The Decaying World

"What is this!? Ugh...!!"

Before Wu Anning could even react, she felt her body rapidly swell as if being inflated. She grew taller and taller, shooting past two and a half meters and approaching three.

Her frame grew broader and more formidable, like a solid wall. Her muscles bulged, and veins popped out all over her body.

RIP.

In an instant, her clothes were stretched to their limit and tore apart, falling to the ground.

But she paid it no mind. Her eyes were completely blood-red, and most of her feminine features had vanished. Only a white pattern on her chest emerged clearly, glowing with a soft, milky light.

It seemed the Dharma Seal, after years of refinement and feedback, had also undergone a subtle change.

"AHH!!" Suddenly, Wu Anning threw her head back and trembled. A semi-transparent shockwave erupted from her body, spreading out in all directions.

But the shockwave had barely spread a meter before Lin Hui manipulated the airflow to quell it.

The airflow manipulation Special Effects from his Star Breath Sword Manual were still active; they had never disappeared.

"How does it feel?" Lin Hui asked with a smile, looking at the current Wu Anning.

"It’s... it’s amazing... What is this power!? Teacher?" Wu Anning reveled in the raw, violent force surging through her.

Compared to this, the halo of light just now, which had seemed like some kind of Magic, was hardly worth mentioning.

In her years with Lin Hui, she had seen monsters like the Mutant Bodies before, so she had a basic level of acceptance for such things. She wasn’t one to make a big fuss like an ordinary person.

In her eyes, Lin Hui, who had single-handedly supported the dojo at such a young age, could never have been an ordinary person.

The scene unfolding before her now only confirmed her suspicions.

"Before I answer you, how about we deal with a few peeping ants first?"

Lin Hui’s voice pulled her back to reality. She saw him looking at the right-hand wall with a smirk, as if he had discovered something.

"This disciple obeys." Wu Anning paused for a moment, then followed his gaze.

On the other side of the wall, an old landlord and two assassins disguised as servants were peering through a small hole. When they saw this, their faces paled, and they stumbled back several steps.

"Isn’t this supposed to be an ordinary sword dojo!? How can an abnormal Mutant Body like this appear here!?"

Just by the size of that red-eyed Mutant Body, they knew they were in deep trouble. Generally, a Mutant Body’s speed, strength, and constitution were determined by its size. But this one in the courtyard wasn’t just massive; it could even maintain a degree of rationality! This was just...!?

The three felt their scalps tingle as cold sweat poured down their backs. Without a second thought, they turned to flee.

A Mutant Body of this level might even break through the normal grades and approach the immortal level!

This was something they couldn’t handle at all!

They had faced a Mutant Body of this size before. All their Magic Artifacts had been destroyed, many had died, and they had only barely managed to survive.

And now, without the expert who had been their main force back then, just the three of them...

"Retreat!!!"

The leader didn’t hesitate, spinning around and sprinting away.

He abandoned his two subordinates. At this moment, his face was contorted, and his heart was filled with nothing but icy terror.

’How did I get so unlucky? If I had known, I would have listened to my subordinate’s advice and just gone after Liu Xuezhen’s guards...’

Suddenly, he skidded to a halt. He looked up ahead and slowly began to back away.

The hulking figure that had been inside the walls just moments ago was now somehow standing right in front of him.

The terrifying, three-meter-tall humanoid now stood like a wall, completely blocking his path forward.

It was early morning, and aside from a few farmers passing by on their way to the market who witnessed the scene, there were hardly any other pedestrians.

He didn’t even have a chance to cry for help.

Without hesitation, the leader acted decisively. He slapped a hidden pouch at his waist, and a rectangular talisman of black paper with silver patterns flew out.

The talisman ignited without a flame, floated in the air, and shot straight toward Wu Anning.

SMACK!

The talisman was swatted out of the air.

It had been surrounded by an invisible, transparent protective field. This was a Mana shield that formed automatically upon the activation of Talismanic Magic to prevent external factors from interrupting it.

But now, it had been knocked aside by a massive, veiny hand the size of a cattail fan.

The leader’s face turned green. He seized the opportunity to retreat, a small black vial now in his hand. He tossed it forward and flicked an iron caltrop, which struck the vial dead center.

POP!

The vial shattered, releasing a large cloud of black, poisonous smoke.

WHOOSH!

The next moment, the massive hand waved, and the black smoke was blown away in an instant.

The leader’s expression twisted further. A crazed look appeared in his eyes as he tore open his shirt, revealing a dense pattern of blue and red demon-face tattoos underneath.

"Limitless Heaven and Earth, I borrow the power of the universe!"

FZZZZZT!!

In an instant, blinding golden rays shot out from the tattoos on his chest, rushing toward Wu Anning.

The next moment, the golden light was once again extinguished by a slap from the giant hand.

"...!!?" This time, the leader was completely out of options. He stood there dumbfounded, staring at Wu Anning.

He had used up all his tricks.

Then, Wu Anning grabbed him and started walking back toward the courtyard wall.

Only then did the leader realize that his other two team members were already lying unconscious on the ground.

As she passed them, Wu Anning grabbed them both by the hair with one hand and dragged them into the courtyard like sacks.

From start to finish, the entire encounter had taken less than twenty seconds.

Because Wu Anning moved so quickly, very few people even saw what happened.

Inside the courtyard, Lin Hui had observed the entire process with his perception and had a rough assessment of the power of the Magic used.

’It must have had some kind of special effect, but because it was too weak, Anning just powered right through it.’

Wu Anning, who already had vigorous qi and blood, now had the strengthening effect of the True Body Seal stacked on top. The True Body Seal provided an all-around enhancement to all physical attributes, including muscle density, various resistances, immunity, recovery, and so on. Anything related to the body was enhanced by half.

The resulting stacking effect was explosive.

In practice, Wu Anning’s strength, speed, and defense had increased several times over.

Looking at the three men who had been thrown inside, Lin Hui smiled.

"Well done."

Wu Anning gave a bashful smile.

"It’s all thanks to your good teaching, Teacher. What was that Dharma Gate just now? Did you press one of my acupoints? How did my strength increase so much all of a sudden?"

"You can think of it as a Secret Technique. As long as you truly consider yourself my disciple, it will remain in effect." Lin Hui added a few points of caution.

As long as she recognized herself as his disciple, she would naturally be considered one of the Qingfeng Daoist Disciples of Qingfei Mountain. Thus, she would be recognized by the Dharma Seal and receive its effects.

When Wu Anning heard about this effect, especially that it would work as long as she considered herself the dojo master’s disciple, her eyes lit up.

This miraculous effect added another layer of mystery to the already incomparably powerful image she had of her dojo master.

"Alright, you can go now. I’ll handle things here," Lin Hui said with a smile. "Remember to control your size. Don’t keep the Dharma Seal’s effect active all the time, or it will strain your body."

"Yes." Like a child with a new toy, Wu Anning experimented with switching the Dharma Seal in her body on and off. Soon, her body rapidly shrank, deflating like a balloon.

After bowing to Lin Hui, she quickly left the courtyard, leaving him alone with the three kidnappers.

"Now then... shall we have a little talk?" Lin Hui said, looking at the pale-faced leader.

"T-talk about what!?" The leader’s body trembled slightly. He was not a man easily frightened, but for some reason, just standing before this person caused an indescribable, instinctual shudder to run through him.

For a frontline operative like him, who had spent years walking on a knife’s edge, this was completely unimaginable.

"Let’s talk about the Magic you just used," Lin Hui said.

「A few minutes later.」

The leader and his two team members slowly walked out of the dojo, heading away from the city center.

Their eyes were empty, holding nothing but a complete void.

After emptying them of their secret knowledge, Lin Hui had made a preliminary attempt at using the Jiuhua Divine Art.

Although the Jiuhua Divine Art specialized in influencing and controlling the nervous system from a distance, his Mental Power was so immense that with a slight lapse in concentration, he had accidentally turned the three men into amnesiac idiots. Frustrated after several failed attempts to reverse it, Lin Hui could only send them away from the city.

’I was just trying to brainwash them and recruit them... what a shame...’ Lin Hui now found himself missing the various divine arts from the Fog People World.

If he had collected more, if he had obtained a divine art specializing in controlling the Heart and Spirit and making minute memory alterations, things might have been much easier now.

Fortunately, the harvest this time was not small.

He had obtained a great deal of detailed intelligence from the three men, including the name of their organization—the Yin-Yang Pavilion.

The three had learned that the Hongyuan Sutra, which contained a trace of a supreme treasure’s spiritual essence, had fallen into the hands of the warlord Liu Chang.

Their mission this time was to kidnap Liu Chang’s daughter, Liu Xuezhen, to exchange her for the Hongyuan Sutra.

’To refine a powerful Magic Artifact, one must first identify a target Magical Treasure. After selecting it, one needs to obtain a trace of that Magical Treasure’s spiritual essence and refine it into one’s own Magic Artifact. Doing so will greatly enhance the Magic Artifact’s power.’

’The poor, who have no spiritual essence to draw from, can only use talismans. Those with a lineage can take the spiritual essence from their inherited Magical Treasures to refine Magic Artifacts. The more spiritual essence, the closer the Magic Artifact’s power will be to the original Magical Treasure. And the stronger the inherited Magical Treasure, the stronger the corresponding Magic Artifact... It’s all interconnected.’ Lin Hui sorted through the information he had obtained.

As for the fact that Liu Chang was supported by a coalition of Buddhist and Daoist forces, he could have guessed that even without being told.

After all, for a warlord to occupy such a large territory, it would be impossible to grow to such a scale without commensurate protective forces. He would have been suppressed or even killed long ago during his rise.

The mortal world, cultivators, the Underworld, and the Celestial Court—all these were mixed together, forming the complex and decadent core of this world.

And the Republic of Zhengshan was not the only country here. There were dozens, even hundreds of foreign nations outside. What the situation was like out there would require careful investigation later.

After gaining this general understanding, the plan in Lin Hui’s mind became clearer.

His previous caution had been correct. According to the intelligence he had just acquired, the major secular cultivation factions had intricate ties to the Underworld and the Celestial Court. Acting rashly would undoubtedly draw the attention of all these powers at once.

This world seemed chaotic, but in reality, a single move could affect the entire situation.

’I need a way to test the waters... The Magic that man used was only powerful enough to affect, interfere with, and control ordinary people. Some of the direct damage Magic was even less powerful than firearms, and the activation procedures were complicated and inconvenient. Plus, one has to start cultivating from a young age, which is time-consuming and labor-intensive.’

’But what about the major factions? What about other Immortal Laws?’ He mused, turning and walking toward the back room in the Government Office where the old Daoist Tian Long was held.

Inside the crystal pillar, Tian Long was still in the same spot, his expression weary. It was clear he had tried many times to break free from the crystal’s seal, all to no avail.

"The power of Magic?" Hearing Lin Hui’s question, he was slightly surprised. "You casually destroyed even my Magic Artifact. Before you, my other Magic is nothing more than a gentle breeze. What power is there to speak of?"

"Just because you can’t doesn’t mean no one can. What if there’s an Immortal Law out there that can specifically target me and find my weakness?" Lin Hui retorted.

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!