The wind swept through the remnants of sand, the grit crackling against the wooden shield like firecrackers.
Li Gongfeng noticed An Gongfeng frozen in place as if plunged into an icy abyss, his spiritual energy eerily stagnant. His expression darkened, brows furrowing into a knot.
"What are you hesitating for, An Gongfeng? Don’t tell me you’re still clinging to the young mistress’s past kindness, thinking of turning traitor?"
"N-no… it’s not… ah—"
An Gongfeng forced the words through gritted teeth, his Taoist robe already drenched in cold sweat. An invisible pressure now bore down on him like a crushing mountain, freezing the spiritual energy in his dantian. Even his fingertips refused to budge.
He could feel the sheer terror of that power—as if the very essence of heaven and earth had bared its fangs at him. The slightest movement would reduce him to dust.
"Can’t move your body? Don’t mock me." Li Gongfeng found the situation bizarre when suddenly, a faint whistling sound brushed past his ear.
It wasn’t the howl of natural wind but more like the residual echo of a blade slicing through the void—
The next instant, the world spun before Li Gongfeng’s eyes.
To the onlookers, a flash of crimson light streaked across their vision. By the time they refocused, a geyser of blood erupted from Li Gongfeng’s neck. His head tumbled to the ground like a severed kite string, rolling twice before stopping at An Gongfeng’s feet, eyes wide with disbelief.
"What?!"
Gasps were cut short as if an invisible hand clenched around their hearts. Everyone stared at the head lying in the sand.
A cultivator at the late Qi Refining stage, slaughtered without even a chance to resist?
Such power was beyond their comprehension!
"L-Li Gongfeng…" An Gongfeng trembled violently as the headless corpse beside him collapsed, blood splattering onto his robe in scalding spurts.
Straining to turn his gaze toward Chen Muling, he saw only confusion on the young mistress’s face. The wooden shield in her hand still bore the scorch marks from his earlier fire technique—clearly, she hadn’t struck.
"Which senior master intervened?" Chen Muling’s heart pounded, but there was no time to dwell. She slammed her shield into the ground with a deafening crash.
"Brothers, charge with me!"
At her rallying cry, the guards surged forward like tigers descending a mountain.
"For the young mistress, offer your hearts!"
The thugs who had relied on the two Gongfengs for support now scattered like startled birds, their morale shattered in an instant.
The dull thuds of blades cleaving flesh, the crisp snaps of breaking bones, and agonized screams filled the air. Within the time it took to burn a stick of incense, the remaining foes fled into the valley’s depths, abandoning even the coins at their feet.
Chen Muling drove her blade through An Gongfeng’s heart, her emotions churning as she stared at the two lifeless heads.
She had known An Gongfeng and Li Gongfeng since childhood—they were practically elders to her.
And yet…
Greed had poisoned their hearts.
Taking a deep breath, she ordered her guards, "Seal these heads in jade boxes. When we reach Xiluo Kingdom, I’ll present them to my uncle myself and demand answers!"
"Yes, young mistress!"
Once the aftermath was dealt with, Chen Muling gazed at the swirling sands and suddenly bowed deeply toward the valley, her voice laced with reverence.
"Esteemed senior, who granted us aid—this humble one, Chen Muling of the Great Qian Trading Company, begs to meet you and offer gratitude!"
Only the mournful wind answered.
The terrifying aura that had obliterated Li Gongfeng in an instant had already receded like the tide, leaving no trace behind. Were it not for the blood still pooling from the corpses, they might have believed the ordeal a nightmare.
"This junior understands. My apologies for the intrusion." Chen Muling bowed again. "A debt of this magnitude cannot be repaid with words. The Great Qian Trading Company and I shall never forget this kindness!"
As she spoke, her eyes involuntarily flicked toward the rear of the caravan—where an unremarkable green-canopied wagon stood, its curtains drawn tight, wheels caked in dust.
But she quickly dismissed the thought. If a senior capable of slaying a Qi Refining cultivator in an instant had been among them, why would they stoop to hiding in a merchant’s wagon?
Such beings would have soared through the skies, leaving even the wind in their wake.
Besides…
That man had been lying bare-bottomed by the roadside, sunbathing his bird.
Chen Muling stifled a laugh, shaking her head to dispel the absurd notion.
Mounting her horse, she turned toward Xiluo Kingdom.
"Move out!"
As the caravan resumed its journey, Ye Chuan let the wagon’s curtain fall shut behind him.
The enemies’ cultivation was so far beneath him that he hadn’t even needed to lift a finger—just a wisp of his aura had paralyzed that Qi Refining nobody.
"Too weak. Where’s the real challenge?" Ye Chuan mused.
Well, except for the little dragon girl.
She still had the upper hand… for now. Once he could bring Lan Xiaoke to the Aiser Continent, he’d settle that score properly.
"Hey, kid, you alright? Didn’t scare you, did it?" The wagon driver poked his head in just as Ye Chuan pondered his next move.
"I’m fine."
"Lucky us. Some passing immortal must’ve saved our hides back there, or we’d be dead meat." The driver sighed.
"Quite the coincidence. Bet that immortal was dashing," Ye Chuan said. "The most handsome in the universe."
"Who knows? Those immortals are all pretty as jade."
After some idle chatter, the caravan crossed into Xiluo Kingdom’s borders. Spotting the distant city walls, the driver warned,
"Listen, kid—when we reach Xiluo, they’ll question your identity. Just say you’re one of our company’s drivers."
Question his identity?
Ye Chuan could blink inside without anyone noticing. What questioning?
"Kid?"
"Hey—?"
When no reply came, the driver turned to find Ye Chuan gone, leaving only a spirit crystal behind.
"What’s this?" Puzzled, he picked it up. With no sign of Ye Chuan, he hurried to the lead wagon.
"Young mistress, that kid vanished. Left this behind."
"Vanished?" Chen Muling absentmindedly accepted the object—then froze. "A spirit crystal? No ordinary person could possess this!"
A single one was worth more than her entire shipment of goods.
"Could it be… he saved us?"
A realization dawned on her, though she hardly dared believe it.
That bare-bottomed man…
Was an immortal?
ive and Ruthless] Before his transmigration, Ye Xuan was playing a game called "Severing Emotions to Attain the Dao." The game's core wasn't about leveling up by fighting monsters, but about conquering various "bad women" with wicked personalities and cold, fickle natures. There was only one method to conquer them: stay unwaveringly by their side, then die at a critical moment, driving them to madness after losing the protagonist. The higher their level of regret, the higher the player's score. To dominate the server, Ye Xuan conquered all the bad women. In the early stages, he showered them with boundless tenderness, only to choose to sacrifice himself for them later, making them weep bitterly and drown in regret. Among them were: Xia Lengyue, the unfaithful immortal wife who chased after powerful men and discarded her husband like trash. Ye Qingcheng, the Demonic Venerable of the Joyous Union Sect, who appeared pure and innocent but was, in reality, promiscuous. Wu Lingxiao, the Empress of the Great Xia Dynasty, who lusted after men and loved maintaining a harem. Bai Qiangu of the Endless Demonic Sect: a bloodthirsty mass murderer. However, when the protagonist transmigrated into the game world, he made a horrifying discovery. Eight hundred years had already passed. The bad women he had conquered had now each become deities and revered ancestors. Faced with the endless stream of toxic women coming for him, Ye Xuan could only rely on his god-tier acting skills to carve a path of survival through this world of treacherous women.
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
lity and could only live as an ordinary mortal. He only wished to live a peaceful life. Yet he didn't know— The dog he adopted, because it ate his food, became a legendary demon king. The kitchen knife he casually forged became a peerless divine weapon, causing numerous experts to fight desperately for it. The young disciple he took in became an immortal lord that led an era, due to cultivating the techniques Ye Feng taught him. Even the skeletons he looked down on the most were ominous demon kings that suppressed countless worlds. Many years later, looking at the void shattered with a punch, Ye Feng murmured to himself: It turns out the peerless kings were myself all along...
ing gift was a patch of barren land, and disciples were all picked up along the way. He spent fifty years diligently building three "ramshackle little sects," thinking he could finally live a carefree life relying on his disciples. But right at the fifty-year mark, he was suddenly swept away by a spatial rift and exiled to the Chaos Desolation, the Disorderly Ruins. There was no spiritual energy there, only slaughter. Relying on the cultivation feedback from his disciples, Gu Changyuan hacked his way through a sea of blood for eleven hundred years. When the system finally fished him back out, he discovered the ramshackle little sects he'd built back then had developed a rather... unusual style. Hold on... I vanished for a thousand years, so how did my ramshackle little sects become holy lands?!
