<h4>Chapter 344 Openly Outmaneuvered</h4>


    “Even the Dark Guild too wants to invite Chu Xun to be their guest?!”


    The same thought shed through every single puzzled mind who was watching the live telecast from all across the world.


    But everyone knew full well that Chu Xun being a guest was nothing than amb being led to the ughter. Both the Holy Temple and the Dark Guild werepeting for the chance to be the ones to earn fame by ying the Devil.


    Chu Xun’s name had always been of great renown and his recent exploits had only made him more famous. Up until this day, hardly anyone on the face of the Earth failed to hear his name.


    And fame woulde to those who manage to kill him.


    “Master Karl,” the grin slowly faded from ude’s face, “I’m afraid the Devil has agreed toe to the Holy Temple.”


    Seeing his chance, Chu Xun remarked off-handedly, “Actually, I’m thinking I might enjoy it more by visiting the Dark Guild. Well, at least I don’t think they would treat their guests by shackling them.”


    Chu Xun gave his heavy manacles a shake for good measure.


    Karl beamed at that, revealing a neat row of white teeth. “Now, do you understand, ude? The Devil is having second thoughts about visiting the Holy Temple as a guest.”


    ude turned to Chu Xun, putting up as best a smile he could muster, “Surely you know that this is the most amicable way the Holy Temple treats guests like you, Chu Xun. One can safely expect that the Dark Guild’s shackles would be worse than our meteorite manacles now dangling off you.”


    Chu Xun threw an inquisitive look at Karl, “Really?”


    Caught by surprise, Karl hastily replied, “Naturally, for guests as unique as you, we have unique ways of ensuring hospitality.”


    Chu Xun gave a surly shake of his head, “I change my mind then.” He turned to ude, “Let’s go. I think I’m better off visiting the Holy Temple.”


    “Your intuition is failing you, Devil,” scoffed Jayce. “Do you think spurious folks like the Holy Temple will show you mercy?”


    “Don’t they worship the Sun God?” gasped Chu Xun with feigned ignorance, “They should practice mercy andpassion, honesty and candor.”


    Karl broke into roaringughter. “Aren’t you a foolish one, Chu Xun,” he added derisively, “You’re nothing but a joke if you hope for such phony trash like them to show youpassion.”


    “But they have been gentle and polite,” remarked Chu Xun doubtfully.


    “Wolves in sheep clothing. That’s what they are. Surely you know better than to believe crocodile’s tears, you naive fool,” said Karl.


    “Naive?!”


    Hearing him being described using “naive” almost had everyone who knew him dropped their jaws with disbelief and shock and even their eyeballs were nearly popping out.


    “The Devil of all people?! Naive?! He’s the most deceitful, most treacherous, most cunning, most shameless, and worst of all, the most duplicitous man out there!”


    Most of all were the people who harbored grudges towards Chu Xun – the Broken Souls Cult among them – who were already stomping their foot while cursing what a bumbling fool Karl is.


    With his smile all but faded, ude decided to no longer show any courtesy to the Dark Guild presbyters. Coldly, he hissed, “The Devil is a captive of the Holy Temple. We will never surrender him to you. So you’d better perish those thoughts.”


    Karl and Jayce drew closer menacingly and retorted with all pretense forgotten, “He destroyed our branch stronghold. That demands retribution from the Dark Guild.”


    “As if the Holy Temple has not suffered any losses ourselves,” scoffed ude, hardly budging an inch, “Our fortress was destroyed too.”


    “I see only one way to settle this dispute then:bat,” said Jayce.


    Chu Xun’s lips twisted into a devious grin. He did not even deign to hide his wicked smile and everyone from all of the world could see him.


    “Is this all Chu Xun’s ruse?! To incite both parties to fight each other while he escapes?”


    The ever-observant ude immediately caught Chu Xun’s expression. “If escaping while we fight is what you’re concocting, I’m afraid it’s rather too feeble a n,” said the Deputy Prte suddenly.


    “Heh heh heh,” Chu Xun giggled weakly. Stiffly, he muttered, “You’ve seen through it, eh?”


    But wait a minute, thought the people who knew him. “This is the Devil we’re talking about! He’d never reveal his emotions so openly!”


    “How funnily innocent you seem,” smirked Karl as well, “And you think we’d not notice?”


    “All right,” Chu Xun shrugged, “Since you’ve seen through my n, so deal with it yourselves. Am I to go to the Holy Temple or the Dark Guild?”


    Instead of waiting for an answer, he trotted to a rock and sat down.


    That left ude, Karl, and everyone else stunned.


    It took barely a split-second before they realized what happened! They had been openly outmaneuvered by him! Without even a single lie or trickery!


    It was true; Chu Xun hardly employed any tricks for he did not even need to.


    The Holy Temple and the Dark Guild, both symbols of demarcating prities and born nemeses of each other with irreconcble differences.


    No trickery or deception was needed. All it took was a little maneuvering and both parties now had to pick their own poison.


    But with the honor and reputation of the organizations they represent at stake, it was but a clear Hobson’s Choice – they could not back down from a fight.


    Sittingfortably on the rock, Chu Xun was rather enjoying the moment and it was all he could do to prevent chanting loudly, “Fight… Fight…”


    No matter how reluctant they were, both ude and Jayce and Karl knew full well that a fight was inevitable.


    “Come on,” prodded Chu Xun, “I’m waiting! I’m anxious!”


    “Waiting for what?!” Everyone watching the telecast was thinking, “Are you so anxious for your own death?!”


    ude’s eyes shed dangerously. He stepped closer to his sworn enemies, trying to talk them down, “Gentlemen, this is a gambit he’s ying on us. We must...”


    BOOM!


    A bright-scarlet ray of light shot at Karl; its heat was so great that the air began to warp and boil.


    Grunting angrily at the sudden attack, Karl quickly conjured a sheet of light that materialized before him.


    Crack!


    The red death ray prated through the sheet of light like a needle through cloth and struck Karl squarely, sending him careening away.


    It was so quick, and no one expected that ude, for all his politeness and manners before, wouldunch a sudden attack.


    Karl was quick to defend himself, but ude’s surprise attack came so suddenly and it hit him, his chest now a smoldering pulp of charred flesh.


    “Holy Temple filth,” snarled Jayce.


    Swoosh! Swoosh!


    Several dozen des wrought of winds shed furiously at ude.


    A strange, brilliant glow of red enveloped around ude and he flung out an arm, firing several rays of scarlet light in response.


    He pounced at Jayce, his entire self shining like a miniature sun as its fiery energy pulsed inside him before he fired a st of it at the presbyter of the Dark Guild.


    Jayce quickly conjured a shield of wind. But it was no use; the churning winds evaporated into nothingness before ude’s fiery energies before the st hit Jayce.


    Howling, the hit sted Jayce some distance away, leaving a trail of white fume from the wound on his chest with the acrid stench of burning flesh.


    Grinning wickedly, ude chased after his quarry. Only, out of nowhere, several scythes of wind came shing at him, forcing him to duck sideways.


    It was Jayce. He was weaker in powers than ude, but he possessed the special ability of wind maniption.


    Then Karl, who had earlier suffered a blow from ude, sprang to his feet and he charged, swinging his fists at ude.


    The wound on his chest was gone.


    Chu Xun, along with everyone watching the live telecast, immediately understood. Karl’s ability allows him to self-regenerate any wounds, an ability immensely useful for a warrior.


    Chu Xun watched with interest. How came these people with their special abilities? Were they born with such unique gifts or did they do something to acquire these abilitiester?


    Karl might look like a clumsy rhino, but his blows were furious and heavy, and with the gift of his self-generation, he attacked ude using his brute force.


    Jayce might be hurt, but still armed with his aerokinesis ability, he hurled more wind des at ude, sending them whistling dangerously through the air.


    These des of winds were so destructive that even they easily split the ground and pummel rocks into stones.


    It turned out to be a difficult conundrum for ude who was locked in a melee with Karl while maintaining constant vignce for any of Jayce’s attacks.


    “Jayce!” Chu Xun called suddenly.


    He pointed at the ten or so acolytes of the Holy Temple that came with ude.


    Jayce’s eyes shed withprehension and he conjured more wind des and sent them hurtling towards the acolytes.


    “ARGGGHH!”


    Unlike ude, the acolytes were lesser warriors who became truembs for ughter before Jayce’s unique ability.


    In just moments, three men died being reduced to minced meat.


    ude spun around with shock when he heard the cries. Seeing the deaths of his men filled him with more rage and his powers rose with greater intensity and the air began sizzling.


    Bang! Bang!


    Yet Karl was holding up on his own. Despite his weaker offensive capabilities, his unique self-regeneration gave him the edge he needed to continue fighting as any part injured would quickly heal.


    “Filthy trash of the Holy Temple, you’re gonna die,” hissed Karl, his eyes red with rancor and grudge for ude’s earlier deceit.


    Jayce carried on flinging more wind des at ude while sending more to attack what remained of the Holy Temple’s retinue.


    “ARRRGHHH!” more acolytes died horribly.


    Swish!


    Blood sprayed everywhere when one of the wind des lopped off the head of an acolyte and the head tumbled to the ground helplessly.


    Slosh! Slosh!


    Blood sprayed uncontrobly like a geyser. Being able to slice and destroy even the hardest of rocks, there was no doubt as to what the wind des could do to humans.


    One after another, the acolytes of the Holy Temple died being ughtered. Some fell with their limbs maimed, some died being quartered at the waist, but most perished by beheading, and everywhere on the floor, blood and dismembered limbsy strewn and scattered with morbid repugnance.


    In mere moments, none of the acolytes that made up ude’s retinue survived, with not even a proper corpse remaining.


    “You foul creatures! How dare you y the citizens of the Sun God! You’ll pay by suffering immtion that willst for thousands of years for this atrocity!”


    At the great hall of the Holy Temple headquarters, everyone there was watching the live broadcast too.


    “I’ll destroy you lot, Dark Guild!” snarled the High Prte, “I swear I’ll destroy you all!”


    “Holy Temple my eye,” said ament left by someone from the Dark Guild during the telecast, “They’re nothing more than a bunch of phony crooks. Mark my words: the day wille when the great hall of the Holy Temple is turned into a pigsty.”


    Meanwhile, ude’s battle against Jayce and Karl was reaching its climax.


    Bang!


    Karl was sent flying into the air by ude, spewing a trail of blood from his mouth.


    But ude looked nowhere near winning himself; the Deputy Prte looked no more the part, with his robes in tattered and blood-soaked and he had nearly died when one of Jayce’s wind des nearly struck his heart.


    At the same time, Chu Xun noticed something: Karl’s self-regeneration ability seemed to be faltering. While it had taken him only a split-second to heal, his wounds now require more time to fully recover.


    Even Jayce’s wind des were beginning to look as slow as a gentle breeze and he looked so pale and exhausted that he could barely conjure any more now.


    “Despicable scum, die!”


    With golden hair streaming in the wind like a roaring lion’s mane, ude summoned his powers and fired a st of energy as searing as the heat of the Sun at the group of acolytes from the Dark Guild in retaliation.


    That single attack killed more than half the men Karl and Jayce brought with them.


    Using this chance, Jayce furiously brought down another de of wind down on ude’s unprotected back, slicing mercilessly through his flesh with blood spurting like a broken dam. ude leaped sideways, but on his back was a long, horrible gash.


    So pale that he looked as if he was going to die, Jayce tried to conjure another wind de only for his magic to fizzle out like dying embers.


    Chu Xun recognized what he saw: overexertion. The use of special abilities is not without limits and it takes a heavy toll on one’s physical strength.


    Karl managed to mber to his feet, this time with his wounds fully healed. With his steps still wobbling, he charged at where ude copsed.


    If not for his darkplexion, he would have been as pale as Jayce.


    Karl lunged at ude, swinging a fist at his head while roaring, “DIE!”


    Swish!


    Karl’s fist halted before it made contact as his eyes traveled down, shaking with disbelief, and stared at a dark-red dagger protruding from his chest. Then he crumbled lifelessly to the ground, his head hanging limply from his shoulders.