"Arrogant!" Xiang Yang laughed in his fury. "I was just worrying about having no one to test my moves on! Since you seek death, I shall oblige!"
Xiang Yang roared and spat a blood-red flying sword from his mouth. This was his life-bound treasure, nurtured for several hundred years, and its emergence brought a thick reek of blood.
"Blood Slays Ten Thousand Miles!"
Xiang Yang formed sword seals with both hands. The blood-red flying sword instantly became a crimson rainbow a hundred zhang long, tearing through the air with a piercing shriek as it stabbed straight toward Qin Chen's brow. The sword moved so fast that it carved a black fissure through space itself.
On the city wall, Xiang Guang shouted excitedly, "Mighty ancestor! Kill him!"
Yet Qin Chen showed no intention of dodging this earth-shaking strike.
He merely stopped walking and slowly clenched his right fist.
Within his body, ten motes of micro star-dust lit up at once. Radiant star force instantly fused with dark-gold ancestral dragon true essence.
Faint, fine patterns of dragon scales emerged on Qin Chen's right arm. Unable to withstand this terrifying physical strength, the surrounding space began to twist violently.
"Flashy nonsense."
Qin Chen snorted coldly and threw a simple, straightforward punch at the hundred-zhang crimson sword light hurtling toward his face.
He used no magical treasure and cast no dazzling spell.
Only pure, absolute brute force!
BOOM-!!!
The instant his fist collided with the crimson sword light, all sound seemed to vanish from heaven and earth.
Then a ring of white air, visible to the naked eye, spread madly in every direction from the two men. Beneath its impact, a layer of the hard blue bricks on the city wall was scraped away as though they were tofu.
Crack!
A crisp snapping sound rang out.
Before Qin Chen's fist, Xiang Yang's life-bound flying sword, nurtured for hundreds of years, failed to last even a second. Starting at its tip, it shattered inch by inch, becoming a skyful of scrap iron.
"Pfft!" With his life-bound treasure destroyed, Xiang Yang violently spat out a mouthful of blood, his face instantly turning white as paper.
But the terror in his eyes had only just begun.
After shattering the flying sword, Qin Chen's punch did not pause in the slightest. The wind of his fist smashed straight toward Xiang Yang's chest with terrifying force that swept through everything like rotten wood.
"No! Impossible! I'm at the Nascent Soul stage! I'm invincible!"
Xiang Yang howled in despair, desperately mobilizing every bit of true essence within his body to erect more than a dozen crimson defensive shields before himself.
But before Qin Chen's fist force, powerful enough to blast stars apart, these shields were as fragile as soap bubbles.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
The dozen-odd shields were pierced in an instant.
Qin Chen's fist slammed squarely into Xiang Yang's chest.
BOOM!
A deep, thunderous impact rang out.
Xiang Yang's body suddenly stiffened. His eyes bulged as he stared fixedly at Qin Chen, who was right before him.
The next second, his immensely tough body, tempered by Nascent Soul stage true essence, exploded in midair like a watermelon struck by a sledgehammer!
Flesh and shattered bones splattered through the sky.
A miniature Xiang Yang burst from the bloody mist, his face filled with terror. It was his nascent soul. The nascent soul shrieked and turned, attempting to teleport away.
"Think you can escape?"
Qin Chen sneered, opened his fist into a claw, and grabbed through the air.
A terrifying suction erupted instantly. Before Xiang Yang's nascent soul could flee ten meters, it was forcibly dragged back into Qin Chen's hand.
"Spare me! Senior, spare me! My Xiang Family is willing to submit! We're willing to hand over the realm! Please, Senior..." Xiang Yang's nascent soul struggled desperately in Qin Chen's hand, pleading shrilly for his life. Not a trace remained of the lofty immortal he had been moments before.
"No need."
Expressionless, Qin Chen suddenly tightened his five fingers.
Squelch.
Xiang Yang's nascent soul was crushed into a mass of pure spiritual energy fragments, his soul utterly scattered.
From Xiang Yang's appearance and arrogant boasts to Qin Chen blasting his body apart with a punch and crushing his nascent soul, the entire process took less than ten breaths.
A breeze swept past. Only Qin Chen remained standing in midair with his hands behind his back, not a single drop of blood on him.
A deathly silence filled heaven and earth.
On the city wall, the wild delight on Chu State Emperor Xiang Guang's face was still frozen at the corners of his mouth. As though every bone had been drained from his body, he slumped to the ground with a thud.
The sight of Xiang Yang's nascent soul being crushed struck the heart of every Chu State defender like a sledgehammer.
That lofty Nascent Soul stage immortal, the Xiang Family's greatest trump card, had been crushed in Qin Chen's single hand as easily as an ant.
He had not had the slightest room to resist.
Clang.
On the city wall, someone's hands trembled so badly that he lost his grip on his spear. The weapon fell onto the bluestone bricks with a crisp clang.
That crisp clang spread across the entire stretch of wall like a contagious disease.
Clang! Clang! Thud!
Countless Chu State defenders went weak in the knees, threw down their weapons, and slumped to the ground, their faces ashen. Even an immortal had been blasted apart with one punch. What could mortals like them possibly use to stop him? Their heads?
At that moment, morale collapsed completely.
Outside the city, Qin De stood on his war chariot, watching the bloody mist dissipate in midair. The shock in his eyes gradually became a savage killing intent suppressed for more than a decade.
He abruptly drew the sword at his waist and pointed its edge straight at the Imperial City gates. Circulating his Golden Core stage true essence, he let out a furious roar that pierced the clouds:
"Jingxiang, today I will avenge you!"
"All troops, heed my command! Raze the Imperial City! Leave no one of the Xiang Clan alive! Kill!"
"Kill! Kill! Kill!"
One hundred thousand soldiers of the Fierce Tiger Army roared in unison. Their voices shook heaven and earth, and their terrifying murderous aura gathered together and surged into the clouds.
There was no need for siege ladders or battering rams.
Dozens of Qin Family Generals at the Xiantian realm led the charge, becoming streaks of afterimages as they rushed toward the heavy, iron-plated city gates.
They bellowed together, their powerful Xiantian true qi converging into a violent current that slammed into the gates.
BOOM!
The gates, several zhang tall and weighing tens of thousands of jin, failed to withstand even a second. The violent true qi blasted them into a skyful of wood splinters, while dozens of Chu State defenders behind them were sent flying backward, spewing blood.
The Imperial City had been breached.
"Charge!"
The dark mass of the Qin Family Army surged wildly through the shattered gateway like a black flood bursting through a dam.
They encountered no meaningful resistance.
Xiang Yang's gruesome death had already scared the courage out of Chu State's imperial guards. Seeing the Fierce Tiger Army charge in like wolves and tigers, they knelt along both sides of the streets with their hands over their heads, not daring even to breathe heavily.
Occasionally, a few generals fiercely loyal to the Xiang Family tried to resist, but before they could draw their blades, experts from the Fierce Tiger Army cut them in two with a single stroke.
They swept through like rotten wood, unstoppable as a blade splitting bamboo.
The Qin Family Army crushed everything along its path and fought straight to the Hall of Supreme Harmony in Chu State's Imperial Palace.
Meanwhile, on the city wall, Chu State Emperor Xiang Guang was still slumped on the ground. His hair hung loose and disheveled, his dragon robe was covered in dust, and a large wet patch soaked his crotch, giving off a foul stench of urine.
"It's over... It's all over..." Xiang Guang stared blankly at the black-armored Qin Family Army pouring in below, mumbling unconsciously.
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