Chapter 9: Black Energy Stone

My name is Zuo Tao, an envoy of the Black Fall Cult to White City, carrying a special order from the Archbishop to deliver the God’s Stone to that lord. This will allow the Black God to descend upon White City, bringing the divine realm to White City, and we will be bathed in the divine light.

Although this mission is incredibly arduous, it is my glorious duty. For the Holy Cult! I cannot fail!

And now, I am only a few kilometers away from that lord. I am about to arrive, and I am very excited.

In the dim bushes, no one would know that a cultist was lurking here.

Su Xuan also didn’t know that on his daily running path, such a great crisis was hidden.

Slowly, the running Su Xuan entered the cultist’s sight.

“Is it someone from the Investigation Bureau?”

Zuo Tao, who was preparing to go to that certain lord, suddenly saw the running Su Xuan and stopped to observe.

“They’ve already tracked me here? Carrying a special iron blade, it must be them! Just one person? And his aura is so weak, is he new to the bureau? Heh heh heh, taking the head of an Investigation Bureau agent as a gift before going to see the lord wouldn’t be bad at all!”

After some deliberation, Zuo Tao looked evilly at the slowly approaching Su Xuan, like a hunter who had locked onto his prey, already calculating the time for a successful sneak attack.

Two dark darts appeared in his hand, and he flicked them with force.

“Swish swish…”

“What was that?”

Su Xuan suddenly heard a strange sound coming from the darkness ahead, as if something was about to drill out from within.

Suddenly, his heart trembled violently. Su Xuan rolled diagonally backward. A black dart flew out from the bushes at high speed and disappeared into the darkness.

Clearly, if Su Xuan hadn’t dodged in time just now, he would be the one lying on the ground.

“Heh heh heh… Little brat from the Investigation Bureau, you’ve got guts, daring to come find me alone…”

A disgusting voice sounded from within the bushes. The voice was like that of a person with a hoarse throat speaking with a stone in their mouth, making one feel very uncomfortable.

As the voice fell, a middle-aged man-like figure crawled out from the bushes.

“Investigation Bureau?”

Su Xuan silently recited this term in his heart. He had seen this term on his phone just yesterday. Unlike ordinary police, they were specially responsible for dealing with heretical cults. So this man who crawled out of the darkness was a cultist!

“A cultist?”

Su Xuan said with suspicion, while thinking of any possible way to escape.

“Heh heh heh, the Investigation Bureau only sent you alone? It seems they haven’t had enough people die yet! They haven’t learned their lesson at all.”

As his voice fell, the man charged towards Su Xuan’s position like a ghost.

Su Xuan quickly raised his blade, looking solemnly at the cultist rushing towards him.

‘Too fast, just like a ghost…’

Su Xuan was shocked in his heart.

“Thwack!”

Before he could react, his abdomen was hit hard. He felt as if his whole body was about to fall apart, and he was sent flying backward like a kite with a broken string.

When he was attacked, he held the blade tightly in his hand, not letting it fall. If the opponent got the blade, he would surely die.

‘The gap is too big…’

Su Xuan thought in despair. He couldn’t even capture his opponent’s movements. How could he fight him? At this speed, how could he possibly escape?

“Heh heh heh, little brat from the Investigation Bureau, I’ve killed no less than ten of your kind! Heh heh heh!”

Hearing the man’s crazed words, Su Xuan felt immense anger and sorrow, tightening his grip on the hilt of the blade.

“Come out~ Ah~, I just love to see that hateful expression on your face. Keep it, die with that wonderful expression. I will offer your beautiful face to the great lord!”

Zuo Tao’s ugly face contorted, making him look even more evil and disgusting.

“Hoo~~ Hoo~”

A sense of despair spread in his heart, like falling into a bottomless abyss, unable to see the light.

“What should I do! What should I do!”

Su Xuan whimpered helplessly in his heart.

“Call me… accept me…”

As if hearing Su Xuan’s despair, a voice suddenly appeared in Su Xuan’s mind.

“You…”

“I… Su Xuan’er, your Phantom Soul~”

Su Xuan immediately shouted her name loudly in his heart, “Su Xuan’er!”

A magical feeling rose in his body. A warm current full of life force filled his entire body. He only felt the energons in his body boiling, and an unparalleled power gradually filled Su Xuan’s entire body.

And Zuo Tao, who had witnessed Su Xuan’s series of changes, went crazy, constantly muttering to himself.

“What is this? The third form? A person who hasn’t even forged a blade, the third form? Master of Darkness, the all-knowing, immortal Black God, please tell me, what is going on! Why would something like this happen?”

“Hurry up… don’t daze out.”

Su Xuan’er’s voice sounded in his mind, carrying a trace of fatigue, as if she was about to fall asleep. Clearly, this state consumed a lot of her energy!

Su Xuan didn’t make a sound. His right leg retreated, forming a lunge. He held the blade in his right hand, his eyes slightly focused. Countless years, countless swings of the blade, were all fused into this one strike.

“Single Stroke Kill!”

The next moment, Su Xuan disappeared. A blue and white light shadow slashed past, and Su Xuan appeared behind Zuo Tao.

“Urgh, hah… what… are… you… ah… pfft!!”

The moon came out, hanging in the sky. Under the moonlight, on the straight line connecting him and Su Xuan, a spray of blood mist erupted. A person was cut in two and fell to the ground. A black metal block the size of a mahjong tile fell to the ground, making a gurgling sliding sound.

Su Xuan, standing with his blade, stood for a few seconds before the vast aura suddenly disappeared, along with the energons in his body.

Although he was very tired, he was extremely excited. Such a strong person was instantly killed by him. How strong was he in that state just now? It must be incredible!

“Phew… am I that strong? I’m that strong? Su Xuan’er, as long as I can always be this strong, I’m willing to cross-dress every day. I know you want me to cross-dress… Hmm? Not talking?”

At first, Su Xuan was so excited that he even said he would cross-dress all the time, but Su Xuan’er didn’t react at all. Coupled with the changes just now, Su Xuan panicked.

Su Xuan kept calling Su Xuan’er’s name in his heart, but still couldn’t get a response, which made Su Xuan very nervous.

His gaze fell on the black metal block. Su Xuan’er’s lack of response made Su Xuan feel as if he had lost his soul. He unconsciously approached the metal block.

He squatted down and picked it up. But as soon as he touched it, the thing was like water, merging into Su Xuan’s body and disappearing.

“?”

Su Xuan immediately snapped out of his dazed state and became flustered. Being suddenly drilled into by something from a heretical cult, probably not many people could remain calm.

Su Xuan thought for a moment, then quickly took out the phone locked in his pocket. But after thinking about it, he didn’t make any further moves. Instead, he looked around, and after finding no one, he immediately walked away.

Su Xuan had lived in this place for more than ten years. This mountain behind was definitely a surveillance blind spot. At most, the surveillance in the corridor or at the corner would have monitored him going out for a run in the morning. It was impossible to monitor him killing a cultist on the mountain.

Moreover, there was no punishment for killing a cultist. On the contrary, there would be a small reward. To avoid trouble, Su Xuan disappeared from the scene, which was very in line with the character of a city vigilante.

In fact, Su Xuan still didn’t want to contact the Investigation Bureau because many things were not easy to explain. Why could he defeat this powerful cultist, why was that thing instantly absorbed by him, and even, if they were interested, his Phantom Soul secret might not be kept.

So Su Xuan decided to go home and check himself first. If that didn’t work, he would go to the hospital for a check-up.

Soon, Su Xuan, taking advantage of the night, walked through the empty residential complex and returned home.

“Clang!”

The blade stood in the corner. Although he had killed a person with it, there was not a trace of blood on it. For the blade, was this killing like Zhu Bajie eating a ginseng fruit, without knowing the taste?

After amusing himself for a moment, Su Xuan turned on the bathroom light, stood in front of a large mirror, and checked his body from front to back. There were no marks at all except for the bruise on his abdomen.

He put on his clothes and picked up an energy stone to start absorbing.

“Su Xuan’er!”

“…”

There was no reaction at all, but he could see her sleeping in a void. He could control the energons to pass by her, taking away wisps of the light blue special substance. But compared to when she assisted him in cultivation, it was less than half.

Suddenly, Su Xuan discovered that there were some energons in his body that were different from the energons absorbed from the energy stone. After thinking for a moment, based on his perception, Su Xuan quickly determined that it was from the black metal block.

“Black metal block, energy… isn’t this a Black Energon Stone?”

Black Energon Stones were the special energy blocks that could create energy stones. This kind of thing could only be produced in the Land of Chaos and was a product of the Dark Abomination civilization. Humans could only obtain it, not create it, and could not absorb it directly.

And he had directly absorbed this special energy, so was the difference between him and others that big? He was indeed not an ordinary person.

Su Xuan used his consciousness to move those energons. The energons flowed slowly, much slower than ordinary energons. It was like water and oil. These Black Energon Stone energons were like oil, moving slowly.

When Su Xuan connected Su Xuan’er’s body with those energons, a strange change occurred.

A large portion of the Black Energon Stone energons rushed towards Su Xuan’er, entering her body and emitting a blue light. After a long time, they became like ordinary energons again, carrying a little bit of soul essence and seeping out of Su Xuan’er’s body, gathering together, without that sticky feeling.

It seemed that Su Xuan’er was like a converter. Those Black Energon Stone energons became like ordinary energons, carrying soul essence and returning to Su Xuan’s body.

This continued for several tens of minutes. The vast majority of the Black Energon Stone energons were “filtered” once and carried a huge amount of soul essence back into Su Xuan’s body.

“Mmm~”

Su Xuan’er frowned and let out a soft, seductive moan. When Su Xuan heard it, he was overjoyed. It was obvious that the “filtered” things were of great benefit to Su Xuan’er.

“Nice!”

Seeing that Su Xuan’er showed signs of reviving, the huge stone hanging in Su Xuan’s heart finally fell.

Although he hated the soul essence that turned him into a female, he really couldn’t blame her, especially since she had just saved his life.

There was still a small half of the metal block energons left. Su Xuan didn’t know whether to save it or what. Suddenly, an idea flashed in his mind.

“If Su Xuan’er can absorb the things in the metal block energons, then can that blade absorb them too?”

At this thought, Su Xuan quickly began to contact the crimson blade in the void.

When Su Xuan drew out that crimson blade and connected his consciousness to the blade and the Black Energon Stone energons, the Black Energon Stone energons also rushed towards the crimson blade like crazy.

A few minutes later, it actually carried out a small amount of soul essence, and the fluctuation shown by these soul essences was a yang fluctuation.

And that blade also became more and more crimson. Su Xuan suddenly had an absurd idea, a real guess about his Phantom Soul.

But none of that was as important as the yang-fluctuation soul essence. This was the important substance that maintained his male nature, a heaven-sent gift he had dreamed of!

Although it was much less than what was carried from Su Xuan’er’s body before, it was because there were not enough metal block energons. So this was extremely joyful news for Su Xuan. He had finally found a way to not become a woman.

“This is just the beginning. I can definitely become a real, normal man!”

Su Xuan raised his head and said to himself proudly.

However, who can say for sure what the future holds?

*TL Note: Black Energon Stone- A raw, unprocessed, and extremely powerful energy source. It is the key component for the Black Fall Cult’s ritual. Su Xuan stole four of them from the altar.