Skinwalker Belle – Chapter 559 – Side Story: The World of Body Refinement

On the glazed tiles of the City Lord’s Manor, Lin Li sat with one leg tucked up, playing with a green plum she had scavenged from somewhere.

In the streets below, the bottoms of the pots had been scraped sparkling clean.

Thousands of refugees, clutching their rounded bellies, had gathered spontaneously outside the manor. They didn’t dare make a sound; instead, they knelt in unison on the ground, kowtowing repeatedly toward the white figure atop the highest point.

There were no unified slogans, only the dull thud of foreheads striking the bluestone slabs.

Invisible pure white specks of light drifted from the heads of these refugees, merging into Lin Li’s body.

Power of Faith.

Though it was as faint as a breeze that could be blown away, it was prized for its purity.

Lin Li took a bite of the green plum.

The sour, astringent juice exploded in her mouth.

Frowning, she tossed the remaining half of the fruit aside and leaped lightly from the roof, which was over ten meters high.

Her long dress fluttered; like a feather, she landed silently before a mother and daughter.

The woman was shedding tears while holding her resurrected daughter. Seeing Lin Li descend, she shuddered in fear and pulled her daughter down to kowtow.

“That’s enough.” Lin Li raised her hand, and an invisible force propped up their knees. “I’m not into that whole kneeling and worshipping thing.”

The woman was flustered, stammering, “Th-thank you, Divine Maiden, for saving our lives. I am Li Siniang, and this is my daughter, Er Ya. If not for you, we…”

Lin Li interrupted her.

“I saw an undried underground river dozens of miles outside the city. Why are the people here starving like this?”

She had observed from above; although this continent was barren, as long as one had hands and feet to dig channels and divert water, survival was possible.

Li Siniang’s eyes reddened, and tears began to fall patter-patter.

“Divine Maiden, you come from the heavens and do not know the suffering of the earth. It is one thing that the heavens don’t rain and the earth doesn’t grow grain, but even when things do grow, we cannot get them into our mouths.”

“Who stole them?” Lin Li’s voice was calm.

“The lords of the Yunshan Sect,” Li Siniang gritted her teeth, her eyes filled with fear and hatred. “They are Immortal Masters; a single punch from them can shatter the city gates. They say they need to refine their Qi-Blood, so they demand we hand over Blood-food every month. If we can’t provide grain, we must provide people.”

Lin Li’s gaze shifted slightly.

“Immortal Masters?”

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“Yes, they can scale walls and possess infinite strength. There used to be over ten thousand people in this city. Half starved to death, and of the remaining half, two thousand were captured by the Yunshan Sect to be used as medicinal catalysts.”

Lin Li asked no more.

She closed her eyes, and the terrifying Mental Strength of a Level 10 God instantly swept across the entire continent in a radial burst, centered on this frontier town.

There was no resistance.

This planet had no Spirit Energy, no magical elements, and no electromagnetic waves from technology.

There was only Qi-Blood.

Her Mental Strength swept over the Great River Mountains, over the prosperous capital, and through the deep forests.

Lin Li saw the rules of this world clearly.

The cultivators here did not absorb external Spirit Energy, nor did they merge with Crystals. Instead, they relied purely on pushing the physical body to its limits and tempering their Qi-Blood to achieve Physical Saintly Ascension.

Under this system, strength was everything.

As her Mental Strength continued to spread, Lin Li sensed several of the most powerful pillars of Qi-Blood atop a high mountain in the center of the continent.

Their Qi-Blood was like dragons, soaring toward the sky.

Converted to the Evolved being levels she was familiar with, these few individuals were roughly around the peak of Level 8.

In the eyes of mortals, they were indeed Immortal Masters capable of reaching the heavens, moving mountains, and filling seas.

She withdrew her Mental Strength.

Lin Li opened her eyes, a flash of extreme disgust crossing her iridescent pupils.

There was nothing wrong with cultivating the body. What was wrong was that these so-called “Immortal Masters,” in order to replenish the massive energy consumed by their martial arts, treated the common people as livestock and crops.

They didn’t farm themselves; they relied on exploiting the weak to fuel their own power.

Using people as catalysts, using people as Blood-food.

It reminded her of Azurewood City.

It reminded her of the stench-filled, wail-ridden Slave Market under Hu Lie’s command.

Pricing their own kind as resources and slaughtering them at will.

Truly disgusting.

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(Of course, I don’t count. I’m the Goddess who ended the Post-apocalypse, hmph o(￣ヘ￣o＃))

Lin Li had thought that since becoming a god and witnessing all sorts of upheavals, her state of mind had become as still as an ancient well. This time, she had torn through space simply wanting to wander around and treat it as a vacation.

She hadn’t expected to step right into a pile of filth the moment she landed.

“Mom, I’m scared,” Er Ya whispered, hiding behind Li Siniang and looking timidly at Lin Li.

Looking at the little girl she had just pulled back from the brink of death, the tension in Lin Li’s lips relaxed, revealing a very faint smile.

She reached out and rubbed Er Ya’s withered, yellow hair.

“Don’t be afraid,” Lin Li said softly. “From now on, no one will be able to steal your food.”

Li Siniang was stunned.

Just then, a dull vibration suddenly emanated from the earth.

On the distant horizon, clouds of yellow dust rose into the sky.

The refugees in the city had just eaten and hadn’t yet had time to digest. Hearing this commotion, their faces turned pale with terror, and they scrambled into the ruins along the streets.

“It’s the Yunshan Sect’s city patrol! They’re here!”

“Run! They’ve come to capture people!”

Screams and wails instantly shattered the peace that had just been established in the small town.

Lin Li remained standing still, looking toward the city gates.

Hundreds of black Scale-horses, each a size larger than an ordinary horse, were sweeping in like a black torrent.

Leading the charge was a burly man with a bare torso and knotted muscles. He carried a thick-backed horse-chopping saber, and the Qi-Blood surging through him was roughly equivalent to a Level 3 Evolved being.

Following at the heels of the man’s horse were several fellows crawling and stumbling.

They were the soldiers Lin Li had stripped naked and “rolled” out of the city earlier.

The soldier leader was now half-dead; though his severed wrist was bandaged, blood still seeped through. He pointed toward the city and screamed shrilly:

“Deacon Zhao! It’s that enchantress! She knows sorcery; she not only conjured a huge pot of white rice porridge out of thin air but also repaired the city walls!”

The burly man called Deacon Zhao pulled the reins.

The Scale-horse reared up, letting out a neigh.

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Looking at the renewed city walls and smelling the lingering scent of porridge in the streets, a greedy light erupted in his eyes.

“Conjured food? Repaired the walls?” Deacon Zhao licked his lips. “The Sect was just worrying that these mud-legs would all die off, leaving no one to farm for us. Capturing this enchantress and offering her to the Elders would definitely be a great achievement!”

He raised his saber, the blade pointing directly at the dazzling white figure in the center of the city.

“The Yunshan Sect is conducting business! Get out of the way, you rabble!”

Deacon Zhao roared, his voice like a great bell, shaking the broken tiles along the streets.

Hundreds of armored soldiers drew their blades and responded with a thunderous roar, charging into the city with murderous intent.

Li Siniang collapsed in terror, clutching her daughter tightly and closing her eyes in despair.

Lin Li looked at Deacon Zhao charging at the front, her expression unchanging.

She didn’t even lift a hand.

“Yunshan Sect, is it?”

Lin Li’s red lips parted slightly.

The moment the words left her mouth, the dozens of Scale-horses at the front felt as if they had hit an invisible wall.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The dull sounds of impact merged into one.

The horses’ bones shattered instantly. The riders were thrown forward by the massive inertia, slamming heavily onto the bluestone slabs and spraying blood.

Deacon Zhao reacted extremely quickly. The moment his horse hit the wall, he kicked off the horse’s back, launching himself into the air like a cannonball.

“You seek death!”

He roared, his Qi-Blood surging, and a strange dark-red hue appeared on the surface of his skin. The horse-chopping saber, carrying the force of a thousand pounds, hacked down violently toward the top of Lin Li’s head.

This single strike was enough to split a carriage in two.

Lin Li looked up, Deacon Zhao’s distorted face reflected in her black pupils.

“Too slow,” she commented indifferently.

In the next second, time seemed to freeze.

Deacon Zhao was frozen mid-air, maintaining his striking posture, his eyes filled with extreme terror.

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Lin Li didn’t use any Power of Rules; she simply used the spatial power inherited from the male Lin Fan to completely lock down the space within a hundred-meter radius.

Looking at the saber suspended above her head, a flash of ruthlessness crossed her eyes.

“Exploiting the weak, feeding on the blood of others, and doing so with such righteousness.”

Lin Li’s voice was soft, yet it reached Deacon Zhao’s ears clearly.

“You trash… no matter which world you’re from, you all wear the same disgusting face.”

As the words fell, a force too terrifying for words erupted from Lin Li.

It wasn’t Spirit Energy, nor was it Qi-Blood.

It was a pure, dimensional strike from a higher-dimensional being against a lower-dimensional one.

Crack!

The horse-chopping saber in Deacon Zhao’s hand shattered inch by inch, turning into a pile of iron scraps.

Next was his proud, powerful physical body.

There were no wounds, no splashing blood.

Deacon Zhao’s body, like a pencil drawing being erased, began to turn into void powder, starting from his fingertips.

“No—!”

He could only let out a shrill scream before he completely vanished into the air, leaving not even a trace of ash.

The hundreds of armored soldiers following behind him didn’t even have time to scream before they followed in Deacon Zhao’s footsteps, turning into flying ash simultaneously.

A light breeze blew through.

The street was clean.

Aside from the hundreds of masterless Scale-horses shivering in place, it was as if nothing had happened.

Li Siniang opened her eyes and looked at the empty street, completely stunned.

The refugees hiding in the city also poked their heads out, their mouths agape, forgetting even to breathe.

Hundreds of powerful Yunshan Sect warriors had just… vanished?