Chapter 868: Acquaintances Reconvene

The ceiling of the spacious cave was riddled with holes that were the size of a baby’s arms. Strange vines that seemed to be made of muscle fibers grew out of them.

On the end of the vines grew peculiar emerald berries that contained extremely rich flesh power and wood power.

A faint green shield could be seen separating the top area of the cave from the fighting humans and outsiders below.

However, both humans and outsiders turned to look at the green berries from time to time in the middle of their fierce battles.

Clearly, those berries were the reason why these humans and outsiders were engaged in fierce battles.

As soon as Nie Tian entered this spacious part of the cave, his bloodline power became unusually active, as if the emerald berries that were the size of fists had a strong appeal to his unique bloodline.

Gazing at the berries, he unleashed his soul awareness to examine them, and rapidly found out that they seemed to have a similar medicinal efficacy as Fruits of Life, but less powerful.

Back in the day, he had obtained several Fruits of Life in the Realm of Unbounded Desolation.

He had accidentally absorbed the power of one Fruit of Life, which had accelerated the upgrade of his bloodline.

Later, he had given the rest of the Fruits of Life to Hua Mu and Wu Ji so that they could gain extra years and solve the lifespan problem they had faced.

If these berries contained similar flesh auras to Fruits of Life, this meant they would also be very helpful for the development of his bloodline.

Meanwhile, since they contained mysterious life force and could help extend lifespans, they were very valuable to both outsiders and humans.

Through obtaining more life power, outsiders could upgrade their bloodlines, and awaken new bloodline talents.

He had derived this enlightenment from the Frost Blood Python and coexisting flowers’ strong desire for him.

As for humans, these berries that contained life power were even more valuable to them.

Unlike outsiders, humans’ lifespans were significantly shorter. If they could extend their lifespans with these berries, then they wouldn’t have to walk their paths of cultivation worrying day and night that they would die of old age because they didn’t make breakthroughs fast enough.

Perhaps this was the reason why these humans and outsiders were fighting each other to the death.

Yin Yanan gave a sarcastic chuckle. “There are quite a few familiar faces here.

“Froste, Pergson, Gutas, Luo Hui from the Heavenly Witchcraft Sect, and that young man who tried to set us up...”

Nie Tian had been intrigued by the change of his bloodline aura, and thus had focused on the emerald berries on the ceiling of the cave.

Only after hearing her words did he take a close look at the fighting crowd, and discover that there were indeed quite a few acquaintances among them.

Aside from Luo Hui from the Heavenly Witchcraft Sect and the young man who had killed his companions and tried to pulled the same scheme on them, he also saw Chai Longge and Chai Fengwu.

As for outsiders, he saw Froste, Pergson, and Gutas, as well as the Fiend who had escaped from them earlier, Billy.

What surprised Nie Tian the most was that he even saw a few other familiar faces: Sylon the Fiend, Armes the Phantasm, and Tago the Demon... 

Years ago, he had traveled through one of six spatial rifts in the Realm of Split Void to a mysterious dimension composed of two paralleled continents. He had fought the three of them on two islands there.

They had also joined an invasion of the Domain of the Falling Stars led by Basto, but had fled upon hearing of Basto’s death.

He had never expected that he would meet them again in the Shatter Battlefield after so many years.

“It’s you!” Armes called out, while he and Froste were teaming up against a few human Qi warriors.

At this point, Armes had already upgraded from the fourth grade to the fifth grade, his battle prowess improving significantly.

Upon seeing Nie Tian, he instantly left his opponents and dashed towards Nie Tian, his eyes reddening with hatred.

“Bloodline magic! Soul Burning Seals!” With his soul power and Blood Essence, he formed clusters of ghostly flames, which floated directly towards Nie Tian.

Years ago, he had only been able to unleash three clusters of ghostly flames, but now he was able to unleash eight of them.

The soul power within each of the eight clusters of ghostly flames was also much more intense than when he had first met and fought Nie Tian.

Nie Tian’s image appeared in the prismatic crystal between Armes’s eyebrows.

He locked Nie Tian down at the first possible moment.

“Armes! Get back here!!” Froste shouted with an anxious look on his face. “You can’t handle him!”

Outsiders had a strict hierarchy among their numerous clans. Froste’s clan was much loftier and more powerful than Armes’. This time, like many other Phantasms, Armes had come as a regular team member, who had to take orders from Froste.

Upon hearing his words, Armes instantly grew vigilant.

He knew Froste wouldn’t have said that without a good reason.

“Soul Burning Seals again...” Nie Tian’s face split into a grin as he jumped into the spacious cave and unleashed Starchains.

One after another, Starchains that could only be detected by soul power flew out of Nie Tian’s eyes.

Carrying profound power from his star souls, they slammed into the Soul Burning Seals Armes had formed with his Blood Essence. In the next moment, all eight of them exploded like glorious fireworks and vanished into thin air.

Armes’ expression flickered drastically.

He had never expected Nie Tian to have become so powerful after just a few years.

Now that he had entered the fifth grade, his strength was roughly equal to that of a Worldly realm human cultivator. When he had first seen Nie Tian, he had been convinced that he was at the Worldly realm, judging from the tainted energies around him.

Normally, it would take human cultivators less time to progress in their cultivation than outsiders.

Plus, he knew that Nie Tian was a disciple of the Ancient Fragmentary Star Palace. Given their profound reserve power, it wasn’t surprising at all that he had advanced to the Worldly realm.

What surprised him was that the amount of tainted energies gathered around Nie Tian soared as he leapt towards him.

The amount of tainted energies around someone was determined by his or her strength.

Therefore, he sensed danger as soon as he saw tainted energies building up around Nie Tian at an alarming rate.

All of a sudden, Nie Tian activated Life Strengthening, and flashed to Armes in a split second with a Starshift.

He clenched his fist and unleashed Titan’s Wrath.

Raging flesh power instantly bore down on Armes, along with devastating flame power and pure spiritual power.

BOOM!

Armes’ body immediately blew up like a ripe watermelon that was dropped to the ground.

Mangled flesh filling the air, Armes died an instant, violent death.

Nie Tian shook his head and muttered, “A fifth grade Phantasm like you is far too weak for me now...”

To unleash this furious strike, he had only summoned a small amount of flesh power, flame power, and pure spiritual power.

In his eyes, such a strike could only be viewed as a warm-up procedure.

However, Armes, whom he had fought in a well-matched battle years ago, actually exploded after taking such a strike.

“My bloodline has upgraded six times, allowing me to awaken six bloodline talents. So by comparing our bloodline power alone, I’m already stronger than him. Then, I summoned different powers to unleash Titan’s Wrath. With such power, killing the fifth grade Armes was indeed as easy as blowing away a speck of dust.” (Idiom: very little effort)

With these thoughts in mind, he grinned and flashed to Sylon the Fiend and Tago the Demon successively, where he unleashed Titan’s Wrath two more times.

BANG! BANG!

Sylon and Tago also exploded instantly without even putting up a fight.

Nie Tian shook his head repeatedly as he sighed and muttered, “Weak, far too weak.

“Back when we first met on that island, any of you could put me in great trouble. But now you’ve become so fragile that you can’t handle a single strike from me. Killing you is so easy that I don’t even enjoy it.”

Then, he went on and activated a few more short-range Starshifts.

As he flashed back and forth between places, several outsiders who he found familiar exploded one by one.

Gutas’ eyebrows knotted as he watched Tago, who was also a Demon, being reduced to bits of flying flesh. Then, he called out to Froste, “Froste, that man has become even stronger than when we last saw him!” 

Not long ago, he had been invited to a joint attack targeting Nie Tian. Back then, Nie Tian’s bloodline had been at the fifth grade.

Even if he had unleashed his bloodline power, it wouldn’t have been so overwhelmingly powerful.

Not to mention, Nie Tian hadn’t used a shred of his bloodline power to fight them back then. All he had used was the Bone Blood Demon, the Spirit Pearl, and his spiritual power.

“He’s not a normal human, but a hybrid!” Froste said with a very grim expression. “It’s just that I can’t seem to identify the bloodline he carries.” 

A few outsiders close to him heard him, their expression flickering drastically. “A hybrid!?”

These outsiders from ancient clans had long since heard that several formidable human sects like the Ancient Fragmentary Star Palace had attempted to make hybrids of humans and outsiders for a very long time now. Their purpose was to steal the outsiders’ powerful bloodline power in order to solve the humans’ lifespan problem.

Therefore, the existence of hybrids in those powerful human sects was already no secret.

However, most of the hybrids turned out to be failures, and even less accomplished than normal humans. Those who actually gained long lifespans and tough bodies were as rare as phoenix feathers and qilin horns.

Who would have thought they would actually run into a successful hybrid in a cave in the Bloody Grave Mountain Range?

“This is a bit tricky now,” Froste muttered softly in the outsiders’ language, but didn’t seem very worried. “But being powerful is a very complicated thing.”

Then, he gave Pergson a sideways glance and asked, “How about you go take care of him?”

Pergson the Bonebrute was fighting the young man who had planned to set up Nie Tian and the girls. He had gained control of the situation, as his death power had already infiltrated into the fan-wielding young man’s flesh and blood, making him struggle.

Upon hearing Froste’s words, Pergson ended his battle against the young man in an unhurried fashion. Then, he laid his eyes on Nie Tian and said in the outsiders’ language, “Sure.”

In the human language, he said to Nie Tian, “You’ll be no match for me here. Although, I’ve got to admit that you’re a good fighter. In fact, you might have a chance at beating me if I didn’t have my Bone Shatterer. But as long as I have it, you’d better run.”

Pergson was well-aware that Nie Tian’s Bone Blood Demon would be limited to a large extent if they were to fight in this place.

First of all, the Bone Blood Demon was too large to move about freely in the cave. Secondly, its vigorous flesh power would make it suffer from a tremendous amount of tainted energy.

Besides, his Bone Shatterer had an innate subduing effect on the Bone Blood Demon.

Therefore, his confidence was well-founded.

“Go help him, Han Sen!” A resounding voice suddenly echoed out. It was a man in golden garments, who was now gazing coldly at the young man who practiced lightning power.

From the look of it, he wasn’t fond of the young man either, but considering the situation, all the humans had to band together.

The Han Sen he referred to was none other than the vicious young man who had been fighting Pergson and failing.

At this moment, he was driving death power out of himself in silence, hoping that Nie Tian would take care of Pergson for him.

He was clearly unhappy to do as he was told, but he still dragged his reluctant steps towards Nie Tian, while muttering, “Why always me...”