Eternal Swordmaster
Chapter 574 - 569 Support 3

Chapter 574: Chapter 569 Support 3

"How did this kid end up here?" Kong Ruyi said, puzzled.

"Who?" Duanqing Long followed his gaze, but only saw the back of a man with a beard.

"Nothing, it’s just a little friend you don’t know," Kong Ruyi shook his head. "Let it be, he’s probably just out traveling." He turned his head, "Do you know why the Demon Spirits have gathered this time?"

Duanqing Long nodded.

"The Gongshang House heard that the Qing Suo Tree finally bore fruit after ten thousand years. It’s said the tree turned into a Demon Spirit, accidentally releasing a trace of Spiritual Energy which was discovered by the Demon Spirits, so they’ve gathered a large group to besiege and snatch the Qing Suo Tree fruit."

"Qing Suo Tree fruit..." Kong Ruyi frowned.

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

Lin Xin dismounted and followed Shangnuo, who had come from the Gongshang House to greet them, winding his way inside the horn-shaped building.

Lin Youke and five others followed behind him, and although they had also become more powerful and cold in temperament over this period, their eyes couldn’t help but drift and they secretly took in their surroundings, this particularly unique family of the Dao Seeking Alliance.

Along the way, maids with arranged postures bent slightly at the waist; the carpet on the ground faintly emitted a scent, clearly having been treated with fragrance in advance.

Shangnuo was a young man who was always elegant and smiling. He was about the same age as Lin Xin and spoke in a very amiable manner.

"It is a great honor for our Gongshang House to receive support from the leading Lin Family, but I don’t know when Sherie’s reinforcements will arrive?" After chatting with Lin Xin for a while, Shangnuo finally couldn’t help but ask.

"They’re still on the way; we’ve arrived first because of other matters," Lin Xin said indifferently. "May I ask Brother Shangnuo to elaborate on this matter of the Demon Spirits? Speaking of which, I haven’t seriously studied the classification structure of Demon Spirits since leaving the family."

Shangnuo smiled.

"That’s easy to say, let me just roughly tell you, Sherie brother."

He coughed.

"Actually, there are two main categories among Demon Spirits: the Demon Race and the Spirit Clan."

"I’ve heard about that," Lin Xin nodded.

Shangnuo continued.

"The Demon Race refers to those who don’t possess much intelligence and only know to act based on brute instinct.

Whereas the Spirit Clan refers to those with intelligence and minds like humans, who know how to plot for benefits and avoid harm."

"So, the Demon Spirits we commonly encounter are the Demon Race?"

Lin Xin asked offhand.

"Exactly, in fact, those from the Spirit Clan with intelligence are extremely formidable," Shangnuo paused before continuing. "Sherie brother also knows that Demon Spirits are divided into ordinary Demon Race, Demon Masters, and Spirit Asuras among other levels, which are the titles and ranks within their hierarchy. But for us, Demon Masters are already equivalent to the Golden Core Layer."

"Indeed," Lin Xin nodded.

Shangnuo went on.

"All things in the world have spirits; Demon Spirits cover almost every category and type. There are simply too many of them, and they materialize too quickly." He gave a wry smile.

"To be honest, the main reason our Gongshang House is under siege this time is because of one Qing Suo Tree fruit that turned into a Demon Spirit."

"Qing Suo Tree fruit?" Lin Xin was also taken aback.

"Yes... The Qing Suo Tree fruit has extraordinary aptitude, an Innate Spirit Body, so one of the major reasons the Demon Spirits are besieging the Gongshang House is to ’rescue’ one of their own."

While chatting, Shangnuo quickly brought the six people into a not-so-small hall, where a feast had already been arranged. As the one who had been tasked with hosting them for the whole journey, Shangnuo naturally joined the table and sat down with them.

He introduced the current specific situation of the Gongshang House.

The Gongshang House ruled over the Northern Sea, originally with eleven islands spread evenly, forming a curved defensive line. Each island was equipped with battle ships and clan members, as well as auxiliary ethnic groups recruited for defense.

However, the attack by the Demon Spirits this time was unusually swift, and in just three days, they had broken through five islands in succession, now heading towards the Gongshang Sect.

Several elders had gone to resist, but only managed to slow down the opposition’s advance.

So the family had no choice but to send out a call for help.

"What about the Dao soldiers?" Lin Xin then asked. "I heard that the Gongshang House also has a Dao soldiers organization; I wonder if that’s true or false?"

"To be frank, although our Gongshang House imitated the outer Sect’s systems and established a Dao soldiers city system, our power is ultimately limited. We can only cultivate two types of Dao soldiers, and due to limited resources, the numbers are not large," Shangnuo admitted with a wry smile. "Right now, all of these Dao soldiers are concentrated in the elders’ hands, who lead teams to face the enemy. Here in the Sect, besides the basic defense, there’s really nothing else."

Lin Xin narrowed his eyes slightly, a thought flickering in his mind.

"I wonder if I could have a look at these two types of Dao soldiers?"

"Of course," Shangnuo replied happily. "However, right now you can only see one kind nearby. It is now time to have dinner and freshen up. You all must be tired from the long journey."

"That sounds good," Lin Xin agreed.

After eating and bathing, everyone retired to rest.

They got up early the next day.

Lin Xin and the others were led by Shangnuo, who had arrived, and went straight to the Dao soldiers cultivation facility of the Gongshang family.

After leaving the Sect’s horn-shaped gate and heading east for more than ten miles, they dismounted.

Arriving in front of a somewhat desolate Chaotic Rock Mountain, Shangnuo formed a spell in his hand, and immediately there was a light sound from the mountain.

Amid rumbling noises, a wide white stone gate rose from the ground.

Once the stone gate opened, a faint trace of Demon Spirit energy could be felt inside.

Shangnuo led the way in, the stone gate revealing a broad passageway. Entering it, they found themselves in a large, white stone-filled pit that was hundreds of meters long and wide, set within a huge cave.

It was like a plaza that had been battered by the deafening impact of meteorites, leaving a messy array of craters behind.

The guards standing on both sides of the entrance were all masked members of the Gongshang House, silently bowing to Shangnuo.

Shangnuo gave a brief introduction.

"This is one of the Dao Bing, unexpectedly created by our Gongshang House. ’Little Stone Man.’

"Little Stone Man?"

Lin Xin looked around at the pits of various sizes.

"Could you call a few out for us to see?"

He had heard that thanks to the powerful method of Dao Bing, the human casualties in the Mortal Realm were not significant. Now seemed to be a good opportunity to see what exactly a Dao Bing was like.

"Of course."

Shangnuo smiled.

"As the deputy of my family, I do have a certain power to command the Dao Bing."

He took a small stone from his waist and gently shook it, his mouth seemingly reciting a few corresponding incantations.

Soon, in a pit not far away, there was a slow throbbing.

Then, under the watchful eyes of Lin Xin and the others, out of the edge of that pit rolled up a lump of grayish-white spheroid.

A round, bumpy grayish-white stone ball.

The ball had two large red eyes on its surface that seemed to be seething with rage at all times, their fierce gaze constantly sweeping around.

Aside from the eyes, there was nothing else on the surface of the ball. From other angles, one might not even recognize it as a Dao Bing.

"This is the Little Stone Man," exclaimed Shangnuo with a hint of pride, pointing at the stone ball.

"This is a person?" Lin Youke couldn’t help but interject. The ball looked like an ordinary spirit creature, and being called ’Little Stone Man’, aside from those eyes that took up a fifth of the stone’s surface, there was nothing else remotely human-like about it.

"It’s just a metaphor, a metaphor," Shangnuo said somewhat embarrassedly.

"Can I touch it?"

"Of course."

Lin Xin stepped forward and gently stroked the surface of the stone ball.

The texture was rough, cold, and pockmarked.

He slid his fingers to the edge of the large eyes, which were also very hard, like some sort of keratinous substance.

Finally, he pressed on the surface of the stone, solid, yet with a faint trace of elasticity.

"What’s the use of this Little Stone Man?" he turned and asked Shangnuo.

"Brother Sherie, don’t underestimate it. Despite seeming unremarkable, this Little Stone Man’s actual combat ability has many times reduced our family’s casualties to the minimum," Shangnuo explained briefly.

"The Little Stone Man itself has no offensive capabilities, but they are easily enraged. So long as they are tied up and thrown into the enemy ranks, they can explode instantly. They create quite a substantial lethal effect."

"How powerful is the explosion?" Lin Xin’s interest was piqued.

"A large piece of azure rock can be instantly destroyed," Shangnuo said earnestly.

As they were speaking, a member of the Gongshang House ran in from outside and spoke cautiously to Shangnuo.

Shangnuo’s smile widened.

"It so happens, Master Sherie, the head of the Lin Family branch, Mr. Lin Shangxiu has also arrived. Would you like to go and take a look together?"

"Lin Shangxiu?" Lin Xin paused in surprise, "Why has she come?"

"It is said she came with the Crown Prince Yun Kai of the Imperial Clan," Shangnuo said with a smile.

"Yun Kai?"

Lin Xin’s eyes narrowed.

He had met this person a few times before, a man of deep schemes, always wearing a seemingly gentle smile, his true nature inscrutable to others.

The most important thing was that with his current level of cultivation, he still could not see through this man, which was somewhat troubling. It meant this person either possessed a formidable cultivation or mysterious hidden methods.

"Forget it, no need to see him. Let’s go back and wait for news," Lin Xin decided after a moment, speaking with a cool tone.

Shangnuo, noticing that he and Lin Shangxiu were no longer on the same path, did not mention it again.

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

The next day, the sky was a clear azure, without a trace of cloud.

The sea surface outside the Gongshang House’s horn-shaped territory also gradually started to set up a huge array of floating stone platforms.

All these stone platforms were floating on the surface of the sea, and they were all gray-black in color, connected into one by steel chains. They swayed with the waves but remained exceptionally stable.

The Gongshang House’s main force, the family head Mr. Gongshang Song, sat silently in the center of a stone platform holding a deep blue ancient zither, eyes closed, wordless.

The five venerable elders of the family each appeared, forming a simple Formation around the family head, facing the vast sea directly.

Then there were the other stone platforms’ main force of the Gongshang House, the Sea Drum Army.

These guys, more than thirty in number, were robust men with their upper bodies bare, each hugging a white drum over a meter in diameter, their skin slick and shiny, muscles bulging, clearly a group of powerful individuals.

On the periphery, there were slender women riding large fish resembling dolphins, all dressed in tight black suits that covered their bodies completely, holding Water Dividing Spikes in their hands, their gaze sharp.