574: Chapter 574 A Blushing Face Under the Pear Blossom Tree

These words had been pressed deep in his throat, like a piece of red-hot iron.

He chewed on them repeatedly, during every sleepless night, and in every moment when his gaze met hers only to hurriedly look away.

He waited for a perfect moment—perhaps at twilight when the sun melted into gold, or on an afternoon of drizzling rain, when a breeze happened to lift her hair, and the world grew quiet, leaving only the sound of each other's heartbeats.

He wanted everything to be just right.

The phrasing had to be gentle and appropriate, the timing had to be precise.

Most importantly, he needed to gather enough courage to look directly into her eyes, to wait for the tomorrow when she would hear him without blushing and running away.

But time... time had cruelly abandoned him.

The Lord of Annihilation gave him no time. It did not even grant him a single moment of mercy.

When that sword, belonging to him, carried with it a strength both familiar and alien, cold and bone-chilling, and precisely pierced her chest, he felt as if he, too, had been skewered.

His consciousness was imprisoned in the deepest part of this shell—darker than an abyss, tighter than a cage.

He could not move, could not even blink; he was like an insect sealed in amber, like a corpse nailed inside a coffin.

He could only watch everything unfold helplessly.

He watched his own fingers—fingers that had once tucked her hair and wiped away her tears—tightly gripping the hilt, knuckles turning bone-white from the force.

He watched that cold, gleaming sword press against the soft fabric of her clothes, how it plunged in without resistance, and how it was stained crimson by the hot blood surging out.

He watched her face—the face that always smiled at him as brilliantly as the stars—how it shattered inch by inch: first, the confusion, as if she hadn't realized what had happened.

Then, the thunderous shock, her pupils shrinking to pinpricks.

Then, the trembling of disbelief, her lips slightly parted, wanting to call his name but unable to make a sound.

Finally, all intense emotions receded like a tide, leaving only a kind of nearly transparent, pure heartache.

This heartache was so deep that it pierced directly through his imprisoned Soul.

"Wufa, are you in pain?"

Her voice was very soft, like a feather drifting on the wind.

There was no questioning, no resentment, no fearful cries for help.

In the final moment as her life rapidly slipped away, what she cared about most was actually whether he was in pain.

His sword was still embedded in her heart, warm blood trickling down the fuller, drop by drop, blooming into shocking flowers on her plain-colored clothes.

Her life was rapidly withering away with these blood droplets, while he was trapped in absolute darkness and silence, unable to even wipe the bloodstains away for her.

In that abyss of consciousness, which no one could touch, he began to scream silently.

It was not a sound, but a shriek erupted as his Soul was roasted over a fire.

He felt himself slamming against the invisible barrier trapping him, time and time again, pouring out all the power of his will.

His vocal cords tore in the void, his throat filled with the metallic taste of blood.

The solid barrier was even cracked like a spiderweb by his desperate collisions.

But whenever a crack appeared, the Lord of Annihilation's viscous and majestic dark power would surge in like a raging tide, instantly filling and reinforcing the cracks, forging an even more despairing cage.

He could not get out.

He could do nothing.

He could only watch.

Watching the girl who, beneath the pear blossom tree, had blushed and twisted the hem of her clothes, whispering, "I will marry you in the future."

Watching the girl who, under the soft moonlight, had gazed at him with intoxicated, hazy eyes, refusing to look away for a long time.

Watching this girl who, until the very last second before her breath stopped, was still using all her remaining strength to care if he was in pain—dying by his sword.

Dying by his hands.

Dying by these hands of his, which were controlled, which had betrayed her, yet were powerless.

"Ah————!!"

Wufa's roar finally broke through the dual imprisonment of his shell and Soul, exploding between heaven and earth.

This was not a roar or bellow that a human could emit—it was a thunderous sound that could only be produced by mountains collapsing, the earth's core boiling, and stars shattering.

This was a wail and rage that had lost all humanity, squeezed out alive from the humblest dust of his Soul, from the crevices where every bone was crushed, and from the depths of flesh and blood soaked in pain and regret.

Boom——!!

The blazing purple lightning no longer swirled around his body, but erupted violently from every pore and every inch of his skin!

It did not spread outwards, but condensed into a pillar of light of astonishing diameter, piercing straight and arrogantly into the firmament!

Inside the pillar of light, purple lightning and golden serpents intertwined and hissed crazily, tearing the already dim sky into pieces, revealing the twisted and violent turbulence of the Void Realm behind it.

In the center of the light pillar, Wufa's figure was already blurred and distorted.

His black hair stood on end, with crackling thunder-fire sputtering from the tips; on his exposed skin, those ancient and profound thunder Dao patterns were completely ignited from their dim state, becoming incomparably bright, deep, and intricate, as if they had come alive—transforming into countless miniature, ferocious thunder Dragons, slithering, clashing, and roaring beneath his skin, as if wanting to break free from the shackles of this shell and destroy everything before him.

In the distance, Wutian was violently blown away by this suddenly erupting, terrifying wave of energy, his body rolling uncontrollably in the rocks and dust, his clothes torn to pieces, covered in cuts and bruises.

Yet he was completely unaware of the pain, trying his best to steady his gaze, staring fixedly at the figure in the center of the light pillar.

This was his younger brother, his closest kin with whom he shared a Bloodline. But what was emanating from his brother at this moment was a kind of madness and despair, bordering on self-destruction, that made his Soul tremble and his heart sink infinitely.

The Lord of Annihilation—this dark Incarnation formed from the purple-black mist, peeled away from within Wufa—at the instant this roar resounded, slightly... retreated half a step.

Half a step.

It was as subtle as an illusion, even more fleeting and harder to capture than the calculated retreat when the Thunder Spirit appeared earlier.

But it had truly, definitely happened.

Under the impact of Wufa's roar, which was filled with endless pain and the will to destroy, this ancient dark existence—its body showed a trace of an almost invisible, backward-leaning posture.

This was not a tactical evasion, not a strategic adjustment.

This was the most primitive—fear—erupting when faced with a certain extreme outburst that transcended understanding, branded deep within the Origin of life.

Although it was only for an instant.

The Lord of Annihilation was, after all, the Lord of Annihilation.

It had traversed endless years, personally experienced the Primordial World-Ending War, and watched the rise and fall of forbidden ferocious spirits.

It had seen existences far more terrifying and unspeakable than thunder.

And most of those existences had already been annihilated in the long river of time.

Only it had lived until now.

That ripple of fear, just as it arose, was completely smoothed over by deeper darkness and arrogance.

"Oh——?"

From the churning purple-black mist, the voice that emerged was deliberately drawn out, carrying a kind of lazy, intrigued mockery, as if watching prey struggle to death beneath its claws.

"Are you angry?"

It slightly tilted the "head" formed by the mist, its purple-black "eyes" looking up and down at Wufa, who was completely enveloped by the violent lightning.

In this gaze, there was no lingering fear, no caution or wariness—only a cold, viscous, naked mockery that seemed to seep into the deepest part of one's bone marrow.

"Let me guess..." Its tone was unhurried, yet every word stung like a poisonous needle into the Soul, "In your brain, which is now burnt out by anger, besides the crazy thought of destroying me... are you not still thinking about them?"

"Thinking about that little girl who is already cold? Thinking about your brother in the distance who was terrified by you? Or thinking about... everything else that is destined to be lost because of this weakness and incompetence of yours?"

It laughed softly, the mist churning, as if enjoying this tragedy that it had directed itself and was about to push to an even higher climax.