Earth Splitting Sect

"You still dare to make excuses!" Xiang Yi barked in fury, his gaze chilling to the core. "Cui Ji, do you think Xiang's blade is dull, that I wouldn't dare kill you? If you ruin the Merchant Alliance's great affair, I'll take your worthless life first!" Seeing the tense atmosphere, the fat man in fine robes slipped between the two to mediate. "Fellow Daoist Xiang, calm your anger. Fellow Daoist Cui surely only dared to act because he was certain it wouldn't disrupt our great task. The vicious beasts attacked so suddenly back then, and in such dire straits while you were inside the stone hall, there was simply no time to consult you..." As the fat man spoke, he shot Cui Ji a meaningful wink. "Fellow Daoist Cui, you were so eager to kill Daoist Qingfeng. I hear you've been stuck at a bottleneck for over ten years without a clue how to overcome it. Could this man be your demonic barrier—are you trapped at this bottleneck and unable to break through because of him?" Cui Ji lowered his head, admitting his fault to Xiang Yi, and shook his head. "This bottleneck is exceptionally unyielding. I wasted many years at it, bordering on despair, until I received word that a certain spiritual medicine in the Hall of Seven Killings might help me break through. Even I am not sure whether that wretched Daoist is a mental obstacle of mine. Originally, it wasn't necessary to kill him; a petty grudge from more than twenty years ago isn't something I couldn't let go of. But back on Dahuang Island, the instant I laid eyes on him, an evil fire surged within me that was hard to suppress. It must have some influence on me. Just to be safe, it was naturally best to kill him, lest an inner barrier ruin the efficacy of the medicine..." The fat man in fine robes nodded. "Fellow Daoist Xiang, the two of us followed your orders and kept a close watch on everyone else's movements the entire time. Just now, I also secretly approached and scouted them out. Aside from this fellow surnamed Pan, the others shouldn't be an issue. Weren't six people supposed to be enough to break the formation anyway? Although Fellow Daoist Cui acted somewhat impulsively, fortunately, he didn't ruin our main business." Seeing Xiang Yi's expression soften slightly, both the fat man and Cui Ji inwardly let out a sigh of relief. Pointing at the bisected corpse on the ground, the fat man asked, "Fellow Daoist Xiang, have you confirmed his identity?" "Earth Splitting Sect!" Xiang Yi kicked the carcass of the giant beast. "Do you see this Ground-Splitting Lizard? Ground-Splitting Lizards are ferocious by nature, and in the cultivation world, only the Earth Splitting Sect possesses the secret method to tame them. His lizard possesses the astonishing strength of the late Demon Core stage, which is rare even within the Earth Splitting Sect. That alone shows his status was definitely extraordinary. Moreover, he hid his true strength; his cultivation was only slightly below mine. If the alliance leader hadn't bestowed upon me a Water Gang Divine Lightning, he might truly have succeeded." "Water Gang Divine Lightning? No wonder the commotion was so massive! I've heard it's a secret treasure of the water element, and only a Nascent Soul Patriarch cultivating the *Water Gang Divine Art* is qualified to condense it. It takes quite a bit of time to craft, and its power is staggering." The fat man looked down at Cultivator Pan, clicking his tongue twice. "The Earth Splitting Sect? Could he be from the demonic path? Who would have thought? It seems our Merchant Alliance has already been targeted by the demonic sects." Xiang Yi nodded. "What's so strange about that? We, the Three Great Merchant Alliances, have long been an eyesore to both the righteous and demonic paths. If the three alliances hadn't stood united, kept to our own bounds, and never revealed any grand ambition, we would probably have been jointly crushed by both paths long ago. "In the Demon Sea, there are plenty of cultivators from both the righteous and demonic factions recruited by the major merchant guilds, but only as guest elders. For someone like him to infiltrate the core of a guild, he had to have an ulterior motive. "Faced with this mission arranged by the alliance leader, he didn't hesitate to expose himself and strike to seize the objective. "As for whether he was acting on orders from the demonic path or on his own initiative, that remains unknown. "The Ground-Splitting Lizard excels at earth-fleeing arts. He must have released it in the canyon. With his strength, concealing it from our senses wasn't difficult. Then he ordered the lizard to lure the Purple Star Eagles in during the chaos, allowing him to fish in troubled waters." The fat man chuckled. "He was scheming and farsighted, but still a step behind Fellow Daoist Xiang. He never could have guessed that we had prepared for this all along, and the real mission still lies ahead. This stone hall was merely the first link of the task, and with a simple ploy, Fellow Daoist Xiang forced him into the open. However..." The fat man's tone shifted, a puzzled look appearing on his face. "From what you're saying, Fellow Daoist Xiang, the difficulty of this mission isn't that great. If the Merchant Alliance had sent a Nascent Soul Patriarch, it could have been accomplished effortlessly. Why go to such great lengths and even allow a demonic spy to slip in?" Xiang Yi glanced at him. "How do you know no Nascent Soul Patriarch came in?" Cui Ji and the fat man exchanged stunned glances. "The Three Great Merchant Alliances are closely watched by both the righteous and demonic paths, so our Nascent Soul Patriarchs cannot be deployed lightly. Those seniors surely have their own tasks. Besides, having spies slip in is unavoidable. After all, the Merchant Alliance is not like a sect; each merchant guild acts independently, and strict enforcement of orders across the board is impossible. To appease all sides, the alliance leader couldn't monopolize the slots either, leaving it to us to stay vigilant and root out any spies." Xiang Yi turned to look at the battlefield. "Enough. We have already wasted too much time. Let us first rescue Fellow Daoist Liu and the others, lest they die at the hands of the vicious beasts. As for what happened earlier, Xiang can let bygones be bygones, but if anyone dares desert their post again later, don't blame me for being ruthless!" The fat man smiled. "I am grateful for Fellow Daoist Xiang's trust. We will certainly be diligent and see the mission through. Besides, this An is still counting on you to help retrieve the treasure, so how could I dare be the least bit careless?" Cui Ji nodded repeatedly as well. Xiang Yi led the charge toward the battlefield, but suddenly remembered something, turning his head to ask Cui Ji, "Are you certain Daoist Qingfeng is dead?" Cui Ji thumped his chest. "Rest assured, Fellow Daoist. I was fully prepared and grievously wounded him. I saw with my own eyes the toxic mist invading his body before he was swallowed by the beast horde. He is doomed to die, and will never cause you any trouble." ... Once they entered the battlefield to rescue the others, Qin Sang's figure silently appeared at the edge of the massive crater. The situation differed greatly from what he had imagined. It turned out Xiang Yi had been baiting a trap, and the fat man in fine robes and Cui Ji had long been recruited by him. Viewed in this light, Cui Ji's rogue ambush on him was not necessarily a bad thing. Otherwise, he might have had to face a joint siege by all three of them later on, which would certainly have been far more perilous than now. If Cui Ji was a man-eating viper, the fat man was a smiling tiger, and Xiang Yi was worse still. Qin Sang had no grievances with the latter two, and they had just been chatting and laughing moments before, yet they had agreed without the slightest hesitation to help Cui Ji kill him. Qin Sang looked down at Cultivator Pan and the Ground-Splitting Lizard. The instant the sudden upheaval occurred earlier, they had been knocked flying by the Ground-Splitting Lizard and had not been able to see clearly. As it turned out, it was not a native vicious beast of the perilous zone, but Cultivator Pan's spirit beast. "Earth Splitting Sect... demonic path..." Qin Sang had overheard their conversation. Qin Sang had heard the name of the Earth Splitting Sect before; it seemed to be one of the major sects of the demonic path. Qin Sang had always operated in the Demon Sea and had only a slight understanding of the Inner Sea. From what he knew, the human race flourished in the Inner Sea, where the righteous and demonic factions stood in sharp opposition. The Three Great Merchant Alliances had risen abruptly, and numerous other powers, large and small, along with rogue cultivators, either secluded themselves from the world or remained neutral. Adding the covetous Witch Clan eyeing them from the sidelines, the situation was tangled and complex. Opening a passage to the Demon Sea had noticeably eased tensions in the Inner Sea; otherwise, they would have plunged into full-scale war long ago.