Firmament Sword

These ancient ruins were vast, stretching for hundreds of thousands of miles. Only a few thousand people had entered this time, so the chances of running into a group were extremely low.

Moreover, the hurried shouts suggested something was definitely happening over there.

Neither of them was the timid, trouble-avoiding type. In fact, they were not just unafraid of trouble, they were daring to the point of recklessness. How could they possibly miss a scene like this?

The pair crested a large mountain, and the view before them opened up dramatically.

Before them was a massive, lush green valley overgrown with all sorts of wild grasses. A large crowd surrounded a dilapidated building, locked in a chaotic battle with war cries that shook the heavens.

”Gao Ping is there, too…” Du Qingteng narrowed his eyes, his gaze cold as he watched a man below sweeping aside all opposition.

”The successor from the Eternal River?” Xu Luo followed Du Qingteng’s gaze down below.

Having spent the last few days with Du Qingteng, Xu Luo had heard him talk about the three great Holy Lands, including the grudge between him and Gao Ping, the successor of the Eternal River.

”Mhm. I tricked him pretty good this time, so he must be fuming. Looks like he’s taking it out on this bunch,” Du Qingteng said with a smile.

Xu Luo glanced at the crowd below and raised an eyebrow. ”His little venting session… doesn’t seem to be going too well.”

”Tell me about it. What bad luck,” Du Qingteng said, gloating.

This group below was no simple mob. Xu Luo observed them for a long while and was surprised to find that not a single one of them was below the Great Saint Realm!

”You scum from Xi Hezhou! Dream on if you think you can take advantage of people from Blazing Flame Province!”

”Brothers, let’s go! Kill this dog from Xi Hezhou!”

”When we find those other dogs from Xi Hezhou’s Celestial Brilliance, we’ll kill them all! We won’t spare a single one!”

”That’s right! It’s a shame that little bitch from Xi Hezhou in the Celestial Venerable Realm didn’t come in. Otherwise… with her power suppressed to the Initial Tier Ultimate Venerable, all of us brothers would’ve taken turns on her!”

An extremely cold glint flashed in Xu Luo’s eyes. ’So, these people are from Blazing Flame Province,’ he thought. ’They’ve hidden themselves well.’

Du Qingteng sneered beside him. ”A bunch of scumbags who only know how to run their mouths! I’ll help you take care of them in a minute, brother!”

”Thanks.” Xu Luo didn’t stand on ceremony. It was unrealistic for him to take on such a large group by himself.

Among this group from Blazing Flame Province, there were seven or eight Initial Tier Ultimate Venerables. It was hard to tell if this was their original strength, or if they were once stronger and had been suppressed.

Against such a large force, unless one was a Celestial Venerable like Xie Wanrou, not even a Venerable Peak expert could guarantee victory.

Here, everyone’s power was suppressed, no matter how strong they originally were!

Meanwhile, Gao Ping was left somewhat stunned by their insults. He roared, ”What nonsense are you spouting? I am Gao Ping!”

”Gao Ping? What kind of dog is that?”

”What breed?”

”A Xi Hezhou sled dog?”

”HAHAHAHA…”

The group from Blazing Flame Province had clearly never heard of Gao Ping. Instead of being intimidated when he announced his name, they only mocked him harder.

”Now… I’ll show you… exactly who I am!” Gao Ping roared in fury as his aura exploded outward. His power, originally beyond the Initial Tier Ultimate Venerable, was currently suppressed to that level.

However, his combat prowess wasn’t greatly affected. He hadn’t been using his full strength before, but now he was thoroughly enraged.

He was going to kill!

BUZZ!

The red jade bottle instantly erupted with an incredibly terrifying aura, sucking several people directly toward it.

The precious bottle had been damaged when Du Qingteng tricked him earlier, and it should have been repaired before being used again.

But Gao Ping couldn’t care less at this point; this crowd had utterly infuriated him.

He was a successor of one of the three great Holy Lands. He represented their honor.

No one had ever dared to humiliate the three great Holy Lands this way. If he couldn’t teach these reckless fools a harsh lesson, and word of this got out, he, Gao Ping… would become a disgrace to the Holy Lands!

Therefore, he would attack even if it meant destroying the precious bottle here today!

Just then, Du Qingteng, who was beside Xu Luo, spoke. ”Even though I can’t stand the sight of Gao Ping and wish he would just die here, right now… I have to step in!”

”The three great Holy Lands are branches from the same tree. We may have our disputes and grudges, but I can’t just stand by and watch him be humiliated and bullied like this!”

”You don’t have to do anything yet, but I can’t take this anymore!”

With that, Du Qingteng leaped from their high vantage point and plunged toward the battle below.

”You scum from Blazing Flame Province, your Master Du is here to kill you!” As he spoke, Du Qingteng brandished his Square Ancient Inkstone. An ink-colored giant, dozens of yards tall and wielding an Ink-Colored Greatsword, emerged from it and slashed directly at a young Great Saint from Blazing Flame Province who was attacking Gao Ping.

The young Great Saint was horrified and tried to dodge, but he found that despite its immense size, the ink-colored giant moved with the agility of a Monkey!

SPLURT!

The young Great Saint’s head was lopped right off!

Blood sprayed high into the air, a chillingly beautiful yet ghastly sight!

It was a truly shocking scene.

The pressure on Gao Ping instantly eased. Seizing the moment while several of his opponents were distracted, he activated the precious bottle and forcefully sucked them inside. A few muffled screams echoed from within it.

Then, abrupt silence!

Many were stunned. They hadn’t expected this man named Gao Ping to possess a treasure that, like the giant tortoise at the entrance, could simply absorb people whole!

Gao Ping said coldly, ”You dared to insult me. Pay with your lives to repair my precious bottle!”

With that, Gao Ping glanced at Du Qingteng. ”I’m not going to thank you for this!”

”And I don’t need your thanks!” Du Qingteng rolled his eyes. Ignoring Gao Ping’s coldness, he turned to charge the frenzied crowd of Blazing Flame Province Martial Artists.

Not seeing Xu Luo, Du Qingteng sighed softly, but then he came to terms with it.

’Those Blazing Flame Province bastards insulted Xi Hezhou and even the elders of Celestial Brilliance, but they have the numbers right now. It’s a rational choice for Xu Luo to stay hidden.’

But even as he told himself this, Du Qingteng still felt a little disappointed.

The group from Blazing Flame Province had been startled, thinking a large reinforcement had arrived. But when they looked closely, they saw it was just one person. He was clearly powerful, having killed one of them instantly.

But this didn’t scare them. On the contrary, it piqued their interest.

One of the young experts, an Initial Tier Ultimate Venerable, had a strange hairstyle—his head was shaved on the sides, with a multitude of small braids left in the middle. He had a muscular build and a sharp glint in his eyes. He looked Du Qingteng up and down as if in recognition. ”You’re the successor of Weiyu Mountain?”

Du Qingteng nodded with cold arrogance. ”I am Master Du!”

”Hahaha! I heard that back in Qingchuan Ancient City, you fought some little mutt from Celestial Brilliance over a woman and lost!” The brawny, braided man roared with laughter.

”You’re fucking courting death!” Du Qingteng was utterly furious. He never imagined that story would have spread so far that even people from Blazing Flame Province had heard it.

He dipped his Fountain Pen into the ink of the Ancient Inkstone and wrote the character for ”kill.” It radiated a monstrous killing intent as it flew toward the brawny man to suppress him.

”Brothers, together now! If we kill this successor of Weiyu Mountain, we’ll be famous!” Facing Du Qingteng’s deadly move, the muscular man showed no weakness and rallied his allies.

In an instant, seven or eight young experts from Blazing Flame Province gathered around the brawny man. Each brandished their own treasures to counter the character for ”kill” that Du Qingteng had unleashed!

RUMBLE!

With a tremendous explosion, the character for ”kill” was blasted to pieces!

”HAHAHAHAHA…”

”So this is Weiyu Mountain’s ultimate technique!”

”Fucking hilarious!”

”First time I’ve seen what one of the three great Holy Lands can do…”

”So impressive!”

”Holy shit, you scared this master so bad my little heart is going THUMP-THUMP-THUMP!”

Having shattered Du Qingteng’s killing move with a single combined strike, the young experts from Blazing Flame Province couldn’t help but roar with derisive laughter.

Du Qingteng’s face, however, showed no trace of anger or dejection. He simply sneered, ”Fools.”

”Sigh… a bunch of real idiots.” Even Gao Ping, who was fighting not far away, let out a sigh of pity.

BOOM!

The body of one of the laughing young experts from Blazing Flame Province suddenly exploded. The sound of his laughter still lingered in the air, but the man himself… had completely disintegrated!

POP!

The head of another one of the mockers exploded like a watermelon smashed on the ground.

Bits of red and white… splattered through the air!

POP! POP! POP! POP! POP!

The remaining few young experts from Blazing Flame Province, their smiles frozen on their faces and terror filling their eyes, exploded one after another! Some had their bodies burst, others their heads…

In the blink of an eye, Du Qingteng had finished off all seven or eight of the young experts with a single word!

Du Qingteng shot Gao Ping a smug smile. ”How about it? A little competition?”

Gao Ping let out a fierce roar, his Long Sword a blur of motion. Sword Qi crisscrossed the air as he charged into the enemy ranks like a ferocious tiger.

There were over a hundred people in the Blazing Flame Province group to begin with. After more than a dozen had been killed, over eighty remained. Seeing the situation, the remaining eighty immediately split into two groups of about forty each and surrounded the pair.

Even ants in great enough numbers can kill an elephant, and these young experts from Blazing Flame Province were no ants—they were all bona fide peerless prodigies!

Surrounded by these two groups and unable to unleash power beyond the Initial Tier Ultimate Venerable, Gao Ping and Du Qingteng’s situation instantly became precarious.

Gao Ping glanced at Du Qingteng and said coldly, ”I take back what I said to you earlier. Thank you for your help. Now go. I’ll cover your retreat!”

”Bullshit, Gao! Why don’t you go? I’ll cover your retreat!” Du Qingteng immediately fired back, cursing, ”It’s just death! You think your Master Du is afraid of that?”

Gao Ping didn’t get angry at being cursed out. He just sighed. ”One of us has to get out of here alive to report back to our sects. Otherwise, if the successors of the three great Holy Lands die here and our sects never find out who did it, wouldn’t we be letting these dogs from Blazing Flame Province off easy?”

Du Qingteng fell silent for a moment, then said, ”Don’t worry. Even if we both die here, word of this… will definitely get out!”

As he spoke, Du Qingteng thought of Xu Luo. ’He might not be willing to fight, but surely he can at least get a message to Weiyu Mountain and the Eternal River, right?’

’That… shouldn’t be a problem, should it?’

’If he won’t even do that much, then I can only say I was blind to have misjudged him.’