What drove the Captain crazy was the aura coming out of the clone’s wound, and the fact that the clone in general exuded a sensation of immortal energy. That was because the clone wasn’t made from flesh and blood, but rather, had been created using a spirit plant. Although it was impossible to say exactly what plant it was, for it to grow so large showed that August Spirit Nethersprite must have spent a lot of effort on it. This clone’s body was itself a precious material.
At the same time, it was also astonishingly dangerous. The moment it landed on the ground, it caused the air around it to distort. It also let off terrifying fluctuations that created a powerful pressure around it. The pressure and its aura created something almost like an attack that reduced all nearby rocks and plants to ash. Even the ground started corroding. It was easy to imagine how life-threateningly dangerous it would be to approach it.
But none of that could stop the passionate and crazy look from appearing in the Captain’s eyes.
“That thing is amazing! Totally amazing! It’s not a flesh-and-blood clone. It was built from a spirit plant. It’s a precious material! I wonder where August Spirit Nethersprite found a human-shaped plant like that!”
As the Captain trembled in excitement, Yanyan looked at him as if he were a ghost. She had come to the conclusion that he wasn’t a lunatic. No, he was a suicidal psycho.
August Spirit Nethersprite’s clone seemed great and all, but even at this distance, Yanyan felt a sense of deadly crisis just looking at it. Every fiber of her being was screaming at her to get away as quickly as possible. Just the invisible fluctuations coming off of the clone had destroyed everything around it. Yanyan was literally shaking. She was about to open her mouth to give her opinion when she noticed Xu Qing’s facial expression. His eyes were glittering just as brightly as the Captain’s.
After a moment of thought, she said, “Big Bro Xu Qing, should we go take a bite?”
Xu Qing’s heart was pounding. His craziness was different from the Captain’s. Precisely speaking, Xu Qing preferred to assess the danger of a situation.
Though the Captain often assessed situations before going in, it wasn’t unusual for him to forget that step. As far as the Captain was concerned, if the treasure was precious enough, it didn’t matter if he had to risk his life to get it. Years ago when he went after Joine’s flesh, he had lost half his body for one piece, and hadn’t complained. And back when he took a bite out of the zombie ancestor statue, it was because he just couldn’t live without doing exciting things. Then, on Seastar Island, he ended up losing everything except his head, and had even asked Xu Qing to throw his head back into the fray. And that was just to get a bite of Bai Li’s savory flesh. In this moment, the Captain wasn’t worried about danger, or pressure, or anything else. All he knew… was that there was a precious treasure right in front of him!
But Xu Qing was different. He could tell that August Spirit Nethersprite’s clone was no ordinary item. He knew full well that it wasn’t made from flesh and blood, but rather, had been created using a spirit plant. A precious material like that could be extremely helpful to his cultivation. That was why he was excited. Up above in midair, August Spirit Nethersprite was suffering setback after setback at the hands of three swordsages. In other words, this was a perfect opportunity. And thus, the crazy look appeared in his eyes as he decided to take a risk.
The main thing to consider was the immense pressure the clone radiated. Even Xu Qing felt a bit nervous about dealing with it, and could sense how it made him instinctively want to flee. Obviously, getting close to the clone wasn’t going to be easy.
Xu Qing looked at the Captain. The Captain looked back at him. Both could see the fervor in each other’s eyes.
“We need magical devices that can resist the pressure,” Xu Qing said.
“I have some!” the Captain replied. Struggling to breathe steadily, he pulled out a handful of about twenty magical devices.
Xu Qing couldn’t help but feel surprised at how well-prepared the Captain was.
“I actually got these before I knew we were moving to Emperor-Receiving Prefecture. I’d been planning to use them to get into Flame Phoenix’s nest. I figured the pressure there would be intense. Sadly, we ended up coming here to Emperor-Receiving Prefecture, so I had to give up on my Flame Phoenix plan. They’ll work perfectly here. But you’re going to owe me, Xu Qing. I’m broke right now.”
The Captain handed some of the magical devices to Xu Qing.
As for Yanyan, her cultivation base wasn’t strong enough even with the magical devices, so after a brief discussion, Xu Qing and the Captain agreed that she shouldn’t participate.
After making the final preparations, the two of them gritted their teeth, and as Yanyan watched nervously, they started running toward Nethersprite’s corpse. They moved with such speed that, in the blink of an eye, they had flown several dozen meters forward. As they closed in, the pressure from the clone grew incomparably intense.
The air around them seemed to solidify, and the clone’s aura pulsed with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force.
Xu Qing and the Captain could feel the effects. Their faces turned pale, and blood oozed out of the corners of their mouths. The magical devices were operating at full blast, but even with their help, the pressure was intense.
The air around the clone was visibly rippling, and that friction caused black lightning bolts to crackle here and there. It was a terrifying sight that would strike fear into the hearts of anyone who saw it.
But the idea of giving up hadn’t even occurred to Xu Qing and the Captain. Dropping to the ground, they started crawling forward as fast as they could. After all, if they were standing up, it could attract lightning. But crawling would enable them to get closer much more easily. They didn’t even need to talk to each other about it beforehand. They just did it in unison.
Time passed as the fighting continued up above, and massive rumbling sounds echoed out. Meanwhile, Xu Qing and the Captain got closer and closer to the clone. The pressure built. The aura grew stronger. Lightning crackled. But none of that could stop them.
As they got closer, their magical devices started having trouble. One by one they started crumbling. Even though the Captain had prepared a lot of magical devices for this specific purpose, now it seemed like he might not have prepared enough. Soon they were about 300 meters away, and the pressure got so intense that it started trying to shove them in the opposite direction. It was almost like countless hands were grabbing onto them and pushing them away from the clone.
Trembling, Xu Qing and the Captain took out some cloth strips that they had taken from August Spirit Nethersprite’s mansion grotto and wrapped themselves up in them. The cloth strips managed to reduce the pressure a bit, but the force of resistance still pushed against them. 𝗼𝐯𝐞𝐥．𝐜𝐨𝗺
Gritting their teeth, they kept crawling forward.
All of a sudden, Xu Qing’s eyes narrowed, and he looked to the side. The Captain noticed the same thing and also looked in that same direction. Instantly, the Captain’s expression became like that of a wild dog ready to fight over its food. Xu Qing’s guard also went up.
Both of them were looking at a distant figure crawling across the ground toward the clone. It was a person in a red robe and ponytail. They had a mask covering their face, but from the way the cloth of the garment shifted over their body, this person was obviously a young woman. Her weapon was a bit ridiculous; it was an evil ghost sickle that was absolutely massive. The top of the sickle looked like a vicious ghost head, with the blade emerging from the mouth. And the shaft was pitch black and looked like it was made from pure bone. The gruish weapon emanated astonishing fluctuations; just looking at it, it was obviously a spectacular item. Especially noteworthy was that it emanated a soft glow that surrounded the young woman and protected her from the pressure.
Right when Xu Qing and the Captain noticed the red-garbed young woman, she noticed them. They were only a few hundred meters apart, lying on the ground, looking at each other.
“Well this is weird,” the Captain said. “Someone’s actually trying to steal our stuff!” The Captain’s gaze was not exactly friendly, and Xu Qing’s eyes were as cold as ice.
Off in the distance, the girl in red frowned beneath her mask as she looked at Xu Qing and the Captain. When she saw the strips of cloth they were wrapped in, she instantly realized that these were the people who had ransacked the mansion grotto. Her expression turned icy.
After a brief moment in which the three of them sized each other up, they all started crawling forward at top speed, fierce expressions in their eyes.
After getting within 300 meters of the clone, the lightning, the fluctuations, and the pressure all grew more intense. Thankfully for Xu Qing and the Captain, their magical devices combined with the strips of cloth ensured that they weren’t slowed down at all.
The most difficult thing to deal with was the force of expulsion created by the clone’s aura. It was so strong that, if they relaxed for even a fraction of a moment, they would be shoved backward. In fact, that force of expulsion created screaming winds that whipped their hair and clothes into a frenzy. And they couldn’t even keep their eyes fully open. Eventually, they were forced to slow down a bit.
Meanwhile, the young woman in red had such amazing protection from her weapon that she didn’t slow down at all. She was already about 120 meters from the clone’s head.
Seeing that, the Captain started to get very anxious. Biting the tip of his tongue, he spat out some blood. As a result, a sleeping face appeared in the pupil of his eye that resembled him, except nefarious and bizarre.
At the same time, the Captain’s aura changed, becoming cold and frigid. Simultaneously, he shot forward with a burst of speed, passing Xu Qing and getting within 90 meters of the clone.
Xu Qing, meanwhile, was only about 150 meters away. Eyes narrowing, he sent some fluctuations to his shadow, which responded by rapidly stretching forward ahead of him.
The pressure didn’t seem to affect the shadow at all, which made sense considering what happened back in the Merfolk Isles, when the shadow ignored the pressure in the mural to get a lamp for Xu Qing. The pressure here was actually far inferior to that pressure.
It didn’t take long for the shadow to reach the clone, wrap around its ear, and then start pulling Xu Qing forward. Instantly, Xu Qing accelerated, virtually ignoring the force of expulsion as he got closer and closer to the clone’s head.
120 meters. 90 meters. 60 meters. 30 meters.
He was moving faster than both the Captain and the red-garbed girl. A moment later, he was right in front of the clone’s neck! After reaching that spot, Xu Qing didn’t hesitate for a moment. Instead of being stingy, he turned back toward the Captain, who was about 30 meters away, and made a grasping gesture. With his help, the Captain accelerated, getting closer and closer until he was right next to Xu Qing. However, his eyes were fixed on the seemingly fair skin of August Spirit Nethersprite’s clone.
“The nose. The nose! Absorb the nose! That’s the highest spot. That’s where the energy converges!”
Xu Qing looked up at the very prominent nose.
All of a sudden, he thought back to when people had been teleporting into Seven Blood Eyes and he saw August Spirit Nethersprite for the first time. Back then, she had been looking at herself in a mirror, and had seemed very pleased with her nose.
Without the slightest hesitation, he lunged toward the clone’s nose. Eyes burning with fanaticism, the Captain also lunged in the same direction.