Chapter 44: Subjugation Through Force

Chapter 44: Beaten into Submission (Third Update)

Zhou Yu pondered for a moment, then stood up and walked out. He came to the mouth of the cliff cave and pushed open the door woven from wooden boards and dried grass. The door hinges let out a creaking sound as they turned, and Zhou Yu looked down.

Not looking would have been one thing, but looking gave him quite a start. He saw that down on the snow stood neatly two rows of colorful monkeys, every single one of them holding a golden staff in their hands. Adding them all up, there were actually twenty in total!

The golden staves flashed brilliantly, casting a dazzling glare in the sunlight and across the white snow.

"That is insanely badass!" Zhou Yu couldn't help shouting out.

Zhou Yu's shock caught Xiao Qing's attention. Xiao Qing walked over, supporting herself against the inner wall of the cave, and when she saw the swarm of colorful monkey clones down below, she too was startled. Covering her mouth, she let out a soft exclamation, "Won't he have to marry twenty wives in the future?"

Just as Zhou Yu and Xiao Qing were shouting about how perverted the colorful monkey was, the colorful monkey himself was lying rigid inside the cave, his face pale, his entire body twitching incessantly, and his teeth chattering loudly.

"Per-perverted your sister... I... I accidentally drained all my demonic energy," the colorful monkey said weakly in disjointed fragments. However, his voice was far too faint, and neither Zhou Yu nor Xiao Qing could hear him.

Because there was no one to command or control them, those twenty colorful monkey clones just stood there foolishly and neatly in the snow.

Zhou Yu and Xiao Qing watched from the cliff cave for a long time and noticed that something seemed amiss.

"Could it be that the monkey doesn't know how to command them?" Zhou Yu guessed, rubbing his nose.

But this guess was immediately dismissed by himself: "The colorful monkey loves to show off. Since this guy suddenly summoned twenty clones, there's no way he wouldn't flaunt them."

As he spoke, Zhou Yu turned back to look at Xiao Qing and said, "Stay here, I'll go down and take a look."

Xiao Qing nodded obediently and let out a soft "Mn."

Feeling a bit uneasy, Zhou Yu formed the clone seal and created two clones to protect Xiao Qing, then leaped down from the cliff cave.

While still mid-air, he heard Xiao Qing let out a gasp of surprise.

"Ah? How come you can conjure up so many too? Won't you also have to marry a lot of wives in the future?"

Hearing this, Zhou Yu felt as though he had been struck by lightning. He plummeted headfirst and drove straight into the snowdrift.

Lying in the cave, the colorful monkey saw Zhou Yu plunge into the snow and couldn't help letting out a "hehe" chuckle. But after a few laughs, it sounded worse than crying.

"He... even his mouth is having spasms..."

Zhou Yu crawled out from the snow and walked over to the clones, looking them up and down. He saw that the clones stood motionless, just like puppets. Zhou Yu even poked one of them.

"Strange, how strange. Why don't these clones move at all? Could it be that the colorful monkey made these puppets overnight just to give me a huge fright? No, I have to test this out."

Zhou Yu clicked his tongue in wonder, then raised his fist and smashed it toward one of the clones.

With a "bang," the clone dissipated into nothingness.

"They really are clones!" Zhou Yu exclaimed in surprise.

Inside the cave, the colorful monkey wore a suffocated expression, feeling a pang of deep heartache: *Monkey brother here suffered such a huge ordeal, and you brat just shattered one of mine!*

After his initial surprise, Zhou Yu threw another punch at a second clone, muttering, "These clones can only stand and not move, what use are they keeping around?"

Throwing punches in succession, Zhou Yu shattered five of them.

The colorful monkey's heart was bleeding!

Having shattered five of them, Zhou Yu grew bored, stopped, and walked to one side.

The colorful monkey let out a long sigh of relief.

Right at that moment, Zhou Yu formed the clone seal and conjured up ten more clones!

After his intimate encounters with Xiao Qing, for some unknown reason, the energy within Zhou Yu's body had increased by another fraction.

Ten clones had been conjured, which, combined with the previous two, made a total of twelve! This was already a frightening number, but Zhou Yu knew he hadn't reached his limit yet.

"Charge!" Zhou Yu gave the order, and all ten clones rushed toward the colorful monkey's clones with fists raised. Instantly, the sounds of bombardment echoed continuously, and in a very short time, all of the colorful monkey's remaining clones were shattered.

"That'll teach you to show off!" Zhou Yu said viciously. "Don't you know I have a very mischievous sense of humor?"

Seeing all of the colorful monkey's clones blasted away, Zhou Yu felt quite satisfied. He rubbed his hands together, recalled his own clones, and prepared to head back up to the cliff cave. But as he turned around, he saw the cave entrance wide open, with the colorful monkey lying flat on the ground, looking utterly grief-stricken.

Zhou Yu was startled at first, then rubbed his hands and walked over. Squatting down before the colorful monkey, he looked at him earnestly.

"Your sister!" the colorful monkey cursed.

Zhou Yu rubbed his nose. He hadn't expected that secretly shattering the colorful monkey's clones would all be witnessed by him, so he felt a bit embarrassed and let the curse slide.

"What's wrong with you?" Zhou Yu asked.

"I... I'm fine... I'm sleeping," the colorful monkey insisted on saving face despite his misery, forcing himself to continue, "Have you never seen someone sleep?"

Zhou Yu let out an "oh," stood up, and began to walk away.

"Where... where are you going?" the colorful monkey asked weakly.

"Going to sleep myself, of course," Zhou Yu replied as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

The colorful monkey twitched his lips and said, "Can you kick the golden staff over to me?"

Zhou Yu asked, "Aren't you sleeping? What do you need the golden staff for?"

"Use it as a pillow..."

As Zhou Yu walked out of the cave entrance, he gave a casual kick, sending the golden staff that had been standing to the side flying toward the colorful monkey.

The poor colorful monkey lay on the ground unable to move, forced to watch helplessly as the golden staff smashed toward him. He closed his eyes.

Once outside the cave, Zhou Yu could no longer hold it in. He squatted down and burst into silent, wild laughter, thinking to himself: *That'll teach you to act cool! That'll teach you to show off! Now do you know the pain of having your demonic energy drained?*

In truth, this condition of the colorful monkey frequently happened among cultivators who were just beginning to learn the art of cloning. Due to an inability to control the number of clones, some cultivators would summon far too many, thereby draining all the energy within their bodies.

Under normal circumstances, one needed to rest for at least three full days in this state to recover all their energy.

After finishing his laugh, Zhou Yu climbed back up to the cliff cave and recounted the whole affair to Xiao Qing, causing her to giggle endlessly.

"Hehe... that monkey didn't look like a good person to begin with, always staring at people day in and day out," Xiao Qing said coyly.

Zhou Yu was left completely speechless.

Although the golden staff had struck the colorful monkey with painful force, once it was close to him, it began continuously feeding energy back into his body, which then transformed into demonic energy.

A moment later, the colorful monkey's complexion eased up.

He slowly sat up, though his hands still tightly gripped the golden staff.

"You didn't even warn me!" the colorful monkey complained angrily.

A bright flash emanated from the golden staff.

The colorful monkey instantly wilted, muttering, "I know, I know."

After a while longer, the colorful monkey finally recovered his full energy. Grabbing the golden staff, he stood up and fiercely slammed it against the ground.

Shouting as he struck, "That'll teach you to threaten me! How dare you say you wouldn't provide me with energy! That'll teach you to threaten me!"

With that, the colorful monkey brandished the golden staff and went on a wild, crashing rampage.

Up in the cliff cave, Zhou Yu felt the surroundings shaking and couldn't help feeling a bit startled. How on earth did this monkey recover so quickly?

Before long, having finished venting his anger down below, the colorful monkey came outside the cave and roared at the top of his lungs.

"Zhou Yu! Get your ass down here! Master monkey is going to thrash you!" the colorful monkey bellowed outside.

After offering Xiao Qing some soothing words, Zhou Yu stepped out. He had long anticipated that this monkey, utterly unable to swallow his humiliation, would come looking to settle accounts the moment he recovered. Moreover, it had been several days since he last threw a punch, and his hands were itching for a fight. Without hesitation, he leaped straight out of the cliff cave, the surging gale of wind bursting open the crude door.

Zhou Yu's figure descended like a giant hawk, landing squarely on the ox-horn fork wedged into the cliff wall.

Standing atop the tip of the fork, Zhou Yu gazed calmly at the colorful monkey below and spoke up, "Feeling itchy for a beating, are we?"

Seeing Zhou Yu appear with such a flamboyant flair, the colorful monkey flew into a rage. Brandishing his golden staff and pointing it at Zhou Yu, he yelled, "Wakaka! Today I am definitely going to beat you up!"

Zhou Yu found it quite amusing internally, but his face remained expressionless as he asked coolly, "Why?"

Stumped by the question, the colorful monkey was momentarily at a loss for words. After a brief, awkward silence, he stammered, "Just... just because I want to spar!"

"Then come at me!" Zhou Yu roared explosively.

This colorful monkey's strength had grown vastly over the past few days, and he was practically getting too big for his boots. Zhou Yu decided to teach him a thorough lesson. Instantly, his hands flew as he formed the clone seal.

Draining the vast majority of the mobilizable energy within his body, he conjured a full fifteen clones!

Those fifteen clones transformed into fifteen streaks of black light, shooting straight toward the colorful monkey in unison. Zhou Yu himself kicked off the ox-horn fork, launched his body forward, and simultaneously reached down to pull the fork from the wall, gripping it in his hands as he thrusted toward the colorful monkey.

Seeing Zhou Yu attack the moment the words left his mouth, the colorful monkey realized that Zhou Yu had been prepared all along and was outmaneuvered yet again. Growing quite annoyed, he furiously swung his golden staff in a wide arc, intending to sweep away all the clones with a single blow.

However, just as the clones were about to be struck, they pressed their palms against one another, utilizing each other's rebound force to spring away in all directions, successfully evading the monkey's staff as it grew longer and thicker.

Zhou Yu charged rapidly through the air, thrusting the ox-horn fork forward. The colorful monkey, failing to sweep away the clones, tried to retract his staff, but it was already too late. He could only swing the staff horizontally to block in front of himself.

With a sharp "clang," the ox-horn fork collided with the golden staff, bursting forth a shower of sparks.

The colorful monkey felt a slight numbness in the palms gripping his staff.

Zhou Yu, however, instantly loosened his grip on the ox-horn fork just a fraction, sliding down the length of the shaft to deliver a vicious kick straight to the colorful monkey's face.

Whenever the colorful monkey fought, he always went all out with reckless abandon, smashing away with his life on the line. How could he possibly possess all the combat techniques Zhou Yu had?

If he met an opponent whose strength was vastly different from his own, that opponent would surely be hammered to death by the monkey's staff. But as it happened, Zhou Yu's strength was roughly on par with his, while Zhou Yu's technique far surpassed the monkey's.

Furthermore, Zhou Yu had always favored a fierce, relentless offensive style. It wasn't until his great battles against the Demon Kings that he discovered the crucial importance of technique. Therefore, he had now retrieved all the combat maneuvers Baidu had once left in his mind, and after two intense battles with Demon Kings, Zhou Yu was able to improvise and apply those combat techniques smoothly in actual combat.

The colorful monkey watched in astonishment as Zhou Yu's foot landed squarely on his face. His nose was instantly flattened and began bleeding, the tremendous impact sending him reeling backward.

Pressing his advantage, Zhou Yu unleashed a flurry of kicks mid-air, hammering the colorful monkey down into the mud with loud, consecutive thuds.

Defeated in a single move, the colorful monkey was subsequently beaten to the point where he couldn't even fight back, and his golden staff rolled away to the side.

By now, Zhou Yu had also landed on the ground. He hauled the colorful monkey out of the deep crater, grabbed him by both legs, and fiercely smashed him against the snow-covered earth. The massive crashing sounds shook the nearby snow-laden trees, causing the accumulated snow to cascade down and reveal their bare branches.

Finally, Zhou Yu hurled the colorful monkey straight toward the fifteen clones.

The fifteen clones had already been rolling up their sleeves in anticipation. Seeing Zhou Yu toss the colorful monkey over, they swarmed him, raining down punches and kicks in a completely chaotic brawl, treating it like a full-on gang beatdown.

Zhou Yu dusted off his hands, pulled the ox-horn fork out of the snow, hoisted it onto his shoulder, and climbed the cliff face in three strides. Casually jamming the fork back into its original spot, he sat down upon it and looked down at the scene below.

As the ox-horn fork swayed gently, Zhou Yu looked with keen interest at the colorful monkey, who was currently hugging his head while taking a severe thrashing, and asked, "Do you know who's boss now?"

Dozens of hands and feet were raining blows down upon the colorful monkey. Aside from protecting his face, he couldn't make any other defensive moves and could only shout, "I know! I know! You're my big brother! I submit!"

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