Assassination

That was truly ruthless. The slap had directly swollen his face, and quite a bit of blood was flowing from his mouth.

Xiao Feng said unclearly, "Xiao Peng, I'm sorry. I was the one in the wrong before. Since you weren't willing to punish me, I felt a little guilty, so I punished myself. I promise you that I won't go back to how I was before."

Watching the red mark on Xiao Feng's face rapidly swell, Xiao Peng's brows furrowed even tighter.

He did not want to see the other man harm himself. He simply felt there was no need to cling to past grievances.

After all, in his view, strength was the foundation for standing firm. Rather than dwelling on old debts here, it was better to spend more time cultivating.

"Enough." Xiao Peng raised a hand and pressed down the hand Xiao Feng was trying to lift again. His force was neither heavy nor light, yet Xiao Feng could not move. "I accept your apology, but there's no need for this."

Xiao Feng apologized to Xiao Peng several more times, then left together with Xiao Ning.

After the two left, Xiao Peng returned to his room and continued cultivating. He felt that in a few more months, he should be able to reach the ninth level of Foundation Establishment.

After Foundation Establishment came preparation for the Golden Core. A Golden Core required quite a few materials in order to form a flawless, perfect Golden Core.

It was possible to break through to the Golden Core without relying on materials, but it would not meet his own standards.

In the blink of an eye, several days passed.

Just after the third watch sounded, the streets and alleys of Wu Tan City sank completely into dead silence.

At this moment, Xiao Peng was seated cross-legged on his bed, cultivating the Nine Revolutions Profound Technique.

"Rustle—"

An extremely faint scraping sound came from beyond the courtyard wall, definitely not the movement of ordinary nocturnal animals.

Xiao Peng slightly raised his eyelids and sensed at least twelve auras creeping along the base of the wall. One of them was barely at the level of a Da Dou Shi.

However, Xiao Peng did not pay much attention to them and continued cultivating the Nine Revolutions Profound Technique.

"Click."

The wooden lock on the courtyard gate was silently picked open with a thin iron wire. More than a dozen shadows darted into the courtyard like wildcats, their feet wrapped in soft cloth as they landed. Only their hurried breathing betrayed their nervousness.

The burly One-Eyed man at the lead made a gesture. Four men immediately spread out to guard the corners, while the rest drew their weapons. Their chain hammers were covered in barbs, their daggers glimmered with eerie blue poison, and two of them even carried compact crossbows on their backs, their arrowheads aimed directly at the bedroom window.

"Boss, it's here."

One of the underlings spoke in an extremely low voice to One-Eyed ahead of him.

One-Eyed raised a hand and pressed it onto the underling's shoulder. His sinister gaze swept over the tightly shut doors and windows of the bedroom. His Adam's apple bobbed as he gave an even quieter order. "Crossbowmen, get ready. Once the door is broken, shoot the bed first. Don't give that brat a chance to react."

The two black-clad men carrying crossbows immediately knelt on one knee and cocked their weapons. Through the gaps in the window paper, their arrowheads locked firmly onto the cross-legged figure sitting on the bed.

The men holding chain hammers and daggers gripped their weapons tightly and held their breath, waiting only for the signal to break down the door.

"Miss, should we intervene?"

Two people watched everything from afar, one of them asking the young woman beside him.

The young woman was Xiao Xun'er. The two had discovered these people long ago and had been secretly watching their movements.

After thinking for a moment, Xiao Xun'er said, "No rush. Let's watch first."

She had always felt that there was an exceptionally powerful master behind Xiao Peng.

There was a chance that Xiao Peng's master would appear during this assassination attempt, and she wanted to see what he was capable of.

As for Xiao Peng being injured?

She thought that was impossible. Ling Ying had told her that Xiao Peng's cultivation was already close to the Dou Ling realm. Those people were no match for him at all.

Just as One-Eyed was about to order them to break down the door, an extremely soft hum suddenly came from inside the bedroom, as though some object had broken free from its restraints.

The next second, a streak of azure light burst through the window, moving so fast that only an afterimage remained!

Squelch!

The first to suffer were the two kneeling crossbowmen. As though it possessed intelligence, the Qingping Sword made a nimble turn in midair and precisely pierced both their throats.

Before their blood could even spray out, the sword had already turned into a streak of light and shot toward the black-clad man on the left holding a chain hammer.

"What is that?!" The black-clad man saw only a flash of azure light before his eyes and instinctively raised his chain hammer to block it.

With a crisp clang, the chain hammer forged from fine iron was cleaved into two by a single strike!

Immediately afterward, the sword light swept across his neck. Before he could even see what his opponent looked like, he had already fallen dead.

One-Eyed's pupils abruptly contracted. This sudden turn of events made his heart tremble violently.

He saw clearly that it was a longsword glowing with azure light from end to end. Faint patterns seemed to flow across its blade, carrying an edge so sharp that it made his heart palpitate.

"Not good."

One-Eyed swung his blade at the Qingping Sword. The Dou Qi of a Da Dou Shi gathered around the blade, trying to force back the bizarre weapon.

After living this long, it was the first time he had encountered something like this. It was simply too strange.

Yet the Qingping Sword seemed to be toying with him, weaving nimbly through the blade shadows. The azure glow on its blade flared brightly as it flew straight at One-Eyed's face with a piercing shriek through the air.

One-Eyed was horrified and hurriedly pulled back his blade to shield his face, but the sword wind swept across his shoulder. With a rip, it sliced a long gash through his robe, and blood instantly seeped out.

"Run! Something's wrong here!"

One-Eyed bared his teeth in pain. How could he dare continue fighting? Roaring, he turned and ran.

At that moment, One-Eyed was furiously cursing the Jia Lie Family in his heart for sending him to kill someone so bizarre.

Seeing their leader defeated, the other black-clad men had long since been scared out of their wits and scattered in every direction.

But how could the Qingping Sword let them go so easily?

The azure light followed them like a shadow. Whenever it caught one, it pierced through his wrist, making him unable to hold his weapon. Whenever it caught another, it flicked away the cloth beneath his feet, sending him sprawling flat on his back across the smooth stone slabs.

Screams and pleas for mercy exploded through the silent night, yet not a single person managed to escape the courtyard.

A moment later, the Qingping Sword hovered in the middle of the courtyard, its blade trembling lightly as if asking for praise.

With a creak, the bedroom door opened. Xiao Peng slowly walked out, raised a hand, and the Qingping Sword obediently flew back into his grasp.

Xiao Peng walked over to a still-living black-clad man and asked, "Who are you? Who sent you here?"

The black-clad man had already been frightened out of his wits. He lay sprawled on the ground, trembling all over. Looking at the bloodstained Qingping Sword in Xiao Peng's hand, his teeth chattered so badly that he could not speak a complete sentence. "We... we're from the Black Wind Group... It... it was the Jia Lie Family... They paid us... paid us to kill you..."

Before he could finish speaking, he suddenly remembered Jia Lie Ying's warning. His face changed drastically, and he hurriedly corrected himself. "No... it wasn't the Jia Lie Family. We... we came to rob you on our own..."

Xiao Peng's gaze turned cold. The Qingping Sword lightly rested against the man's neck, and the chill from its blade instantly stiffened him. "Say that again."

"It was the Jia Lie Family! It really was the Jia Lie Family!" The black-clad man completely broke down, crying as he confessed. "And the Ao Ba Family! The two families hired us together. Jia Lie Ying personally came to negotiate the terms. He said... said that if we killed you, they'd give us 100,000 Gold Coins. He also said... said we were to get rid of someone named Xiao Yan while we were at it..."

Xiao Peng lightly ran his fingertips across the blade. The bloodstains on it slowly faded away, restoring its flowing azure glow.