Chapter 193: CH. 193 | The Twelve Forbidden Techniques
Lin Tian and Mo Shu shot through the air, trading blows in close combat.
Their terrifying speed made it impossible for the disciples and elders of the Yuanmo Sect Hall to keep up with the rhythm of the fight.
All they could see were flashes of white and black light in the sky, followed by booming bursts of qi so powerful they shook the heavens and sent strong winds blasting in every direction.
"Should we help him, Senior Elder Hun Ya?" one of the younger hall elders asked.
Hun Ya, the leader of the Yuanmo Sect Hall at the Black Ink Lake, shook his head in response.
It wasn’t that they didn’t want to help, it was that they wouldn’t be able to help much anyway, especially in a fight between two Soul Formation cultivators.
"I’m worried we’d just be a burden to Grand Elder Mo Shu."
"Focus on strengthening the barrier formation. Don’t let that man break through it," Hun Ya said.
The young elder nodded obediently. They began forming hand seals, and crimson rune arrays appeared beneath their feet.
From those runes, a stream of crimson qi shot up into the sky and touched the dome of the protective barrier, reinforcing the strength of their formation.
Elsewhere, Lin Tian swung his sword and managed to knock Mo Shu’s body far backward, leaving him wounded and exhausted.
"You’re only at Early Soul Formation, yet you have a strong cultivation foundation and an unshakable dao heart," Mo Shu said.
Lin Tian stood tall, his body untouched by the fight so far, "I reached Soul Formation through my own dao conception, not by stealing someone else’s!"
He raised his sword, running his hand along the blade from end to end until it blazed with a brilliant golden light.
Once it was fully charged, Lin Tian swung his sword sideways, launching a slashing strike toward Mo Shu.
Mo Shu didn’t look the least bit intimidated. He formed a hand seal while letting his magic staff hover in front of his face.
A massive death gate appeared, black tinged with green. The gate swung open, and Mo Shu thrust his hand forward.
A monstrous black-green hand shot out, straight into the path of Lin Tian’s golden slash. The demonic palm seized the attack and crushed it in its grip.
Lin Tian jolted in shock, his body thrown backward as he coughed up blood.
"Junior!"
"I want to see just how strong you really are against my Death Abyss Demon Hand!"
Mo Shu launched another attack, still using the black demon hand, but this time shaped like it was pointing straight at Lin Tian.
"Demonic power really is always stronger," Lin Tian said, one hand forming a seal. "But it’s unstable, and it burns through energy fast."
A large white circular rune appeared behind his back, covered in abstract patterns and ancient script.
Lin Tian’s palm filled with white spiritual energy. With a forward motion of his hand, he released a strike of white palm energy straight at Mo Shu’s black demonic finger.
THUMP!
The two cultivators’ powers collided and shook the sky, the wind howling hard enough to tear open the black clouds overhead.
The young elders at the protective dome felt the shockwave. They kept holding the barrier steady with everything they had, even as it drained huge amounts of their qi.
The two attacks strained against each other. Mo Shu started to buckle, and Lin Tian was jolted back. But before either side could claim the upper hand, both attacks suddenly exploded at once.
Both Lin Tian and Mo Shu were sent flying backward. As they looked ahead, smoke billowed up from the site of the blast, a mix of white and black.
"Impressive!"
"Guess I can’t keep holding back anymore," Mo Shu said.
Mo Shu’s hands formed the seal for a different technique. Lin Tian watched closely but couldn’t yet tell what kind of power it was.
Is this dangerous? And if it is, how do I deal with it?
A black-crimson orb appeared at the tip of Mo Shu’s finger, then shot up into the sky, tearing through the rumbling black clouds.
Lin Tian kept his eyes on it, one hand tucked behind his back, ready to form another seal at a moment’s notice.
The rumbling clouds summoned black lightning, and a violent wind tore through the area, ripping dead trees out by their roots and sucking them into the swirling storm.
The sky split open with a deafening roar. Lin Tian saw it clearly: a massive black python emerged from the sky, the manifestation of Mo Shu’s technique.
Hun Ya, who had been watching the fight the whole time, looked stunned. The momentum of qi behind that serpent’s attack, the shape of the python, its raw power. He knew exactly what it was.
"Is that one of the Twelve Forbidden Techniques of the Yuanmo Sect?"
"I never imagined it. In my whole life, I never thought I’d get to see that technique with my own eyes."
Hun Ya wasn’t the only one caught off guard. The other young elders were stunned too. Some looked amazed, others impressed, and more than a few looked outright worried.
The Twelve Forbidden Techniques of the Yuanmo Sect were the original techniques of the demonic path, passed down by the sect’s ancestors.
The higher the number in the sequence, the more powerful the technique when used.
Lin Tian listened closely. He knew what the Twelve Forbidden Techniques of the Yuanmo Sect were, not because he belonged to their ranks, but because of the inherited memories from Senior Yun Feng, who had once explained it to him.
"That so-called forbidden technique is nothing more than a crude imitation of the Three Heavens Manifestation of Youdu!"
"You really think that technique can kill me?!" Lin Tian said firmly.
Mo Shu fell silent for a moment.
He’d never heard of the Three Heavens Manifestation of Youdu before, but what caught him off guard was that Lin Tian knew anything about the Demon Youdu at all, the very source of the Yuanmo Sect’s demonic path.
"How do you know about the Demon Youdu?!" Mo Shu demanded.
Lin Tian didn’t answer. Instead, he raised his hand out to the side, level with his shoulder. His palm clenched into a tight fist, and a powerful surge of qi burst out from his body.
A pillar of golden light rose up and enveloped Lin Tian’s entire body. Mo Shu panicked as he realized Lin Tian’s power was multiplying, again and again.
A transformation swept through Lin Tian’s body. Both his eyes snapped open, blazing with golden light, as the energy of the pillar poured into him.
Mo Shu froze in shock, his mouth hanging open, unable to say a word. Hun Ya and the other young elders wore the exact same expression.
The scale of their fight kept climbing. Now doubt crept into everyone’s hearts: could Mo Shu really beat Lin Tian?
Or would the Yuanmo Sect Hall at Black Ink Lake meet the same end as the hall at Yanzhou Sect?
"I don’t know what power you’re using! But I’m going to kill you now!"
From his palm, a golden sword took shape, a manifestation of both Lin Tian’s spiritual energy and the power inherited from Senior Yun Feng.
"The destruction of the Yuanmo Sect... starts with you!"