Huo Qiang smashed both of his large fists together. After these five years, he had grown a nice red beard to go with his crimson hair that was now longer as well. He was getting ready to jump out of the protective formation along with some of his sect brothers. There was also a particular group of youngsters among them, each one with similar crimson hair as Qiang.
“Father, the barrier will be opening soon.”
“Great, are you and the boys ready?”
Huo Qiang was grinding wide while looking behind him. There were about ten youths that looked similar to each other in one way or another. At the front stood Huo Kong that was looking like a younger version of his father already. The others behind him were his brothers that Huo Qiang had sired.
They were all at the core formation level all of them were at the early stage. Kong was the furthest one in and the closest to reaching the middle stage. With the United Element Sect’s new techniques and ample spiritual resources, people that were core members could rise up their rank rather quickly.
“I’ll be taking care of most of them, try not to get in my way when we are out there!”
He grinned while his body started shining in crimson. He started flying upwards toward the protective barrier. Now when it was empowered there was no fear of it closing. Qiang just needed to wait a moment for the Divine Fist Sect elders to open a path for him. When they did the United Element Sect would show these monsters their might.
The youths looked at their father flying into the distance. They knew that it was wise to not be too close to their pops. He liked to go wild, he had a hard time containing his power and when someone sparred with him they ended up injured in one way or the other. The only person that they knew that could contend with him was Zhang Dong.
Even though he was the number two of the sect, they were still very proud to be his kids. But due to the fact that there were a lot of them here, some family infighting was inevitable. Huo Qiang had a similar outlook about relationships as Zhang Jin. He didn’t have as many wives or kids as the old man, still there were over a hundred of them.
Every child wanted to be on top then they could inherit the family head title. There were also kids from side families and now new sect members that could affect the power dynamics of their clan. The group here wanted to prove themselves to their father, if they were useful they were hoping for rewards such as status.
“Don’t think you will be on top forever, brother…”
One of the red-haired youths stuck his chin up while looking at Huo Kong.
“You can try little brother, but we both know who the superior one is!”
Huo Kong replied while smirking at the other youth. He could see that the moment he did the younger brother’s forehead started showing quite the bulging vein. The redness in his face wasn’t something that he wouldn’t notice either.
“You just wait! I’ll be sure to kill more monsters than you do. Do you dare to make a wager with me if you are that confident!”
Huo Kong raised his eyebrow at the callout. This younger brother of his had quite a mouth to him but he also had some skills to back it up. He wasn’t far behind Kong in cultivation but he always managed to be a step ahead so he wouldn’t fear making a wager.
“What do you want to wager? Spirit herbs? Spirit stones?”
“No, those are plentiful and easy to come by… We will wager Fairy Xue!”
Huo Kong almost tripped over as the large smirk covering his face turned upside down. He was clearly having trouble processing what this younger brother was talking about.
“F-fairy Xue?... w-what do you mean Kueng?”
The younger brother was called Huo Kueng smirked while looking to the side. There she was in the distance, Zhang Xue. She was in the process of walking together with her master Zhang Dong. She and a group of sect members were following the Patriarch into the lighthouse to check up on the comatosed Divine Fist Sect elders.
Huo Kong noticed this and he also looked, their conversation continued but in whispers as the red-haired youth started getting bashful.
“How dare you propose a wager over Sister Xue!”
He also started getting angry, his face showing a similar bulging vein on his forehead as his brothers did earlier. Huo Kueng was the one smirking now as he knew his older brother’s weak point.
“What are you afraid that you would lose? I thought you were confident in your skills, brother Kong?”
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The other brothers looked at these two fighting. They were interested in where this would lead to and if Zhang Xue was on the line even they were considering taking part in the wager.
“Afraid? Me?... never! What is the wager about exactly? Tell me now!”
Huo Kong was easily irritated just like his father, he also didn’t think that he would lose to his younger brother. Kueng on the other hand straightened himself out and started listing the rules of this wager.
“It’s simple brother, whoever wins will be the one to go ask for Fairy Xue’s company in the coming yearly sect festival. The one that loses will not interfere and promise not to bother Fairy Xue for a year! How is that, do you dare take this wager or are you too scared to accept it!”
Huo Kueng pointed with his finger at Huo Kong that was starting to fume. His short temper was clearly getting to him.
“If I accept this bet… how will we determine the winner? Will we count how many monsters we kill?”
Huo Kong was skeptical, how would they even go about this? Would someone be following after them and doing the counting, he couldn’t really trust his younger brother to not cheat if he didn’t have someone trustworthy performing the task.
“No, remember what the Patriarch said about the people. We are to carry them over here to our healers. The one that carries over the most will win. Our doctors were tasked to write down the number of infected, they will do the counting for us.”
The younger brother smirked as if he was the smartest person around. To Huo Kong this would fix the issue of cheating, the doctors would be marking down who carried who over for future reference so that no people get lost.
There was one small problem with this, Kong didn’t feel like it was very ethical to make a wager where people's lives are involved. Someone might die if any of the youths were too overzealous in their rescuing.
It didn’t sit too well with him to use these people's lives during a bet. Before he could decline this offer he heard a high-pitched voice from the side. He recognized who it belonged to almost instantly due to how childlike it sounded.
“What are you idiots doing? If the Senior Sister hears about this you will be punished!”
The group of brothers turned to the side. The voice sounded cute and sweet yet annoyed, it clearly belonged to someone of the female gender. What they saw was quite the small looking girl with an overdeveloped chest and light pink hair. The skin tone and all-around style was similar to their sect’s Matriarch but her demeanor was quite different.
“Nuana?”
Huo Kong called out while the rage inside of him started to subside. This girl was Zhang Liena’s younger sister and where she was Zhang Liu was probably not far away. It didn’t take him long to notice the white-haired man standing a bit behind her, looking at him with an awkward expression.
“Stay out of this sister Nuana, this is between us brothers!”
Kueng was quick to stop the girl from talking. All of these youths here were from the same generation so they didn’t consider the Matriarch’s young sister above them. They were the sons of the number 2 person in the whole sect. In their eyes they might be even above them, they would be close in prestige to Zhang Dong’s own children.
Even though Zhang Dong wanted to be done with the bloodline system. The people of this world weren’t willing to abandon it just yet. Even Zhang Xue and Liu, who were Zhang Dong’s disciples, weren't that closely related by blood. He was only a distant uncle while these youths were direct descendants of a grand elder.
But in the end, it also depended on how close the given person was to the elder in power. Zhang Dong wasn’t that great in asserting the pecking order. He evaded the struggles of the inner members of the sect along with the politics involved. He mostly kept to himself and let others take care of things like inner disputes. Even now he was long gone and not here, the junior members would have to clear things out amongst themselves.
“Between you? This isn’t a picnic you fools, I’m going to tell my elder brother about this! You all will be sorry!”
Nuana was part of the family now, she referred to Zhang Dong as ‘elder brother’. This was quite different from calling him ‘senior brother’. It was more intimate and showed a closer relationship between the two involved parties.
The group for red-haired youths instantly shrunk back in fear when they heard that. The small girl was angrily pointing her finger at them while shouting. If she brought this up with the sect leader it could bring them trouble. There also was a chance that he wouldn’t care but would they be willing to anger that man?
“Hah.”
Zhang Liu that was to the side finally decided to come over after hearing the commotion. He gave out a sigh while pushing Nuana to the side with his hand.
“Stop with your nonsense all of you, can’t you see that Elder Qiang is already leaving the barrier? The other elders are also working, we from the junior generation can’t fall behind!”
Huo Qiang and his younger brother turned to the side and could see their father powering up. His aura spiked while his soul beast was summoned, the path forward was now open and he was starting to attack.
The older members from the sect that was also at the core formation level sprung to action as well. Almost all of them formed battle formations that took on the forms of various serpents and dragons. They looked similar to the old Zhang Clan formations but their quality and strength was far greater.
“Now stop playing around all of you!”
Zhang Liu’s expression shifted into one of contempt as his aura exploded forward. He was the top fighter of his generation and everyone knew that. He didn’t intend to fight these people, instead, he quickly jumped onto his flying sword and propelled himself towards the opening.
Huo Qiang’s sons looked slightly dejected. Getting shouted at by Zhang Dong’s disciple was quite the hit to their face. He was also the brother of Zhang Xue that they all were aiming for which could cause some problems in the future if they tried courting her.
“W-wait Senior Brother Liu, I’ll aid you!”
“M-me too!”
The brothers pulled out their own flying swords and gave chase. Huo Kong and his brother glared at each other before also taking off.
“We will resolve this later.”
“Yes, we will…”
Everyone from the United Element Sect that was strong enough to face these monsters was now outside the barrier. Everyone here was greeted by millions of strange creatures, they all looked horrifying. They were also burning up due to the high amounts of plasma Huo Qiang’s Ifrit soul beast was now discharging towards them.
“Leave the big ones to me, you all just save the people!”
Huo Qiang gave his order while punching forward, his fiery fists causing widespread destruction and turning the monsters to ashes in just fractions of a second.