Following the roar, a slender white figure appeared in the distance, rapidly flying toward the village.

This was clearly the white-clothed Immortal that Tang Jie had failed to find. His appearance at this time was truly unexpected.

"It's an Immortal! Everyone, retreat!" the bandit chief immediately shouted.

By the time he was shouting the first word, that white figure had just appeared at the end of the village's road, his white robes floating, his eyebrows raised as his sword emerged from his sheath. By the time he was shouting 'retreat', the figure had already gone up to a bandit. The sword fell, a head flew, and blood gushed into the air.

In that straightforward fashion, he confronted the bandits, and the brash horse bandits immediately fled like stray dogs.

The bandit chief shouted, "The Blacksand Group was ignorant and did not know this place was guarded by an Immortal. We are willing to withdraw, so please, Immortal, stay your hand!"

The Wildgrain Plain bandits were very sharp and shrewd. They could cause trouble for the heavens and the earth, but definitely not for any place protected by an Immortal.

They had already scouted out Little River Village, and knew that it had no connection to an Immortal. This was why they had been so bold as to strike. But to their surprise, they ended up running into an Immortal anyway.

His power, speed, and the swing of his sword placed him at least at the Mortal Shedding Realm, as a True Spirit Master who had broken free of mortality. Moreover, he killed with decisiveness, with sword arts swift and vicious. There was a more than fifty percent chance that he was a sword cultivator who cultivated the art of killing. This was not something that a mere numerical advantage could deal with, which was why the chief pleaded for mercy. 

The white-clothed man snorted, "The bandits of the Blacksand Group were wiped out three days ago. Where did this other Blacksand Group come from? Sihai has plagued the nearby villages for more than just a day, slaughtering entire villages and committing countless crimes. Bei Sihai, why is it that you dare to do the deed but not confess to it?"

As he spoke, he killed three more bandits, truly killing humans as easily as one would butcher pigs.

When that bandit chief called Bei Sihai heard the white-clothed man exposing him, he immediately knew that there would be no mercy. His face twisted with savagery. "You Immortals take up the most territory and the most resources. You claim to be dragons protecting the world, but you're really just seizing its wonders for yourself, fattening yourselves at its expense while bringing down misfortune on us mortals. Is there any way for us mortals to survive? There's no need to keep up appearances with this old man in a place like this! Even if he's a Spirit Master, so long as his Violet Palace isn't open yet, he's not unkillable."

His words were damning. Cultivation had five major realms. Let alone the fourth realm, the Violet Palace Realm, the second realm, the Mortal Shedding Realm, was not something one-hundred-some bandits could deal with.

On the other end, the white-clothed man couldn't retort to Bei Sihai's words. He only slightly frowned and sighed.

Bandits had always lived with their lives on the line, and when they saw that this man wasn't letting them go, they turned savage, answering Bei Sihai's call and lunging at the Immortal.

Spiritual energy pervaded the world. Immortals could use this energy to cultivate and improve themselves, and while mortals did not have the methods for cultivation, they could strengthen their bodies by spending long periods of time immersed within it.

Though these bandits were mortals, they had been nurtured by spiritual energy. They had powerful physiques and were practiced martial artists who had battled for many years and possessed vicious tactics. Tang Jie had been able to kill one mostly due to luck, with a small part being that his opponent had underestimated him.

Thus, when they all charged together, even that white-clothed man wasn't able to kill all of them at once. Weapons flashed in the air as a brawl ensued. Meanwhile, that Bei Sihai quietly sneaked away. He had called on the others to throw away their lives, but he himself was making a run for it.

He was well aware that what made Immortals truly terrifying was not their weapon arts, but their magic spells. Because of this, this battle was hopeless.

A moment later, the man in white grunted, and his sword erupted with a brilliant light that was about a foot long. This light swept around in a circle, after which the heads of ten-some bandits rolled to the ground.

"It's an Immortal sword art!" the bandits yelped in unison, fear and despair in their eyes.

At this moment, the man in white suddenly grunted again, and his body trembled, a bloodstain appearing on his white robes.

Bei Sihai was stunned at first, and then he shouted in glee, "He's injured! He was injured before this!"

All of the bandits were invigorated by these words, and like a drowning man clutching a straw, they heedlessly lunged at the white-clothed man.

Sure enough, the man's wounds had started making trouble again. He could no longer circulate energy as smoothly, and his movements were no longer light and easy. Some of the bandits began to fire at the man from a distance with bows and crossbows.

"Hmph, scoundrels!" the man angrily grunted.

These bandits were truly lacking in experience, believing that just because an Immortal was injured, they could deal with one. In truth, a normal injury would have had minimal effect on a cultivator.

But sometimes, ignorance and fearlessness would allow one to get extremely lucky.

This man in white had not suffered some light wound. Even one month had only been enough to recover a little. However, in using that sword art just now, he had stimulated the wound, and he could now feel the spiritual energy in his body seething like a turbulent ocean, threatening to explode out of his body. He knew that if he didn't end this battle now, he would probably die here. However, his spiritual energy was difficult to control at the moment, rendering him unable to use any Immortal arts.

If they had all scattered in fear, the white-clothed man could have relied on his skills to kill them one at a time. But now that they were all rushing up and surrounding him, he had no way to get out. Moreover, his injuries were worsening, so if he did not take care of these human dregs soon, he would probably be the one in trouble. It would truly be like a ship overturning in placid waters. 

It seems I'll have to do this… the man in white thought to himself. Looking around at the bandits attacking him, his eyes suddenly released a stream of divine light.

"This is…?" Bei Sihai, who had been cautiously observing the man in white this entire time, noticed something was wrong. He saw that sliver of divine light, and a much-renowned term appeared in his mind.

Divine Sense!

This was Divine Sense!

Bei Sihai was aghast!

This man wasn't in the Mortal Shedding Realm, but the Celestial Heart Realm!

At this moment, he completely gave up on trying to kill the Immortal and began to flee with all his might, no longer caring about what happened behind him.

Wherever the white-clothed man's eyes went, the bandits would grab their heads and howl in pain. They dropped from their horses, blood gushing out from their eyes, ears, mouth, and nose.

A Divine Sense attack covered an enormous range, and mortals simply had no way of stopping it.

But for some reason, the man in white restricted his attack to several dozen meters around. Bei Sihai had fled early, escaping the range of the attack. In addition, the Divine Sense attack aimed only at humans, not horses, so his horse continued to ride away with him. However, the aftershocks from the Divine Sense attack left him in great pain, his brain feeling as if it was being jabbed by needles. The immense pain caused him to miserably howl.

As he fled, a youth charged out from the side and threw a saber at Bei Sihai's back.

Hearing the sound of rushing wind behind him, Bei Sihai tilted his head to the side. He avoided the lethal blow, the tip of the saber brushing past his head, but he ended up with an ear cut off.

As he madly howled, the horse brought Bei Sihai away.

Seeing that he couldn't catch up, Tang Jie helplessly stopped.

He looked back at the man in white, who was simply standing there after making his attack.

On this day, the person he had fruitlessly sought had finally appeared.

He had flown down from the heavens and faced down that group of murderous bandits, killing to his heart's content and leaving rivers of blood in his wake. Not a single bandit had been able to withstand the might of his sword.

Those brash, arrogant, and fearless bandits had been felled by the man's sword, one by one, blood raining down as the survivors covered their heads and fled like rats.

That white figure; the dazzling sword beams as swift as lightning; the rain of blood—all of these scenes had imprinted themselves on Tang Jie's heart.

The scale of this battle was much smaller than that battle of two Immortals in the heavens, but it had left an even deeper impression on Tang Jie.

Even after many years, it would remain an indelible mark in Tang Jie's mind. Not even Godhead Palace's divine connection, Paramount Majesty, or the domineering and peerless 'Only I Am the Truth' of the Annihilation King could overcome the heroic figure of Xu Muyang sweeping through the bandits with his sword.

This was how an Immortal should be, wielding a sword and scourging evil!

But it was also on this day that Little River Village was slaughtered!

Blood flowed through Little River Village, dyeing Tang Jie's field of vision red!

Tang Jie felt like his life was mocking him.

On this day, he had experienced life's greatest rise and greatest fall, both joy and sorrow. He had been stupefied, his emotions thrown into absolute turmoil as he wondered what he should do.

He turned around and looked again at the man in white.

Plush! The man in white vomited blood, and then he limply fell to the ground, unconscious.

On this very same day, Tang Jie saw an Immortal fall.

With this, he understood that even Immortals could die.

Perhaps it was due to this understanding that came from seeing an Immortal fall that he developed a most audacious and unprecedented plan…