Interception!

"It's the Black Camel Guard!"

Wangxingji was a well-known merchant house in the Sunan region, with goods traveling north and south. Naturally, they also had experts stationed there. Standing before Wang Zhiqiou's carriage was a burly man with a purple face, clad in a diagonally fastened jacket and black-and-white cloth boots. He was a disciple of the Xuanmiao Temple in Suzhou and the foremost expert beside Wang Zhiwei, Wang Ting'an.

When Wang Zhiwei boarded the carriage, he could only make out dozens of extremely fast figures, but couldn't discern their appearances. Wang Ting'an, however, saw them clearly at a glance.

These black figures, converging on that street with astonishing speed, were precisely the elite of the elite within the Xiong and Qiang allied forces – the elite death warriors responsible for covertly guarding the main army's tent, the Black Camel Guard!

The Black Camel Guards of the Xiong and Qiang tribes were all subjected to brutal training from childhood. Only one in a hundred would stand out, and each was an astonishingly skilled master. But Wang Ting'an knew that the Black Camel Guard's most formidable asset was the New Moon Iron Bow each of them carried. This long iron-forged bow was jointly manufactured by the master craftsmen of the Xiong and Qiang tribes, boasting an incredible range of eight hundred paces!

Furthermore, the arrows used were refined from the Blood Essence of the Fire Lizard, a bizarre beast from the desert, mixed with refined gold to forge Demon-Breaking Arrows!

While these Demon-Breaking Arrows might not possess the same freedom and control as Flying Swords, which could change direction at will after being unleashed, these Black Camel Guards were masters of the rapid-fire arrow technique. In mere moments, they could loose over a dozen arrows consecutively. If dozens of them drew their bows and fired in unison, it would instantly unleash a torrent of arrows.

One or two ordinary cultivators, without extremely powerful defensive magic treasures, would have no way to withstand it.

Currently, all the nations' armies had their share of extraordinary individuals. The Black Camel Guard, nominally death warriors protecting the main army's tent, actually served a more crucial purpose: to break demons and eliminate cultivators within the enemy's army!

And now, Wang Ting'an saw that in addition to the dozens of black figures speeding across the rooftops with barely their feet touching the ground, many more black figures were also hurtling towards the sealed-off street from numerous alleys and roads.

A total of over a hundred Black Camel Guards – this was nearly all of the Black Camel Guards from the four armies within a thousand-mile radius.

Judging by the way these Black Camel Guards were converging on that street, it was clear they weren't targeting the people from Gouli Dao who had just killed someone in the street, but were instead joining forces with the Gouli Dao members to deal with the person in the street.

"Even the main army is already involved!"

Glancing again at the hundred-plus black figures, Wang Ting'an, a disciple of Xuanmiao Temple, didn't dare to linger. He urged the carriage and galloped towards the west of the city.

At times like these, cultivators were often more dangerous than ordinary people. Although he desperately wanted to know who it was that both the Gouli Dao and the Black Snake Guards were targeting, Wang Ting'an knew all too well that the safest course of action now was to distance himself from the epicenter of the trouble.

The carriage had barely traveled half a mile when the ground of the street, sealed off by the Gouli Dao members, suddenly vibrated slightly, causing even the small pebbles in the muddy water to jump.

In the air, a sound like the beating of war drums, dong dong dong, began to echo.

This sound wasn't from war drums, but merely the synchronized footsteps of the hundred Black Camel Guards rapidly approaching!

Closing in from all directions with astonishing speed, the Black Camel Guards' footsteps and breaths were as synchronized as if they were a single entity!

Their potent Blood Essence and surging killing intent, the sheer aura emanating from the hundred Black Camel Guards as they surged forward like a tide, was enough to dispel certain Daoist arts that specifically confused the mind or were refined from yin souls.

One thousand paces, eight hundred paces, five hundred paces!

When they were still five hundred paces away from the sealed-off street, a loud zing suddenly rang out. All the Black Camel Guards simultaneously drew the New Moon Iron Bows from their backs and pulled them to full draw. "Fire!" With a synchronized shout from over a dozen people, peng peng peng! The bowstrings, made from the tanned tendons of the Black-boned Giant Python, snapped with rapid force, and the air in all four directions was instantly filled with a dense hail of arrows!

Rapid volley!

Each of the hundred Black Camel Guards loosed no less than ten long arrows in that instant. This simultaneous volley from a hundred men was even denser and more ferocious than the arrows shot by a typical thousand archers!

The long iron-forged bows in the hands of the Black Camel Guards had a range of eight hundred paces, but five hundred paces was precisely the distance of their greatest lethality.

And the arrows loosed in this instant were all pitch-black, with arrowheads glowing red – the Demon-Breaking Golden Arrows!

As these arrows flew through the air, their speed was comparable to ordinary Flying Swords, and they emitted sharp tearing sounds as they sliced through the air.

Seen from afar, it was as if the sky had instantly gained a black spinning top, rapidly contracting towards that street.

The target of over a thousand Demon-Breaking Arrows was an unremarkable two-story teahouse in that street. This teahouse had a small Li Ji flag hanging askew, with three or four seats placed outside its south-facing entrance. Its ordinary wooden door was tightly shut, clearly indicating it hadn't opened for business yet today.

"Pfft" "Pfft" "Pfft" "Pfft"... With a series of explosive sounds, over a thousand Demon-Breaking Golden Arrows pierced the ordinary teahouse, riddling it with holes. Yet, the teahouse surprisingly hadn't collapsed yet. Rays of sunlight from the rising eastern sun pierced through the countless holes, creating a spectacular sight.

Judging by the density of the holes in the teahouse that still stood, it was impossible for even a dog or a rabbit inside to survive without being riddled with several holes simultaneously, let alone a person.

"I do not offend others, yet why do others offend me without reason, forcing me..."

However, from within this riddled teahouse, a sigh, tinged with age, suddenly emanated.

Following this aged sigh, the sunlight filtering through the perforated teahouse seemed to intensify severalfold.

In an instant, a burst of bloody mist exploded from the back of the heads of all the Black Camel Guards!

In that instant, what shot out from the teahouse's holes were not sunbeams, but the arrowheads of broken Demon-Breaking Arrows. The person in the teahouse had not only survived the thousand-plus Demon-Breaking Arrows but had, by some unknown method, broken off over a hundred arrowheads and flung them out from the existing holes. The force and speed of these thrown arrowheads were far greater than those shot from the iron-forged bows. None of the hundred Black Camel Guards could react in time; they were instantly pierced through the head and killed.

"Ye Zhaonan," the moment such a technique was displayed, the faces of the Gouli Dao members who had just killed Master Zhang turned ashen. But just then, the previously faint but life-ending voice spoke again, drifting like white clouds in the sky, its source untraceable, "You act with such ruthless brutality, ending the lives of a hundred people in an instant, and yet you feign innocence?"

"If others respect me an inch, I return a foot; if others bully me a foot, I bully them ten feet. You cultivate the Daoist Scripture of True Essence Mysteries, so you should be Zhuo Chendao, a disciple of Xuan Yuan. The faint Golden Gang Sword Qi to the west suggests Tang Qingxiang, a disciple of Wentian. You two have come prepared. If I were to engage you, even though these are all mortal soldiers, I would have to divide my attention to deal with these Demon-Breaking Arrows, and could only eliminate you first." The voice from the teahouse spoke slowly, subtly revealing a hint of sorrow and helplessness.

The voice drifting in the air did not respond for a moment, seemingly contemplating. After a pause, it slowly spoke again, "Ye Zhaonan, your cultivation is profound, but you should also know that Kunlun commands the world. With your solitary strength, you cannot possibly oppose us. Considering your hard-won cultivation, as long as you reveal the whereabouts of Yuan Tianyi's disciple, I will let you go freely."

"Has your Kunlun already learned of Luofu's inheritance? Do you intend to find and eliminate him? Can't things be done with a bit more restraint? Acting this way seems contrary to the righteousness and integrity expected of Kunlun's leading orthodox sect."

"Since your mind is made up, I have nothing more to say."

As this faint, ethereal voice echoed, figures appeared in the skies to the east, west, south, and north.

As these four figures revealed themselves, the Wangxingji personnel on the carriage, who were still galloping towards the west of the city, only saw the sky suddenly seem to change color, and the clouds above that street gathered, forming a funnel shape.

"Ye Zhaonan, perhaps you haven't realized, but we have brought far more than just two people."

In the eastern sky, a young man clad in a light blue Daoist robe, with his hair tied in a topknot and a face as handsome as jade, continued speaking calmly. As he spoke, a flash of lightning seemed to flicker in his pupils, giving the impression that his eyes contained another world, a profound and mysterious sensation.

As this lightning flashed through his pupils, a thunderous boom erupted, and a bolt of purple lightning, as thick as a bucket, struck down from the sky, smashing towards the already dilapidated teahouse.

"Thus have I heard..." Simultaneously, a short, stout monk in a yellow kasaya, wearing golden rings, uttered a Sanskrit phrase. The clouds, already condensed into a funnel shape, suddenly contracted, forming a giant demonic claw with sharp talons in the sky, which descended along with the purple lightning bolt.

Appearing in the south was a young man dressed in a yellow robe, holding a feather fan and wearing a scholar's cap. His face was like jade, and he appeared to be only about twenty years old. However, someone who could stand in the void without relying on Dao essence or any magic treasure had clearly cultivated for many years and possessed the art of preserving youth. Seeing the young man in the east and the stout monk make their move, this scholar-like, upright man casually tossed something, and a colossal golden net, covering an area of dozens of feet, was cast down.

Each rope of the formed net was only as thick as a finger, but the gaps between them were only the size of a palm. Furthermore, each slender golden rope was actually burning with fierce white flames!

The young man in the east whose eyes seemed to flash with lightning first was the leader of this operation, Zhuo Chendao, a disciple of Xuan Yuan, one of the Ten Golden Immortals of Kunlun. And the monk in the yellow kasaya was Zen Master Bule, the abbot of Datong Temple.

Just by witnessing the moves of these two, all the Gouli Dao members present turned pale. It was only now that they realized they were merely pawns used to test the waters.

Upon seeing this colossal net descend, even the two men in brocade robes, each possessing a Yin Scale Black Banner, turned deathly pale and frantically tried to flee!

This was because they recognized from the net that the scholar-like man was True Person Gong Li, the Sect Leader of Qianyuan Palace. And this net was the Qianyuan Palace's sect-protecting magic treasure, the Earth Immortal grade Heavenly Golden Spider Fire Spirit!