Chapter 478 - 451: Who Would Face the Terrifying Lu Bell?

Song Ciwan was unaware of the upheaval in Pinglan City.

She was still tens of thousands of miles away on Thunder Strike Ridge, battling the Celestial Thunder.

No, at this point, she was no longer fighting the raging thunder in the sky. She was fighting herself—her very being!

She had to break the limits of her own physical body and ascend to an entirely new realm.

The dark clouds over Pinglan City chased after the Beichen Sword Immortal, vanishing tens of thousands of miles in an instant. They headed toward Demon Slaughter Pass, where the Eldest Princess, a True Immortal, stood guard.

And as the roiling dark clouds departed from Pinglan City, at almost the exact same moment, Song Ciwan—on Thunder Strike Ridge—finally achieved rebirth after countless destructions!

Below Thunder Strike Ridge, some of the spectating Cultivators were knocked to the ground. Some had even been injured by the aftershocks of the lightning and fallen unconscious—

But only a few had fainted. For one, those who came to spectate were generally not weak in their Cultivation. For another, the vast majority of the lightning was aimed at the person on the peak, so the people at the foot of the mountain were truly only bearing the faintest of aftershocks.

The conscious Cultivators, even those sprawled on the ground, all struggled to raise their heads. They focused their entire being, eyes wide, to carefully watch every change on the peak.

And then they saw it. At a certain moment, from within the endless violet-black lightning, a figure soared into the sky, stepping on the thunder itself.

The black-clothed youth seized it with his left hand and absorbed it with his right.

The furious thunder, like a colossal whip hanging from the heavens or a great dragon traversing the sky, was pinned under the youth’s feet and caught in his hands. It twisted and struggled, but to no avail.

Then, in the next instant, the crowd watched, stunned, as the youth in the sky tore the dragon-like bolt apart, ripped it to shreds, and finally, consumed all the light of the dissolving thunder.

The conscious Cultivators below were almost all dumbstruck.

But that wasn’t all.

As the violet-black bolt at the zenith was absorbed, the countless other bolts across the three-thousand-mile expanse of Thunder Strike Ridge seemed to answer a summons. They suddenly changed direction and, with lightning speed, rushed madly toward the black-clothed youth in the sky.

In the end, all this lightning, converging from every direction, was gulped down like a whale drinking the sea, absorbed completely.

In a mere moment, Thunder Strike Ridge, which had been ceaselessly battered by lightning day and night, suddenly fell silent. The thunder ceased, and the clouds stilled.

Thunder Strike Ridge was quiet.

The onlookers below were even more stupefied. For a time, nearly everyone was rendered speechless. It was as if they had all become blind, deaf, and mute... unable to believe what they had just seen, heard, and comprehended.

They all had the distinct feeling that everything before them was just an illusion, a fleeting dream.

Then they saw the black-clothed youth, still airborne, draw out a Copper Mirror with a flick of his wrist. The youth wiped a hand across the mirror’s surface—it was impossible to know what he saw in it—and then took a single, gentle step through the air.

In an instant, the figure was hundreds of miles away, finally landing on a distant mountain peak overgrown with strange trees.

Due to the great distance, the youth’s figure vanished from the sight of the Cultivators below.

The Cultivators remained collectively silent. They were all quiet, like gourds with their mouths sawn off, like quails hiding in their nests. Only their upturned heads remained fixed, not moving in the slightest.

Then, the Cultivators saw the figure who had previously shouted for Ye Sheng from the distant horizon finally arrive on a cloud, landing on the peak above.

This description might make it seem as though the figure was too slow to arrive.

But that wasn’t the case. If a storyteller were to weave the preceding events into a tale for an audience, it would surely be a long and dramatic epic, perhaps taking three to five hours to tell completely.

In reality, however, all those dramatic twists and turns happened in the span of a single breath.

Therefore, one couldn’t say that the distant figure was too slow—

But this "not slow" was all relative.

When the Cultivators below saw clearly who had arrived, they all gasped inwardly with the same thought: ’General Wang!’

Which General Wang?

It was none other than the Garrison General of Qingshi City, the Fourth Grade Martial General Wang Cheng.

This man was a Celestial Immortal!

A Celestial Immortal of the Court, possessing both Cultivation and an Official Position, who guarded a major commandery—even an Early-Stage Celestial Immortal was an extraordinary figure.

Such a great personage must surely have all sorts of methods for rapid flight.

Qingshi City was not far from Thunder Strike Ridge. From the moment Wang Cheng had called out to Ye Sheng, he had only been about a hundred miles away.

A hundred miles would take a mortal an entire day to walk, but to a Celestial Immortal, it was perhaps no more than the distance of a single stride.

So how long could it have taken?

A single breath at most!

No matter how fast Lu Bell’s actions of drawing and absorbing the thunder had been, logically, Wang Cheng should have been able to arrive in time to intercept him.

And yet, Wang Cheng failed to make it. He only descended from his cloud after Lu Bell had already left.

That was why everyone subconsciously felt that Wang Cheng had been slow.

Some of the more simple-minded couldn’t help but mutter to themselves in their hearts: ’General Wang came himself, but he must be incredibly busy. He arrived a bit too late to stop that Demon, Lu Bell! Poor Brother Ye suffered for nothing, sigh...’

But the quicker-witted ones already understood: ’With General Wang’s speed, was it really possible he couldn’t make it in time?’

’Perhaps General Wang truly did arrive a bit late; after all, Ye Sheng’s Golden Core had already been torn out by the time he appeared.’

’But the time it took for Lu Bell to be battered by the Celestial Thunder should have been more than enough for the general to get there.’

’And in the end, General Wang didn’t make it...’

The quick-witted ones couldn’t help but understand. ’Heh, it makes sense. If I were General Wang, I’d take my sweet time, too.’

’After all, who would want to face someone as terrifying as Lu Bell?’

’Even a Celestial Immortal wouldn’t want to casually offend such a ruthless character.’

’I heard General Wang is on good terms with Ye Sheng’s master, Ye Lingguan, but no matter how good their relationship is, it’s not worth risking your life for a cripple, is it?’

’What if his lifetime of fame was ruined by a stumble here today? What a terrible loss that would be.’

’Ultimately, the fact was that Ye Sheng was crippled.’

’And a Celestial Pride who falls midway is no longer a true Celestial Pride!’

Below the peak, a thousand different thoughts ran through the minds of the crowd. Above, Wang Cheng picked up the barely living Ye Sheng and let out a sigh.

Then, he gazed for a moment in the direction where Lu Bell had vanished before flying away on his cloud with Ye Sheng, not saying a single word.

Only after Wang Cheng’s figure had completely disappeared did someone in the silent crowd below find their voice. "Lu Bell... he’s truly terrifying! Is he... is he really ranked fifty-first? I don’t believe it! Fifty-first can’t be his real rank!"

The person’s tone was one of both terror and bewilderment, and their voice was so soft it was almost inaudible.

But that voice was enough to break the collective silence. The next moment, an eruption of horrified discussion burst forth from the crowd.

The buzzing clamor of discussion was like a surging tide, a tsunami, mirroring the state of their hearts.