In the ruins of the teahouse, rubble continued to fall with a soft rustle, kicking up a choking cloud of dust.
Finn's voice wasn't loud, yet it struck the dead silence like a boulder, sending shockwaves through everyone's heart. The remaining members of the Trident League, their faces still frozen in terror from Valerius Caedo's demonic power, were now shattered by the calm, yet infinitely domineering, words from Finn.
Talk?
In the face of absolute power, what was there to talk about?
"Insolence!"
A weak yet venomous roar came from the ruins. Elder Horace struggled to his feet, covered in blood, his arms twisted at unnatural angles. His opulent elder's robes were torn to shreds, leaving him as pathetic as a stray dog. He stared at Finn, his eyes burning with a mad hatred. "You killed men of my Trident League and you want to talk? None of you will leave Silverwood Prefecture alive today!"
As his voice fell, the uniform sound of clanking armor plates suddenly echoed from all directions, a heavy and oppressive sound, like a sudden storm of steel.
From the ends of the street, waves of the League's heavily armored elite soldiers surged forward, their long spears like a forest, their shields forming an impenetrable iron wall. On the surrounding rooftops, nearly a hundred archers appeared in unison with a soft swoosh. The cold tips of their arrows glinted ominously in the afternoon sun, all aimed squarely at Finn and his group below.
An even deeper, colder aura rose from the reinforcing troops. A stern-faced, middle-aged man in fitted blue attire, wielding a long halberd that radiated a frosty air, stepped out from the crowd. His pace was not fast, but each step seemed to land on everyone's heartbeat, carrying a suffocating sense of pressure.
This was the Trident League's final Champion expert, Sirus "The Frost-Halberd" Vane.
Behind him followed three towering, formidable figures. They were three brothers, nearly identical in height and build, all wearing heavy ironwood armor and each carrying a massive mountain-cleaving axe. Their auras were linked, as if they were one entity, and the combined pressure they exuded, as solid as a mountain, was no less than that of a newly ascended Champion.
The three Ironwood Brothers, three peak Mortal Rank 10 experts, whose combined attack technique was powerful enough to contend with a Champion!
It was a kill zone.
"Finn Adler," Sirus Vane's voice was as cold as the halberd in his hand, "sever your own arm and kneel for mercy, and I might consider leaving you with a whole corpse."
Finn seemed not to see the airtight encirclement around him, nor did he pay any mind to Sirus's condescending proclamation. He simply raised The Crimson Tear in his hand, its dark red blade reflecting his impassive face.
"Take one strike from me," he said, his voice not loud, but it clearly cut through all the noise. "And this matter will be over."
Horace laughed maniacally, as if he had heard the world's greatest joke. "Hahahaha... a wet-behind-the-ears child who has just stepped into the Champion realm dares to make such arrogant claims! Sirus, don't waste your breath on him! Fire! Turn him into a porcupine!"
A cold light flashed in Sirus's eyes, and he swung his arm down sharply!
"Loose!"
SWISH! SWISH! SWISH—!
The dense sound of arrows tearing through the air instantly ripped the atmosphere apart! Hundreds of arrows formed a cloud of death that blotted out the sun, descending from all directions with a piercing whistle!
"Caedo, protect them."
Finn's voice remained calm. The moment he spoke, he moved.
Not back, but forward!
His figure blurred into a bloody afterimage, charging head-on into the rain of arrows!
Ting! Ting! Ting! Ting!
The Crimson Tear in his hand became a blur of dark red light, an impenetrable wheel. Each slash of the blade precisely struck an incoming arrow, splitting it in two. The storm of arrows couldn't even get within three feet of him!
At the same time, with a backhand strike, he unleashed a blade of solidified, blood-red energy. It soared into the sky with a tyrannical force that could sever anything in its path, instantly sweeping across the rooftops to the east!
Thwip! Thwip! Thwip!
Nearly twenty archers were cut in half at the waist before they could even scream. A mist of blood erupted, and severed limbs rained down from the sky.
On the other side, Valerius Caedo simply raised a hand and made a grasping motion at the sky. An invisible force field instantly spread out. All arrows aimed in his direction froze bizarrely in mid-air before crumbling into dust and drifting to the ground.
"You're courting death!"
The three Ironwood Brothers roared, all three of them exploding with power simultaneously, the flagstones beneath their feet shattering! In a triangular formation, like three moving iron mountains, they swung their mountain-cleaving axes at Finn from three different angles, the wind from their strikes tearing through the air!
Their combined attack sealed off all escape routes!
However, just as the three massive axes were about to strike, the domineering crimson light in Finn's eyes blazed to life!
The Eightfold Path of the Asura Blade.
The Crimson Tear in his hand let out a hum of longing, as if from an ancient battlefield.
There was no earth-shattering aura, no flashy, spectacular technique.
There was only a single slash, executed with the ultimate speed and the ultimate purity.
The flash of the blade was like a bolt of blood-red lightning splitting the darkness, gone in an instant.
Time seemed to freeze at that moment.
The charging forms of the three Ironwood Brothers were frozen in mid-air. The ferocious expressions on their faces had yet to fade, but their eyes were already filled with endless confusion and terror.
The next instant, three lines of blood bloomed from their waists simultaneously.
Crack.
With a crisp snap, the three massive bodies, along with the indestructible mountain-cleaving axes in their hands, were all neatly severed into six pieces, the cuts as smooth as a mirror. Their upper and lower bodies separated, and their internal organs, mixed with blood, spilled onto the ground with a wet slap.
One strike, an instant kill!
The entire street fell into a deathly silence.
"Will... Will of the Blade..." Elder Horace stammered, his mind reeling. The madness and venom on his face were replaced by a bone-deep fear. He stared at Finn as if at a monster wearing human skin. "Impossible... you've only just reached the Champion realm... how could you possibly comprehend a state that only a Grandmaster can touch?!"
He was terrified.
The young man before him was no genius; he was a prodigy, a monster! The kind of monster that, once offended, had to be annihilated at all costs, or he would bring ruin upon the entire sect!
The thought of retreat grew wildly in his mind.
"Sir!" Horace's attitude did a complete one-eighty, his voice even taking on a fawning tone. "This is all a misunderstanding! My Trident League is willing to offer... no! Double! Double the price! As long as you are willing to let this go, we..."
"I said," Finn interrupted, the dark red blade slowly pointing at the space between Horace's brows, "take one strike from me."
Horace's face instantly turned ashen. He knew there was no room for negotiation.
"AHHHH—!"
Driven to desperation, Horace erupted in a final, mad frenzy. He poured all his remaining True Qi into his one good left palm. His entire hand turned blood-red, like a searing brand, and he met Finn's advance with the desperate finality of someone determined to burn everything to the ground!
Finn's eyes, however, were completely indifferent.
Within him, The Violet Twilight Force and the killing intent of the Asura Blade merged in an unprecedented, perfect fusion along the blade of The Crimson Tear.
The Divinity Cleaver.
Slowly, he executed his second strike.
This strike was slow, so slow that everyone present could clearly see the trajectory of the blade as it cut through the air.
But they all had the same illusion—it wasn't the blade that was moving, but the entire world that was willingly moving towards its edge!
Horace's furious palm strike, before that blade, was as fragile as a soap bubble in the sun, silently annihilated.
The madness in his eyes froze.
The terror froze.
A thin line of blood slowly traced its way down from between his brows, over the bridge of his nose, his lips, his chin, and down to his chest...
His entire body was perfectly split in two.
The two halves slowly fell to either side.
Cough.
A trickle of blood escaped Finn's lips. Forcibly executing a blade art beyond his current realm had, after all, caused a slight backlash.
He raised a hand and wiped away the blood, his gaze passing over the field of corpses to land on the boy who Sirus Vane was shielding, his face pale with fright—Jace Vance.
The hand Sirus Vane held his halberd with was trembling slightly.
Finn didn't spare him another glance, simply stating calmly, "Hand him over."
...
A few moments later, a new carriage slowly departed from the blood-soaked street.
Finn, Caedo, Isolde, and the rescued Jace Vance were all on board.
The thousand-strong elite of the Trident League, along with their Champion expert Sirus Vane, watched them leave. Not a single person dared to step forward and stop them.
On this day, a legend named Faelan "Crimson Snow" began to quietly circulate in the underworld of the Savage Reach.