Shut Me Up

Wang Keting stood to the side, silent for several seconds.

He had originally thought he was a man who had seen the world.

Only now did he realize how little he had actually seen.

He could understand cultivators fighting ghosts.

But using a divine brush to draw a Vulcan cannon and fire at ghosts? That was beyond him. It had left him utterly shaken.

Liu Zheng looked at Lin Mo, then at Chu Miaomiao, and could not help saying, “Would this count as physical salvation?”

With his eyes closed, Lin Mo replied, “Namo Gatling Bodhisattva, six roots purified by brass rounds. Three thousand six hundred rotations in a single breath. Greatly compassionate, sending the neon souls to reincarnation.”

Jiang Yunlu nearly laughed herself breathless, and the true qi she had just circulated immediately fell into disarray.

Xie Yuling hurriedly reminded her, “Don’t laugh. Regulate your breathing.”

Jiang Yunlu held it in, her face turning bright red.

Standing beside Chu Miaomiao, Ning Qingcheng watched as wave after wave of samurai were forced back into the black mist. She remained silent for a long time.

She had once thought she was already outrageous enough.

Now it seemed that Chu Miaomiao was the one who had hidden herself the deepest.

No, to be precise, the older sister residing within her body was the truly outrageous one—and she had a style all her own.

The more Chu Miaomiao fought, the more excited she became. Finding the nine-barreled Vulcan cannon awkward to handle, she raised her brush and added two more support braces, steadying the barrel.

“Come on! Keep lining up.”

She shouted toward the black mist, “No cutting in line. Big Sis is sending you all back to the furnace for free today.”

The samurai continued pouring out.

But this time, the situation had completely reversed.

They were no longer a nuisance wearing down Ning Qingcheng and the others. Instead, they had become targets for Chu Miaomiao to practice on.

The Vulcan cannon drawn by the divine brush was no ordinary weapon. The bullets carried the brush’s power, giving them a natural advantage against condensed yin energy and malevolent spirits.

Every sweeping burst of gunfire scattered the lingering souls, leaving them with barely any time to re-form.

Lin Mo’s absorption of the baleful energy beneath the ground also accelerated.

The more the samurai outside were scattered, the more chaotic the baleful energy within the seal became. And once it was thrown into chaos, it was actually easier for him to draw it out.

One ring of formation patterns after another lit up.

The floor of the laboratory began to tremble faintly.

Liu Zheng crouched down and touched the ground, his expression turning serious. “There’s something moving underneath.”

Lin Mo finally opened his eyes.

He looked toward the depths of the black mist outside the door, his tone unhurried.

“It isn’t moving.”

“It’s just tired of waiting.”

Chu Miaomiao was still firing wildly. Hearing that, she lowered the muzzle slightly, and her laughter faded by half.

The next second, the sound of a scabbard scraping across the ground came from deep within the black mist.

Once.

Twice.

All the ordinary warriors suddenly stopped and retreated to either side in unison.

The baleful aura outside was torn open, forming a narrow gap.

A tall figure clad in battered armor stepped out of the black mist.

It held a long blade in its hand. Runes covered the blade, and its tip dragged across the ground, leaving behind charred marks.

Chu Miaomiao narrowed her eyes, her finger curling around the switch once more.

“Oh.”

“Now that’s a big one.”

Lin Mo, still inside the laboratory with his eyes closed, spoke in an indifferent tone. “The earth fiend energy was siphoned away, so the defensive mechanism was activated.”

Liu Zheng couldn’t help glancing at Yu Youhan, who stood motionless nearby.

This guy had probably been refined as a defensive mechanism in the first place too.

It was just that this defensive mechanism was under someone else’s control now.

He looked outside. At the end of the corridor, the newly arrived warrior had straightened up.

Cracked armor, a long blade, and fine black ash scattered beneath its feet. Crisscrossing fractures covered its armor, making it look like a defective remnant dragged out of some abandoned battlefield.

But that was precisely where the problem lay.

All the others wore complete armor. So why was this one battered and tattered?

Liu Zheng frowned as he stared at it.

Before he could figure it out, the warrior suddenly raised its head.

“You people are so noisy!”

The corridor fell silent for half a second.

Chu Miaomiao turned around.

Hajimi turned around.

Liu Zheng turned around too.

Everyone looked at Ning Qingcheng.

Ding didn’t understand either.

Under their stares, Ning Qingcheng nearly took half a step backward. “Why are you all looking at me?”

Chu Miaomiao answered with complete justification, “Don’t you speak Japanese?”

“I know how to have a normal conversation. I’m not here to be a simultaneous interpreter for Japs.”

That was what she said, but she had actually understood him.

Ning Qingcheng stared at the samurai and translated with great seriousness: “He says we’re too loud.”

Chu Miaomiao blinked. “Too loud? That’s exactly what we want! Silence is for the dead!”

She raised a hand, and the whirring of the Vulcan cannon rang crisply through the corridor.

The bullets tore from the chamber.

Infused with the special power of the Divine Brush, every round swept toward the battered samurai.

A stream of bullets burst from the barrel, each one carrying the brush’s unique power as they tore toward the shattered samurai.

Muzzle flashes flared briefly before being swallowed by the gloom.

Yet the samurai’s eyes shifted slightly. He made no attempt to dodge.

The long blade dragging across the floor finally moved.

Its tip scraped against the ground, producing a shrill screech. In the next instant, the blade swept horizontally, and a curtain of sword-light spread through the corridor.

“Secret Art: Whirlwind Blazing Slash!”

A swirling current of air erupted from beneath the blade, carrying dust and shattered stone down the corridor straight toward Chu Miaomiao.

Caught in the vortex, the bullets that had been fired suddenly reversed course and came screaming back.

The smile faded somewhat from Chu Miaomiao’s face.

She flipped her wrist, and the Divine Brush dropped into her palm. Its tip swept across the space before her.

With a few strokes, a thick shield took shape and rose across the corridor.

Hajimi stepped forward and braced both paws against the back of the shield.

The bullets disintegrated on their own before they could return, but the tornado’s attack slammed into the shield with full force.

Boom!

The shield jolted backward.

Hajimi’s paws gouged two furrows into the floor as the entire cat was shoved several meters back.

So this defensive mechanism wasn’t just for show.

But it wasn’t invincible, either.

Because Ning Qingcheng had already disappeared.

She had been standing beside Chu Miaomiao, but she had moved away just before the shield was raised.

Tiny creases rippled along the edge of space. A Sky-Rending Arrow shot out from the opposite side at a vicious angle, aimed specifically at the gaps in the samurai’s armor.

The shattered samurai suddenly turned his head.

It was as though he had sensed that faint spatial fluctuation. The long saber snapped back and leveled across his front.

“Esoteric Art: Crescent Slash!”

The blade light swept diagonally.

A charred crack appeared in midair, blocking the Rift-Piercing Arrow head-on. The arrowhead collided with the saber mark, producing a grating screech, yet was forcibly stopped.

Ning Qingcheng’s voice came from somewhere else. “Sure, you can block attacks from the front, but you can’t block the back of your head.”

The Shattered Warrior turned.

But it was already too late.

Ning Qingcheng stepped out from behind him, pressing her palm against the back of his armored chest.

She was so close that she could hear the hollow echo coming from within the armor plates.

“I have an esoteric art too, okay! Behold my ultimate technique: Thunderous, Invincible, Spatial Explode-Explode-Explode!”

The corner of Liu Zheng’s eye twitched.

Even Lin Mo fell silent for a moment.

Jiang Yunlu couldn’t hold back. “Did you seriously think that name through?”

“Don’t interrupt my casting in the middle of battle!”

Space shifted layer upon layer beneath Ning Qingcheng’s palm.

The Shattered Warrior’s armor first caved inward, then cracks spread in every direction.

It raised its hand, intending to smash Ning Qingcheng with the hilt of its saber. But before its arm could rise halfway, an entire section of it was sliced away by the displaced space.

There was no blood.

Only black ash leaking from between the armor plates.

The warrior finally turned its head, mouth opening as if it wanted to say something else.

Ning Qingcheng gave it no chance.

“Shut up.”

She pressed down with her palm.

The spatial ruptures linked together, twisting through the inside of the armor.

The Shattered Warrior’s body began collapsing from the chest outward. One armor plate after another fell away, scattering into ash before they even touched the ground.

With nothing left to support it, the long saber clanged onto the floor. The lingering light along its blade went out as well.

Only a few wisps of black ash drifted down through the corridor.