Like the ti manipulator before him, now it was Ming Zhuo’s body that erupted into flas from within, instantly engulfing his entire body.
Even the sturdiest castle struggles to contain a crisis that breaks out from within. No matter how strong Ming Zhuo’s defenses, they were powerless against an attack erging from his own insides. Moreover, the location occupied by Xuanming Fire was precisely the wound that Ming Zhuo had been unable to heal for a long ti. The expansion of the flas ant a rapid enlargent of the wound.
Ming Zhuo let out a cry of extre agony, the dark red light that had been gathering strength in the palm of his hand dissipated, and his body was quickly charred by the flas. My spirit, like pouring gasoline, was fully invested, and it was no simple matter of intensifying the burn. Ming Zhuo’s body exploded on the spot, his soul utterly disintegrated and destroyed.
He seed to have been killed.
Ming Zhuo is not ; unable to continue living under the condition where both body and soul die simultaneously, his death was to be expected.
Unfortunately, if he could die that easily, I wouldn’t have had such a headache before the battle, unable to co up with a strategy to defeat Ming Zhuo.
Countless fragnts of his exploded body turned into phantoms, which, like snow lting under the sunshine, also dissolved and disappeared. In his place of death, the phantom of his body erged, and quickly condensed from phantom into reality.
He resurrected.
Not only that, but he was resurrected in an almost completely intact form. Although he had just repaired the wounds that I had inflicted on him, the Ming Zhuo that appeared before my eyes seed completely unscathed from the start. There was not the slightest heaviness in his breathing, and his spirit remained incredibly robust with no hint of depletion.
This was the Undying Body he had obtained by signing a contract with Naraku.
The only flaw was that I could still sense the Xuanming Fire inside him. This fla, like a curse entangled with his fate, was sothing he couldn’t rid himself of, even after dying once and resurrecting.
Naturally, if dying once or twice could rid him of it, he would have done so long ago.
"Zhuang Cheng—"
Having just resurrected, Ming Zhuo let out a roar filled with hatred and fury, but I had no intention of listening to whatever words of vengeance he would spout next, as I launched another attack from within him.
His own recovery, including the restoration of the seal over Xuanming Fire, had not reset the fire to its original strength. After being fueled by my spirit, Xuanming Fire had been amplified beyond what the initial seal could completely contain. While it could still be largely contained, there were sparks leaking out. This was enough for to maintain a connection with the blaze.
The flas consud Ming Zhuo’s body once again, but this ti it seed like he concentrated most of his strength within his body, not dying imdiately while also directing part of his power to the external world, shooting dark red beams towards .
At this mont, he found it difficult to focus on both, and if he concentrated exclusively on dealing with Xuanming Fire, the beams he fired could not capture . If his attention shifted to , Xuanming Fire would engulf him in an instant. I would also release the black sun "Eclipse" to attack, disrupting his internal and external equilibrium, eventually leading to him being devoured and killed by the flas.
In the blink of an eye, he had died four or five more tis. While swiftly moving and attacking, I observed his pattern of death and resurrection.
I had roughly figured out the secret of his Naraku Undying Body.
On the levels of cause and effect and fate, I could sense that all causality directly related to his death was being delayed by a mysterious force to a distant future at the very instant of its occurrence.
The "distant future" ntioned here is from the perspective of soone who has lived for less than twenty years; in reality, it is probably less than a decade. To other beings like Impermanence, this may seem like a fleeting mont. Although I am currently capable of intervening in causality, I am powerless against this mysterious phenonon.
This mysterious force had passed judgnt on Ming Zhuo’s fate—he would absolutely die at so point in the future, hence the conclusion that "Ming Zhuo definitely cannot die now" could be drawn.
Even if Ming Zhuo’s body and soul, and even his causality and fate, were all burned to nothingness, this mysterious power would reconstitute Ming Zhuo from a state of non-existence.
As for whether this reconstituted Ming Zhuo was the sa as the original, I was not sure. However, considering the existence of sothing like the True Spirit, even if the reconstituted Ming Zhuo had replicated mories, his consciousness itself was probably still the original Ming Zhuo.
In a sense, although the Naraku Undying Body carries a curse, it might also possess an aspect of "opportunity." It’s conceivable that not all entities like Impermanence could co back to life under the condition of total annihilation of body and soul, yet Ming Zhuo could die and resurrect over and over, which might beco a shortcut to "self-proving one’s True Spirit."
Though that may be the case, not everyone would want to attempt self-proving their True Spirit. At least for a normal person like , attempting to self-prove one’s True Spirit is akin to seeking one’s own death, which Yinyue has definitively negated as well.
Furthermore, the more frequent one’s deaths, the more the fact of ’death’ will accumulate on future ’Anniversaries of Doom’. All the Death Penalties owed now must be paid off in the future. For Ming Zhuo, who desires to overco this impending doom, it’s a terrifying situation that must be avoided at all costs.
So... what should be done next? While I focused my efforts on using the Xuanming Fire to kill Ming Zhuo, I also pondered on how to put an end to him once and for all.
Frankly speaking, by this ti, I had almost given up on the idea of "putting an end to Ming Zhuo" altogether.
I still don’t think the Naraku Undying Body is absolutely invulnerable, but the problem is I don’t have the wisdom or knowledge required to unravel it. As for the "brute force" approach, I had certainly considered it. Alas, the force determining Ming Zhuo’s demise isn’t sothing I can break through by re strength.
Dimly, I sensed that this force was closely connected to another dinsion. Perhaps that was Naraku, the so-called afterlife. In terms of scale, Naraku felt about the sa size as the Living World I inhabited. To destroy this mysterious force using brute force would require annihilating Naraku at its source.
In other words, without the power to destroy a planet, it would be impossible to kill Ming Zhuo.
If he can’t be killed, what about sealing him? A common strategy against Undying Body users is to force them into a state of eternal immobility, such as encasing them in concrete and throwing them into the Pacific Ocean... But Ming Zhuo is Impermanence, concrete won’t hold him; at the very least, sothing of white dwarf star material level would be needed. And I neither have white dwarf material nor do I know any Sealing Spells.
"Have you had enough?" Ming Zhuo coldly asked.
He seed to have given up on suppressing the Xuanming Fire within his body, starting to concentrate on how to find an opportunity to kill with his black and red rays during the gap between death and resurrection. Without the extra effort to aim, his attacks were continuously dodged by .
At this mont, we were at a stalemate; no matter how many tis I killed Ming Zhuo, he appeared no worse for wear. Yet if my offensive were interrupted and I got hit by the black and red rays once or twice, it would an an irreversible disaster for .
The battle had rely been greatly prolonged, as if I had set myself up, whenever I stopped was when I would et my end.
It was just like the tale of the Thousand and One Nights... To avoid being killed by the king, Shanlu Zude had to tell one fascinating story after another each night. Once she ran out of stories, the relentless blade would follow.
"Keep it up, Zhuang Cheng, keep it up! Why are you slowing down?" Ming Zhuo’s voice revealed a grim chill, "Are you starting to feel tired, to despair? Want to cheer you on?
"Don’t worry, I have plenty of patience. Kill a few more tis, show so more tricks! The cicada screams louder as it nears death, if you don’t make so noise now, you won’t have another chance!"
"Is that so?" I said, "Since you so desire it, I’ll oblige you."
"—Hmm?"
He seed to sense sothing was amiss.
I had figured it out.
I’ll admit it, I truly can’t unravel his Naraku Undying Body, neither intellectually nor by force.
If sothing can’t be unraveled, then I won’t bother unravelling it.
That’s not to say I’m surrendering; now, there is only victory on my mind, nothing else.
And as they say, "Where there’s a will, there’s a way," perhaps my desire for victory has called upon a miracle, as an ingeniously perfect strategy erged from within . After giving it so thought, I couldn’t help but admire my own idea. Worthy of indeed, to co up with such a flawless solution.
"You only have at most another ten years to live, right?" I said, "If that’s the case, I’ll just keep burning you to death. No matter how many tis you resurrect, I’ll keep burning you until you die of old age!"
"Eh?" Ming Zhuo was dumbfounded.
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