The two men had dark skin, and their entire bodies shimmered with a metallic sheen.
When Hathaway saw them, she could not help frowning. “The Black Iron Tribe?”
Everyone around them was equally astonished.
“The Black Iron Tribe vanished from the Inner Realm more than fifty years ago. Why have they appeared now?”
“That tribe specializes in body refinement. Back then, they were considered a first-rate power in the Inner Realm.”
…
“Wu Tian, are you all right?”
One of them, a burly old man with a crew cut, asked in a deep voice.
“Senior Tie Chong, I’m still fine!”
Wu Tian took out several pills and swallowed them all at once.
Xu Mu returned to Sheng Qiu’s side. The Great Desolate Tribe elder, Fan Yingjie, was with her as well.
“Thank you for your help, Young Friend. If you hadn’t intervened, I might have been caught off guard by the combined attack of those people.”
Fan Yingjie cupped his hands slightly toward Xu Mu.
“It couldn’t be helped. I’m not interested in the grudges between the various tribes of the Inner Realm, but now they’re trying to hurt my people. I have no choice but to stand up for them!”
As Xu Mu spoke, Fu Jinyu and Nalan Shisan also came to stand beside him.
As for An Ce and the second elder of the Heavenly Demon Tribe, they walked over as well.
The seven of them were now gathered together.
An Linghui and Mu Changfeng, however, remained at a distance.
Mu Changfeng’s tribe was also considered a first-rate power. Unless absolutely necessary, he would never choose to stand against the four major tribes.
For now, all he could do was ensure An Linghui’s safety as best he could.
“Xu Mu! Don’t join forces with them! If you stand with the Great Desolate Tribe, you’ll regret it! Come out here!”
Hathaway shouted at Xu Mu.
“I already said it before. These two members of the Heavenly Demon Tribe are my people, and I’m taking them with me. Do you have the authority to decide otherwise?”
Xu Mu looked at Hathaway.
“What’s so special about these two members of the Heavenly Demon Tribe that you’re willing to risk your life to protect them?”
Hathaway’s voice was cold.
“I think you’re just jealous,” Nalan Shisan said with a smile. “Jealous that Xu Mu and we are so close and spend all day being affectionate with each other. You’re trying to drive a wedge between us, aren’t you?”
“Bullshit!”
Hathaway tightened her grip on the greatsword in her hand.
“Since you’ve chosen to stand with them, don’t blame me for showing no mercy.”
Whoosh!
Hathaway transformed into a streak of light and charged toward Xu Mu.
Xu Mu had no choice but to meet her attack, though his real target was still Wu Tian.
Clang!
Their weapons collided. Just as Xu Mu was preparing to continue his attack on Wu Tian, golden chains suddenly appeared around Hathaway, enclosing both her and Xu Mu.
“Holy Purgatory!”
Hathaway activated her technique, forcibly dragging herself and Xu Mu into the formation’s sealed space.
Xu Mu glanced at the golden runes surrounding them and slowly shook his head. He naturally knew what Hathaway was planning.
“I’m sorry. I’m doing this for your own good. If you stand with the Great Desolate Tribe, you’ll inevitably become an enemy of the Holy Light Tribe.”
Hathaway spoke softly. “I’m doing this to protect you.”
“I have to admit, you’ve risen even higher in my estimation.”
Xu Mu’s expression remained impassive.
“But I’m sorry. I have to get out. I absolutely refuse to stand by and watch my people be killed!”
“Fine. Then defeat me. As long as you can beat me, I’ll open the formation.”
Hathaway raised her greatsword with one hand.
“But I’ll warn you first: I won’t fall for those pills of yours!”
“I’m sorry, but there’s no time.”
Xu Mu tightened his grip on his longsword and activated Demon Guardian, along with Spirit Vein Armament.
Whoosh!
He transformed into a streak of light and charged toward Hathaway.
Golden light surged from Hathaway’s body, and her eyes burned with fierce intensity.
She swung her greatsword with all her strength. A wave of golden radiance erupted from the blade and swept toward Xu Mu like a massive tidal wave.
At that moment, the red qi within Xu Mu’s body suddenly burst outward.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
In the blink of an eye, the air erupted with a series of muffled explosions.
Blood-red trails wrapped around Hathaway a full five times.
“Impossible!”
The instant Hathaway said those words, blood sprayed from her back.
Boom!
Xu Mu’s figure came to a halt in front of Hathaway.
“Release the formation! You’ve lost!”
“You were still holding back!” Hathaway growled. “You hid your true strength when you fought me before. Xu Mu, oh, Xu Mu… I’m not letting you out!”
The golden light around Hathaway grew brighter and brighter, eventually approaching pure white.
Crack!
Centered on the eyepatch covering her right eye, golden lines suddenly appeared, forming a crisscrossing shape.
The horizontal beam of light extended to the bridge of her nose between her eyes, while the vertical beam ran from her forehead through her right eye and down to her chin.
Whoosh!
Xu Mu suddenly noticed a palm-sized golden cross on the armor of his Demon Guardian.
He had no idea what it was. He immediately dispelled the armor, and the cross vanished with it.
But in the next instant, another golden cross appeared on his body. It formed so quickly that he had no chance to dodge.
“Hathaway, I’m sorry! I can only kill you now!”
Xu Mu activated his final spark once more.
Hum!
In an instant, Hathaway appeared in front of Xu Mu, her longsword already within striking distance of his chest.
Xu Mu concentrated one-fifth of his power into his sword and swung.
Boom!
A terrifying burst of blood-red light swallowed Hathaway’s golden radiance and sent her flying backward.
Whoosh!
Hathaway flashed back in front of Xu Mu.
“I understand now!”
Xu Mu blocked her greatsword and said calmly, “In short, you’re engraving a mark similar to a teleportation coordinate. It allows you to instantly appear right beside me.”
“It’s more than that. Do you really think the Holy Light Tribe could become a supreme power for no reason?”
Hathaway raised a hand and lifted the eyepatch covering her right eye.
An extraordinarily dazzling golden light radiated from beneath it. There was no visible white or iris—her entire eye socket was filled with brilliant light.
“A divine-grade technique—the Eye of Judgment: Cross of Judgment.”
Hathaway lowered the eyepatch again.
“What I engraved on you isn’t a teleportation coordinate. It’s a bull’s-eye.”
“What?”
Xu Mu’s eyes widened in shock.
Hathaway immediately raised her hand.
“Holy Judgment!”
A mass of golden thunderclouds appeared above them.
Crack! Crack!
Countless bolts of lightning descended from the sky. Even when Xu Mu fled beyond the clouds, the lightning continued to pursue him.
“Once the bull’s-eye is formed, every attack I launch will home in on you!”
Hathaway swung her sword repeatedly. The sword qi seemed to have eyes of its own, all of it rushing toward Xu Mu.
“Don’t worry. I’ll leave you alive. Without your techniques, the battle outside will be over very soon.”
Crack!
Lightning struck Xu Mu’s Demon Guardian. The reflected damage made Hathaway’s body tremble slightly.
But she did not move. She merely watched Xu Mu in silence.
Ultimately, Xu Mu’s cultivation level was still too low. The reason he could fight opponents many levels above him was that he could evade their fatal attacks.
But if every attack was guaranteed to hit, he would be at a severe disadvantage.
“Hathaway, brace yourself. I can’t waste any more time. I’m coming at you.”
A red fireball the size of a marble appeared in Xu Mu’s hand. He casually tossed it forward.
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.
grated, and just when he finally managed to get into an elite academy, he discovered that he actually had a system, and the way to earn rewards was extremely ridiculous. So for the sake of rewards, he had no choice but to start acting ridiculous as well. Su Cheng: "It's nothing but system quests after all." But later, what confused Su Cheng was that while he was already quite ridiculous, he never expected those serious characters to gradually become ridiculous too. And the way they looked at him became increasingly strange... (This synopsis doesn't do it justice, please read the full story)
he colors of other people’s emotions. Light red meant anxiety. Gray meant exhaustion. Orange meant excitement. Yellow... meant repression. At the same time, he could gain unlimited control over one of those colors. Pale cyan: relaxation. Using this ability, he started offering “two-yuan hugs,” spending an afternoon exchanging emotional-color experiences with others. Then came his final female customer of the day— a girl whose emotional color was pure black... —— A week later, Xu Chuan had become skilled at using pale cyan—Relaxation—treating it like a bottle of menthol balm whenever he needed it. That was when he discovered he had unlocked another unlimited emotional color: Purple, the color of fear. So these emotional colors refresh every week? Fine, I take it back—I’ll never call you useless again... —— Much later, after Xu Chuan had accumulated countless emotional abilities, one night, he suddenly found himself inside someone else’s dream. There, he could use the emotional colors he possessed to paint. And in her dream, he painted her a shower of pink shooting stars, spreading across the depths of the night sky...
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."
