To think a millennial clan had stepped in—the Cui clan possessed an immense background.
Their foundations were profoundly deep, enduring without decay for over a thousand years. Moreover, they had grown increasingly powerful, truly an evergreen family.
Even mortal dynasties rose and fell across the ages, unable to compare to them.
They had sent clan members into the various lineages of both the outer realm and the esoteric sect, and many had risen to become formidable experts.
Yu Gensheng and Zhao Ziyuan frowned, but their expressions soon turned murderously grim.
"Don't rush. Record it with a memory crystal first so our actions will have a righteous pretext!" Yu Gensheng said.
Zhao Ziyuan nodded. "Indeed. While everyone else is fighting the demons and monsters, the Cui clan is busy turning on their own. Utterly disgraceful!"
Both men were mere skin and bones, sparse wisps of hair fluttering atop their heads. They were ancient beyond measure, yet their cultivation grew ever more profound.
Moving like gods and phantoms, vanishing and appearing without a trace, they swept through the waist-high wormwood grass, at times drifting like smoke, at times darting like lightning.
***
The Cui clan's men had arrived, and every person in this small cadre was a master.
Qin Ming halted abruptly. He sensed thick, concentrated malice as a group rapidly approached at an astonishing speed.
Furthermore, they had already fanned out, flanking him from multiple sides.
Qin Ming frowned. The tree desires calm, yet the wind will not cease.
He surmised that these were still people from the Cui clan.
At his current level of strength, he had no wish to clash with them prematurely. But now that matters had reached this point, confrontation was unavoidable.
This stretch of land consisted predominantly of vast meadows. The scattered trees grew exceptionally tall, piercing into the night sky, while a few old crows cawed in the distance.
"Qin Ming!" a thunderous shout boomed.
A burly, bearded giant emerged ahead. He stood a full 2.3 meters tall, his voice echoing under the night sky like a detonation of thunder. In his grip was a pristine white bone spear, dripping with heavy murderous aura.
"Cui Shiliu!" Qin Ming recognized him.
This man belonged to the senior generation, blessed with extraordinary natural talent—an expert on the esoteric sect path.
The bearded giant said coldly, "No matter how you look at it, my Cui clan raised you. Is this the attitude you show upon seeing me? Addressing me directly by my birth order?"
Qin Ming retorted, "I once walked to death's door for your Cui clan, drawing away the pursuit of numerous Li clan experts. I owe nothing to someone like you, whom I barely exchanged a few words with on ordinary days."
He then added, "Besides, you came here to kill me, yet you still expect me to show you courtesy? Fuck right off!"
The bearded giant, Cui Shiliu, glared with eyes as round as bronze bells. The bone spear in his grasp crackled with arcs of lightning, tearing through the dense darkness. The only reason he had not struck at once was that he "knew" there was an expert lurking nearby.
He was probing, waiting for the protector shielding Qin Ming to reveal themselves. That was the true prey their group had come to hunt.
The other Cui clan members stood on high alert, prepared to launch a ferocious strike at any moment to back Cui Shiliu and slay the hidden powerhouse.
"Friend, show yourself!"
Standing in the grass, several Cui clan experts held their breath, carefully scouring the surroundings with their conscious spiritual light and divine wisdom. Yet they detected no dangerous opponent.
Qin Ming realized in an instant: these people assumed he had a Dao protector and refused to believe the previous three parties had been wiped out by him alone.
He sighed inwardly. The Cui clan was overthinking things. He was no immortal seed, divine seed, or pampered clan scion; there was no one backing him.
Under the circumstances, he naturally had to make good use of their misunderstanding. He immediately barked, "What are you shouting for? That senior doesn't deign to waste words on you lot! Now is the time to slay demons and monsters. The elder has no wish for internal strife. Why haven't you bastards backed off yet?!"
Cui Shiliu had already been slighted moments ago, and seeing the boy grow even more arrogant—daring to lecture them—his face turned so icy it seemed coated in frost.
The others darkened as well. Who was the millennial clan here? Had this kid lost his mind, daring to turn around and berate them?
"You've grown bear heart and leopard gall. You're courting death!" Cui Shiliu's voice chilled to the bone as he stepped forward, closing the distance pace by pace.
He refused to believe that person would stay hidden forever. Since the protector could hold their temper, he would first deal with the youth before him to force the hidden master out.
The other Cui clan members kept close, ready to strike together while continually scanning the vast grasslands.
"The ones courting death are you! Do you dare offend the senior's dignity? Get lost this instant!" Qin Ming gave full vent to his feelings. Since enmity was set in stone, what need was there for pleasantries?
The Cui clan members burned with the desire to flay him alive. Having lost direct clan members already, their hearts boiled with boundless fury, yet here he was, jumping up and down in front of them.
Neither Cui Changming, Cui Cheng, nor the spirit birds they dispatched had uncovered anything. They began to suspect no other expert was present after all.
"Could he be carrying a rare treasure?" Several of them entertained the possibility. Had he used something like that to kill Cui Changkong, Cui Qing, and the rest?
Then it occurred to them that several spirit birds had tailed him from afar and truly had not spotted another soul. Had they been mistaken from the very start?
One of them spoke up. "Qin Ming, my Cui clan provided your food and clothing, raising you from childhood. Yet in the end, you ungrateful wolf turned around to slaughter your own clan members. Do you have any conscience left?"
Qin Ming sneered. "Don't you feel sick to your stomach saying such things? You've pushed hypocrisy beyond all limits."
Cui Shiliu bellowed, "You household slave! Who gave you the gall to speak to us like that?!"
At that moment, Qin Ming's fury ignited. To think this man would utter an insult as vile as "household slave."
"With people like you in the Cui clan, your destruction is only a matter of time!" he stated coldly.
Cui Changming chimed in, "Shiliu, why lose your temper with a child? It only makes you look petty and lacking in poise. What harm is there in letting him curse a few times?"
He turned toward Qin Ming. "Child, I know you harbor resentment in your heart. But you cannot truly blame us. A person's words, actions, and choices depend on where they stand. Some decisions are beyond our control; the course of events itself propels us forward."
"What do you want?" Qin Ming asked flatly.
Cui Changming said, "You mastered the silk book method, didn't you? Come back to the Cui clan with me. Even if you have committed numerous bloody killings, I can ensure your safety."
Qin Ming asked, "And if I refuse?"
He knew the Cui clan valued the silk book immensely; even their founding forefather was studying it.
Evidently, the clan saw hope in him, wanting to use him to further decipher the silk book so that those walking the Newborn path in their clan could master it.
As for the hidden flaws in the text that caused the body to explode, that only happened after cultivating to a certain stage, an altitude many would never reach anyway.
These people recognized Qin Ming's value. Even if they couldn't decipher anything from him, they could use him as a primary seed to guide others onto the path.
Cui Changming wore a faint smile. "You are a child raised within the Cui clan. Must certain things be spoken so bluntly?"
"I will never go with you!" Qin Ming refused outright. If he truly ended up in the Cui clan's hands, living would be far more agonizing than death.
Cui Cheng remarked, "Dynasties flow like water, but great clans remain as iron. The Cui clan has watched the various powers of the night mist world rise and fall through history, while we have always stood firm, never departing."
A millennial clan was a colossal behemoth, heavy enough to suffocate many. Merely invoking its name commanded dread across all factions.
Qin Ming drew his blade. The snow-bright steel reflected his handsome face and unyielding expression.
"Shiliu, bring him in," Cui Changming commanded.
It was obvious that Cui Shiliu was unsuited for intelligence work; he was a blade wielded by this cadre, and now it was time for him to do his job.
"Little ungrateful wolf, get over here!" The bearded giant sneered. Gripping the white bone spear in one hand, he reached out with his other massive, fan-like palm to seize Qin Ming.
Qin Ming looked on coldly. Even if he had to expose the rag and Starfire Essence, he could no longer afford to hold back.
Though Cui Shiliu was towering and muscular, his body moved with astonishing agility, like a nocturnal bird skimming over the meadow. To him, several dozen meters were traversed in an instant.
He seemed to teleport, his speed terrifyingly fast.
Yet the savage sneer on his face suddenly froze, and his body locked rigid mid-stride.
Everyone looked on in sheer shock as they clearly witnessed his head abruptly shatter. Bone fragments, blood, and gray matter burst in every direction.
Such a bloody, horrifying sight shocked everyone present. A master at the early stage of the third realm had met such a gruesome end.
The hole blown clean through Cui Shiliu's head was far too abrupt.
A pitch-black iron pellet faintly glowing with heavenly light shot straight through Cui Shiliu's shattered skull. It was this very object that had executed a direct descendant of the Cui clan in an instant.
Only then did a terrifying sonic boom erupt, deafening the ears.
Along the trajectory of the flying iron pellet, the shockwave had utterly pulverized the waist-high grass in its wake.
Cui Shiliu's fierce, headless corpse remained frozen upright for two breaths before collapsing with a dull thud.
The Cui clan members felt their hair stand on end. There truly was someone backing Qin Ming!
Reckless though Cui Shiliu was, his talent had been exceptionally high, making him an extremely effective butcher's blade. Yet in the blink of an eye, he had died violently.
His death came so swiftly that everyone's hearts sank.
Qin Ming was left somewhat dazed. Having fought against the wind this entire journey, when had he ever received this kind of treatment?
Had the sun risen anew from the ground today? It felt entirely surreal.
He knew his own circumstances best; he was well aware that he had no Dao protector by his side.
Out on the meadow, amid the night mist, a ghostly black shadow materialized, lunging fiercely toward Qin Ming.
Not all of the Cui clan's experts had revealed themselves earlier. Someone had been closing in from the shadows and now exposed himself, intending to capture the boy and use him as leverage against that "Dao protector."
Yet swift as he was, he failed to lay a finger on his target.
The meadow trembled as though a colossal beast were charging across it, obliterating all the grass in its path.
A withered, grey figure tore past like a howling hurricane, moving so fast it forced everyone's eyes shut.
The ambushing Cui clan expert who intended to kidnap Qin Ming looked down in sheer horror to find half of his body gone. He tried to let out a bloodcurdling scream, but no proper sound came out.
The left side of his torso, including part of his throat, had vanished.
The grey figure was absurdly fast, like a thunderstorm, like a gale. As it passed, a mere sweep of its wide sleeve had sheared away half of the man's body.
Now, his remaining half dripped with gore; death was only moments away.
The scene was grotesque beyond imagination!
Bone-deep dread crept into the hearts of the Cui clan.
Qin Ming simply stared blankly. In the nick of time, actual help had arrived? This was an unprecedented luxury!
Chapter 239