Chapter 62: Soul Devouring

Hua Sheng cried out internally in alarm! A sudden realization struck him: Xiao Qi’s personality was entirely different from Xiao Wu’s!

What would Xiao Qi choose?

Bound and exhausted, Shadow Slayer Xiao Qi looked fatigued. Perhaps the fire spell Hua Sheng had chanted earlier had conducted through that bizarre magical rope right to Xiao Qi’s neck, scorching a lock of her beautiful golden-brown hair.

Xiao Qi’s gaze was hazy, but when she saw Hua Sheng, a glimmer of light finally sparked in her pupils. She murmured softly, "Hua Sheng... Are you... alright?"

"I'm fine!" Hua Sheng hurriedly replied. "How are you..."

Shadow Slayer breathed with difficulty; the rope noose was tightened painfully. The wound on her shoulder began to seep blood once again.

Seeing her in such a frail state tore Hua Sheng’s heart apart. He tried to cautiously maneuver his chair toward the floating iron-bound circlet chain suspended in mid-air.

The white-robed man said, "The exciting moment of revealing the answer has arrived, and I shall take a life."

He walked up to Hua Sheng and said slowly, "Fortunately, that person is not you."

Hua Sheng glared back, staring fiercely at him.

The white-robed man seemed entirely unaware of Hua Sheng’s attempt to secretly retrieve the iron-bound circlet chain. He took two steps back and said with a satisfied tone, "One Western girl, one Eastern girl. Who shall be the sacrifice of this game?"

Then he thrust his right hand into the wide sleeve of his left robe. When he pulled it out, a dark green magic wand appeared in his hand. The wand was not straight, resembling a venomous snake winding forward. At the base of the wand, the head of a lizard with glowing green eyes was carved.

"The Soul-Eripper Wand!"

Jane screamed, seemingly recognizing the wand in the white-robed man’s hand.

"Where did you get that?! This is definitely not something from the European continent!"

The white-robed man replied, "Since you recognize this, you should know that a magnificent soul-devouring performance is about to take place right here."

Hearing this, Hua Sheng immediately understood this was an item capable of devouring souls. A deep sense of unease welled up within him.

"The one to be sacrificed is this girl called Shadow Slayer!"

Hua Sheng looked at Jane: "Did you also... vote for Shadow Slayer?"

The man laughed evilly, "No, Jane voted for you."

"Then Shadow Slayer didn't vote for someone else?" Hua Sheng found it hard to believe.

"She voted for herself," the white-robed man said. "This girl chose herself!"

"Why! Why!" Hua Sheng shouted toward Shadow Slayer, "Shadow Slayer! Why did you vote for yourself?"

Shadow Slayer raised her head slightly, revealing an exhausted yet tender smile.

"Because this lady could never... let you lose your life. This lady simply cannot."

"But... why would you do such a thing!"

The white-robed man paced slowly around Shadow Slayer: "Because once she voted for herself, she bore the greatest risk. Unless the rest of you all voted for yourselves, or all voted for you, there was no way you could die. She couldn't save you, but she could use her own life to increase the probability of you surviving."

With that, the man waved the Soul-Eripper Wand.

The man said, "So since she yields her life, I shall accept it."

One *luoyu*.

That amounted to a duration of one hundred and forty-four seconds.

Hua Sheng would never have imagined that mere moments later, these one hundred and forty-four seconds would bring him the greatest astonishment of his life thus far.

The white-robed man waved the Soul-Eripper Wand in his hand and pointed it at Shadow Slayer.

An ash-gray light immediately emanated from Shadow Slayer's body. That light flickered in the air like smoke and was reeled in by the wand.

Her eyes, which had still retained a faint glimmer of spirit, instantly lost their vitality, and her pupils began to dilate.

Immediately after, Shadow Slayer, along with the chair, floated into mid-air like a soul-less cloth doll.

"No! Stop it! Don't!" Hua Sheng roared at the white-robed man, "You bastard! Who on earth are you! Why are you killing people!"

He had told himself he must never lose Shadow Slayer; he had to protect this girl!

"Quickly as the law and lệnh command!"

Hua Sheng, chair and all, soared into the air, charging desperately toward the white-robed man ahead!

The man flicked the Soul-Eripper Wand, and a blast of dark energy struck Hua Sheng, whose hands were bound, knocking him heavily to the ground.

Hua Sheng wanted to use immortal arts to break free, but he feared making the situation even worse. Thus, he materialized a steel sword from the hand behind his back, using sword-flying techniques to thrust straight at the white-robed man.

With an incantation, the man deflected the sword while waving a hand toward the iron nails scattered on the ground from the broken wooden wall. Those nails instantly flew up, piercing Hua Sheng’s left thigh with lightning speed, and blood immediately gushed from his leg.

Disregarding his wounds, he leaped into the air once more, charging forward with his own body.

"Since you are so eager to die, your turn is next!"

The white-robed man warded off the charging Hua Sheng with his right hand while holding the Soul-Eripper Wand toward Shadow Slayer with his left. He watched as Shadow Qi’s eyes grew increasingly dim.

Yet at that very moment, Shadow Slayer, who had been on the verge of death, suddenly raised her head and opened her mouth. She looked as though she wanted to say something, yet no sound came out.

The very next instant, Hua Sheng felt a splitting pain as if his head were tearing apart, and a deafening ringing began to fill his ears before he plunged heavily back to the ground from mid-air.

Accompanied by the intense ringing in his ears, his vision instantly failed. Total darkness descended before him!

Everything happened too suddenly; he had no idea what had happened.

Struggling, he attempted to roll over and sit up, but failed after several tries. His body began to grow numb, and he could no longer feel the pain from the wound freshly cut into his leg. This numbness spread throughout his entire body, causing him to even lose his perception of gravity.

Hua Sheng felt as though he had become blind and deaf, floating in a void of nothingness, completely unable to perceive anything around him—just like a soul leaving the body after death.

Without a physical form, the only thing remaining was consciousness.

A sole self-consciousness floating in the void, capable only of thought.

Everything was so sudden, astonishing, and terrifying.

Hua Sheng did not know whether his own soul had also been extracted by the white-robed man. But he remembered with absolute certainty that all of this had begun the moment Shadow Slayer suddenly raised her head and uttered those words.

Those meaningless words without any sound. Perhaps they weren't even a sentence, but merely a single syllable.

The only thing that confirmed to Hua Sheng that he was not yet dead was the persistent, violent headache.

After what felt like a decade-long stretch of time, he finally began to see a tiny trace of light before his eyes.

The scene before Hua Sheng's eyes seemed dimmed, allowing him to perceive only vague, blurry shadows.

To his even greater astonishment, he discovered he was not the only one.

That white-robed man was clutching his ears just like him, his eyes appearing equally blinded. The man was brandishing the Soul-Eripper Wand wildly in the air, shouting incoherently. Regrettably, apart from the ringing in his ears, Hua Sheng could hear no sound at all.

When his vision recovered to about thirty percent, Hua Sheng saw the iron-bound circlet chain lying right beside his feet. Wanting to retrieve the golden-hoop staff, Hua Sheng hastily chanted: "Quickly as the law and command! As-you-wish Golden-Hoop Staff!"

To his surprise, the iron-bound circlet chain showed no reaction whatsoever. Looking closer, he saw that the fire burning in the center of the triangular iron-bound circlet chain had completely vanished! The "golden needle" floating within the pendant's flames was nowhere to be seen!

The circlet chain lay motionless on the ground, as dull and lifeless as an unwanted, out-of-season ornament abandoned in the corner of a warehouse.

It was as if the soul of the iron-bound circlet chain had also been extracted, leaving behind nothing more than a soulless magical "corpse" lying on the floor, impossible ever to awaken again.

Hua Sheng realized they were in dire peril.

With no time to ponder further, he cast a blurred glance toward Jane using his remaining faint peripheral vision.

The bound Jane wore the exact same expression as the white-robed man, struggling with a face full of terror.

Why had everyone lost their senses simultaneously?

What on earth had happened in this room!