Chan Master Wuxiang was the first to recover from his shock. Ripples stirred even across his usually placid face, and he pressed his palms together with a soft sigh:
"Amitabha... General Qing's victory truly thundered in our ears, shattering stone and startling the heavens!"
The Guanyin Tower Master still could not believe it. "He... he actually succeeded?
"With only Golden Core cultivation, he slew a Dharma Nascent Soul opponent above his realm, and in the very lair his enemy had spent so long establishing... This young man... this young man is simply..."
She fell speechless for a long moment, finding herself unable to come up with a fitting word to describe him.
Beside her, True Lord Yunmiao's expression underwent the most spectacular-and unsightly-changes.
His face first flushed scarlet, as though someone had slapped him hard, leaving his skin burning;
Then all the blood drained away, leaving him somewhat pale.
Only a short while ago, he had been holding forth, sneering at Qing Chen as "a mediocrity who only knows how to wage war on paper";
He had declared that Qing Chen's lone advance deep into enemy territory would end in crushing defeat, perhaps even the annihilation of his entire force.
Who could have imagined that news of victory would arrive so quickly, with such force!
Every word and sentence was like a branding iron searing his face, burning him so fiercely that even his Divine Soul trembled.
He felt as though the gazes of his fellow Cultivators in the command tent kept drifting toward him, their looks pricking him until he could neither sit nor stand at ease;
He wished he could use an earth-escape technique on the spot, burrow into a crack in the ground, and never emerge again.
"Ha ha ha ha ha-!"
A burst of thoroughly exuberant