The Immortal Emperor Returns

Chapter 443 Queen Jiu You

Chu Xun could have never been more worried about Jiu You.

“Where did you hear this news from?” Chu Xun asked.

“What news?”

“That Queen Jiu You’s one of the Devil’s consorts?” Chu Xun muttered, feeling rather awkward to have those words coming from himself.

“She herself claimed it so.”

Brazen girl, Chu Xun thought with exasperation. How could she so flippantly make such claims?! Does she not realize the trouble that she could land herself in?!

What worried him the most was how the alien races would react when they hear this. Jiu You seemed to have no qualms to parade her relationship with him that even this silver-beaked eagle who came from far away had heard of her.

“Do you know where the Queen Jiu You is?” Chu Xun asked.

“A few days ago I heard that she killed an Eighth-grade Beast Lord of the alien races at Mount Ravencrow. It was originally a raven. I bet she’s still there now.”

“Go. Take me there,” said Chu Xun, badly worried for Jiu You. He would need to teach her a lesson for the troubles that she could have unwittingly wrought.

“Wait, you’re going to Queen Jiu You too? To pledge your fealty to her?!” the silver-beaked eagle gasped incredulously.

“Why, I am!” Chu Xun said.

“That’s a decision you won’t regret. Trust me,” remarked the eagle proudly.

Chu Xun gave no response, ignoring the shenanigans of the cowardly eagle and clambered up to its back.

Swoosh!

A jet-black shadow resembling a plume of dark clouds rocketed down from the sky aiming straight for Chu Xun like a fighter jet bearing down on its target.

Before the silver-beaked eagle could react, Chu Xun’s hand shot up, and with his magic, a gigantic fist shimmered into appearance and slammed down squarely on the ominous black shape.

Bang!

The fist swatted the black mass into the ground and the impact rocked the earth and kicked up rolling waves of dust everywhere.

A blood-curdling scream pierced the air.

Chu Xun and the eagle finally saw what it was: a giant three-meter-long woodpecker with a coat of black feathers. Tiny hook-like appendages grew all over its one-meter-long beak like the teeth of a saw.

The woodpecker gave a loud and shrill death rattle. Chu Xun’s blow had shattered every bone in its body and feathers were peeling off its bloodied skin.

“You dare ambush me? A mere Sixth-grade avian Beast Lord?” The silver-beaked eagle demanded imperiously when it saw that it was a black woodpecker, for one moment there, it looked really like the lord of the skies.

The silver-beaked eagle drew closer and peered down on the fallen bird with contempt.

“Impudent trash. How dare you ambush me! Are you seeking death?!” The eagle rapped on the woodpecker’s head with a talon.

Meow!

The ringing cry of a cat reverberated across the undergrowth.

The proud and smug eagle winced and its feathers ruffled up like a terrified chicken, trembling and shaking.

Chu Xun turned and looked around. There he saw, a big two-meter-long cat slinking back and forth on a huge boulder with a panther-like grace and poise.

It was a lynx. Not very large, but as ferocious as a tiger as its deep-almond eyes gleamed with strange malice.

The eagle recognized it instantly and shuddered. This was the very same beast that now lorded over every other animal here.

“How dare you hurt a scout of mine, eagle!” the lynx spoke in the human tongue. Its girth was nowhere near as large, but it scared the eagle half to death.

The scaredy coward immediately betrayed Chu Xun at the first sign of trouble. With an unmistakable point with its wings at Chu Xun, it yelped, “Not me! It was him!”

Chu Xun rolled his eyes—something that he rarely did—and thought if he should have killed this lousy bird in the first place.

“How dare you hurt a scout of mine, Human! Die!” the lynx roared fiercely.

Chu Xun shrugged helplessly, shaking his head, and muttered to the lynx, “Go while you still can. I am busy and I don’t like delays. So go while you still have the chance.”

The lynx stared dubiously at Chu Xun. It was a Ninth-grade Beast Lord and the ruler of all beasts in the area. Yet this human dare to sprout nonsense about sparing its life instead?!

It lunged. Whenever it moved, trails of brownish mirages resembling its fur coat shimmered in its wake. With speeds as quickly as lightning, it charged at Chu Xun.

Chu Xun shook his head and lifted a hand. A purplish silhouette of his hand appeared, but immensely larger and more gargantuan.

The lynx yelped with fright when the gigantic purplish fist appeared but it was too late; it ran too swiftly for it to stop, ramming facefirst into the hand that easily clenched its fingers around it.

Bang!

Chu Xun squeezed hard and the giant purplish hand squashed the lynx into a sickening eruption of blood and viscera.

The eagle peered at Chu Xun with terror, its eyes nearly the size of basketballs trembling as it shook from top to bottom and its feathers all ruffled up.

“Sir... I know... I know you’re powerful and invincible... There was no way that the puny cat could defeat you, that was why I said what I said just now..” the eagle pleaded sycophantically.

Chu Xun gazed at him and uttered, “I wonder if I should just kill you or roast you for a meal.”

“Big, big brother, I was wrong. I really knew I was wrong. Don’t kill me. My flesh really isn’t tasty. I still have to bring you to find Queen Jiu You. If you kill me, you can only walk.” The eagle was frightened. His enormous body trembled as if it was shivering.

On the inside, Chu Xun found it rather hilarious that a once-master of the skies could be just as obsequious as a sniveling rat.

“Well, I guess you’re right there,” said Chu Xun, leaping up to its back, “I’ll spare you for now only because I have a use for you. Now let’s go!”

“Sit tight, sir. It’s gonna be a very speedy ride. Please fasten your seat belt,” said the bird abjectly.

But it was true; the bird really could eclipse even fighter jets when it came to speed. All the way they traveled, they kept inside the clouds.

“Are you feeling thirsty, sir? There’s a river down below. We can go down for rest if you like,” said the silver-beaked eagle three hours later with the attentiveness of a butler.

“Just shut up and continue flying,” said Chu Xun, “You can rest all you like when we arrive at Ravencrow.”

The eagle knew better than to say another word and it flapped its wings earnestly.

Mount Ravencrow sat amongst a range of summits in the far north-east where it earned its name because it was once occupied by a raven mutant who set up camp there. The mutant was also a member of the Lost Races.

A lithe and petite figure perched at the precipice of a huge boulder at its peak with a dangerous-looking halberd of gold sticking up straight beside her.

Thump! Thump! Thump!

The earth shook as a behemothic white elephant rumbled over, peering at the little figure with respect.

“We are ready, my queen. Shall we ride for Wildfox Ridge now?” asked the white elephant.

The little girl whose ivory-fair complexion made her look like a doll opened her eyes which sparkled with rainbow shimmers.

It really was Jiu You.

She yanked her halberd from the ground and trotted barefooted off the boulder and leaped directly onto the elephant’s back.

The white elephant turned around and with Jiu You on its back, it came to a flat plain just outside Mount Ravencrow.

It really was a zoo.

Tigers more than three to four meters long, golden-maned lions with coats of copper-brown fur, giant apes the size of a hill, and several Tibetan Mastiffs that make the lions look like stunted cats loomed conspicuously amongst the wild horde of beasts.

The horde numbered almost thirty and all of them were Beast Lords, where half their number were higher-ranked than the rest.

“Queen Jiu You.”

The beasts all greeted her in polite salute the moment they saw her.

“Let’s go. We’re heading for Wildfox Ridge. We’ve brought a fox nest with us.” The great halberd of the Nine Serenities waved its hand in an awe-inspiring manner.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Riding on her white elephant, Jiu You led the charge with the rest of the horde behind her and the stampede shook the hills and mountains to their very foundation, leaving rolling waves of dust in their wake.

Wildfox Ridge, a hundred miles away from Mount Ravencrow, sat nestled right in the midst of a mountain range too and now served as a stronghold for a den of foxes.

Having just killed the raven Beast Lord at Mount Ravencrow, Jiu You exhibited a greater appetite for blood than Chu Xun by attacking Wildfox Ridge now.

The Beast Lords now fighting for Jiu You were all beasts of Earth whose strongholds had been taken by the Beast Lords of the alien races. With their homes occupied, they could only swear their allegiance to Jiu You for help.

She had been famous for the past six months. At least among all beasts on Earth, her prowess and fearlessness in battle were comparable to Chu Xun’s.

In just a year and a half, Jiu You had improved rapidly, leaping from Sixth-grade to Eighth-grade while gaining terrible offensive capabilities that allowed her to challenge warriors a grade or two beyond her rank – including Ninth-grade Human Kings or Beast Lords too.

Despite her youthful appearance, the Beast Lords truly admired her and swore to serve her faithfully, partly helped by her relationship with the Devil. They might not fully take her word that she was one of the Devil’s consorts, but they had little to doubt that she knew him personally.

For almost a year and a half the Devil had disappeared and rumors abounded every corner of the world, wondering if he still lived. Still, many were certain that Chu Xun still prevailed. It was hardly the first time the Devil had vanished for more than a decade before reemerging to keep everyone’s memories of his brutal ways fresh.

Who could tell? For all everyone knew, he could be hiding around somewhere, waiting to pounce on anyone unwary.

For this reason alone, despite the alien races’ clamorous catcalls and taunts at the forces of Chu Mansion, none of them dared to truly mount an attack on any of the Devil’s subjects.

Prior to his disappearance, a son of the Immortals had hatched a plot against the Devil’s parents and loved ones, only to be slain by the Devil instead.

Hence, the alien races all chose to just watch – and wait.

If only they could prove that the Devil’s really dead. That would allow them to mount full-scale assaults on every chapter of the Chu Mansion’s forces everywhere. But before they could, they would never dare to gamble so recklessly.

These ferocious beasts traveled fast and they arrived at Wildfox Ridge in good time.

“Bastards of the alien race, show yourself and surrender! The great and victorious Tiger is here!” the tiger Beast Lord threw back its head and roared, its voice resounding through the woods.

A few low-tiered fox Beast Lords were watching the entrance into the Ridge and they were about to demand answers from Jiu You and her underlings.

Roar!

The golden-maned lion gave a roar which turned out to be a soundwave attack with golden glittering ripples.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The sound wave easily blasted the low-tiered fox Beast Lords into pieces and their blood spattered on the ground.

The Lion’s Roar technique.

“Sorry, tiger. Turns out that I scared your best friends to death. Literally,” the golden-maned lion tilted its head and teased at the tiger beside it.

“Shuddup, will you?!” the tiger scowled at it sourly.

“They say foxes like to be lackeys to tigers (a Chinese folk adage),” said the golden-maned lion, who clearly still hadn’t had his fill of fun, “That makes you guys best friends, innit?”

“Screw yourself,” grimaced the tiger. Which idiot had coined that expression, for the love of Heavens! As if I could ever be friends with a bunch of foxy foxes!

Streaks of yellow lines rushed down the slopes of the Ridge.

They were large foxes more than four to five meters long. Their smooth copper-brown fur resembled silk.

These were all high-tiered Beast Lords.

“Queen Jiu You,” observed one of them when they saw her riding on the white elephant.

Jiu You stood up. She thrust her golden halberd at the fox who recognized her and called loudly, “Vacate Wildfox Ridge now or I’ll leave none alive.”

The foxes shared a quick look before bursting into laughter, their guffaws full of disdain and mockery.

“You’ve overstepped, Queen Jiu You,” said one of them.

“So what if I am?” Jiu You’s face stiffened with coldness. “This place was formerly a stronghold of a tiger Beast Lord, if memory serves. But you killed it and took this place, didn’t you?”

“That’s right. This mountain is indeed formerly the territory of a lousy cat. If you can call it a tiger, that is. And it lacked the intellect to understand that it should do as it was told and so we had to kill it.”

The lion gave the tiger a nudge and joked, “Hear that? The foxes killed a tiger and took its lair. All right, now I’m beginning to doubt that fox and tiger expression now.”

An air of anger and hatred radiated off the tiger as it glared at the foxes with a dangerous look. White steam escaped its nostrils as it glowered fiercely, “Worthless trash. I’ll rip them all one by one myself.”