Chapter 136: The Baby Is Going to Die

“Damn it, what a bully…”

It took several breaths before Lin Zhan finally recovered from that suffocating sensation of standing on the brink of death. His sea of consciousness had been ruthlessly invaded—it was practically the same as being violated.

Naturally, this left him furious beyond words. But whom could he complain to? The other party had been overwhelmingly powerful, forcing its way in without giving him the slightest chance to resist.

Lin Zhan stood where he was, still lightly gripping the golden arrow, though at last he had managed to catch his breath.

“How terrifying!”

The mere aura of this golden arrow was already so frightening. Perhaps only the nameless bow that had once appeared at the Heavenly Treasures Hall auction possessed enough power to fire such an arrow.

An ordinary bow would never be capable of it.

By now, the golden arrow had completely withdrawn its aura. Nothing unusual could be felt where he held it.

Lin Zhan tightened his grip slightly, wanting to see whether he could pull it from the body of the Young Master in Brocade.

Unexpectedly, that single act caused a sudden change.

The young master's corpse instantly crumbled into ash, which pattered to the ground before vanishing like smoke. The entire arrow was exposed.

Lin Zhan noticed that only a tiny portion of the arrowhead had pierced the massive stone. It was insignificant, yet from this he could infer that the cracks in the boulder had actually been caused by the arrow's force.

Lin Zhan brought the golden arrow before his eyes. At that very moment, the huge stone finally split in two with a thunderous roar, opening toward both sides and revealing a stone core flushed with red.

So heavy!

Lin Zhan estimated that the golden arrow weighed somewhere between the Ink Sword and the White Bone Pagoda.

It felt as though he were holding a weight of ten thousand pounds. The arrowhead was not particularly sharp; on the contrary, it was somewhat blunt.

The shaft was covered in obscure, indecipherable writing and patterns. They were likely inscriptions of some supreme formation, meant to unleash the arrow's full power.

“Such a divine arrow would be a terrible waste if it couldn't be retrieved after being fired!”

After studying it for a long while, Lin Zhan placed the golden arrow inside his storage ring. He did not dare rashly store it in the Nine-Star Space. If it went out of control there, the consequences would be disastrous.

Wait. Since the golden arrow was here, could the archer be here as well?

If so, might there be a bow—and perhaps several more arrows just like this one?

Lin Zhan's heart gave an involuntary leap.

Because the lantern-eyed black-faced monster was imprisoned inside the White Bone Pagoda, Lin Zhan had naturally maintained his spiritual connection with it the entire time.

He had also clearly heard the black-faced monster's earlier exchange with Gu Yuanzhou and Teng Sheng.

“A black-faced monster actually called me a big, stupid blackhead. It should take a look at whose territory this is!”

Lin Zhan had also noticed that this somewhat adorable yet idiotic sword spirit was up to mischief. From time to time, its phantom black sword condensed strands of black lines that probed into the interior of the White Bone Pagoda.

Although it was confined to a small area, those black lines seemed to break through with ease, meddling at several nodes of the restriction.

Lin Zhan curled his lips slightly. “If even this can be tampered with, how am I supposed to keep things under control?”

In an instant, he strengthened the restriction a little.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!

All the black lines withdrew at once, as though they had been scalded.

“Bleh, bleh, bleh… You scared me to death…” The black-faced monster's sword spirit curled into a ball, its face puffing up like a bun. “Big, stupid blackhead, let's talk this over. Don't do this. I'm going to die…”

While controlling his sword and searching for his target, Lin Zhan transmitted his voice. “Little Blackie, weren't you having fun? You even wanted to come out and finish me off. I'm waiting.”

The black-faced monster fell silent. It looked utterly obedient, its round face becoming honest and still, no longer daring to change shape at will.

Lin Zhan felt that this mischievous sword spirit had to be dealt with as soon as possible. Its power seemed to be incomplete. After separating from its sword, it had drifted about in the outside world, relying on the spiritual energy of Ghost Flowers and hiding underground day after day merely to cling to life.

Now that Lin Zhan had taken the Ghost Flowers, it would truly be left without support.

“Come work for me!”

“No! I am a dignified sword spirit. I shall never serve two masters in my lifetime.”

“Your former sword master has already left—or perhaps he has already perished. Why, then, are you still alive?”

“I… I don't believe that Master Sword has died. One day, he will return.”

“Even if your sword master isn't dead, you won't be able to wait that long. Even if I release you from the pagoda and let you leave, how many years do you think you can maintain this form?”

Lin Zhan's final question once again plunged the black-faced monster into deep thought.

Indeed. If it were still at its peak, it could overturn the heavens and stir the earth. Why, then, when Lin Zhan appeared, had it needed to create an eerie atmosphere, pretend to be immensely powerful, and rely on spiritual force to deal with him?

At its peak, crushing Lin Zhan would probably have been as easy as crushing a tiny ant.

“What became of your sword master in the end? And where did your original body go?”

“At the time, Master Sword fell into a trap and was on the verge of death. In the critical moment, he broke the sword, then entered that deadly spatial rift carrying the broken blade. I hid inside the broken sword, but when I awoke, the broken sword was nowhere to be found…”

When the black-faced monster mentioned the broken sword, Lin Zhan thought of Broken Blade Peak in the Nine-Star Space. It was formed from a single broken blade.

“Could that be the black-faced monster's original body?”

The White Bone Pagoda not only imprisoned the black-faced monster; it also allowed Lin Zhan to see its temperament and character with perfect clarity.

That Master Sword had probably been a towering human hero. The sword in his hand had slain countless demons, monsters, and wicked traitors. He was someone worthy of respect.

This was also why Lin Zhan could not bring himself to suppress the black-faced monster.

“Go take a look somewhere. See whether that broken sword is your original body.”

With a thought, Lin Zhan transferred the black-faced monster from the White Bone Pagoda into the Nine-Star Space.

The Nine-Star Space was an energy domain belonging to Lin Zhan's true body. Only a soul-form existence such as the black-faced monster could enter it—and once inside, it would not dare cause trouble.

Little Purple, who had been drawn in by the Nine-Star Space when it was already utterly lifeless, was clearly a separate matter.

Upon entering the Nine-Star Space, the black-faced monster's round body floated in midair, somewhat at a loss. The vastness of the space, its strange environment, and the nine enormous stars hanging at varying distances in the far reaches of the sky all left it flustered.

“What kind of damned place is this? Huh? This mountain…”

The black-faced monster drifted over, then came to a quiet stop before Broken Blade Peak.

“Oh. It seems this isn't the black-faced monster's original body.” Lin Zhan watched the activity within the Nine-Star Space through his spiritual sense and reached that conclusion.

“Big, stupid blackhead, where did you get this sword peak?” the black-faced monster transmitted.

Lin Zhan asked, “Is it useful to you?”

“Yes. There are Ghost Flowers here, as well as this blade. I can recover part of my strength.”

“Then come work for me!”

“No! I am a dignified sword spirit. I shall never serve two masters in my lifetime.”

“Then what the hell are we talking about?”

“Or… could you let me think it over first?”

With a whoosh, the black-faced monster burrowed into Broken Blade Peak and began inspecting it from every direction.