Wei Yuan claimed he had come alone, but how could Xu Chunyuan possibly believe him? He quietly cast out his divine sense, attempting to locate the assassins lying in ambush around them.
Vitality bustled inside the manor. Maidservants scurried to and fro, and guards stood dutifully, ramrod-straight at their appointed posts. The head steward, with sharp, fiery eyes, scrutinized the rooms for virtually nonexistent dust. The entire manor was bustling yet dead silent.
No one dared slack off, for none could hide from the divine sense of a Dharma Idol grand master. The few who had dared to slack off earlier had been beaten to death on the spot and dragged away; those who remained lived in terror, as if walking a tightrope.
Nothing was amiss in the manor. Xu Chunyuan's divine sense swept across the grounds, finding not a single assassin. Suddenly, he was startled—he had actually let his mind wander! With a formidable enemy right beside him, he had lost his focus!
Xu Chunyuan shot to his feet, glaring death at Wei Yuan.
Yet Wei Yuan remained still, saying calmly, "A mere middle-stage Dharma Idol doesn't warrant an ambush."
"Junior, you seek death!" Unable to hold back any longer, Xu Chunyuan conjured a colossal twin-tailed scorpion above his head, and one of its barbed stingers plunged down toward Wei Yuan's crown!
The stinger struck like lightning, but midway down, Xu Chunyuan suddenly saw a bright crimson immortal sword appear in Wei Yuan's hand. Wei Yuan was running a finger lightly along the blade. The moment he laid eyes on that immortal sword, Xu Chunyuan was seized by the instant premonition of impending doom!
With a cry of alarm, even though the scorpion tail was about to hit Wei Yuan's head, Xu Chunyuan pulled back his dharma idol, spun around, and fled.
Xu Chunyuan had not yet realized that everything around him had turned granular. Everything, including himself, seemed composed of countless infinitesimal particles. In this bizarre realm, Xu Chunyuan clearly felt he had been flying for a long time, yet his body had not even crossed the threshold of the room.
Wei Yuan seemed to stroll up, coming right before Xu Chunyuan, and drove a savage punch into his abdomen!
The force of this blow was unimaginably immense, like a crashing mountain. It crushed Xu Chunyuan's dharmic power, scattered his physical qi, and shattered his spine.
Xu Chunyuan's back suddenly burst open. Countless shards of flesh, viscera, and broken bone sprayed backward. A gaping hole appeared through his abdomen, right in front of Wei Yuan's fist.
The force behind this single punch was a full million jin!
The eerie granular world dissolved, and everything around them returned to normal.
Trembling all over, Xu Chunyuan was helped by Wei Yuan to sit back at the table. Stowing the bright crimson immortal sword, Wei Yuan said, "Dealing with you doesn't require an immortal sword either. That was just for you to look at."
Mortified and furious, the twin-tailed scorpion above Xu Chunyuan's head flickered in and out of sight, thrashing desperately. In truth, although his physical body had suffered grave wounds, he was not completely stripped of his ability to retaliate. But pale crimson sword qi now laced every inch of his wound, relentlessly slicing and disintegrating his dharmic power, bringing his dharma idol to the brink of collapse.
Even among Dao power, there were disparities in quality. By rights, a Dharma Idol cultivator's Dao power was dense and refined, sweeping away a Dao Foundation cultivator's Dao power like dead wood. Yet Wei Yuan's strike had first relied on pure physical might to punch clean through Xu Chunyuan's dharmic body, immediately followed by a blast of platinum sword qi tinged with pale crimson. This sword qi occupied an extraordinarily high tier, causing Xu Chunyuan's dharmic power to crumble upon contact!
The commotion at the garrison commander's office had already alerted the surroundings. Two colossal dharma idols materialized on either side of the manor, charging over with menacing momentum.
The warm pavilion dissolved silently into nothingness, revealing Wei Yuan and Xu Chunyuan seated side by side at the table. Wei Yuan looked up at the two Xu family elders rushing over. They drew in a sharp breath of cold air and blurted, "Wei Yuan!"
Wei Yuan said, "I have come alone merely to test the methods of you elders, and to settle a bit of an old grudge along the way."
The two elders exchanged glances, then looked behind themselves at the two mysterious cultivators who had silently appeared—one civil, one martial. Though their identities were unknown, they were bona fide Dharma Idols.
A serpent slithered out from who knew where and quietly coiled around Xu Chunyuan's body. Then several Dao Foundation warriors appeared in midair, aiming strange weapons at the two elders.
Wei Yuan smiled faintly and began, "You Xu family Dharma Idols..."
Before he could finish his sentence, the elder whose dharma idol was a six-clawed white tiger abruptly turned and bolted! Caught off guard, the scholar behind him had only just begun spinning up the rotary flying-sword autocannon in his hands when the elder was already a hundred zhang away!
This turn of events caught Wei Yuan completely off guard as well. He had no choice but to bite the bullet and finish his sentence: "...are all trash."
By the time the words left his mouth, that Xu family elder was already far in the distance, impossible to catch. Having lost his target, the scholar immediately teamed up with the towering warrior to surround the remaining Xu family elder.
The remaining Xu elder had reacted a beat too late. Only now did he realize that the serpent was actually a Dharma Idol spirit beast! Counting Wei Yuan himself, wouldn't that make four Dharma Idols?
Shocked and furious, the elder defended himself while shouting curses: "And you claimed to have come alone! Shameless!"
Wei Yuan pointed at the serpent and said casually, "This one isn't human."
He added, "And these two are my puppet guards. So my claim that I came alone is not in error. As for right now, this is a one-on-one duel between you and me, a fair contest of arts. Watch out, for I am about to strike."
Wei Yuan pointed toward the sky. The overcast clouds overhead suddenly brightened a touch as several rays of sunlight pierced through the cloud cover. In midair, they merged with Wei Yuan's Dao power, transforming into blazing torrents of fire that rained straight down upon the elder's head.
When an ordinary Dharma Idol cast this Heavenly Fire Technique, it produced a ten-zhang torrent of fire. But Wei Yuan's Heavenly Fire Technique started at fifty zhang!
Frightened out of his wits, the Xu elder barely managed to fend off this Heavenly Fire Technique under the ferocious assault of the civil and martial Dharma Idols. Yet more and more sunlight broke through the sky, and torrent after torrent of fire rained down in succession, resembling nine layers of celestial vaults from afar!
Just then, battle cries erupted across the entire pass as fires flared in every quarter. Countless figures suddenly launched surprise attacks, striking key locations like the garrison commander's office, patrol stations, the armory, and the granaries. Though their numbers were not vast, every single one possessed profound cultivation, with more than half of them being Dao Foundation cultivators.
Their shouts echoed throughout the fortress city: "The Heaven-Battling Gang is conducting business! Uninvolved persons, return home and shut your doors! Anyone who dares interfere will be shown no mercy!"
Panic instantly engulfed the pass city. Chaos reigned, chickens flew, dogs barked, and people fled in all directions. The name of the Heaven-Battling Gang had long resounded across the Western Regions. Though the upper echelons knew where they came from, how could common folk know any better? For the first time in nearly a century, horse bandits had breached Hanyang Pass!
Fires broke out all across the city, burning with exceptional ferocity. Members of the Heaven-Battling Gang specifically torched military barracks, various yamens, and key official compounds. Even large trees growing in courtyards would instantly erupt into roaring blazes once sprinkled with a handful of their powder.
Garrison patrol units rushed toward the fires, but upon clashing, the bandits instantly formed into low, middle, and high ranks. Gunfire thundered, and more than half of the soldiers charging at the front dropped dead in an instant.
Similar scenes played out across the fortress city. Squads of bandits rampaged unchecked and swept all before them; any patrol units that encountered them suffered devastating casualties, unable to withstand even a single clash.
The main mobile forces within the fortress were deployed along the walls and the four gates, with the west gate alone accounting for half. Seeing the turmoil in the city, the commanders of the four gates dared dispatch only small detachments to suppress the bandits without orders from the garrison commander's office. But these meager forces were shattered in the blink of an eye after entering the streets.
Fires spread to more and more corners of the city, but what terrified everyone most were the torrents of fire raining down one after another over the garrison commander's manor! The manor was already ablaze, with billowing smoke surging into the sky.
Anyone with discerning eyes could see that multiple Dharma Idol cultivators were locked in combat at the commander's manor. No one dared go near to gawk at such a time; brushing against even a shred of the fallout meant dying without a burial site.
Most of the troops in the city were stationed across three military camps, but without orders from the garrison commander, not a single unit could leave camp—doing so was a capital offense. Thus, though the generals were frantic with anxiety, they were helpless. They could only send scout after scout toward the manor to investigate, but none ever returned. Judging by the towering flames engulfing the manor, an order was unlikely to arrive anytime soon.
A moment later, the torrents of fire finally dissipated. The battle at the garrison commander's manor subsided, leaving behind only the burning mansion and official halls.
Having taken more than thirty of Wei Yuan's Heavenly Fire Techniques in succession, the Xu family elder was completely drained of dharmic power and burned to a crisp. Wei Yuan seized his soul and dharma idol, sent them into the Ten Thousand Li of Rivers and Mountains, and offered them before the shadow in the moon.
The bird head appeared, swallowed the dharma idol in one gulp, spat out three streams of advanced karmic luck, and left behind a single thought: *Settled.*
Wei Yuan had initially thought he would need to sacrifice at least two more dharma idols to square the debt. He hadn't expected that a single early-stage dharma idol would suffice. It seemed the shadow in the moon had a special fondness for human dharma idols and souls.
Suppressing and killing this elder had not actually taken much time. Wei Yuan's dozens of Heavenly Fire Techniques had rained down in near-seamless succession, an all-at-once deluge that expended less than half of his Dao power.
With the Dharma Idol elder dealt with, Wei Yuan had no rivals left within the pass city. He promptly rallied a portion of his subordinates causing chaos in the city and charged toward the South Gate.
The defenders at the south gatehouse were far fewer than those at the west gate. Seeing a massive band of horse bandits sweeping toward them in a grand wave, they panicked and drew their heavy bows and powerful crossbows to fire. But the gatehouse's defenses were designed against external threats, not internal ones. Taking cover among houses and residences, the bandits steadily closed the distance.
Just then, military qi suddenly soared into the sky in the distance as a ten-thousand-strong cavalry army came thundering in! Though they numbered only ten thousand riders, their military qi was not the least bit inferior to that of a hundred thousand border troops—if anything, it was even superior.
The cavalry bore prominent banners. One large banner read 'Military Commissioner of Dingxi,' while another bore a massive character: 'Wei.'
As the rolling iron cavalry charged right up beneath the pass, the leading officer called out in a booming voice, "By order of the Lord Military Commissioner, we are pursuing the Heaven-Battling Gang bandits! Open the gates at once! Anyone who delays military operations commits a capital offense!"
Chapter 381