Clan Extermination

"A Dao-protecting supreme divine ability, a slaughtering supreme divine ability, a movement supreme divine ability..." Xi Hong watched Yaoguang charge back toward them, wielding the Two Realms Ruler and the Swimming Dragon Sword, a trace of bleak despair flashing in his eyes. Those two supreme treasures were top-grade spirit treasures of the third generation or higher. On top of that, he commanded three supreme divine abilities... And without exception, every single one had been cultivated to an exceptionally profound level, likely barely shy of full mastery. Such a monster... How had they ended up crossing paths with him? At this moment, Xi Hong didn't even have the heart to blame Xi Hai anymore. It wasn't that Xi Hai hadn't been cautious enough, nor that he hadn't investigated beforehand. No matter how one looked at him, this Heavenly Dao Sect disciple named Yaoguang seemed merely a rather formidable Incandescent White Golden Core cultivator. At best, his combat prowess was somewhat above the norm, matching someone at the Azure Golden Core level. For 460,000 Pure Yang Great Pills, taking control of him should have been effortless for the Xi family. They had simply never imagined... That they would happen upon a monster who defied all reason. Walk along the river long enough, and your shoes will inevitably get wet. At this moment, the Xi family was finally paying the price for what they had done. "Patriarch, rally all the clan's experts to kill him! Kill him!" Xi Hai snarled. His expression was filled with fury, hatred, and even... a sliver of dread. "Only by killing him and wringing those supreme divine abilities and top-grade spirit treasures from him will Sixteenth Brother and Third Granduncle not have died in vain! Only then can we replenish our family's losses! Only then will our Xi family... have a way to survive..." A way to survive! Xi Hong shuddered, suddenly realizing the true meaning behind Xi Hai's words. A way for the Xi family to survive! Theoretically, even if their entire contingent here was wiped out, the Xi family would not be completely erased. After all, they still had substantial power in the imperial capital. Yet from the dread in Xi Hai's voice, it wasn't hard to guess what he truly feared: this youth Yaoguang's talent and potential. As a mere Incandescent White Golden Core, he had cultivated three supreme divine abilities near perfection? If he ever reached the Azure Golden Core stage, how monstrous would he become!? Once he became a true disciple, how many Void Refining or even Void Shattering realm powerhouses would fight to accept him as an apprentice!? Once he became the disciple of some Void Shattering expert in the Heavenly Dao Sect—or even just a Void Refining peak master—his momentum would become truly unstoppable. When that time came, the Xi family would truly face a crisis of survival, confronted with the calamity of clan extermination. "Look at what you've done!" Xi Hong snapped furiously at Xi Hai, yet his divine mind instantly swept through every Xi family cultivator: "All Radiant Sun Golden Cores, heed my command: slay this villain!" "Understood!" Receiving the order, the Xi family cultivators shouted in unison and plunged into the fray. As members of the same clan, they had always shared honor and disgrace alike. "Die." Facing these joining cultivators, Yaoguang showed no mercy either. Or rather, under the art of Taishang Emotion Severing, he had completely shielded himself from the influence of emotion, seeking only to eliminate all enemies with the utmost speed. With the Two Realms Ruler paired with the Nine Transformations of Heavenly Walk, he didn't even engage directly with the two Azure Golden Core powerhouses, Xi Hai and Xi Hong. Instead, he flickered continuously, the golden light of the Swimming Dragon Sword extinguishing one Radiant Sun Golden Core and Incandescent White Golden Core after another. Almost every time the golden light flashed, a Xi family expert fell or was grievously wounded. Meanwhile, though Xi Hai and Xi Hong cast divine abilities without pause in an attempt to restrict Yaoguang's movements and create an opening for the others to focus their fire, their combat powers stood at 640,000 and 770,000—they simply could not pin him down. Furthermore, Yaoguang refused to clash with them head-on, only pruning away the other Radiant Sun and Incandescent White Golden Core cultivators. They could only trail behind him, watching helplessly as their family's elites were slaughtered with nothing they could do. Watching yet another Incandescent White Golden Core perish, Xi Hai couldn't hold back an enraged roar: "Is a dignified disciple of the Heavenly Dao Sect capable only of scurrying away like a rat? If you have the guts, face me head-on!" "Can a dignified Azure Golden Core do nothing but bully the weak and overwhelm the few with the many? If you dare soar three thousand li into the clouds alone, I'll fight you in a duel of life and death!" A voice devoid of emotion resonated from Yaoguang's divine mind. Xi Hong and Xi Hai exchanged glances. Yet neither soared into the sky. They had already experienced Yaoguang's terrifying strength; even joining forces, they might not be able to defeat him. If they were separated... Defeating them one by one would only be a matter of time. "We need more hands!" Xi Hong, as patriarch of the Xi clan, was burning with urgency. His divine mind rapidly spread, sweeping across most of the Haizhou provincial capital: "Fellow cultivators of Haizhou, if you can join me in slaying this villain, the entire Xi family will be eternally grateful! For any Radiant Sun Golden Core who joins the fight, our Xi family will reward you with a thousand Pure Yang Great Pills! For an Incandescent White Golden Core, ten thousand Pure Yang Great Pills! For an Azure Golden Core, a hundred thousand pills! Regardless of the outcome!" A thousand, ten thousand, a hundred thousand Pure Yang Great Pills just for joining the fight? Regardless of the outcome? The Radiant Sun and Incandescent White Golden Cores present, and even the rare Azure Golden Core cultivators, were instantly tempted. Yet before they could act, Yaoguang's divine mind surged out right behind it: "You have tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of Pure Yang Great Pills to hire Incandescent White and Azure Golden Cores to face me, yet you stubbornly refused to pay the 460,000 pills you owed, dragging your Xi family into such perilous straits? Or is the Xi family's credibility worth less than a puff of hot air—promising owed pills, only to repudiate the debt once the crisis passes? Or perhaps you plan to settle scores one by one with anyone who takes advantage of your misfortune!?" As soon as those words rang out, the cultivators who had been eager to move instantly cooled off. Indeed, credibility. What credibility did the Xi family have? Hadn't this mysterious expert attacked the Xi family precisely because Xi Hai was too greedy, kicked an iron plate, and spun a web to entrap himself? Now that the Xi family was in dire straits, they naturally offered fortunes of ten thousand or a hundred thousand Pure Yang Great Pills just for stepping up. Once their crisis was resolved, whether they would honor those promises remained completely unknown. Gambling their lives on the word of a great family? Don't be naive. On Beihai Star, factions that possessed credibility had long been devoured whole back when they were weak. All at once, those cultivators who had been tempted quickly chose to stand by and watch. Some even began to ponder whether they could fish in troubled waters and plunder some resources if the Xi family truly went under. They didn't dare make a move in the Haizhou provincial capital, but the surrounding cities had Xi family cultivators as well—looting them while the fire raged might not be out of the question. Swoosh! Golden light flashed. Yet another Xi family Incandescent White Golden Core perished on the spot. Moreover... this Incandescent White Golden Core was Xi Hong's own son, an extraordinary talent who had attained an Incandescent White Golden Core after cultivating for barely a century. He had already entered Great Shang's Jixia Academy, possessing a status akin to a true disciple of a top celestial sect, though without the dedicated resources granted to a true disciple. This time, he had happened to pass through Haizhou on a mission and was resting in his clan, only to meet this end. Grief washed over Xi Hong. His attacks grew all the more frenzied. Relying on the Two Realms Ruler and the Nine Transformations of Heavenly Walk, Yaoguang weaved continuously through the battlefield. Seeing that the moment had arrived, his divine mind once more pervaded the entire Xi family estate. "Xi Hai, this started because of you. Ascend into the clouds with me for a duel of life and death. Once you are dead, I can let the rest of the Xi family off. After all, I have no desire to completely offend a clan that possesses Void Piercing forces! But... if you remain obstinate and seek to pit the whole Xi family against me to the bitter end, today in the Haizhou provincial capital, I will leave no one alive in the Xi family—I will exterminate your entire clan!" "Yaoguang!" Mad fury blazed in Xi Hai's eyes. Right at that moment, Xi Hong's divine mind echoed in his consciousness: "Agree to it! Buy time! The clan grand formation is being repaired and can soon be barely activated. When the time comes, lure him back into the estate. With the formation's power, even if we cannot kill him, we can trap him and hold out until our kinsmen arrive from the imperial capital!" "Fine!" Xi Hai responded through his divine mind, but on the surface, his ferocious snarl intensified: "A duel of life and death! Then I will fight you to the death! After this battle, regardless of the outcome, this matter ends here!" As he answered, his figure shot into the air, soaring straight into the clouds. Yaoguang's figure followed closely behind. However, they had barely flown a thousand li into the firmament when the pursuing Yaoguang suddenly reversed direction and plunged straight down. With a flick of his Swimming Dragon Sword, spatial ripples flashed. Seizing the opening, he even tapped into the power of the Longxiang Flying Boat. Even though it was merely a sliver, bolstered by the power of this Dao artifact, the capability of the Two Realms Ruler was pushed to its absolute limit. With a single stride into the void, he seemed to traverse space itself, descending directly above Xi Hong, who was preparing to repair the clan's grand formation. The spatial ripples created by traversing space further amplified the might of the Sky-Cleaving Strike, so that as he fell from the sky, the power of this supreme divine ability surged to its pinnacle. "Yaoguang!" The sight caused Xi Hong's eyes to nearly burst with fury. Only by joining forces had the two Azure Golden Cores barely been able to withstand the edge of Yaoguang's sword. Now that Yaoguang had suddenly separated them, and was even using this method of traversing space akin to a Void Piercing cultivator, swooping down from the sky to strike with lethal force—how could he possibly block it!? "You despicable bastard!" Rage and fury exploded in his divine mind across the void. Carrying this fierce unwillingness, the Azure Golden Core struck back violently, his divine ability crashing head-on into the plunging Sky-Cleaving Strike. Rumble! At the absolute epicenter of the blast, Xi Hong was ground to dust on the spot amid fury and despair. The earth beneath the entire Xi family estate seemed to sink violently. Immediately after, a wave of spatial ripples capable of crushing everything blasted outward from the point of collision, violently hurling every building, pavilion, and palace of the Xi family into the sky and tearing them to shreds. Torn to shreds along with them were the low- and mid-tier Xi family cultivators who hadn't even had the right to intervene in the battle. "Ahhh!" Up in the sky, Xi Hai, who had turned and rushed back down, witnessed the entire Xi family being wiped out, letting out an agonized shriek torn from the depths of his soul. "Why! Why!? 460,000 Pure Yang Great Pills! Isn't it just 460,000 Pure Yang Great Pills!? Slaying two of our Xi family's Void Piercing experts wasn't enough—you had to kill our patriarch and slaughter our entire clan!?" The Azure Golden Core's eyes turned blood-red, as if he had descended into madness. "I gave you a chance, but you didn't take it. In that case, this was the only way to sober you up." Amidst the dust, streaming light, and blazing flames, Yaoguang slowly rose into the air once more above the ruins of the Xi family estate. "Though looking at you, you still haven't come to your senses..." "Die! Die! You must die today!" Completely mad, Xi Hai erupted with his divine mind. The Azure Golden Core inside him began to violently collapse; at this moment, he actually sought to forcefully break through to the Void Piercing Realm! Because he knew full well that without reaching Void Piercing, he alone could never defeat an opponent whose combat strength was monstrously powerful! Void Piercing! Only by forcefully breaking through to Void Piercing could he kill the Yaoguang before him and wash away this humiliation! Otherwise, even if he miraculously survived today, having committed such a colossal blunder, the Void Piercing ancestor would never spare him! "Break for me!" Without madness, there is no survival! "The Void Piercing Realm isn't broken into like this." Yaoguang saw through Xi Hai's intention with a single glance, even seeing through the transformation of his Golden Core. Right now, fueled by a do-or-die conviction, his chances of breaking through to Void Piercing might have increased by ten or twenty percent. Even with a ten or twenty percent boost, it was still only a thirty to forty percent chance, but... Currently in the state of Taishang Emotion Severing, Yaoguang obviously wouldn't give Xi Hai any opening. Nor would he allow any variable to occur. In this state, he would cast aside all distracting thoughts and desires, using every means available to achieve ultimate victory. Buzz! The golden light of the Swimming Dragon Sword was like a flying sword tearing across the surface of the sea. Under a visible ripple, it drove forward a spatial wave, condensing it all into a single point through the sword's tip, and slammed viciously into Xi Hai. "No!" Under the Demon Suppressing Hall master's despairing cry, his Azure Golden Core, which had held at best a thirty to forty percent chance of success, completely broke down and spiraled out of control. A blaze of azure light burst forth. In an instant... Countless beams of azure radiance and raw energy poured from this azure ocean, instantly saturating a radius of several hundred li. Its brilliance lit up the entire Haizhou provincial capital. As his body was completely swallowed by the berserk azure energy, deep resentment, dread, and... an unspeakable irony surged within Xi Hai's heart. "460,000 Pure Yang Great Pills..." Merely 460,000 Pure Yang Great Pills! Yet it had brought the Xi family, which had reigned supreme in the Haizhou provincial capital, to such an end. Truly... Blinded by greed, foolish to the extreme.