Chapter 192: A favor
Every time he delivered a blow with the sword, yet a wisp of sword energy would appear. After he had chopped four times in succession, a total of four sword energies had appeared in the form of wisps, with each one being more powerful than the previous one.
These four energies added themselves to the one already chasing Zen and now, he was being hunted by a total of five sword energies, plus the original sword itself.
“I will chop you to pieces.” James roared at him as he held the Ruin Sword in one hand and pointed at the sword tip with the other. He concentrated his will on controlling the five wisps of sword energy which were being telepathically ordered to chase Zen.
Zen reacted rapidly and in the only manner he could right now. After the assassination plot that he had so elaborately planned failed, he didn't stay there anymore and ran away immediately.
However, it wasn't going to be easy for him to get rid of James' chase. Since the first sword energy was already fixated on Zen, the remaining four only needed to follow the first one and they caught up with Zen easily.
Besides, James had hesitated just now and had not diligently controlled the sword energy, so until now, his attack hadn't been that fast.
However, now he was furious and wanted to take Zen's life. He had gotten deeply absorbed in controlling the sword energies and ordering them to jointly attack Zen, so their flying speed was much higher than before.
Zen desperately extracted the energy of the Phoenix Crystal and tried as much as he could to make his body lighter. Noticing a shadow in the wall, he quickly turned inside and found himself in a lane.
This lane was only about 100 feet long so after he had entered, it took him just a second to rush towards the end. Zen's speed reached an extreme high, but the flying speed of the sword energies was astonishing. They were just at the hem of clothes and would have chopped him up if he wasn't running so fast.
As soon as he reached the end of the lane, five wisps of sword energy came to a screeching halt at his back. The overwhelming speed with which they had been flying spread around their momentum and made his hair messy.
“Jump!”
Zen saw that it was difficult to dodge the energies in such a confined space, and he jumped high over the wall on the end. On the other side, he landed into the Mo Mansion courtyard.
However, the speed of the sword energies was too high to be contained. They cut at the wall that Zen had jumped across and broke it into several parts directly. Then, under James' control, the five energies changed direction and rushed towards Zen in the courtyard once more.
The whole affair of breaking the wall happened so fast that Zen didn't have any time to rest. As soon as he fell on the ground, he had to stand up and directly rush into a room in the courtyard. He dashed the wooden door and the back door of the courtyard into a collapse. After bringing down another wall to pieces, he continued running as if he was flying inside the mansion.
The servants of the Mo Clan suffered quite a bit due to his swashbuckling. They were busy in the Mo Mansion, just as the wall to their side exploded into several pieces abruptly. In fact, Zen was on a rampage across the whole house. However, the servants couldn't see clearly who was breaking the Mo Mansion down to pieces. They hid in the corners and trembled in fear.
“Bang, bang, bang...”
The thuds could be heard from time to time.
However, no matter how much Zen tried to increase his speed, he couldn't get rid of the sword energies. They were getting closer and closer to him and once had flown beside his belly several times. As long as they were close to him, they would take his life.
“Gee, why are there only three wisps of sword energy?”
While running crazily, Zen suddenly noticed the change on his back. There had been five wisps of sword energy chasing him originally, but two of them were gone now.
He frowned and knew that the two wisps of sword energy which weren't there couldn't have disappeared for no apparent reason at all.
The two wisps could have turned around and attacked him from the front.
Just as he was thinking about this, Zen suddenly heard two muffled thuds from the wall just in front of him. Then two weird cracks appeared out of nowhere in the wall, and the two wisps which had disappeared just now came out flying across and rushed towards him directly.
At the same time, the three wisps which had been behind him separated themselves suddenly and encircled Zen from three different directions.
“Dang it! I am surrounded!”
Zen couldn't dodge them anymore. There was a sword energy in the front, one at the back, and one each on the left and right. The last one was trying to kill him from above his head.
What should he do now?
In a second, Zen imagined several scenarios and several ideas flashed in his mind, but none of them could be used.
“I'll risk my life!”
Although he was surrounded by the sword energies from all five directions, the circle that the energies had formed wasn't exactly airtight, and there was still a tiny gap he could utilize to go through.
But if he went through such a small space between the sword energies, he might get killed as easily as a mosquito, or he might lose his arms or legs. Even so, it was better than dying. At least he could search for some elixir to recover his broken bones or cut body parts. If he lost his life, he would be done.
The question was, even if he could avoid the attack this time, what about the next? Right now he had healthy legs but was still unable to completely avoid the sword energies. If he was injured in this attack, there was not even a snowball's chance that he could avoid it.
He couldn't overthink the matter but just delayed his death. Just as he was about to go through from the side regardless of possibly getting injured, a voice suddenly ordered from his brain,“Bloke, stand still! I am here to help you!”
“Who is it?” Zen heard the voice but couldn't see the person who was speaking.
Instead of an answer, Zen found that the air around him was getting cold all of a sudden. Then countless ice crystals appeared and as soon as they showed up, they congealed with each other quickly to form a small ice wall.
They were all around him and in an instant, they had formed five walls in the five directions that Zen was being attacked from.
The sword energies immediately started trying to chop up the walls to pieces.
“Crack...”
The energies came chopping and five loud, simultaneous thuds were heard.
Zen was locked in the ice walls but could see clearly that the energies trying to cut through the ice walls had left several deep dents.
He breathed out deeply, but his chest was still heaving and trembling heavily.
It was too dangerous just now. If this powerful man had not helped him, he would probably have died with his body and his head landing in two spots at the same time.
The masters who had reached the Illuminating Soul Realm were really too powerful. He thought of his actions and realized that he was too much at risk in the fairy palace. If he hadn't met the array of Desperate Melee in the pavilion, he couldn't have stayed alive while fighting against the masters at the Illuminating Soul Realm.
“Alright. Bloke, come to the guest hall of Mo Mansion. Don't worry. I am here, and James won't dare to kill you!” His mystery savior casually told him.
As soon as he finished speaking, the ice crystal walls around Zen fell apart into several ice cakes beside Zen's feet.
Zen picked up one of the ice cakes and found that it was ice cold like a real cake. The water from it made his hand wet.
It looked completely ordinary but had been strong enough to resist James' sword energies. This person must be another master at the Illuminating Soul Realm.
When Zen had run away, he knew that Wurth just wouldn't have looked on with folded arms. 'Is this person an official of the Zhang Clan?'
Zen didn't know that when someone had released the ice crystal walls to save him, another person had flashed into existence right in front of James and pressed his sword tip.
The person was tall and big with a red face and thick hair all over his body. He looked like a woodcutter who had grown up in the mountains.
“Master Mo, if I were you, I wouldn't move!” The woodcutter lifted a black wood chopper, and on the edge there was a red light flashing continuously.
James didn't recognize the person, but when he looked at the wood chopper, a legend suddenly flashed into his mind and he shouted with a terrible expression,“You... You are West Mount Woodcutter!”
West Mount Woodcutter...
The West Mount was on the Shura Battlefield.
And the woodcutter was the person cutting the firewood on the mountain as the term suggested.
But there were no trees on the West Mount, so no firewood could be cut there. The only signs of life on the West Mount were demon soldiers and generals.
The West Mount Woodcutter had killed countless demons on that mountain.
His real name was Tyson Shi and he had stayed on the West Mount for three years.
It was known that the West Mount was near the home of the demons and almost at the entrance of their den, but Tyson had cultivated there for three years, without coming to any apparent harm.
He had utilized the demon soldiers and generals as firewood and chopped them while he had been cultivating himself.
Countless demon soldiers and generals had been killed by him.
More incredibly, he had stayed there for three years, but the demon kings had not been able to do anything to him.
At that time, White Emperor City was under heavy pressure. After the imperial army had lost several of their generals, their strength had melted away and they were in danger every time they faced an attack by the demons.
It was only because Tyson had cultivated on the West Mount and mercilessly killed demon soldiers and generals that demons' attack had been delayed.
From then on, Tyson Shi had received a great fame.
And he had been given the nickname West Mount Woodcutter.
Tyson was so powerful that he had slain demons in their den, avoided the demon kings' hunts and stayed on the West Mount for three years. Undoubtedly, he was a miracle.
So the title of West Mount Woodcutter spread, and people forgot his true name.
But when seeing the wood chopper in his hand, everyone would think of the woodcutter who had taken the demons as firewood to chop.
Tyson retired from the imperial army ten years ago. Even though the imperial army tried their best to invite him to guard the White Emperor City, he still chose to go back to the Imperial Capital.
It was said that Tyson would return a favor.
He was known to be an illiterate youth from the mountains with some innate miraculous powers.
After leaving the mountains, he had worked as a drudge in a powerful family. At that time, he had no experience or knowledge of any kind and didn't know about people's evil intentions. The son of the powerful family did something wrong and was about to be convicted by the government. So the powerful family paid a large amount of bribe to deal with the matter, and instead of the boy, they chose Tyson as the scapegoat.
Tyson was put in prison for no reason and sentenced to death unexpectedly. He was about to be beheaded after autumn.
But he was saved by someone on the day of his execution.
The person who had saved Tyson was a young master of the Zhang Clan.
Since then, Tyson had followed the young master all the time. Later, he had promoted his cultivation greatly. Then he had joined the army and made a great deal of contribution.
That young master of the Zhang Clan was the current master of the clan and Wurth's father, Jefferson.
That was why Tyson had left the imperial army and came back to the Imperial Capital in order to return the favor he owed to the Zhang Clan.