"You just said... who wouldn't dare to come?"
He stood in the void directly above the city gate, hands behind his back. The morning breeze passed through the gaps in the scales of the nine True Dragon, bringing with it a deep golden hum.
Jin Han's pupils suddenly contracted.
He subconsciously activated the laws protecting him at the Mid Quasi-Emperor Realm. A layer of pale golden light rose around him, like an invisible shield, causing the surrounding air to slightly cave in.
An invisible pressure, like a mountain, pressed down on him.
An ineffable power, deeper than the laws themselves, had silently swept past from the void beside him.
Jin Han's voice froze in his throat, and the aura of his protective laws exploded.
Then, his body split open from the middle.
There was no blood splattering, no severed limbs.
Only a very thin, faint crack started from his brow and extended all the way to his lower abdomen, then neatly split his entire body in two, as clean as a hot knife slicing through a block of frozen butter.
"Bang!"
Jin Han's mangled body slowly collapsed, blood gushing out like a pillar, crashing onto the ground beside the carriage with a dull thud.
Jin Han... Jin Han from the Jin Clan is dead?
There was a deathly silence at the city gate for three full breaths before someone gasped sharply. " Early-Stage Quasi-Emperor, killed so easily... How did the Lin Clan son manage to do that?"
"He didn't see it clearly! He really didn't see it clearly!"
"Did anyone see it clearly?"
"No!"
The cultivators watching at the city gate all gasped in shock.
This was the first time I had witnessed Lin Fan's power.
They didn't see how Lin Fan made his move, nor did they sense any fluctuations in the laws. They saw Jin Han's protective laws silently split in two, like an eggshell being peeled open.
The Jin Clan elder who had rushed over also stood not far away, his face ashen, his eyes fixed on Lin Fan, a jade slip clutched in his palm, his knuckles white, but he made no move.
Lin Fan stood still, hands behind his back.
A corner of his white robe fluttered in the morning breeze, and a few wisps of Chaos Qi silently circled his fingertips before receding.
He spoke as if he were genuinely just passing by, casually dealing with a dog blocking his way, his tone indifferent. "This imperial prince doesn't like such talk. Even if someone forces me to pretend, I won't!"
These words landed lightly beside Jin Han's mangled body...
But everyone who heard it at the city gate felt a chill rise from the soles of their feet.
On the second floor of a distant restaurant, behind a half-open window, the young man in the green robe paused slightly in the hand holding the wine glass.
The young man in the grey-white robe beside him was silent for a moment, then said in a low voice, "Interesting, he hasn't moved much... that Immortal Qi hasn't fully emerged yet."
"Three strands of Immortal Qi... it's very likely real."
The young man in the green robe put down his wine cup. " The Jin Clan has truly bitten off more than they can chew this time."
The two exchanged a glance, then vanished in a flash.
At the city gate, Lin Fan withdrew his gaze, as if he had truly only swatted a fly. Then, as if sensing something, he glanced at the restaurant.
"That's interesting!"
He landed back on the ground at the city gate, his white robe fluttering slightly, and walked past Jin Han's two halves of his body without even bowing his head.
"The Dao Debate Arena of Immortal Burial City... in which direction is it located?"
He asked a question.
No one in the crowd answered.
A moment later, a young man in gray clothes squeezed out of the crowd, pointed to the west, and shouted, "The city center, that blue stone arena... are you here for the Daoist debate today?"
"Okay, let's go."
Lin Fan nodded, put his hands behind his back, and walked in that direction.
The pace was neither too fast nor too slow.
The crowd at the city gate automatically parted to both sides, as if cleaved in two by an invisible knife, allowing him to pass right through the center.
His figure disappeared into the morning light...
Finally, someone in Immortal Burial City truly realized... that the Lin Clan son had really arrived.
The Jin Clan guards stood there, stunned.
It wasn't until Lin Fan's figure had almost disappeared at the end of the street that someone suddenly came to their senses and ran towards the Jin Clan's mansion in Immortal Burial City.
"Quickly, go and report this!"
Young Master Jin Han is dead!
"I was killed without even seeing how I was killed!"
The sound of footsteps faded into the morning light, gradually disappearing at the end of the street.
The city gates of Immortal Burial City were bustling again!
In the city, there is a huge blue stone arena.
The arena was about a hundred feet square, and was made entirely of a kind of gray-black rock. Its surface was covered with scratches of varying depths, like sword marks and knife marks worn down by countless battles.
Directly in front of the arena stood a huge stone tablet, its body a pale gold color, inscribed with the three characters "Discussion Arena".
The three characters are written with vigorous strokes, containing a restrained yet powerful Daoist charm, as if the cultivator who wrote these three characters was once the strongest person in this place in a certain era.
A considerable number of people were already standing on the sidelines.
The figures around the meditation hall had gradually arrived.
Some wore golden armor, some wore silver robes, and some were shrouded in black robes so their faces were obscured. There were also incredibly young Emperor Pass shrouded in strange phenomena.
Some leaned against stone pillars, some stood at the front of the crowd, and some hid in the shadows.
Most people were already seated, some with their eyes closed, others talking in hushed tones, but everyone's gaze was intentionally or unintentionally drifting in the same direction... towards the untrodden stone path at the entrance to the arena.
Because the person who's supposed to be the final performer hasn't arrived yet.
Jin Han is dead.
This news was like a bucket of cold water poured into a pot of boiling oil, causing a sensation all the way from the city gate to the forum.
A young cultivator in a gray short robe lowered his voice. " Mid-Stage Quasi-Emperor... was cleaved in two between his brows by something unknown, and didn't even have time to fully activate his protective laws."
"Doesn't that mean he didn't even have time to react?"
"It's not that he didn't have time," the person next to him corrected. "He didn't even see the attack. Jin Han's laws were the foundation he had cultivated for two thousand years, yet they were nothing compared to that attack."
"People from Three Thousand Provinces... can they really be this strong?"
You're asking me? Who should I ask?
The murmurs inside the venue rose and fell like a low tide, but one area remained unusually quiet.
There weren't many people at the table where the Jin Clan was seated, but everyone there exuded an unusually heavy aura.
Leading the group was a young man seated upright in a grand chair, his face cold and stern, wearing a dark gold robe with an extremely intricate ancient pattern embroidered on the hem.
He concealed his aura perfectly, like an undercurrent suppressed beneath the surface of ice, without leaking out in the slightest.
But his fingers were gently tapping the armrest.
Once, twice, three times.
The rhythm was steady, but each stroke was a little heavier than the last.
A follower beside him whispered something, and the young man in the golden robe paused for a moment before continuing to tap, only the rhythm was slightly faster than before.
He is Jin Zhen, the Jin Zhen Jin Clan.
The young prodigy of Emperor Pass has condensed a genuine Innate Immortal Qi.
His reputation at the Emperor Pass was even greater than that of most direct descendants of the immortal families, because he truly earned it through his battle achievements...
He once defeated a Peak Quasi-Emperor cultivator from the Mid-Stage Quasi-Emperor Rogue Cultivator - Emperor Pass, a battle that solidified his position among the younger generation of the Emperor Pass.
It's been a long time since anyone has asked him to take action!
It is said that a second layer of energy was formed by chance at some ruins...
But to this day, no one has been able to force him to unleash a second burst of Immortal Qi...
But today, his cousin Jin Han was instantly killed by a Early-Stage Quasi-Emperor of the Three Thousand Provinces at the gate of Immortal Burial City.
Moreover, he died cleanly and swiftly, without anyone even seeing how the other party made a move.