Chapter 195: An Unexpected Surprise...

  Hazel forced her way inside the empty home of Little Snow. Inside was a horrible mess that Hazel believed was made recently. Clothes, sheets, and furniture were strewn all over the place. If Hazel didn't know any better, she'd say Xia Cao's body was separated into pieces and hidden throughout the house. When Little Snow came home, she destroyed everything to find the missing parts and hightailed it out of here.

  This would play out in Hazel's favor because of one of her many friends she made over the past five years. Hazel picked up one of Little Snow's fallen panties on the floor and asked one of the infant demons inside her to track the scent. The small black creature with little sharp claws for hands and a pointy nose spread open her arm from the inside and crawled its way out. Blood, flesh, and bone were visible during this process but Hazel could feel nothing at all from it. Her demon spat on the opening in her arm and it rapidly closed back up without a trace before giving the underwear several sniffs.

  After doing its job correctly, it crawled up Hazel's arm and happily sprawled itself out on her shoulder. Demons couldn't speak human language but had their very own demon language. To a human, it would sound like evil gibberish apparently. Her master thought it did anyway. Hazel just thought it sounded like gibberish gibberish. Like a language that human babies would speak.

"Aka tiki baba!!!" It suddenly screamed as it pointed at the closet.

  Hazel didn't even take a second as she stabbed her demonic sword into the closet after being told that someone was inside. Yes, Hazel could speak demon now after having them live inside her like a hive of insects for five years. It was still wrapped in the cloth she placed over it five years ago but even with this, the sword wrapped in thick cloth was still able to pierce through the door and the hidden assassin behind it with her demonic qi. She felt it stab through flesh and heard someone groan from behind the door. A twisted smile slowly began to form on her face as she wondered who was hiding in the closet watching her.

  Could have it been a real assassin? She was just making a guess before but could it be true? Why else would someone this talented in hiding their presence be inside the house of Little Snow? If it wasn't for her demon spawn, she wouldn't have even known about them being inside there.

"You're a demonic cultivator...? From the Nine Swords Sect...?" It looks like he saw her little friend after all.

"I have a few questions for you assassin." Hazel pulled her sword out, with the tip covered in blood and opened the closet door.

  Her assassin held his stomach as he looked into Hazel's eyes. He wore a mask and outfit that hid everything about him but his eyes. Clear blue eyes that would be able to put any regular woman into a trance. As soon as she opened the door, he jumped forward to strike with his concealed sword. It looks like he wasn't going down so easily.

  Hazel blocked the strike with ease as the assassin attacked her with a lethal assault in his final moments. Black liquid oozed from his wounds because of her demonic sword. While Hazel would love to play with him as his life slowly drains from his body, she had questions she needed to be answered. So, she didn't go too far against him.

  With a casual swing of her covered sword after leaning back and avoiding a chop headed towards her neck, she swiped at his legs and tripped him. His weakening body condition allowed her to overpower him despite his high cultivation stage. But he was determined to give everything he had and refuse to answer her questions before he died. He even used his Qi Domain to try and kill her!

"I'm not going down without giving it my all. What would be the point of cultivating for so long only to die without a fight?" He has now placed his life on the line to kill her.

  Qi Domain was an exclusive technique available to every cultivator in and above the Core Stage. It released a bubble-shaped dome that changed the field to the user's advantage. The range would increase every stage and the only cost would be a majority of the user's qi. By vibrating the core created in the Core Preparation stage, the user's condensed qi would form outward into the bubble.

  Right now, this assassin's Qi Domain enveloped the entire house. The wind suddenly kicked up into a frenzy that blew Hazel's twisted hair strands into the air and robes all around. Her infant demon dug its claws into her so that it wouldn't be blown away and torn apart by the wind. It wasn't the first time Hazel was inside someone's Qi Domain as her master was very thoroughly in explaining the pros and cons of using Qi Domain.

  This innate technique for every Core stage cultivator was a do-or-die type of technique. Either your foe died during the Qi Domain or you'll die after your qi is all used up. A Core stage cultivator will be as vulnerable as a mortal after using Qi Domain but during it, it'll be like they've increased their strength twice or thrice times over! Overall, a very powerful but risky move only saved for when one is unable to escape from the blanket of death enclosing on top of them.

  There were only three methods for dealing with a Qi Domain. Kill the user, escape before it completely forms, or form your own Qi Domain as soon as your opponent does. Hazel didn't want to do the first one, as she had some questions for him. It was too late to escape the house and to form her own Qi Domain.

  By exerting himself so much in trying to kill her, he'll only aggravate his wounds even further and send himself even closer to death. After spending five years with her master, Hazel wasn't the only one to grow under her master. Her sword grew alongside her like a loving leech. It developed an interesting ability to infuse its demonic qi into the bodies of the things it cut. This demonic qi when improperly controlled by Hazel became a poison that wreaked havoc on the body of non-demonic beings. Anyone cut by her sword would experience a slow excruciating pain that would slowly increase the more time passed or whenever they received another cut. It wouldn't end unless Hazel forced her sword to stop it or they destroyed the sword. When properly controlled, they would slowly turn into a demon if they didn't have a strong soul.

"Does it hurt?" Hazel asked as a sharp blade of wind cut across her cheek, dripping blood from her face. She slowly walked towards him without protecting herself at all.

  She could see the pain on his face from how scrunched up it was. An angry grimace stared back at her as he turned up the wind an extra notch. Now it was like a miniature hurricane inside the house. Hazel's body was filled with cuts from the wind and crap flying around inside the Qi Domain. He didn't hold anything back as her left arm went flying in the wind after being severed from her torso.

"It's okay to be honest." She caressed his face with her remaining right arm. Right now, her body was filled with blood and injuries. "I'm surprised you can still stand right now but don't worry it'll be over soon." Hazel complimented him.

  Fear and terror began to settle into the assassin's heart. Why hasn't she tried to protect herself? She's just ignoring his Qi Domain with no care to her own safety. He would've loved to take advantage of this situation if it wasn't just so damn creepy! Here she was smiling and gently rubbing his face while she was being killed! And the pain in his organs was worsening every minute... It was enough to make him want to scream and cry out for his mother. But he was a respectable assassin, how could he lose his nerve to a little pain?

"Die already you crazy bitch..." The assassin stabbed the Corpse Collector through the gut as she held on to him.

  He assumed this was her last moments. By clinging onto him with her nails, she could inflict some lasting damage on him before passing on. Seconds passed, and her strong grip still hasn't weakened. Suddenly, he began to hear high-pitched cackling from her body that didn't resemble her voice in the slightest. Then, a sharp flash of pain struck him from the girl's poison.

"Agh!" He cried out.

"Achi-baba!"

"Achi-baba!"

"Achi-baba!"

  The demons chanted as they crawled out from the woman's cuts. As a human, his instinctual reaction was to free himself and flee as fast as possible but the corpse of the girl just wouldn't let go! He controlled his Qi Domain into cutting her remaining arm off as the black demons pounced at him.