Chapter Ninety-One: The Great Summoning from Hell

The little bat deftly dodged the flick of Uncle Mao’s finger and waddled over to Uncle Ma’s ear on batlike feet, whispering, “Uncle, I sensed that this thing is no ordinary object, so I came to bring you reinforcements!”

“Yes. You took in the two of us, father and son, and we must repay your kindness,” said Carter, Te’s father.

It was the pair that I had guided to Uncle Mao’s house. Had it not been for Uncle Mao, Carter and his son would likely already have met their end.

Having been bound to crosses for baptism far too long, and with the Blood Emperor essence in Carter’s body drained away by Mikas, the two were in a frail state. If they were to encounter some powerful vengeful spirit again, would they not become nothing more than free instant recovery meals for it?

For these past few days, the two vampires had been staying at Uncle Mao’s house in their restored original forms. Unless one paid careful attention, their presence could not be sensed at all.

Most of the time they hung upside down on the wall to recuperate. Through tireless effort, Carter’s strength had only just recovered to the level of a near-duke. To step once more into the realm of the Blood Emperor would likely take several years.

“You’ve fallen into such a miserable state. What reinforcements could you possibly have?” Uncle Mao asked in confusion, looking at Carter perched on his left shoulder.

Hearing this, Carter folded his wings behind his back and struck the pose of a scholar as he said to Uncle Mao, “Ahem, Her Highness Lucy once suffered grievous injuries in a great war in another world. Before dying, she separated three treasures from her body: one was a shield used for defense and mingled with gentle offense, one was the Blood Sovereign Sword that shook the western world, and the last—most important of all to the blood race—was...” As he spoke, Carter deliberately drew out the suspense.

Uncle Mao was listening with rapt attention. Things split off from a supreme master like the Blood Sovereign, someone even higher than a Blood Emperor, were all priceless treasures.

Once one reached that sort of heaven-defying level, further breakthroughs hardly mattered anymore; what counted was whether the equipment in your hands was good or bad.

But Carter’s little tease abruptly broke his train of thought. Embarrassed and irritated, Uncle Mao grabbed Carter’s bat body and, with a tone that was half threatening and half playful, said, “Spit it out. Stop dragging it out. I hate it most when people beat around the bush!” Then he set Carter back on his shoulder.

Carter was frightened by Uncle Mao’s behavior, so he said in a conciliatory tone, “Boss, you pinched my backside just now. It really hurts. To keep you from smacking my rear again, I’ll tell you: it’s Her Highness Lucy Blood Sovereign’s supreme summoning art, The Summoning of Death—the infernal law of summoning that no being from any world can resist!”

When he finished, Carter once again folded his two wings behind his back. The sight of it was truly marvelous.

Uncle Mao clicked his tongue when he heard this and knocked Carter again. “You’re spouting nonsense. Do you really think those supreme treasures would ever fall to the likes of us?” After saying that, he lifted his head and continued watching the vast expanse of black cloud overhead.

At that moment, Te, who had been circling in the air, swooped down again and landed on Uncle Mao’s shoulder. He whispered, “Uncle, I’ll tell you the truth: my dad obtained, three thousand years ago in another dimension, the blood race’s purest inheritance of Her Highness Lucy’s summoning art before her death. Of course he’s going to bring reinforcements for you.”

When he finished, he proudly raised his tiny bat head, but, tragically, he received another flick from Uncle Mao’s finger.

“Not good, the sinister star has appeared! Hurry, everyone, take shelter in the tents!” Uncle Ma shouted.

At his words, thunder and lightning roared in all directions within the black cloud above. The workers below, seeing such a spectacle, knew at once that this was no ordinary thunder. They scattered in every direction, and even officials like Liu Chuanmin and Wang Fu were so frightened that they fled with the workers into the public tent thirty meters from the scene, leaving only Uncle Mao and Lianyu, Uncle Ma and Wang Sheng, the four of them, and, besides them, just the two great bats on Uncle Mao’s shoulder, each three or four times larger than an ordinary bat.

“Carter, what are you waiting for, for the sinister star to invite you to dinner? Use the summoning art already!” Uncle Mao roared, his voice clearly audible within a radius of five hundred meters.

Unfortunately, within those five hundred meters there was no one but them. Aside from their own people, the workers, and the two officials, perhaps only ghosts had heard it.

Hearing Uncle Mao’s roar, Carter knew this was the moment to act. Thus, in a blaze of crimson light, he spread his great wings, and a Western man rose proudly into the void five meters above the ground. Behind him, those pitch-black bat wings flapped once and then again, exuding overwhelming might. The murderous aura leaking from all around him sent the blood-red windbreaker on his body fluttering sharply.

“O ruler of hell, His Highness Caesar, please hear the call of the blood race upon the earth. Send your most capable aide and your fearless war general!”

High above, Carter chanted this incantation again and again in an ancient tongue, a language belonging only to the Smith family, the most ancient house in the history of the blood race.

The moment the summoning spell left Carter’s lips, everything astonishingly returned to an eerie stillness. Even the killing aura around him was covered by some mysterious pressure, and for an instant this invisible force and the black cloud in the sky locked in a standoff.

The thunder above could not strike the ground, and so could not harm Uncle Mao and the others. But hiding in this shell of a turtle was not the answer. So Lianyu stepped forward to Uncle Mao’s side and asked, “Uncle, this stalemate won’t do. If we don’t destroy the sinister star, none of us will survive!”

Just as Lianyu finished speaking, Uncle Mao was about to reply, but he only managed an awkward “Mm,” then painfully swallowed the words that followed. He pointed his finger behind Lianyu and fell silent, merely gazing at the black cloud overhead, shaking his head to show his helplessness.

I knew Uncle Mao was in anguish, because he understood that he lacked the power to duel with the evil deity. Faced with that demon, he had no chance of victory. He could not carry forward the Maoshan arts; he could only watch helplessly as his family’s fortunes declined.

But who knew what Uncle Mao was thinking at that moment? He was thinking of a sentence his master, the Heavenly Silkworm, had spoken before dying: “Jiu Ying, I have revealed too many heavenly secrets for the sake of the world; I fear I will not live past sixty. But from my night observation of the stars, I know that the Maoshan arts for subduing demons and exorcising evil will decline in your hands. If you wish to save South Mao, you must search for the fated one with three moles on the soles of his feet. He can restore the prestige of South Mao. As for who he is...”

Before the sentence could be finished, the Heavenly Silkworm passed into the next world, leaving only Uncle Mao there shouting and crying, “Master, at least tell me who he is! Couldn’t you have left a little later!”

A truly unfilial disciple, one might say, but at the time Uncle Mao was doing everything he could to find the fated person who would restore South Mao, so his emotional outburst can be understood as the heat of the moment causing him to speak recklessly.

At that moment, Lianyu slowly turned around and looked behind the direction Uncle Mao was pointing. In an instant, he covered his mouth in shock, his eyes widening, and stammered, “D... De... Death... god...!”

...