Chapter 127 – Trap Within A Trap
Once the Four Prison Array was broken, another upheaval occured in the already disorganized North Ocean cultivators. Many North Ocean cultivators escaped from the entanglement of the Ocean Overturning Gang, and flew towards the central island.
Ever since Ai Botao and the group of cultivators he led joined the battlefield, the Ocean Overturning Gang cultivators had been gradually losing the battle.
However, as some North Ocean cultivators left the battlefield, they freed up some Ocean Overturning Gang cultivators, allowing them to attack the remaining North Ocean cultivators.
The promising situation of the North Ocean cultivators was suddenly reversed.
Ai Botao and Xuan Ling Sect’s leader were furious. They angrily sent out commands, but they were unable to stop these cultivators who were overtaken by greed.
When Lu Ping saw that the situation had deteriorated, he finally put away his intention of honing his sword skills and struck out a set of hand seals with both hands.
The seawater beneath his feet surged up and turned into a three-foot square platform. Lu Ping began to walk at ease around the opposing cultivator.
Every few steps he took, left behind an identical “Lu Ping”; with each copy of himself also making identical hand seals, as if they were casting the Yan Ling Swords together.
After Lu Ping had walked one round around the cultivator, a total of 18 Lu Ping’s had surrounded the enemy cultivator.
The cultivator spread out his divine sense to identify which of the eighteen was the real Lu Ping. However, to his disappointment, it seemed as if they were all real and fake at the same time. The cultivator started to panic, wondering what Lu Ping’s next move would be.
This was the [Sea Crossing Concealment Art] of [North Ocean Twelve Ultimates]!
Just as the cultivator was focusing on the 18 Lu Ping’s, a sudden ripple of arcane energy came from the bottom of his feet. The cultivator was shocked and immediately realized the situation, “Oh no, I’ve been fooled, these eighteen are all fake.”
The cultivator leaped upwards in a hurry, with the vine net above his head immediately wrapping tightly around his body. At the same time, he quickly sent out three charms. These charms exploded into three balls of seaweed that instantly laid a thick wall on the sea surface beneath him.
While the cultivator was protecting himself tightly and used his charms to defend the arcane energy coming from underneath him, he failed to notice that the eighteen Lu Ping’s around him had all begun to smile mockingly.
They suddenly changed the hand seals they had been making and a mid-grade flying sword was cast out from each of their hands. All of a sudden, there were eighteen flying swords flying in the air.
When the flying swords slashed through the air, 18 giant waves surged up from the sea surface and turned into 18 mystical-looking Water Jiaos. The flying swords protruded out from the forehead of the Water Jiaos, just like the sharp horns of a qilin, and lunged towards the cultivator.
This was the [Green Jiao Sea Haunting Art] of the [North Ocean Twelve Ultimates]!
The cultivator couldn’t identify which of the 18 Water Jiaos was real, so he took out a mid-grade flying sword and launched it towards one of the Water Jiaos, while defending the rest with his vine net high-grade mystic instrument.
As the Water Jiao collided with the mid-grade flying sword, it scattered into a splash of water. Sure enough, this Water Jiao only had the shape and form with no power behind it.
At the same time, the remaining seventeen Water Jiaos struck the vine net. With a series of loud explosions, the seventeen Water Jiaos exploded together with the horn on their heads, shattering two vines on the vine net.
“[Blood Sacrificial Art]!” the cultivator shouted in anger.
However, this was just the beginning.
Immediately after the explosions, a Water Jiao suddenly appeared from the bottom of the sea, where the cultivator thought he was safe. Despite the seaweed’s obstruction, the Water Jiao exploded and managed to shatter another vine.
With that, the original high-grade vine net mystic instrument was downgraded into a mid-grade mystic instrument.
Lu Ping’s dazzling spells had completely distracted the Ocean Overturning Gang cultivator.
Lu Ping’s Yan Ling Swords, that were originally parrying the cultivator’s high-grade flying sword in the air, seized the chance and pushed back the flying sword. The dual swords then shot into the sea and when they resubmerged, they had transformed into eighteen Water Jiaos with wings.
The Ocean Overturning Gang cultivator was shocked and hurriedly increased the speed of his flying sword to the limit. The flying sword pierced through twelve Water Jiaos in a row, but was too late to stop the remaining six Water Jiaos, which curled their wings and rotated to try and slash him into pieces.
The cultivator was in a hurry to put up a spare defensive shield again, but he didn’t know which direction to block. So, he could only choose a random direction to block. Naturally, he didn’t choose the right direction.
With painful cutting sounds, and a series of loud bangs, this excellent vine net defensive mystic instrument was broken by Lu Ping’s Water Jiaos.
At the very last second, after the Water Jiaos broke through the vine net mystic instrument and lunged towards him, the cultivator recalled his high-grade flying sword to his side. It blocked the swaying wings of the exhausted Water Jiaos.
As the cultivator was nervously sweating and just catching his breath, he suddenly felt something strange above his head. The cultivator looked up and saw another Water Jiao opening its huge mouth. The cultivator was swallowed whole in the next second.
After that, the empty space above the cultivator suddenly quivered a few times like ripples of water on a pond. Then, from the starting point of the ripples, another Lu Ping appeared, while the eighteen Lu Ping’s surrounding the cultivator turned into a puddle of seawater and dispersed.
In this battle, Lu Ping had killed his opponent even though his cultivation and mystic instruments were not as good as the opposing cultivator. This gave Lu Ping an intuitive understanding of his own combat power, and made him more determined to continue cultivating the [North Ocean Wave Listening Scripture].
Despite Lu Ping’s best effort to keep a low profile, the [North Ocean Twelve Ultimates] was so powerful that it still drew the attention of other cultivators.
Shortly after Lu Ping finished the fight, an Ocean Overturning Gang Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivator shouted, “How dare you!”
The Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivator then suddenly shot towards Lu Ping, like a nocked arrow let loose.
Looking at the fast approaching Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivator, Lu Ping whined bitterly in his heart. Although he was no longer as afraid of Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivators as before, in a chaotic situation like this, he really didn’t want to show off his full power.
Suddenly, a streak of green light flashed across the sky and stopped in front of the Ocean Overturning Gang cultivator. The man inside the green light said loudly, “You are a Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivator. Where did you find the face to bully the smaller guys? Come, let me accompany you in a proper fight.
Lu Ping focused his eyes and saw that the man was Ai Botao.
Ai Botao sent out nine small banners in his hand which surrounded the Ocean Overturning Gang cultivator in the middle. The Ocean Overturning Gang cultivator roared in anger but was unable to break out of Ai Botao’s blockade.
The two were of similar cultivation, and their mystic instruments and spells were also equal in power. Hence, it was hard to tell the difference in their power and determine the outcome of the fight in a short time.
Lu Ping looked at Ai Botao with gratitude and thought, I really am right, Ai Botao is also using a set of mystic instruments just like Brother Ai Shutao. I wonder what their relationship is.
Lu Ping flew up in the air. As he was looking around the battlefield, for a fight where he could provide his assistance, he heard an alarming cry, “The treasure is fake, there is no treasure on the island!”
Lu Ping frowned and looked around to find that the dozen North Ocean cultivators, who had taken advantage of the reinforcement to break the Four Prison Array, had returned to the battlefield in a panic. Along with their return was a shocking piece of news to the cultivators in the battlefield.
Not only did the North Ocean cultivators realize that something was wrong, even the Ocean Overturning Gang was also stunned by this news.
Everyone noticed the strangeness of the situation. Almost immediately after hearing the news, the three parties’ Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivators had reached a tacit agreement and ordered their cultivators to stop fighting.
However, the three groups had more than 200 cultivators in total, with more than one third of the cultivators already lost in battle. This drove the cultivators so desperate that they simply couldn’t stop fighting in a short period of time.
Furthermore, the three parties were intertwined and entangled in the battlefield. Even if there were cultivators with a clear mind that wanted to leave the battlefield, they would still have to defend themselves from the attacks of others.
For example, Lu Ping already started retreating towards Ai Botao and the other Late Blood Condensation Realm cultivators as soon as Ai Botao commanded them to stop fighting. However, he was still stopped by three Ocean Overturning Gang cultivators in a row. Lu Ping was forced to kill two of them before he scared the third one away.
Just as Lu Ping was getting away from the battlefield and was about to reach Ai Botao and the others, there was a sudden loud bang followed by the sound of war drums on the sea.
Dong! Dong! Dong!
The continuous sound of war drums was getting louder and louder in their ears as whatever it was, was approaching the battlefield. However, the sound of war drums seemed to be coming from all directions, which made the crowd unable to perceive its exact direction. The only thing they knew was that it was getting closer and closer.
This time, every cultivator in the battlefield finally realized that something was wrong and they all stopped fighting.
Suddenly, they felt their arcane energy was affected by the sound of the war drums, and they had the feeling of losing control over their arcane energy. Not only that, but their hearts also started beating with the loud sounds, as if their hearts were about to explode.
At the same time, a murderous aura spread out across the sea, overwhelming the cultivators. The cultivators soon found it hard to breathe in front of this presence.
As the cultivators were converging, the calm sea abruptly started to boil like hot water. Dozens of Blood Condensation Realm monsters of various shapes and sizes sprang out from the boiling water and attacked the cultivators around them.
More than 20 Mid Blood Condensation Realm cultivators were killed instantly by the monsters’ attack, with a dozen others seriously injured.
The sudden appearance of the monsters shocked the human cultivators. The Late Blood Condensation Realm from all three groups also quickly attacked the monsters to rescue their cultivators.
As everything was in utter chaos, four water pillars with the diameter of a thousand feet surged up from the sea surface around the five islands.
There was one water pillar in each direction. At the top of each pillar there were more than 50 Blood Condensation Realm monsters who spread out and surrounded the human cultivators. The sounds of beating war drums were also coming from the top of these four water pillars.
Just as the human cultivators in the monster’s encirclement were still in shock, a long, cackling laugh sounded out, “There is actually so much human-food here. After slaughtering these human cultivators, we four siblings will surely make a grand entrance on our father’s birthday.”
Lu Ping looked in the direction where the voice had come from and found a human-like monster talking from the top of the east water pillar. This monster looked like a normal human except that it had a crocodile mouth.
Ai Botao also saw the monster and he muttered in shock, “A half-humanoid monster, yet it can utter human speech, could it be……”
Lu Ping listened to Ai Botao’s words from the side and was still trying to understand what he meant when suddenly, the other cultivators who were shocked to see the speaking monster, exclaimed in terror, “A humanoid monster, it’s actually a humanoid monster!”
“Is that not the same level as the Core Forging Realm Enlightened Masters!”
“It’s over, it’s all over! We’re not going to live this time!”
……
Ai Botao saw that all the cultivators were beginning to resign to their fate without the slightest will to fight, so he hurriedly shouted, “You are only at the Ninth Layer Blood Condensation Realm. It’s because of your noble bloodline and the use of medicinal pellets that you are able to achieve a half-humanoid form and human speech in the Blood Condensation Realm. What makes you so sure that you can take us down?”