Chapter 462 — Duel of Arts in Thunder Mountain City
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 4
A woman in black rose upon the spider's body, her face veiled in black gauze, but from the skin that showed, her face must have been covered in toad-like poison lumps. She cried shrilly, "Mu Yingxue, I've come back! Get out here, you — today I'll have it out with you again!"
Shen Mu's interest was instantly roused; he came to the foot of the platform to watch the fight. Other adepts of Thunder Mountain City came surging over as well, surrounding the platform so tightly that not a drop could have leaked through.
One woman said excitedly, "The Poison Master is going to make her move!"
Another woman was just as thrilled. "It's been so long since we saw the Poison Master act! I hear that ever since she met the Dark Demon Cult Master of the Central Plains — himself a great master of the poison path — love first stirred in them, their eyes met, and there was an unspeakable romantic affair between them. After the Poison Master returned, her poison arts grew greatly, she advanced further still on the poison path, and entered a realm unfathomable to gods and ghosts! Who would dare match against her?"
"You don't recognize this woman? She is the great poison master of the True Heaven Palace, called Jade Cicada — one of the foremost figures on the poison path. She once contended with our Mu family's Poison Master for the title and lost. It was the Poison Master who ruined her face!"
...
Shen Mu blinked. How had he come to have an unspeakable romantic affair with Mu Yingxue?
He had only fought a poison duel with Mu Yingxue; each had poisoned the other into a wretched state, faces hideous, even deformed by poison. That was hardly romance — though mutual admiration, that you could call it.
"She did kiss me, though."
At the thought, the youth's heart pounded, and a strange feeling and emotion stirred in him. Then he suddenly started. "Oh no! My heart races, blood surges to my face, my cheeks flush, my breathing quickens and grows rough, and at the mere thought of her warm currents flow through my heart — can it be that the lovesickness poison Sister Mu gave me has taken effect? But this poison seems harmless enough. Mm, no need to take it to heart..."
He turned his thoughts to Ling Yuxiu, to Si Yunxiang, to He Yiyi, to other girls, and the warm current vanished at once.
"Seems the lovesickness poison isn't hard to handle after all," the youth said, calm and composed.
"Mu Yingxue, do you dare not show yourself?"
The black-clad woman on the platform, Jade Cicada, sneered. "You're not some little man — hiding your head and tucking your tail is not your style!"
Just then a light laugh came, and a green vine in the city grew with incredible speed, stretching out from a mansion at the city's heart. The vine grew thicker and thicker, coiling like a green dragon, swiftly putting out great leaves in midair and growing longer tendrils.
In but a moment the vine had grown three or four li, arriving above the platform.
Pop.
With a soft sound, the vine put forth a great flower bud that hung above the platform. The flower bloomed, and a girl whose skin rivaled snow leapt out from it. Before she landed, seeds on the platform sprouted and put forth branches, and another great flower bloomed.
Mu Yingxue stood on the flower's pistil, barefoot, wearing no shoes, never touching the ground, and laughed. "Jade Cicada, last time you lost to me, and you never even dissolved the lingering poison I left in you — so that your once delicate, lovely face is still covered in lumps to this day. Coming here this time, aren't you just delivering yourself to death?"
Jade Cicada laughed low. "Heh heh heh. Did you think I've made no progress all these years? Last time I lost to you and you ruined my face. In all my walking marriages since, what man has dared look me straight in the eye?"