This much was obvious. The reason A-Hu and the others had remained unharmed after being tainted by demonic energy was that their physical bodies and vitality were powerful enough. As for the hundred-odd clansmen who had been corrupted, they were all relatively the weakest among the group.
Once
Previously, Yang Kai had only meant to experiment, but he had never expected such excellent results.
It now seemed that if he were to cast the Bloodlust Technique on the clansmen at the moment the demonic energy surged, stimulating their blood and vital force, they should be able to resist the erosion of demonic energy altogether.
The barbarians understood far too little about demonic energy, and useful information was scarce.
When the demon folk invaded, all four tribes had been destroyed, not one of the four great tribes surviving, so naturally very little intelligence had made it out. Later, when the four Great Shamans took action, they had gone straight for the most powerful among the demon race, and the ensuing battle had ended in a stalemate.
Before departing the Royal City, Wutu had told the assembled Great Shamans to seek out the weaknesses of the demon folk during combat. Now, Yang Kai felt he had found a method to counter demonic energy.
The only drawback was that applying the Bloodlust Technique too many times would inevitably lead to premature aging, even in the sturdiest of clansmen. But at a moment when the very survival of their people hung in the balance, who could afford to worry about that?
As he turned the matter over in his mind, however, Yang Kai sensed something was off.
If raw vitality alone could resist the erosion of demonic energy, then there was no reason so many warriors had been converted into demonfolk when Fenglin City had been besieged by demonic energy all those years ago.
Warriors of later generations, despite most of them neglecting the cultivation of their physical bodies, had spent years nourishing their frames with the spiritual energy of heaven and earth. Their physical constitution should not have been significantly inferior to that of A-Hu and the others under his command.
Yet those warriors had possessed no ability whatsoever to withstand demonic energy. Every last one who had been tainted had been transformed into a demonfolk, a far cry from the performance of A-Hu and his group.
Of the three thousand men under his command, only a hundred-odd had failed to resist.
Could it be the laws of heaven and earth? This primordial world was at least a hundred thousand years removed from the later era, and the natural laws and tidal forces of the two epochs were entirely different.
Under different heavenly laws, the types of powerhouses that could be nurtured would differ as well. Just as he, an Emperor realm cultivator, found his strength utterly useless after arriving here, so too did the rules of this world reshape those who lived within them.
The barbarians made their home in this primordial world. Under the invisible yet omnipresent influence of its heavenly laws, they might well possess something that warriors of later generations did not. That would explain why they could use their blood and vital force alone to resist the erosion of demonic energy.
The more he considered it, the more likely this explanation seemed.
Having received Yang Kai's explanation, the dozen or so shamans all came to a sudden realization. Yu and Lu, in particular, showed respect toward Yang Kai for the very first time.
The two of them were the most talented shamans of the Southern Barbarian Division. Given enough time, reaching the Shaman King realm was no idle fantasy. And as elite graduates of the Shaman Temple, every technique they had studied and practiced was among the most formidable and profound shamanic arts and knowledge of their era.
Though Wutu had assigned them to serve under Yang Kai, the truth was that Yu and Lu had never felt this Shaman Bull was significantly more powerful than either of them. All along, the two had regarded Yang Kai as merely their equal, offering him no particular deference. In their minds, it was only a matter of time before they surpassed this Shaman Bull and reached heights he could never hope to attain.
But after what had just transpired, they discovered that not all powerful shamans hailed from the Shaman Temple — there were experts among the common folk as well.
Setting everything else aside, the Bloodlust Technique alone, conjured from will and thought with such fluid ease, had shocked them both. It was a feat neither could have accomplished on her own, not even working together.
And now, in an impossibly short span, he had found a way to cure the corrupted clansmen. That was something no ordinary shaman could have achieved — it required an extraordinarily broad perspective and an immense wellspring of knowledge as a foundation.
Yang Kai's inadvertent display had earned the twin sisters' genuine respect.
At the same time, under Yang Kai's direction, another hundred or so corrupted clansmen had been gathered together. Every one of them had darkened eyes, and though shamanic chains bound them tight, they still growled like wild beasts, baring their fangs at the surrounding clansmen and making everyone's hearts clench with unease.
Yang Kai waved his hand, and a crimson radiance washed over the group. A layer of bloody mist bloomed across the body of each corrupted clansman, and their pitch-black pupils slowly began to glow red.
Once their vitality had been stimulated, some of the clansmen quickly regained their senses, while others needed more time.
Continuously, streams of pitch-black demonic energy poured forth from their seven orifices. The dozen or more shamans worked in concert, unleashing their Purification Technique. Under its enveloping glow, every tendril of demonic energy was cleansed the instant it appeared.
Just as everyone watched with faces alight with hope, an accident occurred.
With a muffled boom, one of the corrupted clansmen suddenly suffered a catastrophic head wound, red and white matter spraying outward as his body crumpled to the ground.
Everyone cried out in shock, and Yang Kai's eyes narrowed.
It was not over. The fate that had befallen this man spread outward like wildfire.
Amid a series of booming detonations, over a dozen clansmen fell dead, one after another.