Catastrophe

[Killed a Saint realm cultivator, fits villainous behavior, Villain Points +12888!]

[Killed two purple aura cultivators, successfully plundered their fortune, Fortune Points +200!]

Having successfully dealt with two Saint realm powerhouses, Mo Tianxiao let out a sigh of relief.

This was the true way to use a Divine Emperor remnant soul. That fool Xiao Fan had a treasure and didn’t know how to use it, letting it languish in silence all these years.

Old Yun and the host of restless spirits instantly finished dividing the two Saint realm souls among themselves.

“Young friend Mo, these two Buddhist cultivators may have only just stepped into the Saint realm, but they still possessed some combat strength. I dabble a bit in puppet arts and can refine them into puppets. They won’t be as strong as in life, but they’ll still be far more formidable than your average Transcended Tribulation cultivator.”

Old Yun looked at Mo Tianxiao, waiting for his opinion.

Mo Tianxiao’s eyes lit up. “You mean we can do that? Then I’ll leave this matter in your hands, Old Yun.”

Two Saint realm puppets—definitely not a lowly prize.

“By the way, after you’ve refined them, remember to change their appearance a little.”

They were still Buddhist disciples after all. He wasn’t afraid of the Buddhist sect, but if anyone found out he’d turned their members into puppets, it would stir up quite a bit of trouble.

Old Yun stroked his beard and nodded with a smile. “I understand.”

Mo Tianxiao grinned too. Under the shroud of the massive formation packed with thousands of dark spirits, the pair’s smiles looked especially sinister—true villains in every sense.

Once everything was settled, Mo Tianxiao retracted the Human Sovereign Banner, dismantled the formation, and flew toward Ao Dalong’s direction.

By now, the Saint grade talisman should have exhausted itself. Ao Dalong was probably already holding his own against two opponents.

But after flying for only a short time, Mo Tianxiao slowed down.

Several figures came flying from the distance—Ao Dalong, Zhou Muxi, and the others.

“Boss! Are you okay?”

Ao Dalong was carrying two corpses, his face still worried.

“Let me check if you’re injured!”

Huang Xiaoyao rushed to Mo Tianxiao’s side and scanned him from head to toe.

Mo Tianxiao waved them off. “It’s nothing, I barely made it.”

“But Sister Muxi, I didn’t expect you to come in person.”

He turned to Zhou Muxi, surprised.

He’d assumed she’d just send a couple of underlings to help as a courtesy, not that she—a Saint King realm powerhouse herself—would actually show up.

Zhou Muxi crossed her arms, a faint smile curling at her lips. Her eyes held a hint of appraisal. “You’re my good little sister here, after all. I rushed over the moment I heard.”

Of course, the main reason was that Mo Tianxiao still held immense value to her. There was no way she’d let something happen to him before her plans were complete.

“Sister cares so much about me—I really am flattered.” Mo Tianxiao put on an expression of exaggerated surprise.

Zhou Muxi, however, wasn’t interested in continuing that line of conversation. She stared at Mo Tianxiao with a knowing smile. “You’ve been fooling me all along, sis. You’ve had a Saint realm great demon by your side, and you made him pose as an ordinary cultivator.”

Mo Tianxiao’s expression didn’t change. He kept his smile. “Traveling around, being on my own—it’s better to be cautious.”

Zhou Muxi was unconvinced. She pressed further. “Then tell me, if you’re not specialized in killing, how did your Transcended Tribulation cultivation manage to slay two Saint realm cultivators?”

At that, Mo Tianxiao’s face twitched. “Not... specialized? Well, traveling around, you’ve got to have a few aces up your sleeve, right? Besides, those two bald monks were underestimating me, and they’d only just advanced to the Saint realm. I caught them off guard.”

“Sister, you have no idea—you almost never saw your dear little sis again!”

Mo Tianxiao forced out a couple of tears of theatrical pity and wiped them away, looking so pitiful it seemed genuine.

Zhou Muxi’s fair cheeks twitched twice, her expression growing stiff. “Alright. I don’t care about your secrets. Go prepare properly. In a little while, you’ll have to follow me to headquarters.”

“Understood.”

Mo Tianxiao returned to his normal demeanor.

Ao Dalong, standing nearby, asked curiously, “What do we do with these two? Baldy is too crunchy—eating them gave me a bad aftertaste.”

Mo Tianxiao’s eyes sparkled, and he put on a sorrowful expression. “Ah, greed is the root of all sorrow. They trained all the way to the Saint realm—such a pity. Hand them over to me. I’ll give them a proper burial.”

For all their cultivation, in the end they’d only nourish the earth. How tragic.

Mo Tianxiao felt it wouldn’t be right to let these two be buried alone. They should be reunited with the others. They came together, so they should leave together.

No one found anything suspicious except for Yun Sangyi, who gave Mo Tianxiao a strange glance as if she saw through something.

After all, she knew him well enough by now to know he was no bleeding-heart good Samaritan.

The journey continued in silence.

Back at the Righteous Qi Sect, Ao Dalong kept a much lower profile. He stopped wandering around and decided to first refine the Buddhist Heart he’d absorbed to boost his cultivation.

Mo Tianxiao, on the other hand, went back to playing the generous benefactor. He launched a combo special event at the sect covering alchemy, artifact forging, talismans, and formations. Since he still had time to kill, he figured he’d earn a few more Villain Points.

Several more years slipped by.

Zhou Muxi finally contacted him. Everything was ready. The last Blood Son had succeeded in breaking through to the Saint King realm, and the Blood God Transition Ceremony could begin.

Aboard the Cloud Piercer shuttling toward the Blood God Sect headquarters, Mo Tianxiao was curious.

“I’ve always heard the headquarters are in the extreme west. Is that true, Sister Muxi?”

Zhou Muxi answered calmly. “Yes. The Blood God Sect headquarters are located in the far west. Almost no cultivators live there. The environment is harsh, making it a perfect natural barrier.”

“Even if every cultivator in the world knew where our headquarters were, no enemy would be willing to rally their forces to come searching for us.”

“After all, no one knows exactly how vast the western wilderness is, nor the precise location of the Blood God Sect.”

“That’s also one reason the Blood God Sect has remained unshaken for so long.”

Mo Tianxiao nodded. “That far west sounds like a great place to hide out.”

Zhou Muxi agreed. “Exactly why I want to take control of the Blood God Sect as soon as possible—to prepare for the coming calamity.”

“Calamity? What calamity?”

Mo Tianxiao froze. This was news to him.

Zhou Muxi gave him a brief glance. “Not knowing about this is normal. Only veteran Saint King realm experts know a little about it. If it weren’t for my father, I wouldn’t be aware myself.”

“According to ancient records, every time an ascender emerges in the Yellowwood Realm, a calamity is destined to follow. The more ascenders appear, the more devastating the calamity becomes.”

“The last great calamity struck a hundred thousand years ago, when the Yellowwood Realm produced three ascenders at once. The entire realm was hit. Except for a handful of powerful sects that relied on their deep foundations to preserve their inheritance, almost all other powers were wiped out and reshuffled.”

Zhou Muxi turned to look at Mo Tianxiao, her gaze level.

“And my father told me that within a few decades, or at most a little over a hundred years, the Yellowwood Realm will see a number of ascenders far exceeding what happened a hundred thousand years ago.”

“That means the Yellowwood Realm might be about to experience a world-ending catastrophe—the kind only seen during lost eras of ancient splendor.”