The night wind blew, kicking up a frigid mist from the white snow. The fiery red bamboo grove shimmered with lustrous light, and fragmented gold bamboo leaves swayed, scattering sunset radiance.
Qin Ming broke through, arriving at the ninth layer of the spirit field. His heart was brimming with joy, but he kept his composure and continued to contract the natural spirit field.
Though the mountain woods were bitterly cold, the hearts of the two groups were blazing hot. Delight showed clearly on every face, and their eyes gleamed with greed.
"Daoist brother, congratulations!" Fifth Elder Cui said with a laugh.
"Haha, congratulations to us both! We joined forces, so this fortune belongs to both our sides!" The old bladesman laughed boisterously. In his excitement, two thick goat horns sprouted from his head, and black fur bristled outward across his face.
Their joy came from the heart, but their mutual congratulations were purely superficial. They had merely allied for the moment because they needed to breach this place together.
As for whether they would turn on each other afterward, that was a matter for later.
"The spirit field has dimmed. Children, prepare to act."
"To think that after emerging into the world, this humanoid divine item knows how to conceal its brilliance! Could this be an extraordinary medicine even more precious than a Pure Yang Flower?"
Many rubbed their palms and eagerly geared up. Even if they could not partake of the "humanoid shoot," there were still the red-gold treasure shoots interwoven with flowing radiance throughout the bamboo grove, which thoroughly thrilled them.
The Cui clan's puppets stepped into the bamboo grove. Although bathed in lustrous red and brilliant gold halos, they were not destroyed.
"All clear! It's safe and feasible—the spirit field has truly receded!"
"How thrilling! I can already smell the shoot's faint, pure fragrance. Mixed with the natural scent of the soil, it's suffused with rich Dao rhymes! Consuming a single shoot would definitely allow me to break through!"
Members of both the Cui clan and the foreign bladesmen set foot into the bamboo grove, fearing that if they were a step too slow, the medicinal shoots would be picked clean by others.
Those clumsy puppets had already lost their competitive edge.
"Don't shove, friend! You haven't even picked any precious medicine yet, so why is your hand already on your hilt? What is the meaning of this?"
Even as they advanced, both sides harbored sinister intentions, guarding against one another and seizing advantageous positions and terrain.
Fifth Elder Cui warned the crowd, "Though the spirit field is contracting, it might have one final flare-up before it dies down. You must not get too close."
The old bladesman barked as well, "Do not act recklessly! Our two sides are cooperating cordially right now, and any medicinal shoots will be split equally!"
The two old fellows still did not dare enter the grove. With their juniors doing the legwork, they were content to hold the rear for now.
Sure enough, as the crowd neared the depths of the red-and-gold bamboo grove, ripples surged from the spirit field, barring the way for a large group of people.
Some probed from a distance, throwing weapons or casting strange treasures. They discovered that the shrunken spirit field had grown gentle; it merely bounced away the sabers and axes rather than reacting with its earlier ferocity.
Instantly, many could hold back no longer. They pressed closer and deployed various methods to dig up the shoots, only to suffer a slightly stronger counterattack from the spirit field this time.
Some were injured, but none faced mortal danger.
"It's confirmed! There's no problem!"
"You juniors, clear out and let us handle it!" Several middle-aged men parted the crowd and moved to the very front, preparing to seize the medicine.
Their status was naturally high. Some had accompanied Fifth Elder Cui and the old bladesman into the City Lord's Manor, and all were core members of the two factions.
Among them was Cui Shuning, who also arrived nearby. Though she did not personally step forward, she was eager to try. In a world undergoing such upheavals, who wouldn't want to increase their strength, achieve godhood, or become an ancestor?
Some were even scheming whether they could take several big bites of the humanoid shoot if they reached the core area first. Could Fifth Elder Cui and the old bladesman really force them to vomit it back up?
The group of middle-aged men remained uninjured and managed to partially pull out several red-gold treasure shoots, bringing up clumps of earth. Yet they always fell just short of success, blocked by glowing ripples and coming away empty-handed.
They fussed about for a long time, until the old bladesman and Fifth Elder Cui could no longer bear to watch.
"Clumsy fools! You're stopped in your tracks before you even reach the humanoid divine medicine? Get out of the way!"
Ultimately, the old bladesman and Fifth Elder Cui decided to step forward.
They had observed for a long time and were certain the spirit field had weakened, making the relevant area entirely safe.
Most importantly, the two had studied it carefully. This was a spirit field born of heaven and earth, not created by human hands and not controlled by any outsider; naturally, there could be no trap.
Even if a heavenly treasure knew how to conceal its brilliance and possessed some spirituality, in the end, it was merely a humanoid medicinal shoot. Could it truly plot someone's death?
All of this stemmed from their preconceived notions, causing them to misjudge the situation from the very foundation.
Still, the two old fellows remained quite cautious. As they penetrated deep into the grove, their entire bodies glowed, and their late fourth-realm power was displayed without reservation, wrapped in dense, intricate patterns.
Moreover, both had donned high-grade armor, protecting them completely from head to toe.
Beneath the frozen soil and snow, Qin Ming sat quietly. His mind was clear and empty as he resonated with this spirit field, blending seamlessly with the entire bamboo grove. Those two old fellows were precisely who he had been waiting for.
Through the fluctuations of the spirit field, he could now clearly perceive everything outside.
"All of you, back away!" The two old fellows arrived at the front. Even Cui Shuning, the burly middle-aged bladesmen, and the others yielded their spots, retreating one after another.
Right at that moment, Qin Ming struck!
He had contracted the spirit field precisely to unleash a more ferocious eruption—one launched selectively at the two of them. The tranquil bamboo grove suddenly seemed to churn with monstrous, crashing waves.
Ripples of crimson and gold surged forth with terrifying ferocity, knocking the two old fellows off their feet. The armor on their bodies shattered on the spot, and both coughed up mouthfuls of blood.
Rippling outward, the spirit field engulfed them.
Much of their spiritual light was dispersed, and their flesh was covered in cracks. This was despite their ample preparations, their high-grade armor, and their protective amulets.
Even so, when the life-saving paper talismans burned to cinders, both let out shrill screams. The old bladesman's right foot was shredded by the ripples, and Fifth Elder Cui's left kneecap blew apart.
Although they used the protective talismans to flee toward the perimeter, their bodies were already crisscrossed with horrifying fissures, nearly torn to shreds. Many of their bones were broken, and their intestines spilled from their abdomens.
The two groaned repeatedly before breaking into agonized shrieks. Their bodies had nearly fallen apart into ragged pieces, carved with gruesome wounds from which blood gushed like torrential rain.
They had already turned into men of blood. The old bladesman had partly revealed his true form, his two thick horns broken off, while Fifth Elder Cui's left eye had exploded completely.
At this moment, they were seized by terror, fury, and a heart full of resentment. Even now, they had no idea what was happening. Why had the spirit field suddenly revived when it had clearly ebbed away?
Severely wounded, the two collapsed into the snow and frantically tried to take healing medicine. However, few of the bottles and jars on their persons remained intact; almost all were shattered. They poured what remained of the medicines straight into their mouths.
"Ahhh!"
The bamboo grove was a gruesome scene of gore, like an Asura slaughterhouse. Most of the people had been obliterated. Only a few important direct descendants, who likewise possessed life-saving trump cards, barely managed to survive.
This was primarily because Qin Ming had controlled the spirit field to focus heavily on the old bladesman and Fifth Elder Cui. Otherwise, not a single one of the others would have been left—all would have blown to pieces.
Even so, had he not pulled back in time, there would have been no survivors; those people would have been torn apart by the spirit field's impact just the same.
This was not out of softheartedness on Qin Ming's part. Rather, he was also inside the spirit field, right at its center. Although he was resonating and blending with this place, if he allowed the spirit field to run wild for too long, he might be caught in the backlash as well.
"Ah, where is my leg? And my hand..." Cui Shuning was going mad. What woman did not care about her looks? Yet now she was missing an arm and a leg.
Comparatively speaking, her injuries were considered light. That was mainly because she had seen the old bladesman and Fifth Elder Cui approaching, and fearing that internal strife might suddenly erupt into a fierce clash, she had walked toward the perimeter of the bamboo grove beforehand, thereby sustaining less of the impact.
Most of the other survivors were in similar positions.
At this moment, only the few lookouts keeping watch on the perimeter were unhurt, but they were now paralyzed with terror. What was going on? They had come in as an organized force, yet they were nearly wiped out!
"It... came out again!"
Those lookouts saw that in the core area of the bamboo grove, the humanoid shoot was slowly emerging once more, pushing past the frozen soil and snow to the surface.
"Has this shoot become a demon? It's not a medicinal herb, but a monster!" The old bladesman coughed up blood in fury. This was his second time coming here, and he had been wounded again—far worse than before, nearly losing his life.
"Damn it!" Fifth Elder Cui could not hold back from cursing either. Defeated before achieving anything, he had gained nothing and nearly perished on the spot.
"You..." Cui Shuning was stunned, her beautiful eyes going wide. She was still inside the grove and had not escaped. With her line of sight unobstructed by the bamboos, she could clearly see Qin Ming's profile from her angle.
Her whole world crumbled, and she felt as if she were about to explode. Even if that familiar young face were burned to ash, she would still recognize it.
After all, during Qin Ming and Lu Zizai's last visit to the Cui family, he had slapped her across the face. She felt she would remember that humiliation for three lifetimes.
"How could it be you..." She could not believe it. Wasn't this a source-grade spirit field naturally formed by heaven and earth? Why was it under someone's control?
"Who is it? What happened?" Fifth Elder Cui shouted.
Cui Shuning was usually cold and aloof, but now her face was drained of color and covered in blood. A possibility occurred to her: it was said that Qin Ming was exceptionally gifted, possessing an aptitude on the Newborn path that ordinary people could scarcely dream of. Could he have comprehended the source of the spirit field here?
"He is—" The moment Cui Shuning opened her mouth, she cried out in alarm. Her face turned as pale as paper as Qin Ming used heavenly light to seize control of her, hurling her into midair before slamming her violently toward the ground.
She was terrified, enraged, and choked with grievance. So many of them had actually been attacked by this youth, suffering massive casualties, leaving her permanently crippled, and now he was still using her to beat others!
"Ah!"
Inside the bamboo grove, a middle-aged man from the Cui clan who had barely survived was smashed to death by Qin Ming using Cui Shuning's body.
Cui Shuning's mind completely shattered. She had been turned into a weapon, forced to take part in the slaughter against her will.
Immediately afterward, a heavily wounded foreign bladesman was struck by her as well, drawing his last breath on the spot.
"It's you... Qin!" Three other members of the Cui clan widened their eyes, unable to believe what they were seeing as they recognized Qin Ming.
The last two surviving foreign bladesmen in the bamboo grove were also dazed. They had accompanied the old bladesman into the City Lord's Manor, seen Qin Ming, and even wanted him to guide them into the mountains.
Qin Ming controlled Cui Shuning with heavenly light and smashed the remaining three Cui clan members to death.
Afterward, the two middle-aged foreign bladesmen were likewise crushed under the heavy burden of the woman, drawing their final, humiliated breaths.
Cui Shuning felt she was losing her mind. She suffered from severe germaphobia. Years ago, to make a show of affection, she had hypocritically tried to pat Qin Ming on the head, only to pull her hand back at the critical moment, the disgust in her eyes impossible to hide.
And now, covered in blood, missing an arm and a leg, she was forced to smash into goat bladesmen who had revealed their true forms, becoming coated in countless strands of goat hair.
This was more agonizing to her than death. Looking at the long black hairs clinging to her open wounds, reeking of raw mutton, she broke down completely, screaming in sheer hysteria.
"Qin Ming, I'll kill you! Ah, I'll skin you alive!" Her hair disheveled, she crawled frantically across the bloody ground strewn with severed limbs.
Outside, the survivors trembled to the core. What had they just heard? What was happening in the bamboo grove was connected to Qin Ming?
Qin Ming stood up, shaking off the frozen soil and snow from his body. He strode out of the core area of the bamboo grove, drawing his mutton-fat jade iron saber with a clear clang.
"You... stay back! Don't kill me!" In that critical moment, the hysterical Cui Shuning cowered. Fear gripped her, and when faced with death, she ultimately chose to cling to life, no longer displaying her earlier madness or stubborn arrogance.
Qin Ming gripped his saber and walked toward her.
She cried out, "I beg you, Qin Ming, I am your aunt! You can't kill me!"
Qin Ming could not be bothered to waste words on her. Before the fallout with the Cui clan, back when he still resided in the Cui Estate, this woman who knew the truth had treated him coldly, and there had never been much interaction between them.
Watching the youth advance like an unfeeling fiendgod, Cui Shuning collapsed completely, dropping to her knees to beg for mercy as she wept, "Qin Ming, I regret everything! Please, let me go!"
Slash!
The mutton-fat jade iron saber swept across. Her head flew off, and within the heavenly light bursting from the blade's edge, her spiritual consciousness was burned to ash as well, ending her life right then and there.
"You, little beast!" Fifth Elder Cui bellowed in fury.
Today's turn of events far exceeded his expectations. Even if he racked his brains, he never could have imagined such an outcome: a single youth was going to exterminate them all!
"It was actually you!" The old bladesman's face was frosty. He realized that the person who had killed his juniors earlier had nothing to do with the Cui clan—it was this youth before them.
"Qin... Ming!" The lookouts' teeth chattered as they stared at the blood-drenched ground and the ethereal, transcendent youth, their hearts gripped by dread.
"Kill him! He's just a brat!" Fifth Elder Cui shouted.
"Alright!" The old bladesman nodded.
Though severely wounded, they had no intention of retreating. Mainly, it was because one had lost his right foot while the other's kneecap had blown apart; escaping would not be easy in the first place.
"Granduncle, I'll go find help to avenge you!" One slightly blunt fellow shouted with a stiff face, then turned and bolted.
The others said nothing at all, turning around and sprinting for their lives.
Yet all of them suddenly froze in their tracks, their path barred.
"City Lord Meng!" Their courage failed them.
Immediately, they scattered in all directions to flee.
"Halt!" one of them heard a roar and saw the creature blocking his way... surprisingly, it was a red squirrel.
He wanted nothing more than to sneer that even a wretched rodent dared bar his path. He raised his foot to stomp it down, but suddenly a shadow fell over him. A fourth-realm Thunder King Bird appeared behind the squirrel, extending a massive talon.
"Where do you think you're running?" On the other side, a fleeing Cui clan member's heart quaked upon hearing Qin Ming's voice. He collapsed onto his rear, but when he looked up, he realized it was a blue speech sparrow using ventriloquism to mimic Qin Ming's voice.
Evidently, whether foreign bladesmen or Cui clan members, not a single one could escape. With Meng Xinghai barring their path, in the blink of an eye, they were all reduced to cold corpses.
"Xinghai, our two families share some history! Do you truly intend to move against me?" Fifth Elder Cui yelled.
"Rest assured, there's no need for Uncle Meng to step in. Slaying you myself will suffice!" Qin Ming approached with saber in hand.
Fifth Elder Cui and the old bladesman exchanged a glance. Ignoring Meng Xinghai for the moment, they charged at Qin Ming simultaneously. Even though both were crippled, their speed remained frightfully swift for a brief burst.
Unfortunately, their injuries were far too severe. In the middle of their charge, blood began spraying from their bodies. Fissures ran deep into their flesh, revealing bone, intestines, and internal organs.
Qin Ming waited with his saber until they reached him before swinging.
In an instant, Qin Ming traded several blows with the heavily wounded old bladesman. The old fellow possessed profound cultivation and exquisite blade skills, but with every swing of his saber, blood erupted from his own body.
Slash!
A goat's head flew off at an angle. The old bladesman was decapitated by Qin Ming's mutton-fat jade iron saber, and his true form—a headless goat carcass—thumped into the snow, blood gushing out in streams.
"I hate this! One day, the Barbarian God will enter Yezhou, and you will not escape the reckoning!" His consciousness roared, but he was powerless to reverse his fate.
How overbearing was the heavenly light contained in Qin Ming's blade? With just one more slash, the bladesman's spiritual consciousness shattered, burned completely into nothingness.
"You..." Fifth Elder Cui stumbled backward. He had been attacking as well, but was clearly not as brave as the old bladesman. Pointing his greatsword at Qin Ming, he barked repeatedly.
Qin Ming gave the mutton-fat jade iron saber a sharp flick, instantly sending the few drops of blood clinging to it flying off.
Fifth Elder Cui said, "No matter what, it was my Cui family that raised you! Now that you've killed so many of us, do you dare kill me as well? In the past, I was your Fifth Grandfather!"
Immediately after, a look of delight crossed his face, for he saw Qin Ming put away the mutton-fat jade iron saber.
In the next instant, however, his facial muscles twitched. Qin Ming produced a massive sledgehammer, pitch-black as ink and forged from the same jade iron, clearly intending to bash him into meat paste.
"Old fellow, you still have the nerve to mention the past? I already died once in the Cui family's place; whatever ties we had were severed long ago. Never mind the others—how many times have you personally tried to kill me since then?"
Qin Ming did not wish to speak any further. With a resounding boom, he swung the massive hammer forward.
"What is going on in that forest? There's strange commotion!" In the distance, people from the Eastern Lands heard the clashing of weapons and faint, indistinct shouts.
They could not make out the details because the distance was too great.
"I'll go take a look," Qi Yunzheng said. After arriving near Chixia City, he was filled with resentment, wanting to avenge his brother Qi Yunxiao, yet unable to find the culprit.
"I'll go with you." The woman who had once claimed outside the City Lord's Manor that she would smash Qin Ming's skull stepped up alongside him.
An elder instructed them, "Do not act rashly, you two. Return immediately once you find out what is happening."
Before the bamboo grove shimmering with red and gold light, Qin Ming swung the great hammer, rattling Fifth Elder Cui so hard that he coughed up mouthfuls of blood, cracks appearing on his hand bones.
"Ah!" Fifth Elder Cui roared, fighting back with everything he had.
With a loud clang, the greatsword in his hands snapped.
Moreover, his right hand was on the verge of exploding.
Splat!
As Fifth Elder Cui coughed blood, the hand holding the sword was mangled, the finger bones fractured inch by inch until he could no longer hold the broken sword—entirely concussed by the great hammer.
He howled like a cornered beast. Amid the dense shadows of the hammer, the shield he had driven with his consciousness also shattered, and the dagger he pulled out in desperation was utterly insufficient.
"Ahhh!" Fifth Elder Cui was in agonizing pain. In that instant, both of his hands were pounded directly into mush by the great hammer, and fracturing sounds burst from his arms as the bones shattered and tendons snapped, leaving both limbs hanging completely limp.
His eyes nearly split with fury, filled with grief, rage, and despair, as he watched the massive hammer crash toward his face with a thunderous boom.
Fifth Elder Cui tried with all his might to dodge, but his face still shattered into fragments, followed by his entire skull, which blew apart in a violent explosion.
Fifth Elder Cui was dead!
"Today, I collect the first debt!" Qin Ming stood in the snow, holding the bloodstained great hammer.
Chapter 420