Chapter 42 Good-for-nothing

Right now, the cultivation level displayed by Wang Zhenling was definitely above the realm of Divine Elder.

Even less did the Envoy of the Chengshi Tao expect that Wang Zhenling would actually be able to mobilize the momentum and fortune of the Xiaji County to unleash such an attack!

In this world, almost no one had ever accomplished such a feat before!

Ordinary officials and civil servants, needless to say, could only cultivate their spiritual essence rather than their physical life force. With powerful spiritual radiance, they could communicate with and mobilize the fortune of the government through their official seals and the laws of the realm. However, they could never command it as smoothly as moving their own fingers!

As for Qi practitioners... even if members of the Chengshi Tao sneaked into the imperial court and secured official posts, they were never officials governing the common people, nor did they possess anything like the foundation Wang Zhenling had, which was virtually equivalent to having built a brand-new county city from scratch.

And most importantly, they did not possess a Heaven-Connecting Lotus Seed like the one in Wang Zhenling's hands!

Therefore, there had never been anyone like Wang Zhenling—someone who was both a cultivator capable of manipulating power with absolute ease and an existence capable of communicating with and driving the currents of fortune!

"Damn it, I underestimated my enemy!"

Just as the Chengshi Tao Envoy cried out inwardly in alarm, the long spear had already pierced his shoulder.

If he had been an ordinary person, the tremendous force carried by the long spear would have been enough to blast his entire body into dust.

Even a typical expert in the Out-of-Body stage, if struck by this spear at such a moment, would almost certainly be blown apart; under the crushing weight of the massive fortune, even their primordial spirit would be pulverized!

Yet, employing some unknown technique, the Chengshi Tao Envoy abruptly substituted a peach wood for a plum tree to escape disaster.

The long spear pierced straight through a rattan staff, while the Envoy, turning deathly pale, reappeared safe and sound a丈 (ten feet) away!

"A fine trick!"

Wang Zhenling praised condescendingly from above. Instantly, the crimson clouds floating over the Xiaji County, resembling roaring flames, surged forward and enveloped the primordial spirit soaring out from his crown chakra.

It was as if Wang Zhenling's primordial spirit had donned a magnificent crimson robe that fluttered like blazing fire!

In a split second, the boundless sea of fiery blood-energy churned across the sky, transforming into a ferocious and terrifying horned dragon that plunged straight down from the heavens!

"Damn it..."

In an instant, the face of the Chengshi Tao Envoy changed drastically once more. At this moment, he felt as though he were no longer fighting Wang Zhenling alone, but rather fighting the entire Xiaji County and the tens of thousands of common people residing within it!

The Chengshi Tao had long opposed the imperial court, and now they were cooperating with it once again.

Had Wang Zhenling merely relied on the power of the dynastic laws and fortune, the Envoy would not have been particularly afraid!

Even one could say he might have taken the opportunity to scheme against Wang Zhenling behind his back.

After all, the net of state laws was woven by men, making it far too rigid and riddled with countless loopholes.

However, Wang Zhenling did not rely on the fortune of the state laws at all; instead, he directly used the power of his primordial spirit to drive the entire fortune of Xiaji County, sweeping it down relentlessly toward him.

Let alone the fact that this Envoy had not yet reached the realm of true deities, even if he truly were a divine master, pitting the strength of a single person against the gathered fortune of an entire city would result in nothing less than a dead end!

Bang!

The force carried by Wang Zhenling's primordial spirit slammed straight into the Chengshi Tao Envoy like a violent tornado.

This time, even if he wanted to substitute himself to escape death once more, it was utterly impossible.

The mighty vortex engulfed him completely, spinning with a thunderous roar to grind him into absolute annihilation!

"Huh? This Chengshi Tao Envoy is not actually a creature of flesh and blood?"

After thoroughly obliterating the Envoy, Wang Zhenling was astonished to find that there was no corpse left behind—only a decaying rattan staff remained on the spot.

Wang Zhenling had originally thought the Envoy had employed some bizarre arcane art to escape with his life once more.

However, realization dawned upon him almost immediately; things were not as he had suspected.

The Chengshi Tao Envoy was merely an avatar!

"No wonder the Envoy of the Chengshi Tao was so weak; it turns out this was just a borrowed form manifested through an object..."

Understanding this, Wang Zhenling suddenly saw the light, finally realizing that the Envoy dodging his spear earlier was not some substitute death magic.

That rattan staff was his true physical vessel!

The Grand Heavenly Lord of the Chengshi Tao personally wielded a Nine-Section Staff, and the Seven-Section Envoys, in terms of hierarchy, were only two ranks below the Grand Heavenly Lord, placing them among the upper echelons of the Chengshi Tao!

How could they possibly possess merely the cultivation realm of a mortal immortal or the Out-of-Body stage?

As for just how high the cultivation of the Grand Heavenly Lord himself was today, no one knew, and Wang Zhenling had no way of knowing either.

Yet, according to the records of the Chengshi Tao, back when that Grand Heavenly Lord first established his own sect, he was already a Ghost Immortal Realized Person!

And since the Chengshi Tao now commanded such overwhelming momentum and dared to support the current Great Cheng Emperor in directly defying the Heavenly Court, the cultivation of this Grand Heavenly Lord should undoubtedly be no lower than that of an Earth Immortal.

It was even possible he had reached the realm of a Celestial Immortal!

Since the Seven-Section Envoys were high-ranking figures within the Chengshi Tao, even if they were not Earth Immortals, they should at least be Ghost Immortal Realized Persons!

The circumstantial evidence was that this mere avatar of his already possessed a realm approaching that of divine spirits.

"Useless, utterly useless... A dignified Seven-Section Envoy of the Chengshi Tao turned out to be so weak..."

Seeing that the Envoy had been eradicated by Wang Zhenling, the chieftain flew into a towering rage, cursing loudly and bitterly.

With the death of the Envoy, the chieftain found himself caught in a difficult dilemma, trapped in a position where advance and retreat were equally impossible.

Wang Zhenling had deployed such a formidable formation, complete with countless bonfires and the surging blood-energy of humanity.

If he led his troops to charge in, it was highly likely he would suffer a thousand losses while inflicting eight hundred on the enemy.

Once he captured the Xiaji County city, the ghostly soldiers under his command would probably suffer catastrophic damage, and by then, dreaming of seizing the spiritual vein's Jade Pivot would be sheer delusion!

Yet, retreating now was even more difficult!

Generally speaking, ghostly entities did not travel great distances.

For spirits, the realm of the living was never their proper dwelling place, and the blazing solar fire of daylight posed a fatal danger to them.

While ghosts could roam freely at night, once dawn approached, they had to find a place to hide.

They either retreated into graveyards or sought out other places heavy with yin energy to evade the intense yang energy of the daytime!

A solitary ghost could easily find a place to conceal itself, but leading a massive horde of spirits on a migration while trying to find a suitable hiding spot every single day was by no means an easy task.

As for personally intervening or dispatching powerful ghosts to capture the enemy leader first—

Jokes aside, those flames and that blood-energy were the natural nemesis of all ghostly beings.

No matter how powerful a ghost might be, the greater part of its strength would be suppressed; charging into that formation would be no different from marching to one's death!

With none of the three options viable, the chieftain fell into utter despair, leaving him with no outlet other than cursing the Chengshi Tao Envoy who had sweet-talked him into this venture and lured him all the way here with exaggerated boasts!

Yet, he could not linger here indefinitely either; once dawn arrived, disaster would still befall them.

Under the present circumstances...

"General, since it is tasteless to eat yet a pity to discard, we might as well simply retreat...

If this Xiaji County is already such a hard nut to crack, who knows what kind of situation awaits us in the Wuji Mountains?"

A ghostly spirit stepped forward to offer counsel to the chieftain.