The captain of the guards, Li Shan, saw his expression shift drastically again and again. Gritting his teeth at last, he said with a stern expression, "Xu Chen has fallen into the demonic path. Let us all strike together and kill him to rid the people of this scourge!"
With that, he took the lead, leaping up and slashing a saber down toward Xu Chen. The long blade tore through the air, carrying a piercing howl of wind. Seeing Li Shan make his move, the other guards drew their sabers and swords one after another, rushing forward together to kill Xu Chen. The cultivation realms of these guards were all above the Fourth Layer of Qi Condensation, and the guard captain Li Shan was even at the Peak of the Seventh Layer of Qi Condensation. With over a dozen men swarming forward in a chaotic flurry of blades, even a martial artist at the Eighth Layer of Qi Condensation would be forced to retreat three hundred paces.
Yet, facing the encirclement of the crowd, Xu Chen said indifferently, "A pack of ants."
He stamped hard upon the ground.
"Boom!"
It was like a sudden peal of thunder. The ground fractured instantly. With Xu Chen at the center, the earth within a radius of twenty meters caved inward, forming a shocking, gaping crater. Cracks spread rapidly outward across the ground like a spiderweb.
The guards inside the crater were jarred dizzy and sent sprawling in all directions, their faces turning pale. Several guards who had rushed within three meters of Xu Chen coughed up mouthfuls of blood and were sent flying sideways.
A single strike!
He had used only a single strike for Xu Chen to instantly slaughter the crowd of guards. Only Li Shan, with a pale face, gritted his teeth and swung his saber, continuing his slash toward Xu Chen.
"Deluded to the end!"
"Die!"
Xu Chen sidestepped to evade Li Shan's attack, his right hand forming a blade with his fingers as he slashed diagonally across the latter's chest.
"Puff!"
Blood spattered. Li Shan's chest seemed to have been struck by a sharp blade; his flesh burst open, leaving a terrifying gash that went straight down to his heart. Li Shan let out a miserable scream, his body flying backward like a kite with a snapped string.
"Bang!"
With a loud crash and a billow of dust, Li Shan smashed a human-shaped crater into the bluestone pavement. At the bottom of the crater, Li Shan stared wide-eyed at Xu Chen in disbelief, stammering intermittently, "You, you, are, are you at the, the Qi Condensation, Condensation Realm..."
In the True Wu Realm, the cultivation realms of martial artists, from lowest to highest, were sequentially divided into: the Qi Condensation Realm, the Qi Condensation Realm, the True Qi Realm, the Qi Control Realm, the Qi Creation Realm, the Qi Transformation Realm, the Qi Sea Realm, the Nirvana Realm, the Saint Realm...
"The Qi Condensation Realm? Not yet. But after wiping you out, I should be getting close." Xu Chen murmured to himself in a low voice.
Just seconds after asking that question, Li Shan breathed his last.
Xu Chen turned his gaze toward the remaining guards. These people had originally been the guards of his Xu family, but after the father and son Xu Tai successfully usurped power, these people had defected to them without the slightest hesitation.
Slaves bullying their master — deserving of death!
Ingrates lacking all loyalty — deserving of death!
Therefore... these people were not worthy of pity.
With this thought in mind, Xu Chen stamped the ground once more. Amidst a resounding crash, jagged fragments of stone flew outward in all directions.
"Puff, puff, puff, puff!!!"
The rock shards were like sharp, merciless arrows, piercing straight through the guards' chests, glabellas, throats, and other fatal points. Over a dozen guards perished instantly.
"Hiss～"
Xu Chen swept his gaze across the corpses strewn everywhere and drew in a breath, releasing a devouring force.
A short while later, the dozen or so corpses on the ground had already withered into mummies.
"Not bad, I've reached the Eighth Layer of Qi Condensation." Xu Chen smiled with satisfaction.
Immediately afterward, he looked toward that flustered, fleeing figure and smiled coldly, "Qin Jing, run. Run a little faster. Today, I'd like to see who can possibly stop the person I want to kill! Who dares to stop them!"
A playful smile of a cat toying with a mouse appeared on Xu Chen's face. Qin Jing was destined to die today, but before she died, he wanted to plunge her into utter despair and let her perish within that despair.
Moving his feet, Xu Chen gave chase, hanging closely behind Qin Jing at a moderate distance.
Qin Jing glanced back and, seeing Xu Chen in pursuit, turned deathly pale with fright. Fleeing for her life, she screamed at the top of her lungs for help, and before long, another squad of guards rushed over at the sound.
Qin Jing gave a hasty command and, without even looking back, continued her frantic escape. She knew that this squad of guards couldn't possibly stop Xu Chen.
Sure enough, after she had fled a short distance ahead, a series of miserable screams echoed from behind. The cries lasted for less than three breaths before abruptly cutting off.
Her heart trembled violently.
Three breaths. In less than three breaths, an entire squad had been completely wiped out. She knew what this meant. Her master was away on an errand, and now the only one in the Xu family who could save her was her eldest senior brother. Even her father, Qin Wei, was most likely no match for Xu Chen.
"Run, then. Don't stop, keep running..." Xu Chen's figure appeared thirty meters behind Qin Jing, urging her on with cold indifference.
"Whoosh!"
He flicked his hand, and a sharp sword was hurled outward. With a *squeak* of tearing flesh, Qin Jing's right arm cleanly severed and went flying through the air.
"Ah!!!"
Qin Jing shrieked in agony. Clutching her severed arm, she glanced at her missing hand, not daring to pick it up, nor daring to slow her pace, because the god of slaughter behind her was drawing closer and closer.
"Father, save me! Save me!"
A figure suddenly appeared ahead of Qin Jing. Recognizing who it was, she was both startled and overjoyed, and hurried to cry out for help at the top of her lungs.
"Jing'er, your arm!"
Seeing Qin Jing, who had lost an arm in agony, Qin Wei's expression changed drastically.
Clutching her severed limb, Qin Jing cried out, "Father, it's Xu Chen! He's the one who hurt me, and Big Brother—Big Brother died at Xu Chen's hands!"
"What?! My son, he..." A look of profound grief crossed Qin Wei's face, which instantly gave way to an overwhelming murderous intent as he looked toward Xu Chen. "Xu Chen, I spared your life, yet you dared to harm my daughter and murder my son! Today, I will butcher you with my own hands!"
"Hum～"
A majestic surge of Spiritual Power billowed forth, gathering in the palm of his right hand. An invisible, gray spiritual vapor flowed upward, enveloping his entire right arm and finally taking the shape of a beast's claw.
"Heavenly Wolf Hand!"
"A High-Grade Yellow Grade martial art!"
"The family head has unleashed the Heavenly Wolf Hand right from the start. It seems he's truly enraged; this Xu Chen is a dead man."
"Indeed, the family head is a martial artist at the Ninth Layer of Qi Condensation. With him wielding the immensely powerful Heavenly Wolf Hand, there's no way Xu Chen can escape death."
The guards who had arrived subsequently cried out in alarm at the sight, reverence gleaming in their eyes.
At this moment, everyone believed beyond a doubt that Xu Chen was doomed to die. Only Qin Jing felt a lingering apprehension in her heart; she quietly retreated behind the others, resolving that the moment her father failed to take down Xu Chen, she would immediately flee to seek help from her eldest senior brother.
Amidst the discussions of the crowd, Qin Wei charged forward in a single bound, his body shooting toward Xu Chen like an arrow released from a taut bowstring in the blink of an eye.
"Die!"
The gray wolf claw, churning with terrifying aura, viciously clawed down toward Xu Chen.
Everyone held their breath, staring unblinkingly at the scene unfolding before them. They could almost picture Xu Chen's miserable demise.
However, the scene they had anticipated failed to materialize.
That wolf claw, carrying a massive amount of Spiritual Power, suddenly froze less than three inches from Xu Chen's chest.
For Xu Chen's right hand had, at some unknown moment, locked in a death grip around Qin Wei's wrist, rendering him utterly unable to advance or retreat.
Every single person's pupils constricted. Their breathing stalled involuntarily.
One had to know that Qin Wei was a martial artist of the Ninth Layer of Qi Condensation, and the Heavenly Wolf Hand was the premier martial art of the Qin family, boasting a might so formidable that none could rival it.
An attack that should have swept away all resistance and scored an instant kill had actually been effortlessly caught by Xu Chen.
How could this be?! Confusion filled everyone's hearts.
***
Qin Wei's ferocious grin also froze, replaced by a look of sheer astonishment.
Before he could react, however, Xu Chen tightened his grip on Qin Wei's wrist and squeezed hard. With a crisp *crack*, Qin Wei's wrist was directly crushed.
Agony struck like a tidal wave.
"Ah!" Qin Wei let out a miserable shriek.
"Stop!"
"Xu Chen, stop this instant! Do not bring about your own destruction!"
"Quickly save the family head!"
A chorus of guards snapped back to their senses. Driven by deep loyalty to their master, they drew their sabers and charged at Xu Chen to kill him.
Yet, it was ultimately a step too late.
By the time they drew their weapons and charged, Xu Chen had already activated the Devouring Heaven Emperor Art, and a powerful devouring force coursed down his arm, frantically draining Qin Wei's Spiritual Power and vital blood.
Qin Wei struggled with all his might, but under the tyrannical devouring of the Devouring Heaven Emperor Art, his struggles were futile and powerless.
In the blink of an eye, Qin Wei's towering physique had already shrunken by a full circle.
When had these guards ever witnessed such a bizarre and horrifying sight? They stopped in their tracks, terror plastered across their faces.
"Hoh～" Xu Chen exhaled a breath of satisfaction. With a casual toss, he flung away Qin Wei, who had already been reduced to a withered mummy.
The guards retreated step by step.
Raising his head to look at the halted and terrified guards, Xu Chen spoke with a placid tone laced with boundless chill, "You were all originally guards of the Xu family. When Qin Wei and his son committed treason and usurped our family's assets, I saw none of you display loyalty unto death. Now that the villains have met their punishment, you remain unrepentant and draw your blades against me. Since that is the case, there is no need for any of you to remain in this world."
"Go to hell, all of you."
As his words fell, the group of guards watched in mounting terror as the Spiritual Power within their own bodies began to drain away uncontrollably.
They panicked and retreated.
Yet, their Spiritual Power continued to hemorrhage.
Some turned to flee, but the moment they turned, they were pierced through on the spot by a shard of stone.
Before long, all the guards had been transformed into dried corpses.
"Now, who can possibly save you?"
Xu Chen looked at Qin Jing, who had long since collapsed limply to the ground, and walked toward her step by step.
"Xu Chen, you've already killed my big brother and my father! For the sake of my younger sister, please spare me!" Qin Jing had completely broken down, beginning to beg Xu Chen for her life.
Cold light surged in Xu Chen's eyes. "Your younger sister? If you hadn't mentioned her, I almost forgot about her. Where is she? With such a commotion going on, why hasn't she shown her face?"
"My sister is already a disciple of the Liuyun Sect..."
"So that's how it is. No wonder she's nowhere to be seen. She must have entered the Liuyun Sect relying on that entry token of the Liuyun Sect belonging to my Xu family, didn't she?"
The Liuyun Sect was one of the five major sects of Taishang Country. To recruit talented disciples from various factions, the Liuyun Sect distributed an indeterminate number of entry tokens every three years to large and small families within various cities; with the token, one could enter the Liuyun Sect.
The Xu family had possessed one such entry token, which had been prepared for Xu Chen. He had never expected that it would ultimately benefit Qin Qingrou.
"Xu Chen, I beg you, please don't kill me... As long as you spare me, I'll do anything you ask! Didn't you like my sister? I am not a whit less attractive than her; as long as you are willing, I can become your woman..."
Qin Jing crawled toward Xu Chen like a dog. To survive, she did not hesitate to offer herself.
Looking at Qin Jing's pitiful and charming face, Xu Chen remained unmoved. A flash of killing intent glinted in the depths of his eyes, and he raised his hand to execute her.
At that very moment, a piercing sound cut through the air.
A figure clad in gray robes came hurtling forward at lightning speed.
Seeing the newcomer, Qin Jing's face blossomed with wild joy, and she hurriedly cried out for help at the top of her lungs, "Senior Brother, save me!"
The newcomer was Qin Jing's eldest senior brother, and also one of the chief culprits behind the destruction of the Xu family on that fateful day.
While crying out for help, she stumbled wildly toward the newcomer.
"No matter who comes, they won't save you!"
Xu Chen made a large grasping motion with his hand, drawing a longsword flying into his grip. With a flick of his wrist, the longsword shrieked as it tore through the air.
The sword moved like lightning.
"Puff!"
The longsword pierced into Qin Jing's back and burst out through her chest, cleanly impaling her heart.
Qin Jing's movements abruptly stiffened. She lowered her head to look at the blade jutting from her chest, her lips parting as if to speak, before she finally collapsed into a pool of blood with unfulfilled resentment.
Witnessing Qin Jing's brutal death, the gray-robed man's expression immediately sank.
"Not only did you escape the dungeon alive, but your strength has actually grown. It seems you do possess some measure of capability."
"Yet you are too foolish."
"Die!"
Unwilling to waste further breath, the gray-robed man raised his hand and flicked it. A streak of black light shot toward Xu Chen with the speed of a flint's spark, intent on dealing a fatal blow.
"Humph!"
Xu Chen let out a disdainful cold snort.
With a flick of his finger, a burst of vital energy lanced out, striking the incoming streak of black light dead on. With a soft *squeak*, the black light shattered, and dark green liquid splattered across the ground.
As it turned out, that black light was actually a venomous Gu insect.
Upon seeing this, the gray-robed man's pupils contracted slightly. Just what had happened to Xu Chen? A person who was supposed to be a dead man had not only escaped the dungeon, but his strength had also skyrocketed.
"No matter what happened to you, today you will undoubtedly die!"
He held supreme confidence in his own abilities, believing that no matter how much Xu Chen's strength had increased, he could never be a match for him.
With a single thought, a buzzing vibration immediately emanated from his sleeves. Following closely, a swarm of Gu insects came howling outward, blotting out the sky as they enveloped Xu Chen.
"Sorcery and Gu arts — mere parlor tricks, unworthy of standing on any grand stage."
Xu Chen's disdain for Gu sorcery was plain for all to see. He raised his right hand and gently patted forward.
"Boom!"
A majestic torrent of Spiritual Power roared forth, weaving and converging in mid-air into a gigantic hand of spiritual energy that pressed down with crushing force.
"Crack, crack, crack!!!"
Before the spiritual hand had even descended, the earth was already fissuring inch by inch under its violent, unyielding pressure.
"Boom!"
The ground collapsed, and rock fragments flew wildly in all directions.
"Puff, puff, puff, puff!!!!"
The swarm of Gu insects blotting out the sky were shattered into scrap under the offensive sweep of the spiritual hand, not a single one left behind.
"Impossible!"
The gray-robed man was both shocked and infuriated, disbelief plastered across his face.
He was a martial artist of the Qi Condensation Realm, and the Gu insects he cultivated and nurtured were at least of the late First Grade. When hundreds of Gu insects swarmed together, let alone a mere minor martial artist of the Qi Condensation Realm, even fellow practitioners of the Qi Condensation Realm would be forced to retreat three hundred paces.
Yet Xu Chen had actually...
"You, you..."
"What about me?"
Xu Chen couldn't be bothered to waste words. He struck out with another palm strike.
The spiritual energy hand reappeared.
This time, the target of the spiritual hand's attack was the gray-robed man.
The gray-robed man's expression changed drastically, instantly yielding to despair.
"Boom!"
Another thunderous crash echoed out.
Another massive crater was added to the ground.
At the bottom of the crater, the gray-robed man lay drenched in blood, his aura withered, on the verge of death and suffering from critical injuries.
"Where is your master?"
Xu Chen walked up to the gray-robed man and looked down at him from on high, demanding an answer.
When Qin Wei and his son had destroyed the Xu family back then, there had been two outsiders assisting them. One was the grievously injured gray-robed man before him, and the other was the one they referred to as their master.
"Cough, cough... Kid, if you want to know my master's whereabouts, then I'll tell you. My master went to the Sand River Town three hundred miles away..."
Driven by some unknown motive, the gray-robed man readily blurted out his master's location.
As the final syllable fell, the gray-robed man breathed his last.
"Sand River Town? Why would he go to Sand River Town? What happened over there?"
***
The scale of Sand River Town was quite large, boasting a population of one hundred thousand. Its streets crisscrossed, houses stood in dense rows, pedestrians bustled like weaving shuttles, and commerce was exceptionally prosperous.
Having traveled through the night, Xu Chen was feeling hungry.
Finally, he stopped his footsteps before the entrance of a restaurant named "Immortal Guest."
Seeing him, the restaurant waiter hurriedly bustled over with a servile bow, asking, "Master, are you here for lodging or a meal?"
"A meal."
With that, he strode into the restaurant.
The restaurant had a total of three stories.
The first floor served as the main hall, furnished with over a dozen tables. At this moment, there were seven or eight tables of diners eating in the first-floor hall, all of whom were martial artists.
The second floor contained private rooms.
The third floor featured VIP private suites, which required a certain level of status to enter.
"Master, the first floor or the second?" the waiter asked with a smile.
"The first floor will do."
Xu Chen walked straight over to a table in the corner.
"What would the master like to eat?"
"Just bring a few of your establishment's specialty dishes."
Xu Chen pulled out a chair and sat down, picked up the teapot to pour himself a cup, and spoke casually.
"Please wait a moment." The waiter left with a face full of smiles.
Xu Chen took a sip of tea, glanced at a group from the neighboring table who had just paid their bill and were leaving, and frowned inwardly. "Ever since I entered Sand River Town, I've already seen more than a dozen groups of hurried martial artists. Could it be that there's truly something fishy about this Sand River Town?"
At that moment, a group of people walked in.
Xu Chen raised his head to look.
There were seven people in total who entered: five men and two women. After entering the restaurant, the seven of them did not linger, heading straight for the second floor.
After the figures of the seven disappeared around the staircase, Xu Chen faintly overheard diners sitting a few tables away conversing in low voices.
"They're disciples of the Liuyun Sect."
"I didn't expect the news to spread so fast that even disciples of the Liuyun Sect have rushed here upon hearing it."
"Not just the Liuyun Sect; I hear disciples of the Heavenly Sword Villa have come as well."
"Things are getting more and more interesting now."
"With a Shui Mansion emerging into the world, it's destined to be another bloody storm."
"..."
"There really is something going on!"
Xu Chen's eyes lit up.
After listening for a little longer, Xu Chen finally figured it out.
Thirty miles west of Sand River Town lay a body of water called the Sand River. A month ago, the waters of the Sand River had stirred abnormally, with Spiritual Power converging toward it, and a Shui Mansion had emerged from the river...
Once the news leaked out, countless martial artists swarmed in, creating the current situation today.
"Qin Jing's master most likely came here for the Shui Mansion as well."
"Sand River Town is too massive, with a population of a hundred thousand. Finding him would be no different from searching for a needle in a haystack. I only need to wait at the entrance of the Shui Mansion..."
Having eaten and drunk his fill, Xu Chen was just about to stand up and leave when a man carrying a longsword on his back and bearing a ferocious knife scar across his face strode in.
The aura of the scarred man was immensely oppressive, radiating a suffocating smell of blood from his entire body. It was as if this man had just walked out of a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood.
The moment he stepped into the restaurant, the previously bustling main hall instantly grew dead silent.
Not a single pin could be heard dropping.
The scarred man swept his cold gaze across everyone present before walking straight toward the second floor.
"Such dense killing intent! Who is this person?" A diner lowered his voice to ask the others.
"It's him!"
"Who on earth is he?"
"He's the villain on the wanted list — the Blood-Hand Butcher!"
"The Blood-Hand Butcher, it's actually him!"
"The Blood-Hand Butcher once slaughtered a village of a thousand people overnight, and his cruel methods are enough to make anyone's blood run cold."
"It's said that an inner sect disciple of the Liuyun Sect chased the Blood-Hand Butcher for a thousand miles, yet he still managed to escape."
"Oh no! Let's get out of here!"
"There are Liuyun Sect disciples upstairs. If the Blood-Hand Butcher clashes with them, we who stay behind will inevitably suffer collateral damage!"
The expressions of the diners changed drastically, and they scrambled to their feet, preparing to flee the premises.
But right at that moment, a furious roar abruptly erupted from upstairs.
"Blood-Hand Butcher, you murder the innocent indiscriminately and your crimes are too heinous to be forgiven! Today, we senior and junior brothers are here to rid the people of this scourge. Prepare to meet your maker!"
"Just seven little fry want to kill me?"
The Blood-Hand Butcher let out a disdainful, cold laugh.
"Judging by the clothes you're wearing, you must be disciples of the Liuyun Sect! What a pity that today, you are destined to fall right here."
In the next instant, the sound of a terrifying collision burst forth from upstairs.
A fierce blast of air swept across all directions. The tables and chairs on the second floor were shattered to pieces, while some diners who had failed to leave in time suffered bleeding from their seven orifices and shrieked in agony.
"Run!"
The diners on the first floor turned deathly pale, scrambling over one another to escape the place.
Unwilling to invite trouble, Xu Chen followed the crowd out of the restaurant to watch the commotion from outside.
"Boom!"
The windows on the second floor of the restaurant shattered. Wood splinters flew wildly.
Several figures leaped downward.
Upon landing, the seven disciples of the Liuyun Sect immediately surrounded the Blood-Hand Butcher in the center.
"Blood-Hand Butcher, this place shall be your burial ground; you cannot escape!"
A disciple in cyan robes pointed his sword at the Blood-Hand Butcher, speaking with confidence.
"Ignorant of life and death!"
The Blood-Hand Butcher's expression remained cold and detached.
"Boom!"
The ground beneath the Blood-Hand Butcher's feet suddenly cracked apart. It was as if heaven and earth were turning upside down.
The onlookers in the distance felt as though the earth itself was rolling over, making it difficult for them to maintain their footing. And those seven Liuyun Sect disciples who had surrounded the Blood-Hand Butcher, though not thrown off balance, were still affected, their Spiritual Power sent into disarray.
Seizing this opportunity, the Blood-Hand Butcher moved like a bloody tiger, his fists driving forward with the force of a gale. With a resounding *bang*, he launched a punch straight at the cyan-robed youth.
The cyan-robed youth hastily raised his sword to block.
"Bang!"
Fist and sword collided, surprisingly bursting forth with the metallic clanging sound of forged steel.
"Hah～"
The Blood-Hand Butcher let out a low shout. Unleashing the full momentum of his punch, he knocked the longsword aside, drove straight through the youth's defenses, and smashed savagely into the cyan-robed youth's chest.
"Crack!"
The sound of snapping bones rang out in tandem.
The cyan-robed youth coughed up blood as he was sent flying backward.
The remaining six Liuyun Sect disciples turned ghastly pale.