Blazing flames kindled in Hu Fangyuan's eyes!
Become a god!
Those words echoed endlessly in his mind like a spell.
Once he became a god, he would live forever!
Once he became a god, no one would ever be able to threaten his life again!
Once he became a god, he would truly be able to control his own destiny!
Brimming with ambition, he suddenly realized something.
Why couldn't he become a god?
His father's headlong flight, the deaths of his mother and clansmen-those vibrant lives had almost all vanished in an instant.
When people were killed, they died.
Then he had to become so powerful that no one could threaten his life.
But what about time?
Even the Limit Douluos depicted in novels and biographies became a handful of yellow earth after two or three hundred years.
Then he would become a god!
Once he became a god, he would live forever!
Hu Fangyuan slowly clenched his fist.
The Blood Skull Gu in his palm seemed to sense the killing intent and ambition in his heart. The crimson, blood-thread markings between its bones glowed faintly, and it gave a series of soft clacking sounds.
Just then, the Heavenly Essence Treasure Lotus and the Blood Skull Gu each turned into a streak of light and flew back into the Heaven Refining Furnace.
The Heavenly Essence Treasure Lotus settled inside the furnace, its petals gently unfurling and shedding a faint bluish-white glow. The essence crystal granules at its center flickered with tiny points of light.
The Blood Skull Gu nestled beside the Kirin Fire Gate, its hollow eye sockets facing the fire chamber. Its lower jaw opened and closed slightly, making clacking sounds.
As they were rank-three and rank-four Gu, Hu Fangyuan currently found it somewhat taxing to activate them each time.
That will had just helped him use the abundant soul power supplied by the Heavenly Essence Treasure Lotus to unleash the killer move "Steal Life," nearly draining both his soul power and his body dry. Had the Steal Life killer move not drawn out the vitality of the three Evil Soul Masters and fed it back to him, he would probably have already died of exhaustion.
Hu Fangyuan lowered his head and looked at his hands.
His newly grown left arm was as pale and delicate as a baby's, its meridians and blood vessels clearly visible. But he knew that the strength of this arm was still far from its peak.
He needed time.
He needed resources.
He needed... cultivation resources!
Hu Fangyuan's gaze slowly swept his surroundings.
Charred flower beds, burning corridors, collapsed courtyard walls, and... bodies strewn every which way.
Among those bodies were members of the Hu Family, Hu Family guards, guests who had come to attend the banquet, and... Evil Soul Masters.
His clansmen...
His clansmen had all been killed.
A flicker of pain crossed Hu Fangyuan's eyes, only to be replaced by resolve.
Rather than let them turn to drifting ash in the fire, it would be better...
To make them his cultivation resources!
The Blood Skull Gu required sacrifices of his own bloodline to achieve its greatest effect. The bodies of the Hu Family clansmen were the best offerings!
The Heavenly Essence Treasure Lotus needed flowing essence spring water, pure energy, and the spiritual energy of heaven and earth at dawn as nourishment. There were bound to be plenty of soul tool cores among his clansmen's collections!
The Heaven Refining Furnace needed all kinds of heavenly treasures and earthly rarities to refine Gu. The entire Hu Family Manor was an immense treasure vault!
Leaving these things here would accomplish nothing.
He might as well let them serve one final purpose!
One day, he would surely avenge them!
Hu Fangyuan silently swore that oath in his heart.
He stood up, brushed the dust off himself, and looked resolutely toward the Hu Family Manor.
There, flames soared into the sky, and faint cries of battle drifted over.
There lay his home.
There, a pack of demons was ravaging it at this very moment.
But Hu Fangyuan knew that the most dangerous place was the safest place.
These Evil Soul Masters were currently hunting down the scattered guests and isolated members of the Hu Family. The strongest among them had all gone after his father, who had abandoned his wife, children, and clansmen.
They would never imagine that he would return to the Hu Family Manor.
After all, in their eyes, a child with a severed arm and a cultivation level of only thirteen should long since have been scared into pissing and shitting himself, fleeing as far as he could.
Who would have imagined that this child would actually dare to wheel around and strike back?
Fortune lay amid peril!
Let's do it!
A ruthless glint flashed through Hu Fangyuan's eyes.
He drew a deep breath, withdrew the Heaven Refining Furnace into his dantian, then crouched low and crept toward the Hu Family Manor under cover of darkness and firelight.
The manor's side gate had already burned away.
The bodies of two Hu Family guards lay at the entrance, covered in blackened scorch marks, their deaths gruesome.
Hu Fangyuan carefully skirted the bodies and slipped through the gap where the side gate had been.
Inside, the manor was a scene of devastation.
Bodies and blood littered the ground, and the air was thick with the stench of blood and burning. Most of the pavilions and towers had collapsed, while the few buildings still burning gave off sharp crackles.
Crouching low, Hu Fangyuan moved swiftly through the shadows along the courtyard wall.
His destination was clear: the Hu Family's main compound!
The Hu Family's main compound was the heart of the entire Hu Family Manor, where successive family heads had lived and stored important possessions. It held not only the wealth the Hu Family had accumulated over centuries, but also the various heavenly treasures, earthly rarities, and soul tools Hu Heming had secretly collected over the years.
As Hu Fangyuan hurried along, his thoughts raced.
He did not know why the Evil Soul Masters had come, but it naturally could not have been merely to kill that damned father of his over a grudge.
Hu Fangyuan had learned a little about the grievances between the Holy Spirit Cult and Hu Heming from their earlier exchange of insults.
Hu Heming had joined the Holy Spirit Cult in his youth and spent quite a few years among them. Later, for some unknown reason, he had suddenly washed his hands of that life, left the Holy Spirit Cult, and returned to Lingbi City to inherit the position of head of the Hu Family.
The Holy Spirit Cult had never come knocking all these years, and Hu Heming had thought the matter was over.
But now, things seemed far from that simple.
In this large-scale assault, the Evil Soul Masters had deployed at least a dozen experts of Soul Elder rank or higher, with even three Soul Ancestor-level experts overseeing the attack. Using such a force against a single level-forty-six Soul Ancestor was like using an ox-cleaving blade to slaughter a chicken.
Unless...
Their target had only ever been Hu Heming's life.
And, even more, everything the Hu Family had accumulated over the years!
As a Soul Master family in Lingbi City, the Hu Family had built up its holdings over centuries, amassing wealth far beyond an ordinary person's imagination. Essence stones, soul tools, medicinal pills, soul bones, all kinds of heavenly treasures and earthly rarities-any one of them would be enough to drive Soul Masters mad.
The Holy Spirit Cult had suffered severe suppression by the Sun Moon Federation over the years. Short of resources, they urgently needed large quantities of supplies to replenish their stores. Naturally, they would not let a fat sheep like the Hu Family slip away.
Hu Fangyuan even suspected that his father might have secretly kept something for himself during his time as an Evil Soul Master, and had washed his hands of that life out of fear of being discovered.
At that thought, Hu Fangyuan's gaze grew even darker.
If that truly was the case, then the deaths of nearly a hundred people in the Hu Family were all Hu Heming's doing!
That damned old bastard!
Hu Fangyuan cursed viciously in his heart, but his feet moved even faster.
Crouching low, he passed through a burning bamboo grove, skirted a collapsed rockery, and finally reached the entrance to the Hu Family's main compound.
The compound's main gates had already been smashed by the Evil Soul Masters through brute force. Of the two heavy ironwood doors, one lay on the ground, while the other hung crookedly from its hinges, creaking.
Beyond the gates, flames soared into the sky, and the cries of battle had gradually grown sparse.
Hu Fangyuan cautiously poked his head out and looked into the compound.
Dozens of bodies lay strewn every which way across the open ground.
There were Hu Family clansmen, Hu Family guards, and Evil Soul Masters.
Blood gathered into little streams, flowing over the blue-brick ground before finally draining into the pond at the center of the courtyard, staining the entire pool of clear water dark red.
The air was thick with the stench of blood and burning, so overpowering that it made one's head swim.
Before you continue