Chapter 535 - Like The Devil Incarnate

The operation that Cassius had proposed was entirely voluntary. He did not force the combat artists, elders, or sect masters of the various Covert Martial Arts sects; anyone willing could take the bait.

He said that the Eternal Archipelago contained an ancient ruin, and within that ruin stood a fist technique armory. It sounded like an impossible pie, yet the combat artists of many small sects loved the idea. A fair number were willing to give it a try, since East Sea County was not far from the Eternal Archipelago. The round trip would take no more than half a month.

The remaining combat artists, seeing so many answering Cassius's call, also decided to join and pick up some bargains along the way. Since there were so many combat artists working together, everyone felt failure was unlikely.

Besides, the more participants there were, the smaller the danger became. They simply could not imagine what threat a mere island could pose when a fist master like Cassius and at least fifty combat artists were on the field.

Even if lethal perils had once lurked there, they no longer counted as dangers now. Hazard was ever a relative thing! From this moment on, they were the real menace to the Eternal Archipelago!

Therefore, many at the meeting grew restless with anticipation. Even certain first-rate sects were tempted. Though they lacked neither powerful Covert Martial Arts nor abundant Secret Techniques, who would complain about more good things?

A large, influential sect's foundation was built bit by bit. Now that there were cheap gains in sight, how could they let the chance slip? Of course these sects had many combat artist experts and would not dispatch them all. At most they would send one or two to accompany the rest.

Soon, the Kafka Hall meeting entered its voting and headcount phase. The original exchange tournament staff kept the records.

Small nations of the world: three people.

Blue Star Empire: three people.

Hongli Federation: East twenty-three, North sixteen, South thirteen, West twelve.

The tally came to precisely seventy people. Adding Cassius's five from the Golem Sect made seventy-five in total. Everyone was a combat artist. If that force pulled as one rope, it could sweep the Dark Hunter Organization aside.

When Cassius destroyed Black Rain Manor, the Northern Covert Martial Arts world had mustered barely more than a handful of combat artists. Now the expedition to the Eternal Archipelago fielded seven or eight times that. Cassius’s confidence brimmed. They agreed to set sail for the southeastern sea in four or five days.

After all, they needed time to prepare and inform their sects. Since the journey held danger, every sect's elders and heads had to settle affairs to prevent disorder if accidents struck.

Cassius likewise meant to use the days to digest his surge in strength. First, his Southern Dipper Red Falcon Fist had broken through six more acupoints, reaching forty-six, the fifth stage of Death's Fang Force. He needed to grow accustomed and fully master the force that had advanced a stage.

Meanwhile the acupoints of the Southern Dipper Sonic Snake Fist were lighting up one by one in resonance. Achieving perfect balance between that and the Red Falcon Fist would take some time.

Second, the renewed evolution of the Golem Covert Martial Arts had changed the ceiling of his physical growth. Cassius had to examine it and judge its merits. He would reassess his bodily strength and see how every stat had risen.

Third, his Will had grown clearer and purer, like a diamond of extreme hardness, as he pursued the Dominator Fist path. He felt inspiration surge in his mind; every word and deed took on the bearing of a tyrant. That was likely the benefit of defeating Arlington.

Last came the writing of the Southern Dipper Covert Martial Inheritance. Cassius had never ceased; only a few more chapters remained after finishing the Illusory Moon Fist.

While East Sea City settled into calm and many sects prepared for the journey to Eternal Island, the Gate Organization, on the other hand, fell into upheaval.

Numerous General Kings had gathered in a hidden, spacious, high-security base, summoned by the First General King and Holy Fist Demon Phoenix to explore the archipelago's ruin.

But that afternoon, Holy Fist Demon Phoenix had returned from the field gravely wounded. He was coughing blood, and his power had dimmed to a shocking degree. He looked a complete wreck, like a kicked-out cur hounded all the way home.

None of the General Kings had ever imagined that the elegant, powerful Holy Fist Demon Phoenix could suffer such humiliation. As Gate Organization's vice leader, he had modeled himself after Xiadu, moving mysteriously and often alone.

Whenever he appeared, he wore a white coat and sported blood-red hair. His hands were gloved in white, his features always exquisite, and his aura stern and formidable. Many General Kings recruited in recent years even feared Holy Fist Demon Phoenix. A mighty, solemn image had been branded into their minds.

That image had collapsed with his arrival. His white coat hung in tatters; one shoe and a trouser leg were gone. Bloody gashes marred his back as though some force had exploded and disintegrated him. His aura was as faint as a candle in the wind.

It seemed he had burned his Qi down to the last drop, leaving him exceptionally frail. He was dragging along another nearly crippled figure. At first, no one recognized him, but then they realized it was Whale King Arlington, the United States of Yana's extreme combat artist.

He was a friend of the First General King, and an expedition partner. Could the rumor the Fourth General King spoke of be true? Had Arlington gone to kill the First General King? Then, had Holy Fist Demon Phoenix gone to avenge him? Then, they truly fought three hundred rounds before Demon Phoenix eked out a bloody win?

Arlington had then been seized alive as the Gate Organization's trophy. The theory sold well, but it was soon overturned. Holy Fist Demon Phoenix had not fought Arlington to the death; rather, he had rescued him. And Arlington had not slain the First General King; that had been a tragic mischance. As for the brutal wounds on both extreme combat artists, they had come from a single person, a single combat artist!

Cassius from the Golem Sect! An extreme combat artist who had burst out of the Hongli Empire out of nowhere! A fist technique master—no, likely a grandmaster!

First, he had shattered Arlington's confidence and path from every angle and defeated him. Holy Fist Demon Phoenix had tried to spirit Arlington away but had quickly been intercepted by Cassius. Demon Phoenix had tried to flee, yet he too proved no match!

In the end, he had been forced to use the Ring of Calamity granted by leader Xiadu. It had brought a Xiadu avatar down, bent on annihilating everything before it. However, Cassius's fighting ability had gone beyond imagination. He did not seem to be a new extreme combat artist but one who was virtually a Holy Fist in the present age!

Even Xiadu's avatar had failed to overpower him and their wild clash had leveled a mountain. The avatar had mutated after as even its ultimate trump card was forced out. Demon Phoenix did not know what followed, having fled with Arlington. But given the fearsome strength Cassius had shown, it was very likely he still lived.

The gathered General Kings sat speechless inside a hollowed-out mountain cave. It was so quiet one could hear a pin drop. The Fourth General King had even stopped breathing. The First General King seemed to have been killed by this Cassius of the Golem Sect!

Such a heavy will to kill! Such overwhelming strength! He was like the devil incarnate.

He had remained obscure for years, yet the moment he appeared, he had beaten three of the era's extreme combat artists in succession! He had slain one and wounded two! He had even forced out the great one's avatar and was still unbroken. Terrifying indeed! The Fourth General King drew in a cold breath.

The very air seemed to heat up at once.

"So what now? The First General King is dead, you and Arlington are gravely hurt. Does the Gate Organization still want to move against Cassius of the Golem Sect?"

"..." The pallid Holy Fist Demon Phoenix, clad in a fresh white coat, fell into a rare silence. Reluctance, anger, and dread flickered between his brows. "For now, no. Touching him would be like going into a tiger's maw. Even you General Kings, once he senses you, would scarcely escape..."

"As for that man, we shall wait until Lord Xiadu's main body fully awakens. The time is not far, perhaps only two or three years. The Tide of Calamity plan will begin. When the flood that sweeps all away comes, Cassius too will be drowned..."

Holy Fist Demon Phoenix drew in a long breath; healing Secret Techniques coursed through him, knitting internal and external wounds. "As for my injuries and Arlington's, we shall mend soon with the elixirs we brought. For now we proceed with the original plan..."

"The Eternal Archipelago and its ancient ruin—I must have it."

"But my Lord, the First General King has fallen. He was the only source of much of the information. We have also lost a top combatant; thus—" Before the Second General King finished, the Phoenix shook his head.

"Lost intelligence is unavoidable. As for peak force, we shall tap a portion of our foundation."

"You mean?" The Second faintly guessed.

Throughout the Gate Organization's history, every vice leader had been styled a Holy Fist. Though not true Holy Fists in realm, they were fist technique masters of the extreme combat artist realm. After death, their bodies were preserved, along with their residual Qi, in a strange limbo between extinction and persistence.

It was a special Gate Organization method to use those corpses to link up with the wandering dead spirits in the World of Calamity. It aimed at a twisted resurrection, and in its own way, a crooked immortality.

Of course, it had not succeeded. Only the first steps had ever been successfully achieved; the rest proved impossible. However, the dark creature experiments of Zhu Hun and Yang Yan in Florence had offered a sliver of opportunity. If one used the Arcane Stone Tablet to bathe a vice leader's corpse in the power of an origin of calamity, an unforeseen change would erupt.

The Gate Organization had only devised this crude method in the past five years. Now, it seemed Demon Phoenix was planning on testing it earlier than planned. They could only hope all went smoothly without further mishap.

***

At the same time, deep in the Ten Thousand Mountains of the empire's south, the Totem Temple's sole remaining top-tier combat artist, Lava Shaman, felt the Totem King's call and entered the mountain range's heart once more.

No one knew what transpired or what words passed between them. The many shamans outside only saw a fearsome volcano in the range's center erupting in an explosion. Roaring lava fell like waterfalls, turning all around into a golden-red sea.

Scorching heat seared the air and a figure strode forth through the swirling ash. His shaman garb lay in tatters. A golden-red totem was branded on his bared chest, glowing brightly and radiating molten heat. It was as though a sun burned within him.

***

An eerie forest of densely packed white trees that spread over plains and slopes stood on the Eternal Archipelago. Closer inspection revealed the trees were made of bones with glass-smooth surfaces. Their crowns were bone spikes, glinting immobile in sunlight.

At the forest's very center towered a colossal tree. Its roots were thick as coiling dragons, the surface etched with fine bone patterns. Its branches hung low with spherical fruit, including some special, alien ones. These alien fruits were ring-shaped, just the size to be worn.

The rings possessed wondrous power and an astonishing allure. Occasionally, birds were drawn to peck them, only to explode on contact. Blood splattered over the rings, making them more eerily bizarre.

Black-robed Ripple Practitioners waited in silence around the tree. Today was the day the mother tree's fruit ripened and the bone rings dropped. For Eternal Archipelago's Ripple Practitioners, it was the most important moment in years.

The scene was solemn, representing tradition. Yet cry after cry shattered the calm. Every bowed praying Ripple Practitioner raised his head, staring at the crown.

There, three glittering bone rings shone. Bloody red, abyssal black, and stormy blue...

Supreme bone rings! The finest the mother tree bore! One emerged every forty or fifty years, and its bearer became the Ripple Practitioners’ leader.

How could three appear at once!?

Only a little over a decade had passed since the last supreme bone ring's birth!

Strange... Some change must have occurred!

Hum-hum-hum...

The towering mother tree vibrated imperceptibly, as though resonating with the underworld. In that world, upon an ashen land where cinders flew, a mountain-sized tree stood erect!

Its branches waved and its surface burned faintly with flames. It was an eternal, indestructible fire that burned all things!