Chapter 733: Reporting Back
"Dare to steal my pig?"
Mo Hua's voice was crisp and carried a faint disdain.
The Broken Gold Sect senior knelt before him, humiliated to the core.
He had been blown up by an array, hacked by blades and axes, and even poisoned. His body was covered in wounds.
But as a late Foundation Establishment cultivator, his foundation was solid. The injuries were serious but not fatal.
Still, he was a tough one. Grinding his teeth, he spat out:
"You little bastards!"
Cheng Mo immediately gave him a solid slap across the face.
Blood dribbled from the senior's mouth, his eyes full of hatred. Yet he still refused to back down, snarling:
"A tiger fallen from grace, captured by a bunch of cubs—I accept my loss! But this debt… I will repay it! Just you wait!"
Mo Hua raised an eyebrow.
So tough?
He asked, curious, "Aren't you afraid we'll just kill you?"
A little lesson was one thing…
But indeed…
The Broken Gold senior's chest tightened. His face twitched, but he still forced a cold, defiant sneer.
"This humiliation—I'll return it a hundredfold!"
…They really couldn't kill him.
Mo Hua fell silent in thought.
What was there to be smug about while kneeling?
"If your Broken Gold Sect was so amazing, you wouldn't be kneeling in front of me right now."
The realization sank in.
If it were a demonic or criminal cultivator, it'd be different. But this guy was from the Broken Gold Sect, one of the Twelve Second-Tier Sects in Ganxue Prefecture. He hadn't violated any major Dao laws either. If Mo Hua killed him, the Broken Gold Sect would definitely come for answers.
The senior was furious but helpless. He could only suffer Cheng Mo's rough treatment, shame and rage twisting his face.
"I won't let you off!"
Mo Hua asked casually, "Wanna kill him?"
Then added seriously, "Strip him naked, hang him from a tree, and draw a turtle on his chest."
"He robbed us, then got robbed in return. Got beat down, and now he's even kneeling... pathetic."
The Broken Gold senior sneered, "You don't dare to kill me."
Mo Hua raised a brow—oh? Want to test that theory?
Cheng Mo, annoyed by his smugness, said:
"Little senior brother, are we really not killing him?"
Mo Hua curled his lip, utterly unimpressed.
The Broken Gold senior's eyes reddened. "You ambushed us like cowards! If it had been a fair fight—"
He became more and more convinced that Mo Hua wouldn't kill him and grew even more brazen.
Cheng Mo shook his head.
He might be reckless, but he wasn't stupid.
"Kid, I'll give you a warning. You don't know what kind of trouble you're asking for, messing with the Broken Gold Sect!"
Demon-Taming Mountain may have lots of beasts and dangers, but it wasn't lawless.
The Broken Gold senior got so worked up he spat blood.
Mo Hua shrugged. "Please. If we're talking about cowardice, we still can't beat you lot."
Killing him would cause too much trouble—with the Broken Gold Sect, the Great Void Sect, the Dao Court, even Cheng Mo's own clan.
"You outnumbered us and still shamelessly snatched a beast from junior disciples."
And again—this was Demon-Taming Mountain.
Cheng Mo didn't hesitate—he stripped the senior's robes and tied him up with a spirit-binding rope, preparing to hang him from a tree.
The Dao Court wouldn't ignore something like this either.
"Kneeling's fine—but stripped, hanging from a tree with a turtle drawn on your chest? Now that's humiliation."
"Got it!"
Mo Hua was speechless. "Are we children? 'Dishonorable ambush' this, 'cowardly tactics' that. You're so childish it's embarrassing. What did you cultivate, dog logic?"
"Do you grow taller when you eat, but your brain doesn't grow with it?"
This kind of humiliation was worse than death!
"You little brats, how dare you?!" the Broken Gold senior shouted.
He was just talking big.
Mo Hua said kindly, "Then you'd better be careful next time. If you're this useless again and fall into my hands, I'll make you kneel a hundred times—and draw a hundred turtles on you."
He sighed. "I really did overestimate the disciples of the Broken Gold Sect."
"Tie him up, hang him, draw the turtle."
The senior froze—and then his face completely changed.
"I prepared all those tactics and you still lost out to someone who's worth less than the pig I killed…"
Hao Xuan reminded, "You'd better stop now, little senior brother. Say one more word and he's gonna drop dead from rage."
Wouldn't be good if words, not weapons, were what killed him.
The Dao Court wouldn't be happy with that either.
"Oh."
Mo Hua glanced at the tied-up senior, pale and barely breathing.
Finally, he stopped.
But keeping his promise, he dipped a brush in spiritual ink and carefully drew a very realistic turtle on the man's chest.
He was very pleased with his work.
The senior's eyes rolled back—and he fainted from sheer rage.
"Is he dead?" Situ Jian asked.
Mo Hua checked. "Still breathing."
"Good."
"Clean up. Let's move."
"Got it!"
The group then started sweeping the battlefield. But halfway through looting, someone asked:
"Wait… are we allowed to take their storage bags?"
"I think… probably not…"
Situ Jian pondered, "Beating up disciples from the Broken Gold Sect might create grudges, sure—but nothing too serious."
"But stealing their storage bags? That's outright robbery. That crosses a line."
"Plus, what if they have sect secrets or inheritance items in there—like the Broken Gold Sword Command? They could accuse us of stealing their heritage!"
"And if they're shameless enough to claim we took their sect's sacred techniques… we're screwed."
Everyone nodded.
Mo Hua nodded guiltily.
Because, well… he had taken their sect's sword technique.
The jade slip containing the Broken Gold Sword Command was already resting safely in his Storage Ring.
Can't let the "Petty Sect" know about that…
Mo Hua said solemnly, "We're decent people. No robbery—just taking back what's rightfully ours."
"If people don't mess with us, we won't mess with them."
"But if they do? We strip them, hang them, and draw turtles."
Everyone nodded. "Little senior brother is right!"
After that, they gathered all the materials from the Pig-Head Demon Beast, but returned the Broken Gold disciples' storage bags.
With everything wrapped up, they left Demon-Taming Mountain under the cover of night.
As for whether those Broken Gold disciples might get eaten by beasts afterward—
Well, Mo Hua didn't really care.
He didn't kill them. If they got eaten, they probably deserved it.
That said, Mo Hua still had a conscience. Before leaving, he even fed them each a healing pill—just in case they actually kicked the bucket.
Sometime after Mo Hua and his group left, the medicinal effects began to take hold.
The Broken Gold disciples stirred, slowly waking up.
And then they saw… their revered, awe-inspiring senior brother—
Stripped naked, dangling from a tree, with a turtle drawn on his chest—looking just like a complete clown.
They were all stunned.
"Senior brother, you…"
The senior awoke, roaring in fury, "Why are you just standing there?! Get me down!"
The disciples scrambled to release him.
"Senior brother, who did this to you?!"
"I blacked out in one hit—I didn't see anything…"
"I just saw a blur of figures—were we attacked by a whole group of Foundation-Late cultivators?"
Someone spoke gravely, "If even Senior Brother Jin couldn't fight back and was humiliated like this, then the other side must've had multiple late Foundation cultivators…"
"Senior Brother Jin…"
"Shut the hell up, all of you!!"
"Everyone shut the hell up!"
The Broken Gold Sect senior, surnamed Jin, roared.
Each word from those disciples was like a dagger stabbing into his chest.
He felt humiliated and furious beyond reason, his chest tightening with rage—he couldn't help but cough up another mouthful of blood.
The night deepened. The forest was cold and still, with the occasional low growl of a demonic beast.
The mountain air was growing more dangerous by the moment.
"Let's go back first. This debt—we will settle it!"
His eyes gleamed with venom.
The other disciples, now terrified into silence, supported each other as they headed down the mountain.
Once they were gone, a shadow stirred on the dark hillside.
Xun Ziyou slowly stepped out from the gloom and sighed softly.
He hadn't even needed to act.
A late Foundation Establishment senior from the Broken Gold Sect, leading seven mid-stage Foundation disciples—wiped out just like that.
The methods were cruel, sure—but measured. No one had actually been killed.
Still, where on earth had that kid learned such devious tactics?
He looked so clean and obedient, yet his actions were sly and ruthless, full of hidden tricks and wicked schemes...
Xun Ziyou shook his head and thought:
"But maybe that's not a bad thing. At least he's not someone who lets others trample him. Even if bullied, he doesn't need a sect elder to stand up for him—he'll get his revenge himself…"
That was rare and valuable.
Principled yet pragmatic. Lawful, but unbound by dogma. Able to bend, yet not break.
Suddenly, Xun Ziyou felt a bit wistful.
"Senior Brother Xuan back then had brilliant talent and unyielding character… But maybe it was that very inflexibility that led to his downfall…"
"If only he hadn't been so rigid…"
Meanwhile, Mo Hua and his group returned to the sect as if nothing had happened.
The next day, Mo Hua was back to his usual routine—cultivating, attending class like a proper student.
From the shadows, Xun Ziyou quietly watched him. Mo Hua's expression was perfectly normal, as if last night never happened.
As if:
—He never killed a mid-stage Rank 2 pig demon.
—He was never ambushed by the Broken Gold Sect.
—He never turned the tables, beat the crap out of a late-stage Foundation senior, stripped him, hung him from a tree, and drew a turtle on his chest…
Xun Ziyou felt a bit helpless.
This kid… really had nerves of steel.
If he had slaughtered all those Broken Gold disciples last night, he'd still show up to class today without batting an eye.
Such composure… He's destined for great things.
Though… whether those things are good or evil—who could say?
Xun Ziyou turned away and headed to the Elder Hall to report to Old Master Xun.
But when he arrived, Xun Ziyou was stunned to find the old man standing frozen, holding a jade slip.
Old Master Xun's expression was visibly shaken, his hand trembling slightly.
Xun Ziyou had rarely seen him like this.
The old patriarch had lived long, always stern and reserved. His emotions almost never showed.
But now, his face was etched with shock.
Something big had clearly happened.
Xun Ziyou didn't dare step in. Afraid to catch his elder's ire, he stood like a wooden post outside the door.
Inside the room, Old Master Xun clutched the jade slip, a storm raging in his mind.
The disciple he had sent to investigate Mo Hua's background had just returned—with that jade slip.
Line by line, the contents hit like thunder:
Tongxian City, Mo Hua.
Rumored to have constructed a Grade-One Five Elements Demon-Slaughtering Array while still in Qi Refinement Realm, used it to slay the great demon Feng Xi, saving an entire city of cultivators.
After the array collapsed, he perished alongside Feng Xi.
But according to street rumors, when the array broke down, the heavens changed, tribulation lightning descended from the sky and circled three times above his head—yet not a single strike touched him…
…
Has a master—origin unknown.
Once went traveling, and returned at Foundation Establishment.
Now studies alone in Gan Prefecture.
Deeds engraved on the Demon-Suppressing Stele. Cultivators across a hundred-mile radius sing his praises…
Old Master Xun sucked in a cold breath.
Qi Refinement realm—setting up a grand formation—slaying a great demon—surviving tribulation lightning!
It all sounded like some ridiculous tale a storyteller would make up. Like a myth from the old cultivation legends—totally unbelievable.
People had no idea what kind of formation it was.
Nor did they understand what it meant for a Qi Refinement cultivator to build a formation of that scale.
And the great demon…
That was a being born from Dao-corruption, ruling an entire region. A terrifying threat to the Dao.
As for the tribulation lightning not harming him? That was pure fantasy.
Tribulation lightning is the will of the heavens—its power can erase anything under its laws.
Gods. Spirits. Dao-corrupted beasts. All are wiped out.
A mere Qi Refinement cultivator? They'd be obliterated in an instant.
To seasoned cultivators, this all sounded like nonsense.
But the person involved… was Mo Hua.
Old Master Xun's heart thudded.
He knew Mo Hua had exceptional spiritual sense.
And with a top-tier divine sense, theoretically, a Qi Refinement cultivator could build a high-level formation.
If he built the formation—he could fight the great demon.
If the formation collapsed and both perished, that also tracked.
And if tribulation lightning is designed to erase all within the laws—but his divine sense is beyond the laws…
Then surviving the lightning wasn't impossible either.
So, thinking from that angle—those absurd rumors… might actually make sense?
Old Master Xun's pupils trembled.
Suddenly, he realized that, from his lifelong understanding of cultivation, he had deduced a series of "facts" that completely contradicted his worldview… and yet seemed totally reasonable.
He could hardly believe it.
He re-read the jade slip word by word.
Each character made his eyelids twitch.
And then he noticed a single line:
"Has a master—origin unknown…"
What kind of master could produce such a disciple?
Then a horrifying guess struck him—one that made his scalp tingle.
This mysterious, nameless master… Could it be—
A figure suddenly flashed through his mind.
Dressed in white robes, impossibly handsome. Brows full of freedom, pride, and wild spirit—and a natural immortal aura of pure Dao.
A name, long buried in memory, resurfaced:
Zhuang Daoling!
Old Master Xun inhaled sharply, heart shaking.
Mo Hua… could he be his disciple?!
He's that man's disciple?!
Old Master Xun felt cold sweat trickling down his back.
This wasn't the first time he'd had such a suspicion.
When Mo Hua had first joined the sect, he'd vaguely sensed something.
Though the two looked very different—one wild and unrestrained, the other gentle and refined—and their temperaments also diverged greatly, there was something eerily similar.
That clarity of comprehension, the profound understanding of array fundamentals, and the affinity with the Dao itself… they were nearly identical.
A rogue cultivator from a minor immortal city—without guidance—couldn't possibly possess such a natural, Dao-harmonized aura.
But… how was that even possible?
Old Master Xun frowned deeply.
That man's standards were frighteningly high. Every one of his disciples had monstrous talent. Why would he take in a low-to-mid spiritual root disciple like Mo Hua?
Besides, after spending this time observing him, Old Master Xun was certain: the boy didn't know the Immortal Heaven Array System.
That made no sense.
Mo Hua's grasp of array theory and Dao comprehension was excellent—this was no casual teaching.
To instill such knowledge clearly showed the teacher intended to pass on all his skills.
But why… would he not teach the most important Immortal Heaven Array System?
Without that, how could it be called a true legacy?
Could it be… he hadn't had time yet?
Old Master Xun's pale brows furrowed. Then he sighed deeply.
Regardless—if Mo Hua really was that man's disciple—this would be a matter of heaven-shaking karma…
His heart felt heavy, even faintly uneasy.
When he finally came to his senses, he noticed a "wooden post" still standing in the doorway.
"Come in."
Old Master Xun quickly composed himself and said calmly.
Outside, Xun Ziyou felt the elder's presence return to its usual calm—no longer oppressive. He finally let out a breath and stepped respectfully into the room.
A young Dao attendant brought tea.
Xun Ziyou sipped a little nervously before finally speaking in a low voice, "Old Ancestor, you…"
He wanted to ask what had happened to shake the elder so profoundly…
But as the words reached his lips, he wisely swallowed them.
Disaster comes from loose lips. Less said, less wrong.
Old Master Xun scowled slightly. "Speak your mind. You're already an elder—don't act like some timid housewife."
Xun Ziyou winced and muttered, "It's about Mo Hua…"
But the moment those two words left his mouth, Old Master Xun's expression shifted drastically—and a powerful Void Tribulation aura briefly leaked out.
Xun Ziyou's heart leapt. "Old Ancestor—!"
The old man froze for a moment, then retracted his aura and asked evenly:
"What about Mo Hua?"
Xun Ziyou sighed. "Nothing serious. Just… the task you gave me to observe him. That child's methods are… a bit unusual."
Old Master Xun's brows twitched.
So Xun Ziyou explained everything he had seen at Demon Refining Mountain:
"His array drawing is excellent. Even among his peers, he commands respect…"
"Last night, he led four disciples to slay a mid-tier Rank 2 pig demon. The formation he used seemed to amplify spiritual power—I've never seen one like it…"
"Later, he clashed with disciples from the Broken Gold Sect."
"They were eight in total—including a late-stage Foundation senior. But they were no match at all."
"His array construction method was bizarre—he seemed to draw with his mind, using the ground as medium…"
Old Master Xun's eyes widened slightly.
An amplification array… drawing on the ground… forming with thought…
These unusual techniques—were exactly that man's style.
Piece by piece, it all aligned.
At this point, Old Master Xun could almost confirm that Mo Hua was Zhuang Daoling's personal disciple!
He sat dazed for a moment—still struggling to believe it—and filled with unanswered questions.
Why would that man's disciple end up in our Great Void Sect?
Why not the Heavenly Dao Sect?
Meanwhile, unaware of Old Master Xun's train of thought, Xun Ziyou raised his own suspicion:
"Those formations… and his method of setting them up… I've never seen anything like them. Could it be… you taught him?"
Old Master Xun frowned, just about to deny it—when a sudden thought occurred.
His expression shifted subtly. He glanced at Xun Ziyou with a meaningful look and said calmly:
"This matter—do not speak of it to anyone."
He didn't say yes. He didn't say no.
But Xun Ziyou thought he understood perfectly.
Ah! So the Old Ancestor taught him in secret!
Of course it couldn't be public—people would say he was playing favorites.
Even though… everyone already knew he played favorites.
Xun Ziyou nodded solemnly. "Don't worry, Old Ancestor! I won't breathe a word!"
Old Master Xun gave a small nod.
But Xun Ziyou couldn't help but ask, "…But Old Ancestor, do you actually know those techniques?"
Amplification arrays, spiritual sense-based array construction—he'd never seen the old man use anything like them.
If he didn't know them—how could he teach them?
Old Master Xun gave him a long, silent look.
Xun Ziyou tensed up and quickly chuckled awkwardly, "Of course, of course! The Old Ancestor's knowledge is boundless—how could I question it…"
Expressionless, Old Master Xun said nothing.
Xun Ziyou squirmed under his gaze, feeling like he was sitting on needles.
After a while, Old Master Xun finally waved him off. "Go handle your own affairs."
Xun Ziyou, as if pardoned from execution, instantly said:
"Then I won't disturb you further—this junior takes his leave!"
He didn't dare stay a second longer and rushed out of the room.
Inside, Old Master Xun sat alone in silence.
His thoughts churned, his expression shifting again and again.
If this truly involved that man… then the heavenly secrets entangled here were fathomless.
Too deep. The karma too vast.
His brow furrowed—then he stilled, eyes growing distant.
Perhaps… there was another possibility.
This "destiny" was simply too terrifying…
(End of chapter)