had only spoken a few words, she had used a Dharma Transmission Skill.

When a Dharma Transmission Skill is used at a high level, it can even cause heavenly flowers to fall and stubborn stones to nod. Song Ciwan’s few light words were merely a small taste of her true ability.

The instant Gu Peng became alert, he looked up at the sky, and a bolt of lightning came crashing down!

The lightning came like a galloping river, like a raging sea.

Its speed and might were such that, to say nothing of how Gu Peng felt beneath it, just the Human Race Cultivators and the various demons at the edge of the plaza felt their hearts palpitate with panic.

Some with lower Cultivation even started bleeding from all seven orifices and were about to collapse just from a single glance at the lightning’s glare.

And this "lower Cultivation" referred to some Cultivators at Early-Stage Qi Refining, Innate Second Transformation or below, and others of equivalent realms.

Back then, when Song Ciwan was traveling on her goose, she had encountered a Demon Cultivator at the Divinity Transformation realm. With just a casual bolt of lightning, she had struck the Demon Cultivator dead on the spot.

And at that time, Song Ciwan hadn’t even broken through to Divinity Transformation herself. Her Power now was more than just one realm higher.

The difference in realms was one that could hardly be described as ten or a hundred times greater!

After all, as of this very day, this very moment, Song Ciwan had successfully broken through to Divinity Transformation.

The time she spent in Cultivation inside her cave-dwelling seemed to be only a short month and a half, but the actual years that passed were longer than the entire lifespan of many Cultivators!

This lightning was no longer simple lightning; it was like a heavenly punishment.

Gu Peng, beneath the lightning’s glare, had absolutely no room to dodge.

The long spear he held even seemed to be a Magical Treasure for attracting lightning, beckoning the bolts to rain down upon him.

Gu Peng looked up and opened his mouth, "You..."

BANG!

The lightning struck, and the sky itself seemed to crack open.

No, it didn’t just seem to crack open. It really did crack open.

CRACKLE! POP! The lightning was like the heavenly river pouring down.

The Poetry Immortal once wrote: "I suspect it’s the Galaxy falling from the Nine Heavens."

This scene was exactly as the poem described.

All of Gu Peng’s words were cut off by the thunder. The lightning landed on him, merging into a sheet of white light. The white light washed over him like a giant wave, and beneath it, Gu Peng’s entire body trembled.

He opened his mouth several times, only to see the injured and bleeding Cultivators at the edge of the plaza being carried away one after another.

Amidst the glare of the lightning, people exclaimed in shock, "Quick! Get back! Farther back!"

Then, finally, at a certain moment, Gu Peng managed to spit out a broken sentence: "You... Song Zhao... you launched a sneak attack! You have no martial virtue! But... so what?"