Chapter 277: TOYING WITH THE CULT ELDERS

Several bones shattered within Desirus’s colossal frame from the bone-jarring impact, the cracks resounding like thunderclaps echoing through the sealed space, fragments of splintered rib and vertebra scattering across the fractured ground.The damaged bones regenerated almost immediately, knitting back together with unnatural speed and hardening further in the process, evolving into even more resilient structures. But such adaptations held little concern for Aaron, who viewed them as mere temporary delays in his relentless assault.

Aaron seized the back of Desirus’s head with an iron grip, his fingers digging into the toughened flesh and matted hair like vise clamps.

Ruthlessly and without a shred of mercy, Aaron slammed the jiangshi king’s skull into the unyielding earth over and over again, each ferocious impact carving a deeper and wider crater into the terrain, sending shockwaves that pulverized rock and soil into fine dust, the successive craters merging into a vast, gaping abyss that swallowed the surrounding debris.

"It’s no use. He is only going to regenerate and harden until your actions have no effect against him," Qin Luo bragged from her vantage point outside the sealed barrier, her voice dripping with smug confidence as she crossed her arms, utterly convinced of Desirus’s inevitable triumph over the intruder.

"We will see about that," Aaron replied coolly, his tone laced with unshakeable certainty as he manipulated the fabric of space itself, encasing Desirus in an even tighter confinement that allowed him not even an inch of wriggle room, the spatial compression humming with oppressive pressure.

Tightening his knuckles until they whitened under the strain, Aaron delivered a cataclysmic blow that crushed Desirus’s skull entirely, the cranium exploding in a spray of gore and bone shards.

Once more, the skull regenerated, reforming with that same eerie resilience, but it proved insufficient to deter Aaron’s unyielding onslaught.

Again and again, Aaron amplified the raw force behind each punch, pulverizing the skull repeatedly with escalating power, his fists becoming blurs of destruction that turned the regeneration process into a futile struggle.

He persisted in this brutal rhythm until, gradually, Desirus’s vaunted regeneration began to falter, lagging behind the overwhelming damage Aaron inflicted, the jiangshi king’s form twitching erratically as it struggled to keep pace with the ceaseless devastation.

"I guess you were unable to finish the task given to you with just your toy," the branch master observed calmly, his masked gaze fixed on the one-sided domination unfolding within the sealed space, the piling injuries on Desirus revealing the stark truth.

Drawing from his own vast battle experience and keen discernment, the branch master swiftly recognized the pointlessness of relying solely on Desirus to subdue Aaron, the so-called "jiangshi king reduced to little more than a battered plaything.

Qin Luo fell silent, a flicker of fear crossing her features as she worried that her failure might have disappointed the branch master, her previous bravado crumbling under the weight of reality.

"See to it that the error is corrected. The rest of you, support her," he commanded the assembled cult elders arrayed behind him, his voice brooking no dissent as he issued the order with authoritative finality.

"All of us attacking? Wouldn’t that be overkill, branch master?" one of the men queried from the back, his words oozing with arrogance and unchecked pride, his posture radiating the haughty disposition of someone who considered himself far above such menial conflicts.

He possessed unnaturally pale skin that gleamed almost translucently under the dim light, complemented by long, flowing black hair that cascaded down his shoulders like silken shadows. His face, though strikingly handsome, evoked the chilling sensation of a ghostly apparition granted tangible form, beautiful yet profoundly unnerving.

This was Jian Wuxian, the infamous Myriad Ghost Eater Elder.

"I have a simple instruction, Wuxian. You all attack together. Or do you plan to go against my instructions?" The branch master turned slowly to face him, his tone deceptively even but laced with an undercurrent of warning that chilled the air.

"Definitely not, branch master. Forgive me," Wuxian bowed his head respectfully, swallowing his pride as he submitted to the hierarchy.

"Let’s be done with this as quickly as possible and return to our original task," the branch master concluded, refocusing on the battlefield.

Qin Luo drew forth a handful of slender needles from her sleeves, her movements fluid and practiced. As the first to strike, she hurled them toward Aaron with pinpoint accuracy, the projectiles whistling through the air like venomous hornets.

Aaron sliced through the fabric of space itself between himself and the incoming needles, severing their trajectory effortlessly and causing them to dissipate harmlessly into the void.

Undeterred by the failure, Qin Luo charged forward with predatory grace, closing the distance rapidly.

"Flying needle rain," she intoned, retrieving dozens more needles from her sleeve and flinging them skyward in a glittering arc that rained down like a deadly metallic storm.

Aaron conjured a vast shadow canopy directly above his head, the darkness swallowing the barrage whole without a trace. In the next instant, he manifested another shadow portal behind the unsuspecting Qin Luo, expelling the captured needles at her back with vicious velocity.

The redirected projectiles embedded deeply into her flesh like the quills of an enraged porcupine, piercing skin and muscle in a flurry of sharp impacts.

Qin Luo gritted her teeth against the searing agony, stifling any cry of pain that threatened to escape her lips.

As the Poison Elder herself, the toxins coating the needles held no sway over her immune system, rendering the venom inert.

The branch master glanced sidelong at the remaining elders, who had yet to commit to the assault, his impatience evident in the subtle shift of his stance.

Realizing there was no leeway to defy the branch master’s directive, the others surged into the fray, converging on Aaron with coordinated menace.

"Crimson tide escape art," declared one of the elders, Lan Cheng, who darted ahead of the pack, clapping his hands together with a resonant smack before slamming his open palm against the ground.

From the point of contact, a roaring sea of viscous crimson blood erupted forth, surging toward Aaron in massive, unrelenting waves that carried the metallic tang of slaughter and threatened to drown everything in its path.

Aaron regarded the grotesque spectacle with a mix of amusement and pity, unsure whether to laugh or weep for the cultivator’s misguided confidence.

He welcomed the blood art openly, allowing the tidal wave to crash over and consume him entirely, the warm, sticky fluid enveloping his form in a suffocating embrace.

Lan Cheng’s face lit up with a triumphant smile, convinced he had sealed Aaron’s fate in that bloody deluge.