"Young Sword Cultivator, you truly are strong. You rival those peerless masters of the sword I met when I was still a prodigy. Every one of them dazzled an entire era.
But none possessed your unwavering will or your extreme methods.
Allowing you to rise would drive all of our kind down a road to certain death.
So today, you must die!"
The Seven Emotions Demon Venerable was no ordinary cultivator. He excelled at toying with people's hearts.
With a lift of his hand, a dazzling, multicolored net blanketed the sky and enveloped Li Yang.
Li Yang slashed with his sword, but could not strike it. The net had no physical substance.
In an instant-
Li Yang entered another world.
When his parents suffered abuse, their fellow villagers stood up for justice;
When his younger sister was about to be sexually assaulted, she killed the village bully's son instead, and the judge ruled it self-defense;
An inspection team arrived in the county, rooting out the criminals' protectors and cracking down on organized crime.
After his discharge from the military, his whole family reunited.
Everything was so wonderful...
Li Yang smiled. Still smiling, he took up his woodcutting blade and cleaved apart this illusion.
Because over a decade of bloodshed and suffering had never stopped reminding him.
Evil bred every moment, staining the entire world black.
It made his fellow villagers numb, afraid of retaliation, wanting nothing to do with criminals and their wickedness;
It turned death sentences into life imprisonment, life imprisonment into fixed terms, and fixed terms into release.
It proved a line from a television drama true: "Where would so many corrupt officials come from? To put it plainly, you're just fighting among yourselves."
Li Yang did not want to change this world. All he wanted was to kill everyone who had stained it black.
But after he cleaved apart that illusion.
The world turned the gray of withered leaves.
A lone, forsaken figure knelt on an execution ground.
"Do you regret it? You sought only the fleeting pleasure of killing, leaving your parents with no one to care for them in their old age." A deeply provocative voice rang out.
Li Yang rose:
"The one in the wrong isn't me. It's this world!"
The world changed again.
Everything turned the inky black of eternal night. Evil Fiends descended, each radiating an overwhelming aura, and the Six Desires Demon Venerable was among them.
Li Yang became an ant at the foot of towering mountains, about to be crushed by these mighty demons.
But with a clang, his sword's cry still thundered to the heavens.
He lifted his head, killing intent blazing. "If I survive, I will slay every Evil Fiend beneath the heavens!"
Suddenly-
The world changed again.
Li Yang appeared in a bridal chamber.
He lifted the bridal veil, and Xiao Feng nestled against his chest, gazing at him pleadingly:
"Husband, don't you love me anymore? Why must you leave me to pursue something as elusive as immortality?"
"Love?" Li Yang shook his head.
He had never loved, and did not know what romantic love was:
"I pursue strength so that more people can marry and have children, just like you."
It changed again.
The Mystic Heaven Sword Sect turned a mottled, stony blue-green.
An old man who cultivated the corpse arts, his aura reaching the heavens, refined everyone in the Mystic Heaven Sword Sect into Human Puppets.
"Keh heh heh! Li Yang, you killed my granddaughter, so I exterminated your entire sect! You're the one who got them killed!"
Then his master, Lu Feng, and his fellow disciples from Crane-Cry Peak appeared with contorted expressions.
But before they could recount the misery of their unjust deaths, Li Yang had already raised his sword and slashed at the old man:
"Keh heh your fucking mother!"
The world collapsed.
Vast banks of immortal mist appeared, billowing and swirling.
Blissful golden light shone down, and Li Yang felt his strength rise higher and higher.
His body felt utterly at ease, as though he had ascended to immortality!
In the world before him, the ground consisted of endless supreme-grade spirit stones. Rich spiritual springs were everywhere, and an immortal was expounding the Dao.
A mountaintop bristled with Nine-Pattern Spirit Swords. Top-grade Sword Pellets flew freely between heaven and earth.
At this sight, Li Yang's desires swelled without limit.
The immortal looked over and smiled:
"Take whatever you desire. Even opportunities to become immortal can be found everywhere."
But...
Li Yang's blood-red eyes blazed scarlet as the greatest desire in his heart swelled-
The desire to kill!
The desire to kill demons and defend the Dao!!!
Clang!!!
The Spirit Swords and Sword Pellets throughout the world unleashed terrifying sword cries at once, overwhelming this world like toppling mountains and surging seas.
Li Yang casually seized a sword and slashed at the immortal.
"This is my desire!"
The world shattered completely.
Li Yang's mind became perfectly clear. Before him stood Gu Zang, who was about to take his head amid casual laughter-in other words, the Seven Emotions Demon Venerable.
Clang!
The Phoenix Sword erupted with even sharper sword qi, cleaving the Seven Emotions Demon Venerable apart with a single strike beneath his stunned, horrified gaze.
His body split into two equal halves. His cultivation, which had climbed to the Golden Core stage, never had a chance to serve him.
He had believed his Seven Emotions Killing Secret Art would trap Li Yang within it, allowing him to pluck off the young man's head at leisure.
He had never imagined Li Yang would pass so swiftly through the seven realms of desire-joy, anger, sorrow, fear, love, hatred, and desire-without his emotions being affected in the slightest.
All that remained was his terrifying obsession with killing the Demon Venerable!
"No-!"
That final cry came from Gu Zang.
He had believed everything was under his control, with his master as his final trump card.
Yet in the end, he died so swiftly.
How could this Sword Cultivator, only at the first level of Foundation Establishment, be so terrifying?!
Li Yang let out a long breath.
That had been far too dangerous.
If his Dao heart had not been firm, and he had not begun condensing his sword heart, he would likely have died at this Evil Fiend's hands.
Demon Cultivators who cultivated the Dao of emotions were exceedingly rare. The illusions he had just passed through had been far too real. He had possessed no conscious control at all, relying entirely on his Dao heart's instincts.
It seems I'll need to buy a Spirit Artifact that protects the soul, Li Yang thought warily.
He really had received a fright just now, thinking the Seven Emotions Demon Venerable himself would manifest and crush him with one finger.
Fortunately, he had possessed Gu Zang, and was not impossible to kill.
At this point, no enemies remained before Li Yang.
He had thought this demon-slaying expedition in Yongning Commandery was over. As for Xiao Feng, she had nothing to do with him; he could simply continue his mortal transfiguration.
But suddenly-terrifying killing intent came from behind him!
"Junior brother!"
Ning Xinyao screamed in panic.
Li Yang looked back and discovered that Xiao Feng had fallen into Xuan Shi's hands!
"Something's wrong!" Li Yang frowned. The man's aura was strange. It was not the aura of the Heaven-Swallowing Demonic Art, but that of-the Six Desires Demon Venerable from Myriad Phenomena City!
When Ning Xinyao sensed how terrifying the Seven Emotions Demon Venerable was, she had immediately put away her pill furnace and fled with Xiao Feng.
She had never expected Xuan Shi, who had been hiding in the shadows, to be possessed by the Six Desires Demon Venerable. He had ambushed them and seized Xiao Feng.
"Keh heh heh~ You little bastard, when you killed my daughter back then, did you ever imagine this day would come?"
The Six Desires Demon Venerable laughed wildly. "Did you think you would be the one laughing last? I would never leave her to you, nor would I let you climb aboard the Ning Lineage's ship!"
Yet Li Yang remained perfectly composed.
Does this old bastard also think Xiao Feng is my goal?
How laughable.
"And then? What are you going to force me to do by holding her hostage?"
The Six Desires Demon Venerable clenched Xiao Feng's neck tightly, holding her like a little chick. As though he had obtained some supreme authority, he commanded:
"Cripple your own cultivation!"
Li Yang shook his head. "Dream on."
The Six Desires Demon Venerable realized that was unrealistic, and said instead, "Give me your sword."
Holding the Phoenix Sword, Li Yang shook his head again. "You're dreaming out your ass."
"You're courting death!" The Six Desires Demon Venerable tightened his grip, and Xiao Feng's face turned deathly blue.
She called to Li Yang, "Don't... agree to... anything!"
She did not need to say it. Li Yang would never compromise with an Evil Fiend.
"Aren't you afraid I'll strangle her?" The smile vanished from the Six Desires Demon Venerable's face, leaving it dark and sinister.
Ning Xinyao panicked as well:
"Junior brother, don't be rash!"
"Shut up!" Li Yang snapped at his senior sister as usual.
His gaze immediately returned to the Six Desires Demon Venerable. "It's not as though I can't give you anything."
"Keh heh~" The Six Desires Demon Venerable laughed. "You are afraid after all. Tell me, then. What can you give me?"
"A sword strike!" Li Yang's fierce expression concealed an even fiercer ruthlessness as he raised his sword and slashed.
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