Defeat

"Help eldest brother first!" Not a trace of humanity remained in the second Liu brother's blood-red eyes. Clearly, he had almost lost his mind.

Even at a time like this, he could still think of the Eldest of the Liu Household, who was likewise in grave danger beneath Bai Bian's sword. These Evil Cultivators really were good to their own—there was nothing to fault there.

"Fuck, if this madman hadn't taken my whole set of Midnight-Noon Nails, I'm afraid he could've sliced up even Bai Bian."

Kang Dabao's expression grew uglier by the moment. The second Liu brother's strength had soared, and his blows sent the fat all over Kang Dabao's body quivering. Kang Dabao was finding it harder and harder to fend him off.

If another one joined in, he really might be finished.

The third Liu brother had only a breath of life left. The fourth Liu brother put him down, then dragged Second Sister Song, who had completely lost the will to fight, over to look after him. Gritting his teeth, he controlled a saber-shaped Law Artifact and staggered over to lend the Eldest of the Liu Household some support.

Bai Bian's sword changed course, its edge spitting out a Sword-Ray a full ten feet long, its force overbearing.

Already on the back foot, the Eldest of the Liu Household dared not take it head-on. His feet moved swiftly through a Movement Method, but all he could do was dodge in a sorry state.

Then Bai Bian brought his fingers together as a sword, and dozens of sharp gusts shot straight for the vital points all over the fourth Liu brother's body. This was the Desolate Rank, Supreme Grade Technique Method on which Bai Bian had built his fame, the "Sword Qi Finger."

In years past, quite a few cultivators had fallen to this old man's move. As for what became of them, naturally, few had come through intact.

The fourth Liu brother's face turned deathly pale. So badly injured, how could he possibly dodge? He could only summon the saber-shaped Law Artifact before him and wave it about wildly.

The famed Law Technique of an eighty- or ninety-year-old cultivator was no easy thing to withstand. After clashing with only a few of the sharp gusts, the saber-shaped Law Artifact could hold out no longer and shattered into fragments that filled the sky.

The fourth Liu brother took most of the dozens of sharp gusts that followed, and those that pierced through him did not stop.

A broad swath of soft earth exploded. Before the smoke and dust had fully settled, great holes a full ten feet deep could already be seen in the ground.

The grievously wounded fourth Liu brother fared even worse. Already badly hurt, he now had bloody holes all over his body, and blood streamed, spurted, and dripped from him in great quantities. He could only collapse to his knees, too weak to stand again.

For an ordinary Qi Refinement cultivator, injuries like these were probably beyond saving.

Still unsatisfied, Bai Bian gave a cold shout. His flying sword held the Eldest of the Liu Household, whose eyes were nearly splitting with rage, firmly in check. With a backhanded gesture, he struck again with one finger, aiming straight at the fourth Liu brother, who was meat on the chopping block.

"Second brother!" The Eldest of the Liu Household's eyes were scarlet as he cried out in alarm. He truly hated the flying sword before him to the extreme.

The second Liu brother, who looked like a mad demon, actually abandoned Kang Dabao and rushed in front of the fourth Liu brother with his flying wheel to shield him. But he was a step too slow and did not even manage to use a protective talisman.

Kang Dabao saw only the second Liu brother, who had taken the full force of the Sword Qi Finger, shaking all over as though he had been hit by a machine gun.

With the situation so favorable, this Daoist master naturally had to seize the advantage!

Kang Dabao drove the Mountain-Splitting Hammer to its utmost speed, sending it flying toward the head atop the still-standing second Liu brother's shoulders.

"I don't believe your Blood-Burning Great Method can turn that ugly thing on your neck into refined steel too!"

"Heavenly Thunder Seed!" Kang Dabao suddenly heard a startled shout behind him. He forced down the panic in his heart, keeping his hand seals moving as the Mountain-Splitting Hammer continued crashing toward the second Liu brother.

He had underestimated the Heavenly Thunder Seed's power. It missed by only a little, but the Mountain-Splitting Hammer and Second Liu and the fourth Liu brother, whose lives or deaths were unknown, were all sent flying by a blast wave.

Kang Dabao's face filled with despair when he heard the shout, and he nearly ground his teeth to pieces. How he wished it had been the Eldest of the Liu Household who had cried out!

A moment later, he too was knocked down by the aftermath, and the Mountain-Splitting Hammer lost its aim and sank into a deep pit.

"A Heavenly Thunder Seed comparable to a Foundation Establishment cultivator's strike, wasted on an old man buried up to his chin. I was planning to use it to wipe out a sect for fun in a few years."

The Eldest of the Liu Household spat as he looked at the pile of blackened charcoal opposite him.

That Heavenly Thunder Seed had cost the brothers more than half their fortune. Even a Peak Qi Refinement cultivator would have found it hard to survive a hit from it. Using it on someone almost dead of old age really was not worth it.

Qi Refinement cultivators who grew old without dying really were hard to deal with.

"Who knows what this woman was really plotting? The people who came this time were all skilled too. She was slower than usual sending word and making her move, and she didn't seem to hold back when she stabbed second brother! We didn't even have time to use a lot of the contingencies we'd prepared. Could she really have wanted to attach herself to that old bastard and enjoy the good life in the Bai Household?! We brothers haven't been in such a miserable state for years!"

Though the third Liu brother was too weak to fight again, he had cast aside the refined bearing he had shown when they first met. He turned to look at Second Sister Song and spoke hatefully.

With two of his brothers seemingly about to die, how could the word hatred sum up what was in his heart?

"Third brother, third brother, I had no such intention, third brother!" Second Sister Song was immediately terrified. The color drained from her lovely face, and tears and snot streamed down it.

This group of Evil Cultivators had tortured her until she hardly lived like a human being. How would she dare harbor such thoughts?

Smack! The third Liu brother, who had been at death's door only moments ago, summoned all his strength and viciously slapped the beautiful woman across the face. "Wretched bitch, hurry up and carry second brother and fourth brother over here!"

"Enough, third brother. Someone implanted with a Heart-Eating Worm wouldn't have the nerve. Treat second brother and fourth brother's injuries. I'll go finish off that fatty first!"

Kang Dabao had lost all his support. Watching the Eldest of the Liu Household limp toward him with a sword in hand, he was no longer afraid. Instead, he felt a sense of openness in his heart.

He raised a hand and recalled the Mountain-Splitting Hammer. The spiritual seals in his hands flowed more smoothly than ever, and he controlled the immensely cumbersome Law Artifact with exquisite skill.

For a time, he traded blows back and forth with the Eldest of the Liu Household, who had just fought a fierce battle against a powerful enemy.

He did not know whether it was an illusion, but he even felt the bottleneck at the Qi Refinement Fourth Layer, which he had been unable to break through for years, loosen a little.

"What use is it, coming so late?" Kang Dabao did not know whether to laugh or cry. He had never imagined that the legendary event of breaking through in battle would actually happen to him.

If I'd known, I wouldn't have brought so many Spirit Stones out with me. How much better it would've been to leave them to second brother and third brother. Now they'll just be fed to a dog, Kang Dabao thought.

In this desperate moment, he tried once more to activate the black bone in his Storage Bag. Unsurprisingly, there was no response. Was it junk or a treasure? At a time like this, was it still not going to protect its master?

"This Daoist master... still seems to have a sliver of a chance to live, doesn't he?" Kang Dabao felt his spiritual power growing increasingly scarce, while the Eldest of the Liu Household's flying sword before him was beginning to falter too.

This fellow was not made of iron after all; he got tired too. Damn it, but Kang Dabao was tiring even faster than him!

The Eldest of the Liu Household drew closer and closer. Just how many people had this fellow killed? His Sha Qi was so heavy!

Bang! The Mountain-Splitting Hammer burst apart in a flash of spiritual light, making a tremendous commotion.

Generally speaking, a Qi Refinement cultivator's low-grade Law Artifact exploding itself would often have little effect on an opponent of a similar or higher cultivation level.

More often than not, it was merely a defiant measure taken by a dying person unwilling to leave their Law Artifact to the enemy.

Niu Gui'er, for instance, had only lost a few ghost dolls to the flying wheel when it shattered earlier. In the end, his head had been taken by the second Liu brother only because he had fallen for a trick.

Thus, the Eldest of the Liu Household paid no heed to Kang Dabao's move, the last kick of a Guizhou donkey that had exhausted its tricks.

After limping aside and dodging several fragments of the Mountain-Splitting Hammer with some effort, he was struck in the chest by something.

He was greatly alarmed, but the agonizing pain he expected did not come. He looked closely, and his expression changed instantly.

What had struck him was half of his own second brother's head!

The second Liu brother had taken a direct hit from Bai Bian's Sword Qi Finger earlier, leaving him barely able to stand.

The viciousness the Blood-Burning Great Method had given him had been driven away by the excruciating pain throughout his body. Just as he had climbed onto Second Sister Song's soft back, a Law Artifact fragment came flying over, and he lacked the strength to turn his head any farther.

"Ah!" Second Sister Song cried out in fright, her beautiful hair covered in white matter.

That Law Artifact fragment had whizzed past her eyelid. One of the Four Ghosts of the Liu Household had died on her back, and she seemed to see her own miserable end.

Fluids of every color were still flowing from the corpse on her back, staining her once-fine red dress filthy, yet she continued walking forward in a daze, without the courage to put the corpse down.

"Second brother! Wretched bitch, why didn't you die?!" The Eldest of the Liu Household grabbed his second brother's corpse and sent Second Sister Song flying with a slap. She cried out in pain, tumbling and kicking up a spray of grass clippings.

The Eldest of the Liu Household had not held back. Second Sister Song had taken the blow squarely, and who knew how many bones she had broken? Sharp splinters of bone had torn her internal organs to shreds.

She whimpered, not daring to cry aloud. Tears streaming down her face, she tremblingly pulled out a damaged jade bottle and futilely stuffed shriveled pills into her mouth.

She stared blankly at the only two men present who could still stand, yet could not say which one she hoped would be the final winner.

"I'll skin you alive!" Suffering the pain of losing his younger brother, the Eldest of the Liu Household charged at Kang Dabao, blood pouring from Kang Dabao's mouth.

"I'm going to die anyway. I ought to try, shouldn't I?" Kang Dabao felt he could no longer hold his body up. His Law Artifact was shattered, his spiritual power exhausted, and even the whole world seemed to spin before his eyes.

At the final moment as he fell to the ground, he forced his eyes open and looked at the Eldest of the Liu Household charging toward him. Then, all at once, he remembered what his master had told him in private while he was still alive.

"Although the founding patriarch was only a true Foundation Establishment cultivator, he had the talent to order the heavens and weave the earth, and created a remarkable cosmic-rank secret Technique. His gifts were scarcely inferior even to those of an ordinary Golden Core exalted cultivator.

"Come, I'll recite it and you listen. You must commit it to memory."

"If it's really so formidable, Master, you wouldn't have lost to the head of Hemu Dao."

"You foolish boy, it's not that the patriarch's secret Technique isn't formidable. Your master simply couldn't grasp the key to it and couldn't use it."

"I'm a dullard too. I doubt I could use it even if I learned it."

"...Heh, that's true enough. But the sect leader has to learn it, and there's no harm in learning. Even if you can't use it, you still have to remember it and pass it down, just like me."

"Remember this: the first passage of the Delusion-Breaking Golden Eyes: 'What the doubled radiance refers to is the sun and moon; this is called light succeeding light without end.'"

"What the doubled radiance refers to is the sun and moon; this is called light succeeding light without end."

Kang Dabao murmured the words, the last trace of Spiritual Qi in his body circulating with difficulty. Tears of blood suddenly seeped from his eyes, and then two sharp beams of golden light actually shot out from them.

The Eldest of the Liu Household cried out inwardly that this was bad. Could this fatty really turn the tables on him?!

The vicious man shifted his feet slightly and charged sideways. The two beams of golden light passed him and converged at a point directly beyond him.

They struck the third Liu brother, who was behind him, forcing down his grief with tears in his eyes as he applied medicine to stop the fourth Liu brother's bleeding.

The fourth Liu brother watched the tragedy unfold, his own brother's flesh, blood, and bone fragments raining down all over him.

Already breathing more out than in, he was so enraged that he could not draw another breath. His head lolled to one side, and the lungs in his chest swelled and burst open, killing him.

"Damn it, I finally managed to use it, and I can still miss? Damn it, what kind of lousy secret Technique is this? It couldn't even finish off a few Qi Refining Realm scumbags!"

Kang Dabao gave a bitter smile. Through his blurred vision, he seemed to see the Eldest of the Liu Household scream and throw himself onto the mingled pulp of his two younger brothers.

"Ah, I don't even have the strength to keep my eyelids open. This Daoist master still has to die! Next life, next life, could I be a young master who lives in luxury? Both my lives have been so tiring."

Another day of looking forward to the first comment.