Just moments ago, Xu Ying had darted and flitted around the Queen Mother of the West for this very moment.
He had first driven all kinds of Immortal Dao runes into Fang Songhuai's Immortal Dao domain, and then unleashed all their power at once, finally achieving miraculous success.
He knew that compared to an Immortal King like Fang Songhuai, his cultivation lagged far behind. Even with the Imperial Monarch having "taught him everything," the gap in cultivation would have allowed Fang Songhuai to easily evade his seals or even sever them.
That was why he had advanced step by step, first nailing the various sealing runes into the domain. The most crucial part of this was sealing Fang Songhuai's fate beforehand.
The Immortal Dao rune required for this was the "Destiny" character formula.
The "Destiny" formula was an Immortal Dao art comprehended by the Imperial Monarch to alter one's fate. Back then, the Imperial Monarch had used this very seal to alter Xu Ying's fate, leaving him unable to escape the destiny arranged for him for the next forty-eight thousand years.
Xu Ying feared his own cultivation would fall short, so among the sealing runes he had struck out just now, the "Destiny" formula was the most numerous, all to ensure that Immortal King Fang Songhuai's fate would be altered and seized into his own hands!
Fang Songhuai suddenly froze, motionless. His Primordial Spirit, his cultivation base, his physical body, divine consciousness, vital qi, heart power, yin and yang qi, and Great Dao were all stripped and sealed away, plunging him into utter terror.
He felt that everything about himself was no longer under his control.
This was what it felt like to have one's destiny controlled by another, to be suppressed by another, to be sealed by another!
For the first time in his life, fear welled up within him—an overwhelming fear.
In the sky, the terrifying might of the Bixiao Brahma Immortal Formation still lingered, continuing to surge downward. That boundless Immortal Dao power even affected the deities of Kunlun, throwing their own Heavenly Dao into disarray!
Everyone looked up, watching the scene in despair.
Suddenly, the Bixiao Brahma Immortal Formation collapsed. Within the unfathomably terrifying Immortal Dao glow, the blazing Dao chains abruptly shattered, dissolving into countless flowing Dao images before scattering away.
*Whoosh!*
The torrent of immortal mist crashed downward, washing over Kunlun's sacred mountains. Yet it posed no threat; instead, it made Kunlun resemble an immortal wonderland, radiant with light and brimming with immortal qi at every turn.
Formidable as the Bixiao Brahma Immortal Formation was as the Thunder Department's greatest immortal array, without Fang Songhuai to control it, it naturally could not sustain itself.
Relieved of the heavy burden, everyone burst into cheers.
Xu Ying had appeared out of nowhere just moments ago, sealing the cultivation, magic treasures, or divine consciousness of their opponents one after another. They had finally turned defeat into victory and eliminated their foes.
Now that the apocalyptic disaster had also dissipated on its own, they were overwhelmed with excitement.
Amidst the cheering, Xu Ying bowed in apology to the Queen Mother of the West and inquired, "Does the Queen Mother of the West have any use for this Immortal King of the Thunder Department?"
The Queen Mother of the West gazed at him and shook her head. "This wretch was one of the immortals who destroyed Kunlun back then, but the one who killed me was not him, but the Heavenly Venerable. Thus, he is of no use to me."
Xu Ying bowed deeply in thanks, grabbed Fang Songhuai by the back of the collar, and flew toward Kunlun's Jade Void Peak.
Shocked and enraged, Fang Songhuai struggled frantically and yelled, "You are a remnant of Kunlun's Undying People! To think you managed to survive until now! Do you have any idea what became of the man and woman who escorted you out of Kunlun back then?"
He secretly surged his cultivation, attempting to break through Xu Ying's seal, and laughed loudly, shouting, "They're dead! I led the legions of the Thunder Capital Office to refine them to death outside Kunlun!"
Xu Ying's heart twitched violently. Remaining silent, he continued flying toward Jade Void Peak with the man in tow.
While battering against the seal, Fang Songhuai sneered, "They were very close to you, weren't they? Were they your senior martial brother and sister, or your brothers and sisters? No, even closer than that... They were your parents, weren't they?"
He strained to break the seal, but to his growing dread, the seal wouldn't budge in the slightest!
He was a renowned Immortal King of the Immortal Realm. Though an Immortal King in the Thunder Department could never climb to such a rank without some backing, since he could sit upon that throne, he certainly possessed real skill!
With his abilities, how could he fail to break through Xu Ying's seal? How was this possible?
"They were your parents, yet they died by my hands. All these years, you must have suffered tremendously, haven't you?"
Fang Songhuai spoke while attempting to unravel the Immortal Dao seals left inside his body. He reasoned that Xu Ying was merely a Qi Refiner; even if the seals were Immortal Dao seals, they would at most be at the level of a Human Immortal or Earth Immortal, incapable of containing profound Great Dao.
"Every single moment over these years, you've wanted to avenge them, haven't you? Yet you had no idea who your enemy was, did you? Your Dao heart has been tormented, warped... Just what kind of seal is this?!"
Cold sweat poured down Fang Songhuai's forehead. Only now did he realize that he couldn't comprehend Xu Ying's seals in the slightest!
There weren't many kinds of Immortal Dao runes Xu Ying had left inside him—merely twelve characters: Shou, Ming, Yong, Zhen, Ling, Yu, Qiu, Kun, Feng, Jin, You, Yu. Yet the cultivation contained within these twelve characters was far beyond that of an Immortal King like Fang Songhuai! As he studied them frantically, he found that deciphering their mysteries in a short time was entirely impossible. If he couldn't even decipher their profundity, unraveling their Dao methods was naturally out of the question!
Seeing that Xu Ying didn't reply, Fang Songhuai panicked. He had remained calm and collected earlier only because he believed he could break the seal, kill Xu Ying with ease, and escape with his life.
Now, realizing it might take him hundreds or thousands of years just to understand their meaning, and several thousand or even tens of thousands of years to unravel them, he was gripped by panic.
He battered against the seal with all his might, but his physical body, vital qi, divine consciousness, Primordial Spirit, yin and yang, heart power, domain, and Dao chains were all suppressed and sealed. The power he could muster was truly meager; breaking through the seal was utterly out of the question!
"Even deciphering a single rune would be something... What the fuck kind of seal is this?!" Fang Songhuai cursed in fury.
Finally, they arrived before a stretch of ruins on Jade Void Peak. Xu Ying dropped Fang Songhuai, dug out the gateway of Xujiaping buried underground with his bare hands, reshaped it with dharmic power, and erected it once more.
Grabbing Fang Songhuai by the foot, he dragged him into the ruins.
Fang Songhuai paid no heed to his surroundings. Closing his eyes, he did everything he could to deduce a method to decipher the runes.
Xu Ying released his foot, using dharmic power to carve into the mountain rocks and construct an altar.
Fang Songhuai opened his eyes. Seeing the altar, his composure shattered, and he frantically shouted, "What are you doing? Why are you building an altar? Don't do anything reckless! I am an Immortal King of the Immortal Realm's Thunder Department! Do you know how illustrious my origins are? Do you know my background? Three generations of my family have been Immortal Kings of the Immortal Realm! You dare lay a finger on me? If you touch me, you..."
Without a word, Xu Ying summoned the Water-Fire Huntian Cauldron and placed it before the altar. Dragging Fang Songhuai by the foot up the altar steps, he forced him to kneel in the center.
Fang Songhuai's face changed drastically, and he shouted, "Xu Ying! Fellow Daoist Xu! Let's talk this out! I was only following orders! It wasn't my fault! I was an accomplice, not the mastermind!"
Xu Ying stepped down from the altar, took out several sticks of incense, held them up as he silently recited an invocation, and after a moment, planted them in the cauldron.
Fang Songhuai hurriedly said, "Fellow Daoist, Fellow Daoist! I didn't kill your parents! I really didn't! They were extraordinarily capable and escaped from my hands! I truly didn't kill them!"
Xu Ying opened his eyes. Suppressing the surge of emotion in his chest, he asked in a hoarse voice, "You're saying they are still alive?"
Fang Songhuai cried out, "They're alive! Fellow Daoist Xu, so long as you spare my life, I will tell you everything about that day down to the last detail!"
Xu Ying nodded gently and said, "Fine. I will not kill you. Speak."
Fang Songhuai breathed a sigh of relief and shouted toward the sky, "Queen Mother of the West, fellow Daoist deities of the Kunlun Realm, you all heard it! Fellow Daoist Xu gave his word that he will not kill me! Fellow Daoist Xu, you cannot go back on your word!"
Leading the deities hovering in midair, the Queen Mother of the West said, "This Palace has heard it."
Xu Ying said, "Rest assured, I never break a promise. Speak!"
Master Fire Dragon and Han Zekang exchanged a glance, feeling a bit uneasy inside.
Fang Songhuai said, "Back then, on the orders of the Heavenly Venerable, I led the immortals of the Thunder Capital Office to attack Jade Void Peak. Assisting me in attacking Jade Void Peak were two other offices: the Myriad Gods Thunder Office and the Thunder Department Office. As for the other two courts, the Five Thunder Court and the Evil-Dispelling Court, they were attacking Jade Bead Peak. Before departing, the Heavenly Venerable told me that although Jade Void Peak was not as strong as Jade Bead Peak, it was of paramount importance. It had to be utterly destroyed, weeds pulled by the roots, leaving none alive."
Xu Ying's expression darkened. "What grudge, what enmity?"
Fang Songhuai shook his head. "Likely no enmity at all. Fellow Daoist Xu thinks too shallowly of us immortals. If we harbored grudges, we would have settled them long ago. I heard from the Heavenly Venerable that the main reason was that the Undying People of Jade Void Peak possessed a power that should not belong to mortals. Immortality belongs solely to immortals. If the power of the Undying People were to spread, it would be an immense calamity. It had to be erased."
Xu Ying said, "So the Immortal Realm believed that the power wielded by the Undying People could threaten the rule of the immortals?"
Fang Songhuai gave a dry chuckle and didn't take up the topic, saying instead, "When we fought our way up Jade Void Peak, we discovered that the Undying People here were indeed exceedingly formidable. They did not resemble Qi Refiners at the Ascension stage at all; the strongest among them could even rival Immortal Kings! Some of the sights here terrified even us immortals. This place should not have been part of the mortal realm—or rather, it should never have appeared in the mortal realm!"
Xu Ying did not understand what he meant by that.
Fang Songhuai steadied himself and continued, "Back then, after a succession of vicious battles, I sustained some injuries. The Undying People of Kunlun all cultivated the six secret depositories, and none were more formidable than the six secret depositories of the Undying People of Xujiaping on Jade Bead Peak. That young couple was the foremost among them. I led the pursuit, and many immortals died to their combined hands. I thought of using that brat as bait..."
Xu Ying's face darkened.
That brat was him.
Fang Songhuai said, "They fought desperately to protect that brat, unwilling to let him come to any harm. So as long as we attacked the brat relentlessly, that young couple would risk injury to shield him. That way, their wounds would grow worse and worse until they died at our hands. At first, the plan went smoothly, and they indeed took wounds. But the subordinates at my side dwindled as well. Later, that man risked everything to cover the woman as she escorted the brat away. We fought all the way to Wangxiang Platform, and deep within Wangxiang Platform, I lost all trace of that man."
He paused, then said, "I didn't dare pursue any deeper. The interior of Wangxiang Platform was terrifying in the extreme; I feared I would become trapped within and never return. I was an Immortal King with a bright future ahead of me; why throw away my life? There were still two immortals by my side, both subordinates of mine. But the fact that I failed to kill them could never be leaked, so..."
The corner of his eye twitched. "I sent my two good brothers on their way, and only then did I leave Wangxiang Platform to search for the mother and child. I pursued them to the Fuqing World, caught traces of that woman, and kept tracking her, only to lose the trail. I searched every corner of the Fuqing World and still couldn't find the boy, only then realizing I had fallen for a ruse to lure the tiger away from the mountain. That woman must have sent the brat to another world and intentionally left tracks to lead me to the Fuqing World."
Xu Ying waited a moment, a thread of hope kindling in his chest. He pressed, "And then?"
Fang Songhuai said, "And then? Then I returned to Kunlun and reported that I had slain all three, and that the immortal generals at my side had fallen in battle. And so I handed in my assignment."
Xu Ying said, "That was it?"
Fang Songhuai nodded. "Back then, our extermination of Kunlun wasn't completely clean. Some of the Undying People still managed to escape Kunlun and spread the six secret depositories. Later, when I visited the mortal realm to inspect, I found that what they had spread were not the true arts of the six secret depositories, so my mind was put at ease. At the time, I assumed that the couple who mastered the true six secret depositories had likely succumbed to heavy injuries and died. But..."
He glanced at Xu Ying and hesitated before adding, "Since you managed to survive, what reason is there that they couldn't?"
Xu Ying's chest burned hot with hope, and he murmured, "Yes... If I could survive, they naturally could have survived as well. They were so powerful back then..."
He closed his eyes, two streams of clear tears trickling down his cheeks.
Behind him, a torrent of killing intent surged forth as a broken sword slowly emerged.
The moment the broken sword appeared, whirlwinds abruptly rose all around. In the howling wind, the Great Dao of heaven and earth seemed to wail, coalescing into billows of black qi.
For a time, sun and moon lost their light, and a chilling killing intent filled heaven and earth. Even the deities of Kunlun felt their divine power was on the verge of being severed beneath the broken sword!
Fang Songhuai shrieked in terror, "Xu Ying, what are you doing?! You promised me! You said you wouldn't kill me! If you kill me, you will violate your Dao heart and your cultivation will never advance an inch! Deities of Kunlun, Queen Mother of the West, you witnessed it just now!"
The Queen Mother of the West hesitated, then spoke, "Child of the Xu clan..."
*Shua!*
A flash of sword light sliced level across the altar, and the killing intent filling the sky suddenly snapped shut.
Recalling the Zhuxian sword qi, Xu Ying said with a calm countenance, "Nothing—not even an oath made by my own lips—can stop me from avenging my clan."
Dazed, Fang Songhuai remained kneeling on the altar, when suddenly his head slid off his neck.
At that very instant, his Primordial Spirit was also decapitated, meeting an untimely death.
The Zhuxian sword qi's immense killing intent severed every thread of his Immortal Dao and extinguished all life force. Even his divine soul was annihilated; any means of survival was utterly useless before this sword!
All that remained of Fang Songhuai was a speck of imperishable true spirit, drifting off toward the Netherworld.
Xu Ying bowed deeply toward the altar and whispered, "To all my kin of Xujiaping who died here: I will slaughter the enemies one by one with my own hands and avenge you!"
Only after a long while did he straighten his back.
Watching his back, the Queen Mother of the West thought silently to herself, *A man tortured by hatred who stops at nothing to achieve his ends is a terrifying man.*
Chapter 395