Chapter 130

Amid the screeching sound of a black energy orb tearing through the air, Shen Mingyue was thrown back by the shockwave, her spine slamming hard against a broken wall. Dust from crumbling masonry, mingled with the metallic tang of blood, choked her throat. She coughed violently, and the blood seeping through her fingers stained the blue bricks in a grim pattern. Looking up, she saw that the black mist enveloping the hooded figure had coalesced into the phantoms of a hundred weeping ghosts. Their faces were twisted, their nails long as sickles, and each phantom clawed its way toward everything around it. The Diamond Formation held by the Shaolin monks crumbled inch by inch within the black mist; the golden radiance of their Zen staffs was swallowed, turning into a sinister, dark purple. Sweat beaded on the monks' strained faces, and their chanting grew increasingly frantic, yet they could not withstand the corrosion of the Netherworld Power. The peachwood swords of the Wudang Taoists began to bleed, droplets sliding down the hilts to burn charred holes into the ground. In the distance, the low chanting of the monks and the frantic incantations of the Taoists wove together like a tragic battle hymn, but it proved no match for the encroaching power.