One of the men with a youthful appearance stepped forward and opened his mouth, “We were giving it our best. It’s just that Captain Ji couldn’t stall the other for long enough.” Hearing this, a vein appeared on the forehead of every Saint present. Feeling the sudden murderous aura locked onto him, the fellow immediately shut up and took a step back, face pale. Curo then smiled lightly, “Is that so?”

Hearing this sentence, Mo Hao threw the previous Recording Artefact into the air and replayed the entire battle. When the Roaming Squads saw that recording, their faces paled even more as they knew that they would not be able to explain themselves. After the recording had finished, a cracking of bones echoed out as one of the puppets clenched his fist.

When Curo saw the man’s face, even he felt slight dread. The man was completely and utterly filled with unbound rage. The man then turned towards the Burning Heavens Citadel Commander and said coldly, “Commander Feng, I am going to have to borrow a few of your soldiers to escort these deserters back to face trial.” Hearing this, everyone present, Curo and the Commander included sucked in a deep breath. From the words of the man, crippling their cultivation or even execution was already certain. Commander Feng gave the men a quick, cold gaze before cupping his hands towards the man and beckoning a few people over.

Just as they tried to justify themselves once more, the Sovereign puppet from the Hidden Dragon Academy coldly said, “You idiots don’t seem to realize the situation we are in with this war. If we lose, this entire Realm will become slaves. Your actions today may have cost our Five Academy Alliance and most specifically the Nirvana Phoenix Academy to lose over 200 Saint Realm Experts. Besides that, there are over ten million lower levelled cultivators as well that would have been annihilated.” The man paused for a second and then continued coldly, “Most importantly, we would have lost this location’. This Citadel is the closest one we have to the Nine Clans territory so all of the strategies we have planned have been planned through this Citadel. If we lost this Citadel, could you truly take the responsibility for it?” Hearing this, the various Squad’s gulped.

They had only wanted to see Curo suffer a bit, however, they had no idea that their bit of greed and jealousy may have had such dire consequences. Not to mention losing the most important strategic location their Alliance had, they would directly be the people responsible for the deaths of 200 Saints and over 10 million lower levelled cultivators.

Even if they survived the slaughter and managed to flee, the Five Academies would most likely annihilate their entire Clans due to rage. The Nirvana Phoenix Academy might even torture all of them to death. The 70 plus people from the Roaming Squads all lowered their heads with pale faces. In their eyes, there was dread. Only now did they realize what implications their actions had.

Besides saying that one sentence, Curo had been completely silent throughout the entire It didn’t take long for the gigantic ship to arrive with each of the four Academies sending over a 100 Saints and 5 million low levelled cultivators as reinforcements. To house all of them, Commander Feng had to expand the Citadel by quite a lot.

With the addition of 400 Saints, 20 million low levelled cultivators and 10 Sovereign Puppets, the combat strength of the Burning Heavens Citadel had risen three fold in an instant. To Commander Fengs relief, none of the Saints or Sovereign Puppet Controllers would interfere with his commands. It was obvious that they had received strict orders to be under Commander Feng’s command and to obey every order he send out. This rooted out quite a bit of problems he was afraid that would pop up. With the Nine Clans in retreat and the reinforcements arriving, Curo and the rest of the Burning Citadels Saints could finally get a well earned rest.

Mo Hao supported Curo to the room that was allocated to him and when he sat down to cultivate, Mo Hao and the rest kept guard just in case. Suddenly, there was a knock on the door and ten figures walked in. These ten were the Sovereign Puppet Controllers. Seeing the people enter, Curo stood up and cupped his hands in salute. When the others returned the greeting, Curo asked in a serious tone, “What is this order?”

One of the people stepped forward and passed Curo a jade slip. Curo frowned as he accepted it and after sending a bit of Qi into it, his face first turned serious, then thoughtful and then complex. After he fell in thought, the man asked, “Do you have any confidence in being able to achieve this?” Curo raised his head as he said seriously, “It is possible but are they sure they want to send me there?”

The ten people exchanged a glance before two of them took out an identical Artefact that sealed the entire room. The man then answered with a serious face, “The operation to seize the Top Grade Qi Stone Mines has started. As the Five Academies and Four Clans are gathering their troops for this, they want to send you in as a distraction.”

Hearing this, Curo gave a bitter smile as he said, “My face is plastered across the entire Nine Clans Territory, I am the Number One on their Bounty board with a bounty of 10 million Top Grade Qi Stones, a position of Inner Elder in any of the Nine Clans of the person choosing and being able to marry into the Clan and take their surname….” As his words trailed of, the man sighed as he nodded, “With you making an appearance deep inside their territory, there is no lack of people that will head over to kill you.” Curo sighed deeply, “What did they send over to help us survive this?” The man then immediately withdrew a Spacial Ring and threw it to Curo. When he checked what was inside, he couldn’t help but take a deep breath.

The inside of the Spacial ring was stocked to the brim with all kinds of Top Grade Healing Medicines, Offensive Talismans, Defensive Talismans, Spacial Talismans…. The wealth contained in this Spacial Ring was something that only some truly old and ancient Clans could rival if they sold off all their assets. This went to show that, reserves of wealth that these Five Academies had accumulated over the years was truly terrifying. Curo passed the Spacial Ring to Mo Hao and then asked them seriously, “I thought that the plan was to probe the Nine Clans for the next century and then seize the Qi Stone Mines?”

The man had a complex gaze as he looked towards the person in the centre, seemingly asking for permission. The person nodded his head and the man then explained, “Our intelligence brought back that they managed to stumble upon the Realms Will. After exhausting much resources, they managed to capture it again. If we don’t seize the mines as soon as possible….” Curo let out a deep breath as he muttered, “Then we can consider ourselves lost already….” The man nodded his head. Curo rubbed the bridge of his nose and then asked, “Was there anything I wasn’t allowed to do to draw their attention?” The man was startled, he then slowly shook his head and Curo asked again with a malicious smile, “Then, do we know which Clan obtained the Realms Will?”

The man was puzzled and said, “If our information is correct then it should be the Han Clan. What are you planning to do?” Curo only gave a smile but he didn’t say anything more. The man then understood that this was something that was of utter importance and could not be leaked, so he didn’t continue questioning. After speaking a bit more with Curo on the time frame and several other things like what to watch out for, the ten people left.

When they had left, Curo withdrew an identical Artefact that the men had used from his Spacial Ring and activated it. Once the space around the room was sealed, he turned to the four and said, “You should probably guessing what I am planning to do?” The four hesitantly nodded as Mo Hao said, “You plan on raiding the Han Clan’s Han Imperial City, aren’t you?” Curo shook his head and then said….

***

Inside a luxurious hall, there were three figures. One of them gloomily said, “Even though it was our Meng Clan that had found and subdued the Realms Will, those Han Clan punks truly have balls to force us to hand it over like that.” His face was red like pigs liver. The other two nodded their heads as another angrily spoke, “Not only the Han Clan but the rest of the Clans also joined in glamouring about incompetence and what not.”

The final man then sighed deeply as a smile curled to his lips, “Let’s see how far they can hold onto this hot potato.” Hearing this, the two seemed to think of something and also smiled.

It seemed like they had prepared for this for a long time or perhaps, they had something else in mind.

***

In a spacious hall with a round table, nine figures sat at the table. Seven of the nine figures looked at the other two with a complicated expression. One built man then asked, “Oi, Jing. I honestly know that you are a wicked and cold person but to this extent….”

Jing Fang turned his gaze towards the man and gave him a malicious smile, “Trust me on this, when it comes to maliciousness and wickedness, I am no match for that fellow?” Hearing this, the man was startled as he raised a brow. Jing Fang then chuckled, “I just received word that he had received his orders and had instead on inquired who had obtained the Realms Will.” Hearing this, the man frowned as he asked, “So what?”

Jing Fang then gave a smile and said, “I have known that brat for only a few short years, however, he has never ceased to amaze me in his ways of causing havoc.” Qing Zhao at his side also nodded his head with a wicked smile and added, “No matter what he is planning on doing, I have a feeling that it will be something grand and will drag the Han clan’s face through the mud.” The seven exchanged glances before they sighed.

They couldn’t understand just how did they have so much confidence in that little brat. From his reputation, he could be considered a Just Saint. However, these two were currently painting him as a Devil.

Seeing these gazes, Jing Fang let out a sigh and said, “That fellow…. He has an extremely clear division of friend and foe. When he sees a stranger in trouble, he won’t hesitate to extend a helping hand, however, once you have made him your enemy, even the Heavens can’t save you from plans he makes.” The seven were astounded, especially the three Divine Beasts.

They narrowed their eyes when they heard Jing Fang’s praise. In all their years, there have been only a handful of people that had earned a word of praise from Jing Fang and each one of them had grown up to me a dazzling figure. For him to say this much about this boy, they couldn’t help but eagerly wait for what he was going to do.

Jing Fang then turned serious, “When Curo is done with his plan, he will have probably allowed the Realms Will to escape again. This time, we need to track it down and convince it to let us hide it somewhere where the Nine Clans can’t reach it.” The three Divine Beasts nodded their heads. However, their eyes revealed shock as they heard that Curo would most likely help the Realms Will escape somehow. “How the hell is he planning on doing that? To make those old monsters lose control over the Dormation that is sealing the Realms Will, you would have to….”

As a hought entered their heads, the three turned their heads towards Jing Fang with shocked eyes as a beautiful young woman with red hair asked in shock, “He isn’t planning on….” As he words trailed off, Jing Fang nodded his head and said, “Knowing his character, most likely is planning on doing exactly that.”

***

It took three days for Curo to heal his injuries and arrive at his peak state. When he was in his peak state, he only exchanged a few words with the Ten Sovereign Puppet Controllers and Commander Feng before he and his Squad left the Burning Heavens Citadel. They immediately took course for the Han Imperial City. The four men: Mo Hao, Shin Haotian, Huang Feng, Cheng Heng, were looking at Curo with a complex gaze.

When they first heard of Curo’s plan, they had simply thought that it was insane. However, when he explained it a bit more detailed, the were forced to admit, that it didn’t have any flaws. If they stuck to the plan and didn’t take any unnecessary risks, then, once the plan would be in full motion, they would all be long gone from there. To think of such a plan, the four couldn’t help but shudder. However, at the same time a tinge of excitement appeared in their eyes. If they managed to pull it off, then with only 5 people, they would be able to drag the entire Han Clan’s face through the mud.

The humiliation they would receive would even make their enemies feel pity for them. It took them slightly over a month to travel from World to World before they arrived in front of an enormously gigantic city. When the five saw the City, they were all slightly dazzled before lowering their heads and entering the City. Using some Face Changing Arts, they five had completely disguised themselves. They had ditched their Academy Robes and had put on Han Clan Robes they had plundered from the cultivators on the way. With their Identity Tokens, it wasn’t hard to enter the City and putting on a bit of airs managed to give them safe passage in without much trouble.

When the five entered the City, Curo gave a signal and the four men behind him started walking in different directions. Their hands flashed from time to time but no passer by noticed anything wrong. Seeing this, Curo smiled as he set his steps towards the centre of the City, where the Imperial Palace was. In the years to come, this would become known as an absolute legend that would be passed down by cultivators to their young.

The epic tale of five Saints taking down the entire Han Imperial City with only the five of them.