Carrying Xian through the portal with my roots, I emerged directly into my courtyard. And immediately, a gloomy aura hit me. "Stay here," I ordered Xian before turning to leave.

Where were my disciples? Why did it feel so odd?

Turning my sensitivity to its peak, I felt their presence in the pagoda. 'Are they practicing now even though their seniors just came back half-dead? These rascals.'

But as I headed to the pagoda to check on them and even scold them, the sight before me made my soul feel like it had cracked like glass.

Buildings were destroyed in what seemed to be a result of a fierce fight; blood was all over the ground, beasts were lying motionless, and even my pavilions hadn't been spared.

Everything was a big bloody mess.

"Clay?" I called, my heart starting to pound as I feared the worst had happened. But all the stars were thinking just fine, so how had they not reached out to me?

Right, that cave seemed to cut connections with the outside world, or was it that monster?

Whatever the answer was, I'd find out later because right now, I could feel the raw anger bubbling within me, yelling to be unleashed.

Who had done this?

I took a step forward and walked through the portal to appear in the pagoda.

The barrier was still intact, keeping the pagoda and the source secure. But most importantly, my disciples were all safe.

I walked through the barrier and straight onto the seventh floor, where Liu Ming, Wu Tao, and Liuyue lay unconscious on the floor. They hadn't recovered from the monster attack earlier. But the twins sitting against the wall hugging each other with bruises and cuts all over their small bodies drew all my attention and rage.

"Clay?" I growled.

Silence.

Reaching my mental galaxy, I dived into the memories of the twins since they had been conscious during the attack.

Five cultivators had down this. From the color of their robes, they were from...Soul Sect.

'Him!' I hissed cracking open my eyes. It was the man who had killed Han. He was dressed differently from the robes I remembered. These looked similar to Elder Jun's, meaning that the crooked bastard was an elder in the sect.

And that 'dead' elder had brought another elder and three powerful disciples to lay to waste my sect.

I chuckled from the anger now flowing through my veins like my blood.

The twins, weak as they were had tried helping Clay and the beasts fight off the enemies. Tian had used his chaos ability to give Clay the will to fight ruthlessly while Ling had used her Order ability to calm the wounded beasts.

The fight didn't last long, but they fought with all they had. In the end, they subdued Clay with a type of purple rope that emitted a horrifying breath and captured him.

If they hadn't used such despicable means, Clay would have defeated them.

"Where are you?" I asked, finally linking with Clay.

"Master," he spoke weakly.

While he wasn't dying, he sounded like he was in a lot of pain. "I...tried."

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

"Hold on Clay. I'm coming."

##########

Bidding them one last goodbye with my eyes and heart, I set the beasts' corpses ablaze and watched them burn down to ashes.

They must have taken the guardian beast since it was missing as well, before brutally slaughtering the rest without any form of respect.

I put on the devil mask as the black hole appeared between me and the dying black fire. 'It's time to make them feel pain.'

With anger blinding my soul and eyes, I moved through the void to where Clay would be but only managed to appear as far as the sect's gigantic gates.

The strong arrays set up both on the ground and in the sky kept me from entering, not for long though.

"Clay, I'm here. Don't you dare give in to whatever they're doing to you!"

'Yes...Master."

'I'm not strong enough to deal with too many powerful enemies at the same time. But I cannot think clearly because of my damn anger. I guess there is only one thing I can use.'

The void. I planned to harness the strange energy nesting in the void along with the black lightning. Who cared if I ended up using all of the lighting? I just wanted vengeance. I could not allow myself to feel helpless like I had back on Earth, or in those other lifetimes. I'd fight with all I had, and if it became too much for me to handle, I'd take shelter in the void or flee.

Either way, I had a plan B in case I met those old geezers who were at the peak of the power chain in this sect.

"Who are you?" asked one of the four disciples guarding the entrance. "Do you know-"

My roots shot out, immediately knocking them to unconsciousness. Why had it been that easy to take out four cultivators at once? Because with my cultivation level hidden, everyone always mistook me for a mortal, thus never guarded against my attacks in time.

I stopped in front of the shut double doors to look up at the setting sun. Heavens, no, darkness was helping me.

*Bam* *Bam* *Bam* I began pounding the gates with my qi, making it as loud as I could for all to hear.

Yes, I wanted to distract every soul in the sect so that whoever was inflicting pain on Clay would stop.

When I had had enough, I drew out my sword and sent a cross slash at the heavy gates, using a little of the void energy and the black fire to make a meaningful impact.

*Boom*

The gates fell in, destroyed before catching flames.

Immediately, the bell started ringing out, flowing through the air to warn or call for the guardians and disciples who could neutralize me before getting the leaders involved.

The array came alive as well after sensing the killing intent in the attack, but I was already in their sect.

Like birds and flies, the disciples in white robes came flying in the sky on their swords and other weapons and blocked my path.

"Who are you, as why do you come to seek death here?" questioned the one radiating the most powerful breath of them all.

Ignoring him, I concentrated on the power levels of all the disciples around me. Combined, they made it past the one million and five hundred mark.

That was too much power to take on in my five thousand level.

"Bring out the bastards who attacked Dragon Sword Sect!" I boomed the order, making sure there was no fear or weakness in my voice.

There was truly no fear inside me. I already knew I'd be facing something like this when I got here. But there was a weakness, which was that I was weak compared to all of them.

And when facing an enemy, you couldn't dictate how they'd fight like in a duel. If they were to attack, they'd do it simultaneously, giving me no room to counter or block them.

Some murmurs came, but they vanished when the young man spoke again. "I do not know what you're talking about. But showing up at our doors uninvited and destroying our gates is unforgivable."

I chuckled, feeling amused by his logic. Isn't that what those bastards had done to my sect?

'Enough Ren. Stop wasting time here.'

"Is that a no?"

"Cut off one of your arms and-"

Countless palm-sized black holes appeared all over the sky and the ground, instantly intimidating the disciples.

"Bring. Them. Out!"

He frowned summoning a golden spear.

"You have no power to make demands in our sect! Attack!" he yelled.

As if the tens of disciples had been eagerly waiting for that order, they started descending at me, blatantly ignoring the danger that was right there with them.

"I gave you a chance to live," I muttered expanding the black holes and letting them devour any part of the disciples that came in contact with them. Hands, legs, arms, half bodies. Within a minute, the first batch of disciples that had been sent to kill me were lying on the ground, either dead or half dead, with missing limbs and blood flowing like a river beneath my feet.

I could now see and feel the fear of leaving the disciples remaining. It felt good. It felt, addictive.

I wanted more. More blood. More flesh. More...death.

*********************************

3RD POV

*********************************

The legends once said that the void was the most powerful entity. More powerful than the Dao itself. For all things came from nothing. And the void, 'is' nothing.

They said that tapping into its power could grant a cultivator immeasurable power. Power to soar the worlds and reach the gods. But with such power and little control of it, those who welcomed it were eventually consumed by it.

And thus, knowledge of it was erased from the history of the fourth star.

Streams of crimson blood flowed on the ground. Moans of pain and pleas of a quick death replaced the wind.

They started saying a devil had come to destroy them. A devil with a mysterious power that could consume both flesh and qi.

"Where are they?" Ren yelled, sending out a ripple of qi with his voice.

His eyes now glowed both golden and black, just like the qi he was using to kill the disciples who hadn't ceased attacking him.

"Formation!" someone yelled from around him but he could not tell who had. All he wanted was his vengeance. And the void was feeding off that deep-rooted emotion to grant him the power to destroy whatever stood in his way without him even realizing it.