It wasn’t just him. Zhou Dekun watched on dumbly. He had been very sure that the pill was real, and had never imagined that the events just now could occur. Everything Meng Hao said seemed perfectly reasonable.
“You… you!!” Chen Jiaxi’s mind spun so violently he almost couldn’t comprehend what was happening. He had been pushed into the ultimate corner by Meng Hao. If he didn’t consume the pill, then everyone would obviously suspect him.
“Fang Mu!!” he howled.
Suddenly, he threw the pill into his mouth. Immediately, streaks of blood snaked through his eyes, and blue veins bulged on his forehead. He looked like some sort of devilish fiend. Patriarch Violet Sieve hesitated for a moment when this happened, but didn’t move to interfere.
The ruddy-faced man sitting next to him also was shaken inwardly, yet did nothing.
“I’ve consumed it,” he howled glaring at Meng Hao. “Did you see, Fang Mu? I consumed the Primordial Heavenly Replenishing Pill!!”
“One, two, three…” said Meng Hao, his voice light. When he said the word “three,” three breaths had passed. Chen Jiaxi’s face suddenly changed. His body began to tremble, and his face distorted. He let out a blood-curdling scream, and then blood began to ooze out of his eyes, mouth and nose.
Immediately, all of the Cultivators present on the fifty-seventh mountain of the Black Sieve Sect burst into a commotion. Many of them shot to their feet, their eyes filled with astonishment.
Li Yiming’s vision began to grow dark, and his mind filled with a spinning roar that caused him to nearly lose consciousness.
Zhou Dekun gasped, his face filled with disbelief as he looked at Chen Jiaxi standing there, screaming miserably, blood dripping down his face.
Patriarch Violet Sieve’s pupils constricted, and then began to fill with fury. Next to him, the ruddy-faced old man frowned, and his eyes began to fill with displeasure.
Meng Hao stood there on the stage, continuing to count softly.
“Four, five, six….”
As Meng Hao counted, Chen Jiaxi fell to the ground, screaming shrilly. His body thrashed, and blood flew everywhere. His Qi passageways had reversed, and popping sounds could be heard ringing out from within his body. A mist of blood sprayed from his mouth, turning his red robe into a true garment of gore.
All of this was exactly as Meng Hao had described. Soon, the tenth breath would arrive, and Chen Jiaxi would die. However, the moment Meng Hao spoke the word nine, his body suddenly flickered forward. His right hand pressed down onto the top of wheezing Chen Jiaxi’s head.
Immediately, Chen Jiaxi’s screaming ceased. His body trembled, and his aura was feeble, but it seemed that his trip down the road of death had paused momentarily. From the look of it, though, he only had a few moments left before death found him.
“For the sake of Grandmaster Eternal Mountain, Fang Mu is going to save your life today,” said Meng Hao coolly. His face was as calm as ever. Therefore, no one knew that his heart was actually surging with waves of indescribable excitement.