Chapter 148 Targeted by Everyone? I'm Serious About Living Off Women!
The gates of the Bronze Immortal Palace slowly opened, accompanied by a heavy, ancient grinding of hinges, as a blinding spiritual light instantly flooded in.
Outside, a dragnet had already been laid.
The Western Church’s "Holy Light Judgment Team" fanned out; twelve Adjudicators at the Late Stage of the Grandmaster Realm held holy swords, their Holy Light nearly turning the sky white. Leading them was a grim-faced middle-aged man in bright silver armor—the Church’s new Chief Judge, Soren.
On the other side, the Tianli Research Institute’s "Godslayer" armored phalanx had already calibrated their energy cannons.
Those mechas, emitting a cold metallic luster, were biological weapons specifically developed to target high-level Martial Artists.
Further away, powerhouses from the Phoenix Sect and the True Dragon Nest had also arrived in person.
Although the Sect Masters themselves hadn't come, these were ruthless figures at the Elder level, and their presence made the surrounding air warp.
"He’s out!"
"Is that Jiang Chen? The bandit who killed our Saint and stole our floor tiles?"
"Why does he look... so drained?"
Under a multitude of murderous gazes, Jiang Chen shuffled out in his cartoon-patterned slippers, draped in a bedsheet and clutching a pillow. With Su Qingyue and Mu Qingxue supporting him on either side, the scene looked like two peerless female war gods escorting a sickly weakling who had been completely drained.
"Jiang Chen!" Chief Judge Soren stepped forward, his holy sword pointing at the tip of Jiang Chen’s nose, his voice booming like a great bell. "Blaspheming the gods, stealing sacred artifacts, and kidnapping the Saintess! You heretic, today is your doomsday!"
He closed his eyes to sense Jiang Chen’s aura, then let out a contemptuous, wild laugh: "Hahahaha! I thought you were some formidable figure, but you’re just a piece of trash in the Grandmaster Realm! It seems the previous rumors were all fabricated by those fools in the Church to cover up their failures! A piece of garbage who relies on women and external items to keep up appearances dares to run wild in the Holy City?"
"Hey, you over there in the tin can."
Jiang Chen’s eyes were half-closed, his head resting on Mu Qingxue’s fair shoulder, as he spoke in a muffled voice, "Your voice is at such a high frequency it’s making my brain ache. Didn't your mother teach you to keep quiet in public?"
"Impudent!" Soren roared in fury, the light on his holy sword flaring intensely. "You dare to be so tongue-tied when death is at your door! Kneel and repent!"
"Make me kneel?"
Jiang Chen didn't even lift his eyelids; instead, he snuggled further into Su Qingyue’s embrace. "Qingyue, he wants me to kneel. Look at my waist... I sprained it inside just now, I can't kneel."
Looking at Jiang Chen’s "frail and unable to care for himself" act, Su Qingyue knew he was faking, but her protective instinct instantly redlined. She stepped forward, and her Phoenix True Fire erupted with a roar, making the surrounding air sizzle.
"You want to touch him? You’ll have to go through the crimson flame sword in my hand first!"
"Hmph, the Heavenly Phoenix Bloodline is indeed precious, but before me, it's not enough!" The Fifth Elder of the Phoenix Sect gave a cold smile, his figure turning into an afterimage as he lunged directly for Su Qingyue. "I’ll take you back to the Sect to serve as a Cauldron for the Saint!"
The battle erupted instantly.
Mu Qingxue and Su Qingyue let out soft cries and both attacked. Having been baptized by the Empress’s aura inside the Immortal Palace, their strength had surged, and for a moment, they actually held off the siege of several Grandmasters.
But the situation looked extremely unfavorable for Jiang Chen.
"Look, everyone, that Jiang Chen really is a waste! He’s been hiding behind women the whole time!"
"How can a man living off women like this become the National Top Scorer? Is the Great Xia Kingdom out of people?"
Mockery from various factions rose and fell.
Inside one of the Tianli Research Institute’s mechas, the pilot sneered: "Target locked. Blood-qi fluctuations at the Grandmaster Realm; judged as trash. Use the capture net directly. Don’t damage his brain; it’s prime experimental material."
"Whoosh!"
An alloy net flickering with high-voltage electricity swept down toward the top of Jiang Chen’s head.
At this moment, Jiang Chen was in an extremely mysterious state.
Although his Mental Energy had reached the Half-step Grandmaster level and even touched the edge of "Transcending Mortality and Entering Sainthood," his "itchy hands" from touching the Empress in the crystal coffin earlier had caused their auras to become strangely entangled. Right now, his Sea of Consciousness was on a loop, playing memories of the Empress as a child destroying half a galaxy because she hadn't slept enough.
"So violent... Sister Empress had a worse temper than me when she was a kid..." Jiang Chen lamented internally.
Seeing the electric net about to fall, the surrounding villains wore triumphant smiles.
"Caught him just like that? Boring."
Suddenly, Jiang Chen moved.
He didn't counterattack; instead... he let out a huge yawn.
"Ya—wn—"
With that yawn, an invisible purple ripple centered on Jiang Chen’s mouth and instantly spread out in a ring.
The electric net, which was certain to hit, seemed to encounter some incomprehensible spatial distortion the moment it touched the ripple. It actually automatically wove itself in mid-air into a... ball of yarn?
Yes, a round, soft metallic ball of yarn fell to the ground and even bounced twice.
The entire field fell deathly silent.
"What... just happened?"
"How did the electric net turn into a ball?"
Jiang Chen rubbed his eyes and looked at the mecha, saying in a ghostly tone, "Uncle, the quality of your net isn't great; it’s too elastic. Also, you guys are really disturbing my reminiscing of a beautiful dream."
"You're looking for death! Fire!" Chief Judge Soren sensed something was wrong. His holy sword erupted with a piercing white light—this was the Church’s forbidden technique: Holy Light Judgment!
A rain of light fell from the sky, each beam enough to pierce through solid steel.
Jiang Chen sighed, pulled the bedsheet draped over him upward, and covered his head.
"Since none of you want to let me rest properly, then..."
His hand, hidden under the bedsheet, lightly tapped the void.
[Skill: Sleepwalking Materialization · Absolute Silence Zone.]
In an instant, the sky full of Holy Light, the roar of the mechas, and the bellows of the villains all vanished.
The entire battlefield turned into an eerie silent film.
People discovered in horror that they had their mouths wide open but couldn't make a sound, and even the circulation of True Qi in their bodies became as slow as a crawling turtle.
And in this absolute silence, only the "patter, patter" sound of Jiang Chen walking toward Soren in his slippers was as clear as the footsteps of the Grim Reaper.
He walked up to this powerful Chief Judge, tilted his head to look him over, and then slowly raised his right hand.
"This slap is because your armor is too bright; it’s hurting my eyes."
Slap!
A slow-motion-like slap landed lightly on Soren’s sacred and inviolable face.