One down.

Xiao Wu let go of the corpse in her hand. Her fleet footwork brought her beside another cloaked man that had yet to realize what was happening.

Swish!

With a diagonal sweep of her left arm, the black blade cut cleanly through the tendons by the knees, down to the bone.

“Argh!” Having suddenly lost his footing, the man couldn’t even retaliate properly as the last ditch effort of stabbing out with his dagger-like fingers was easily sidestepped.

“Uh!” Xiao Wu elegantly twirled by the extended arm as seven blades silently shot straight through the man’s heart, her black robes fluttering like the wings of a butterfly…

Swish!

In the midst of that dance, a black streak flashed past the man’s vision: the unfortunate robed cultivator only felt a slight pain by the neck as his field of vision began spinning and spinning, blackening and blackening…

And that would be the last thing he’d ever see in this world.

Xiao Wu’s eyes were doused in a purple glaze as her Spiritual Energy-infused Black Dragon Blade just cleaved straight through the neck of a person as if cutting down a blade of grass.

Second one down!

Dancing like a swallow, the blade’s trajectory was further extended with a swift rotation of the waist: revived by the sudden burst of force, the sword motion met with a third cultivator’s jugular before its momentum was exhausted…

“Kah,” was all he could utter as he fell.

Three, down!

“Ah!” a horrified person exclaimed: before anybody had even realized that one of their companions had long fallen, one more had been beheaded. Furthermore, a third was already on his knees, desperately grasping at his throat with a shocked expression: his eyes were already as murky as the waters of a swamp as his dying breath was snuffed out.

"Advanced Stage battle strength!" A shocked, furious shrill rang out, as one of the cultivators that had witnessed everything from start to finish without finding a chance to interfere alerted his companions.

“You little demonspawn, face me if you dare!” A cultivator with an Advanced Stage cultivation shouted with bloodshot eyes as he placed himself in between the handful of his remaining Basic Stage companions and the purple-haired lady in black.

Feeling the powerful cultivation base, Xiao Wu immediately kicked off the ground and retreated as fast as she could manage. Her breathing was a bit rushed and her eyes seemed calm, but in reality, her mind was reeling with both fear and shock.

The first kill of a lifetime was a great blow to a person’s mind… It was not odd for it to be enough to offset the balance of the metaphorical scale lying within: the psychology of man was fragile, much so that it was possible to change someone completely with just a small nudge.

In the midst of a battle for her life however, Xiao Wu could only let the issue slide and focus. She forced any thoughts of guilt down as she defended from a wave after wave of enraged attackers. Those three black robed men she had managed to take out had had a cultivation of the high level Basic stage. With that alone, they couldn’t possibly be a match of Xiao Wu once she unleashed the full power of her Pseudo-Core, even more so as she had taken them by surprise.

This was also why she could deal with them easily, and the same reason she had taken the risk to strike first so as to reduce the number of her opponents.

Unfortunately now, things wouldn’t go as easy as before since now the remaining seventeen cloaked men were now taking her seriously, akin to enraged beasts with their hair standing on their end. Shouting, yelling and cursing at this little girl in front of them, they charged all at once!

Behind Xiao Wu, six flying blades revealed themselves and began wreaking havoc, albeit only on the surface: the young girl didn’t yet possess the skill to perfectly divide her attention across multiple Flying Swords. It was a last ditch attempt on her part, but the experienced and now also wary cultivators easily dodged those half-baked attacks before closing in on her.

At that point, she could only rely on her footwork and swordsmanship to hold on: her accomplishments with the blade were great for her age, and her experience fighting fearsome monsters in the wild in the day and even stronger cultivator by night had further polished that raw genius into pure combat power.

Xiao Wu moved her whole body as fast as she could and the Black Dragon Blade was akin to a butcher’s blade, slicing and dicing flesh left and right.

Her first few strikes cut through her fourth and fifth victims: they both fell on the ground, lifeless, drowning in their own blood. A sixth was hit by a wolf hand-knife, forcing him back with a fist-size gap in his shoulder.

Fly, my talons, fly!

Dance, my blade, dance!

Enemy after enemy fell, but, as the saying goes, two fists cannot fight four fists, let alone dozens.

Finally, the ninth cloaked man was pierced by the fierce counterattack of the last Vengeful Talon that the purple-haired girl had kept hidden behind her back all along: his heart was crushed and he died on the spot.

After that, she wasn't able to do any further damage.

In another story, she might have been able to struggle on.

Or, had her last Martial Way been available, her Pseudo Core detonated, or even just her proficiency with the Xiao Scriptures higher, all wouldn’t have been lost yet. Unfortunately, that right there had been her limit, both hers, and that of her willpower: five Basic Stage peak and four low Advanced Stage opponents at once. When more joined in, she was overwhelmed.

Dozens of the strong, sturdy hands of the body cultivators grabbed onto her limbs and pinned her down on the ground. A peak Advanced Stage cultivator furiously slammed his palm onto her forehead and her vision swam, any control she had over her Spiritual Energy was cut off. Then, blow after blow landed on her body and sealed her movements, until she could barely raise a finger.

"Cough!" Xiao Wu weakly coughed out blood. It trickled down the sides of her mouth, almost choking her as it slowly stained the grass by her head crimson.

"This little monster!" A black robed person reached for his left cheek with astonishment, where a deep cut had been inflicted by the black sword, "She was so fierce! We actually lost nine of our men, elite warriors, just to capture an eight-year-old Inferior Stage brat!"

"She had such weird techniques... She dodged so many of my strikes, as if she could read my mind!" One of the men holding her arm lamented: he felt humiliated at how he couldn’t land a single blow and felt the need to explain himself before his companions. Fortunately, he was not the only one, as one after another voiced out their thoughts.

"Really, a true demon! If she is so strong now, what about in a few years! I doubt we could have captured her alive…” Another man fearfully added with a trembling sigh.

Zi Luo was also pale at the thought of losing so many able men in the span of a few breaths. However…

“However, ‘a vermillion sun setting over a battlefield for the winner to rule over existence in the morning’; a catastrophe now might become a blessing in the coming days! With this child’s talent, we might have struck gold!” His deep, grey-ash eyes lit up and his lips arranged into a complicated smile, “This fierce lad might be the killer of our kin, but as we thought, she might just be the key to our Clan’s resurgence! It was worth capturing her alive after all!"

“What are you planning to do, exactly?” The emerald-eyed girl’s blood-stained teeth clenched tightly together.

“That’s not for you to know right now, vile criminal.” Zi Luo smirked as he played with his goatee: right now, his hands were as steady as a mountain range. “First off, to wash away your sins, I’m going to have you help us lure out your dear friend in there…”

Xiao Wu’s eyes widened, expressing shock and fury, “I assure you, that is never going to happen! I’ll kill myself first!”

Zi luo chuckled, “Why do you think I had my men incapacitate you? Right now, your jaw couldn’t bite into the softest grass porridge, let alone your tongue. First, we’ll kill your brother. Then, by the time we are back and are done messing with you, you’ll be unable to even speak up to me… after all you’ve done, I’ll be sure you’ll be helpful to our esteemed Zi Clan!”

“You!” Xiao Wu seemed to have understood some implicit workings, “You are going to force me to be one of your Clan’s slave warriors until my death, aren’t you!”

Zi Luo smirked, but didn’t reply.

Instead…

“Close… but not close enough.”

A youth’s voice lingered over at this time, shocking everyone present.

“The current Zi Clan doesn’t need an Elder as much as it craves for a successor! That’s why the Head wishes to capture you, who has created such a ruckus, and proceed to use various methods, from torture and threats to straight-out brainwashing, to convince you that you actually are his daughter.”

“After that is done, he’s going to announce to the world that the rising star, the ‘Night Challenger’ is actually his second son from one of his concubines. Of course, as such a person doesn’t really exist, he’ll take advantage of his son’s death by leaking rumors that it was his first wife that had assassinated her when she learned of your ‘birth’. However, after many years of struggle as a commoner, you eventually gained enough power to defeat and cripple your ‘brother’ in a duel and avenge your ‘mother’.”

“The Head’s wife will then henceforth be executed on the grounds of murder, while her son would ‘disappear’ soon thereafter. Rumors about him escaping or even committing suicide will then be fueled by the Clan’s espionage corps, until eventually he will be forgotten; only you, the rising star of Zi, will be left behind, eventually taking the spot as the Clan Head in your late years, leading the clan to never seen before heights!”

“This way, this crafty old man would have both avenged his fallen son and gained an even more talented ‘daughter’, one that will prop his declining Clan back onto its lofty spot as a first-rated power… am I close enough, Senior Luo?”

Under everyone’s shocked gaze, the film of golden light opened up to reveal a white-haired, blue-eyed youth. The white of his eyes was red and his expression was like that of an enraged beast. Veins were popping on his forehead and his pearly teeth were pressed together so tightly he seemed to want to grind them into dust.

…

Anger.

Extreme anger.

That was what Fuyin felt filling every cell of his body as he saw the purple-haired girl damaged, wounded, lying on the ground motionlessly like a broken corpse.

He had managed to hold on all this while, but couldn’t keep it in anymore.

That girl was one of the four most important people in his life, so no matter what orders he had been given, he couldn’t possibly watch on any longer!

“You are-” Zi Luo started. However…

WHAM!

The Zi Clan Head’s gray eyes open wide, losing any semblance of dullness as he witnessed a sudden explosion of energy send his men flying. Before his eyes, a gargantuan azure door had materialized from thin air and slammed open, regurgitating countless figures in azure, full-body armor!

Each of them of the Advanced Stage!

Dozens, Hundreds, they held spears, swords, bows, wielding the vastest array of weapons!

And as they moved together in a horrifyingly orderly manner they all but resembled a giant meat grinder!

Of the few body cultivators that had withstood the first shockwave from the opening of the Underworld Gates, they were all gobbled up from the first to the last, the sudden flood of Wang Protectors wiping a dozen cultivators of the Advanced and Superior Stage in a matter of moments!

That was what happened the moment Zi Luo blinked once and opened his eyes again: next thing he knew, pieces of limbs lay everywhere; from the trees, embedded into the walls, and even sprouting from the ground like horrifying flowers, the strong force delving them deeply in the mud that was slowly being dyed crimson.

Lastly, was an army, arranged in perfect ranks. Each soldier was clad in a majestic armor underworld-azure in color covering every inch of their body. And now, this fearsome corp of skilled warriors paid its respects to its sole leader! Each of those myriad warriors slammed their fists onto their chest, a loud clanging sound echoing throughout the seventh ward from the Sixth Ring of the Mysterious Light-Shadow Sect.

“Hail to the Underworld King,” was the unspoken message within those motions as the Wang Protectors wordlessly stood to the side and opened up a passage to their master for the Zi Clan Head to see.

They all bowed, from the first to the last of the thousands at the front, each of them an elite warrior of the Advanced Stage! They all bowed to their Lord who now carried the wounded Xiao Wu in his arms. At his feet, the mangled heads of Zi Luo’s men lay unceremoniously, Advanced and Superior Stage aura still leaking out as was blood and brain matter.

The pair of the underworld-azure pupils, shaped like inverted triangles, reflected straight into the ash-grey eyes of the last of Zi.

“Kid, you actually dared…” Zi Luo’s expression twisted greatly as pressure akin to a tidal wave, eclipsing by itself that of all Advanced Stage Wang Protectors put together, rushed out and engulfed the courtyard without spilling even a single drop outside. “What in this world could possibly give you the confidence to challenge the might of the great Clan of Zi?”

“Low level Sung Stage, exactly as he said. An insurmountable roadblock even to the current me to handle, let alone for Little Wu. Cheng Hao might be harsher to his enemies, but his standards sure are high.” Fuyin noted nonchalantly, the corner of his eyes twitching albeit so slightly.

It wasn’t that sheer numbers couldn’t overwhelm a single powerhouse. In the Mortal Realm the stages were not yet so far apart that numbers couldn’t make up for the difference in overall power. However, as long as the guy was still right in the head, nothing would prevent the Sung Stage expert from making a beeline for Fuyin and beheading the leader in one, swift move.

To Sung Stage cultivators, Advanced Stage were like infants holding knives to a grown man: still somewhat dangerous, sure, but it would be a massacre before they would be able to considerably wound, let alone overwhelm, a fully developed adult.

“No Clan in the Western Continent is to be underestimated, even terrible talent can be easily propped up to unimaginable height otherwise, and that is all thanks to their deep reserves. That’s what years and years of accumulation during the events a thousand years ago has brought to the cultivation world today: this single continent has average might that far outclasses any other, even a mere Zi Clan has a Sung Stage Head.”

“However…” Wang Fuyin raised his chin up with a carefree smile, “That means little when that duo of monsters is here.”

Zi Luo’s expression suddenly fell as a majestic dragon cry reached his ears…