A howling gale whipped at the great banner bearing the character "Xu." Beneath it stood tens of thousands of disorderly rebels, every one of them sporting a ferocious expression, their killing intent surging as they glared at the government troops arrayed opposite them.
This State of Ji army numbered around ten thousand men, putting them at a clear numerical disadvantage. Though many of the soldiers looked famished and sallow, their legs trembling, they managed to hold their formation under the gleaming sabers of the commanding general's battle-enforcement guards. Within the State of Ji, this was already a rare, formidable army.
Under the banner bearing "Xu" stood a dark-skinned, burly man whose open robe revealed thick black chest hair. At this moment, his aura surged upward, taking the shape of a grotesquely mismatched dharma idol: a malicious ghost with two heads and five arms.
Rough breaths huffed continuously from his nostrils, as though he were barely keeping himself in check. Yet behind his narrowed eyes, sharp glints shifted, clear and calculating. The Ji army before him maintained a fairly disciplined formation; fighting them would likely exact a steep price. He cast what seemed like a casual glance over his own battle lines, weighing the cost against the payoff.
Several officers among the rebels were somewhat puzzled, finding General Tiger's behavior rather unusual today. Normally, he would have long since ordered the horde to charge; wouldn't a meager force of government troops like this shatter at the first rush?
For reasons he could not fathom, Xu Kuang felt an uneasy pounding in his chest. Slowly, he raised a hand, traced a circle, and pointed backward.
Retreat?
The rebel commanders found it hard to believe, yet an order was an order, and none dared disobey. The general of the State of Ji was also on edge; he could scarcely believe his eyes either, yet he still fought desperately to keep his formation steady. Only with an orderly battle line could they clash and hold for a short while, giving him a chance to flee.
Suddenly, a plume of military qi appeared in the distance. Though tightly gathered and shaped like a sharp sword, its piercing edge rushing toward them, the plume was rather slender—suggesting a force of only a few thousand at most.
That sword-like military qi moved at blistering speed, entering the battlefield in the blink of an eye. Astonishingly, it was a squad of a mere hundred men.
Though there were only a hundred of them, their momentum rivaled that of thousands of horses and tens of thousands of troops. Curiously, every soldier carried a rather large pack on his back, its purpose unknown.
Just then, a thunderclap tore through the clear sky! It rumbled into a resounding voice, booming like the splitting of earth and heaven: "Xu Kuang, come out and die!"
When had Xu Kuang ever been subjected to such provocation? With a broad wave of his hand, he halted the rebels' retreat and narrowed his eyes toward Wei Yuan. High above, Wei Yuan looked down disdainfully, his gaze sweeping the entire battlefield before locking onto Xu Kuang.
Xu Kuang felt a tremor in his heart, sensing that his opponent, just like himself, was at Dharma Idol perfection. Since the day he raised the banner of rebellion, he had never encountered such a formidable foe.
Xu Kuang first cupped his hands in a polite salute, then called out, "I believe I have never met Your Excellency before. In what way have I offended you?"
The rebels were taken aback once more; never had they seen Xu Kuang so pleasant and reasonable.
Wei Yuan said indifferently, "You are Xu Kuang? Very well, then!"
With a wave of Wei Yuan's hand, his hundred-strong force immediately deployed into a horizontal line, leveled their peculiar spears, and began advancing in unison. Then Wei Yuan pointed to the sky once more. Bolt after bolt of lightning struck in near-unbroken succession, crashing straight down toward Xu Kuang!
The malicious ghost manifested above Xu Kuang's head, each of its five hands wielding a different artifact to intercept the lightning. The first bolt crashed into the ghost's magical implements, erupting into a huge burst of thunderfire. The ghost actually let out a wail of pain, tinged with fear.
Xu Kuang's eyes widened. These were clearly ordinary thunderbolts—how could they possess such horrifying power? A single strike had caused agonizing pain to his dharma idol; even the immortal sects' Evil-Cleaving Divine Thunder could hardly surpass this.
Yet Wei Yuan's lightning did not come in ones or twos, nor by the tens or twenties. His opening volley was a deluge of one to two hundred bolts!
What the onlookers saw was a cascading waterfall of lightning.
In an instant, the thunderous brilliance faded. The ghost dharma idol was already battered and scarred, reduced to three arms and barely more than half a head. Xu Kuang was scared out of his wits—especially because Wei Yuan appeared entirely calm and unruffled, as if his Dao power had barely been tapped.
Without the slightest hesitation, Wei Yuan pointed heavenward again, and countless arcs of lightning came crashing down once more!
Just then, a sigh drifted through the air, and someone spoke: "Where it is possible to show mercy, one should show mercy. Young man, why must you pursue extermination to the bitter end?"
From midair, someone tossed down a small parasol. It spun swiftly, magically catching every single thunderbolt. Even so, once the barrage ceased, the luster on its canopy had dulled considerably.
An elderly man appeared. Seeing his treasured parasol damaged, a streak of ferocity surged between his brows. He gave a heavy harrumph and said, "What a heavy hand you have, brat! Did your elders never teach you properly?"
Wei Yuan sneered. "If my family elders were here and you dared speak like that, I might actually respect you as a man! But with a mere mid-stage Scenery Command cultivation, you think you can stand in my way?"
Wei Yuan raised his hand to the sky again. Lightning surged like a tide—three hundred and sixty bolts all at once! The intervals between each bolt were infinitesimal, so tiny that not even a Scenery Command True Monarch could distinguish them; to their eyes, it looked like a single, colossal pillar of radiant lightning plunging from the heavens!
The treasured parasol spun at full tilt. In an instant, blazing fire ignited across its canopy, accompanied by ceaseless wails resembling the crying of infants. Countless tender faces of young children surfaced across the fabric, every one twisted in extreme agony.
In the blink of an eye, the parasol turned into a fireball as the many bound souls of young children dispersed amid the thunderfire. Finally, three to five unobstructed bolts slipped through and struck Xu Kuang, causing him to cough up a huge mouthful of blood on the spot.
Xu Kuang was truly unfortunate. Though he commanded tens of thousands of troops, their military qi was completely scattered, practically nonexistent. Wei Yuan's lightning arts were immensely potent and specifically lethal against ghostly entities, making the strikes excruciatingly painful.
Had these tens of thousands of rebels been Qingming elites, their solidified military qi would have blunted the lightning's power by at least thirty percent. And had it been an array formed by Xu family youths—their military qi upright, square, devoid of impurities and free of flashiness—it could have shaved off half the lightning's might.
Thus, if two cultivators possessed comparable cultivation and methods, one standing within a disciplined army of ten thousand was already essentially invincible.
Yet this band of rebels obviously possessed nothing worthy of being called military qi.
Up in the air, the old man was casting incantation after incantation at the parasol to extinguish the flames. Ultimately, however, the treasure was damaged beyond repair. With a loud pop, it shattered, and eighteen infant spirits flew out, hovering dazed in the air.
The old man hastily blew two streams of white qi from his nostrils, attempting to reel the infant spirits back in. But Wei Yuan flicked a finger, and those infant spirits flew toward him instead, vanishing into his body.
Shocked and enraged, the old man shrieked, "You dare steal my holy infants?!"
Wei Yuan did not speak. He slowly raised his hand. This time, the lightning did not fall immediately; instead, it coalesced into a thundercloud in the sky, growing brighter and brighter.
The old man was astounded as he sensed the terrifying power within the thundercloud. Below, Xu Kuang was the thundercloud's target. His face was deathly pale, and he did not even dare run. The moment he moved, the shift in his aura would drag the lightning tribulation down upon his head instantly!
The old man cried out in panic, "Absolutely not! Stop, quickly!"
Wei Yuan ignored him entirely, watching the old man with a cold gaze to see if he dared close in. Wei Yuan now possessed military qi of his own; though modest in quantity, it was of supreme quality. With this reinforcement, Wei Yuan was confident he could trap the old man the moment he drew near.
Judging by those dozen-odd infant souls and hundreds of child spirits alone, Wei Yuan had already decided not to let the old man leave alive. The hundreds of young souls had now been guided into the Yellow Springs Grotto-Heaven, and Wei Yuan could already feel a distinct blessing of aspiration power. Having received this aspiration power, he was naturally bound to fulfill their wishes. Even without it, however, Wei Yuan would have done it all the same.
The old man no longer dared presume upon his seniority, shouting in frantic haste, "Xu Kuang is the bloodline descendant of an immortal! His descent down the mountain this time is to gather treasure medicines of longevity for an Immortal Venerable! If you harm him, you will be obstructing the Immortal Venerable's Dao path!!"
Wei Yuan waited until the old man finished his very last word before triggering the lightning tribulation. A rolling ball of thunder hurled toward Xu Kuang, and only then did Wei Yuan say, "I don't believe you."
With the lightning tribulation crashing down overhead, a pale yellow shield of light suddenly materialized around Xu Kuang, shielding him. When Wei Yuan's tribulation thunder struck, it unexpectedly dissolved against the light shield, failing to harm Xu Kuang in the slightest.
Wei Yuan's expression turned grave. With this single thunderstrike, he realized that Xu Kuang was far more than a mere herb-gatherer for an Immortal Venerable—he was the Immortal Venerable's Dao path itself!
Chapter 963