Chapter 113 — The White Fox
The Sword Questions the Heavens · Page 2 of 7
It was an animal that struck one as beautiful at a single glance, yet its bulk was so immense that unconsciously one felt a touch of dread as well. And in truth, this white fox was at this moment in a state of extreme agitation.
The once silent space of the altar was now filled with the white fox's mournful cries and shrill howls. The pair of deep black eyes set in its pale hide were now filled with madness as well.
The blue light grew ever brighter, and at some point a wind had begun to blow. Ming Li's robe flapped and snapped, and Little Grey was shrieking shrilly, baring its teeth and snarling at the white fox, putting on a ferocious display.
Suddenly a hiss rose in the white fox's throat, and it abruptly lifted its forelegs from the ground—it had reared up. Almost in time with its motion, Ming Li felt the ice around them blaze with blue light, and amid a rumbling roar two enormous blocks of ice, each fully three men tall, shifted through the air and came crashing savagely at Ming Li.
Ming Li's brows knitted tight; the azure light of Soul Devourer flared, bearing him and Little Grey swiftly backward. Almost at the very instant their figures vanished, the two great blocks of ice slammed into each other with a deafening crash and burst into fragments that scattered across the ground.
Before they could even come to a stop, every slab of ice on the third level of the altar that gave off blue ghost-light lit up at once. In an instant the uncanny demon power in that space surged, and countless blocks of ice, large and small, slowly floated up into the air, glittering and radiant—a sight of incomparable beauty and splendor.
Ming Li's frown deepened. This Nine-Tailed Celestial Fox was indeed of exceedingly powerful demonic might. Among all the spirits and strange beasts he had encountered over the years, save for inconceivable ancient titans like the Blackwater Mystic Serpent, this Nine-Tailed Celestial Fox before him was the strongest.
Yet for some reason, when his gaze passed through the countless ice blocks blazing with beautiful, bewitching blue light and settled upon that white figure—upon those eyes tinged with madness and deep, deep sorrow—a certain feeling he had not known for many years, like the figures of that pair of fox-demons who died for love in that year, began to linger in his heart. And try though he might, he could not bring himself to strike at this white fox.
But while he hesitated, the Nine-Tailed Celestial Fox on the other side gave a shrill howl, and in an instant the countless ice blocks floating in midair, as though commanded by some mysterious power, all came shrieking in at the speed of lightning.
Ming Li's face went cold. He reached out, gathered Little Grey to his chest, and at the same time rode the Soul Devourer demon-staff flying off to the side. For a time the air was full of flickering blue light, ice falling like rain, and the endless din of colliding blocks. In every lightning-flash instant, countless streaks of blue ice chased that single azure figure.
But the azure shadow was like a ghost, ever slipping through in the barest instant of space, weaving left and right, up and down through the rain of ice, evading that seemingly endless, layer upon layer of frozen rain.
The white fox's shrieks grew shriller still, though for some reason they seemed to lack a certain vigor beneath the fury. In the thick of the fight, the azure shadow suddenly flashed—Ming Li's figure had somehow passed through layer upon layer of ice and closed upon the white fox itself.