Long Tao moved first, slipping over to Master and drawing up a quick defensive array. In the meantime, the entire houses hook violently as some of the glassed panels shattered, exploding into a shower of shards. Screams followed as some of those shards tore through the flesh and killed quite a few attendees below. By then, everyone else had woken up to the fact they were being attacked.
"We need to get out," Shufen spoke up. "Who the hell dares actually attack the auction?"
Long Tao's gaze and Divine Sense wandered out as he came to a somewhat horrific realization: there was a massive array around the entire house disallowing exit, and a force about a thousand strong coming from underneath, digging towards the building at such speeds that they were going to burst out within ten seconds.
"We can't leave," he announced. "There's an array trapping us."
"What?!"
"Protect Master," he continued, quickly assigning roles to everyone. "Light, Zhao, and you two old farts stay with Master at all times, no matter what. Lan, you're with me; if you see someone coming at me, stop them. Xiu, Yimu, Feng, break encirclement slowly and help lead Master's group to the edge. Feng, you're in charge; if I hear either of you two disobeyed him, you'll have special, private training with me. Rayce, you'll have to make your own choices. Support us when you can, but conserve Words early on. This won't be solved that quickly."
"Yes, Brother Tao!" most everyone exclaimed in unison as he cracked his wrists. It has been quite some time since he went all out, and he had a feeling today that streak would be interrupted.
"No," it was Master's voice which stopped him in his tracks, causing him to nearly stumble. There was something somewhat odd about the man's voice, and looking at him, Long Tao realized that he was... angry. "I'm going."
"Where?"
"To them," Master said.
"Master--"
"--it's non-negotiable," he interrupted just as the first forces began to dig out of the ground; chaos had plowed through the entire house as everyone tried running and dispersing in every direction, only making it that much harder to survive a sudden onslaught. "So close."
"... huh?"
"I was so close. All my worries. All my fears. Just an hour or two, and I would have had a peaceful mind for at least a year."
"M-Master...?" everyone looked at him worriedly.
"They stole it!" he exclaimed. "I'm so sick and fucking tired of those shitstains always interrupting my peace! Tao'er!"
"Y-yes...?"
"We will kill them all," Master clearly wasn't himself. Something in him snapped and a dark that had been hiding inside had come out. "I don't care if we get marked completely. No--I want them to know it was us. I want them to piss themselves any time they even think of us."
"..." Long Tao smiled faintly. "Very well. You heard him," he said. "We're going to war."
The group dispersed in roughly the same groupings, but rather than taking up a defensive position while Long Tao and Wan Lan attacked, they all began to descend toward the platforms. Quite a few groups had already vacated the private booths, emerging into the hallways that were besieged by cloaked figures. Whereas most others tried to initiate conversations, their group didn't bother.
Long Tao led charge, sword in his hand quaking visibly as he sped through, cutting across several figures in one go, killing them. As the hallway widened into one of the emerging halls, and it grew more spacious, everyone scattered in a rough circle while Rayce began to tear up Words.
Swirls of light shot outward like fireflies, and Long Tao felt himself bolstered as he heaved over a spray of light that was aimed for his head. Without skipping a beat, he hurled a singular swing in a general direction while rolling forward midair, conjuring a massive, twenty-foot tall array of Sword Qi that tore through the tiled floor, uprooting it into a scattering mess of debris, and soon conjuring a shower of blood and gore as it split some fifteen cloaked figures without any resistance.
At the same time, Wan Lan charged further ahead of him, straight into the midst of some forty figures that were currently surrounding a small group of the house's attendants. Just before one more of the remaining seven was killed, she appeared like a ghost, grabbing the descending axe with her bare fist, pressing her fingers into it, and shattering it. At the same time, her other hand swung out, swirls of torrential energy erupting as her fist met a face--obliterating it utterly and turning it into a shower of blood and bone dust.
Meanwhile, Master was relentless--he'd taken the right flank, nestled into the wall which led toward the house's entrance. There were already some twenty corpses of the house's attendants as well as auction attendees, but he jumped in seemingly without a care, taking out a sword and beginning to dance. His figure kept shuttling between points like a ghastly ghoul, appearing behind the cloaked figures like a nightmarish apparition and beheading them each with a singular stroke.
Before a few seconds were up, he was already covered in deep crimson, yet his expression hardly mellowed out. He really, truly, thoroughly was angry.
On the other flank, Xi Zhao and Dai Xiu paired up rather perfectly. Despite being outnumbered forty to two, both weaved between the emerging arrays of martial arts, with Dai Xiu dancing directly in the midst of cloaked figures while Xi Zhao continued drawing and cutting the sword in every which angle. Milky-white surges of light shot forth, dyed red with blood as they traveled, dissipating before they hit a wall or any of the pillars holding up the ceiling.
Sounds mingled and mixed to the point where it was difficult to discern much of anything. Long Tao ignored the masses of cloaked figures as the kids broke out into individual groups, with even Lao Shun and Shufen joining them, easily handling them.
Instead, he focused on the figure furthest from everyone--they stood blocking a doorway leading to the set of hallways which connected to the central platform. Their gaze met Long Tao's; unlike the cloaked ones, there was will behind those eyes. They weren't mere bloats of Life Qi meant to die. They had desires and dreams. Which meant that Master would wish to talk to them.
Long Tao easily crossed the distance between the two, stopping when he got within thirty feet of them. The space around the two was clear, with all battles happening well in the back, providing plenty of room.
"You sure you're alright just standing there while your friends die?" Long Tao asked casually, slicing outward with his sword to clean it of blood.
"..." they didn't reply, merely taking out the pair of identical, red-dyed swords from the two scabbards.
"Ordinarily, I would have just cut your head off and been on my way," Long Tao said, his lips splitting into a smile. "But you've committed a sin worthy of a far greater punishment. So, I'll have to carve a lesson into your bones, one stroke at a time. I hope they are sturdy, you worthless hull of thoughts, as I have many, many, many words I wish to write."