Looking at Hu Yiming lying on the ground, unrecognizable like a dead dog, Hu Zheng's heart ached.
He rushed towards Ma Hongjun and Dai Mubai, wanting to kill them to avenge his son.
Dai Mubai's side was protected by powerful Soul Saints and Soul Douluos, but many others had also come with Hu Zheng.
At this point, it had become a chaotic battle.
However, Ma Hongjun's side had the advantage of an army.
Hu Zheng wanted to rush over, but he had no chance; he was blocked by the army.
"Senior Sword Douluo, are you going to get involved in the affairs of our Star Luo Empire?" Hu Xiao asked angrily.
"The affairs of the Star Luo Empire are none of my concern, but the affairs of evil Soul Masters are my duty.
Tiger Soul Douluo, you shouldn't have gone down the evil path."
Sword Douluo's Seven Kill Sword was extremely sharp; even the two Title Douluos, Tiger Soul and Lava, couldn't withstand it. This was the power of a Super Douluo, and the power of the Seven Kill Sword, the strongest martial soul.
"Evil Soul Masters?"
Lava Douluo stared at Hu Xiao in astonishment, his face full of questions. He seemed completely unaware of anything about evil soul masters.
"Hu Xiao, what's going on?"
Lava Douluo had a rough idea of what was happening, deducing from the Davis incident.
He genuinely knew nothing of these matters. As allies, he and the Tiger Soul Clan had indeed signed a pact of mutual support, and had even harbored thoughts of rebellion. This sudden attack led him to believe it was due to the rebellion, but now it seemed the Tiger Soul Clan was colluding with evil soul masters.
What troubled Lava Douluo wasn't the evil soul masters themselves, but the fact that Hu Xiao, as an ally, hadn't informed him.
It was too late to say anything now.
"I'm sorry, old friend!"
Hu Xiao said apologetically.
However, it was pointless now. Whether it was rebellion or collusion with evil soul masters, neither was tolerated by the Star Luo Empire.
This rare encounter with Sword Douluo and Poison Douluo presented an excellent opportunity to deal with these two families, and Dailot wouldn't let it slip by.
In this battle, the Tiger Soul and Lava families had no chance. Their core strength in the capital was never as formidable as the White Tiger and Spirit Cat families. The previously evenly matched strength of the Title Douluo was completely disrupted by the sudden arrival of Sword Douluo and Poison Douluo.
Soon, Spirit Cat Douluo and Poison Douluo charged in, making it four against two.
Six Title Douluo engaged in a fierce battle in the air.
White Tiger and Spirit Cat cooperated against Tiger Soul Douluo,
while Sword Douluo and Poison Douluo cooperated against Lava Douluo.
As time passed, the two families were nearly exhausted, and the entire Hu Family Duke's Mansion was reduced to ruins by various soul skills.
The flashing lights of various soul skills and the battle of thousands of soul masters created a sound that shook the entire Star Luo City.
The battle between Title Douluo was particularly earth-shattering; even a slight ripple could cause death to those below.
Even with two against one, it was difficult to kill or capture a Title Douluo in a short time.
Ma Hongjun and the others remained on the periphery, watching the battle between the Title Douluos.
The White Tiger True Form and the Netherworld Spirit Cat True Form had merged, their Spirit Fusion Skill: Netherworld White Tiger. A
gigantic white tiger phantom unfolded in the air, like a divine beast covering the sky. The behemoth swung its long, dark claws, colliding with Hu Xiao's Tiger Soul Blade True Form.
The Spirit Fusion Skill used by the Title Douluos was truly terrifying. The enormous tiger paw had already enveloped Hu Xiao, and the Tiger Soul Blade True Form couldn't withstand the Netherworld White Tiger's claws at all. With just one strike, Hu Xiao was sent flying.
Hu Xiao's strength was comparable to Dai Luote's, and now with the addition of the Spirit Cat Douluo and the Spirit Fusion Skill, he was even stronger.
Just then, Hu Xiao's aura began to change, and dense black energy erupted from his body.
Streams of black energy, like insects, surged towards the Hu family members with their Tiger Soul Blade Spirits below.
"Feel the power of the evil god!"
Hu Xiao's face was twisted beyond recognition, most terrifyingly, his pupils had turned completely black, like burning black flames.
Below, the Tiger Soul Blade Soul Masters, corrupted by the black energy, had completely lost their minds, becoming bloodthirsty and frenzied, fearless of death, their strength surging.
The side that was originally at a disadvantage was now gradually turning the tide due to the corruption of the black energy.
This was why Hu Xiao dared to fight against the White Tiger and Spirit Cat families.
The most unexpected factor in this battle for him was the sudden addition of Sword Douluo and Poison Douluo.
Otherwise, his corrupted strength could have withstood the two White Tiger and Spirit Cat Douluos, and then the others could have been handled by Lava Douluo, thus turning the tide.
However, such a bloody battle was not the result Hu Xiao wanted. The price would be too high, turning all the Soul Masters of the Tiger Soul Blade family into evil slaves.
The power of the evil god was not something anyone could obtain. In other words, obtaining the power of the evil god required paying a price, and those Soul Masters who were not usually favored would become the evil god's slaves.
They also need to contribute a certain amount of flesh and blood to the evil god in order to obtain the evil god's power while maintaining their rationality.
Hu Xiao's ideal plan was to control Davis and become the ruler of the Star Luo Empire without bloodshed, thus concealing his identity as an evil soul master.
After all, evil soul masters were too wicked and unpopular.
Faced with this sudden turn of events, everyone panicked.
Although they had anticipated that the Tiger Soul Blade family would have a large number of evil soul masters, they hadn't expected it to happen in this way.
Judging from this, Hu Xiao seemed to have gained a great deal of power; as a Title Douluo, he had gained the favor of the Evil God.
Hu Zheng was also emanating a large amount of black energy; he was one of the few evil soul masters who could maintain his rationality.
Among the evil soul masters Ma Hongjun had seen, it seemed that few could remain rational.
It seemed that these evil soul masters were ranked.
Only Hu Xiao and his son Hu Zheng could maintain their rationality.
It seemed that only these three direct descendants of the Hu family had obtained the power of the Evil God.
The battle became bloody, and the power of the two sides temporarily reached a balance, resulting in heavy casualties.
"Evil God, this is the flesh and blood offered to you, please grant me power."
At this moment, crimson patterns lit up on the ground of the Hu family mansion. Large amounts of blood flowed from the corpses of the dead Soul Masters, even their flesh and bones turning into blood.
These crimson patterns extended to the Hu family's backyard, where a gigantic statue stood. The statue was bizarre, a grotesque monster, neither human nor beast, possessing numerous tentacles and mouthparts.
At this moment, crimson energy gathered from the sky, and the tentacles and mouthparts of the Dragon Soul entered the statue, slowly turning it blood-red.
As the crimson energy increased, Hu Xiao's black aura above grew denser, his strength increasing rapidly, reaching level ninety-six in the blink of an eye, and his aura continued to intensify.
Hu Xiao was completely engulfed by the black aura, looking like a demon god. His strength was gradually becoming equal to that of the Netherworld White Tiger, whose Martial Soul fusion could not be maintained for long.
It seems a vicious cycle has begun. As more and more people die below, the blood and blood energy increase, and the black aura thickens. This thick black aura then transforms into the enemy's power.
At this point, Lava Douluo is already injured. Seeing the situation is dire, Sword Douluo hands the weakened Lava Douluo over to Poison Douluo, while he goes to help the Netherworld White Tiger fight Tiger Soul Douluo.
Meanwhile, below, as the black aura intensifies, the Tiger Soul Blade Soul Masters become increasingly powerful.
This leads Ma Hongjun to discover a problem: it seems that black aura, the power of evil gods, only works on special martial souls, such as the Black Tiger, the Tombstone, the previously unseen Demon God Tiger, and now the Tiger Soul Blade.
These martial souls all share a common characteristic: they possess an abnormal aura. The Black Tiger and Tiger Soul Blade exude a baleful aura, the Tombstone exudes a corpse aura, and the Demon God Tiger exudes a demonic aura.
These unusual auras all share similarities with black aura.
No wonder Davis's strength is somewhat weaker.
Davis's martial soul is the White Tiger, carrying a holy aura, which is incompatible with the characteristics of black aura.
It can now be roughly deduced that Davis's limited increase in strength stemmed from the incompatibility between his martial soul and the dark energy, preventing him from effectively utilizing the power of the evil god. This explains why he lost to Dai Mubai even after breaking through to the Soul King realm.
Ma Hongjun compared Davis's and Hu Yiming's transformed strengths. Although one was a Soul King and the other a Soul Emperor, Hu Yiming's power increase after his corruption was significantly greater.
This also explains why the Ganbei family of Soto City didn't become corrupted—their martial souls didn't align with the power of the evil god.
The situation descended into a brutal battle, with more and more people dying.
As the blood energy increased and the dark energy transformed, the scales of victory seemed to tip in favor of the evil soul masters.
At this point, everyone could see that this was a conspiracy,
or rather, an open conspiracy.
Hu Xiao, knowing he was exposed and that the strength was unequal, still dared to remain in his mansion awaiting the army's conquest. This was his reliance.
He had already set up an array in his mansion; any battle that occurred there would result in death, and the dead would bring blood energy, which could be used to sacrifice to the evil god and obtain its power.
Especially for Soul Masters, the stronger the Soul Master, the more abundant their blood energy, resulting in greater power from the sacrifice. Almost all the Soul Masters here are at least Soul Venerables, and although there are only a few thousand of them, their blood energy is comparable to tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, of ordinary people.
As long as this sacrificial formation exists, this place is essentially a execution ground for an evil god.
With more and more Soul Masters sacrificing themselves, no one is left to protect Ma Hongjun and Dai Mubai; everyone has joined the battle.
At this point, the most sensible course of action would be to retreat from this area and stop fighting.
However, the battle has already reached a fever pitch, and retreating would only cause greater losses.
"Try to destroy these blood-red patterns and see if it has any effect,"
Bai Baoshan thoughtfully suggested.
Ma Hongjun immediately stepped forward, entering the edge of the battlefield. His second Soul Ring lit up, and Ma Hongjun thrust his Dragon Soul Spear at the connection point of two blood-red patterns.
"Explode!"
The patterns exploded, broken.
"It worked!"
Ma Hongjun exclaimed happily.
But in the blink of an eye, they were reconnected by the flowing blood energy; these patterns seemed invisible.
He tried several more places, but with the same result: the connection would break briefly and then reconnect.
Ma Hongjun calmed down and carefully observed the area. He had Oscar give him a flying mushroom sausage, and then flew into the air to look down.
Soon, Ma Hongjun discovered that although these blood-red patterns were crisscrossing, they followed a pattern. They were like the blood vessels of the human body, but the structure they formed was not human-shaped; rather, it was a strange form.
Ma Hongjun forced himself to calm down, trying to find a flaw in these blood-red patterns.
The thickness of the patterns.
Ma Hongjun suddenly thought of the main and branch meridians of the human body. Observing these blood-red patterns, they also varied in thickness, just like the main and branch meridians. The thicker blood-red patterns extended into many thinner ones.
Following the thicker blood-red patterns, Ma Hongjun discovered that they all converged in one place: the center of the Hu family mansion.
"Mu Bai, I have a plan. I don't know if it will work, but I want to try it. You cover me; I need to get into the center of the Hu family mansion,"
Ma Hongjun discussed with Dai Mu Bai, the master, and others.
Based on his years of studying in his previous life, to break a formation, one should first find the location of the formation's core, then destroy it to break the formation.
"The situation is urgent now. Since Hongjun has a method, let's try it first. Anyway, there's no better way,"
Bai Baoshan immediately affirmed.
Without further hesitation, the group formed a team and moved into the battlefield.
To enter the center of the Hu family mansion, they had to cross the battlefield.
Of course, they could choose to fly through the air, but that was too risky. With six Title Douluos battling in the air, even a small shockwave could kill them.
Title Douluos fight using their Martial Soul True Body to unleash Soul Skills; their power was unimaginable.
Bai Baoshan cleared the way, and a seven-ring Soul Saint General, seeing Dai Mubai join the battle, immediately summoned a small team to cover the group.
Ning Huahua, Ning Rongrong, Ye Lingling, Oscar, Xiao Yuanyuan, and other support Soul Masters were protected in the middle.
Bai Baoshan's strength was already high-end in this battlefield, and with his Heavenly Star Furnace being a top-tier defensive Martial Soul, clearing the way was very smooth.
However, seeing Ma Hongjun and Dai Mubai join the battle, the already bloodthirsty and crazed Hu Zheng became even more excited, leading his group of corrupted Tiger Soul Blade Soul Masters to attack.
This instantly increased the pressure here.
"Rongrong, brother-in-law, speed boost!
Xiao Ao, prepare the mushroom sausages!"
Ma Hongjun didn't want to linger here. With the speed boost, the group didn't engage in much combat and quickly crossed the battlefield.
Once they reached the enemy's back, he and Ning Rongrong ate mushroom sausages and then flew close to the ground to increase their speed.
"You guys hold them off, the rest of you, Rongrong and I will destroy the sacrificial formation."
Ma Hongjun grabbed Ning Rongrong's hand, and the two quickly headed towards the center.
"Hongjun, be careful!" He
had no time to respond to everyone's concern. The situation was too urgent; every second was costing lives, and the evil soul masters' momentum was gradually increasing.
Hu Xiao in the air had already reached level ninety-seven, and with the boost from the black energy, he was evenly matched with the three titled Douluo.
Following the blood energy patterns, Ma Hongjun finally found the source.
It was a bizarre and malevolent statue, now blood-red, its countless tentacles and mandibles sending chills down one's spine.
Its head resembled a demon god, grotesque and terrifying, with two sharp bull horns and sunken eye sockets that seemed to drain nothing, like two black holes that sucked the soul in.
Looking at this grotesque and sinister monster, Ma Hongjun was filled with questions.
"Is this an evil god?"
(End of Chapter)