Volume One, Chapter Eighty-Five: The Extraordinary Power of the Calabash Brothers

Chapter Eighty-Five: The Unrivaled Power of the Gourd Child

The Gourd Child patted his belly and muttered that the taste was mediocre, but he was quite stuffed. Tu Zhe wiped his forehead, momentarily at a loss for words. After eating all that, there was not the slightest adverse reaction? How many did he eat? Four or five perhaps? That’s hundreds of small worlds’ worth of power. Are you saying your stomach is bigger than your father’s?

Well then, you’re full? Time to digest.

Tu Zhe put on a stern face and said, “See that old serpent over there? Can you finish him off in one blow? If not, you won’t be eating the beans so casually from now on.”

The Gourd Child grew anxious, waving his little knife and shouting, “What’s the big deal? One blow, that’s all! I’ve never seen a parent like you, always wanting to skimp on your son’s meals!”

With that, he sprang from Tu Zhe’s embrace, swung his knife, and cried out in a childish voice, “Hey—!

Listen, you old mud eel! I, the Crown Prince, am about to finish you off. Have you washed your neck clean?”

Ti Tou Lai Zha regarded the Gourd Child coldly, not even inclined to respond. He thought, “I am a grand Emperor—how could my dignity allow me to converse with a mere primordial spirit?”

Seeing Ti Tou Lai Zha ignore him, the Gourd Child grew even more agitated, shouting, “Old mud eel, watch the blade—!”

In an instant, his little knife grew larger and longer. Unlike the previous massacre of the assassins, the blade now radiated a black light. Streams of black water, symbolizing the infinite troubles of the world, flowed across its surface and then merged into the blade. Next, it flashed a blood-red glow, as the fiery agony of all worldly suffering burned across the blade, instantly fusing within. Then, the blade shimmered with the light of decay and flourishing; cries of birth, death, success, and destruction echoed and merged into it. Finally, the blade revealed the six cycles of reincarnation: heaven, humanity, asura, beasts, hungry ghosts, hell—life eternally trapped, unable to escape. These visions of the suffering of samsara also fused into the blade.

The Gourd Child swung his blade.

All the turmoil, agony, mortality, and endless cycles—every negative emotion—roared within the silhouette of the blade as it cleaved toward Ti Tou Lai Zha, the monstrous dragon king.

Simultaneously, Ti Tou Lai Zha let out a thunderous roar. Power surged about him like wind and thunder. His dragon claws interlaced to form a celestial net, reaching for the shadow of the blade.

With that grasp, a thousand leagues of space were torn apart, waves thousands of feet tall evaporated, the dragon’s thunderous roar echoed, lightning shot from his eyes, his claws and the arts entwined upon them confronted the Gourd Child’s blade like a hurricane and thunderstorm.

A gasp!

The astonishment of billions of celestial beings was brief but intense.

They had witnessed Ti Tou Lai Zha’s power, and doubted whether the Gourd Child’s blade could withstand it.

Yet another gasp echoed across the Six Heavens of the Desire Realm.

Almost the instant Ti Tou Lai Zha’s dragon claws and mighty arts touched the blade, the expected fierce collision did not occur.

The Gourd Child’s blade, carrying an effortless air and supreme arrogance, descended upon Ti Tou Lai Zha’s head.

In a moment—no, even a moment cannot describe the swiftness of it. Twenty thoughts make a moment, twenty moments a snap of the fingers.

Is a moment fast?

It was merely a thought’s span—the blade, imperious and disdainful, cleaved directly into Ti Tou Lai Zha’s skull.

Yes, cleaved into his skull, straight to his consciousness and soul, yet his head bore no visible wound.

Still, within that single thought, Ti Tou Lai Zha let out a tragic howl. Black water of troubles flowed from his skull; fiery agony burst from his seven orifices; the boundless calamities of life and the suffering of the six cycles thundered through his consciousness and soul.

All within that single thought.

Not even a second passed.

Ti Tou Lai Zha, the monstrous dragon king—

Was reduced to nothingness.

Dead?

A formidable emperor of the Three Realms—the mighty, Mahā Naga clan’s great dragon king Ti Tou Lai Zha—died under the eyes of billions of celestial beings?

Slain in an instant by a primordial spirit, a plump little Gourd Child wearing only a bright red bellyband and nothing else?

No!

It was not merely an instant kill.

Moments ago, the Gourd Child had slaughtered a group of Yaksha saints, stabbing with his blade ten million times in a single second.

Yet, as for Ti Tou Lai Zha, the monstrous dragon king, it was but a single, seemingly casual stroke. Not even a second. Within a single thought, Ti Tou Lai Zha vanished, only managing to utter a brief, pitiful cry.

Billions of celestial beings, and the lords of the Six Heavens watching this duel, had no time to react—they saw only the blade’s flash.

With a single flash, everything ended.

Only the slain Ti Tou Lai Zha knew how he died.

The blade, embodying all the world’s troubles, sufferings, mortality, and cycles—those obsessions bypassed all defenses, cleaving straight into his consciousness, exploding within, reducing it to nothingness. The black waters of torment and the fires of agony, in that corrosive and burning instant, rendered his physical body void.

Yes—body and consciousness simultaneously dissolved into nothingness.

Only Tu Zhe understood this clearly. He half-closed his eyes, savoring the blade’s power. In his mind, the explosion, burning, and corrosion of the four obsessions replayed, conveying an immense, boundless force.

Tell me, among all sentient beings, who does not harbor obsessions?

As long as you cling to greed, ignorance, arrogance, or love, you can never escape the blade’s execution.

Sentience itself is poison; the blade is the catalyst.

The catalyst triggers every obsession, every negative emotion in a total eruption—who could survive?

Unless you’re so transcendent as to forget all emotion.

But what is transcendence, truly?

In all the Three Realms, none know what transcendence actually is.

It’s said to exist in the highest heavens of the North Pole—but have you seen it?

Now, almost all the billions of celestial beings in the Six Heavens of the Desire Realm forgot to cheer.

Not because Tu Zhe’s performance was undeserving—but because it was so astonishing that it left them speechless.

In other words, they were shaken to their core.

Indra sat in silence, lost in thought.

From the fall of dozens of saintly assassins from the “Enchanting Citadel,” to the death and destruction of Ti Tou Lai Zha, the monstrous dragon king—it all happened as swiftly as a meteor.

A storm, planned in the open and in secret, with forces enough to stir up a hurricane across the Three Realms. In the Six Heavens, any surface facing simultaneous attacks from these two powers would have struggled to withstand.

But what left the old emperor dumbfounded was that, whether Naga clan in the open, or the assassins of the “Enchanting Citadel” in secret, nearly all were wiped out by Tu Zhe alone. Only the powerless millions of Naga soldiers, Long Yi, and half the wounded saints remained.

From initial shock, anger, and unwillingness, to final terror, unease, and numbness, the old emperor suffered a torment of emotions. Yet he still had to face this outcome.

How could he bear it?