Could it be that Shen Shu was from the Asura race—was he the Asura King?!

This was the first thought that flashed through Xu Qi An’s mind.

If Shen Shu was indeed from the Asura race, then considering his status, he could only be the legendary Asura King who was sealed by Buddha with the Demon-Sealing Nail and imprisoned beneath Mount Alanda.

However, according to legend, the Asura King had long since perished.

As for whether he could be another member of the Asura race, Xu Qi An thought it impossible. The reason was simple: after the Asura King’s death, the title of “Asura” was inherited by his youngest son.

This indicated that Asura was the strongest warrior of their race.

Following this logic, if Shen Shu was from the Asura race, then as a Half-Step Martial Deity, he could only be the Asura King himself.

“So Shen Shu is the Asura King, the Asura King, and the Beast Realm Sovereign were lovers, the Nine-Tailed Fox is the Asura King’s daughter, and she’s siblings with Asura…” Xu Qi An muttered to himself:

This was getting interesting!

However, there were still many unexplainable mysteries, the main one being the timeline.

According to Xu Qi An’s understanding, the Asura race’s submission to Buddhism happened at least a thousand years ago, perhaps even longer, while the Beast Purge occurred five hundred years ago.

In other words, the Asura King should have perished a thousand years ago, which made Shen Shu being the Asura King rather suspicious.

Consider this: if the Asura King had converted to Buddhism, the Buddhist sect would certainly have proclaimed it widely, recorded it in their scriptures and announced it to all believers to establish their authority.

They wouldn’t have spread the story that the compassionate Buddha had destroyed the Asura King.

“Right, the deal—Shen Shu and Buddha had a secret agreement…”

Xu Qi An’s mind stirred as he vaguely grasped something, but time didn’t allow him to think further. The aura emanating from Asura grew increasingly terrifying.

It cast the entire South Dharma Temple in shadow.

Standing nine feet tall, with jet-black skin and bulging muscles rippling across his body, coupled with protruding brow ridges and an ugly countenance, Asura now resembled a war god emerging from hell.

Beneath those protruding brow ridges, his sharp eyes glowed crimson.

In those eyes, Xu Qi An saw bloodthirst, brutality, and the essence of battle.

The Asura race were born warriors.

“Amitabha!”

Not just Xu Qi An, but even the monks of South Dharma Temple were uncomfortable with Asura’s current state.

They stopped forming their formation, chanting Buddha’s name while retreating.

The most distinctive trait of an Asura in a berserk state was that they recognized no one, not even family.

Xu Qi An held his Taiping Blade, maintaining vigilant focus while glancing skyward at the second artillery strike that Monk Sun Xuanji was gathering.

If Shen Shu was indeed the Asura King, did Asura know this? If he didn’t, perhaps I could turn him against them… Xu Qi An’s mind stirred as he transmitted: “Do you know who is sealed in that tower?”

“A demon monk!”

Asura responded, his voice no longer young and mellow, but filled with cold detachment that looked down upon everything.

“What if I told you it was your father, the Asura King, the previous generation’s Asura?”

Xu Qi An transmitted.

“So what if he is? Once one enters Buddhism, all worldly attachments become void.”

Asura replied indifferently.

Mere patricide… Seeing Asura like this, Xu Qi An recalled the words of the stunning Bodhisattva Liu Li when she arrived from the Western Regions to assist Lord Xu Pingfeng in capturing him.

Once one enters Buddhism, all worldly attachments become void!

A chill ran through his heart.

If Bodhisattva Liu Li had succeeded back then, his situation wouldn’t have been much better than Asura’s.

“Zing zing…”

Asura’s fingers extended into black claws emanating dark light. His figure vanished, as if teleporting, appearing before Xu Qi An.

So fast… Xu Qi An’s pupils reflected Asura’s ugly face, his battle instincts moving faster than thought as he swung the Taiping Blade.

“Whoosh!”

Dark golden blood sprayed as the severed arm fell along with the Taiping Blade.

The power of a Bandit-Slaying Realm expert combined with his Asura physique completely overwhelmed the Diamond Body Technique… Xu Qi An leaped right, using his remaining arm to execute a graceful flip.

During the movement, he retrieved his severed arm while activating Jade Shatter, returning the injury to Asura and disrupting his attack rhythm.

A claw mark appeared on Asura’s black right arm, cutting to the bone, but failing to tear the arm apart.

He clenched his fist hard, causing the muscles in his right arm to explode with power, instantly healing the wound.

The power of Jade Shatter has dropped, not even fifty percent… Xu Qi An’s heart sank as he melted into the shadows.

At his original position, Asura’s towering figure suddenly appeared, his right fist striking out, targeting Xu Qi An’s head.

Xu Qi An appeared dozens of yards away, slashing the Taiping Blade to his right.

Clang!

Sparks flew as it struck Asura’s chest, who had suddenly appeared there.

Simultaneously, after making his strike, Xu Qi An once again melted into the shadows, vanishing.

He appeared beneath the Sealing Tower. Clang! Sparks flew again as Xu Qi An once more used Shadow Jump to disappear.

In the vast western courtyard, the two fought in an eerie manner, appearing sometimes in the east, sometimes in the south, occasionally only the “clang” of contact and flying sparks visible, with no sight of the combatants themselves.

Xu Qi An was no longer just a crude warrior who only knew direct combat. Having mastered the Seven Fatal Venoms, he possessed enough flashy techniques.

First using the “Moving Stars and Shifting Constellations” spell to mask his presence, then relying on Shadow Jump to engage, Asura couldn’t predict where he would appear. Even with his terrifying speed in pursuit, he was always one step behind, unable to anticipate his opponent’s moves.

But this had a drawback—he had to keep jumping, constantly jumping. Once he slowed down, say, to try destroying the Sealing Tower, Asura would catch him.

The Sealing Tower was protected by a formation created by sixty-eight Chan masters. Even he couldn’t easily break it.

“Boom!”

The dazzling light pillar descended again, illuminating the South Dharma Temple.

Sun Xuanji’s second artillery strike had arrived, but the target was no longer Asura—it was the Sealing Tower.

Bang! Bang!

Crack!

The golden light covering the Sealing Tower’s surface grew thinner, tiles shattered, and walls cracked, suffering massive damage.

The light pillar quickly vanished as Sun Xuanji piloted his Pagoda Treasure skyward, accumulating power for the next strike.

At this moment, the suppressive properties between different cultivation systems became apparent. If a shaman rain master or Daoist cultivator were present, Sun Xuanji wouldn’t dare fly so high. Both systems possessed the ability to summon lightning.

But while Buddhist techniques were mysterious and unpredictable, they rarely included spells manipulating natural forces.

“Two more strikes and we can break open the Sealing Tower…”

Xu Qi An felt secretly encouraged.

Originally, if Senior Brother Sun had personally come down, breaking the formation would have been effortless, but he feared Asura and dared not descend.

The chase continued until the third artillery strike was ready, the cannon mouth spewing a light pillar one meter in diameter, once again bombarding the Sealing Tower.

South Dharma Temple was once more bathed in daylight.

At this moment, Xu Qi An noticed Asura had vanished.

He wasn’t pursuing Xu Qi An anymore.

Simultaneously, Asura appeared on the artillery platform, avoiding the sensing formations Sun Xuanji had arranged around it, arriving silently.

At the platform’s height, supernatural warriors couldn’t achieve a silent approach. Unlike on land with its footholds, where warriors could rely on their terrifying explosive power for short-distance movements comparable to teleportation.

The sky had no footholds. Warriors’ speed in the air was slow and conspicuous, impossible to hide from a third-rank artificer. Let alone the sensing formations radiating from the artillery platform.

But there was one place the sensing formations couldn’t cover, one place Sun Xuanji couldn’t detect.

That was the light pillar shooting from the cannon mouth.

Asura made his way up to the platform against the light pillar.

Now, his black skin was covered in burn marks, smoking, emanating the smell of burnt flesh.

Now, he was less than thirty feet from Sun Xuanji.

And the current Sun Xuanji was his true body, not a puppet substitute.

A deadly situation!

Bang… Asura’s fist shot out like a cannon, tearing through the air.

On the platform, clear light flashed as a defensive formation manifested, taking the shape of a tortoise shell. But under Asura’s overwhelmingly powerful punch, it shattered like fragments of light.

If even Xu Qi An’s Diamond Body Technique couldn’t withstand it, how could a mere defensive formation?

At this moment, a figure suddenly appeared before Sun Xuanji, spreading his arms to meet Asura’s fist.

Xu Qi An!

The black fist instantly penetrated Xu Qi An’s chest, pulverizing his heart.

At this moment, Sun Xuanji finally responded, sliding a modified firearm from his sleeve. He stepped across from behind Xu Qi An, aimed at Asura’s chest, and pulled the trigger.

The formations inscribed on the firearm instantly lit up, shooting out a dark golden nail.

As Sun Xuanji pulled the trigger, Xu Qi An activated Jade Shatter, causing Asura’s chest to collapse into a bloody mess, breaking through his supposedly invincible physique.

“Thud…”

The Demon-Sealing Nail penetrated Asura’s chest.

His sharp gaze slightly dispersed as he looked down in shock at the dark golden nail embedded in his heart.

The black skin receded like a tide as Asura staggered backward, clutching his chest, his aura plummeting like a cliff.

Success…

Xu Qi An and Sun Xuanji simultaneously exhaled.

This was their pre-arranged strategy. Facing a second-rank Asura plus third-rank Vajra, Xu Qi An and Sun Xuanji weren’t arrogant enough to think they could easily defeat him.

A straightforward battle wouldn’t work; they needed to combine it with strategy.

The Demon-Sealing Nail was their trump card.

Only this could severely wound a warrior and weaken their combat power. Its effectiveness even surpassed the Nation-Stabilizing Sword.

Reality proved this correct. Even if Xu Qi An had borrowed the Nation-Stabilizing Sword again, whether he could subdue the enemy was uncertain, and this divine weapon of Great Feng might have ended up permanently staying in the Southern Borderlands.

Asura’s strength wasn’t something a third-rank warrior could handle, and the possibility of losing the weapon was extremely high.

In Xu Qi An and Sun Xuanji’s plan, Asura would try his best to eliminate the third-rank artificer who could easily break formations, and the artificer’s “weakness” would cause the warrior to let his guard down somewhat.

Therefore, the Demon-Sealing Nail had to be fired by Sun Xuanji himself.

The only risk was that Senior Brother Sun would also face the danger of perishing.

However, the artificer system’s teleportation formations greatly reduced the risk. When Xu Qi An discovered Asura’s disappearance, he decisively crushed the teleportation jade talisman.

The teleportation point had been pre-arranged on the artillery platform, right in front of where Sun Xuanji stood.

Enduring the pain in his chest, Xu Qi An grabbed Asura’s neck and jumped down from the platform with him, tumbling as they fell.

“Senior Brother Sun, break the seal!”

Xu Qi An shouted.