Chapter 794

On the sea, a violent rainstorm poured down.

On a vast expanse of five-colored auspicious clouds, ten White Lotus Palace disciples and thirty Red Lotus Temple monks were forced by Wu Jin and others to kneel.

Forty Wu family youths wielded great axes, standing behind those White Lotus Palace and Red Lotus Temple disciples; as soon as Wu Tie gave the order, the axes would fall, resulting in rolling heads and blood gushing like springs.

Fan Kun's face twitched violently; the prayer beads in his hand spun so fast they almost became a blur.

He bellowed hoarsely: "Martial King, this is unfair… why kill only ten of his White Lotus Palace disciples, yet thirty of my Red Lotus Temple disciples?"

Wu Tie looked at Fan Kun in surprise: "Isn't that strange? The White Lotus Palace has only a little over a hundred disciples, while your Red Lotus Temple has about three hundred sixty, so naturally we should kill you three times as many."

Fan Kun roared: "But the matter was started by the White Lotus Palace!"

Wu Tie lightly shook his head: "Yeah, the matter was provoked by them… but what good are you Red Lotus Temple lot? Well, consider yourselves unlucky. Does this explanation satisfy you?"

Fan Kun stared, speechless.

A scholar meeting soldiers may have reason but can't explain it; similarly, a monk meeting soldiers seems to have no room for reasoning.

In the Sui dynasty, with these Red Lotus Temple monks' silver-tongued lotus-flower eloquence, they could dupe an honest man into stupidity.

But encountering the stubborn Wu Tie, Fan Kun truly had no idea what to do.

"Bai Wen, Bai Wu, and that saying again…" Wu Tie looked at Bai Wen and Bai Wu, saying lightly: "Return Pei Feng, and everything can be discussed. You take your Yangguan Road, I take my single-plank bridge; we just stay out of each other's way."

"If you don't return the person, don't blame me for being ruthless." Wu Tie's tone grew increasingly fickle.

The more fire in his heart, the more unfathomable Wu Tie's aura became; his scarlet eyes fixed on Bai Wen and Bai Wu, even a smile appearing on his face.

Bai Wen and Bai Wu exchanged a glance; Bai Wen said in a low voice: "Fellow junior brothers and sisters, remember: might cannot bend, wealth cannot indulge… sacrifice life for righteousness, the time is now."

Wu Tie narrowed his eyes and gave a forceful wave of his hand.

"'Sacrifice life for righteousness, the time is now'? Saying that makes it seem as if Wu Tie had become the greatest villain in the world."

If so, then let him be a villain.

Fan Kun bellowed hoarsely: "Martial King, wait… Bai Wen, Bai Wu, you two little brats, if you're going to die, then don't…"

Where would there still be time to stop it?

Fan Kun lunged at Wu Jin and the others, but the forty great axes fell together; thirty bald heads and ten disheveled heads sprayed out, amidst mournful wails, forty rays of light dimmed, and divine fetuses as tall as about four chi and as short as just over one chi burst forth.

These White Lotus Palace and Red Lotus Temple disciples, the strong among them already possessed cultivation of the tenth heaven of the Divine Realm, while the weak had the strength of the fifth heaven. Their divine fetus power had already merged largely with their divine bodies; thus the divine fetuses they escaped with appeared rather weak.

Fan Kun rushed forward and threw a punch at Wu Jin.

Wu Jin raised his left hand, an ancient, weathered wooden shield, and let Fan Kun's punch land upon it.

Wu Yin and Wu Tong, with four hands, grasped a black banner whose pole was white bone, and gave it a vigorous shake.

Then came the incessant, ghastly wails of gods and demons; from that banner, black vapor condensed into many large hands that reached out, seven hands and eight feet grabbing the forty divine fetuses and pulling them bit by bit toward the banner's surface.

"Senior brother, save me!" the divine fetuses of ten White Lotus Palace disciples cried out together.

Just moments ago, when they were forcibly pressed onto the auspicious clouds and forced to kneel, these White Lotus Palace disciples had already felt fear rising, almost begging for mercy.

But Bai Wen confined them with the so-called slogan "might cannot bend, wealth cannot indulge," and then shouted the slogan "sacrifice life for righteousness, the time is now."

These White Lotus Palace disciples, even if each of them were hypocrites, having pretended to be gentlemen for so many years that they momentarily forgot their true selves, they still needed to save face.

Thus, until the axes fell, they still hadn't had the chance to beg for mercy.

However, compared to having their divine bodies chopped and their divine fetuses tossed into an evil secret treasure, to be tormented day and night and never be reborn, the divine fetuses are still more important.

Ten White Lotus Palace disciples wept bitterly and wailed loudly.

Bai Wen and Bai Wu's faces twitched violently; they merely clenched their teeth, uttering no sound. Meanwhile, their fellow White Lotus Palace disciples Bai Lu, Bai He, and Bai Yi stood at a loss, gazing at their two senior brothers.

Fan Long and the other Red Lotus Temple disciples beside him roared in unison, shouting curses at Wu Tie.

A tremendous crash rang out; Wu Jin spat blood mouthful after mouthful, staggering backward, his left arm obviously broken into several segments, limp and dangling; the wooden shield in his hand emitted a piercing whine, slipping from his grasp and being sent flying hundreds of li by Fan Kun's punch.

Wu Tie waved his left hand, and a startling sword-light tore through the air.

Among the crowd, fifty Red Lotus Temple disciples had their heads fly up; an exterminating-all-beings sword intent erupted, and before fifty divine fetuses could even exit their bodies, the sword intent utterly shredded them, blasting their souls and spirits to utter annihilation.

Fan Kun's body suddenly stiffened.

Fan Long's eye corner split, and a mouthful of blood spurted out.

These disciples, these Red Lotus Temple disciples, were all the elite forming the Diamond Sumeru Formation; to set up the formation and coordinate, they lived together day in and day out, making them the closest band of brother-disciples in the Red Lotus Temple.

But Wu Tie was so ruthless and decisive that he directly cut down fifty of them, blasting their souls and spirits to scatter…

Fan Long felt heartbroken, his heart aching as if twisted.

"Martial King Wu Tie…" Fan Long spat blood while emitting a mournful, blood-crying cuckoo-like howl of utter despair.

"Kneel!" Wu Tie pointed at Fan Kun: "You injured my elder brother; that's a capital crime… kneel, or I will now slaughter all these bald monks!"

Fan Kun's body trembled; he stared fixedly at Wu Tie, behind him a faint Kun-Peng phantom flickered, he breathed heavily, his scarlet eyes revealing a frenzy, savagery, and bestial nature.

Having cultivated mind and nature for many years in the Red Lotus Temple, Fan Kun had thought he had worn away the innate bestiality in his bloodline; but today he realized that the bestiality lay in his heart, never having dissipated.

He very much wanted to rush forward and swallow Wu Tie whole.

At Wu Tie's fingertips, another sword-light flared; he gave Fan Kun a half-smile and asked slowly: "You want to kill me? Come… let's see whether you kill me first, or I slaughter them first."

Fan Kun closed his eyes; two lines of blood-tears streamed down from his eye sockets.

"Great demon!" Fan Kun murmured.

"Is that interesting?" Wu Tie burst out laughing, then lowered his voice and murmured: "It's you who forced me to kill, and now you slap the label of great demon on me… is that interesting?"

"Tsk, Red Lotus Temple, White Lotus Palace… you really are boring." Wu Tie shook his head and sighed: "But what's the point of wasting words with you? I am the lord of Wuguo, not you lot of miscellaneous characters."

"You dare scheme against me, dare scheme against those around me… then just kill them all."

The sword-light spat out, and another Red Lotus Temple disciple was blown to bits, his body and soul utterly shattered by the sword intent. Wu Tie roared sternly: "Fan Kun, kneel!"

Fan Kun's body jerked violently, and with a thud he knelt in midair.

Beneath the sea, waves surged skyward; from Fan Kun's knees burst two terrifying pulses of qi, blasting a hundred-li-wide crater on the sea surface, then the qi shot straight into the seabed strata, blasting this disaster-prone seabed into a hole a hundred li across and ten thousand li deep.

Wu Jin's left hand gave a mighty shake; the unmatched Wu clan bloodline erupted with tremendous vital force, and his arm swiftly healed.

With a backhand move, the wooden shield flew back from several hundred li to his hand; Wu Jin wore a grim face, strode forward to Fan Kun, and brandishing his great axe, he chopped down dozens of blows at Fan Kun.

The ringing of 'ding ding dang dang' never ceased; Wu Jin's great axe in his hand burst forth with blinding light, yet it only scattered great sparks across Fan Kun's body, unable to injure him in the slightest.

Fan Kun's cultivation far surpasses Wu Jin's; compared to the peak of the tenth heaven of the Divine Realm and Wu Jin's third heaven of the Divine Realm, the gap is immeasurably vast.

Moreover, Fan Kun's true form is that of a kun-peng; the bloodline of such an ancient divine beast is extraordinarily tyrannical, his flesh comparable to a hundred times that of an ordinary body cultivator at the tenth heaven—what ordinary divine weapon could possibly harm him?

Wu Tie sneered again: 'Fan Kun, won't you properly cooperate with my elder brother?'

Fan Kun stared blankly; he glanced at the tattered corpse upon the five-colored auspicious clouds, gritted his teeth, and forced his blood to flow backwards.

Fan Kun's tyrannical physique instantly split open with gashes of blood; Wu Jin's axe fell madly, carving deep, bone-reaching wounds across Fan Kun's massive body, causing him to convulse in pain and emit low, continuous roars from his throat.

'You all shouldn't keep scheming against my brother,' Wu Jin snarled, his eyes reddening as he, too, fell into a half-mad demonic state.

Wu Jin once again recalled the events of that year.

Back then, at the Wu family's Shibao stronghold, when foreign invaders attacked, his father and brothers collapsed helplessly in pools of blood……

Wu Jin could, for his brother's sake, kneel before the enemy and beg for mercy…… In his heart, this was an untouchable taboo.

Wu Tie was unharmed, but Pei Feng had been seized by someone using divine abilities.

Wu Jin understood Wu Tie's current feelings.

Thus, Wu Jin also went mad.

'We have only ever wanted to eat our fill, drink our fill, and have a place to call home,' Wu Jin growled lowly: 'We have only ever wanted our kin and friends nearby to live well.'

'Why, you… once, once, once, once…' With each utterance of 'once' by Wu Jin, his axe came down heavily on Fan Kun's body: 'once, once, once…'

Wu Jin hacked away madly; aside from uttering 'once,' he seemed unable to speak.

Wu Yin and Wu Tong's faces also turned grim; they shook the standard, forcibly dragging forty divine embryos into its surface.

From within the standard immediately came shrill wails of ghostly howls; the ancient demonic spirits refined by the Wu clan within the standard frenziedly fought over and devoured these forty fresh, fiery divine embryos, simultaneously transforming the true spirit within each embryo into a demon as well.

Upon the five-colored auspicious clouds, anguished howls shook the heavens, and blood soaked the ground.

At a glance, Wu Tie and his cohorts truly resembled heretical demons, while the disciples of the Red Lotus Temple seemed like true Buddhas who subdue demons; and those pale-faced, lovely maidens of the White Lotus Palace were transformed into innocent victims harmed by demons.

'Bai Wen, Bai Wu… what are you thinking?' Wu Tie narrowed his eyes at Bai Wen and Bai Wu.

"My brothers could never commit such evil… but evil demons fill the world. In Wuguo's prisons there are no shortage of scoundrels and bastards." Wu Tie said slowly, "You say, if I order your delicate, lovely little junior sisters thrown into Wuguo's darkest, most brutal prison, what fate awaits them?"

The female disciples of the White Lotus Palace immediately changed expression.

Bai Wen let out a soft sigh and finally spoke: "Prince Wu, you dare kill my White Lotus Palace disciples—you have committed an unforgivable grave crime… aren't you worried about how we will retaliate against Pei Feng?"

Wu Tie pondered for a moment, then nodded: "It's fine; if she dies, I will avenge her. How simple a matter!"

With a point of his finger, a 'bang' sounded, and the Bai Ji perched beside Bai Wen had his head exploded by Wu Tie's fingertip.

A fist-sized cluster of spiritual light flew from Bai Ji's body, turning into a flowing light about to escape.

Bai Ji had already reached the pinnacle of the tenth heaven of the Divine Manifest Realm; his divine fetus had fully merged with his body, leaving only a strand of innate primordial spirit hidden deep within his divine form. This innate primordial spirit was marvelously subtle—though it held little power, every divine ability and transformation, especially evasion-light techniques, was far more agile and ingenious than his divine body.

Bai Ji's innate primordial spirit flew out, about to escape.

However, the Yin-Yang Daoist's innate Yin-Yang Two-Qi Bottle behind him was faster; a black and white strand of spiritual light swirled once and sucked Bai Ji's spirit into the bottle.

Inside the bottle, the spiritual light swirled; Bai Ji's spirit let out a miserable howl and instantly turned into a mass of innate primordial qi, becoming nourishment for the Yin-Yang Two-Qi Bottle.

Bai Wen and Bai Wu's faces suddenly changed.

Unlike ordinary White Lotus Palace disciples, Bai Ji, Bai Lu, and Bai He—those who can become the palace's outward-walking disciples, representing its image—are of exceptional talent and cultivation.

Moreover, the clan power behind Bai Ji is also formidable, being the household of the venerable 'State Lord' of the Sui Dynasty.

The White Lotus Palace could sacrifice thirty or fifty thousand ordinary disciples— for them, there are as many ordinary disciples as needed. But losing even one elite disciple like Bai Ji would be a tremendous fault for Bai Wen and Bai Wu.

A bit of a misstep…

Bai Wen and Bai Wu fell into a difficult dilemma.

But soon, their slightly wavering gazes became extremely resolute.

Bai Wen smiled at Wu Tie and said softly: "Prince Wu, you may keep killing… slowly killing… the White Lotus Palace disciples—how could they cling to life and fear death? As for the fellow junior sisters… Prince Wu, feel free to unleash those brutal methods."

The faces of the White Lotus Palace's female disciples turned deathly pale, each trembling as they tightly shut their mouths.

Wu Tie gave Bai Wen a cold stare.

Bai Wen gave Wu Tie a cold stare.

Both had not spoken for a long time.