Chapter 1404: Hu Jiu

Chapter 1404: Chapter 1404: Hu Jiu

"No need! I’ll find a way to break free from this damn thing myself! Keep an eye on that old thing, Delacuri. Don’t let him break the seal and escape. Remember to use the mechanical state cautiously with your life force. Be careful, his Blood Race magic is particularly troublesome." Pei Yan took a deep breath and instructed, facing Hu Jiu’s worried gaze.

"Understood!" Hu Jiu responded, immediately transforming into a silver wolf, and then completed his mechanical transformation. Although Hu Jiu had advanced in strength and could fight in a human form, he was more accustomed to confronting enemies in his original form.

"Awoo! Buzz~!" A high-pitched wolf howl resounded within the space, followed by the roar of machinery. Hu Jiu opened his mechanical jaws, and a blue light converged deep in his throat. The next second, an accurate electromagnetic cannon blasted at the spot where Delacuri was standing.

Now, Delacuri truly felt overwhelmed. Although Hu Jiu was three-tenths weaker than Pei Yan, he still wasn’t someone Delacuri could easily deal with in a short time. With Hu Jiu’s full interference, breaking the seal to escape seemed impossible. As Delacuri evaded the attack mid-air, he quickly weighed the pros and cons, shifting his target towards Pei Yan like a shadow.

Though it seemed hopeless, he could only risk it all. The two had signed a symbiotic contract—live and die together. If he could seize the chance to kill Pei Yan, now trapped, he might have a sliver of survival. Even if he couldn’t kill him, severely injuring Pei Yan would free him up to deal with the other mechanical monster.

Unfortunately, Pei Yan wasn’t foolish. Hu Jiu reacted swiftly, almost instantly, as Delacuri moved. Pei Yan dissolved the state of fusion between the two Divine Artifacts, picked up the Revolver of Moonshot again, and aimed it at Delacuri for a shot.

The consecutive battles had left Delacuri with a considerable psychological shadow regarding the Divine Artifact. Seeing Pei Yan’s action, he instinctively raised his protective aura to the maximum, performing several evasive maneuvers to avoid the attack. However, Delacuri didn’t hear the expected gunshot, making his actions look like a foolish clown being mocked. Seeing Delacuri like this, Pei Yan wore a satisfied smile, spreading his hands, his mockery unreserved.

With the Divine Artifacts fused, both entered cooldown time, and he couldn’t fire a shot! Realizing he was played, Delacuri’s shame turned to anger, but during his brief stupefaction, Hu Jiu had already charged up. With a flicker of his wolf image, dozens of silver mechanical wolves appeared simultaneously. As these silver wolves slightly opened their mouths, dozens of gleaming lights filled Delacuri’s vision like a starlit sky.

It’s fake! An illusion! Delacuri instantly judged. Even the Clone Technique required time; it was impossible to exhibit so many mechanical clones in an instant without splitting. He just needed to identify the real target and make evasive maneuvers.

Wait! No! Why did his intuition signal danger towards all these mechanical wolves? Why did he sense vast energy amassing inside their mouths? Just a moment ago, Delacuri calmly deduced, yet in the next second, he broke out in a cold sweat from his findings. Could it be that Pei Yan’s symbiotic beast is truly this powerful?

But this thought only flashed in Delacuri’s mind for a moment. With the barrage of electromagnetic cannons about to fire, he still found a slight gap, identifying the true target and performing appropriate evasive actions.

Boom!

In an instant, dozens of beams simultaneously fired. The beams streaked through the air like meteors with astonishing might, seemingly tearing everything in front of them to pieces. However, amid the barrage, Delacuri dodged left and right, finally charging directly into a beam. Watching the beam pass through his body and explode behind him with a loud roar, Delacuri felt a sense of relief—just as he suspected. Although intricately mimicked, only one shell exploded; the rest were illusions.

"Cough! Pah!" Holding this thought, Delacuri’s lips just began to curl, only to have his face freeze, unable to laugh. The intense pain in his chest made it hard to maintain his stance; his knees buckled, and he coughed up a mouthful of blood.

"This guy is really remarkable, actually able to see through my illusion, but he only noticed a bit."

The voice came from behind. Delacuri glanced sideways, not knowing when Hu Jiu, restored to human form, had already stood behind him, holding a blood-stained dagger like wolf teeth. Looking forward, the silver mechanical giant wolf still stood guard before Pei Yan, but now it no longer had the characteristic of aura, merely a mechanical puppet clone.

Pei Yan and Hu Jiu were two-in-one; basically, what Pei Yan knew, Hu Jiu also knew. Yet, in all aspects, Pei Yan excelled over Hu Jiu, except in powerful self-healing and illusion techniques--areas where Hu Jiu outperformed Pei Yan. The former’s advantage came from the gene inherited from his father, the Ancestral God, unmatched by anyone. The latter stemmed from the Divine Artifact offered by the Nine-tailed Fox Race appointed for his wife, alongside Tushan Suisui’s wholehearted teaching of Nine-tailed Fox illusion techniques to him over this period.

As Pei Yan progressed, he diligently chased after him. Now, relying on the Divine Artifact, Moon Glorious, Hu Jiu could release illusions excellently alongside Pei Yan’s spirit energy and various technological projection effects, simulating illusion scenes exquisitely. Even Pei Yan might be fooled without careful discernment, let alone Delacuri, whose mind was in chaos during the battle.

"Brother! How did he see through my illusion?"

Facing Hu Jiu’s confusion while struggling against the seal, Pei Yan chuckled, "You got careless! You disguised everything well, but don’t forget your enemy is the Blood Race. He quickly identified your true body among the illusions, further analyzing your state to see they’re all illusions. Remember, when facing enemies at the pinnacle of the Heavenly Dao, vigilance is crucial for everyone. A slight slip, and you’ll fall into their trap like I did. If he wasn’t destabilized by my attack, your final sneak attack probably wouldn’t have escaped his detection."

Hu Jiu didn’t consider Pei Yan’s words as boasting about his strength, nodding appreciatively, raising his guard and vigilance towards Delacuri.

Under Hu Jiu’s gaze, Delacuri gave a bitter smile, touching the wound on his chest. Just after Hu Jiu launched a dazzling, eye-catching electromagnetic cannon attack, his true body was hidden among the beams, sneaking an attack that gravely injured him. As Pei Yan said, he should’ve detected such an unsophisticated trick, but reality was otherwise.

Delacuri’s mind was in turmoil!