“Great Leader,” the Go Hall Director suddenly addressed the rotund man beside him, “Ye Zhongming is temporarily blind. This is our best chance to kill him. I’ve already deployed all my forces—my people, my beasts. Shouldn’t Soul Merchant also contribute?”
Aside from Dr. Ziche, he had mobilized all his elite fighters. Yet Soul Merchant? Only Saint Green Serpent and Sister Bo remained on the battlefield.
The Great Leader laughed heartily. “Naturally, naturally! I don’t have your vast resources, Director, and my subordinates are a bunch of useless trash, hardly worth mentioning. But I do have a way to assist everyone.”
With that, he pulled out a stone-carved landscape sculpture from his robes. Miniature streams flowed across its surface, and within a fist-sized pond, tiny fish darted about.
The Director stared at it, baffled.
“Mountain and Water Eternal World,” the Great Leader explained. “Nothing too impressive—just a large-scale confinement tool with a time limit. Once activated, it’ll envelop this entire area, including Ye Zhongming’s battlefield. For one hour, unless someone attacks it with equipment of a higher grade, the barrier won’t break.”
The Director’s interest piqued. He almost asked why the Great Leader hadn’t used it earlier, but then realized its limitations: without sufficient allied forces inside, it was useless. So he dropped the question.
“What grade is it?”
The Great Leader smirked, his stone carving glowing faintly—a soft purple light.
Equipment of this category was rare and specialized, typically low-grade. Yet this one had reached purple-grade.
“Then that means—”
“Exactly.” The Great Leader’s eyebrows arched triumphantly. “Only seven-colored-grade equipment can break it—and it must be a weapon! I refuse to believe Ye Zhongming possesses such a thing!”
“What’s the range?”
If the Director had been 80% confident in killing Ye Zhongming before, he was now 100% certain.
The Great Leader didn’t hesitate. He pulled out a map, marked their location, scaled it, and roughly outlined the affected area.
The Director mentally compared it to his own arrangements and nodded. “It doesn’t cover everything, but it’ll suffice!”
The Great Leader grinned, biting his finger and letting two drops of blood fall into the sculpture’s tiny pond. The stone carving levitated, spinning into the air as it expanded, growing to the size of a mountain peak before vanishing without a trace.
Yet both the Director and Mei Rang, still using Earth Eye, sensed an intangible shift in their surroundings.
“Impressive!” The Director couldn’t help but praise.
“A shame it only has two uses.” The Great Leader sighed regretfully.
……………………………………
Ye Zhongming felt it too.
It’s said that when humans lose their sight, their hearing and smell sharpen. Science attributes this to heightened reliance on other senses, which, through constant use, become unnaturally acute.
Perhaps this, too, was a minor form of evolution.
Blinded, Ye Zhongming now relied solely on sound to navigate. Moments ago, he’d felt a sudden claustrophobic pressure—not suffocation, but the sensation of being locked in an inescapable prison.
He didn’t know its origin, nor if his perception was accurate. His only option was to run.
The longer he fled, the more time his eyes had to recover.
For a terrifying moment, he’d truly believed he’d gone permanently blind.
But as the pain dulled, he managed to crack his eyelids open—a sliver of light seeped in.
Just a sliver, but it meant hope.
His vision wasn’t entirely destroyed.
If so, there had to be a way to heal it.
He gulped down healing potions, antidotes, anything that might aid his injured eyes.
Now, he could only wait and see if they worked.
Even without sight, Ye Zhongming could effortlessly dodge obstacles as an eight-star evolved. He weaved through the forest, relying on instinct to guide him.
A sudden sidestep—a crimson sleeve pierced the air, striking a tree trunk so hard it shattered on impact.
Ah Xiu had caught up.
Though he wouldn’t crash into trees, blindness slowed him significantly. Combined with Ah Xiu’s agility, he’d inevitably be cornered.
Ye Zhongming dodged calmly, using the forest as cover. Even if trees were fragile against eight-star evolved, charging through them would only hinder speed. So both pursued and pursuer zigzagged, locked in a deadly chase.
Abruptly, Ye Zhongming halted. A sleeve shot past his front while another speared toward his skull from behind.
The logical move was to dodge sideways—but Ye Zhongming merely tilted his head and slashed diagonally.
“Dammit! How’d you spot me blind?!”
Vice-Leader Yang’s voice rang out. He’d been hiding beside a tree, suppressing all traces of his presence, waiting for Ye Zhongming to blunder into him. Yet somehow, the blind king had sensed him, ignoring Ah Xiu’s feint to strike first. Yang barely blocked in time.
Ye Zhongming snorted but didn’t linger, darting away.
Ah Xiu and Yang gave chase.
Though sightless, his instincts led him to a forest stream. If memory served, a small lake lay ahead.
Now, only sound-emitting landmarks could pinpoint his location.
He stopped abruptly. His pursuers did too.
Because Ye Zhongming sensed three presences ahead, standing by the stream.
“Brother Cheng Ou!” Ah Xiu cried, relief in her voice.
Of the Director’s five core subordinates, Tong Lu and Silver were dead. Only Ah Xiu and Cheng Ou remained.
“You killed two of my brothers,” Cheng Ou spat, ignoring Ah Xiu. “I’ll make you die screaming.”
Beside him crouched two monstrous beasts, each two meters tall. Their origins were unclear, but their aura was unmistakable—eight stars.
“I smell the stench of God Hall’s stitched abominations.” Ye Zhongming’s lips curled coldly. Then—he attacked first.