Liu Xing looked at the man. He seemed young, but Liu Xing knew looks could be deceiving. The man was a cultivator at the Lock Opening realm seventh stage, making him the strongest among the others. His yellow robe and the memory of the people in the Second Gray Cloud City shouting about the Xia Clan riding swords made Liu Xing suspect that he was from the Xia Clan.
As Liu Xing felt the man's qi, he realized that while he was at the seventh stage, his qi wasn't very powerful. He was still undoubtedly of a higher stage than Liu Xing, but Liu Xing felt like he was a man with a shaky foundation. In the Purple Moon Sect, there were a few people like him. They had enough talent to be accepted as outer disciples but lacked the talent to advance further. To compensate, they spent a lot of money on pills. They could progress, but their cultivation was weaker than others at their level.
"My name is Xia Yongzhi, the leader of the Xia Clan, as well as the father and brother you unjustly killed. Despicable Junior, prepare to die!"
Liu Xing's eyebrows shot up when he heard this. Many questions swirled in his mind. When had he killed people from the Xia clan? Were the ones the leader was referring to Xia Shizi and Xia Hongyi?
Xia Yongzhi kicked the ground, sending a wave of earth beneath him. He jumped over the river, his fists clenched, and golden light emerged from his entire body, surrounding him and making him look like a human on fire. In a split second, he was in front of Liu Xing, his fists flying towards his face like giant bullets. The faint roar of a tiger could be heard.
Seeing this, adrenaline surged through him as he summoned his gun. As the fists came within centimeters of his nose, Liu Xing activated his Lightning Cloak and tilted his head to the left. The fist only grazing his earlobe. Wind rushing through his cheek, but in the end, the attack did not harm him.
For a split second, Xia Yongzhi's eyes widened before his face contorted in anger. He spun his body in the air and tried to kick Liu Xing's side. Seeing this, Liu Xing converted some of his qi into bullets and sent them to his necklace. Yellow lines swirled around his left hand as he caught Xia Yongzhi's ankle in mid-air, his grip as firm as steel.
As he held Xia Yongzhi's ankle, Liu Xing smiled ferociously. After eating one and a half Diamond Pills, his body was now stronger. Combined with the stable qi from the necklace, he was as tough as a Core Splitting cultivator.
Xia Yongzhi's face was flushed red, his eyes blazing with an intensity that could melt steel. Hatred, raw and unfiltered, poured from his gaze, as if he wanted to incinerate Liu Xing with the sheer force of his will.
"Die!"
Even though Liu Xing was still holding his ankle, the man jumped and rotated his body. The rotation caused Liu Xing to lose his grip on his ankle, and Xia Yongzhi tried to kick the right side of his head.
Seeing the attack, Liu Xing defended his head with his right hand. The feet hit his gauntlet, and Liu Xing was pushed to the side toward the river. His feet left trails on the ground.
The kick was heavy. Liu Xing felt like his hand was trembling like a bar of iron hit by a hammer, but aside from that, the damage was minimal.
If Liu Xing had fought with him at full strength, there's no doubt that he would have killed Xia Yongzhi easily. The circumstances would have justified him killing them all, since they wanted to kill him first. But while Xia Yongzhi's eyes were red with anger and hatred, Liu Xing knew that part of the reason was because Xia Yongzhi was grieving. Liu Xing knew that this was all a misunderstanding. There was no real reason for him to kill them all as long as they were willing to listen.
"Sect leader of the Xia clan, my name is Liu Xing, and I think we have a misunderstanding. I've never killed one of your clansmen, let alone two."
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"I have a witness who claim you were the last person to see my son and my brother. If you're not the killer, then who?"
"Is your son Xia Hongyi and your brother Xia Shizi?"
Liu Xing has only ever met these Xia clansmen. He remembers that they fled when he fought the inverted pyramid.
When Liu Xing asked this question, Xia Yongzhi's eyes narrowed. "So you admit that you killed them! I know it. Everyone from the major sects is a bunch of arrogant people. Just because you're from a big sect doesn't mean you can do whatever you want! Guards, help me subdue this man and bring justice to this world!"
A unanimous "Yes!" echoed, and Liu Xing turned to the ten men on the other side of the river. Beads of sweat rolled down their foreheads, and as Liu Xing looked at them, some of their eyes faltered, as if they were facing a deadly beast.
He glanced back at Xia Yongzhi, who was still looking at him as if Liu Xing was evil and needed to be vanquished for the world.
"It seems like all of you are misjudging me. Sure, my hands aren't clean. I've killed people before, but I'm honest when I say I didn't kill your clansmen. While I met Xia Hongyi and Xia Shizi, I didn't kill them."
"Attack!" Xia Yongzhi shouted.
As he shouted, Xia Yongzhi jumped towards him, a golden aura surrounding his entire body forming a silhouette of a roaring tiger. The ten men on the other side of the river also jumped. Some of their spears glowed, and some of them pulled out yellow talismans and pointed them at him.
Seeing this, Liu Xing inhaled deeply. The electricity encasing his body danced brightly.
"But the most important misunderstanding you have is thinking you can all subdue me."
After he said that, Liu Xing moved. The world blurred, adrenaline and qi coursing through his body, making the world seem to move in slow motion. But Liu Xing knew it wasn't the case. The world wasn't moving slower. These people were moving so slowly that the world seemed unmoving.
Liu Xing jumped towards a guard who was halfway across the river. When he arrived, Liu Xing punched him in the stomach. There was silver armor there, but his punch shattered the armor, and the man was almost folded in half. Using the shield, Liu Xing moved to the next target and kicked him in the neck, causing him to fall into the river. He punched the next target right in the face, the next target in the back, the next target he threw into the river, and so on and so forth until he landed near a black horse that looked agitated, as if it knew something was wrong but couldn't comprehend what had happened.
From an outsider's perspective, when those men jumped, Liu Xing turned into a bolt of lightning. This bolt of lightning circled around these jumping men in less than a second, and then Liu Xing suddenly appeared on the other side of the river.
Liu Xing turned his body to face the river. Ten spots were splashing water, some of the men falling headfirst, some backfirst, some feet first. All of them spat out blood from their mouths and submerged in the water.
On the other side of the river, Xia Yongzhi punched the ground where he stood with a golden fist, and the golden aura around him formed a leaping tiger. This aura caused the ground where Liu Xing stood to be destroyed. Then, Xia Yongzhi turned his head towards Liu Xing with his eyes wide open, beads of sweat forming around his face. This punch was meant to crush Liu Xing, but it only hit the ground.
Liu Xing wondered what was going through his mind right now. Surely, he knew that Liu Xing was strong, after all, he was able to dodge and block his first two attacks, yet anger had blinded him and made him attack, and now Liu Xing suspected that his eyes were open.
Liu Xing kicked the ground again, crossed the river, and appeared right on top of Xia Yongzhi. Liu Xing spun in the air and aimed his feet, which were decorated with yellow swirling lines, directly at Xia Yongzhi's neck. Xia Yongzhi had time to turn his head, but he didn't have time to dodge.
When his feet hit Xia Yongzhi's face, Xia Yongzhi fell to the ground. A cloud of dust erupted as his body hit the ground, leaving a spider web crack and a small depression where his face had hit the ground. When Liu Xing kicked him again, Liu Xing could see that Xia Yongzhi spat out a mouthful of blood, bounced once on the ground, and when he landed again, his eyes rolled up and he fainted.
Liu Xing deactivated his Lightning Cloak and dismissed the gun.
"You guys have eyes, but you can't see Mount Tai."
A small smile crept over his lips. He'd always wanted to say that, and he'd thought he'd only be able to say it in the future, when his realm was higher, but to think that he could say the words so soon.
Liu Xing's smirk quickly faded.
“Who killed them?”
The last time Liu Xing saw them was when they fled during his battle with the inverted pyramid. Was it a coincidence? Or was someone trying to set him up?