Yang Chen's indifferent attitude made Houtu pause slightly.
The gentle aura around her, one that seemed fused with the pulse of the earth, momentarily stagnated almost imperceptibly.
This man... he knows who I am and understands the delicacy of the situation, yet he remains so dismissive. Is that arrogance, or does he possess the confidence to disregard everything? The disturbance in the Ancestral Witch statues is too deeply involved. Our Witch Clan cannot afford a single misstep.
In that instant.
Throughout the Witch Clan settlement, the earth-shaking cries of countless Witch People and their fanatical roars powerful enough to shake the heavens seemed to have their throats seized by an invisible hand.
The sound vanished into thin air.
The wind stopped.
Even the dust floating in the air hung motionless.
Dead silence.
A silence heavier than a bottomless abyss enveloped this land of iron and blood.
The gentle, compassionate clarity in Houtu's eyes deepened slightly.
She did not get angry.
But the figure beside her could no longer endure it.
Boom!
A dull thunderous crash rang out, not from weapons clashing, but from a foot crushing the ground beneath it, ground harder than refined iron.
An incomparably burly figure stepped forward.
Again. Houtu is thinking about all those twists and turns again. So slow! My blood is practically boiling! This fellow smells dangerous and powerful, like a storm about to break! Wonderful! It's been so long since I met an opponent who could make even my axe tremble with excitement!
He carried an enormous battle-axe wholly disproportionate to his frame, its blade still stained with dark red blood, while his other hand held an ancient shield.
His upper body was bare, every muscle seeming carved from the hardest granite, brimming with explosive strength visible to the naked eye, ready to erupt at any moment.
His eyes were not like bronze bells.
They were two stars burning with molten lava.
That gaze was nailed tightly to Yang Chen, holding not the slightest reverence, much less Houtu's caution and probing.
There was only the purest, most primal, most undisguised fighting spirit, along with the bone-deep excitement of a hunter discovering prey worthy of the hunt.
"Just taking a look around?"
His voice rang out, every word like two boulders grinding against each other—rough, sonorous, carrying a tyrannical force that shook the Divine Soul.
"Brat, you make that sound far too easy!"
He did not even glance at Houtu beside him. Within those two burning eyes, only Yang Chen's reflection remained.
"I can feel it."
He bared his teeth in a grin, revealing a mouthful of stark white fangs. That smile was more terrifying than the fiercest primordial beast.
"That smell on you is fragrant and foul at the same time!"
That scent... it is the stench of the demon called Rahula from the legends, Father God's mortal enemy. But... it is mixed with a pure, overbearing power, as though Father God himself had arrived! Strange... who cares! He is strong enough! That's all that matters!
"It smells a little like that demon from the legends, Rahula!"
At those words, Houtu's brow furrowed ever so slightly.
Below, the expressions of the countless Witch People who had only just been swept up in fervor instantly froze, turning to suspicion and vigilance.
Rahula!
To them, that name represented Father God's greatest enemy!
Yet the burly man did not care at all. Instead, he stepped forward once more, and the vitality and blood around him began to surge uncontrollably, heating the surrounding air.
He was the Witch Clan's universally acknowledged strongest warrior apart from the Twelve Ancestral Witches!
Great Witch Xing Tian!
Xing Tian was forthright by nature and simple in thought. He never believed in convoluted schemes, only in his fists and his instincts.
His instincts told him that the man before him was dangerous.
His instincts also told him that the man before him was "delicious"!
It was a craving from the depths of his bloodline, an instinctive urge to collide with him, tear him apart, and then devour him!
"I can also feel that you are carrying a heaven-sized problem!"
Xing Tian's voice abruptly rose, and the scorching vitality and blood gathered behind him, vaguely forming a pillar of crimson smoke that shot into the sky.
He pointed that massive battle-axe at Yang Chen, who hovered in midair. His fighting spirit boiled like molten lava and erupted completely!
"Are you the brat burdened with boundless karmic sin?"
"Perfect!"
Xing Tian let out an earth-shaking laugh, filled with undisguised fervor and provocation.
Boundless karmic sin? Good! That is the burden worthy of a true powerhouse! If you cannot bear it, then this trouble of yours, along with your head, will be mine, Xing Tian's, to claim!
"What I, Xing Tian, love most is dealing with trouble!"
"Come, come!"
"Let me see what you're really made of, and whether you deserve all this trouble!"
Before his words had even faded.
Boom—!
The pillar of crimson smoke blasting into the heavens from Xing Tian's back no longer held back in the slightest. It brazenly tore apart Kunlun's eternal silence and savagely pierced the clouds!
This was no longer invisible pressure.
This was a tangible storm.
An incomparably violent, incomparably pure fighting spirit swept up sand and stone from the sky, carrying scorching waves of air as it transformed into a roaring primordial beast that crushed headlong toward Yang Chen's position!
He was going to attack directly!
He would use the oldest, most direct, and only method recognized by the Witch Clan to "test" Yang Chen's worth!
"Xing Tian!"
For the first time, urgency entered Houtu's voice. The gentle earth field around her instantly condensed as she tried to stop the conflict on the verge of breaking out.
This brute! I have not yet uncovered this man's true capabilities, and he is already acting so rashly. How great a variable will this bring to our Witch Clan?
But it was too late.
Xing Tian's movements were faster than her voice.
His will was more direct than her thoughts.
That tyrannical storm of fighting spirit did not even leave her words room to echo before smashing them, together with the gentle field around her, into scattered fragments.
Houtu's outstretched hand stopped in midair.
Traces of the dispersed laws of earth still lingered at her fingertips.
She watched Xing Tian's back, his fighting spirit piercing the heavens like an ancient divine mountain, and felt that resoluteness that would not rest until death, that refusal to question right or wrong. In the end, she could only let out an almost inaudible sigh.
So be it.
Given Xing Tian's temperament, this battle was unavoidable.
Her gaze returned to Yang Chen at the center of that storm of fighting spirit.
There, light twisted and space wailed.
So be it.
My probing was too gentle. Perhaps it was utterly useless against an existence like him.
Xing Tian's battle-axe is the most direct question in this primordial world.
Your response will explain everything.
Good.
This is the perfect chance to see with my own eyes.
What trump card this mysterious man, who stirred the Ancestral Witch statues and bore the two extreme karmic ties of Father God's mortal enemy and Father God's inheritance...
...was hiding after all.
Before you continue