“Deputy Grand Commander Zhang Shi sent me to report that…”
“The commanders who followed Madam have all been dealt with!”
Zhou Mengyan leaped to his feet, overjoyed. “What?”
“Dealt with?”
“Quick, quick, quick! Come in, come in!”
By the time the guard entered the tent, he had already rushed forward. Unable to contain his impatience, he gripped the guard’s shoulders with both hands and asked, “What did you say?”
“Say it again!”
“Zhang Shi dealt with all the naval commanders who followed Madam?”
“Grand Commander, I didn’t hear that wrong, did I?”
Zhou Mengyan was strong. His arms unconsciously tightened, and the guard’s shoulders felt as though two weapons had been embedded in them. Grimacing in pain, the guard still replied, “Y-yes, Grand Commander. Deputy Grand Commander Zhang Shi instructed me to report exactly that…”
“Hahahaha!”
Zhou Mengyan released the guard and burst into loud laughter.
“General Zhang Shi is impressive!”
“For years, this Grand Commander couldn’t solve the problem, yet the moment he took action, he managed to bring them all under control?”
“A great talent!”
“A truly great talent!”
“Absolutely a rare genius!”
“No wonder he was able to sweep across the northern frontier and destroy every enemy stronghold!”
“I am thoroughly convinced!”
Ruan Fei hurried over to offer her congratulations. “See, Brother Mengyan? I told you General Zhang Shi was extraordinary. With his abilities, having him come over to serve you can only bring endless benefits, never any harm.”
“He’s barely arrived, and he’s already uprooted Madam’s entire faction. With such ability, how many generals in the whole world could do the same?”
“Brother Mengyan, you must reward General Zhang Shi!”
Zhou Mengyan was in an exceptionally good mood and was not stingy in the slightest. “Reward him? Of course. We must reward him—generously, heavily, and lavishly!”
“A talent like General Zhang Shi deserves a substantial reward!”
“But we shouldn’t reward only General Zhang Shi. Little Fei, you also deserve recognition for recommending him. So how about this… I’ll promote you to Naval General!”
“Your position will be second only to mine. You’ll stand on equal footing with General Zhang Shi!”
“What do you think?”
Ruan Fei was delighted. She immediately replied in a sweet, cloying voice, “Brother Mengyan, you’re so good to me. Little Fei… Little Fei will definitely repay you for the rest of her life!”
Her gaze at Zhou Mengyan seemed to shimmer with tears, filling him with indescribable pride. Now that Zhang Shi had dealt with the commanders who followed Madam, he would be the sole authority in the army.
From now on, he would be the true master of the military camp!
And by giving Ruan Fei a nominal position, he had completely secured the entire naval force’s power in his own hands. His mood was simply wonderful!
Still, he had not forgotten to ask about the details. “How did General Zhang Shi deal with those people?”
“Did he win them over through his personal charisma?”
“Or did he threaten them into submission?”
“Surely he didn’t bribe them with money. That isn’t General Zhang Shi’s style.”
Zhou Mengyan had always been someone who dared to delegate authority. Once he handed power over, he rarely interfered. As long as the result met his expectations, that was all he cared about.
But this time was different. It concerned the matter he valued most—and, besides, he was genuinely curious.
What method had Zhang Shi used?
The guard before him was already sweating profusely. After a long hesitation, he shook his head. “N-no…”
“No? It wasn’t any of the things I mentioned?” Zhou Mengyan became even more curious. “Then how did General Zhang Shi deal with Madam’s subordinates?”
“Could it be that General Zhang Shi did something unexpected?”
Ruan Fei’s curiosity was piqued as well. “That’s right. Just how did General Zhang Shi make Madam’s commanders submit?”
“Those commanders were just like Shitou today—stubborn and impossible to deal with. How did General Zhang Shi manage to handle them?”
The guard became even more hesitant.
Not only was he stammering; the panic on his face was growing more pronounced by the moment.
This left Zhou Mengyan and Ruan Fei bewildered.
Only after they pressed him again did the guard finally say, “Well… the method General Zhang Shi used was particularly direct…”
“He… he killed all twenty-seven commanders who were affiliated with Madam!”
“What?” Zhou Mengyan shouted.
“What?” Ruan Fei shouted as well.
Both of them wore expressions of utter disbelief.
Twenty-seven naval commanders—the backbone of the entire military camp—had been killed?
No… he had just killed them outright?
“It’s true. Absolutely true!” the guard said. “General Zhang Shi personally did it. One slash per man. He killed every last one of those commanders!”
Zhou Mengyan’s insides churned violently, and he felt as though he were about to explode.
Twenty-seven naval commanders!
The backbone of the naval camp!
Killed?
No, he had just killed them all?
This… wasn’t that a little too ruthless?
No, not merely a little too ruthless. He was unbelievably ruthless!
Zhou Mengyan could not help drawing a sharp breath.
He had known Zhang Shi was ruthless, but he had never imagined he could be this ruthless—ruthless enough to make even him tremble with fear!
“Let’s go, let’s go…”
Zhou Mengyan spoke.
The guard hurriedly asked, “Grand Commander, where are we going?”
“Where else could we go? To find General Zhang Shi, of course. I—I need to see this for myself!”
…
Madam’s tent.
Her informant stumbled inside.
Although night had already fallen, as a woman’s tent, hers was not a place outsiders could casually enter. But this was a military camp, and military camps had their own rules. More often than not, those rules made no distinction between men and women.
Madam had been stationed in the military camp for many years. After years of relinquishing authority, the fact that she could summon enough forces to oppose Zhou Mengyan at will proved that she had long since adapted completely to life in the army.
“R-reporting, M-Madam…”
“What happened?”
Madam sat before her dressing table. Just a moment earlier, she had been lamenting the passage of time and sighing over how the years spared no one. Once, she had worn a brilliant red bridal dress and rushed joyfully toward Zhou Mengyan. In the blink of an eye, her hair had turned gray, her beauty had faded, and the vows of eternal love Zhou Mengyan had once made to her had become nothing but empty words. He had turned around and fallen into another woman’s arms.
The next moment, her expression hardened, becoming cold and severe. “Did the twenty-seven commanders who follow me give Zhang Shi a show of force?”
“Did they arrive within the time he demanded—within one incense stick?”
The informant was drenched in sweat.
Stammering, he said, “M-Madam…”
Madam sharply repeated herself. “Did they give Zhang Shi a show of force?”
“Y-yes…” The informant had no choice but to answer. “All twenty-seven naval commanders only arrived at General Zhang Shi’s tent after two incense sticks had burned…”
“Good!”
Madam rose to her feet, one hand clasped behind her back, giving her the air of a strategist. “Zhou Mengyan has always been indecisive. Zhang Shi is acting on his orders and actually thinks he can challenge me? What wishful thinking!”
“This show of force by the twenty-seven men is only the beginning. From now on… I’ll make sure Zhang Shi can’t take a single step in the army!”
“He actually thinks he can infiltrate my military camp?”
“Zhou Mengyan is both a fool and a weakling. Does he truly think I’m a fool and a weakling as well?”
Madam wore a look of utter confidence, as though everything were already under control.
But it nearly drove her informant to death with anxiety. “Madam, no! No, that’s not it…”
“General Zhang Shi is nothing like the Grand Commander! He—he—he simply refuses to be cowed!”
“He…”
“He had all twenty-seven naval commanders executed!”
Madam leaped to her feet. “What?”
“Executed? All of them?”
“What nonsense are you talking about?”
Madam simply refused to believe it. “Zhang Shi came to the Yangtze River camp alone. He had no men of his own to command, and even the soldiers assigned to him were provided by Zhou Mengyan.”
“Zhou Mengyan may not even have had the courage to reprimand those naval commanders. His personal guards must be no different. Without those soldiers, what could Zhang Shi possibly have used to execute my naval commanders?”
“Did he do it by himself?”
“Hmph!”
Madam snorted coldly, clearly unwilling to believe such a claim. There were twenty-seven naval commanders—any one of them would have represented a formidable force in any military camp.
Zhou Mengyan would never dare lay a hand on them.
And Zhang Shi dared?
Even if Zhang Shi truly had the nerve, there were twenty-seven of them—not twenty-seven pigs!
How could one man possibly defeat twenty-seven naval commanders?
“Madam…” The informant grew even more frantic. “It’s true! It really is…”
“General Zhang Shi said those naval commanders were to be punished, so Zhou Mengyan’s personal guards tied them up. Everyone knew that, given Grand Commander Zhou Mengyan’s temperament, nothing truly serious would happen, so they didn’t resist with all their might. But then…”
At this point, sweat poured from every inch of the informant’s body. “Then General Zhang Shi took a saber and went down the line, cutting them down one by one…”
“Not a single naval commander was spared!”
“There were twenty-seven of them—twenty-seven naval commanders in all! General Zhang Shi cut down every last one!”
Madam collapsed to the ground with a thud, unable to suppress the shock that seized her entire body. Only then did she suddenly realize that Zhang Shi… Zhang Shi was not someone who could be judged by ordinary standards.
Under normal circumstances, no one would dare casually move against twenty-seven pillars of the military, let alone order their deaths. Even someone who slaughtered enemies without mercy would never dare butcher his own people so wantonly!
But that was Zhang Shi.
Zhang Shi, the God of Slaughter.
Madam’s voice trembled. “Come. Come with me. We—we’re going to see it for ourselves…”
…
nd fell into a coma while saving his younger sister from an out-of-control car. He became a vegetable. No one knew that his consciousness had crossed into a world of cultivation. Over the course of sixty years, he began as the lowest kind of mine slave, struggling to survive amid mountains of corpses and seas of blood. By sheer chance, he eventually obtained the complete memories of a fallen Immortal King. Alchemy, medicine, formations, feng shui, physiognomy, artifact forging… Every great inheritance of the cultivation world was now his. But when he opened his eyes again, he discovered that ten full years had passed in the modern world. To pay for his treatment, his father had sold the family’s shop and house, leaving himself covered in lasting injuries and illness. His mother had cared for him day and night, and more than half of her hair had already turned white. His younger sister, who had been only fifteen back then, was now twenty-five. To help repay the family’s debts, she had been forced to lower her head and put on a smiling face in places of glittering lights and endless revelry. Only then did Chen Xuan understand that what he had lost was not merely ten years. He had lost the life his entire family was meant to have. The good news was that he had brought back the memories of an Immortal King’s entire lifetime. The bad news was that his soul had returned alone—his cultivation had not come with him. Spiritual energy was scarce, resources were depleted, and the modern world still had firearms, surveillance, capital, and laws. If he wanted to protect his family, break free from everyone’s control, and become truly invincible beneath the heavens, he would have to start all over again.
e vast world of cultivation, where he becomes the master of the Heavenly Ruins Sacred Hall, a dying old man with barely a tenth of his former cultivation remaining. He is immediately confronted with a deadly crisis: his subordinates have rebelled, and his protectors are forcing him to abdicate. At the critical moment, the system descends from the heavens: [Ding! The host has been detected facing a life-or-death crisis. The system is now officially activated!] [As a gift, you have received the Supreme Beginner’s Pack and awakened the ultimate cheat: ten thousand years of pure cultivation essence every second!] Yin Tianjue: “Wait… ten thousand years of cultivation every second? That’s six hundred thousand years a minute, and in one day… I can’t even calculate it. Either way, I’m already invincible!” You’re a peerless prodigy rarely seen in ten thousand years? Sorry, I gain ten thousand years of cultivation every second. You’re an undying ancestor who has guarded a sacred land for countless ages? Sorry, I gain ten thousand years of cultivation every second. You’re the strongest chosen one, blessed with heaven-defying destiny? Sorry, I gain ten thousand years of cultivation every second. From this day forth, I have only one thing to say: “I gain ten thousand years of cultivation every second. Now, how exactly are you supposed to deal with that?”
m back to his original world. In the end, he realized he had overthought things. [Hey, why is Shen Manni, the female lead, acting strange? Shouldn't she be fawning over the male lead at this point?] [Zhou Qiaoqiao, are you sick? Weren't you supposed to break off your engagement today?] [Damn it! An Youyi, please do your job as an undercover agent and sell my information to the protagonist, you idiot!] ... At this moment, Xu Mo himself didn't know that these female leads had already heard his inner thoughts. Then they decided not to play by the rules. Xu Mo: Please respect my profession as the big villain!
s the Eldest Princess, renowned for her cold and aloof detachment, became the most docile of lambs, obeying his every command without question. But when the final move was played on the chessboard, as Gu Chenghan seized everything and ascended on the verge of apotheosis, that very Princess suddenly embraced him from behind, her tone carrying a dependence never heard before: "Wait... you haven't yet... commanded me to love you forever." Gu Chenghan froze abruptly. She... hadn't been hypnotized?! ... [The Eldest Princess's Diary] [When my soul was extracted, becoming the sole spectator outside my own shell] [At first, there was overwhelming fury, until I saw] [How he used my sword to effortlessly shatter my inescapable doom] [How he wielded my authority to eradicate fatal conspiracies I had never even detected] [Like a deity, he rescued me from the deep mire I was trapped in] [If not for those annoying vixens, he and I would be a match made in heaven] [I think I am ill, gravely ill] [My deity should belong to me alone] ... "Hypnosis? Oh, it succeeded, my dear Master." "Only this time, it's my turn to hypnotize you."
