About half a kilometer from the city walls.
In the shadows of a market quarter untouched by the fighting.
Yan Qiya and Yang Kaitian hid there with the dozen or so surviving core members of the Great Vehicle Sect and Göktürk Wolf Guards. All bore injuries, their auras unsteady. Clearly, breaking out of the Xiao Family Ancestral Tombs had come at a price.
Their eyes remained fixed on the towering flames and chaotic battle at the city gate, focusing above all on the figure in blue who moved through an army of thousands as though no one stood in his way. Shock and disbelief covered their faces.
"This... how is this possible?!"
A Great Vehicle Sect follower looked as though he had seen a ghost. "A few months ago, when the Holy Maiden attacked him, he was only at the peak of the Second Realm... even if he encountered some extraordinary fortune, this rate of advancement is far too..."
Yan Qiya's expression remained fairly calm, but her gaze was grave as ice.
From the moment she first heard Lu Changfeng's name, she had known he was no ordinary man. Anyone trusted by both Princess Taiping and Xue Ne could hardly be mediocre. Yet witnessing such might firsthand still exceeded her expectations-this was absolutely not something the fourth realm peak alone could accomplish.
Yang Kaitian's feelings were even more complicated, tinged with a sense of absurdity.
As a protector of the Great Vehicle Sect, he had long known of Lu Changfeng. A few months earlier, when Lu Changfeng devised a way to break the Immeasurable Seal in Luoyang, his cultivation had unquestionably been at the peak of the Second Realm. How much time had passed since then?
Less than half a year, even by the most generous reckoning, and this man