Rebirth as a Demonic Cultivator: Starting with a Zombie Planet

Chapter 49: Secret Tattoo Sutra, Evil-Suppressing Tattoo!

A low, guttural roar tore from Huikong’s throat as his muscles swelled, straining against his monk’s robes. Beneath his skin, hidden golden dragon tattoos flared to life, peeling off his flesh to manifest in the physical world.

In an instant, phantom dragons soared above Cloud Mist Manor. Their divine roars and holy chants shook the very heavens, radiating a suffocating, pious majesty!

Tens of thousands of shrieking ghosts poured from Li Xuanming’s black banner, but before they could even near the battle monk, the golden dragons tore into them. The holy light radiating from the serpentine beasts was absolute poison to the spectral horde. Weaker spirits didn’t even need to be struck; the mere glow of the dragons incinerated them into ash.

In the blink of an eye, the demonic swarm was utterly annihilated.

A torrential downpour of golden light blanketed Cloud Mist Manor. Beneath its oppressive, righteous weight, Li Xuanming, Liu Zhenxiong, and Wu Teng choked. Their blood stagnated, their qi locked up, and their spiritual power ground to a halt. The holy radiance pressed down on them like a physical mountain.

Even Chu Xuan, lying flat against the cold tiles of a nearby roof, felt the circulation of his Blood Fiend Demon Refining Sutra grow sluggish.

Wu Teng’s face twisted in shock and fury, completely blind to the nature of this magic. But Li Xuanming, who had crossed paths with the bald donkeys of Jinlong Temple before, recognized the oppressive aura instantly.

“The Evil-Suppressing Tattoo?” he gasped, his voice trembling with disbelief. “You actually mastered that technique?!”

At the name, the blood drained from Liu Zhenxiong and Wu Teng’s faces.

The spells and sutras of Jinlong Temple were purpose-built to eradicate evil. Demonic Cultivators always fought them at a severe disadvantage. But the Evil-Suppressing Tattoo was something else entirely—a legendary art from the temple’s *Secret Tattoo Sutra*. It was notoriously difficult to learn, but once mastered, it granted the user overwhelming power, allowing them to slaughter enemies one or even two minor realms above their own.

In the entire Jinlong Temple, the monks who bore this tattoo could be counted on two hands.

And this hypocritical brute was one of them!

No wonder Huikong dared to face three Foundation Establishment cultivators alone. No wonder he arrogantly declared that none of them would leave alive. He had the power of the heavens backing him!

*Bzzzt!*

A pillar of golden light slammed into the black banner. The artifact let out a mournful, tearing shriek as its dark aura shattered, deep cracks webbing across its fabric.

Li Xuanming violently coughed up a mouthful of black blood. Forced to recall his weapon, he stared at it in absolute horror. This was his Natal Artifact, the Black Wind Banner. The tens of thousands of souls trapped within were the agonizingly extracted life forces of cultivators he had slaughtered. Yet, before Huikong’s holy light, they were nothing.

With his Natal Artifact severely damaged, what else could possibly stop this mad monk?

“Hahahaha! Is that all?” Huikong roared, his laughter booming with pious arrogance. “Bring out your Natal Artifacts! Unleash your demonic tricks! Let the Buddha’s light purify your wretched souls!”

He stood tall, utterly convinced of his divine invincibility.

Li Xuanming gritted his bloodstained teeth. “Do not hold back! Throw everything you have at him, or we die here!”

Liu Zhenxiong and Wu Teng didn’t hesitate.

Liu Zhenxiong summoned his Corpse Nurturing Tower. With a frantic point of his finger, a streak of black light shot forth, revealing a towering Corpse General he had painstakingly refined for years.

Huikong merely glanced at the rotting behemoth and sneered. “Pathetic. If it were a third-level Corpse General, I might have spared it a second glance. But a mere second-level abomination? Dust!”

Beside him, Wu Teng slammed a hand against his own shoulder. The flesh tore open, and a grotesque, bloated insect burrowed out. Aiming its rear at the monk, it fired a rapid volley of thumb-sized eggs. The eggs hatched mid-air, bursting into thousands of transparent, vicious little bugs that swarmed toward Huikong.

The monk’s sneer deepened. “Brain-Eating Insects? This is your grand trump card?”

“I’m not done!” Li Xuanming bellowed, hurling a pitch-black pearl into the sky.

The pearl detonated mid-air, unleashing a torrential wave of Yin Fiend energy that instantly swallowed Cloud Mist Manor. The corrosive black fog clashed violently against the holy golden light, clawing back just enough territory to free the three demonic cultivators from the suffocating suppression.

“A Yin Fiend Black Pearl? Impressive! You demons truly hoard the vilest of treasures!” Huikong laughed, his voice dripping with haughty disdain. “But did you really think my Evil-Suppressing Tattoo was this weak?”

Before Li Xuanming could react, the golden dragons spiraling in the sky erupted with blinding intensity!

The corrosive domain created by the Yin Fiend Black Pearl was shredded like wet paper.

Liu Zhenxiong’s second-level Corpse General had barely taken a step before the golden light washed over it. The undead monstrosity shrieked in agony as its flesh ignited, thick, putrid smoke billowing from its burning body. Seeing their chance, the three surviving Shenggang Sect cultivators surged forward, surrounding the burning corpse to hack it to pieces.

Meanwhile, Wu Teng’s Brain-Eating Insects—immune to the holy light—swarmed Huikong, but they couldn’t even breach the monk’s protective aura. Their tiny bodies piled up around his feet, yet not a single scratch marred Huikong’s bronze skin.

“Weak! Weak! Utterly pathetic!” Huikong roared in manic delight. His precept blade danced in his hands, carving through the swarm of Brain-Eating Insects with contemptuous ease.

Then, without warning, the blade tore through the air, hurtling straight for Wu Teng!

Caught completely off guard, Wu Teng barely managed to jerk his head aside. The blinding arc of the precept blade missed his neck but sheared cleanly through his right shoulder. His arm plummeted to the dirt. The bloated mother insect clinging to his severed limb was bisected in the same strike, its foul juices splattering across the ground.

That mother insect was Wu Teng’s Natal Gu. The moment it died, a catastrophic backlash slammed into his mind. It was as if a sledgehammer had crushed his skull. His eyes rolled back, and he collapsed to the ground, convulsing, unable to even scream.

“Perish, demon!” Huikong bellowed, his eyes wide with righteous bloodlust as he brought the precept blade down for the killing blow.

Li Xuanming and Liu Zhenxiong were pinned down. They could only watch helplessly as their comrade was about to be cleaved in two.

But in that split second, a dense surge of Yin Fiend energy erupted from the shadows.

A pitch-black chain whipped through the air like a striking viper, hurtling straight for the back of Huikong’s heart!

Sensing the icy grip of death, Huikong’s arrogant sneer vanished, replaced by sheer terror. Abandoning his execution of Wu Teng, he desperately summoned a golden alms bowl to shield his back.

*CRACK!*

The Fiend Soul Chain slammed into the holy artifact. It was like a hammer striking brittle glass. Deep fissures spiderwebbed across the golden bowl before it shattered entirely, the fragments blasting away into the night.

Without losing an ounce of momentum, the chain whipped forward and carved into Huikong’s chest.

Flesh tore. Bone cracked. A gruesome, jagged trench was ripped open from the monk’s left shoulder down to his right waist. Hot blood sprayed into the air!

More importantly, the brutal strike severed the intricate lines of the golden dragon tattoos etched into his skin. The suffocating holy light illuminating Cloud Mist Manor instantly flickered and dimmed.

His ego shattered and his life flashing before his eyes, Huikong scrambled backward, clutching his bleeding chest as he stared in horror at his attacker.

Li Xuanming and Liu Zhenxiong snapped their heads toward the shadows, their jaws dropping in absolute shock.

Stepping out from the darkness, cold and unbothered, was Chu Xuan.

“Chu Xuan?!” Liu Zhenxiong gasped.

He had assumed the young cultivator had long since fled at the sight of the Jinlong Temple monk. He never expected Chu Xuan to not only stay, but to deliver a crippling, precision strike that shattered the Evil-Suppressing Tattoo’s formation!

A strange gleam flickered in Li Xuanming’s eyes.

The Evil-Suppressing Tattoo was an overwhelming force, but it had one fatal flaw: it was physically inscribed on the flesh. If the skin was torn and the tattoo’s lines broken, the magic would collapse. Li Xuanming had known this weakness all along, but Huikong’s oppressive aura had made it impossible to get close enough to land a scratch.

Logically, Chu Xuan should have never even heard of the Evil-Suppressing Tattoo.

So how did he know exactly where to strike?