Step Back! Master is Here! - Chapter 51
Chapter 51: You Look More Resistant To Violence
These weren’t the times back when he had been journeying to the west and able to attack mindlessly, after all.
The reason why his attacks couldn’t kill the opponent was only that his damage output wasn’t high enough.
The current Tang Luo was still heavily injured. He had no choice but to be more careful and stricter in his budgeting. He needed to consider how he could dish out higher offensive power with his limited strength.
Such matters weren’t something that one could figure out just by staying in their room and exercising their imagination alone.
It must be established through practice.
Honestly, it actually wasn’t that easy to find targets.
The bronze-armored zombie next to him counted as one. Thus, Tang Luo used him as a practice target.
The results? Barely passable.
The corpse transporter shook the bell in his hand, forcefully again. Still, the bronze-armored zombie didn’t react in any way whatsoever.
The corpse transporter, who had kept his head slightly lowered all this time, lifted his head. A pair of fierce and ferocious eyes could vaguely be seen.
“Amitabha.” Tang Luo chanted Buddha’s name as an indication of his identity. “Benefactor, if you don’t need your eyes, you can donate them to people in need.”
He provided a little counseling.
The other party might just attain enlightenment on the spot, after all? Dreams must be kept alive.
The corpse transporter merely let out a laugh. He didn’t ring his bell anymore. “What did you do to my bronze-armored zombie?”
“Is Benefactor talking about this?” Tang Luo looked at the bronze-armored zombie. “This monk has released it from its misery.”
As he spoke, the bronze-armored zombie next to him suddenly disintegrated into dust and landed on the floor. It was practically as if it had been cremated.
The eyes of the corpse transporter widened. He couldn’t help but take a step back. He almost knocked into K, who was behind him and still shaking his head left and right.
The corpse transporter wouldn’t be surprised if anyone managed to damage the bronze-armored zombie. In fact, he wouldn’t be surprised even if it was cut or ripped apart.
Although the bronze-armored zombie was said to be impenetrable and resistant to the elements, it also depended on the raw materials and the skill of the person refining it.
The corpse transporter’s bronze-armored zombie was only impenetrable and resistant to the elements to a certain extent. But even if it was just a certain extent, it was impossible for someone to reduce it directly into dust.
It wasn’t as if it had been burned by scorching flames.
The other party had clearly only been engaged in a drawn-out fight with the bronze-armored zombie and looking for opportunities to smack it once in a while.
Was it even possible to produce such an effect just by smacking it with his palm?
Even the Iron Sand Palm[1] wasn’t this powerful.
“Monk, what’s that kungfu technique you’re using?” asked the corpse transporter. When he was worked up, his speech was no longer in bits and pieces.
“Gautama’s Palm Hit,” replied Tang Luo.
“Gautama’s Palm Hit…” mumbled the corpse transporter, seemingly wanting to store this kungfu technique that could reduce a bronze-armored zombie into dust fully in his memory.
“Well, I hope that Benefactor can last a little longer than that zombie.”
Tang Luo took a step forward.
A gust of chilly wind blew past them.
The moonlight suddenly dimmed dramatically. A thin black mist enveloped the atmosphere all of a sudden.
Tang Luo halted his footsteps and looked to the right.
The corpse transporter also looked in the same direction. Then, he immediately fell to his knees and knelt on the floor. He shouted, “I humbly welcome the Great Master!”
In the terminal, someone appeared together with the chilly wind.
It was a man with a face so pale that it was as though he had been soaked in water for three days and three nights. He held a kerosene lamp in his hand.
The man was dressed in cyan robes. A decorative pattern-like character was embroidered on the left of his chest.
To Employees of Gods and Demons who were auto-equipped with language fluency, they easily recognized it as the character Feng.
The Feng of Feng Village.
The black aura emanating from the corpse transporter’s severed stump of an arm was completely restrained now.
The pale-faced man ignored the corpse transporter. His line of vision shifted between K and Tang Luo constantly.
“Great Master?” The corpse transporter spoke cautiously.
“I want him,” replied the pale-faced man.
“Aye!”
The corpse transporter crawled over to K at once and absorbed some black aura from him.
At the same time, he secretly counted himself lucky that he hadn’t really made a move to make a zombie out of this man in front of him. Otherwise, he was probably going to end up becoming the soil of the Longevity Mushroom.
The corpse aura wreaking havoc in K’s body was extracted. K gradually recovered. His limbs still felt rather weak, but at least he wasn’t dizzy anymore. Since he wasn’t dizzy anymore, he could now see a pale-faced man standing in front of him and looking at him.
The look in his eyes caused goosebumps to rise all over K. Not from fear but from disgust.
There was joy, adoration, and delight in the pale-faced man’s eyes. One could tell just how satisfied and fond he was of K.
However, this fondness wasn’t the fondness between two people.
It was more like how a butcher would look at a fat pig that was awaiting slaughter in front of him while thinking that this particular pig was extremely well-proportioned, be it in terms of size or the ratio of muscle to fat.
It was the fondness from being able to profit greatly, whether he chose to sell it or eat it after slaughtering it.
K felt like he was precisely a pig that was awaiting slaughter in the pale-faced man’s eyes.
His teeth chattered uncontrollably. His mind was on the brink of breaking down. The limits were being tested madly.
He was clearly an Employee of Gods and Demons who had already gone through a few missions and struggled at the fringe of life and death to survive.
K didn’t understand why he was this fearful and frightened. His uncontrollable emotions surged like the tide and rammed against the dam of his rationality. His past encounters, experience, and build-up were all gone with the wind.
“S-spare me,” said K in a stuttering manner.
“Be good.” Smiling, the pale-faced man reached out and stroked K’s head, as if he was stroking his pet dog. “I won’t kill you.”
When he heard that, K’s entire body relaxed—he almost sprawled onto the floor.
“Won’t kill you”?
What beautiful words.
“But only one out of the two of you can live,” said the pale-faced man with a smile as he suddenly pointed at Tang Luo.
K’s immensely grateful expression froze.
What did that mean?
Only one of them could live.
Why would anyone ask such a thing?
Wasn’t this obvious?
“Me! Me! I’m willing to pledge allegiance to the Great Master!” K was practically bellowing.
It wasn’t as if the two of them were friends who were ready to die for each other anyway. They were just people who had been coincidentally grouped together for a mission.
K wouldn’t hesitate to kill everyone if it meant that he could live on, much less a situation like this where only one of them was allowed to live.
“Fantastic. Now that’s more like the soil that I’m looking for.” The pale-faced man said something which K didn’t understand. “In that case, get up and kill him. You’ll only be able to live if you kill him.”
Only the soil of sin and flowerpots manifested from various negative emotions could give birth to stronger and more unique Longevity Mushrooms.
Between these two outsiders, whoever was able to survive would qualify to become the Pot of the Living.
The one that died could only become a regular petri dish.
Only survivors had the right to live on. Becoming the Pot of the Living of the Longevity Mushrooms was a kindness bestowed by the Feng Clan.
“Alright, but right now, I’m…” K said hesitantly.
He was nowhere in good condition right now. Not only were his skills gone, but there wasn’t even any strength in his limbs.
‘Where am I supposed to get combat power from? That Xuanzang guy is no ordinary man.’
In a situation where he wasn’t launching a sneak attack, even if K had his skills with him, he wouldn’t be his match.
It wasn’t him that wasn’t working hard enough but that the enemy was too powerful.
“It’s alright, I can give you a little help.” The pale-faced man came across as someone very agreeable.
Then, he opened his mouth, widening it to the extent where it could fit an adult’s fist.
It was pitch-black inside. K actually couldn’t see his tongue or teeth.
When he took a close look, it was then that K realized that the black hole inside his mouth was moving.
It squeezed its way out bit by bit.
“Ugh!”
Together with the obvious retching, the pale-faced man spat something out of his mouth.
It was a mushroom. Or at least, it was a plant in the shape of a mushroom, or rather, a fungus?
K had never seen such a mushroom before. It was completely black in color. On the cap of the mushroom was multi-colored and indistinct iridescence.
“Eat it,” said the pale-faced man as he pointed at the corpse-mushroom, or Longevity Mushroom, that he had spat out.
“Huh?”
K was evidently stunned for a moment.
‘Eat it?’
“Hmm?” The gentle tone of the pale-faced man changed, and his intonation went up.
“I’ll eat it!”
K picked up the Longevity Mushroom and stuffed it into his mouth right away.
The corpse transporter at the side watched with a complex look comprising a hint of envy, as well as a hint of jealousy and sympathy in his eyes as K swallowed it whole.
K didn’t care whether the black mushroom was poisonous or not.
What he wanted was simply to survive the next few hours.
Once he got past it, he would truly be free.
After going through the initial treatment administered by the Gods and Demons, even if there were any residual effects, they would also be reduced and suppressed.
He could then use the medical science of the real world to solve the issue after that.
In the real world, K was rich and didn’t lack the money to seek medical treatment.
What he lacked was just the opportunity to survive.
“Go on.” The pale-faced man got up and looked at Tang Luo, who was standing at the side and watching the show. “You seem very confident?”
“Amitabha.” Tang Luo asked, “What makes Benefactor say that?”
“Yes, I’m even more certain now that you must have destroyed my setup,” replied the pale-faced man. His countenance suddenly turned savage. “Therefore! I can’t keep you alive!”
As he spoke, K got up and looked at Tang Luo. He said, “Monk, don’t blame me.”
“Not at all,” replied Tang Luo.
Sacrificing oneself for the sake of others and dying a hero’s death wasn’t something that just anyone could achieve after all.
It was but just the pain and agony of death. Was there a need to blame him?
“Then, I’ll send you to your Gautama Buddha now.”
K’s eyes were red.
The black mushroom he ate was converted into surging currents of power, which fluctuated throughout his body.
K could feel that he would probably explode if he didn’t vent this current of power soon.
“As long as you can really achieve it,” replied Tang Luo as he launched a palm strike through the air.
Gautama’s Palm Hit!
K, who had just gotten within ten meters of Tang Luo, was thrown backward.
He landed in front of the pale-faced man. His red eyes were widened, and the savage expression was still on his face.
Although his body was still intact, he was already thoroughly dead.
However, unlike Sun Ang, the aura of skills didn’t surface from K’s corpse.
The pale-faced man looked at Tang Luo. There was a rather strange look in his eyes.
“Which benefactor would like to be enlightened by this monk next?” A smile appeared on Tang Luo’s face.
Killing K didn’t give him much power of virtuous merits. He had only received a token amount.
Killing someone who wanted to kill him counted more as karmic retribution instead.
However, this wasn’t the same for the corpse transporter and the Feng Clan’s pale-faced man.
By enlightening these two, it would give him a substantial amount of power of virtuous merits for sure.
No matter what, it would definitely be of the +999 level.
“Great Master, let me do it!” said the corpse transporter ingratiatingly as he got up.
‘This is a rare opportun—’
“Excellent.”
Tang Luo appeared next to the corpse transporter and faced the side of his body to him. He didn’t even bother looking and hit him casually with his palm instead.
The corpse transporter’s chest sunk inward, and his upper body almost flattened into a sheet of paper. His body flew backward and hit against the bus, causing it to crash against the metal door.
As a few deafening booms resounded, the bus that was now a pile of scrap metal overturned and rolled past the collapsed metal door.
It produced ear-piercing sounds of friction on the road outside the metal door.
As for the corpse transporter, he had already broken into a few parts during the process of the crash.
Even the most skilled undertaker or person who sewed corpses back together couldn’t restore him back to what he was.
“He’s not as resistant as the bronze-armored zombie.” Tang Luo gave an accurate appraisal and looked at the pale-faced man. “You look like you’re more resistant to violence.”
With a punching bag that looked even newer and better now, he lost interest in all the old ones.
He was simply such a fickle man.
[1] A Chinese martial arts technique where one strikes against iron sand to strengthen one’s bones and body hardness
