"You patricide, fratricide, and inhuman monster!"
Upon hearing Zhang Lingyun's insane declaration to slaughter the entire Jiang Family, the Old Jiang, who was now possessing Qiu Ruobai's body, finally erupted with the anger and sorrow that had been suppressed in his chest for countless years.
He no longer cared about Qiu Ruobai's physical limits, and frantically unleashed the power contained in his Remnant Soul, launching an attack like a storm, each move aimed directly at Zhang Lingyun's vitals.
"Ha ha!
"Patricide? Brother murder? Inhumanity?"
As Zhang Lingyun wielded the Sea of Blood, conjuring thousands of ferocious blood demons to resist Old Jiang's attacks, she let out an even sharper, more piercing laugh, filled with endless sorrow, resentment, and irony.
"He could kill his wife, his son, his daughter, and slaughter my entire family for that damned, Ruthless Great Dao. Why can't I kill his Jiang Family to avenge him?"
"You're talking nonsense!"
Old Jiang roared and unleashed a palm strike, the powerful blazing Blazing Sun Palm Seal evaporating the several blood demons that rushed towards him.
"Wuchen is Ruthless Dao genius who appears only once in a thousand years in my Jiang Family and even the entire Sword Sect."
Everything he did was to sever his ties to the world, to understand the Great Dao, and ultimately to protect all living beings and eliminate the evil forces.
That's about righteousness.
It means sacrificing the individual for the greater good.
How could you possibly understand?
"The greater good? Sacrificing oneself for the greater good? Protecting the common people?"
Zhang Lingyun seemed to have heard the most ridiculous joke in the world. Two lines of bloody tears flowed from her scarlet eyes, and her voice trembled and twisted with extreme anger and grief.
What a noble cause!
What a noble act of protecting all living beings!
Then let me ask you, you old man.
She pointed sharply at Old Jiang, her voice piercing through the intense clash of energy, echoing throughout the shattered world:
"If Jiang Wuchen wants to prove the Ruthless Great Dao, why doesn't he kill your own Jiang Family members?"
Why not kill his first First Wife, who was of noble birth and helped him ascend to the position of Young Master?
Why not kill his beloved Legitimate Son from his First Wife?
Every question is like a heavy hammer blow, striking the heart.
"Your Jiang Family is nothing but a bunch of hypocritical, two-faced bitches."
Zhang Lingyun's voice was filled with deep-seated hatred.
"You are unwilling to harm your own bloodline, and unwilling to touch those powerful and influential relatives by marriage."
They came up with such a heinous and wicked scheme.
His memories were sealed, and he was thrown into the mortal world, where he met, fell in love with, married, and had children with an ordinary woman who had no background and knew nothing about him.
He had what appeared to be a happy and fulfilling family.
"Then what?"
Zhang Lingyun's voice suddenly rose, filled with endless anguish.
Then, when he loved his wife and children most deeply, was enjoying the bliss of family life most, and was least on guard.
He was lured back to the Ruthless Dao, then personally slaughtered his wife and children, and exterminated his wife's entire family, so that he might understand the true Ruthless Great Dao.
"Ha ha.
What a fine Jiang Family, what a fine Sword Sect are, what a Ruthless Great Dao.
Zhang Lingyun appeared to be insane; the Sea of Blood boiled and surged because of her emotions.
What did my mother do wrong?
She was just a Mortal woman who believed in the man who suddenly appeared in her life.
She bore him children, managed the household chores for him, and gave him her whole heart.
My younger brother, Jiang Lingfeng, is only five years old.
He died without understanding why his most admired and relied-upon father had suddenly become so unfamiliar and terrifying.
Even as he lay dying, he looked at him with those clear eyes and asked, "Father, why? What did Feng'er do wrong?"
"And my maternal grandfather, my maternal grandmother, my uncle, and all seventy-three servants and guards of the Zhang Mansion... what did they do wrong?"
"A total of 173 lives were lost in the Zhang Mansion and the surrounding neighborhood."
That night, rivers of blood flowed, and screams shook the heavens.
"Jiang Wuchen, my good father."
He held his blood-dripping sword, his eyes as cold as a block of ice, looking at the corpses he had created himself, looking at my mother and me huddled in a corner, trembling with fear. He had been merciless.
"What do those 173 lives mean to him, to his Jiang Family, and to you high and mighty cultivators?"
Are they merely insignificant stepping stones on Jiang Wuchen's Ruthless Great Dao?
Does that mean the Jiang Family is willing to sacrifice and crush ants at will in order to cultivate a 'genius'?
Every word Zhang Lingyun uttered was like a poisoned knife, not only revealing the bloody truth of what happened back then.
That wasn't just Zhang Lingyun's hatred, but also the overwhelming Resentment Qi accumulated over a thousand years by the original ordinary woman mother, the innocent child Jiang Lingfeng, and the more than one hundred members of the Zhang Family who died tragically.
"Shut up, you wicked child!"
Old Jiang seemed utterly enraged, or perhaps to suppress the slight wavering in his heart, his voice suddenly became stern and cold, carrying a condescending indifference.
What do you know?
Such views are those of women and children, narrow-minded and ignorant.
The Jiang Family members possess Innate Sword Bodies, making them unparalleled geniuses born with the Fortune of heaven and earth.
Their mission is to pursue the highest swordsmanship and to protect the Fortune of the Human Race Three Thousand Great Provinces.
What a grand vision this is, what a heavy responsibility it is! How could you, a wicked being blinded by hatred, possibly comprehend it?
He stared at the crazed Jiang Ling, his tone cold and firm:
"Every Jiang Family is an important resource for protecting the Human Race, and a cornerstone for resisting foreign enemies and maintaining the balance of the Heaven and Earth."
How could they possibly be compared to your mother's family, those vulgar ants?
Your mother's family, by fortuitous opportunity chance, became the 'resources' for Wuchen to hone his Daoist heart and break through the barriers of emotion.
They, with their mortal bodies, can contribute to the Wuchen Ruthless Great Dao, and to the future guardians of our Human Race. This is their Supreme Merit, a blessing they have accumulated over many lifetimes.
Instead of being grateful for this great kindness in helping you achieve the Great Dao, you harbor resentment and have even fallen into Demonic Dao, slaughtering your own kind. You are utterly stubborn and heinous.
Old Jiang's words were filled with condescending indifference and a distorted logic that glorified sacrifice as Merit.
In his view, or rather in the view of some high-ranking Jiang Family, it is only natural to sacrifice some insignificant Mortals in order to cultivate top-notch experts who can protect the common people, and it is even an honor for those who are sacrificed.
What a Merit!
What a blessing!
Jiang Ling's voice was icy cold and full of endless mockery:
"To put it bluntly, you are all selfish, self-serving, and utterly hypocritical."
They want the fruits of that Ruthless Great Dao, yet they can't bear to see their own children suffer the pain of losing loved ones and bear the sins of Sea of Blood. So they find us, helpless Mortals, to be their scapegoats and stepping stones.
And then they want to erect a memorial arch for themselves, claiming it's for the sake of the common people, Merit?
Bah!
Your Jiang Family, from top to bottom, inside and out, are all hypocritical and pretentious bitches.
"Jiang Ling, you wretched child, you have absolutely no idea what it means to prioritize the greater good."
Old Jiang was furious, but he also knew that, morally and emotionally, he could no longer persuade this soul that had been consumed by hatred for a thousand years.
He can only blame the consequences and harm:
"Even if the Lineage's methods of training Wuchen back then were somewhat flawed, your subsequent actions were even more heinous and beyond description."
You not only murdered your own father and harmed your elder brother, but you also slaughtered countless promising young talents and prodigies of the Jiang Family.
That's not all. You have gone so far as to hunt down my Jiang Family's scattered branches throughout the Three Thousand Great Provinces, committing countless atrocities.
Do you know how much of the Jiang Family's blood is on your hands?
You are truly inhumane and deserve to die.
It turned out that Jiang Ling was stabbed through the heart by her father Jiang Wuchen, but her intense resentment and unwillingness prevented her soul from immediately dissipating.
By fortuitous opportunity stroke of luck, her Remnant Soul was collected and condensed by a powerful cultivator of the ghost path, and with boundless Resentment Qi as its foundation, she cultivated into Vengeful Spirit ghost cultivator.
From then on, she abandoned everything from the past, with only one Obsession in her heart—to take revenge on the Jiang Family.
She lay low, cultivated her skills, and became powerful and enigmatic.
Finally, after a century of scheming, she orchestrated the murder of her "father," Jiang Wuchen, who had given her life and then destroyed everything she had.
Afterwards, she plotted to poison her half-brother, Jiang Wuhen.
However, the Jiang Family has a deep foundation, and its core strength is far beyond her ability to contend with. Moreover, the Tianzhu Sword Sect is her backer.
Unable to directly attack the Jiang family's ancestral land, she began a long and bloody revenge.
She hunted down Jiang Family members who went out to train, especially those with outstanding talent, causing heavy losses to the Jiang Family and a shortage of geniuses.
That wasn't enough; she turned her attention to the Jiang Family's scattered branches across the Three Thousand Great Provinces, whose bloodlines were relatively thin.
She wanted to use the cruelest methods to wipe out the Jiang Family's bloodline, to make the Jiang Family taste the pain of having their bloodline severed and their loved ones die tragically!
The reason she came to the Eastern Domain of Yuhua Prefecture was because there was a branch of the Jiang Family there.
Jiang Luohan, by all accounts, is a collateral descendant of this bloodline, many generations removed.
To Jiang Ling, anyone of the Jiang Family bloodline, regardless of kinship or innocence, deserves to die.
They should all be buried with her mother, her brother, and the 173 lives lost in the Zhang Family.
Originally, given Jiang Ling's Cultivation and unorthodox methods at the time, dealing with Jiang Pojun, who was chasing her, wouldn't have been too difficult.
But by chance, she bumped into two Immortals from the Eastern Domain during her journey.
In a fierce battle, Jiang Ling was almost completely annihilated, and her last remaining spirit was suppressed in East Green Mountain. She only managed to escape recently.
The Immortals of East Green Mountain and Wenhua Academy also perished one after another, leaving only a Jiang Pojun Remnant Soul.
Listening to Old Jiang's twisted logic of prioritizing the big picture, Jiang Ling felt nauseous and wanted to vomit. She angrily said:
"Since you think that the lives of Mortals are not lives, but the lives of the Jiang Family are, then I will kill all of you Jiang Family and let you taste the bitterness of having your bloodline cut off."
"Look at what will happen then. Your grand plans and your Merits will be worth only a few copper coins."
"Stubborn and incorrigible."
Old Jiang knew that words could no longer sway his opponent in the slightest, and the last trace of complex emotion in his eyes vanished completely, leaving only a chilling Killing Intent.
"Since you insist on going against your Lineage and the greater good of Human Race, today, for the sake of this world, I will rid you of this scourge."