Old Bastard

The "Lineage's standby medicine" had once again lived up to Si Chen's expectations.

Within a few breaths, most of his depleted spiritual power and exhausted soul had recovered.

The cultivators and members of the Demon Race he had rescued from the blood pool followed closely behind. The demons, in particular, gathered around Red Wind of their own accord, keeping Si Chen sheltered in their midst and eyeing the other human cultivators warily.

The interior of Dragonfall Land resembled an enormous maze, its passageways crisscrossing in every direction.

Their procession made quite a commotion. Black Mountain charged at the head, his enormous body almost filling the passage.

"Lü Ci, you son of a bitch! Don't let me catch you, or I'll squeeze the yolks out of your balls! ..."

He cursed nonstop as he ran, working his way from Lü Ci himself through more than eighteen generations of his ancestors. An endless stream of filthy language echoed through the enclosed space.

This counted as redirected hatred, more or less.

The procession advanced in force, occasionally encountering scattered human cultivators.

At the sight of them, especially the Mountain-Shaking Bear in the lead who was running while greeting Lü Ci's ancestors with every obscenity imaginable, those cultivators turned pale and flattened themselves against the walls to clear a path, terrified that a moment's delay would make them the punching bag of this clearly furious bear lord.

They passed numerous stone chambers and halls of all sizes. Spiritual light flickered within, suggesting that plenty of treasures lay hidden inside.

Si Chen spotted a cultivator in a nearby stone chamber grabbing a gleaming longsword, his face wild with joy. Judging by its spiritual fluctuations, its grade was certainly high.

But before the man's smile had fully spread, the longsword in his hand shuddered violently and exploded with a boom! He never even had time to scream before the blast left him a mangled mass of flesh and blood.

How could that old Flood Dragon possibly let anyone walk away with his treasured collection so easily?

Of course, some cultivators did find genuine Magic Treasures and spirit materials and pocketed them, drawing red-eyed newcomers into desperate fights over the spoils.

Si Chen barely spared any of it a glance. None of these things interested him.

Black Mountain and Red Wind were even more impatient. They only wanted to find that old bastard Lü Ci quickly, put on a good show in front of their brother, and recover the face they had just lost.

The human cultivators who had come with them were soon drawn to the treasure-filled halls and gradually fell behind.

Not a single demon, however, left the group. They stayed firmly at Si Chen's side.

That alone showed how different the temperaments of the two races truly were.

Black Mountain had a keen nose. He sniffed sharply, then turned back to Si Chen and rumbled, "Brother, we're almost there! That old bastard's stink, and the stench of his two little hangers-on, are right ahead. No mistake!"

"Huh? There's also a... very strange burnt smell."

"A burnt smell?" Si Chen paused in surprise.

"That's right." Red Wind twitched his nostrils beside him. "Like... something scorched by lightning, but not quite the same. More overpowering."

Something stirred faintly in Si Chen's heart at those words.

Lightning?

It reminded him of the Yang Thunder he had been searching for all this time.

"Who cares what it smells like!" Black Mountain could no longer wait, his paws scraping impatiently at the ground.

"Find that old bastard first!"

With a low growl, he charged forward again on heavy feet, even faster this time, driven by a vicious determination to settle the score.

Sure enough, the farther they went, the wider the passage became, and the more cultivators they encountered.

These people stood in groups of three or five, craning their necks to peer ahead, their faces full of resentment and indignation. Their muttered complaints reached the group clearly:

"Damn it, the Flowing Cloud Sword Sect is too overbearing! There's so much room inside. What gives them the right to throw us all out?"

"Exactly! Being at Nascent Soul means you get to hog the whole feast?"

"Shh! Keep your voice down! If you want to die, don't drag me along! Didn't you see those guys who refused to back down get blasted out by his Sword Qi? They're still over there coughing up blood and regulating their breathing!"

"Ugh, what can we do? His fists are bigger..."

Black Mountain's fury shot higher when he heard that. Quickening his pace, he unleashed another torrent of abuse. "Hogging the feast? I won't even let him eat shit while it's hot! Lü Ci, fuck your mother, you old bastard who screws his own daughter-in-law..."

His curses grew fouler and fouler, spewing like a barrage of cannon fire and echoing through the passage.

The complaining cultivators ahead jumped in fright, staring slack-jawed at this giant bear whose mouth overflowed with such fragrant language.

Then they looked behind him. Good grief! An entire force followed the bear. Si Chen, that "evil cultivator," sat astride the third-rank tiger demon, surrounded by a crowd of fierce-looking demons.

They hurried to either side, afraid to block the way.

As they watched this murderous procession charge straight toward the defenses Lü Ci had set up, their initial terror gave way to barely concealed anticipation of a good show.

That's what you get for hogging everything, Lü Ci!

At the end of the passage stood an exceptionally broad cavern entrance, but a ceaselessly shifting curtain of fierce sword light sealed it tight.

It was clearly a Sword Formation Lü Ci had laid down to keep others out.

"That old bastard really thinks this is his own home?!"

Black Mountain's fury surged straight to the crown of his head, his bear eyes widening into circles.

"Open up, damn you!"

Roaring, Black Mountain concentrated all his demonic power into his broad paw and slammed it straight into the Sword Formation in a furious blow!

BOOOOM!!!

The Sword Formation, which posed a lethal threat to Golden Core and Foundation Establishment cultivators, failed to last even three breaths beneath Black Mountain's crushing strike. It burst into a skyful of streaming light and vanished without a trace.

"Your Grandpa Black Mountain is here!"

Black Mountain roared and charged in first, with Red Wind and Si Chen close behind. The other demons surged through the entrance, howling.

The cultivators barred outside, who had previously dared to feel angry but not speak, exchanged looks. No one knew who took the lead, but they all rushed after them.

Only a fool would pass up a free advantage. What if they managed to pick up some overlooked treasure?

The crowd immediately stirred, scrambling over one another to rush inside.

The sight within the cavern made everyone pause.

This underground space was several times larger than the earlier blood pool hall, its ceiling too high to see. Countless faintly glowing crystals studded the surrounding rock walls, illuminating the entire cavern as brightly as day.

But what caught the eye most was the enormous shape coiled like a small mountain in the very center of the cavern...

The remains of a Flood Dragon, long devoid of life!

Even after an unknown number of years in death, it still radiated a heart-pounding pressure.

Large swaths of scales had been cast out as bait, leaving the dull flesh beneath exposed and making the Flood Dragon's remains look somewhat ravaged.

Most striking of all were the tiny streaks of purple lightning that occasionally darted through the gaps in the dragon corpse's flesh, giving off faint crackles.

At the center of its coils, something seemed to be pinned beneath its enormous body, radiating energy fluctuations that made hearts tremble.

Lü Ci, the two Core Formation Elders, Young Master Fang, and his gray-robed guardian all stood before the dragon corpse.

They seemed to be studying how to retrieve the object beneath it. Hearing the commotion, they turned in unison.

When Lü Ci saw Si Chen completely unharmed, and especially when he sensed the steady aura around him, his pupils abruptly contracted and disbelief filled his face.

"You... actually survived...?"

He had sealed this brat inside the blood pool hall with those lunatics! Even if they had not torn him apart, there was no way he could have recovered so quickly!

Young Master Fang and the gray-robed elder also looked somewhat surprised.

Si Chen looked at the old man who had repeatedly caused him trouble. Black Mountain's style of cursing still echoed in his mind, and almost without thinking, he blurted out:

"Surprised, old bastard?"

The moment the words left his mouth, even Si Chen froze briefly. He did not normally talk like that.

Beside him, Red Wind was visibly stunned, his tiger face full of astonishment, as though saying:

Brother, you've picked up bad habits!

Black Mountain paused at first, then his bear face took on the pleased expression of someone discovering a promising pupil. He even slapped his thigh with a paw. "Yes! That's how you curse him! Curse that old geezer to death!"

Lü Ci's face instantly went from shocked to liver-purple, his entire body trembling with rage.

He was the esteemed sect master of the Flowing Cloud Sword Sect, a Nascent Soul Cultivator. When had he ever suffered such humiliation?

And to be publicly insulted in such vulgar terms by a mere Foundation Establishment junior!?