Chapter 492 - 462: The Ancient Chaos Bell, That Era

THUMP-THUMP-THUMP—

Jing Huaisheng lay prone on the ground. That was the sound of his heart beating.

THUMP-THUMP-THUMP—

The villagers were mauling each other like madmen. That was also the sound of the Bronze Fragment, pulsing and striking.

It was like a bronze bell from ancient times, carrying that vast and archaic sound from the distant, unknown past to the present day.

Song Ciwan stood outside the ancestral hall, listening to the tolling of the bell. For a moment, she felt a surge of inspiration. The sound seemed to merge in a strange and wonderful way with everything she had previously seen through the Bronze Fragment.

Every toll of the bell was filled with the subtle rhythm of the Dao.

It was as if an invisible hand had emerged between heaven and earth, plucking the threads of the Dao and its principles at will, as if they were strings.

Song Ciwan listened, utterly entranced. All her previous learning seemed to converge with the sound of the Dao’s rhythm in a wonderfully beautiful intersection, a moment of profound confirmation.

And so, at this very moment, the Blood Evil Qi shrouding the inside and outside of the ancestral hall was no longer just simple Blood Evil Qi in Song Ciwan’s eyes.

The flow of the qi’s rhythm seemed to take on a tangible form. It spun and intersected, points forming lines, lines forming planes, and planes forming time, space, the past, the future...

The villagers were still brawling. The first person drew blood, the second had a limb torn off, and then, at a certain point, someone’s neck was suddenly bitten through!

"Aargh! It hurts! I’m going to die!" someone screamed in pain.

"You deserve it! HAHAHA..." someone else laughed maniacally.

BAM!

BAM! BAM! BAM!

It was the sound of fists hitting flesh, of blood spraying everywhere.

The cacophony of sounds grew more and more demonic. These crazed noises even seemed to ride the rhythm of the bell, joining with its tolling to connect with the ancient past, faintly outlining an illusory scene.

The Blood Evil Qi surged, and the illusory scene overlapped with the grotesque happenings in the ancestral hall.

Fifth Uncle cupped his hands, one above the other, and pecked at a villager pouncing on him from behind. Though he was clearly moving his hands, in that hazy vision, it was as if a magnificent rooster was growing from his body. And that sudden peck—how could it have come from a hand?

It was clearly the sharp beak of a rooster!

"Argh!" The villager behind Fifth Uncle had his eye pecked out, but what fell was not an eyeball. Instead, it was a tangled mass of... brilliantly colored snakes!

The villagers’ brawl had transformed into the chaotic battle of wild beasts in a primeval jungle.

No, not wild beasts.

They were Demon Beasts!

On the other side of this illusory time and space, these Demon Beasts cried out and roared, able to Call Wind and Rain. When they clashed, mountains and rocks shattered. When they rode the wind, the world turned from dawn to dusk. If there was a battle, it was fought with unrestrained ferocity; if there was no battle, they were utterly free.

Although their existence was primitive, bloody, and savage, and though they grew wildly and the weak became prey for the strong, they were, in fact, truly free and unrestrained.

Born of heaven and earth, they put their all into growing, their all into fighting, and even their all into dying.

These were the primeval demons!

The Ancient Demons!

Compared to the Human Race that was born later, the Ancient Demons who once ruled the world were all colossal in size with extraordinary bloodlines. They were born with an innate understanding of all kinds of Magic, possessing the power to move mountains, fill seas, chase the stars, and catch the moon.

It seemed the Ancient Demons were the species born with a greater affinity for the Dao!

THUMP-THUMP-THUMP—

The tolling of the bell continued.

The villagers’ brawl grew even more intense, and more and more people fell. Among those fighting was Jing Huaisheng’s grandmother, Third Granny.

However, perhaps because Third Granny had drunk the most blood earlier, her body had become exceptionally robust. Amid the brawl, as others fell one by one, she only fought with increasing ferocity.

A villager pointed a finger at Third Granny’s nose and cursed, "You old witch! You filthy hag! You might have fooled Huai Sheng, but you can’t fool us old neighbors! Who doesn’t know what you’re like? When Huai Sheng’s mother was alive, you were the cruelest to her, tormenting her the most!

His mother died from a difficult childbirth, and you didn’t want Huai Sheng back then, either. All you wanted was for your son’s new wife to give you another grandchild.

You despised Huai Sheng for having six fingers on one hand. If it weren’t for that period when you had constant bad luck—even choking on water—and the Witch from Wuli Village said you’d committed sins and were carrying a karmic burden that heaven itself was about to punish you for, would you have ever taken Huai Sheng back to raise him?"

Third Granny’s body had been unusually tall and bloated. In the brawl, she had been the most ferocious, felling the most villagers.

But after being cursed at like this, for some unknown reason, her towering frame suddenly shrank by three inches!

Seeing that cursing at her was effective, another villager quickly stepped forward to dig up her past.

"When it comes to being cruel-hearted, no one in our Erliu Village is crueler than Third Granny! You claim to have raised Huai Sheng, but when has he ever had a single good day under your roof?

When he was little, you tied him up in the house like a dog. If you were happy, you’d toss him a few bites to eat; if you were unhappy, you’d give him a savage beating. After he got older, what wasn’t he forced to do? Work inside the house and out, in the rooms and in the fields!

When your precious little grandson wanted to learn martial arts, you made Huai Sheng do hard labor to save up the silver to pay for the martial arts school!

You say you raised Huai Sheng and tell him to remember your kindness. It’s a good thing that boy is a fool. He’s so stupid! Hehehe..."

A moment ago, Third Granny had been majestic and imposing, beating her neighbors back into retreat.

But now, as she was being cursed at, her form kept shrinking again and again.

Before, it was as if she had reverted to her youth—sturdy, agile, and a full seven feet tall.

Now, she shrank inch by inch, growing smaller and shorter. As the curses rained down on her, the young, strong, and robust Third Granny soon reverted back into a shriveled, scrawny old woman!