Archfiend

Chapter 443: Iron Maiden (2)

Translator: XTB

The Netherpierce Eye could see a few things that normal people couldn’t. Although, Zhao Ziqi’s realm was still low, and he couldn't display his strength, he still felt a horror that was hard to describe.

“What in the world is this thing?” Moonless said lowly.

Zhao Ziqi drifted out, carefully inspected the copper coffin, and said after a long time, This is a Romanian-style carving.

If the land of Romania was said alone, then it wouldn’t have been anything. But Moonless had just explained a good deal to Xu Yangyi. The two of them promptly mirrored each other and wordlessly shared a glance.

Romania... the lair of vampires! The land where vampires started in legend!

In soul form, Zhao Ziqi flew over. Xu Yangyi called out to him to be careful, but the spirit laughed, It’s nothing, big bro. There’s nothing inside, not even a vengeful spirit. I trust this point in the Netherpierce Eye. I don’t have a physical body, so there’s no problem if I touch it.

He circled around the iron maiden a couple times. Everywhere he flew, dried hams fell down one after another. After a long time, he said with certainty, This isn’t an ordinary iron maiden. It’s a torture tool that only a royal house can use.

His ghostly body gathered into human shape, and he stroked the iron maiden inch after inch. In ancient Romania, worshiping the Cult of Blood was very fashionable. This should be something in the royal house for torturing prisoners. Maybe it was the favorite one of some prince, Seniors. Take a look, the surrounding edges appear dim and gloomy, but its actually all pure gold. And the eyes of this woman’s bust is also pure sapphire... hehe, in any time period, thumb-sized sapphires are quite expensive.

Apart from a royal house, no one could be so wealthy. Especially... His hand stroked both sides of the iron maiden. There, complex ornate designs were carved everywhere. This is a house crest that only a grand duke or greater could use. Apart from the old aristocracy, I can’t think of anyone else who could use such a design.

But just as his hand left the face of the nude iron maiden, her eyes suddenly flashed.

Afterwards, two streams of blood-red tears flowed out from iron maiden’s eyes and soaked the two sapphires!

Yet how sharp was Foundation Establishment spiritual sense? In this twinkling, Xu Yangyi’s and Moonless’s gazes flickered. Without the slightest hesitation, a white light and blue light hacked straight in front of Zhao Ziqi!

Meanwhile, from all the iron maiden’s secret holes, streaks of blood-red qi erupted with a bang! A giant mouth was formed, violently chomping down at Zhao Ziqi!

Clang! On the brink of crisis, a sharp noise echoed. Two streaks of qi and the bloody maw locked together in combat. Soon, they vanished simultaneously.

Zhao Ziqi was dazed, only now reacting. Quickly, he retreated without pause, but he was dumbfounded as soon as he moved.

However, he wasn’t alone. Xu Yangyi and Moonless were likewise stunned.

B-Big bro... Zhao Ziqi’s voice was underlined by a slight sob. S-Save me... I-I don’t want to die...

At the tail of his ghostly body, countless blood threads had wrapped around him, climbing up him little by little!

“How?!” Moonless stepped forward, all his clothes swelling freely of the wind. He couldn’t help but cry out, “This thing’s at least a couple centuries or close to a thousand years old! How could the spiritual force be preserved? Could this be related to what’s inside? Because it was pierced shut by countless spikes for several hundred years?”

Here and now, the blood threads instantly came to life. As if they sensed something, similar to countless living creatures of blood, they shot out from the holes like vines! In a flash, they formed a blood-colored orb and took Zhao Ziqi in a deathly embrace!

Whoosh! Meanwhile, in the underground bar at New York Harbor, the man and woman stood up at the same time in shock!

“There’s no way!” The woman’s eyes were wide and her mouth was ajar. “The object activated? How is this possible? It can only activate if essence touches it, and it has to be a full-powered attack from a high Marquis-rank expert! There are at least a hundred Marquises on the east coast, there are less than 700 in the entire United States! And the ones at or over mid-rank can all be counted! How could it activate now?!”

“Could it be someone from the Corvinus?” The man was dazed for a brief moment, but his eyes immediately turned blood-red and looked at the woman. His teeth grinded audibly and grew longer and longer. “They actually dare to make a move on the House of Dracul’s Holy Relic?”

The woman bit her lips hard, lowering her head and contemplating. Several seconds later, she said with certainty, “No, it’s not. Even the Corvinus can’t find so many high Marquis experts! They have around a dozen, at best!”

“Then what do we do now?”

“There must not be any mistake with the Holy Relic,” the woman gritted out, “Immediately notify borough overseer Mr. Andreas. We’ll wait here for the Normandy.”

“So we’re just gonna sit around?” The man’s eyes reddened as he spoke.

“What else can we do?!” Unexpectedly, the woman, who seemed calm all along, bolted up to her feet. Her ears slowly grew long, and she jumped onto the roof in one bound. With a kind of gravity that humans couldn’t understand, she stood upside down on the roof, her hair hanging down as she faced the man. At the same time, the joints of her lower jaw separated, and her mouth spread open to a strange degree!

“The Corvinus have eyes everywhere! And the Church’s Site of Judgement is watching us as well. If we act blindly without thinking right now, who will be able to handle the consequences if something happens to the Holy Relic because of this?!”

They didn’t know that on the Normandy which they cared about, white and blue light simultaneously hit the blood-red orb at the instant it closed!

Squelch! Blood splattered everywhere, and a wave of fuzziness appeared in front of Xu Yangyi and Moonless at the same time.

“An Imprisonment Formation?” Without hesitation, Xu Yangyi was already streaking ahead like lightning. “And it’s a very superior Imprisonment Formation. But it’s been broken?”

In midair, his momentum was like a fierce tiger, and a tiger’s roar thundered. His hands swung out a series of ten afterimages!

Swoosh swoosh swoosh! Splitting Air was unleashed! The second star of the Nine Glorious Stars Descent! In a flash, ten spatial cracks neatly appeared in the air! The claw-scars didn’t lose out on momentum, chopping straight at the blood orb!

“Physique art?” Moonless’s gaze flashed. On that day against Enihilus and the Dream Walker, he hadn’t carefully observed Xu Yangyi’s divine abilities. He hadn’t expected an ultra-rare physique divine ability from his counterpart.

His hand wasn’t slow amidst his contemplations either, but his battle tactics were the model of a Chinese Foundation Establishment cultivator, an opponent’s severed head fetched within a range of a hundred meters. All that was seen was a puff from his mouth, and a yellow magik artifact flew out. Along with a wisp of earthen-yellow light, it formed into the shape of a blade and slashed the blood orb!

Squelch! Squelch! Two divine abilities sunk into the blood orb, but it didn’t collapse. On the contrary, it began to violently shudder!

“This...” Xu Yangyi’s gaze flashed, and his figure twisted in the air, awesomely somersaulting away.

Above the massive blood orb, in the wake of this shudder, a head and four limbs surprisingly grew out!

Approaching two meters in size, the blood orb grew out a terribly chaotic head and limbs. In a flash, a several-meter-tall humanoid of blood was actually formed! Like it was pregnant, it took Zhao Ziqi into its abdomen!

“ROAR!!!” As soon as it formed, it shouted angrily! The entire ship was shaking. Following this roar, a hard-to-describe bloody odor explosively flared! The smell choked the mouth and nose.

“Late Qi Condensation?” Xu Yangyi and Moonless shot each other a look, both of them feeling this to be somewhat unbelievable.

Their last two moves could kill a late Qi Condensation cultivator and then some! However, not even a tiny dent was left on this blood giant’s skin!

“How about we visit this move again?” Moonless’s eyes grew cold, and he slapped the crown of his head. A golden radiance suddenly brightened, and a golden lotus sprouted on his head. The heart of the lotus contained a compliant-scepter of Buddhism’s Three Treasures: the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha. With his slap, the scepter emitted three brilliances of red, blue, and green, dyeing the surrounding area in a resplendent domain.

Nonetheless, these three brilliances actually whittled away in front of the formless bloody aura! In less than three seconds, the lights dimmed more and more, but the bloody aura in their surroundings was now gradually congealing and forming swaths of visible blood mist!

The faint sounds of shouts, screeches, and pleading drifted out from the blood mist, causing one to feel as if they were placed in hell.

But before the three brilliances scattered away, ten fire-dragons rushed out from them. Moonless turned his head and saw that Xu Yangyi was charging over with the Fishbowel Sword in hand. On the Fishbowel Sword, the imprint of ten fire-dragons was progressively hiding away.

Swoosh... In the next second, the blood mist, which was continuing to strengthen in front of them, instantly solidified into two hands of blood that were spread wide open. A sonorous rumble echoed, and each blood finger met one fire-dragon. Under purple fire splashing through the air, the Ten Cardinals Purgatory, which would relentlessly burn all things until they died, was surprisingly canceled out by the blood!

“HISS!!!” A piercing screech was heard from behind the blood mist. Moonless’s gaze brightened, and his hands rapidly chained seals. His stomach swelled up like a balloon, and he yelled, “Air Swallows Winds And Clouds!!!”

“Huff!” With his hands at the side of his mouth, he blew out, and a visible white tornado quickly formed. At great speed, it swept up all the surrounding blood mist. Shockingly, he and Xu Yangyi saw that while the blood giant in the blood mist had shrunk somewhat, the attack still wasn’t enough to kill it.

“What in the world is this thing?! Late Qi Condensation is actually so hard to kill!” Moonless’s eyes flashed with killing intent. Just now he was afraid that he injured Zhao Ziqi, so he hadn’t attacked at full strength. However, a middle Foundation Establishment had surprisingly failed to kill a late Qi Condensation in one move. In truth, he found himself feeling slightly trapped by the giant’s process of development. This successfully provoked his murderous heart.

However, he suddenly raised a brow. Without time to turn his head, he promptly flew back to his original position.

Where he was standing, a terrible spiritual pressure rumbled and surged! Afterwards, it became a whirlwind of qi and stabbed straight at the giant! At the same time, his attack was accompanied by Xu Yangyi’s cold snort.

“Heavenly Opening Devour Blood!!!”

The blood giant’s reaction wasn’t fast, but three seconds later in its originally emotionless eyes, a look of terror flickered through!

In the next second, a boom rang out! The whole tanker slightly shook!

Bang bang bang bang... The blood giant answered and became numerous clumps of blood, scattering all around. But as these clumps flew through the air, as if they had encountered fire, a barrage of hissing noises followed. All of them transformed into ashes.

Zhao Ziqi’s spirit was curled up in a ball. Xu Yangyi bounded over and used his spiritual force to encapsulate him. As he was doing so, he also fully unleashed his spiritual sense, running his gaze through the vicinity.

Gone...

That strange blood giant had disappeared just as it had come. Under the extreme focus of Heavenly Opening Devour Blood, it had vanished like a spring sun turning to snowfall.

“What was that thing?”

“That little brother just said there wasn’t a vengeful spirit...” Moonless mumbled to himself as he took a step forward and said in a low voice, “If that’s the case, there’s another kind of possibility.”

“A curse?” Before Moonless even finished speaking, Xu Yangyi had already thought of the answer. He narrowed his eyes and said, “A curse that’s still around after hundreds of years? But a curse shouldn’t exert a negative state and torture the offender to death, right?”