112 Ancient Assembly (4200)

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“Who are you?”
Xiu Nan narrowed his eyes tightly, sensing an extremely strange aura emanating from the other man. It was both unfamiliar and yet somehow familiar, but he couldn’t recall where he had encountered it before.

“Hehehe…”
A low, guttural sound came from the man’s throat.

He slowly stood up, his upper garment tearing apart inch by inch, revealing a body wrapped in black tattoos beneath. Thick mist extended from his hands.

Gradually, two curved daggers formed just below his pinky fingers, their blades glinting with a cold light, serrated edges biting fiercely.

“You don’t need to know the answer to that question… because…”

Suddenly, the man lifted his head, his eyes blazing like fire.

He spoke each word deliberately:
“You’re about to die!”

Boom! A tremendous force exploded from Xiu Nan’s lower abdomen.

The man flew backwards as if his body had been snapped in two, his bones cracking and groaning in pain.

Suspended midair, he stared wide-eyed in disbelief.

When… how…?

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Within the meditative time, a savage figure charged forward like a meteor chasing the moon. Its massive, heavy body thundered as it rushed ahead, terrifying arms spread wide.

It resembled an eagle beating its wings upward.

While the man was still flying backward, the Pale Knight reappeared before him. Two fists the size of watermelons merged together and slammed down like a meteor hammer.

Ssshhh…

The man’s body instantly bent at an exaggerated angle. For an ordinary person, all the bones would have shattered, but he seemed locked by some strange force preserving his life.

Thick black smoke continuously poured from his pores, enveloping his body’s surface. The smoke moved as if alive, flowing and swirling.

The Pale Knight’s fists struck the smoke, instantly creating a small pit. But almost immediately, the eerie smoke from elsewhere flowed back to fill the gap.

Even during the extreme time slowdown of the meditative state, a strange blurred human face began forming in the mist on the man’s chest, rapidly taking shape.

“Pale Knight! Corrupt Resonance!”

In an instant, the Pale Knight’s legs, as thick as a normal person’s torso, slammed hard onto the ground like an elephant’s stomp, cracking the concrete beneath.

Its heavy knees thrust upward with a counterforce.

A corrosive energy spread across the surface and struck the man’s spine like thunder.

Crack! The defense was finally shattered.

A gush of thick blood sprayed from the rupture, splattering onto the Pale Knight’s armor.

“Roar!” An excited growl came from beneath its helmet.

Its eyes gleamed red with increasing intensity.

The Pale Knight’s iron fists hammered the bloodied figure in midair like a punching bag.

Due to the severe time dilation, the man couldn’t land, trembling uncontrollably.

His organs were deformed by the blows.

Fractured bones protruded through tears in his skin, white shards mingling with red flesh.

“Roar! Roar! Roar! Roar! Roar!”

Each roar accompanied a heavy punch.

The Pale Knight grew wild with excitement, its bloodlust soaring beyond reason, as if a flame burned in its eyes. The blood gushing from this living punching bag was endless.

That strange power was protecting the man’s body, sustaining his life in an unusual way.

Though battered so severely, he had not lost consciousness. Blood flowed like a fountain from his wounds.

The Pale Knight’s blood vitality surged, its runes gradually turning red.

It was on the verge of entering a bloodthirsty frenzy, where it would transform into the Blood-Red Knight, massively boosting its physique in a short time.

To what extent, even Xiu Nan did not know.

“Impudent!!!”

A furious roar suddenly sounded, accompanied by an aura so terrifying it seemed to freeze the air.

In midair, on the chest of the battered man, a face made of black smoke coalesced.

It looked disdainfully at the Pale Knight.

“I am the Ninth Star King of the Ancient Society! You…”

Boom! An iron-like arm slammed heavily into the smoky face, silencing it instantly.

Xiu Nan actually wanted the face to finish speaking, but the Pale Knight would not allow it. Its bloodlust had overcome everything else, desperate to enter its blood-red state.

“I will…”

The smoky face twisted with rage and distortion.

Fists rained down like raindrops. The Pale Knight’s arms turned blood-red, strength surging. A continuous barrage of heavy blows threatened to shatter the smoky visage completely.

The so-called Ninth Star King tried to control this body to fight but realized too late that it had arrived seconds too late. The body was already devastated!

Bones, muscles, and skin were crushed into a mangled mass.

Even the head was hammered into the chest cavity, and one arm and both legs were torn away somewhere unknown. The torso was utterly ruined.

The White had arrived; the situation was beyond salvage.

Boom!

A pitch-black arm pierced through the chest like an iron rod. The flesh hung on the arm as the Pale Knight lifted it inch by inch, drops of blood splattering onto its heavy helmet.

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“Roar!”

The Pale Knight transformed into the Blood-Red Knight.

The blurred smoky face looked downward, sensing something far away in the darkness. A figure stood silently there like a stranger, and a familiar aura gradually rose in the heart.

“Black Smoke Realm!!! Ahhhhh…”

The next moment, the man was torn to pieces by the Blood-Red Knight. A cold voice echoed in the air.

“I will come for you! My true form will come for you! I…” The voice abruptly cut off.

Plop. A black boot stepped on the bloodied flesh.

A cold face looked down at the ground.

“Black Smoke King…”

Xiu Nan lifted his head slightly, muttering to himself.

“The Milodalen Sect, Saint Omega, Senior Brother Frost… and that distant era…”

What had happened in that era? The ruins on Bone Island, shrouded in black mist, were the complete opposite of the original Milodalen Sect—one a hell, the other a paradise. It seemed some powerful force destroyed the ancient sect.

Xiu Nan shook his head, suppressing his thoughts.

He stood quietly and exited the meditative state.

In an instant, over a dozen figures emerged from the shadows, each bearing a tattoo on their necks.

It seemed to be the mark of a certain faction.

“Leader?” a young man asked, puzzled, turning his head.

“Where is he?”

Many were confused. They had been lying in ambush in the shadows. The leader charged out first like a vanguard, showing great strength, directly knocking a sports car off the cliff.

One unlucky guy fell with it.

Another confronted the leader from a few meters away.

Everyone rushed to support, but in the blink of an eye, the leader’s men had vanished?

“Where’s our leader?!”

A red-haired youth glared angrily at Xiu Nan.

“He’s right here.”

Xiu Nan gently kicked something on the ground that looked like a soccer ball, sending it rolling. The surface was sticky.

The red-haired youth slashed at it with a knife, instantly cutting the ball open. The enemy must have been playing some trick!

Plop. The exploded ball scattered. A shattered face mask stuck to the ground, and the youth’s eyes widened in shock.

That was clearly the leader!!! How could this be?

I just cut the leader’s head open…

The dozen or so surrounding members exchanged stunned looks.

An eerie, terrifying atmosphere spread.

“Such deep affection… then I’ll send you all down to join him, so he won’t be lonely…”

The red-haired youth looked up in horror. A crescent-shaped black light blade formed around him, slicing sharply.

Deadly, elegant, and bloody.

Splat! Splat! Splat!

Heads were severed, blood vessels ruptured, and the sounds never ceased. One by one, heads were blasted into the sky by the blood pressure.

The Blood-Red Knight howled to the heavens.

Spreading its arms wide, bathed in a rain of blood.

“Click, click, click…” Its jaws violently snapped.

The red-haired youth trembled amid the hellish scene.

Fear gripped him like creeping vines.

He glanced around wildly; all his comrades were dead, only headless corpses lay scattered.

Whoosh!

A black light flashed by.

“Ah!” An arm flew five or six meters away.

The red-haired youth screamed miserably, then was stomped down by a metal boot, pinned heavily to the ground.

A voice came faintly from above.

“From now on, you answer my questions.”

“Tell one lie, lose one limb…”

Two minutes later, the light in the red-haired youth’s eyes dimmed rapidly. He vomited black blood and lost all vitality.

The youth died while answering a question about the internal affairs of the Ancient Society. It seemed to have triggered a hidden mechanism that unleashed a control measure within his body.

Yet, Xiu Nan had extracted some information.

The Ancient Society was an organization that suddenly appeared fifty years ago. It had nine powerful Star Kings, each mysterious and rarely seen.

Its members were either formidable, highly learned, or immensely influential—a top secretive faction in the modern world.

The Ancient Society was low-profile and extremely mysterious.

It possessed wealth and means to acquire great power. Beneath it was a vast force mainly dedicated to exploring ancient ruins and protecting the exploration process from interference.

There was other superficial information but no valuable leads, while the key information remained elusive.

“The Ancient Society… Ninth Star King…”

Xiu Nan muttered in the darkness.

“They’re also exploring ancient ruins… it seems many things that reach a certain level are related to the ruins…”

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“Just the right opportunity to contact the Fire Deer Antiquities Company…”

Xiu Nan made up his mind, but then remembered the mask had fallen off the cliff.

The car exploded—he wasn’t sure if it was still alive.

He stepped to the roadside, glanced down into the dark abyss, and without hesitation leapt.

A blood-red figure spread its wings, directly catching Xiu Nan in its embrace, then slowly glided downward.

Two minutes later, on a tree beside the cliff, a dark silhouette hung there. Torn fabric fluttered in the cold evening breeze.

“Found it, lucky bastard.”

A large hand reached from behind and scooped up the mask. Then the Pale Knight climbed upwards like an ape, swiftly reaching the road.

Tens of thousands of miles away, a towering mountain stood on the earth, surrounded by vast yellow desert.

Winds swept freely across the barren land.

Woo-woo-woo…

The mountain’s surface was riddled with holes, dense like a wasp’s nest. Wind carrying yellow sand howled through them, sounding like mournful cries.

Boom! The whole mountain shook violently as boulders tumbled down.

It seemed on the verge of collapsing entirely.

Thick black smoke poured wildly from the holes, almost covering the entire mountain. The smoke collapsed and formed a giant dozens of meters tall on the summit.

The giant was entirely made of black smoke, constantly swirling and rolling, its face a blurred visage.

It raised its head to the sky, quietly gazing into the distance.

“My soul smoke seed… one is missing…”

After a moment, the giant spoke in a rumbling voice.

“Dan.”

“At your command!”

A figure in a trench coat appeared like the wind.

“Go to Nilodo—one seed died there. Find the culprit and kill him…”

The smoky giant remained expressionless throughout.

“Yes!”

Dan snapped his head up, revealing a half-disfigured, ugly face.

He tapped his toes, disappearing instantly, melting into the air like quicksand.

The cold wind howled as the giant stood silently.

Until a moment later, it suddenly raised a hand.

A faint light, imperceptible to ordinary people, was touched by its fingertip and vanished the instant it fell through the air—like snow falling on a hot summer day.

“Time is near; they should be returning soon.”

“Our era…”

**************

“Ah!”

The mask suddenly woke with a gasp, breathing heavily.

He seemed to have had a nightmare—a terrifying one. He dreamed he was driving on a mountain road when an assassin struck him so fast he couldn’t use any battle tools.

Helplessly, he was knocked off the cliff; the car exploded, and his body was mercilessly torn apart by flames.

Shaken, his pupils gradually focused.

The mask realized he was lying in a pure white room, bound to a soft bed. Except for his head, which was unbandaged, all other parts were tied up.

Nearby, a tall figure toyed with something—a small purple vial.

“Yo, you’re awake.”

The figure put the vial back in his pocket and spoke.

“Yeah.” The mask responded, the previously blurry surroundings gradually clarifying as he adjusted.

He looked at Xiu Nan’s sharp-profiled side face.

“Did you save me?”

“Yes.”

“Thank you!”

Xiu Nan met the grateful gaze but chose not to reveal the true cause of the attack.

He simply nodded silently. “No need to thank me.”

Ten minutes later, in the next room—also a recovery chamber but empty, with two wide white beds in the corner—

Xiu Nan glanced around, then took out a purple vial from his pocket. He opened the stopper, revealing about half a bottle of thick brown liquid. A faint white smoke rose as Xiu Nan sniffed deeply.

The Evolution Points of the Sacred Bone Secret Ring surged wildly upward!

“Good stuff!”