Thousand-Year Family

"Bang!"

With a muffled impact, the bluestone floor—said to be so hard it could withstand a full-force blow from an entry-level warrior—shattered in an instant. Broken stone, sand, and dust sprayed everywhere. When the smoke cleared, a pit a meter across and half a foot deep had appeared in the once-intact floor. The inner edges of the pit were scorched black, and the charred corpses of insects that had originally lived beneath the bluestone could be seen clearly.

Staring at the scene before him, caused by no more than a casual wave of his hand, Liu Feng was dumbstruck.

"Soul Power! This is the power caused by elemental Soul Power!" Liu Feng murmured. After his astonishment passed, he immediately understood—just now, in his anger, he had actually used elemental Soul Power.

Its power seemed anything but small, but what element was it? Puzzled, Liu Feng crouched down and carefully examined the pit.

Judging from the scorched-looking surroundings, it ought to belong to the fire element, but on closer inspection, it did not quite seem so.

Fire magic possessed astonishing destructive power. Logically, those insects should have been reduced to flying ash without leaving the slightest trace. Yet now, they looked as if they had merely been burned black by electricity.

Electricity! That was right—it was not fire, but the power of lightning! Liu Feng shot to his feet, a look of shock appearing in his eyes. He suddenly remembered that when the Soul Power had left his body just now, he seemed to have seen a flash like lightning.

Though lightning magic was not unfamiliar on the continent, it could still be considered rare. Because of the lightning element's naturally berserk nature, ordinary people were fundamentally unable to use it. Liu Feng had never expected that the level-six Crystal Core inside his body would actually be the scarce lightning type. This made Liu Feng once again sigh that his luck was absolutely hard enough to stand tall.

But what level of strength did it count as, exactly? Liu Feng grew somewhat puzzled.

The Falan Continent itself was a continent where the strong were revered, and its divisions of strength were also very clear. There were three major ranks—low, middle, and high—and each rank was divided into three levels. Each level was further divided into upper, middle, and lower grades, for a total of nine levels and twenty-seven grades. Above the ninth level was the Saint Rank, whose strength was extraordinary; above the Saint Rank were the legendary divine-ranked experts, divided into the two levels of Sub-God Rank and God Rank. However, these two levels had already vanished from the continent over the past thousand years. The Saint Rank was the extreme.

The best way to know one's own level was to find people of the same level and spar with them. Unfortunately, the current Liu Feng had no such candidate, and could only give up helplessly.

Just then, Turner's towering figure appeared inside the living room, accompanied by his rough, booming voice.

"Young Master, I sent Master Faraday off! Hm? Young Master, what's with this big pit?" Turner's gaze fell on the pit that had appeared so suddenly. He remembered that when he had gone out just now, he had not seen it there.

"Struck by lightning!" Liu Feng answered offhandedly. Then he turned and left the living room, walking toward the gate of the side courtyard.

Leaving the Count's Mansion was only a matter of time. Since that was the case, he might as well leave earlier. Toward this place, Liu Feng no longer had the slightest bit of attachment. He decided to go see Count Derek at once and settle the time of departure.

"Lightning? How can there be lightning inside a room?" Turner scratched his messy hair in confusion, his black eyes full of incomprehension as he followed behind Liu Feng.

The distance between the main courtyard and the side courtyard of the Palister Family's Count's Mansion was only a few hundred meters. Liu Feng reached the gate of the main courtyard in a few steps, and could not help carefully sizing up the residence of this God-Descendant Count once more. In his memories, this place should have been his own home, yet Liu Feng already felt it was incomparably unfamiliar.

Unlike the luxurious façades of other nobles, the Palister Family's decorations were extremely simple and ancient. Yet within that simplicity, there was a faint solemn, steady grandeur. Though this family, which had inherited countless glories, had already declined over the past several centuries, it still possessed something that made others not dare look down on it.

In front of the Count's Mansion stood an enormous stone statue more than ten meters tall. This was the first family head who had single-handedly created the Palister Family's millennia of glory: Haojue Palister.

On that incomparably handsome face was a cold severity and a trace of disdain. The greatsword in his hand rested across his right shoulder, as if he were mocking all the heroes under heaven. Though it was only a statue, from head to toe it still faintly emitted that tyrannical aura of supremacy over the world, making no one dare despise it.

Looking at this imposing statue, Liu Feng's eyes flashed with a trace of daze. In his memories, the Palister Family's absolutely glorious history swept past in an instant.

Several thousand years ago, the first family head, Haojue Palister, had appeared as if out of nowhere. Relying on the greatsword in his hand and on the peerless martial strength of the Sub-God Rank, which at that time stood at the pinnacle of the continent, he had forcibly helped the first emperor of the Saint Mavana Empire establish the current Saint Mavana Empire.

Afterward, this family head did not become arrogant because of his talent. Instead, he refused all rewards from the empire, returned to his hometown, Ama City, and lived a life of seclusion.

However, the emperor at the time clearly did not mistreat this meritorious subject, and still bestowed upon him the title of count.

At first, the emperor's original intention had been to grant him the title of prince, or at the very least, duke. But Haojue Palister firmly refused to accept it. In the end, both sides took a step back, and he was ennobled as a count.

However, although the title of count was not extremely high, it was exceptionally powerful and noble.

God-Descendant Count! This was a title countless people could struggle their entire lives for. Not only could its holder meet the emperor without kneeling, but everyone below the emperor—princes and dukes, even including the crown prince and other princes—had to salute first upon meeting him. It could be called an immense honor.

After that, although the Palister Family had never participated in the empire's politics, whenever the empire fell into crisis, the Palister Family was still its strongest mainstay, several times saving the empire from peril.

Fifteen hundred years ago, the neighboring Dominico Empire colluded with powerful races such as Barbarians and Orcs. An army of nearly a million suddenly attacked the Saint Mavana Empire, smashing through everything in their path, breaking through several cities, and pointing their spearhead straight at the imperial capital, Hailan City. The situation was incomparably critical.

At that time, the empire unexpectedly did not have a single general capable of resisting them, and the empire sank into the crisis of destruction.

And at that moment, that generation's head of the Palister Family, Babus Palister, holding a written request order from the emperor of the empire at the time, once again went alone to the rescue.

He charged alone into the enemy camp, killing dozens of experts above the eighth level, including their great general. After that, even at the cost of crippling one of his own arms, he slew Dominico's greatest reliance in this campaign—a Saint Magister—beneath his sword.

Afterward, disregarding his own severe injuries, this family head once again led the armies that other lords had brought to reinforce them, slaughtering the Dominico army until corpses lay strewn across the fields. They beheaded several hundred thousand and ultimately repelled the Dominico army, successfully saving the empire.

In that battle, it was said that the Palister family head alone slew nearly a thousand people. Even many years later, Dominico's upper echelons still did not dare mention this family head's name, and it became a taboo.

And seven hundred years ago, rebellion broke out within the empire. Thirteen lords in the eastern part of the empire joined forces in revolt, relying on large numbers of Dark Mages and dozens of Dragon Knights to besiege the imperial capital.

Once again, it was Brown, the Palister family head at the time, who took action. He slew dozens of Dragon Knights together with all their giant dragons outside the imperial capital, making those thirteen lords bow their heads and surrender under endless terror and pressure...

In every imperial crisis, the Palister Family's figure had never been absent. And by pulling the empire back from crisis several times, the Palister Family's glory in the Saint Mavana Empire had become unmatched.

Yet behind this glory, the Palister Family had paid an enormous price. Although those family heads' martial strength had all been called peerless in their era, and they had slain all sorts of experts as if they were nothing, it had by no means been easy. Though they won, in the end they all died from their severe injuries.

Because of this, the Palister Family's formidable martial arts gradually declined. Although for the past several centuries the empire had not again encountered a crisis requiring the Palister Family to act, the Palister clan had also never again produced an unequaled expert. The highest level reached was only the ninth level, far below the first family head's super-powerful martial strength of the Sub-God Rank. In fact, after the death of the family head Brown seven hundred years ago, not even a single Saint Rank expert had appeared again.

And the current head of the Palister Family, Derek, was only an upper-grade eighth-level existence. The severity of the family's decline was truly a kind of sorrow.

For a family that had relied on peerless martial strength to achieve glory, how much importance they placed on the strength of their clansmen could easily be imagined. Thinking of this, Liu Feng suddenly understood Nicholas's situation back then somewhat. A cripple who could not cultivate being mocked by people in the family seemed only a matter of course.

But the current Nicholas was no longer a cripple! Feeling the pressing domineering aura in the statue of Haojue Palister, after his extreme shock, Liu Feng, for no reason, also felt a surge of heroic spirit rise within him. Though these several thousand years of glory had already passed, could he not make it flourish once more? Even surpass the past?

Thinking of this, a fanatical look instantly appeared in Liu Feng's eyes. An indescribable aura gradually began to rise from his body, and the thought in his heart of becoming a peerless expert grew even stronger.

But in the blink of an eye, Liu Feng returned to normal again. He was about to leave the Palister Family soon. What did everything in this family still have to do with him? With a bitter smile, he shook his head. Liu Feng drew his gaze away from the statue, took a deep breath, and strode into the main courtyard of the Count's Mansion, which he had not set foot in once over the past ten years.

The courtyard, like the façade, carried a trace of steadiness within its ancient simplicity and elegance, with no luxury visible at all. Liu Feng had no mood to admire this scenery. Amid the guards' mocking laughter, his expression unchanged, he walked toward the study in the rear courtyard.

In his memories, Count Derek would usually be reading there.

Who would have thought that he had only taken a few steps when a voice filled with surprise and mockery rang out.

"Yo! Look, everyone, look. Isn't this that cripple Nicholas? How did he make something of himself today and actually run to the main courtyard? Tsk, tsk, what a miracle!" Along with these eccentric, ridicule-filled words, a group of gorgeously dressed people appeared in front of Liu Feng.

The one leading them was a blond youth of sixteen or seventeen. He was incomparably handsome, with a tall, sturdy build, dressed in the finery of a warrior. Though he was not old, his entire body faintly emitted the aura of a strong person. This was none other than Nicholas's half-brother, known as the genius youth of this generation of the Palister Family, the Second Young Master, Gilbert.