Chapter Sixty-One: A Slash on the Verge of No-Mind

Chen Qi hurriedly suppressed all emotion, drew his blade and gathered his strength, while keeping his calves in constant motion so he would not sink into the mire.

Looking around, he saw the sounds all about them growing ever more numerous. Bubbles were rising endlessly from the marsh, and among them came the gurgling of ferocious beasts surfacing through the slime.

The once lifeless-looking poisonous swamp had at last bared its fangs in full.

"Watch out for ranged attacks!"

Yun Tianxin, who was leading the way, called out first.

With her warning came streaks of cyan finger-force. As they fell in rapid succession, the marsh around her was blasted into a pockmarked wasteland, as if a team of savage oxen had plowed through it; countless venomous insects died beneath that single strike.

But far too many poisonous creatures were surging up from the swamp. Seeming devoid of any reason, they struck back at once without the slightest hesitation.

Poison needles shot from the tails of black scorpions, venom sprayed from the mouths of snakes, and clouds of poisonous dust were flung by unknown insects...

In a few breaths, the masters of the Black Poison Swamp had gone all out, warmly "welcoming" the uninvited guests.

Their attacks gathered into a vast tide of poison, sweeping up the toxic miasma above the swamp and rolling toward the group with overwhelming force, displaying the might to exterminate all living things.

After only a moment of sensing it, everyone felt a deep, suffocating dread.

Watching the poisonous "waves" rapidly closing in from afar, Chen Qi's scalp prickled. He could not help gripping his long blade tighter as he swiftly worked out in his mind how to respond when the tide drew near.

At the crucial moment, it was still Yun Tianxin who stepped forward first.

With her right hand, she poured qi into the Purple Mist longsword she had just drawn, as though qi were free for the taking. In an instant, the sword was awash in a rich violet radiance.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!

Three purple sword auras, each nearly a meter long, flew toward the tide in a fan-shaped spread. The two forces met and canceled one another, unleashing a fierce, corrosive hiss; the purple sword energy visibly dimmed at a speed the eye could see.

The tide was stopped for several seconds before surging toward them once more.

Yet its power was no longer what it had been at the start, when it had seemed capable of destroying all before it. Its originally pitch-black color had faded to a dull charcoal, and the area it swept across had narrowed somewhat as well.

Thanks to those few seconds of delay, the experienced members of the group quickly adjusted their formation.

The two inner sect disciples at the flanks also showed their sense of duty. Stepping forward from both sides, one wrapped his long sword in true qi while the other flicked emerald light from his fingertips, each using his own method to meet the tide head-on.

Where their true qi met the poisonous surge, the same violent hissing of corrosion arose again. The two men flushed red, and though they forced themselves to hold their ground and shattered the toxic wave on their respective sides, the gap between them was inevitably seeped through.

The poisonous tide was blocked once more, breaking into scattered flows that seeped through, and before long they were about to reach Chen Qi in the line.

The tide had come.

With a faint murmur in his heart, Chen Qi, fully focused on the scene before him, reacted at once.

The pale-red long blade was once again flooded with abundant blood qi until it turned crimson, and he was the first to thrust toward the solid projectiles in the toxic flow, such as poison needles.

At the same time, the blood qi throughout his body burst forth in an instant. With the force of his right hand swinging the blade, he swept a gale of blood-colored energy toward the formless poison dust.

Not only that, but in a flash, Chen Qi activated the bone chain's "Blood Qi Impact" in his mind.

But unlike before, when he had controlled this skill to launch an active assault, this time he guided the ferocious blood qi it generated to cling in front of him, forming the final line of defense before his body to resist the pervasive venomous mist.

In a very short time, Chen Qi displayed the three methods he had just devised.

Had this been a world ago, it was something he would never have dared even imagine. But after several life-and-death struggles, it had become his combat instinct.

Like a sun within black fog, the blade light sliced through the poison mist. The sound of hard objects being knocked away rang out continuously, like tiny beads striking the ground again and again.

Though the venomous haze had dimmed by several more degrees, it remained thick and viscous, continually slowing the speed of the long blade.

Still in a state of breath-holding, Chen Qi soon felt the blade momentum weaken. The blood qi bursting from his body was extinguished the moment it left his skin, and the blood veil formed by the skill on his body was thinning rapidly.

The system prompt flashed again and again:

You are affected by deadly poison: Corrosion, losing 30 health per second.

You are affected by deadly poison: Paralysis, nerve reflex speed reduced by 20 percent.

...

The poison mist quickly enveloped Chen Qi, and the debuff notifications filled his vision.

Dim sight, loss of hearing, numb limbs, itching skin, dizziness...

It was as though Chen Qi had entered a giant silkworm cocoon, or perhaps an endless frozen seal, severed from the outside world, with even thought itself on the verge of falling still.

At the end of it, a sliver of clarity from his survival instinct reached his spiritual core, and his increasingly dulled mind issued its final command: activate the skill Focus Burst!

The instant activation made his sluggish mind move again, granting him an unprecedented experience.

He felt as though he were viewing this body within the black mist from a godlike vantage, coldly watching blood qi and poison mist annihilate each other, and, not far away, Yun Tianxin with a look of urgency on her face as she swung her sword to save the others.

Only now could Chen Qi faintly sense the existence of his own limbs, and of the long blade in his right hand, suspended motionless in midair.

With a force that seemed born with him, Chen Qi squeezed out the remaining blood qi in his bones once more and struck.

The motionless long blade gained momentum, and in an instant became a streak of blade light.

As the light flashed, his thoughts turned utterly clear. His heartbeat and breathing ceased, the sea of thought became calm and undisturbed, and he forgot why he had struck this blow, forgot what outcome it might bring.

In Chen Qi's perception at that moment, the entire fabric of time and space seemed to freeze for an instant, and within his pupils there was only that streak of blade light.

This strike was without thought or intention, without desire for victory or fear of defeat, without any wish to survive. It was a blade nearing the state of no-thought.

A blood-red blade shadow bloomed in the pale-black venomous mist, like evening glow reflected in the colors of sunset, the sunset entwined with night, preserving the last of its own radiance.

When the black mist dispersed, Chen Qi stood with his blade planted on the ground, serene as the clear sky and calm wind.

Only his right hand, still gripping the sword, could not help trembling. His entire body gave off the frailty of one recovering from a grave illness, and at the tail end of the skill's duration, he barely managed to hold a cold, stern expression.

Very quickly, Chen Qi's expression collapsed. He saw Yun Tianxin sweep past him and rescue the others who had been trapped in the black mist.

Though everyone showed signs of poisoning, they had not been touched by it for long, and none were seriously affected in their movements.

Chen Qi looked at them and suddenly realized he was still in the poisonous swamp. His motionless body was continuing to sink; the marsh had already swallowed everything below his calves, and the exposed skin still stung with burning pain.

At once, he could no longer care about his dignity and cried out in alarm:

"Senior Sister Yun, save me again!"

Wait—why did I say "again"?

Just as Chen Qi was staring blankly, Yun Tianxin, who had been darting back and forth over the swamp, had already rescued the others. She turned and swept over to his side. Looking at Chen Qi, whose body was already submerged below the waist, her bright eyes were woven with both surprise and hesitation.

After a brief pause, she extended her flawless left hand and seized the back of his neck.

The direct touch of skin made Yun Tianxin tremble all at once, and her slender hand froze upon the fateful back of Chen Qi's neck.

"I don't want to be carried like a little orange cat."

At that moment, this was the only thought in Chen Qi's head. Then he felt a tremendous force lift him bodily and hurl him into the air.

Right then, the two inner sect disciples who had been joining hands in the slaughter of the poisonous insects suddenly cried out a warning:

"Look out, something big is coming!"