Grievances of Old Huang

At the beginning of the battle, everything unfolded exactly as they had expected.

Relying on their profound Ancient Emperor battle arts, exquisite spell control, and an extraordinary grasp of combat rhythm gifted to them by their bloodlines, they steadily suppressed the young men.

The scales of victory seemed to have tipped toward them without the slightest suspense.

Chi Huang even sneered inwardly. So the Azure Mystic Sect was nothing special after all, aside from those few top monsters.

However, a subtle change began to take place during the latter half of the first day.

Were these people monsters?

Their will to fight and ability to adapt were simply inconceivable!

They had clearly been struck. They had clearly fallen into a disadvantageous position. Blood had clearly trickled from the corners of their mouths. And yet, their eyes only grew brighter, while their fighting spirit burned more fiercely.

It was as if the pain of their injuries and the pressure they faced had instead become catalysts for their transformation.

Their techniques rapidly melded, improved, and fused together in the midst of actual combat…

By the third day, the battle had already begun to even out.

The Ancient Emperor battle arts and bloodline secret techniques they had once been so proud of no longer seemed to provide an overwhelming advantage.

Their opponents could always find the most ingenious and effortless way to deal with them. They had even begun attempting counterattacks.

The fifth day marked the beginning of their nightmare.

Once those few people had seemingly grown completely accustomed to the power that had surged within them, the battle gradually began to reverse!

They went from being evenly matched, to slowly falling behind, and finally to being completely suppressed!

That sword cultivator called Li Xuanfeng had actually infused his sword intent with a trace of the conception of opening up a world!

The body cultivator Shi Jingxian possessed such domineering power in his fists that he could shake the defenses of their imperial bloodline!

Their opponents were like tireless battle machines that constantly evolved. The more they fought, the stronger and more excited they became, pure longing for battle and victory blazing in their eyes.

And they, four dignified Sons of the Ancient Emperor, heirs to the most exalted bloodlines, had truly become sandbags for others to practice on! They had become nothing more than sparring partners!

By the end, the battle had practically turned into a one-sided training session.

Li Xuanfeng and the others had seized complete control of the situation, treating them as the finest sparring partners as they continuously tested and honed the battle methods and laws they had newly comprehended.

As for the four Sons of the Ancient Emperor, they could do nothing but fend off the attacks in a sorry state, their dignity utterly trampled.

At last, they left.

Inside the sealed space, only the four of them remained. They lay sprawled on the ground as though every ounce of strength had been drained from their bodies.

The air was filled with deathly silence, along with the emptiness that followed the collapse of faith.

Battle Asura and those others were monsters, but why were even a few random direct disciples from their sect so abnormal?!

Just what kind of cursed place was the Azure Mystic Sect?!

Were they really Sons of the Ancient Emperor? Or were they actually the worthless ones?

Chi Huang gazed at the hazy “sky.” Images from the past seven days repeatedly echoed through his mind. An absurdity and self-doubt he had never experienced before coiled around his heart like poisonous vines.

In a corner not far away, Mu Sen and Li Mo huddled together, not even daring to breathe too loudly.

The shock in their hearts had long since overturned everything they knew. All that remained was endless fear and absurdity.

Sons of the Ancient Emperor!

The four people before them—who had been tossed inside like dead dogs, only to be beaten like sandbags by the direct disciples of the various peaks—were actually Sons of the Ancient Emperor?!

Those were the direct descendants of an emperor!

Their fathers had once gazed down upon the eternal ages and wielded Heaven’s Mandate. They were supreme beings who stood at the pinnacle of existence!

To Mu Sen and Li Mo, such figures were no different from characters in myths and legends.

But now…

The Azure Mystic Sect had not only captured them—it had captured four of them in one go!

Even more outrageous, and utterly incomprehensible to them, was that these dignified Sons of the Ancient Emperor could not defeat the direct disciples of the various peak masters?!

This had completely exceeded the limits of their imagination, shattering all their former understanding of cultivation and the world itself.

If being toyed with in turn by the elders of the Azure Mystic Sect had previously amounted to nothing more than physical torment and the trampling of their dignity, then the scene before them represented a total destruction of the spirit.

At first, they had thought they had provoked a Saint-level sect with some foundation.

Later, they had decided it might be a secluded sect with profound and unfathomable foundations.

After that, they discovered that this sect might be even more terrifying than they had imagined.

But now… they understood.

This was not a “sect” at all!

This damn place was a nest of monsters—a realm so incomprehensible that it could capture Sons of the Ancient Emperor and hand them over to its disciples as sparring partners!

Mu Sen’s face was as pale as paper. His lips trembled, yet he could not utter a word. Only the uncontrollable clacking of his teeth could be heard, producing faint clicking sounds.

Li Mo’s entire body had gone limp. He nearly curled himself into the corner, his eyes vacant. Only one thought continued to echo madly through his mind.

“What in the world possessed us to provoke a place like this back then…?”

Looking at the four Ancient Imperial Princes who had once seemed impossibly lofty in their eyes, but who now lay battered and disheveled, their gazes hollow, Mu Sen and Li Mo could not even muster the slightest feeling of shared misery.

All that remained was an extreme terror, like watching a rabbit die after the fox.

The Azure Mystic Sect was not a place where reason or cultivation held any meaning.

This was an abyss that existed solely to produce monsters and destroy common sense!

At that moment, beside the spirit fields in the courtyard of Purple Bamboo Peak, Lao Huang was lazily wagging his tail as he munched on a spirit herb that had just ripened.

He had now reached the pinnacle of the Quasi-Emperor realm. His aura was deep and weighty, while Dao patterns flowed across his dark-cyan fur.

Suddenly, the corner of his eye caught sight of Little White basking in the sun nearby. Lao Huang moved closer, his enormous bull’s head nearly pressing against Little White’s body, and sniffed vigorously.

“Something’s not right…”

Lao Huang muttered in his deep, booming voice, his bell-sized eyes widening.

“Why does your scent kinda make my legs go weak? You… you couldn’t possibly be…”

Little White lazily raised its head and glanced at him without saying a word. A wisp of extremely faint imperial might swept past by accident.

The pressure seemed weak, yet it was like an abyss that had endured since the dawn of time, carrying an unparalleled majesty that looked down upon the heavens. It pierced straight through the soul!

The hair covering Lao Huang’s entire body suddenly stood on end. Like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, he sprang far away in an instant.

Even his voice changed pitch, trembling with disbelief.

“Holy crap! You really became an Emperor?!”

Immediately afterward…

“Mooooo—!!”

A long, mournful bellow, filled with grief and grievance, resounded across the rear mountains of Purple Bamboo Peak, startling several spirit birds into flight.

Lao Huang turned his enormous head toward Gu Changge. His bull’s eyes quickly filled with tears.

His expression was complicated beyond words. There was the sorrow of having been deceived, the collapse that came with learning the truth, and, more than anything else, an indescribable resentment that seemed to have turned sour all the way to his bones.

“Master…” Lao Huang’s voice was thick with emotion and trembled uncontrollably.

He looked at Little White’s indifferent expression, as though the matter had nothing to do with it, along with the faint, secretively teasing look that seemed to say, You finally figured it out.

The enormous grievance in his heart finally erupted.

“Waaah! Master, you’re being so biased!”

Lao Huang could hold it in no longer. His enormous tears fell like beads from a broken string, splattering onto the ground and mixing with the dirt, carving two muddy trails down his face.

“I, Lao Huang, have worked diligently and complained about nothing! I’m the one who plows the fields, the one who watches the garden, and whenever you feel like eating meat, you’re the one who butchers me!”

“I was so overjoyed when I broke through to the Quasi-Emperor realm that I didn’t know whether I was coming or going. I thought I’d finally have some confidence for once…”

The more Lao Huang spoke, the more dejected he became, until even his ox tail drooped.

Seeing Lao Huang like this, Gu Changge couldn’t help but laugh.

He naturally understood what was on Lao Huang’s mind. During this period, Lao Huang had cultivated diligently without pause, and his mentality had been tempered to near perfection.

Gu Changge nodded slightly and said in an indifferent tone, “Your foundation is stable, and your Dao heart is firm. Indeed, the time has come for you to break through.”