Chapter 1657 — By Nature, a Wild and Unbridled Guest

Haotian Zun looked at that head, its face covered in a full beard—it was indeed Shi Qiluo, who must have had his head cut off by someone in the battle of Xuandu, and then been picked up by this man.

But what sent a slight chill through him was that Shi Qiluo's skull had been pried open, and the brain inside had vanished without a trace.

He looked up at the brain matrix in the sky. Shi Qiluo's brain must be in there.

Then he looked again at Xing An's chest. Just what other frightful things were hidden inside it?

"You are so wicked that even I am chilled to the bone. Mutian Zun actually dares to employ you—his boldness is truly heaven-high."

Haotian Zun could not help but exclaim in admiration, "If you were to pledge yourself to me, I could make you Palace Lord of Zaofu. Your talents—I admire them greatly."

Xing An raised his hand and drew the brain matrix back from the sky. "Cult Master Shen does not dare to use me; he dreads that I will do something beyond all bounds. The one who dares to use me is the Emperor of Jingping. Her measure is far greater than that of a petty-minded being like Cult Master Shen. I will go to the Heavenly Court; the collection there is sure to be abundant."

He closed the chest. "I have already calculated the flaws in your arts. You may now become part of my collection."

Haotian Zun's pupils constricted. Xing An had displayed the brain matrix to him and spoken so many words to him all for one purpose: to use the brain matrix to deduce the flaws in his arts from the traces of divine powers left here and the various wounds in Huotian Zun's flesh.

Now Xing An must already have deduced some flaw, and so the dagger stood revealed.

Though Haotian Zun thought exceedingly highly of himself, after coming into contact with the Jingping Reforms he had come to realize that this world abounded in people of every kind of talent.

This Xing An might well be one of them.

At that very moment, Xing An struck.

Haotian Zun gave a low shout, and a whole expanse of heavenly palaces burst forth behind his head, forming two Great Heavenly Courts. The two Great Heavenly Courts stood erect and became two Myriad Dao Heaven Wheels, one obverse and one reverse, one dark and one bright.

The perfect union of the Innate One Qi and the Great Way of Guixu.

This reincarnated body of his was only a reincarnation of a single soul-fragment; his cultivation realm still stood at the Heavenly Sea realm, poised between Yaochi and the God-Slaying Terrace. Yet by his arts alone he could contend with Lingxiao experts of the traditional realms.

Add to that his Dao realm cultivation of the thirtyfold heaven, and he could vie with beings of the Emperor Throne realm.

Of course, he was somewhat inferior to the Emperor Throne realm beings of Jingping; the Emperor Throne experts of Jingping were not many, but there were a few, and every one of them had laid a foundation of incomparable solidity.

The Jingping Reforms had a history of a hundred and thirty years, and across those hundred and thirty years the transformations in arts and divine powers had grown ever more fierce, giving birth to a whole host of elites.

Haotian Zun had entered the fray rather late, but as a Tianzun who had pioneered a realm a million years ago, his fame was no empty thing; in but a few short decades he had already become one of the strongest few beings in Jingping.

That he could slay Huotian Zun's reincarnated body without the slightest injury showed that he had the confidence and the depth to back it up.

Yet just as he urged his arts to their utmost, Xing An flew in close, and the two clashed at short range. In the instant Haotian Zun stirred his arts, Xing An pointed a finger at the very center of his Myriad Dao Heaven Wheels.

In that moment Haotian Zun felt a hairline flaw appear in the working of his arts, which turned slightly sluggish; the two Myriad Dao Heaven Wheels that had been perfectly combined at once came into conflict. The two different forces collided, heavenly palace after heavenly palace smashed into one another, and there was a vague tendency for each pair to destroy itself.

Before he could find where the flaw had appeared, Xing An had already chopped a palm toward the center of his brow.

Haotian Zun's Dao-realm divine power erupted. Boom, boom, boom—thirty layers of Myriad Dao Heaven Wheels in succession, each borrowing the force of the next, blossomed forward in overlapping waves. This strike had once forced Shen Mu, upon the River of Chaos in the Jade Capital of the Ancestral Court, to retreat too late, driven by a single move onto the Chaos River.

Yet Xing An gave it a light flick, and the heaven-wheel divine power that borrowed force from force at once turned to mutual countering; they collided and annihilated one another.

Haotian Zun was startled. Xing An's mana was far more vigorous than that of this reincarnated body of his, and his arts and divine powers were more bizarre and unfathomable still.

Xing An had found only one flaw in his arts, but that single flaw was already enough to be fatal.

In his flurry, Xing An's palm had already chopped down upon the center of his brow.

His primordial spirit was violently shaken and tumbled out of his body.

Swish, swish, swish—steel needles pricked into his body one after another, barring his primordial spirit outside.

Xing An reached out to seize his primordial spirit, seeking to capture his soul and spirit. Haotian Zun laughed coldly, and his primordial spirit flew up toward the heavens beyond. "I am a Heavenly Emperor; are my soul and spirit things you can lay your hands on?"

Xing An flicked his fingers in rapid succession, and Haotian Zun's primordial spirit was at once stripped, spirit from soul. His heart gave a start. "A monstrous fiend of Jingping."

He hurriedly drew back his own soul, while his other soul and spirit were scooped up in a sleeve by Xing An.

"I will find the flaws in my arts and cut you into ten thousand pieces." The voice of one of Haotian Zun's souls came from beyond the heavens.

Xing An paid it no heed, but gathered up the remaining soul and spirit-fetus of Haotian Zun's reincarnated body and stored them away in the chest.

"By then, I should have found still more flaws in your arts."

His vital essence, like blades and like threads, dissected Haotian Zun's reincarnated body with fine precision, and a gleam of exhilaration came into his eyes.

The chest bounced about with a clatter, clatter, as though urging him on.

Xing An looked up, rolled up the reincarnated body of Haotian Zun, which had already been unfolded layer upon layer, and placed it in the chest. He said, "You are right; I must not be too shocking to the world. Cult Master Shen is petty-minded—if he knew I did such things in broad daylight, he would certainly make things hard for me. Let us go back..."

"By the way, could Cult Master Shen spare me a piece of his brain? It can regenerate anyway. What do you think... I think not either. He is a very stingy man..."