Chapter 2589: Counterattack The rainbow and golden light intertwined now and then, only for the chase to resume shortly after. It didn’t take long for Zu An to incur injuries. Emperor Jun was the future Celestial Emperor, after all. Even with just a sliver of his soul in a Golden Crow Prince’s body, he was still not an opponent Zu An could deal with. His only concern earlier had been that Xihe and Zu An would join forces against him, but in a 1-on-1, Zu An had no chance of turning the tables on him at all. “Don’t worry, I won’t let you die so easily. I’ll rip off your flesh bit by bit, and your soul shall eternally suffer in the Myriad Souls Banner!” Emperor Jun spat threats through clenched jaws while chasing after Zu An. He wanted to see Zu An suffer a mental breakdown. But Zu An didn’t show the slightest fear. Instead, he calmly replied, “You said such words earlier too, but I’m still prancing around here. As a Celestial Emperor, you need to do more than running your mouth.” Emperor Jun’s cheeks twitched. He'd wanted to erode Zu An’s willpower, but the latter had turned the tables on him. You have successfully trolled Emperor Jun for +600... +600... +600... He had no idea why he easily lost control of his emotions whenever he was dealing with Zu An. Someone of his level of cultivation was supposed to have far greater control over their emotions. However, a smile soon formed on his face. Zu An was fleeing toward the South Celestial Gate. Despite his calm exterior, he must be panicking inside to flee to the South Celestial Gate of all places. Did Xihe not tell him that Zhao Lingguan and the celestial soldiers stationed there are all my people? He couldn’t wait to see the look on Zu An’s face. However, when he saw Zu An’s appearance changing into that of his original body, his smile suddenly stiffened up. “What is that bastard up to? Who does he think he's fooling with such cheap tricks?” In the meantime, the two of them reached the South Celestial Gate. Zhao Lingguan and the celestial soldiers had long noticed the commotion and rushed over. Emperor Jun was just about to order Zhao Lingguan to take down Zu An when the latter beat him to it. “Zhao Lingguan, take down that unfilial son of mine right now!” Emperor Jun’s heart skipped a beat. He finally understood where the problem lay. He was currently taking the identity of the Golden Crow’s Tenth Prince. Very few people in the Celestial Court knew about him possessing the Golden Crow Ten Princes, and Zhao Lingguan clearly wasn’t one of them. “Your Majesty, what happened?” Zhao Lingguan and the other celestial guards were baffled. The Golden Crow Tenth Prince is trying to kill Emperor Jun? Did the sun rise from the wrong direction today? Putting aside how the father and son came to blows in the first place, shouldn’t Emperor Jun be one-sidedly teaching his son a lesson? How did Emperor Jun end up on the losing side against his son? Having guessed their thoughts, Zu An quickly replied, “He has gone berserk under someone’s influence. He assaulted me and Xihe in an attempt to refine us.” He tried to explain how ‘Emperor Jun’ was being put in a disadvantageous position against his son with a generic cover story. He didn’t dare to go into detail, as he didn’t know whether Zhao Lingguan knew about the Myriad Souls Banner or not. Emperor Jun was stunned. How can this bastard be so shameless? “Don’t listen to him, Zhao Lingguan! I am the real Emperor Jun!” Zhao Lingguan stared at the arguing duo in bewilderment. He couldn’t believe such a ridiculous thing could happen in the Celestial Court, especially with Emperor Jun. This Emperor Jun looks and feels like the real Emperor Jun, but for some reason, the Golden Crow Tenth Prince’s manner of speech feels inexplicably familiar. “Quickly send some men to my chamber to rescue Xihe. After being attacked by that unfilial son, she’s on the verge of death.” Zu An said. Through this ‘unwitting’ reminder, Zhao Lingguan suddenly remembered that Emperor Jun had carried Xihe into the Celestial Court via the South Celestial Gate earlier. That proved this Emperor Jun was the real one. This is my chance to prove myself. With a heart quivering with glee, he turned to the real Emperor Jun and roared, “Tenth Prince, how can you commit such an atrocious deed? You should surrender right away!” I must hold back against the Tenth Prince later. They are still father and son, after all. If they mend their relationship afterward, I’ll become the sinner instead. What I should do is capture the Tenth Prince alive and hand him over to Emperor Jun to mete out punishment. Emperor Jun was rendered speechless. “Zhao Lingguan, how can you be this dumb?” Zhao Lingguan was infuriated. “I shall apprehend you on His Majesty’s behalf!” He raised his axe, which instantaneously expanded to three thousand meters in length, and hacked it down on Emperor Jun. Even the Celestial Court’s sea of clouds was split into two before the overwhelming might of his axe. But this attack landed on empty air. Emperor Jun surged over to Zhao Lingguan’s side as a surge of golden light and spat, “Scram!” He sent Zhao Lingguan flying with a kick. Zhao Lingguan was speechless. I thought this would be an easy battle. When did the Tenth Prince become so powerful? However, he wasn’t about to be humiliated in front of his subordinates. With a furious roar, he charged at Emperor Jun with his massive axe. “Where do you think you’re going?!” Emperor Jun was rendered speechless. Zu An had already been in his grasp, only for this fellow to appear out of nowhere and tie him down. What made things even more frustrating was that he couldn’t tell Zhao Lingguan the truth! It was shocking news for a Celestial Emperor to possess his son’s body. Revealing the truth could solve the problem at hand, but there could be severe repercussions in the future. Left with no choice, Emperor Jun had to devote his attention to shaking off Zhao Lingguan. By the time he succeeded, Zu An was nowhere to be seen. “Where did he go? Did he return to the celestial palace?” Emperor Jun was about to head back when he suddenly felt a rush of anger. His gut feeling was telling him that Zu An was in another direction. So, he followed his gut feeling and eventually saw Zu An rushing down the sacred tree Jianmu. He burst into laughter. “I should have let Xihe witness your cowardice. Who could have thought you would abandon them and escape by yourself?” After everything that had happened, he didn’t want to waste any more time. He just wanted to kill Zu An and get this over with. Golden light beams erupted from his eyes. No matter how fast Zu An was, he couldn’t be faster than light. Much to Emperor Jun’s surprise, Zu An made no attempt to dodge the attack. Instead, he took out a formation plate and created a spatial rift in front of him. The golden light shot through the spatial rift and was diverted onto the sacred tree Jianmu. Emperor Jun was horrified. It finally dawned on him that Zu An wasn’t banking on Zhao Lingguan to defeat him. Zu An had merely been buying time to construct a teleportation formation here in order to use Jianmu’s divine runes against him! He would have nothing to fear if he was in his peak condition, but he only had a sliver of his soul here. In his current state, Jianmu’s divine runes were more than enough to pose a threat to him. Still, he wasn’t the Celestial Emperor for no reason. With a wave of his sleeves, he swiftly formed another spatial rift around Jianmu to divert his beams of golden light elsewhere. Zu An sighed. He hadn’t expected Emperor Jun to react so quickly. Emperor Jun secretly wiped away cold sweat before glaring at Zu An with cold eyes. “You are a scheming one. I nearly fell for your trick. There won’t be a second time.” The same trick wouldn’t work twice. Zu An was aware of that, but he chuckled nevertheless. “I know that you won’t attack Jianmu on your own accord anymore... but I can!” He emulated the Golden Crow’s sword ki using the Rune Weapon Chart and attacked Jianmu. At the same time, he used his position swap to exchange places with Emperor Jun. Emperor Jun sneered, “What’s the use of swapping positions? The divine runes don’t recognize the aggressor by their position, but...” His expression suddenly warped. He noticed that Zu An had reverted to his original form, which made him realize that Zu An had struck Jianmu in his appearance using his methods. He had no idea how Zu An’s disguise worked, but even Zhao Lingguan had been fooled by it. In other words, there was a chance that the divine runes could perceive him as the aggressor! “NO!” He was about to dodge when the divine runes lit up and devoured him with their terrifying light.