Chapter 1174: Goodbye, Emptiness

**Chapter 1174: Encountering Kongwang Again**

"Wow!! What an amazing trick!!"

"I thought this big brother had no skills... Turns out he only showed off his abilities after the wedding procession!"

"Are you kidding? They were together from the start; they must be from the same troupe!"

"But this doesn't seem like a lion dance... it looks a bit familiar?"

"This is Nuo opera, understand? It's for warding off sickness and disaster!"

"First a lion dance, then Nuo opera... Boss Pao only gave a small piece of gold; can it really achieve this effect?"

Chen Ling's sudden transformation caused the onlookers to burst into exclamations and stunned the other young men in the wedding procession. They had always thought Chen Ling was just an uninterested bystander, never imagining he had such a special skill hidden.

Sun Bumian stared blankly at Chen Ling's receding red and black theatrical robe, taking a long time to come back to his senses. He smiled with a sigh of emotion, then with an agile turn, he leaped to the front of the motorcade, swaying his head as he continued to lead the way amidst the cheers!

The Audi, with its hazard lights flashing, gradually drove away amidst the sound of firecrackers. When the awakened lion left, everyone turned back to look for the performer, only to find that he had disappeared without a trace.

In the deserted, dim alleyway, Kongwang's figure moved like a ghost. A black shadow streaked over his head. Kongwang's brow furrowed, and his tightly closed eyes, as if sensing something, slowly turned towards another direction.

Faint lightning flashed across the heavy, gloomy clouds. A pale bolt of lightning suddenly appeared, illuminating a figure wearing a grotesque Nuo mask and a red and black theatrical robe, staring at him from the end of the alley.

"'Nuo?'" Kongwang's voice was extremely low. "No wonder you can see me... In this era, there's actually a second 'Nuo'."

Chen Ling scrutinized him for a moment. "Kongwang... why are you here? Shouldn't you be hiding in the Ancient Ghost Dao Tomb?"

Hearing Chen Ling call out his name, Kongwang froze, his brows furrowing even deeper. "You know me... How is that possible? Besides that damned Auspicious Omen, no one can speak my name. Who exactly are you?"

Kongwang examined him carefully, a strange glimmer flashing from the cinnabar mark on his forehead. His tone was filled with confusion. "No... you shouldn't be here. You don't belong here."

"Oh?" Chen Ling's brow raised under his mask. "You can tell?"

Chen Ling indeed didn't belong to this era; he had entered it through a temporal archive... But he hadn't expected that Kongwang, standing before him, could see through his true nature at a glance. When he was in the Tianshu Domain, Chen Ling had fought Kongwang, but at that time, he had only regarded the other as a soul-reaping Ghost God Path practitioner. Now, however, it seemed that the secrets this guy held, or rather the secrets within the Ancient Ghost Dao Tomb, were far greater than he had imagined.

Kongwang didn't intend to answer Chen Ling, only speaking in a low voice, "No matter who you are, I don't know how you got here, but you'd best leave quickly..."

"Is that so?" Chen Ling sneered. A boning knife slid into his palm. As lightning streaked across the sky, its blade reflected a pale, chilling gleam, bone-piercingly cold. "What if... I refuse?"

Kongwang's face was as cold as frost. With a raise of his hand, several void chains swiftly shot out from the ground, coiling around Chen Ling's body like pythons! "Then I'll have to search your soul myself to find out what secrets are hidden there..."

Chen Ling looked down at the chains coiled around him and suddenly smiled. He casually grabbed one, and a strange shimmer flashed from his palm, instantly shattering several chains into fragments!

"'Soul Recall Art?!'" Kongwang exclaimed in shock. "How could you possibly know the Soul Recall Art?!" This was the first time Kongwang had shown such a loss of composure. It was common knowledge that the Soul Recall Art was exclusive to the Ghost God Path; only the six emissaries of the Ancient Ghost Dao Tomb knew how to use it... How could Chen Ling, an outsider, possess Ghost God Path abilities?

"Is it that strange?" Chen Ling spoke unhurriedly. Under the heavy, gloomy clouds, tendrils of red paper tentacles surged out from beneath the hem of his red and black theatrical robe, spreading outwards. "I know many more things."

The vast expanse of red paper instantly filled the entire alley, surging towards Kongwang. The current Chen Ling was no longer the Chen Ling from the Tianshu Domain era; enemies that required every effort to defeat back then seemed insignificant to him now. It became clear that even Kongwang had never encountered Calamity Force. As he fended off Chen Ling's attacks, he continuously retreated, his face extremely grim.

"Answer my question," Chen Ling said calmly again. "Why are the people from the Ancient Ghost Dao Tomb here... And why did you take that girl's life?"

"It's not that I wanted to take her life; she was already going to die. I merely took her soul while I was at it." Kongwang leaped, dodging all of Chen Ling's red paper attacks, and spoke in a low voice, "I know you are Nuo, but even if you can save one person's life, can you save everyone?"

Hearing the latter half of the sentence, Chen Ling frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Everyone here will die. Not even a Nuo can change that." Kongwang seemed to sense something, frowning as he glanced in another direction, his expression growing even more grim... "Since you all want to protect that girl so much, then her life will temporarily be yours... However, no matter how hard you try, the final outcome cannot be changed. This is the 'fate' of everyone here; it cannot be altered."

After speaking, Kongwang's form seemed to turn into a ghost, plunging directly into the earth. Moments later, his presence vanished completely.

Chen Ling frowned deeply, staring at the ground beneath his feet, his palm gently touching the surface, as if sensing something... "He actually vanished... How did he do that?" Chen Ling murmured to himself.

The next moment, Chen Ling seemed to sense something and looked up towards another direction. It was the direction Kongwang had looked in earlier. Dark clouds gathered, thunder rumbled and lightning flashed. Amidst the booming thunder, faint drumbeats seemed to emanate from the void... As a bolt of lightning illuminated the scene, a figure draped in a black theatrical robe, holding a black flag, slowly descended to the ground. A grotesque Nuo mask, similar to the one on Chen Ling's face, shimmered with an unusual glow under the lightning.

That was another Nuo.

Only then did Chen Ling realize that Kongwang's hasty escape wasn't solely because of him, but because Kongwang had sensed that the only two Nuo in this world were both approaching this location. The person, holding a flag in one hand and a bell in the other, slowly walked along the other side of the alley... Beneath the grotesque Nuo mask, Shen Nan's gaze was filled with immense confusion.

Two Nuo figures stood facing each other under the gloomy clouds. After a long moment, Shen Nan hesitantly opened his mouth and tentatively called out a name...

"...Chen Ling???"