The atmosphere inside the Azure Mysterious Ancient Kingdom's heavenly grotto had transcended mere tension; it had become a suffocating solid, a gravity well that pressed against the very souls of those watching.
High above the ruined courtyard, an Ancient Saint—a fossil from a bygone era, his blood energy usually vast enough to eclipse the sun—was trembling. His face, weathered by thousands of years of cultivation, was twisted in a grimace of sheer desperation.
He realized, with a dawning horror that froze his marrow, that they could not win.
"Retreat!" the Ancient Saint snarled, his voice cracking with urgency. "Preserve the bloodline—!"
With a roar that shook the surrounding spatial fabric, he clenched his teeth and threw out a high-grade life-saving treasure. It was an ancient bronze mirror, swirling with chaotic runes, designed to twist the coordinates of the void and open an instant escape tunnel through the domain.
The mirror flared, its light piercing the gloom, seeking a path to the outside world.
Ling Feng, standing amidst the rubble with his hands in his pockets, looked up. He didn't circulate a technique. He didn't chant a mantra. He simply looked bored.
"Going somewhere?"
He raised his right hand and made a closing motion, like he was crushing a soda can.
Click.
The Green Chaos Emerald within his Inner Void pulsed once.
Space didn't just bend; it solidified. The surrounding void, usually pliable to an Ancient Saint, instantly hardened into an impenetrable cage of absolute stasis.
Crack!
The ancient bronze mirror, a treasure that had survived wars between kingdoms, shattered in mid-air like cheap glass dropped on concrete. The spatial backlash didn't dissipate; Ling Feng forced it back onto the caster.
"No—!"
The backlash slammed into the Ancient Saint. There was no time to scream. His protective Dao Laws crumbled like wet paper, and his body detonated into a fine, red mist.
Ling Feng dusted off his hands, his expression indifferent. "Next."
The remaining Ancient Saints of the Azure Mysterious Ancient Kingdom felt their scalps go numb. They were old monsters, beings who had slaughtered thousands to reach their current heights. But this… this was not cultivation. This was bullying.
"Kill him!" one roared, burning his Longevity Blood. "Joint formation! Burn the Ancestral Foundation!"
Desperation drove them to madness. Three Ancient Saints moved in unison, their Fate Palaces appearing behind their heads—massive, majestic structures that poured down waterfalls of Worldly Energy. They unleashed a joint killing formation, a technique capable of grinding continents into dust.
Ling Feng didn't dodge. He didn't summon a shield.
He just let his aura leak.
The Chaos Force.
It wasn't the aggressive, sharp pressure of Spirit Energy. It was a heavy, alien density—like the gravity of a collapsing star suddenly appearing in the living room.
"Down," Ling Feng said.
It wasn't a command to them. It was a command to reality.
BOOM!
The attacking Ancient Saints didn't just fall; they were smashed.
Their knees hit the fractured stone floor with a sickening crunch that echoed through the silent city. It wasn't that they wanted to kneel; it was that the air above them had suddenly become heavier than Mount Tai.
"Urgh... Ahhh!"
They screamed as their protective barriers shattered. The difference in "weight" was absolute. It was the difference between their ancient, arrogant Dao and something alien sitting above them like a ruler on a table.
Crack. Snap. Splat.
Physically, their bodies couldn't withstand the proximity to Ling Feng's unfiltered existence. Their bones turned to powder. Their Life Wheels, spinning frantically to generate power, stalled and burst under the pressure.
One by one, the Ancient Saints of a majestic kingdom exploded into horrific mists of blood and bone shards, painting the ruined grotto in grim colors.
Ling Feng stood in the center of the carnage, not a drop of blood on his gray robes. He glanced at the crumbling remains of the last Ancient Saint with a look of mild disappointment.
"Weak," he muttered. "Not even enough for a warm-up."
He cleared his throat, amplifying his voice with a touch of Chaos Energy. It carried through the heavenly grotto, pierced the defensive formations, and rolled out into the watching Ancient Sky City like a thunderclap.
"Listen up," he said. His tone wasn't the archaic, booming voice of an Immortal Emperor. It was casual, like a guy shouting across the street to a neighbor. "Azure Mysterious Ancient Kingdom—you guys are officially on my list."
His eyes swept the distant rooftops outside the grotto, where countless cultivators—Royal Nobles, Enlightened Beings, and hidden masters—stood with pale faces.
"And the only reason your whole kingdom is still standing right now..." Ling Feng smiled, a gentle expression that terrified them more than a scowl, "...is because I'm saving you. I want my sect and my women to crush you with their own hands later. Consider it a reservation."
Behind him, the captive Nine Saint Demon Gate elder was trembling so hard his teeth clicked together audibly.
Ling Feng continued, his voice light but carrying an undertone of absolute finality. "If you or the Heavenly God Sect try something funny again... I don't mind wiping you off the map early. Don't be a clown. Stay in your lane."
Silence followed.
It wasn't the silence of respect. It was the silence of a predator entering a room full of prey. Even the spirit beasts hiding in the distant mountains stopped breathing, their instincts screaming at them to play dead.
Then—a ripple tore across the sky.
RUMBLE.
A presence arrived—vast, ancient, and furious. It rolled over the city like a tsunami, crushing the wills of weaker cultivators instantly.
A man stepped out of the void, his robes whipping around him in a frenzy. Hovering beside him was a terrifying treasure—a clay jar sealed with layers of golden talismans, emanating a stench of rot and death so potent it withered the plants on the ground below.
His aura was not merely Ancient Saint. It had begun to fuse with the Grand Dao.
Nantian Hudu. The National Teacher of the Southern Heavenly Kingdom. A legendary genius with Eight Fate Palaces, who had reached the realm of Grand Dao Saint.
His eyes were bloodshot, burning with the rage of a man who had lost his legacy.
"You killed Nantian!" he thundered, his voice shaking the walls of the grotto. "You slaughtered my kingdom's hope! You junior animal! Today I will grind your bones to dust and refine your soul for ten thousand years!"
The pressure of a Grand Dao Saint descended. Onlookers in the city coughed blood, forced to their knees by the sheer spiritual weight.
Ling Feng stared at him for a second. He blinked.
Then, he rubbed his forehead like he had a migraine.
"Man," he muttered, shaking his head. "You guys really love the dramatic entrances. Always showing up late to the party."
"Die!" Nantian Hudu roared.
His aura surged. Eight Fate Palaces rose behind him like skyscrapers, blindingly bright. He raised his hand to unseal the clay jar—a Forbidden Treasure containing a horror capable of devouring a city.
"Junior, face the wrath of the Southern Heavenly—"
Ling Feng lifted his hand.
He didn't summon a sword. He didn't activate a physique.
He just extended two fingers, pointing them like a child playing cops and robbers.
"Bang."
Inside his Inner Void, the Yellow Chaos Emerald thrummed.
It was the mastery of Energy and Electromagnetism. The Chaos Force bypassed the laws of the Nine Worlds, ignoring the need for chanting or gathering potential.
ZZZT.
A single bolt of lightning snapped into existence.
It wasn't the thick, roaring lightning of a Heavenly Tribulation. It was thin, yellow, and silent. It looked almost harmless.
But it moved at the speed of light—not the dampened "light speed" of the cultivation world, but true, physics-breaking velocity.
It hit Nantian Hudu before his brain could even register the flash.
There was no battle. No exchange of moves. No desperate struggle of Dao Laws.
The lightning simply erased the space he occupied.
Nantian Hudu's protective barrier, his Eight Fate Palaces, his Grand Dao laws, and his physical body—all of it was overridden by the absolute energy authority of the Chaos Emerald.
Poof.
Flesh, bones, spirit, True Fate—gone.
The clay jar screamed, a high-pitched wail as the entity inside tried to protect itself.
The lightning touched it too.
The jar shattered into dust. The talismans burned into nothingness. The horror inside was vaporized before it could even manifest.
A second later, a thunderclap finally caught up to the visual, shaking the entire city.
BOOM!
Where a Grand Dao Saint had stood a moment ago, there was now only a scorch mark in the air and the smell of ozone.
Ling Feng blew on his fingers, as if cooling a smoking gun.
"See?" he said to the watching city, his tone almost friendly, contrasting sharply with the annihilation he had just dispensed. "I don't mind flattening a kingdom either. Don't test me."
Then, he let a little more Chaos Force slip—just enough to send a message.
Somewhere far away, hidden in the void, old monsters—Virtuous Paragons who had been spying with divine sense—felt it. They went stiff.
Even those nearing the Heavenly King level felt their throats tighten. Because they recognized the truth: that lightning wasn't a technique. It was a command. This boy wasn't playing by their rules.
Ling Feng turned back to his group, treating the erasure of a Heavenly Sovereign like annoying background noise.
"Good work, ladies," he said, his voice instantly shifting from cold indifference to warmth.
He stepped over the rubble and approached Li Shuangyan first. The icy beauty, usually as approachable as a glacier, stood amidst the ruins, her Pure Jade Physique humming with the residual power of the Chaos Force he had shared with her.
"Shuangyan," he murmured, his hand reaching out to touch the veil covering her face. His fingers were gentle, a stark contrast to the hand that had just crushed Ancient Saints. "Beautiful execution today."
He lifted the corner of her veil. Li Shuangyan's eyes, usually sharp and proud, wavered. Before she could protest, he leaned in and captured her lips.
It wasn't a chaste peck. It was possessive, deep, and infused with Chaos Energy that made her aura flicker wildly.
When he pulled back, Li Shuangyan's face was flushed. She adjusted her veil quickly, her voice trying to maintain its cool dignity but failing. "Young Noble... enjoys provoking death."
Ling Feng grinned and pivoted to Chen Baojiao. The Supreme beauty of the Tyrannical Valley was breathing hard, her eyes shining with the thrill of battle.
"And you," he said, poking her forehead. "You are an absolute menace. I love it."
Baojiao laughed, a bright, bell-like sound amidst the carnage. She grabbed his collar, pulling him down slightly. "Hmph. Tell me something I don't know, Feng. Did you see that last one? I crushed his sternum."
"I saw," he said, and kissed her—quick, teasing, but full of affection. "Savage."
She looked far too pleased with herself.
Then, Ling Feng turned to Xu Pei. The gentle girl stood a little uncertainly near the back, her cheeks flushed, her eyes still wide with the adrenaline of the fight.
Ling Feng's expression softened completely. He walked over and brushed a stray lock of hair behind her ear.
"Pei," he said softly. "You kept up perfectly. You were amazing out there."
Xu Pei's breath caught in her throat. She looked at him with sheer adoration. "Feng..."
He kissed her gently, a stabilizing touch that stopped her trembling hands. The chaotic energy around them seemed to calm down just for her.
Finally, his gaze slid to Bai Jianzhen.
The Prime Descendant of the Divine Sword Sacred Ground stood apart, hugging her black sword. She was watching him like she watched everything: carefully, quietly, without wasting a single muscle movement.
Ling Feng smiled at her. It was a genuine, inviting smile.
"What?" he asked, tilting his head. "Feeling left out? Want one too?"
Bai Jianzhen's eyes narrowed a fraction. Her grip on her sword tightened.
"...Shameless," she said, her voice crisp and emotionless.
Chen Baojiao cackled loudly. Li Shuangyan rolled her eyes, though a faint smile tugged at her lips.
Ling Feng laughed, genuinely amused. "Fair enough. Maybe next time."
He clapped his hands once, the sound echoing through the ruined hall. "Alright, romance later. Let's get the bag."
He looked around at the burning halls of the Heavenly Grotto. The vault doors were broken, revealing mountains of refined jades. Treasure storehouses were shattered, with ancestral weapons lying in heaps and secret manuals half-exposed behind collapsing walls.
"A huge haul from all these dead fools," Ling Feng said, rubbing his hands together. "We're gonna be rich. Like, a few years worth rich."
The Nine Saint elder behind him made a strangled sound. "T-this... Young Noble, this is the Azure Mysterious Ancient Kingdom's accumulation of—"
"—stuff?" Ling Feng finished. "Yeah. It's ours now."
He grinned, his eyes bright with that relaxed, modern mischief that didn't belong in the stiff, face-obsessed Nine Worlds.
"Consider it interest," he said, kicking a piece of rubble. "They charged you guys a lot over the years. I'm just balancing the books."
He glanced at the four women, his eyes twinkling. "And I can already see Yonghuang's face when we get back to the sect with all this loot."
Baojiao's grin turned feral. "She'll think the sky fell. She might actually faint."
Xu Pei giggled despite herself, covering her mouth.
Li Shuangyan's eyes softened at the thought of her sect elders' shock. "The Elders will likely have heart demons trying to process this."
Bai Jianzhen simply said, calm as always: "If there are more enemies, call me."
Ling Feng nodded, satisfied.
"Trust me," he said, looking at the horizon where the sun was beginning to set over the ruined city. "After today... plenty of people are going to line up to be stupid. And we'll be ready."
Then, with the Azure Mysterious Ancient Kingdom's heavenly grotto burning behind them and the entire Ancient Sky City staring in stunned silence—
Ling Feng rolled his shoulders, stretched his neck, and smiled.
"Alright," he said. "Let's clean this place out. Even the floor tiles. Take everything."
...
Ling Feng's name didn't just spread. It detonated.
Within a single day, the rumors that had begun as panicked shouts in Ancient Sky City turned into a tidal wave that swept across the Grand Middle Territory, crashing against the borders of the Hundred Cities in the east.
At first, the stories were fragmented, sounding like the ravings of madmen.
"Cleansing Incense Ancient Sect's prime disciple went mad in the Heavenly God Sect's heavenly grotto—"
Then, the details grew teeth.
"—no, forget 'mad'. He flattened the place. Literally leveled it."
"The Heavenly God Sect's divine runes were burned to ash. Their ancestral altar cracked in half!"
Then Azure Mysterious was dragged into the narrative, adding a layer of impossible horror.
"He didn't stop there. He went straight to the Azure Mysterious Ancient Kingdom's heavenly grotto and destroyed that as well."
And then, someone added the final stone to the cairn of disbelief.
"The Southern Heavenly Kingdom's National Teacher rushed over. Nantian Hudu. A Grand Dao Saint, eight palaces—one move."
"What do you mean 'one move'?"
"...He died. Instantly. Vaporized."
Every time the story was retold, the speaker lowered their voice at that point. Not out of reverence, but out of instinctual fear.
In the Mortal Emperor World, there were realms that belonged to "old ancestors" and realms that belonged to "laws of heaven and earth." A Grand Dao Saint stood with one foot on that higher shore.
For a junior at the Named Hero realm to erase such a person with a flick of his fingers—no matter how exaggerated it sounded—wasn't just "talent."
It was heresy. It broke the logic of the Grand Dao.
In a bustling tavern under Ancient Sky City's ruined sky, cups slammed onto tables and teapots shook.
"Impossible!" A middle-aged cultivator pounded the table, his beard bristling with indignation. "Cleansing Incense declined thirty thousand years ago! At best they should have a few decrepit old men left burning incense to Min Ren. Where did a monster like this 'Ling Feng' come from?"
"Declined or not, they were founded by Immortal Emperor Min Ren," a younger scholar murmured, his expression complicated as he gazed into his tea. "Perhaps... this is the shadow of that era resurfacing. The return of the Emperor's lineage."
"A shadow doesn't shatter heavenly grottos, you fool!"
"And those women," someone else added, leaning in and lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "The prime descendant of Nine Saint Demon Gate—Li Shuangyan. The precious princess of the Tyrannical Valley—Chen Baojiao. That little girl... and now even the Divine Sword Sacred Ground's prime descendant, Bai Jianzhen, is walking behind him. Royal Nobles, Enlightened Beings—killed like chickens by his maids!"
"Just thinking about it makes my scalp numb. Those four alone could become pillars of any Ancient Kingdom. They are supreme beauties who should be ruling the world, not following a boy."
"And yet they're all following him. A boy whose cultivation is still only at the Named Hero realm."
"Named Hero..." someone whispered, a shudder passing through the room. "But with combat strength far, far beyond his supposed realm..."
At a corner table, an old monster who had lived too long and seen too many geniuses rise and fall shook his head slowly.
"Forget the realm," he rasped, his voice sounding like grinding stones. "Look at the pattern. First he overturned the Heavenly God Sect's grotto. Then Azure Mysterious. Those two joined hands to destroy Cleansing Incense's Ancient Kingdom thirty thousand years ago. For them to taste fear now... the karma is too neat. The wheel is turning."
...
In a distant, majestic hall, banners of Azure flooded the air.
The Azure Mysterious Ancient Kingdom's ancestral palace was lit only by the cold, oppressive glow of formation light. Several old figures sat in silence on high thrones. The air seemed frozen, heavy with the weight of millennia of authority—and new, unfamiliar fear.
"...This matter must be investigated thoroughly," one of the elders finally forced out, his voice hoarse.
"Investigated?" another sneered, slamming his hand on the armrest. "If we could not even keep our heavenly grotto safe in Ancient Sky City, do you intend to send another batch of descendants to die? That boy erased Nantian Hudu!"
"Then you would have us endure this humiliation? We are the Azure Mysterious Ancient Kingdom!"
"Endure?" The sneer turned to bitter, fearful laughter. "Did you not feel that pressure across the void? That lightning? This is not merely a junior who stepped half a realm above his cultivation. This is something other. Even if we send out Virtuous Paragons... can you guarantee they will return?"
The word Virtuous Paragon fell like a slab of heavy iron in the hall.
Silence. Absolute, terrified silence. No one dared to answer.
In the end, the eldest ancestor, a being whose skin looked like dried bark, spoke.
"For now... we watch," he said slowly. "Our kingdom's roots are in the Heavenly Dao Academy and the Hundred Cities. Ancient Sky City is merely a branch. Until we know the truth of this 'Ling Feng'... until we know who—or what—is backing him... we will not act rashly."
"Cowards," a younger elder muttered under his breath.
But no one stood up to leave the hall. No one ordered a counterattack. The shadow of Ling Feng had already fallen over their hearts.
...
On the other side of the territory, in a simple, snow-white hall filled with sword intent so sharp it could slice through thoughts, an old man opened his eyes.
The Divine Sword Sacred Ground.
In front of him, a high-ranking disciple on his knees reported in a trembling voice.
"Reporting to Ancestor. Bai Jianzhen... Prime Descendant Bai... after returning from the Burial Ground and Ancient Sky City, has announced that she will follow Cleansing Incense Ancient Sect's Ling Feng from now on. She... she acts as his sword."
The word follow echoed in the hall like a blade scraping against a scabbard.
The old man's eyes remained closed for a long time. He was an existence that even Ancient Kingdoms feared, yet he sat there calmly.
At last, he sighed. "That child's sword heart was always too stubborn. Once she chooses a path, ten Immortal Emperors cannot drag her back."
"Ancestor, are we... not going to demand an explanation?" the disciple asked, stunned. "She is our Prime Descendant! To follow a Named Hero from a fallen sect..."
"Demand?" The old man gave a faint, cold smile. "And what will we demand? That she come back and let us clip her sword? That we dull her edge?"
He slowly lifted his eyelids. Sword light flickered in the depths of his pupils, vast and terrifying, before withdrawing.
"Since she decided to follow him, then we watch," he said. "If this Ling Feng is a mere flash of lightning, he will burn out and she will walk away. But if he can carry her sword farther than we can..."
He closed his eyes again, his voice dropping to a whisper.
"...then the Divine Sword Sacred Ground owes him a debt rather than a grudge."
Thus, while the world waited for the Divine Sword Sacred Ground's thunderous retribution, the mountain remained still.
Their silence only made Ling Feng's shadow loom larger.