After that sword strike, the morale of the Yan Kingdom's army utterly collapsed.
The shock of seeing those hundred thousand lives reduced to ash before their eyes.
For the rest of their lives, the surviving soldiers would jolt awake from that sight every night.
The survivors on the outskirts cast aside their helmets and armor and fled to the rear in desperation.
Some threw away their blades, some stripped off their armor, and some were trampled to death by their own comrades.
No one had the courage to look back at the figure carrying the longsword.
Fear spread through the ranks like a plague, from the outskirts to the center, and from the center to the rear camp.
The colonels could not hold back the soldiers, the generals could not hold back the colonels, and even the squads charged with enforcing discipline were swept along with the routed troops fleeing to the rear.
An army of three hundred thousand tigers and wolves had turned into a rabble before a single man!
But S itu Zhen did not flee. He stood before the central command tent as soldiers streamed past him in retreat like a tide.
He bent down and picked up a longsword from the ground. Its blade was still smeared with mud left by the fleeing soldiers' boots.
He wiped the blade clean with his sleeve, then looked up at the figure approaching the center of the army in the distance.
The figure passed through smoke and fire, his stride unchanged.
S itu Zhen took a deep breath and strode out to meet him.
His steps were heavy at first. His Saint Rank Early Stage cultivation had yet to fully settle after the lingering force of that sword light.
With every step, a needlelike pain stabbed through his meridians.
But as he walked faster and faster, his breathing gradually steadied instead.
By the time he finally stopped before Chen Du, he had regained the bearing of a commander in chief.
He did not look at the army fleeing behind him. He simply stared into Chen Du's eyes and asked in a deep voice, "Who are you, really?"
Chen Du looked at him.
The man's armor was covered in dust, but his gaze was sharp as a blade. Even facing someone who could kill a hundred thousand with one sword strike, he did not look away.
Chen Du was silent for a moment before he spoke two words: "Qinghe Village."
S itu Zhen's gaze trembled slightly.
He did not ask where Qinghe Village was or what kind of place it was.
In the past few days, Qinghe Village was far from the only village the Southern Expedition Army had slaughtered on its march.
He tightened his grip on his sword hilt and heard the man opposite him continue, "Grandma said my father still hadn't come home.
"My little brother was only twelve. Someone pinned him through the chest with a spear, and he died in my arms.
"My grandma ran after them to demand justice for him, and then she too was pinned to the ground at the village entrance with a spear.
"Your Yan Kingdom's army killed everyone I knew, so I came.
"An immortal in rage, burning with fire... I am the fury of every soul lost on this land you trampled.
"I've come to collect what you owe tonight.
"And not just tonight. I will utterly annihilate the Yan Kingdom!"
S itu Zhen listened to the end in silence.
Behind him, his commander's banner snapped in the wind, and the clamor of the fleeing soldiers grew more and more distant.
On this little patch of battlefield, it seemed as though only the two of them remained.
Then he slowly raised the sword in his hand. "I am S itu Zhen, commander in chief of the Yan Kingdom's Southern Expedition Army. I have fought for forty years and have never suffered a defeat.
"Today, the Yan Kingdom is certain to lose, but S itu Zhen will not be defeated. I do not fear death, but I will not allow anyone to trample my country to pieces.
"If you want to destroy the Yan Kingdom, you'll have to step over my corpse first."
With those words, he wasted no more breath.
He poured all the power he had cultivated over his lifetime into the longsword. Countless fine cracks appeared in it, yet he still gripped it tightly.
He leaped into the air and, using the last of his strength, slashed down at Chen Du.
His Saint Rank Early Stage cultivation erupted without restraint at that moment. Sword qi streaked like a rainbow, cleaving the air with a piercing shriek.
There were no fancy variations in that strike, no feints, no move held in reserve.
There was only the resolve to face death without looking back.
He knew full well that the strike could not hurt Chen Du and that he himself would die the next instant, but he struck all the same.
For the Yan Kingdom, for his forty years on campaign, and for the commander's banner behind him that could not be allowed to fall.
Chen Du turned his wrist and simply thrust forward.
It was an utterly ordinary thrust, so fast that no words could describe it.
The instant S itu Zhen's sword qi met the thrust, it melted away like ice and snow. The longsword in his hand shattered inch by inch, its fragments whirling through the air and reflecting firelight and morning light.
Then the sword tip sank into his chest and pierced his heart, yet not a single drop of blood splashed out, as though even his blood had been vaporized by the speed of the strike.
Fast!
So fast he did not even have time to feel pain!
S itu Zhen lowered his head and looked at the sword wound on his chest, as fine as a strand of hair, then slowly sank to his knees.
There was no fear in his eyes, no unwillingness to accept his fate, only a calm that was gradually fading.
He could not make a sound. Then, remaining on one knee, he went still.
Chen Du withdrew his longsword and looked at the remains of the Yan Kingdom's commander in chief.
S itu Zhen had not closed his eyes even in death. His unfocused eyes still gazed in the direction of the Yan Kingdom.
He had not feared death, and for the sake of his own country, he had gone to meet it without looking back.
He was the first person Chen Du had killed in this war who was worth remembering.
He walked around S itu Zhen's corpse and continued north.
Chen Du went north all the way.
He did not ride a horse, use a movement technique, or draw on the power of the Heaven-Human Realm to ride the wind.
He simply walked, step by step.
Nine out of ten homes in the villages and towns along the way stood empty, and fallen ears of wheat rotted in the fields.
There was no one left to collect and bury the corpses by the roadside. Wild dogs wandered among the ruins with bones in their mouths.
He walked through it all, his stride unchanged.
After walking for several days in a row, he stopped by a stream and drank a few mouthfuls of water, then took half a wheat cake from his robes and gnawed a few bites from it. It was hard enough to jar his teeth.
He had found it in the ruins when he left Qinghe Village. Someone had probably cooked it that morning. It had gone moldy, but he could not bring himself to throw it away.
He tucked the remaining half back into his robes, stood up, and continued walking.
Chen Du made no particular effort to remember how long he had walked, nor how far.
He only knew that he was getting closer and closer to the Yan Kingdom's capital, and that the fury in his heart had not faded with his steps.
Instead, it burned ever fiercer, so fiercely that even he could no longer tell whether it could be put out.
When would it go out?
Perhaps it would have to wait until the Yan Kingdom was destroyed, or perhaps until the last name in his heart had been erased from his mind.
No, perhaps it would never go out.
He would destroy the Yan Kingdom, until this fury had burned itself completely away.
In the Yan Kingdom's capital, in the royal palace's great hall.
Prince Yan sat upright on his throne. The twelve strands of jade beads hanging from his crown swayed slightly, concealing most of his face, but they could not hide the cold sweat constantly seeping from his temples.
The ministers stood in two rows on either side of the hall. Not a crow or a sparrow could be heard; even the veteran ministers who most loved to argue kept their heads bowed and said nothing.
That silence made Prince Yan's heart pound more than any report.
"Report!"
A scout stumbled and scrambled into the hall, his armor covered in dust, the corners of his mouth cracked and bleeding.
Clearly, he had ridden back at full speed without stopping. "Your Majesty, that man has passed Lichuan and is heading toward the capital.
"He is not traveling quickly, covering only a few dozen li each day, but not one pass, garrison, or city defense along the way has been able to stop him for even half a step!"
Prince Yan gripped the armrests of the dragon throne, his knuckles turning white. Lichuan was now less than three hundred li from the capital.
"Is it the same man again?"
he asked, his voice suppressing fear that was nearly spilling over.
The scout lay prostrate on the floor, not daring to raise his head. He only nodded.
A white-haired veteran minister stepped forward and bowed shakily. "Your Majesty, Lichuan's garrison has three thousand men, and its commanding general is a Profound Rank Peak Stage expert.
"That man did not attack. He simply walked over, and the three thousand soldiers laid down their weapons and made way... His aura kept them from even drawing their blades."
Deathly silence fell over the hall once more, and Prince Yan closed his eyes.
He had never heard of such a divine being under heaven: one who could wipe out an army of a hundred thousand with a single sword strike, and make a garrison of three thousand lay down their arms and make way merely by walking past.
Fifty years ago, the Blade Saint in Ning State's capital had held back the Yan Kingdom's army alone for half a month.
But the Blade Saint had only defended the city, only delayed them. He had not killed a hundred thousand with one sword strike, and in the end he had still died amid the chaos of battle.
This man was stronger than the Blade Saint, much stronger.
If the Blade Saint was a hero of the mortal world, then this man was a god of slaughter descended from heaven.
He wanted to ask why. The Yan Kingdom had never provoked such a person, so why had the man come straight for it?
But he did not ask, because he had an inkling of the answer.
He was not entirely unaware of how many villages the Southern Expedition Army had slaughtered or how many common people it had killed along the way.
He had simply never cared. A few villages, a few worthless lives—what did they amount to before the great undertaking of expanding his territory?
Now those worthless lives had become the man carrying a sword, walking step by step toward his throne!