Hearing the sound of battle, Hengsheng accelerated his footstep instantly, leaving the other eight figures behind. His figure blurred as he dashed forward, and the landscape changed rapidly. He could feel a strong air resistance against his skin.
Soon, Hengsheng arrived at the scene. He saw a lone disciple of the Golden Sword Sect with heavy injury fighting fiercely against a couple dozen black-masked cultivators who had encircled him. All of these attackers were in the early stages of the Spiritual Foundation Realm.
The lone golden-robed disciple was exceptionally powerful. Despite his own heavy wound, he battled with unwavering ferocity. The floor around him was littered with the corpses of several black-masked cultivators, who had fallen by his sword.
Behind Hengsheng, other Golden Sword Sect disciples finally caught up. When they saw the scene, they quickly rushed in to help the encircled disciple.
With the sudden arrival of reinforcements, the black-masked attackers were caught off guard. Eight disciples, wielding their swords, struck at the backs of the attackers, and one by one, they dropped dead.
Hengsheng did not wait any longer. He asks Yunsu to secure the escape route like last time he doesn’t intend to let any of the black-masked attackers escape and then he joins the battle himself.
Hengsheng rushed forward, striking his palm Qi against one of the unfortunate black-masked cultivators. The man's body exploded, and he then turned and sent his Qi cannon toward the black-masked one who was about to flee from him.
BOOM!
As he battles his own, Hengsheng also observes the disciples of the Golden Sword Sect fighting while using their Qi technique. Their swords flew through the air, following their hand signs and piercing the enemy’s bodies with deadly precision. A surge of golden sword Qi erupted from the ground and impaled a helpless black-masked cultivator. Some disciples performed a technique that summoned a golden river of Qi, which they wielded as a formidable whip sword. Hengsheng couldn’t help but be impressed by their Qi technique.
After the reinforcements arrived, there was no longer a battle—it had become purely a massacre. Executed by Hengsheng and disciples of the Golden Sword sect, the black-masked cultivators keep falling one by one at a visible rate.
With each attack Hengsheng launched, he heard the system notify him that he had received system points; the sound encouraged him. He didn't feel any remorse about killing these guys since their association with the God Spawn was enough reason for him to label them as "villains."
Soon, the battle ended, and only two black-masked attackers remained alive within Hengsheng gripping their necks tight. He intended to investigate them and learn their goal.
"Junior Brothers! Junior Sisters! You are alive!" a heavily injured disciple shouted in a joyful voice before collapsing from his injuries.
"Senior Brother!" another disciple rushed over to support him, but the injured man shook his head and refused the support before he said in a weak voice, "I already sacrificed my Spirit Core."
"No! Senior Brother!" the juniors cried out, immediately realizing that their senior did not have much time left. In their sect, every disciple had to learn many basic techniques—including how to sacrifice their Spirit Core to gain a surge of power—a technique that no one wished to use unless in a dire and certain death situation, as it would bring down an enemy along with them.
It is not surprising why he decides to make this choice, since he is surrounded by a dozen enemies who have the same cultivation realm as him. Even though he is stronger than they are, being outnumbered so greatly leaves him no choice but to sacrifice himself, as he is not willing to hand over the seal artifact to the enemy so easily.
Tears flowed from the juniors' eyes as they gritted their teeth and looked at the living enemy in Hengsheng's hands—the black-masked attackers with anger. One of the disciples even stood up with a sword in hand and walked straight toward Hengsheng's direction, aiming for the heads of the black-masked attackers Hengsheng held. Hengsheng knew what this guy intended to do.
Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.
"Wait. I intend to let them live for a while so I can investigate them for the information," Hengsheng said in a firm tone before this disciple could kill one of the black masks in his hand. The disciple seemed to recover from his sorrow and recalled Hengsheng's strength.
He acted politely and said, "Fellow Dao Lan, an investigation is meaningless. Our sect has tried that many times, but these cultivators tend to have soul contracts with their faction—they will die immediately if they attempt to split their word out."
Hengsheng frowned; he hoped he could get something out of them if he tried, but he also had expected something like this. Since he couldn't gain anything from them, he increased the pressure in his hands.
BOB! BOB!
Ding!
[You have earned: 120 SP.] x 2
Their heads exploded under Hengsheng's grip, and the disciples watched in horror at his ruthlessness before stepping back to regroup with other disciples who were still mournful beside their senior brother.
Hengsheng looked at the dramatic scene from afar, not wanting to get too involved with these people. Moreover, he did not trust them—their eyes secretly had a hint of disdain, and his instinct told him they were looking down on him or harboring other negative thoughts, despite his having saved their lives.
The senior brother took out a pentagon-shaped metal seal with the rune word "Earth" engraved on its surface—a rune Hengsheng recognized from his studies. He is curious to know why such an Artifact, if it fell into the hands of those black-masked people, might cause the problems as it described in the quest panel.
Senior Brother who is very weak as time passes leans his back against the metal tree and hands the artifact to Cao Feng, Seems like he entrusted his mission to the juniors. As they spoke, Hengsheng noticed that Senior Brother glanced in his direction and nodded in thanks.
As Hengsheng watched, they seemed to speak to each other with divine sense, intentionally not letting him hear what they were discussing. He did not care much about their secrets; he intended to leave quickly after the quest was done before they realized he was not there.
While waiting for these people to finish saying their goodbyes, he opened his system panel. Since the start of the battle—from the God Spawn to the black-masked cultivators—he had accumulated quite a few system points.
Ding!
[System Points: 6750 SP]
He planned to spend them on upgrading his Sun Gaze Trait, as it did not cost him much—only 1,000 SP.
Ding!
Sun Gaze Genetic Trait: Tier 1 - S [Upgrade requires 1,000 SP]
[1,000 SP Deducted.]
[Sun Gaze Genetic Trait Upgrading…]
The next moment, Hengsheng felt a burning sensation in his eyes. "It hurts!" he thought. He closed his eyes and pretended to rest; he couldn’t show his vulnerable side to anyone, especially not before those he did not trust.
He focused his divine sense as if using it as his eyes, and observed what was happening to his eyeballs. He saw that his entire eye was being reconstructed. He couldn’t see the change at the cellular level because his divine sense was not that powerful, but the process did not seem to finish quickly.
With his eyes closed, Hengsheng noticed that the senior brother had already passed away and that his corpse had been stored in their space ring. After a while one of the disciples walked toward him it was Cao Feng.
Cao Feng’s eyes narrowed with concern as he addressed Hengsheng, "Fellow Dao Lan, we will leave now. Do you still wish to come with us?"
"Yes, I think it's better to send you guys to a safe place since this is something those black-masked attackers do not want."
"I will help you," Hengsheng replied while closing his eyes—a gesture that puzzled Cao Feng.
"Wait—why are your eyes closing like that?" Cao Feng asked, his tone edged with confusion.
Hengsheng showed a calm smile and then he replied shamelessly. "Sometimes, to fully understand the flow of nature, one must surrender their senses of oneself to the flow."
Cao Feng was even more confused by his nonsense words. "Ahem… then follow us closely, We will head west; our destination is very near—only three days away at our current speed."
As Cao Feng and the others hurried off toward the west, Hengsheng followed them closely with Yunsu above his head.
----------------------------------------
Axeman opened his eyes after hearing a report from his subordinate that they had lost track of the group of disciples fleeing with the Earth Seal core formation. A heavy sigh escaped him as he muttered, "It can’t be helped."
His voice, edged with irritation, conveyed the gravity of the situation: confronting the overlord's army of disciples at the Metal Seal location head-on was out of the question, as they would surely lose.
Without hesitation, he commanded, "Summon everyone; we will use the last plan."
The subordinate’s face drained of color as he swallowed hard, knowing well that the last plan involved deploying a large number of God Spawns to swarm their enemy.
"As you command, Prince Da-shan," the subordinate replied, his tone trembling with anxiety yet marked by unwavering obedience.
Axeman watched his subordinate step out of his tent. He thought about his goal, His eyes were filled with a hint of insanity and madness. "For the Lord of All Senses."