Chapter 4570 — A Plea for Help

"That damned Vermilion Bird actually did such a thing—this is beyond all forbearance! Once I recover my strength, the very first thing I'll do is tear it apart limb from limb and flay it alive!" The Ghost Thing was grinding his teeth in fury as well. As the former Azure Dragon, he had been the undisputed leader of the dragon clan, and now, hearing that such an important member of the clan as the Five-Venom Flood Dragon had died at the Vermilion Bird's poisonous hands, he wished he could go find the Vermilion Bird and fight it to the death right then and there.

The Five-Bane Dragon had been sunk in grief and rage, but at the Ghost Thing's words it suddenly froze, its eyes traveling up and down him in searching appraisal. It had been puzzling over the Ghost Thing's identity from the start, and judging by the tone of what he had just said—that even the Vermilion Bird could be dealt with at his peak—his origins were truly no small matter.

"Five-Bane boy, do you know who I am?" the Ghost Thing suddenly said to the Five-Bane Dragon.

"You... aren't you just some primordial spirit from the mortal world?" the Five-Bane Dragon said in surprise.

"A primordial spirit from the mortal world? Hmph—do you really think a place like the mortal world, where spiritual energy is so thin it might as well be nothing, would just spontaneously produce a lone primordial spirit?" The Ghost Thing snorted with a curl of his lip, then revealed himself: "I'll tell you the truth—I am that Azure Dragon Elder who vanished all those years ago!!!"

"What? You're the Azure Dragon Elder? How is that possible? Then how did you end up in this state?" The Five-Bane Dragon was thunderstruck. Even a being like its own master, the Five-Venom Flood Dragon, had never ultimately become the Azure Dragon Elder—though there had been reasons for that—and it had assumed the former Azure Dragon must have been a terror of the highest order among top-tier spirit beasts. How could he be a broken primordial spirit?

"It's not something a sentence or two can explain. To put it simply: I ended up like this because I went to the mortal world. I can only linger on like this, scraping by—otherwise, would I ever have let that damned Vermilion Bird run so rampant..." the Ghost Thing said with a bitter smile.

The Five-Bane Dragon was utterly stunned. Its pair of huge bronze-bell eyes swept over the Ghost Thing in disbelief. It had been only a few short sentences, but the inside story they revealed was enough to keep it digesting for quite a while.

After a long silence, the Five-Bane Dragon suddenly prostrated all five limbs on the ground and, in the manner unique to the dragon clan, bowed respectfully to the Ghost Thing: "The Five-Bane Dragon pays its respects to Senior Azure Dragon!"

Had it been anyone else, the Five-Bane Dragon would never have believed such a few scraps of words so easily—but it had dealt with him before in the mortal world, and more than that, it had sensed from the Ghost Thing that thread of senior-clansman's majesty.

The last time, in the mortal world, its strength had been lowly, and all the Five-Bane Dragon knew was that the other party was an existence far above its own. Beyond that it had been utterly in the dark. But this time it was already at the Earth-Opening stage, and at close range it could clearly sense that faint thread of ancient, primeval dragon-clan aura seeping from the Ghost Thing; even when he had been roused to anger just now, it had trembled at the force of it. There was only one explanation: this one before it, even if not the Azure Dragon Elder, must surely be a dragon-clan senior of profound lineage.

And if he was a dragon-clan senior, then his words naturally carried credibility—and besides, when it came down to it, the Ghost Thing had no need whatsoever to lie to it about such a thing. It would be utterly meaningless; after all, the Five-Bane Dragon was not going to truly obey his every word just because he was the former Azure Dragon Elder. At most it would show a little more respect.

"Get up. I am no longer the Azure Dragon Elder. If you call me 'Senior Azure Dragon,' people will take you for one of that damned Vermilion Bird's cronies." The Ghost Thing laughed with a sigh. "Just do as Wei Zhao here does and call me Senior Ghost!"

"Yes, Senior Ghost!" The Five-Bane Dragon hastily corrected itself, then glanced at Wei Zhao and could not resist asking, "Say, how did you two end up in this place? I'm a spirit beast with all five elements, so being teleported to the Five-Venom Swamp makes sense—but how did a human cultivator like you fall in here too? Don't tell me you're not actually human, but a spirit beast in disguise?"

Hearing this wildly imaginative conjecture, Wei Zhao, who had been sighing wordlessly a moment before, was suddenly amused. "You're an Earth-Opening stage existence now—can't you tell whether I'm human or a spirit beast?"

"I could have before, but isn't Senior Ghost here? Maybe he used some special method to completely hide any trace of you being a spirit beast?" The Five-Bane Dragon wagged its great head. Broken primordial spirit or not, it was plain that it held the Ghost Thing, the former Azure Dragon, in deep esteem.

"All right, then let me tell you with absolute and utter certainty: I am a human being!" Wei Zhao shook his head with a laugh. Seeing that the Five-Bane Dragon still looked baffled, he explained, "The reason I fell down here is that I was being hunted by a formidable evil cultivator from something called the Old Sect of the Western Mountain. With no other choice, I fled down here—this is the only place he doesn't dare follow. Anywhere else, I'd have been killed ten thousand times over by now."

"The Old Sect of the Western Mountain? Is this evil cultivator very strong?" the Five-Bane Dragon asked casually. Though such a one could not possibly be mentioned in the same breath as an Earth-Opening stage existence like itself, in its view Wei Zhao's strength was hardly weak either—and with the Ghost Thing helping him besides, no cultivator of ordinary caliber could have hounded him into such a sorry state.

"He's an evil-cultivator magnate at the Mountain-Cleaving stage. To you he's nothing at all, but to me he's a deadly thorn. I've been hiding in here for several months already, and the bastard still hasn't given up. He's even got people stationed up there watching to this day—the moment I go up, he'll know immediately. So I'm thoroughly trapped down here." Wei Zhao paused there, then looked at the Five-Bane Dragon, his eyes suddenly brightening. "That's right—if I go up and kill those two watchers, the Old Sect of the Western Mountain will come charging over at once. You could just take care of him for me, couldn't you? He's only a Mountain-Cleaving stage evil cultivator—should be child's play for you, no?"

"Naturally. What fucking evil-cultivator magnate would dare come swaggering before me? I'd slap him dead in a split second and wash him down with wine!" the Five-Bane Dragon said with a face full of pride—and this was no boast. With its present Earth-Opening stage strength, dealing with a mere Old Sect of the Western Mountain would truly be the work of a split second.

"Good, then I'll go up right now and kill those two bastards Li Yanji and Guan Zhiyuan, who are keeping watch up there. I happen to have a bit of an old grudge with them anyway. Once those two are dead, the Old Sect of the Western Mountain will be here in an instant—and after that, I'm leaving it to you." Wei Zhao made his decision on the spot.

By his nature he would never have troubled others, but this time he truly had no other way! (To be continued)