Lightning flashed, a meteor streaked!
The suffocating Innate Spirit pressed down on the two men, leaving them unable to move.
The ten-meter distance vanished in the blink of an eye!
"It's you! It's actually you!"
The moment the dark figure approached, Tian Lie recognized him, a trace of terror and shock appearing in his eyes.
The Wan Household elder saw him too. His mouth fell wide open, and he froze in place, at a complete loss.
"That's right. It's me!"
The short blade left its sheath, its cold gleam tearing through the air and appearing before the Wan Household elder. He tried to raise his sword to block, but he was still half a beat too slow. The cold light swept across his neck, and his body shriveled bit by bit, turning into a sheet of human skin before Tian Lie's eyes.
Tian Lie was frightened out of his wits and screamed. The Wan Household elder had been at the seventh layer of Innate, yet someone had killed him with a single slash. This was simply unbelievable.
The remaining seven Acquired Realm disciples watched helplessly as the Wan Household elder died.
"It's... it's Liu Wuxie!"
In the faint light, his youthful face appeared before everyone, a harmless smile hanging at his lips. Nothing about this sunny youth suggested that he killed without blinking, having taken dozens of their lives in a single night.
"Impossible! He's trash! How could he have killed so many of us?"
The disciples of the two households who had rushed over roared in fury, unable to accept the shock.
"Trash?" Tian Lie gave a miserable laugh. Unless someone was in the Spirit Cleansing Realm, no one could have withstood that slash. "If he's trash, what does that make us?"
Bitterness crept onto his lips. They had charged into the Sunset Mountain Range brimming with confidence, only to meet this end. It was like falling from heaven into hell.
The trash they had always despised had become a towering giant overnight, and they did not even qualify to look up at him. No one could accept it. They were going mad, every one of them.
"He hid himself so deeply. What was it all for?"
Confusion and doubt filled their chests. Liu Wuxie looked at them disdainfully, raised his short blade, and stepped lightly forward. Like an eerie afterimage, he vanished from his spot and charged into the crowd.
"Not good! Scatter and escape! Get the news back to the Lineage!"
Tian Lie shouted, telling them to scatter and flee. They still had a slim chance. As long as one person escaped and brought news of this back to Canglan City, the Tian Household and Wan Household could prepare.
The remaining seven disciples fled swiftly in seven directions. Tian Lie suddenly lunged forward to intercept Liu Wuxie, buying them time to escape.
"None of you will escape tonight!"
The afterimages shifted bit by bit, and seven Liu Wuxies appeared on the field, rushing in seven directions. His short blade swept up, blade shadows layering upon one another. Fierce blade Qi formed a blade dragon that swept across the wilderness. The seven fleeing men fell one after another, all their bodies shriveled.
Tian Lie stopped in his tracks, his eyes nearly popping from their sockets. Killing seven people simultaneously with one slash and forming a blade dragon required at least fifty years of cultivation to achieve. Was he even human?
"Your turn!"
Liu Wuxie walked toward Tian Lie step by step, the killing intent around him growing thicker. Had the Song Household not told him the news, the Xu Household would already have changed hands, divided between the Tian Household and Wan Household. Even his father-in-law would have been thrown into prison.
"You... stay away!"
Tian Lie was afraid. He did not want to die yet. He had lived more than half his life and had yet to enjoy his remaining years in comfort, only to die here.
Stepping on dead branches, Liu Wuxie approached one step at a time. Tian Lie kept retreating until he reached the cliff wall, with nowhere left to go. His face was deathly pale, and his body trembled.
"Tell me, what is your Tian Household planning next?"
Only by knowing oneself and one's enemy could one win every battle. He needed to learn the Tian Household's next move, prepare defenses, and strike back where appropriate.
He stopped, a cold smile appearing at the corner of his mouth as he questioned him.
"You little bastard, don't even think about getting a single word out of me."
Tian Lie gritted his teeth. Terrifying Innate Spirit surged skyward, and his hair ribbon burst apart. He looked like a ferocious fiend as he thrust his longsword at Liu Wuxie, fighting to take him down with him.
"Obstinate fool!"
Liu Wuxie turned sideways to evade him. Tian Lie's thrust struck empty air, and, realizing things had gone wrong, he sprinted forward, actually trying to escape.
"Hmph!"
With a cold snort, Liu Wuxie slashed his short blade downward through the air. A series of sonic bursts rang out as blade Qi skimmed the ground. In the blink of an eye, a scream rose from the dense forest.
"Ahhh! My legs!"
Both of Tian Lie's legs were gone, severed by the blade Qi. Blood spurted in jets. Without his legs, he could only lie on the ground and howl.
Neither hurried nor slow, Liu Wuxie walked toward Tian Lie step by step. Tian Lie's face was twisted with pain as he stared at Liu Wuxie with venomous hatred.
"You little beast! You'll die a horrible death! Your Xu Household isn't far from destruction!"
All manner of vicious curses poured from his mouth. His blood gathered into a small stream, staining the surrounding grass red. The thick smell of blood drew several powerful Demon Beasts, which lingered nearby but dared not approach.
"What is the Tian Household planning next?"
He rested the short blade on Tian Lie's right arm. He did not press him, speaking as though two old friends were chatting. Liu Wuxie's tone did not fluctuate at all, its flatness frightening Tian Lie.
After killing more than thirty of them in succession, anyone's emotions would surely change-nervousness, excitement, fear, and so on. That was human nature. Yet his breathing remained steady, as though he had done something utterly insignificant.
"Don't waste your... ah!" Before he could finish saying "effort," his right arm suddenly vanished. The short blade fell, and blood sprayed wildly.
Liu Wuxie drew back the short blade and rested it on his left arm, that harmless smile never leaving his lips. Tian Lie was truly afraid now. He was a devil.
"My patience has limits. If you don't want to die in too much pain, speak quickly."
Tian Lie was afraid. His body shook like chaff in a sieve. Whether from fear or utter despair, he collapsed completely, lying helplessly on the ground as blood spurted from him.
"I'll tell you. Give me a quick death."
This was his final plea. He only wanted to die quickly, rather than suffer any more inhuman torture. Liu Wuxie had utterly broken his will.
"Speak!"
Sitting on a clean patch of ground some distance away, Liu Wuxie put away his short blade and quietly listened to his account.
"We joined forces with the Stone-Breaking Army to deal with your Xu Household. We planned to seize the Xu Household's businesses while Xu Yilin was in the Sunset Mountain Range, then use the Stone-Breaking Army to eliminate Xu Yilin..."
It was much as Liu Wuxie had surmised. Zhou Hu had already revealed the information he knew to him.
"What else?"
He already knew all this. He had to learn what the Tian Household would do next and seize the initiative.
"We've already dispatched a secret team to the purple-gold mine. Even if we can't occupy it, we'll destroy it. Once your Xu Household loses the purple-gold mine, its weapons workshop will close. We won't even have to act. The Xu Household will fall apart on its own within three months."
This information was far too important to Liu Wuxie. Without the purple-gold mine, the weapons workshop would lose its supply of raw materials. Unless they found new materials for forging weapons, closure would only be a matter of time.
"When will this team reach the purple-gold mine?"
He hoped he could still reach the mine in time, before the Tian Household beat him to it.
"Within the next day or two!"
Tian Lie's breathing grew weaker, and his words were already slurred. Blood no longer flowed from his severed legs and right arm. The blood in his body had all but run dry.
The short blade left its sheath, and Tian Lie's head flew into the air. The essence within his body was absorbed by the Heaven-Devouring Divine Cauldron, transformed into a drop of liquid, and merged into Liu Wuxie's Dantian.
Rumble...
His Dantian shook violently. This was a sign of an impending breakthrough. After killing so many people and accumulating enough liquid, he had finally reached the opportunity to break through.
After cleaning up the battlefield, he vanished from the spot, seeking a secluded place to break through to the third layer of Innate Realm.
Liu Wuxie slipped into a concealed cave and opened the Storage Bag Zhou Hu had left behind. Inside were over fifty Spirit Stones and a hundred thousand gold coins. He took out ten Spirit Stones and placed them around him, setting up a Spirit Gathering Formation.
Spiritual Qi was abundant in the Sunset Mountain Range. The instant the Spirit Gathering Formation took shape, Spiritual Qi from tens of thousands of meters around rapidly converged, forming a spiritual cloud that hovered outside the cave.
The power within those spiritual clouds was absorbed by a dozen or so Spirit Stones and gathered around Liu Wuxie. The Grand Desolation Heaven-Devouring Instruction abruptly began circulating. Like a divine taotie beast opening its bloody maw, it devoured all the surrounding Spiritual Qi.
The Grand Desolation Dantian continued to expand. Its mountain ranges grew more massive, and towering primordial trees rose from the ground, releasing pure Wood Element essence Qi.
The mountain rocks contained geng-metal power. Oceans and lakes unfolded into blue paintings, reflecting the entire Primordial Desolation World.
Various elements intertwined. After devouring vast amounts of Spiritual Qi, the Heaven-Devouring Divine Cauldron compressed it into dozens of drops of brown liquid and poured them into his Dantian. Terrifying power swept through the entire cave.
Boom!
A thunderous sound erupted from Liu Wuxie's body inside the cave, shaking countless cracks into the surrounding stone walls. What tremendous power!
Force shot from his pores like needles as fine as ox hairs, piercing the stone walls and creating more and more cracks.
His cultivation rose steadily. The ten Spirit Stones on the ground crackled, the Spiritual Qi within them rapidly vanishing as the Heaven-Devouring Divine Cauldron absorbed it all.
The area within ten thousand meters became barren and depleted of Spiritual Qi. Many Demon Beasts looked up at the sky, unsure what had happened. Some martial artists who had entered the area stared around blankly. Who had the ability to empty this place of all its Spiritual Qi?
"What happened? All the Spiritual Qi here disappeared in the blink of an eye."
Day had fully broken, and many martial artists from Canglan City had entered the Sunset Mountain Range to train.
"Some important figure is probably making a breakthrough here."
That was the only possibility. They thought little of it and continued on their way.
The ten Spirit Stones were completely exhausted, and his cultivation finally settled at the early stage of the third layer of Innate Realm. He slowly opened his eyes, and his gaze shot out of the cave like two sharp swords.
Hiss! Hiss!
Two sword marks appeared on two trees outside the cave, like wounds left by someone slashing them with a sharp sword.
Each minor realm was divided into early, middle, late, and peak stages. Having absorbed so much Spiritual Qi, an ordinary person would already have broken through to the fourth layer of Innate, or even the fifth.
The Grand Desolation Dantian was incomparably vast, and he had only barely reached the early stage. Every future breakthrough would require more than ten times the Spiritual Qi and resources an ordinary person needed.
Just thinking about it gave him a headache. His Dantian was still expanding, and the Heaven-Devouring Divine Cauldron was constantly devouring Spiritual Qi, but it was producing liquid more and more slowly. Canglan City was, after all, tucked away in a remote corner, with scarce Spiritual Qi.
He stood up, and thunderclaps and tiger roars sounded within his body, like pounding war drums, rushing rivers, and a roaring sea...
He threw a punch. The air abruptly exploded, producing a string of reports like firecrackers.