Qi-Yan sighed in relief as trouble left. He had no idea what caused the city lord and the vice-head of the Whirlwind Blade Sect to be so frantic that they had to lockdown the city. They even took the chance of offending the Xin family by intruding upon their inn and questioning the tenants. Qi-Yan apologized to the youths for allowing the embarrassing incident to happen and escorted them back to their room.

Never in a million years would Qi-Yan suspect that the three youths from the Montgomery and Maxwell family were actually responsible for the incident. First of all they were just in Heaven Domain. The lord himself was in King Domain and he had plenty of Heaven Domain experts working for him inside his mansion. Second of all, to break in and sneak out of the mansion was something that even he can’t do easily. He could never guess that two masterminds in the shadows, Mr. R and John, had orchestrated an elaborate heist that most likely crippled the city lord’s achievements for the past few hundred years.

“Hey Dragon!” Leonardo said with a smile as he entered his room. Ryu was levitating one lightning fruit above his right hand but wasn’t cultivating due to the commotion earlier.

“Hi Leo, how as your errand?” Ryu asked politely.

“There were some complications. Master and John had to leave. Nothing important but please don’t mention the two of them, thanks.” Leonardo said as he fell backwards on his bed. Before Ryu could respond suddenly a beeping sound rang out, someone was trying to contact Leonardo through a voice crystal.

“Leo, pack your things. Someone will retrieve the three of you in a few minutes.” The unknown caller said in monotone.

“What? We had a deal, the elders agreed that we can travel alone to gain life experience.” Leonardo replied with frustration.

“Something has come up. Your second uncle had being murdered. Not only that, three of your cousins have also gone missing. It seems like someone is boldly making a move on our family.” The caller said in the same robotic voice.

“What? Uncle Joey was murdered?” Leonardo said speechlessly. Ryu didn’t understand what was going on but he knew that this was a family matter so he politely left the room.

“Yes, please inform your cousin Harry and tell Lady Jane too. She’ll be a handful but the patriarch of the Montgomery family had already being informed and he agrees that it’s safer for her to come back with you guys.” The robotic voice became stern, this matter was no joke. Someone dared to make a move on the Maxwell family that owns an inter-continental flight service business. They had tens of thousands of expert employees.

Ryu waited in the living room. He was extremely curious about Leonardo’s background. Why would he rob the city lord when he seems to be from a respectable and rich background? Where did this Mr. R and John disappear to? What is the purpose of the stolen skeletal key? Ryu hoped to get some answers from Leonardo later on.

Before he could analyze the situation further in his mind, Ryu sensed a dreadful aura approaching the city. It wasn’t just him, everyone within the city that had decent cultivation slowly felt it as well. This was because the source of this awesome energy wasn’t attempting to hide its strength at all. Leonardo came out of the room with a gloomy face. Harry and Jane also came out of their own rooms with an upset expression.

Suddenly a peak Emperor Domain expert appeared outside the inn with a loud bang, a crater was formed upon his arrival. This was just by Ryu’s estimate because he couldn’t sense the depth of this person’s Qi. Even by looking at his reservoir, it seemed immeasurably deep. His reservoir had already entered a gaseous state and formed an infant essence. Essences are formed when one enters the Emperor Domain. Of course it couldn’t be compared the bottomless darkness that Alexis’s Qi reservoir contained. In a flash he appeared beside Leonardo.

It was evident that he came here in a rush. Above the inn was an Emperor Domain flying beast! This Emperor Domain person was clad in silver armor and had a giant claymore hung on his back. He was actually sent to keep an eye out on these three in case something happened. Since the spoiled heirs wanted to be independent, he was usually a city away for the past few months as backup. If an SOS signal was sent or if he was given an order from the main family like right now, he would retrieve them as soon as possible. Just a few minutes ago he got an order to retrieve them.

“I have orders from the patriarch of the Maxwell to bring you three back. I am afraid this is non-negotiable.” The armored knight said. Three golden rings enveloped the trio before they can protest and brought them out the window and up to the Emperor Domain dragon-like beast. This beast appeared out of nowhere and had stayed stationary for less than a minute but the whole city was in another uproar once again. Just half an hour ago, the city guards were interrogating any experts they could find. Now a ridiculously strong and intimating beast is hovering over the city. With a Qi blast, it could probably wipe out half the city.

“Hey what gives?” Jane said angrily as she struggled futilely against the golden Qi restrictions that binds her.

“Lady Jane pardon our intrusion but this is for your own safety. Many descendants from the main family of the Maxwell family had disappeared within the last ten hours.” A mysterious voice came out of nowhere.

“Elder Sona?” Leonardo said in surprise. This was one of the Supreme Domain expert from his family that specializes in light elements. There’s no way for mere Heaven Domain expert to see her unless she permits it. The situation must be graver than he thought.

This intimidating flying beast that’s sending the whole city and the two sects camped outside into mass panic flew away in a blink of an eye. Ryu watched them disappear as he once again felt how weak he was. Before he was naïve and didn’t understand what true power was so he wasn’t afraid of Alexis’s bottomless Qi. Now he realizes that Alexis was a hundred times stronger than his current self, he wouldn’t even be able to take one blow from him.

Just like that the three influential heirs disappeared. The city took a few hours to calm down. This was definitely going to be a hot topic for the coming years. Emperor Domain experts and beasts are hard to come by for ordinary cultivators. Quite a few experts were already ticked off by the city lord’s lockdown and some decided to leave as they felt the difference between themselves and an Emperor Domain expert for the first time.

Ryu didn’t know what to make of it. Leonardo’s group left so fast that they didn’t get to speak much after the heist they pulled on the city lord. What is so significant about the skeletal key that caused Mr. R and the city lord to be so stressed? It seemed like Leonardo, Jane and Harry were in the dark about the skeletal key. Ryu had many questions but no answers.

Night time came and Ryu decided to stroll around the streets, wondering what he should do next. All of the sudden something caught his ears.

“So sad, he was such a nice man too. He had opened that food stall for thirty years.”

“What a tragedy… and the two daughters, I heard they were raped before they were killed.”

“Sigh what can we do, these experts holds no regard for regular people’s lives.”

Ryu picked up on the conversations ran towards the stall where he first met Leonardo. To his relief, the food stall was there and the owner seemed healthy. It was the food stall a block away that suffered a disaster. Ryu found a couple of flowers and a portrait of a family in its place. From what he could gather, the food stall owner’s family was mysteriously tortured and raped then buried alive.

Did the Resilient Gaia Sect go after these poor mortals, burying someone does sound like their skill. Ryu thought to himself.

Whatever the reason, Ryu was furious. There was no excuse to harm innocent mortals. Ryu knew that he was no match for the whole Resilient Gaia Sect. He would definitely lose to the sect leader, whom Ryu estimates to be in upper King Domain. That doesn’t mean he can’t revenge the fallen food stall owner’s family though. With the arsenal of techniques and bountiful of Qi he has, he could definitely deal a heavy blow to the sect.

However, even if Ryu was infuriated his mind was clear. He had a feeling that he was being followed since he left the inn. There were too many people in the crowd, he couldn’t know for sure but he sensed a handful of people moving in the same direction as him since a few minutes ago. Ryu knew that this was a rash move but he decided to confront his stalkers in an open field outside of the city.

Since it was night time, Ryu slipped out of the city. While he was exiting, he fashioned a pseudo glass lens in front of his eye and looked towards the camp which the Resilient Gaia Sect resides in. There were over five thousand disciples and dozens of elders. A first rate sect usually have the population of small city. All of these people are from the core court except a few gifted individuals that are not quite at the core court standards but had great talent.

Ryu obviously wasn’t going to walk towards the enemy’s camp when he has a few stalkers following him so he chose to go back to the wildness where he met the Drunken Master Du-Bai. After walking a few kilometers away from the city at a leisurely pace, Ryu sprinted away out of nowhere. His pursuers obviously increased their efforts to keep up. Unbeknownst to them, Ryu had released a clone to bait them out into the open while his main body is hidden. His Qi had been suppressed and assimilated into the nature. Only another expert in shaman arts had a good chance of detecting him.

Watching his chasers flying past him, Ryu couldn’t tell who they are exactly but they were three entry King Domain experts. The moment they flew past Ryu, Ryu released his clone that was baiting them. The three pursuers stopped in surprise.

“Where did he go? How did he escape our senses” One of them said.

“He must be pretty skillful to escape us three elders.” Another one of them said. Ryu felt a pulse in the ground and realized it’s the same technique he faced from a previous elder from the Resilient Gaia Sect.

“The leader told us to teach him a lesson and take his storage ring… but judging from his speed, he shouldn’t only be in Grandmaster Domain…” The oldest elder said as he tried his best to sense Ryu. Ryu’s cultivation was the same as these three elders but his technique is much more profound.

“How petty! They followed me to rob me?” Ryu said to himself. Ryu was almost completely sure that this shameless sect had killed the food stall owner and his family.

“Perhaps it was an illusionary skill…” One elder said as he pondered for an explanation.

“Or maybe…” Another elder was about to say something until they sensed a powerful source of energy from behind them. They quickly turned around and saw Ryu stepping out from the shadows.

The three elders had the same thought when they saw Ryu. Either he was a fool or a supreme expert that managed to hoodwink them. Instantly they unleashed their special skills. The earth beneath Ryu shattered and a powerful restrictive gravity pulled down on him. Sand rose form the ground and shot at him. A giant stone golem formed and grabbed onto him.

The reason why there were no lethal moves was because these elders had orders to get his storage ring. If it was locked, they would need to have Ryu unlock it or the treasures inside won’t be recoverable. What they didn’t know was that Ryu stored all his valuables inside his Infinity Tomes anyways.

Ryu was completely restricted by a variety of earthen Qi skills. There were layers of sand and stone that covered him, he was like a big boulder at this point. Just as the elders approached Ryu, fissures quickly formed and lights shot out of the cracks. The next moment Ryu floated out completely unharmed. Ryu’s body was covered in bright energy, the raw Qi contained a hint of lightning since he had absorbed from the lightning fruits for the past few days. He hasn’t completely refined the lightning Qi into his own yet.

With a wave of his hand, two power streams of lightning shot out and collided with two elders. The third elder jumped back but Ryu was faster, in a flash he was in front of him. Ryu used an odd move that made him look like he was skating in mid-air. This was one of the stances of the Drunken Dragon Fist, Riding the Eight Dragons. Ryu can form Qi tracks beneath his feet and channel his Qi to his feet to gain an astonishing speed. The tracks are alive and can be changed at will. Once Ryu was in front of the elder, he shot out the first stance of the Drunken Dragon Fist, Beheading the Divine Dragon.

This punch was the signature move of the Drunken Dragon Fist, its mysterious force can’t be explained and when used properly it was deadly beyond words. The unfortunate elder was too proud of his own palm strikes and decided to meet Ryu’s attack head on. As his palm collided with Ryu’s fist, the bones in his arm cracked. The pain momentary shocked him and caused him to be unable to respond to Ryu’s next punch. Thankfully the other two elders came to his aid. They attacked Ryu’s back which forced him to retract his punch to defend himself. After that the three elders surrounded and circled around him, it was a formation skill from their sect.

The ground below started forming into rings of different sizes. The rings spun around and seemingly fueled the three elders somehow. An unusually strong gravity also appeared, making it difficult for Ryu to sustain flight.

Besides the Drunken Master and the Shaman Prince that trained Ryu, these elders were the most skillful opponents Ryu had faced. It is also a given since reaching the level 60, the King Domain, takes an average person nearly a thousand years. Anyone who reached it must have grasped a few special skills. This made Ryu realize that the longer the fight drags out, the more disadvantaged he’ll be so he has to take them out one by one fast.

While maintaining the gravity formation that’s impeding Ryu, the elders released their specializations. Above one elder, a flood of red sand appeared out of nowhere around him. This was his specialization, Bloody Sand.

Another elder’s skin became metallic. He looked like a lump of steel that could move. Even his hair was steel now. This was his specialization, Metallic Body.

The last elder sat down on a ground and attempted to release his specialization but nothing happened. Before he could try again, it was too late since Ryu already made his move.