Twilight Boundary-Chapter 575 - 566: Destroy the Temple and Demolish the Golden Body
With the Demon Suppression Golden Mace in hand, no head in all the lands is beyond its strike!
Ever since he acquired this mace from Stone Box Village, Hu Ma had been pondering whose head he should strike. Now, he finally understood; the timing was perfect.
Stepping forward, he unleashed all his cultivation from Entering the Mansion and his four columns of cultivation. Yet, this was still too little for the Demon Suppression Golden Mace. The mace was too heavy, so heavy that he could barely lift it.
But when a firm resolve emerged within him, knowing whom he wanted to strike, and for whom, the mace was lifted. Not only lifted, but it seemed as if the vast yin winds and baleful qi of the entire Zhensui Mansion were surging, empowering this mace.
The weight of this mace had almost surpassed Hu Ma’s current abilities and discernment.
Then he gritted his teeth, his gaze cold and menacing, and headed straight for Mingzhou City. Fiercely, he brought down the high-raised mace, as if to shatter the terrified faces of those distant relatives as well.
"You all scheme and scheme, relying only on the belief that you understand Zhensui Mansion better than I do, that you understand the Demon Suppression Golden Mace better than I do. Yet you are wrong..."
"There indeed is no one around me who understands Zhensui Mansion. Not even Granny told me anything about its past before she left. But that’s because she knew it was no longer necessary to tell me these things; I have my own ways to understand them."
"Ever since I took up this Demon Suppression Golden Mace, I have learned many things from it. I have also seen many individuals connected to this mace—all sorts of people. But ironically..."
"...none of them is the Emperor you speak of!"
A multitude of thoughts flashed through his mind, and he even found it somewhat amusing.
Back in Juehu Village, when he officially took hold of this mace, he was already engulfed in myriad visions. He saw a place similar to the Golden Throne Hall where the Demon Suppression Golden Mace was bestowed. Those who took it had to have the courage to exorcise ghosts and expel evil, destroy gods and assault temples, and even uphold the rules of yin and yang.
Since then, Hu Ma had understood the responsibilities of Zhensui Mansion and the burden of wielding this mace. However, he still couldn’t clearly see the person who had bestowed the mace, though he was acutely aware of one thing.
That person was definitely not the Emperor.
It was precisely because he deeply understood this that when he saw his opponents trying to use that human skin against him, he only found it ridiculous and laughable.
He didn’t know much about the history of Zhensui Mansion. Perhaps it had once served at the Emperor’s summons, but the Emperor had been skinned twenty years ago. Ever since the mace was re-bestowed twenty years ago, Zhensui Mansion had become different.
Sensing the weight of the Demon Suppression Golden Mace in his hand, he couldn’t help but mock the people in the city: "You self-proclaimed noble, orthodox walking ghosts, your vision is too small. Even now, you still yearn for the so-called Emperor... It’s just that... do any of you among the Ten Surnames truly take the Emperor seriously?"
As these thoughts stirred in his mind, the Golden Mace he held aloft suddenly came crashing down. Though the mace was merely held in his hand, this strike unleashed howling yin winds, like mountains collapsing and seas splitting.
WHOOSH...
Inside Mingzhou City, every tightly shut door and window was suddenly blown open by the gale, winds scattering the clouds.
In the countless residences of Mingzhou, an unknown number of spirits or yin souls lay hidden—some harmful, some nurtured by individuals with malicious intent.
These spirits had gone unnoticed when the Lord of Official Zhou was invited over; they were hidden deeply. Yet now, with the distant strike of the Demon Suppression Golden Mace, shrill, despairing sounds erupted all around.
Someone looked up suddenly to see the vase on their table—from which a fox demon would emerge at night—unexpectedly shatter. Someone else, in a daze, felt the vindictive soul that had haunted them for so long dissipate.
A man had raised a dog that always looked at him with hatred. Now, as the fierce wind howled outside the city, he suddenly saw a slender shadow emerge from the dog’s ear, bearing the likeness of his enemy.
Someone else had worshipped ancestral tablets for three or four years. When the gusts swept through, the tablets suddenly fell to the ground and shattered. Cries for mercy echoed in their ears, and they realized they had been worshipping the wrong ancestors; their incense offerings had been consumed by another for three or four years.
These events were not intentionally caused by Hu Ma; he was even unaware of their existence. It was simply because the Demon Suppression Golden Mace struck towards Mingzhou City. As a result, those hidden in the city—spirits and vindictive souls who violated the order of yin and yang—suffered a blow.
Wherever the Demon Suppression Golden Mace was present, ghostly gods and humans alike had to follow the rules. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎
And as the storm filled the city and strange occurrences arose one after another, a change was happening in the city’s center. On that tall building, Fourth Young Master of the Hu Family was kneeling on one knee, clutching the so-called imperial decree. He felt his face change drastically and his head buzz.
He widened his eyes, only to see the imperial edict in his hands suddenly disintegrate into powder.
Concurrently, outside on the battle formation, the remaining imperial aura on Zhong Benyi, the Heavenly Destiny General, also dissipated from the reverberations of this strike, fading like smoke. Yet, precisely because this so-called imperial aura vanished, his eyes suddenly cleared, and he understood many things at once.
He abruptly lifted his head, looking at the mysterious figure striking with the mace, and a deep sense of awe inexplicably arose in his heart. As awe appeared, his arrogance disappeared, and regret flooded his being.
CRASH!
As the imperial edict in Fourth Young Master of the Hu Family’s hand shattered, the red cloth covering the clay statue behind Second Young Master Hu was also torn to shreds by the gale. Instantly, the clay statue, unable to withstand even a moment, crumbled into pieces.
"Who dares..."
Amidst the flying fragments of the clay statue, a furious shout was vaguely heard. The sliver of True Spirit of the Lord of Official Zhou hidden within instantly escaped.
After all, this was a dignified Lord of a Prefecture, who had enjoyed incense offerings for hundreds of years. Its manifested Dharma Form was enormous, almost covering the entire battlefield. It forced everyone to look up, especially those hungry ghosts from Official Zhou, who raised their heads like puppets, their faces vacant.
The Mana of the Lord of Official Zhou was vast, covering the sky and obscuring the sun, but its sliver of True Spirit fled rapidly.
The distant Official Zhou was already desolate, yet this Lord still had temples scattered everywhere. Indeed, in these disaster-stricken, impoverished lands, his temples thrived even more.
Among them, the grandest shrine stood, housing a golden body erected two hundred years ago by the Yi Dynasty Emperor of the Dou Clan. It had always flourished with incense offerings.
Of course, decay there was rapid, and even with money, one couldn’t buy food. Coupled with the Lord of Official Zhou’s ghost soldiers providing protection and his long-standing, deeply entrenched authority over the people of Official Zhou, the gold leaf on this Divine Statue had not been peeled off and sold by the starving populace.
Yet now, as the Lord of Official Zhou fled rapidly, the golden body within this temple suddenly radiated a brilliant golden light, transforming into a golden cloud to counter the mace’s strike.
Beneath the golden cloud, a streak of dark energy burrowed into the ground, attempting to escape to the underworld to evade responsibility.
Using the hungry ghosts looking up to resist the mace, dispersing his Mana to obscure the world’s ambient qi, fleeing back to Official Zhou, using the imperial golden body to counter the mace, and attempting to sneak into the underworld to hide his True Spirit—this Lord of Official Zhou did everything humanly possible at that moment.
But to Hu Ma, it was merely bringing the mace down.
From the moment he swung the mace, he had effectively scared off the Lord of Official Zhou summoned to the altar. In the Path, this constituted a victory in a duel.
But what good is merely scaring him away?
I must *destroy* you!
CRACK!
The action was decisive and swift. Because the mace fell so quickly, it even sliced through the air with a piercing sound, smashing a crater into the ground.
Simultaneously, in the instant this crater appeared, the sinister dark clouds that had converged due to the Lord of Official Zhou’s Mana suddenly split in two. Blazing sunlight abruptly shone upon the ground, making everyone realize that day had already broken.
The next moment, those hungry ghosts influenced by the Lord of Official Zhou, who had been blankly raising their heads, seemed to lose all strength. With a thud, they knelt on the ground.
Their expressions of indifference vanished. Some looked bewildered. Others suddenly remembered everything, clutching their hearts, pressing their foreheads to the ground, and weeping bitterly. At this moment, they turned back into living people.
In Official Zhou, all the temples of the Lord of Official Zhou seemed to be struck by invisible lightning, abruptly destroying them. Inside, the Divine Statues, whether clay or golden, shattered into pieces at this moment, their spiritual essence fading.
The True Spirit of the Lord of Official Zhou, attempting to escape to the underworld, felt the ground become as hard as iron upon contact. Terrified, it raised its head. Along with the corrupted qi surrounding it, it exuded an unusual sense of terror—unwilling, angry, mad—yet it could only watch as a vast Great Power descended.
It was broken into pieces, crushed to powder, then dissipated into nothing. This fate befell not only the Lord of Official Zhou but also the corrupted qi around it. All was wiped clean, completely disappearing at this moment.
CLATTER!
As the Lord of Official Zhou utterly vanished, the land of Official Zhou roared as if struck by an earthquake. It sank several inches. Or perhaps, it was more like its weight had suddenly increased manifold, causing it to plummet violently, making the earth rumble all around.
Then, a series of muffled thunderclaps resounded in the sky, crackling. Dark clouds gathered densely, and lightning rolled. Official Zhou, a land long stricken by drought, barren, lifeless, with scarcely any human vitality, suddenly experienced a torrential downpour.
The world became deathly silent at this moment. This mace strike seemed to have struck deep into the hearts of countless people.
Even in the direction of Old Yin Mountain, someone stood up from a tree stump, quietly watching this mace strike, their expression a mixture of lament and relief. "I once asked, this first strike, whose head should it land upon...
"Perhaps a weighty one, or a vicious one. But he said it must be one that resonates loud enough...
"Now, this mace has fallen. It’s heavy enough; it shattered the Lord of Official Zhou’s golden body, destroying two hundred years of accumulated incense and destiny in an instant, and beat Official Zhou back into the human world...
"It’s also vicious enough; a dignified Zhou Lord’s Divine Soul was obliterated. Even the Meng Family Ancestor couldn’t protect him. This serves as a warning to others...
"Most importantly, it struck loudly enough..."
He couldn’t help but start laughing. "Those who still believe in the Emperor’s Mandate should awaken."
