Records of Mysterious Things in the Southern Dynasties

Chapter 541: Getting into the trap
But he now knows that the human form is not simply a 'smaller version', but an avatar of an ancient god, a part that was separated from his body.

Having killed the ancient god's human form, he would naturally have caused considerable damage to the god, and the god would certainly not let him go!

Sure enough, a tremendous roar resounded from the bottom of Xuanwu Lake, like ten thousand great bells exploding simultaneously, causing bricks and tiles of Jiankang City to fall in a flurry. The vast lake surface then began to boil, the water churning in all directions, and some enormous creature was slowly rising from the lakebed!
The lake water was steamed by the high temperature of the giant object, forming clouds that enveloped the entire Jiankang, and then poured down as a torrential rain.

Ren Yuan stared intently at the lake. The first thing to emerge from the water was a gigantic claw covered in black and red scales, each claw as large as a city wall. With a single swipe, it shattered Chicken Cage Mountain. The Jianyuan Temple at the foot of the mountain crumbled like paper; the golden hall was reduced to ruins, and the Buddha statues broke and collapsed. The monks, however, remained motionless, chanting Buddhist scriptures as they marched towards destruction.

Immediately afterwards, the hundred-foot-tall dragon head burst through the water. Two blood-red suns burned in its vertical pupils, and its whiskers hung down like giant steel ropes. When it swept across the stone city, even the solid city walls collapsed with a roar. The defenders on the city walls didn't even have time to scream before they were swept into the surging lake, leaving only scattered weapons and broken armor floating on the surface.

When the water of Xuanwu Lake evaporated completely, the true form of the ancient god of slaughter was finally revealed, and it turned out to be a black Qilin!

The Qilin is a benevolent divine beast, while the Black Qilin is an extremely ferocious beast!
Its body is covered in layers of red and black scales arranged in a diamond pattern, with sharp edges like knives. The blood-red aura flowing between the scales writhes like a living creature; these are the killing runes of ancient gods. Its once gentle bull tail has been completely transformed into a gigantic scorpion tail, its stinger flashing with a ghostly blue venomous light, capable of killing even a god with a single prick.

Its four limbs were no longer the even-toed hooves unique to the Qilin, but had transformed into incomparably sharp giant claws. With each step it took, spiderweb-like cracks appeared on the ground, from which crimson magma seeped out...

He is the embodiment of all human killing.

The more blood is shed on Earth, the stronger He becomes. In this chaotic era of the Northern and Southern Dynasties, the ancient god of slaughter is the god among gods!

The black Qilin opened its blood-red maw, revealing fangs each as large as Mount Zijin. It roared fiercely, unleashing a terrifying hurricane. Houses in Jiankang City collapsed in the gale, and countless people were blown into the sky.

The largest and most prosperous city in the world, Jiankang, is nothing more than a sandcastle casually built by a child in front of this ancient god-like beast, so fragile that it can be destroyed at any moment...

Seeing this, Ren Yuan let out a long roar, and his two-hundred-foot-tall Yinglong true body burst forth from the sky!

The black Qilin roared furiously and launched the first attack. It swung its massive claws, unleashing countless streaks of crimson light that hurtled towards Ren Yuan. The Yinglong's long tail swept out, tearing a bottomless rift in the void! Endless chaotic power surged from the rift, colliding violently with the crimson light!
Hou Jing was shocked to see that Ren Yuanming had not advanced to the Ancient God level, yet he was able to withstand his attack. He never expected that his true self would be weakened to such an extent after the death of his human form.

He dared not be careless any longer. The black Qilin spewed out crimson and black divine flames, destroying everything in its path. Yinglong also opened its mouth wide and spewed out terrifying chaotic breath, which intertwined with the divine flames, bursting out with dazzling light that made the world lose its color.

"Boom!"

The violent explosion shook the heavens and earth! Space instantly distorted, forming a small black hole that sucked in everything within its range—mountains, vegetation, buildings, people, and livestock—and reduced them all to dust…

The two divine beasts were no longer concerned with anything else; they had only one thought in their minds—to kill each other!
However, Ren Yuan proactively shifted the battlefield from the ground to the sky, minimizing unnecessary damage. The two gods fiercely clashed in the vast starry sky, the black Qilin baring its fangs and claws, launching a frenzied attack. Yinglong, on the other hand, nimbly dodged and weaved, its tail constantly sweeping out in counterattacks.

Ren Yuan's claws were not idle either, seizing the opportunity to grab the black Qilin's neck, but were deflected by the runes flowing on Hou Jing's body. The black Qilin's fangs took the opportunity to bite Yinglong's neck, while Yinglong suddenly shook its head, its dragon horns colliding with the fangs. The sparks that burst from the collision streaked across the night sky like a meteor shower, visible even on both banks of the Yellow River thousands of miles away.

However, the difference in divine status cannot be bridged by petty tricks. Gradually, Hou Jing gained the upper hand. The Black Qilin grew stronger with each battle, while Yinglong could only parry and had no power to retaliate. It relied solely on its wings to move faster than its opponent, managing to dodge fatal attacks time and again. But as time went on, Yinglong's body inevitably became covered in wounds, and its movements grew increasingly sluggish. Hou Jing, on the other hand, grew stronger with each battle. The Black Qilin's divine body bared its fangs and claws, and the bloodthirsty aura surrounding it condensed into countless Asura phantoms, each emitting a deafening battle roar!

Disturbed by the battle roar, Yinglong involuntarily froze.

"Crack!" Hou Jing finally seized the opportunity, pounced forward, and tore apart Yinglong's left wing with his giant claws.

Yinglong screamed and plummeted downwards, its dragon scales falling like meteors into the densely populated counties of Wu County.

One after another, the county towns were instantly engulfed in flames. Fortunately, the people had already become spirits, so the casualties were not too great...

Ren Yuanze plunged straight into Taihu Lake, sending up a water column hundreds of feet high!

Hou Jing was not about to give him a chance to catch his breath. He followed closely behind and swooped down, ready to take advantage of his weakness and kill him.

Like the dragon, the Qilin is an aquatic beast, even more powerful in water than on land. Hou Jing, without hesitation, followed the faint black and white light and plunged into Taihu Lake!

However, after entering the water, He did not see Ren Yuan's remains, but instead saw thousands of runes suddenly light up at the bottom of the lake, and a Yin-Yang fish array with a diameter of a hundred miles slowly emerged!
It turns out that the faint black and white light wasn't emitted by Ren Yuan at all...

"The Great Han Dynasty's Supreme Treasure - the God-Slaying Formation!" Hou Jing recognized its value and immediately waved his claws, trying to tear through the void and escape from the formation.

But when the claws swung, they only stirred up ripples, without even opening a crack in the void.

He tried to leap up again, but suddenly felt his body sink – the water of Taihu Lake had turned into a chaotic medium like asphalt, imprisoning his enormous black Qilin body within it.

Hou Jing was horrified to find himself unable to see the sky above or the ground below, and unable to distinguish east from west or north from south. All he could see were churning, chaotic vortexes, like a pot of overcooked black sesame dumplings. Black and white swirled and collided within the boiling vortexes, each collision unleashing terrifying, world-destroying energy.

He was just a fly that had accidentally wandered into this pot of glutinous rice balls...

Here, all the laws of spacetime collapse. No matter where or how this headless fly flies, it cannot escape this chicken-egg-sized chaos.

Instead, it was constantly attacked by the earth, water, fire, and wind from the chaos...

(End of this chapter)