Blood rained from the sky.

Qin Heng, the Golden Core powerhouse whose strength was second only to the Sect Leader, died without fanfare. There was no earth-shattering explosion, no final defiant roar. Just a sickening crunch and a silent, limp fall.

“Master!”

Below, Zhao Feng’s eyes turned glacial.

He wanted to scream, to fly up and catch the body, but the relentless waves of attacks hammering the formation kept him pinned. He could only watch in helpless rage as the Blood Bone Holy Venerable casually tossed Qin Heng’s broken corpse aside like a piece of trash.

But just as the body began its freefall, a brilliant streak of sword light erupted from within the corpse.

Schwing!

It moved with eye-popping speed, a desperate comet tearing through the mountain mist. In the blink of an eye, the light—which seemed to carry a faint, translucent figure—vanished into the distance, escaping toward the horizon.

The Blood Bone Holy Venerable turned its massive skull to give chase, but a sudden, grating sound erupted from its own body.

Creeeeaaak.

It was the sound of bone grinding against bone. The crimson light fading, the skeletal armor lost its integrity. One by one, the massive blood-bones detached and plummeted from the sky, exhausted of power.

As the armor crumbled, the figure within was revealed—a man in black robes, his face still obscured by shadow.

BOOM!

The distraction was momentary. The tottering Mountain Guarding Formation, pushed beyond its limits, finally shattered.

The light curtain disintegrated into motes of spiritual dust.

The barrier was gone.

In an instant, the Heavenly Gate Sect cultivators swarmed toward the Sect’s core area like a plague of locusts.

The situation unraveled so fast that Wang Ba’s mind reeled.

It wasn’t until a bloodied Laborer Disciple suddenly appeared in Ding-Nine Manor and imploded into a bone that Wang Ba finally understood the nagging wrongness he had felt earlier.

Even he—a Qi Refining cultivator protected by a Middle Grade Spirit Beast and burning Top Grade Swift Movement Talismans—had barely survived the run here. How could thousands of defenseless Laborer Disciples have retreated to the core area unscathed?

There was only one possibility: The Heavenly Gate Sect had herded them here on purpose.

But realizing the trap now was useless. It was too late.

When the Blood Bone Holy Venerable appeared, radiating an aura of apocalyptic terror, Wang Ba’s mind went blank. And when he looked up to see the teleportation formation activate, whisking away the Sect Leader and the high command, a chill froze him to the marrow.

They left us.

The realization hit him harder than any spell.

We are the discarded pawns.

In truth, the moment the Sect Leader led the elite forces away to “conquer the State of Fu,” those left behind were already dead men walking. Wang Ba had never considered himself a loyal son of the Eastern Sage Sect, but he had stayed because of Zhao Feng.

Now, loyalty was a death sentence. The leadership had fled, leaving the scraps to be devoured by the enraged enemy.

CRASH!

The formation broke.

The roar of the invading army drowned out all thought. They descended like demons, eyes burning with greed and bloodlust.

“KILL!”

“One ‘Blood Pill’ for every early-stage Qi Refining kill!”

“One ‘Blood Essence Pill’ for a late-stage kill! A Foundation Establishment kill grants a promotion!”

The rewards system turned the battlefield into a slaughterhouse.

Beside Wang Ba, Lin Yu stood frozen, her eyes wide and vacant with shock.

Wang Ba gritted his teeth, scanning for an exit. But there was none. Enemies were everywhere, a wall of hostile magic closing in from all sides.

“Die!”

A cultivator with a face twisted in savagery lunged at him, driving a magical artifact straight for his heart.

Wang Ba instinctively raised his left hand, ready to fire a spell, but the enemy was too fast.

“Alpha-Seven!”

Cluck!

The spirit chicken burst from his spirit beast bag. With a nimble dodge that defied physics, it blurred forward.

Peck!

“ARGH!”

The enemy cultivator screamed, clutching his face. Blood streamed between his fingers where his right eye used to be.

“My eye! You beast! You ruined my Dao body! I’ll kill you!”

Pain fueled the man’s rage. His Spiritual Power surged, and the string of white bone beads around his neck levitated, glowing with ominous light.

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

They fired like a machine-gun barrage, tearing up the earth as they tracked Wang Ba.

“Aaah!” Lin Yu shrieked, cowering.

Wang Ba didn’t have time for her. He pumped every ounce of Spiritual Power he had into his legs, dodging frantically.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Dirt exploded around him. The beads were relentless. He dodged three, four, five—but the last few locked onto him. There was no angle left.

Suddenly, a figure stepped in front of him.

Wings spread wide. Head held high. A defiant shield of feathers.

“Alpha-Seven!!!” Wang Ba screamed, eyes bulging.

For the first time, he saw the chicken’s movement clearly. It wasn’t trying to dodge. It was trying to block.

Swish.

A sound like silk tearing filled the air.

A beam of sword Qi sliced through the chaotic battlefield.

The incoming bone beads were sheared cleanly in half, dropping harmlessly to the ground inches from Alpha-Seven’s beak.

A few meters away, the one-eyed cultivator froze. A thin red line appeared on his neck.

His head slid off his shoulders, and a fountain of blood erupted skyward.

“Senior Brother Zhao!”

Wang Ba stared at the cold, stern figure standing before him. Alpha-Seven, realizing the danger had passed, immediately shrank its neck and scurried behind Wang Ba’s leg, clucking softly.

“No time to talk. Move!”

Zhao Feng didn’t look back.

Wang Ba stared at him in awe. Despite the hellscape around them, Zhao Feng appeared untouched. Only the scorched edges of his sleeves hinted at the fierce battles he had just fought.

His face was a mask of stoic ice, but Wang Ba could sense the storm raging beneath.

Unlike Wang Ba, who was just a passerby trying to survive, Zhao Feng had given forty years of his life to this sect. To be abandoned like trash… the betrayal must have cut deeper than any blade.

But there was no time for grief. The mountain gate was breached. The leaders were gone. The disciples left behind were dead meat.

Zhao Feng stepped forward. A Qi Refining 9th Layer enemy rushed him, screaming a war cry.

Slash.

One strike. The enemy’s head exploded.

Zhao Feng didn’t slow down. He grabbed Wang Ba and a few nearby survivors, carving a bloody path through the encirclement.

He fought with terrifying efficiency. No wasted movements. No flashy techniques. Every swing of his sword meant death.

“Rally to me!”

Seeing Zhao Feng’s divine might, scattered disciples began to flock to him, desperate for a savior. The group grew larger, a small island of resistance in a sea of enemies.

Naturally, this attracted the big sharks.

“Arrogant fool!”

A Foundation Establishment cultivator from the Heavenly Gate Sect descended from the sky, palms crackling with lightning.

“Die!”

Thunder boomed as a massive lightning bolt crashed down. The disciples behind Zhao Feng screamed in terror.

Zhao Feng didn’t flinch. He didn’t even look up. He simply swung his sword up.

One strike.

The lightning shattered.

The Foundation Establishment enemy looked down, confused. Then, a thin line appeared on his waist. His upper body slid off his lower body, tumbling from the sky.

Silence rippled through the immediate battlefield.

“Senior Brother…” Wang Ba’s voice trembled. “You… you’ve reached Foundation Establishment?”

Only a Foundation Establishment cultivator could butcher another Foundation Establishment cultivator with such casual ease.

Zhao Feng didn’t answer. He just nodded slightly, his sword dripping blood.

He continued forward.

Gods blocking? Kill gods. Demons blocking? Kill demons.

Watching Zhao Feng’s back, Wang Ba finally understood the true weight of that phrase. He was an unstoppable force of nature.

But even a god has limits.

As the remaining pockets of resistance were snuffed out, the entire Heavenly Gate Sect army turned its attention to Zhao Feng’s group.

The circle tightened.

Then, the crowd parted.

A black-robed cultivator walked forward. His face was a blur, distorted by magic, but his presence commanded absolute silence from his subordinates.

It was the main body of the Blood Bone Holy Venerable.

He stopped, staring at Zhao Feng.

Zhao Feng stopped too. His stoic mask cracked, just for a second, revealing a flicker of complex emotion.

He recognized him.

“Wang Ba,” Zhao Feng said suddenly, his voice quiet.

“Senior Brother!” Wang Ba replied, sensing the shift in atmosphere.

Zhao Feng turned to look at him. He took in Wang Ba’s disheveled robes, the terror in his eyes, the desperate grip on his spirit beast bag.

For a moment, Zhao Feng didn’t see Wang Ba. He saw a younger version of himself.

A rare, gentle smile softened his harsh features.

“Live well.”

Bam!

He struck Wang Ba with an open palm. It wasn’t an attack—it was a push, sending Wang Ba stumbling backward into the center of the huddled survivors.

Before Wang Ba could speak, Zhao Feng flipped his sleeve.

A small black object flew out, expanding rapidly in the wind. It was a massive iron cage, designed to imprison powerful beasts or criminals.

BOOM!

The cage crashed down, trapping Wang Ba and the other disciples inside.

Instantly, a thick black curtain unfurled from the bars, enveloping the cage in total darkness. They were cut off from the world.

Inside the pitch-black confinement, Wang Ba scrambled to the bars, pressing his ear against the cold iron.

He could only hear one thing—Zhao Feng’s voice, muffled and heavy with sorrow.

“Senior Brother Lu… it really is you.”