The forest erupted in a catastrophic blast of violent energy.
Shockwaves exploded from the point of impact, tearing through ancient trees and making the entire mountain structure tremble. Gold, silver, and blue—a trio of distinct spiritual auras—clashed in a blinding storm of Qi, fanning out across nearly a kilometer of forest. Massive trunks groaned under the immense atmospheric pressure before snapping like twigs, their severed branches hurled through the air like lethal javelins as sweeping whirlwinds kicked up clouds of debris.
Crackling arcs of silver lightning danced across the forest canopy, striking the soil in showers of sparks. Golden energy crawled over the torn earth, while ghostly blue spiritual flames flickered among the gnarled, exposed roots. For several breathless seconds, the woods looked as though they had been engulfed by a divine storm of destruction.
BOOM!
Another shockwave detonated, drawing the surrounding air outward like a sudden vacuum. Wang Gu had engaged the three bandit leaders directly.
The first boss lunged forward, closing the distance in a blur. He lashed out with a vicious leftward dagger slash, but Wang Gu slipped inside the arc with effortless grace. Leaving the attacker completely overextended, the elder thrust the heavy hilt of his spiritual sword straight into the center of the man's chest.
CRACK!
Reinforced armor shattered on impact. Fractured ribs caved inward, and the kinetic force launched the boss backward through the canopy.
Before the elder could reset his stance, the blind, white-one eye leader materialized directly behind him, driving a lethal, flying kick straight toward Wang Gu's head.
BANG!
Wang Gu blocked the blow with an open palm, his boots rooted firmly to the earth.
The blind leader's eye widened in sheer disbelief.
"A cowardly ambush," Wang Gu murmured coldly, his voice dropping an octave. "Entirely pointless."
With a brutal twist of his arm, Wang Gu seized the blind leader, slammed him ruthlessly onto the stone ground, and then swung his body like a heavy flail into the second boss, who was rushing in to assist.
BANG!
The collision sent both leaders tumbling backward, smashing violently into a house-sized boulder.
Without a moment's pause, Wang Gu flicked his wrist. A razor-sharp, flying crescent of intense golden-red Qi shot through the air toward the fallen pair, cleaving a deep trench directly through the bedrock beneath it.
In the distance, Ren and Tao watched the terrifying display of power with wide, petrified eyes.
The two crashing bosses frantically stabilized themselves, pouring every drop of their remaining energy into a desperate, combined Qi shield.
"AHHH!" They gritted their teeth, straining under the crushing weight of the advancing crescent.
"Waste your breath all you wish," Wang Gu mocked, his tone dripping with disdain. "You are already dead."
Just before the crescent could crush them, the first boss—having recovered from the hilt-strike—dashed back into the fray with a desperate roar. He drove his dagger against the side of the flying blade, executing a high-risk parry to deflect the energy away from his allies. Working in frantic unison, the three of them barely managed to grind the attack to a halt.
Fifty meters away, the three mercenaries stood panting heavily, their chests heaving in utter exhaustion.
"Oh? A mere trio of Qi Condensation pests actually managed to stop it?" Wang Gu remarked, completely unbothered.
He raised his primary blade slightly, the cold steel reflecting the dim light. "I shall slaughter all three of you with my very next strike."
The bandit bosses froze. He wasn't even taking the battle seriously. Suddenly, the atmospheric pressure plummeted. Every inch of space around them felt as though it had been transformed into an invisible, suffocating array of sharp blades.
Terror and greed warred frantically within their minds. What... what is this intensity?! the bosses communicated, their bodies shivering uncontrollably as killing intent wrapped tightly around their throats.
We cannot defeat him, the blind leader realized, his breath hitching as he clutched his broken hand. We cannot match his power, nor his speed. Even our most coordinated ambushes are nothing before his spiritual senses. But if we turn and run now, his blade will split us before we can take three steps.
Despite their current desperation, they were not ordinary bandits; they were the most lethal mercenary trio in the Mamaya region. All three had progressed far beyond the initial stages of cultivation. The boss with the artifact eyeloop was a Late Qi Condensation cultivator; the blind leader was at the Middle stage; and the leader with the dagger necklace had reached the absolute Peak of the Qi Condensation Realm. Together, their combined combat experience allowed them to threaten low-level elders.
"Don't hold back!" the Peak-stage boss roared, tearing his collar open. "Activate everything! Use our trump cards now or die!"
In perfect synchronization, the three bosses pushed their Dantians to the absolute limit, churning the air around them with a wild, chaotic surge of mixed spiritual energy.
The boss with the artifact eyeloop struck first, channeling his entire Qi reserve into his left eye socket. The mechanical glass lens whirred violently. "Illusion Array: Shattered Void!" he bellowed. A beam of violet light shot from the lens, expanding into a massive dome that warped the surrounding forest into a swirling kaleidoscope of false realities to trick the elder's senses.
Simultaneously, the Peak-stage boss ripped the small dagger necklace from his throat, bit his tongue, and spat a mouthful of essence blood onto the metal. "Ultimate Technique: Asura's Crimson Rain!"
The necklace expanded rapidly, splitting into hundreds of blood-red daggers that hummed with a piercing, lethal vibration. With a wave of his arm, a storm of blood-blades rained down on Wang Gu, shredding the canopy and tearing the ground to ribbons.
Concealed by the illusion and the descending rain of blades, the blind leader merged with the shadows. He became one with the wind, channeling his condensed Qi into the tip of his weapon. "Ghost Strike: Heart-Piercing Needle!" He materialized instantly from Wang Gu's blind spot, driving his dagger toward the elder's spine in a silent attack designed to bore through solid diamond.
Three high-tier Qi Condensation techniques converged on a single target from three distinct angles. It was a textbook, lethal execution.
Yet Wang Gu remained entirely unfazed.
Even as the illusion warped his vision, the blood-blades rained from above, and the lethal thrust closed in on his back, the Fourth Elder moved with absolute composure. Keeping his left hand tucked casually behind his back beneath his flowing silk robes, he took a single, precise step to the side.
SHING!
His spiritual sword moved in a pristine, circular arc. Rather than a simple block, he parried the exact tip of the blind leader's thrust. The kinetic recoil shattered the bones in the blind leader's arm, sending a violent shockwave through his meridians.
"AHHH!" the blind boss shrieked as his weapon was forced straight into the earth, throwing him completely off balance.
Without breaking momentum, Wang Gu spun his wrist, tracing a complex defensive matrix in the air.
CLANG-CLANG-CLANG-CLANG!
A rapid, rhythmic melody of clashing steel rang through the clearing. Wang Gu intercepted every single blood-red dagger from the Asura's Crimson Rain. He used no massive defensive shield; he simply deflected each projectile with the tip of his sword, sending them flying harmlessly into the distance to explode against the distant mountain rocks.
The Peak-stage boss gasped, his chest heaving as his ultimate technique was dismantled like child's play. "Monster..."
"Your illusions are mere child's play before my spiritual eye," Wang Gu's voice resonated through the chaos.
Before the eyeloop boss could deactivate his domain, Wang Gu flicked his fingers. A concentrated shard of crimson Qi detached from his sword and shot forward like a sniper bullet, piercing the violet dome.
CRACK!
The illusion shattered like brittle glass. The Qi shard continued its path, slamming directly into the mechanical eyeloop and detonating the lens inside the boss's socket.
"MY EYE!" the late-stage boss shrieked, clutching his bleeding face as his cultivation base backfired violently, rupturing his veins.
In a matter of seconds, their ultimate combination attack had been completely dismantled. Wang Gu stood calmly in the center of the clearing, his grand silk robes settling gently around him, entirely untouched.
Silence fell over the scorched clearing.
The heavy mist hung motionless in the air, but the quiet was shattered moments later by faint, frantic footsteps echoing from a hundred meters deep within the dense forest.
Wang Gu's eyes narrowed, his razor-sharp gaze piercing straight through the thick fog. He spotted Ren and Tao. Stripped of their former arrogance, the two Netherworld Sect agents were fleeing for their lives, their dark robes fluttering wildly as they leaped over exposed roots.
"Did I give you permission to leave?" the Fourth Elder barked.
The sheer acoustic weight of his voice, laced with concentrated Qi, caught up to the fleeing pair instantly, striking their ears like a crack of thunder.
"No..." Ren whimpered, his knees buckling under the psychological pressure as he collapsed onto the damp forest floor. "I don't want to die! I don't want to die here!"
Tao spun around, hauling Ren up by his collar with frantic urgency. "Get up, you fool! Move! We need to leave right now!"
Back in the clearing, Wang Gu lowered his stance slightly, his fingers tightening around the hilt of his blade.
The immediate area fell into a chilling, absolute stillness. He shifted into a fluid offensive posture, the tip of his sword angled toward the earth.
"Crimson Whip of Embers," Gu whispered softly.
VMMM!
A volatile, golden-red Qi erupted along the length of his blade, coiling around the steel like a living, crackling serpent. His aura bloomed outward, radiating a heat so intense it instantly dried the mud beneath his boots.
What pure, terrifyingly compressed Qi... the Peak-stage bandit boss thought, staring at the glowing blade in absolute despair.
"What do we do?" the eyeloop boss stammered, blood leaking through his fingers as he clutched his face. "What else do we have?!"
They had nothing left. Their Dantians were dry, their artifact weapons broken, and their eyes held only the hollow dread of impending death.
"I should have never taken this contract..." the blind leader muttered, his voice cracking as he held his broken arm against his chest. "All my men are dead... and the clients have abandoned us..."
As the elder's killing intent peaked, the blind leader's survival instincts overrode his remaining pride. He dropped his weapon entirely, falling to his knees in desperate compliance.
"Senior! Have mercy!" he cried out, bowing his head to the dirt. "I will do anything! I will become your servant! I will give you everything I own!"
The other two bosses turned to him in shock. "You bastard..." the Peak-stage boss hissed through his teeth.
Wang Gu's breathing remained slow, deliberate, and perfectly controlled. He did not even look at the kneeling mercenary.
"It is far too late," the elder said simply.
With an explosive burst of movement, Wang Gu slashed his blade forward. His wrist blurred, tracing an interlocking matrix of golden-red light through the air, before he pivoted his entire body in a powerful, sweeping arc to release the full force of the Crimson Whip of Embers.
In an instant, concentrated shockwaves of intense Qi lashed across the clearing like a web of searing threads.
SPURT!
The glowing threads passed clean through the three bandit bosses, bisecting their bodies instantly before the intense heat turned their remains to ash. The slashes surged onward, tearing a hundred-meter trench through the bedrock and cleanly felling every ancient tree in their path.
The wave of destruction passed mere inches above the unconscious Wang Zhi—leaving his robes and hair entirely unscathed—before screaming down the forest corridor straight toward the fleeing agents.
Hearing the catastrophic rumble closing in from behind, Tao's blood ran cold.
"No... NO!" he screamed in terror.
He thrust his hand into his inner pocket, pulled out his final, highest-grade defensive talisman, and poured every drop of his remaining Qi into the paper. The talisman dissolved into a shimmering dome of golden energy.
BOOM!
The residual waves of the elder's sword technique slammed into the golden barrier, throwing up a massive cloud of dust and earth.
Tao panted heavily, a brief wave of relief washing over him as the shield held.
The relief lasted less than a second.
CRACK!
A sharp, distinct fracture split the center of the dome.
"No... No, no, no!" Tao panicked, his face draining of color. He desperately attempted to wring more spiritual energy from his drained Dantian, but the barrier continued to splinter rapidly. "Hold! Maintain!" he screamed until his voice went hoarse.
SHATTER!
The barrier dissolved into a shower of useless sparks. Tao's eyes widened as the remaining heat pressure rushed toward his chest. Realizing the futility of resistance, his arms fell to his sides and his eyes closed. He stood frozen in the forest, awaiting for death.
One second passed. Then another.
The expected strike never landed.
Instead, a deep, smooth voice echoed from the canopy above, carrying a chilling resonance that instantly snuffed out the remaining embers in the air:
"Fellow Daoist... are you attempting to openly provoke the Netherworld Sect?"