Chapter 577 Trap

 "You mentioned you could track it?" asked the old man. 

"Yes, I can locate the main shadow," I replied. "And where is it now, I guess it's hiding among its many brethren outside…"

 "No, it's with us in the palace," I replied. The old man frowned. 

"It was only able to enter after altering the formation around the city and the palace. And since the rest of the shadows are senseless beasts they couldn't replicate it. But now, it can't leave since it needs to re-alter the formation again, and the moment it touches the formation it will be caught."

 "Then we'll just have to wait until it touches the formation…" 

"I don't have time for that. That thing had waited for millions of years, if it wanted to hide and wait, we have no guarantee we'll even catch it," I said. 

"So, junior brother, what do you suppose we should do? Do we split up and look for it separately?" he asked. 

"That's the worst idea I've heard in a while," I said.

The old man looked perplexed and slightly embarrassed, "I don't understand how is my idea that bad…"

 "The first time I met it, it was trying to kill you. And if we split up we'll just be two targets," I said.

"Well, I can probably take care of myself, I'm pretty strong," the old man smiled.

I sighed, "I know you're strong, but I'm not. Remember, it's your Heart Demon, poor ol me will just be a snack for it. Not to mention you were comatose when I found you, meaning he had already beaten you once," I replied.

"I never thought that my junior brother's mouth can be this sharp, but you're right, let's stay together, the only issue will be that it will take us longer to capture that thing," he said.

"Valid argument, but that's not an issue. I told you, he's trapped here, he can't leave," I said.

"That only stops him from leaving, this palace is gigantic," he said.

"Not when I'm here, look up, what do you see," I said as I pointed.

"The formation?"

"Exactly, it's a cage, a trap, but it can also be a net. I'm capable of controlling it, and adjusting its radius. You only have to do one thing," I said.

"What do you need me to do?" he asked.

"Once I start retracting the net, the monsters outside will assault the palace, I'm sure the golden stones will stop the bulk of them, but the formation was doing most of the work, you'll have to take down the bigger monsters, as for that shadow, once the net tightens enough on him, I'll be able to cage him like a bird," I said… however, that wasn't all that I said, I made sure to send him a divine sense message with a bit more information.

I needed the shadow to hear half our plan. And only half our plan.

The old man nodded and said, "Good, I like that idea."

***

"These fools think they can catch me, good, we'll see how you can do that…"

The shadow moved around the palace's roof surveying the surrounding. Many of its clones spread all over the area had perished to the old man, but it will take only time for them to come back.

After all the only thing they have here is time.

The shadow was enraged, enraged at the fact that his plan didn't work. As nothing but a mere Heart Demon, it cannot kill its creator directly. It needs to borrow other hands to do it.

The Heart Demon tried many times in creating situations for the old man to die, but nothing ever happened.

After all the only way for this heart demon to live is to possess the dead body of the original owner of that body. 

And he almost got things to work. All because of that new guy who seemed to be trapped in this banished world. Although the Shadow couldn't use the tunnels to leave this banished world, he was able to pull in people to this place who crossed nearby.

This guy seemed like a fool, he didn't have any Qi in him. With that knowledge, the shadow judged that it could control the boy and use him. After all the shadow was bored for the many years it lived and managed to understand some inscriptions, thus he formulated a plan and wanted to use the child.

The plan was simple, to use a faulty understanding of formation to kill the host, and once the old man dies, the shadow will take over and will be able to leave this damned place.

But now, that child ended up being far greater in formation-making than the shadow assumed, causing many years of waiting to go to waste.

But nothing is too ruined to cry over for now. The child mentioned using the formation to trap the shadow, it was a foolish idea because the shadow knew the formation left and right and could easily skip through the so-called net.

Not to mention, it would be a great idea to take over the child's body instead of the old man. After all that old man would be really hard to kill, and the mere fact that his cultivation level is so absurdly high makes his body almost impervious to possession. But the child, from their conversation, seems to be the junior brother of the old man.

And once the shadow possesses the junior brother, he'll have better chances and opportunities to kill the old man.

A good plan and all he needed to do was to apply it.

The child in the middle of the hall began moving his hands, and soon as he had mentioned, the whole formation began changing and moving, closing in like an actual net.

The shadow was impressed at first, after all, it's not easy to control such a formation, it took ages for the shadow just to gain access once inside it.

But now the child is moving it after just a few looks he took at it.

Good, the shadow would be happy with such a body and its knowledge.

Just as the net was closing in, the brethren began moving. Having the formation move away from the walls of the palace allowed them access to it and thus the old man had to split with the child and start a massacre.

The old man continued on fighting disregarding the child, and that gave the shadow a great opportunity to attack.

The child had mentioned that the shadow could only enter the formation and never leave. But in the many years the shadow had spent here, he had already managed to understand some of the formations and easily left the net, and now took a roundabout path as he fused with the ground and rushed toward the focused child.

The child's hands were raised up along with a brush that he used to control the formation, unaware of the shadow coming at him from the bottom. 

But just as the shadow approached and was under the child's feet, where he was about to ponce, he noticed something that shouldn't be there.

The child's lips were curled up, and the child's eyes were already looking at him.

"Gotcha!"