Without that sword, what will you use to kill me?

Song Tiangang was a scion of a noble family.

At eighteen, he achieved the Nascent Soul realm and entered the capital to participate in the imperial examinations.

He passed the imperial examinations with top honors, placing in the first tier, though not among the top three.

Afterward, he left the capital to serve as the Prefect of Xuzhou.

Entrusted by the Emperor of Daikang to govern a region and empowered by a golden imperial seal, his strength was comparable to that of a prefectural city god.

The path of cultivation stopped at the Nascent Soul realm.

No matter how heaven-defying one's natural talent might be, one could only embark on the single path of achieving divinity on the spot.

Yet throughout all the years of Song Tiangang's cultivation,

he had never witnessed any cultivator unleash such a terrifying and pure sword gleam.

That sword gleam was fast to the extreme.

In the blink of an eye, it cleaved down toward Song Tiangang's forehead.

Unstoppable, severing everything in its path!

Song Tiangang's hair stood on end, his eyes bloodshot, while a golden square seal at his waist grew scorching hot. Boundless mortal fortune surged into the sky, and vague human faces materialized within it, all of them opening their wide mouths.

"Freeze for this old man!"

At Song Tiangang's urging,

that mortal fortune began to burn, generating an invisible force out of thin air in an attempt to lock the sword gleam in place.

Yet, though mortal fortune possessed infinite marvelous uses,

when pitted against this sword gleam, it truly proved to be no more than a block of tofu, shattering at the slightest touch.

The pristine white sword gleam descended,

and the boundless mortal fortune was instantly cleaved with a massive gap.

Song Tiangang, situated right within that mortal fortune, changed expression drastically.

"Block!!!"

Song Tiangang roared, frantically channeling the golden seal.

Illusory silhouettes of deities emerged from thin air one after another, throwing themselves unflinchingly at the sword gleam.

Fortunately, though this sword gleam was terrifying and extraordinary, it too possessed a limit.

When those hundreds of deity silhouettes were sliced to nothingness by the sword gleam,

the sword gleam finally dissipated as well.

Song Tiangang closed his eyes tightly as two streams of bloody tears rolled down his cheeks,

the result of injuries inflicted by that sword gleam.

Fortunately, the next second, mortal fortune circulated,

and Song Tiangang's eyes restored to normal.

Yet at this moment, as he looked once more at Chen Huangpi standing before him—Chen Huangpi, behind whom floated the silhouette of a towering demonic tree and who wielded the Void-Piercing Divine Sword—he no longer harbored the slightest bit of contempt, feeling instead an indescribable creepiness.

"That mutated divine statue fell into your hands, didn't it?!"

Song Tiangang said in terror, "You are not a deity; yet at such a young age, your cultivation is this terrifying. You have already stepped onto the immortal path—how dare you do this, how dare you?!"

He could not see through Chen Huangpi's cultivation.

Yet such formidable strength was already capable of killing him, an unorthodox prefectural city god backed by a golden seal.

If he hadn't obtained the mutated divine statue and learned the secret of attaining immortality, how could he possibly possess such fortune?

And that mutated divine statue

should clearly have been securely in the grasp of Song Tiangang.

It would have been better if he hadn't mentioned the mutated divine statue.
The moment he brought it up, Chen Huangpi's liver fire flared instantly.

"Old thief, prepare to die!"

Seething with fury, Chen Huangpi once more slashed out a sword gleam.

Accompanied by the falling sword gleam,

the mournful cry of the Tribulation Eye rang out.

Even the sword body trembled. Previously in the netherworld of the Yellow Springs, Chen Huangpi had hacked dozens of times in succession, pushing the Tribulation Eye to its limit. Although he had not used it since, in such a short span of time, the Tribulation Eye had not recovered much of its vitality.

Illusory silhouettes of deities once again stepped forth from the golden seal.

Song Tiangang felt a chill in his heart.

Backed by the golden seal, he was unafraid of this terrifying sword gleam.

Yet a single sword strike
demanded the consumption of ten percent of his mortal fortune just to block it.

And although this golden seal had plundered ninety percent of Xuzhou's tax revenue in mortal fortune for the current year, marching out of Xuzhou City and shaking off those imperial commissioners had not been without cost; at present, only fifty percent remained.

Moreover, watching Chen Huangpi unleash this terrifying sword gleam with such effortless ease—as simple as eating and drinking, without the slightest exertion—

under the waxing of one and the waning of the other,

it was merely a matter of dying sooner or later.

"Flee! Flee! Flee!"

Song Tiangang urged the golden seal, attempting to transform into a streak of light and escape. But the moment he moved, a tree branch as thick as a water vat, winding nearly a thousand feet long, smashed fiercely down toward his head, forcing him to retreat step after step.

That was a branch of the demonic tree.

Chen Huangpi had mined on the desolate mountain, and all the agony he had endured had been borne by the demonic tree.

Consequently, the demonic tree now submitted to Chen Huangpi by eighty percent.

Naturally, Chen Huangpi could command the power of the demonic tree without any misgivings.

"Demonic tree, suppress him for me!"

At his command, the towering phantom of the demonic tree behind him rattled noisily.

The demonic tree was too massive.

Its trunk resembled the heaven-supporting building wood.

Its canopy blotted out the sun and sky.

Looking out, the entire perimeter of a hundred miles around Yuqiong Mountain was enveloped entirely in shadow.

No matter how Song Tiangang urged the golden seal, he could not break free from the coverage of the demonic tree's canopy, as if he had been locked inside an octagonal cage, with the sole key gripped firmly in Chen Huangpi's hand.

Without killing Chen Huangpi, dreaming of escape was pure fantasy.

Song Tiangang gritted his teeth and said, "Chen Huangpi, you and I have no grievances in the past and no enmity in the present. Why must you ruthlessly try to take my life? Could there be some misunderstanding?"

"You truly have no shame."

Chen Huangpi said with utter disdain, "Lin Ye and the others you sent wanted to kill me; Song Qiuyue whom you sent also wanted to kill me; and Song Jiu whom you sent wanted to kill me as well. Even you yourself want to kill me. And now you tell me there's a misunderstanding?"

"Fine, throw away that golden seal and take a strike from my sword. Then I'll pretend everything before was just a misunderstanding."

"You're asking me to die!"

Suppressing the anger in his heart, Song Tiangang shouted loudly, "Qiuyue was killed by you, but prior to that, I had never even heard your name. The reason I came looking for you was solely directed at that mutated divine statue!"

"You and I truly harbor no enmity!"

In truth, his purpose in coming here was to extract the whereabouts of the mutated divine statue from Chen Huangpi's mouth and then slaughter him to avenge both old and new grudges.

Yet now, as the saying goes, others are the knife and I am the fish.

Naturally, he had to rack his brain to salvage the situation for himself.

"Whether there is enmity or not is not for you to decide."

Chen Huangpi said coldly, "Besides, do you truly think your murderous intent is invisible to me?"

Though he could not see with his eyes,

within the shadows cast by the canopy of this demonic tree, everything was perceived by it.

Even Song Tiangang's inner thoughts were completely transparent to him.

"Brother Chen! Hear me out."

Song Tiangang cupped his fists and said, "Now that you have ascended the immortal path, those delusional thoughts of mine naturally vanish like smoke. As the saying goes, when fortune smiles, heaven and earth lend their aid. My admiration for Brother Chen is absolute and unconditional."

As he spoke, he actually prostrated himself flat on the ground, kowtowing to Chen Huangpi in complete prostration.

"Brother Chen, if you let me leave, I will surely repay this heavy kindness manifold in the future. Yet, because I yearn for the immortal path, letting me go would be no different from killing me. Instead, why not take me under your command? I am willing to serve as a mere foot soldier at your disposal."

Discarding all his dignity, Song Tiangang pleaded earnestly, "I am a scion of the Qinghe Song family, and I have served as the Prefect of Xuzhou for decades. I have met countless people and know innumerable matters; I can certainly prove to be a great asset to Brother Chen."

The fox mountain deity, sitting at the mountain gate, could not help but click its tongue.

The fox mountain deity remarked, "This Song Tiangang really knows how to bow and scrape. If this were before the upheaval of heaven and earth, he might truly have accomplished something."

"Him?"

The brass oil lamp said with disdain, "His vision and capability are merely the result of shelter from his ancestors. Before the upheaval of heaven and earth, cultivation emphasized natural talent; while his talent wasn't awful, it certainly wasn't good either—he was destined for nothing more than the Foundation Establishment realm."

"Besides, if he truly knew how to bend and stretch, he wouldn't still be refusing to accept his fate at this juncture."

The words had barely faded
when the prostrated Song Tiangang suddenly burst into action.

He lunged straight toward Chen Huangpi to kill him.

"Chen Huangpi! Go to hell!"

"The one who should die is you."

Chen Huangpi snorted coldly, ignoring the painful entreaties of the Tribulation Eye, and slashed out with another sword.

At that very moment, the ground beneath his feet suddenly collapsed.

Immediately following, a roaring pillar of blazing fire fueled by mortal fortune erupted from within.

Amidst those raging flames,

Song Tiangang brandished the golden seal, his eyes filled with murderous intent: "DIE!!!!"

Two Song Tiangangs—one preceding the other,

one true, one false—

timed their moves precisely to the moment Chen Huangpi unleashed his sword strike.

With chilling murderous intent in his heart, Song Tiangang had already perceived the flaw: though the sword in Chen Huangpi's hand was powerful, it could only unleash a single sword gleam at a time.

Moreover, the sword gleam was overly sharp and biting,
harming oneself before harming others.

The sword itself was almost unable to bear it; how many more times could Chen Huangpi swing it?

As expected.

Chen Huangpi slashed out with one sword, cleaving the preceding Song Tiangang squarely at the waist, and wisps of mortal fortune immediately dissipated into nothingness.

When he raised his sword to strike downward once more,

he saw the Tribulation Eye continuously shedding bloody tears, begging him in agony. For that sword gleam to manifest was equivalent to tearing open its own body; repeating this over and over, it was truly on the verge of collapse.

Chen Huangpi paused involuntarily.

Yet it was precisely this brief hesitation that allowed blazing fire to engulf him entirely.

"Hahahaha!"

Song Tiangang laughed aloud, "You petty brat Huangpi, what of your initial ascent to the immortal path? Have you not heard that even ants can bite a giant elephant to death? Let alone the fact that I am no ant, and you are no giant elephant. To dare act so arrogant before me—you have brought this death upon yourself."

Just like Song Jiu earlier, who had utilized a bronze seal to transform into three fires protecting his head and shoulders,
the blessing of a bronze seal was comparable to a county city god,
while the blessing of a golden seal was comparable to a prefectural city god.
The fire of mortal fortune fueled by the golden seal was the true fire of humanity.

The will of the people could move mountains and fill seas.
Naturally, this true fire of humanity possessed the capability to incinerate mountains and boil seas.

Although Chen Huangpi possessed formidable cultivation,
Song Tiangang hailed from the Song family and naturally knew that ancient cultivators prior to the upheaval of heaven and earth primarily focused on refining their primordial spirit, while their physical bodies were not particularly sturdy. Now that the true fire of humanity had enveloped Chen Huangpi, it would reduce him to ashes in an instant.

"The immortal path is above, favoring me!"

Grinning hideously, Song Tiangang urged the golden seal, feeding all the remaining mortal fortune like firewood into the true fire of humanity.

He intended to refine Chen Huangpi into a pill.

Ancient cultivators possessed methods to seize foundations.
Right now, he would seize Chen Huangpi's dao foundation and forge it into his own foundation for immortality.

The true fire of humanity burned ever brighter,
and the surrounding temperature grew searingly hot.

Yet, Song Tiangang's heart grew increasingly cold.

Because the outline of the towering demonic tree had not vanished, nor could the glare of the true fire of humanity illuminate the surrounding gloom.

Within the burning true fire,

Chen Huangpi slowly walked out from the midst of it.

Forget about boiling seas and incinerating mountains;
not even a single strand of hair had been scorched.

"How is this possible?"

Song Tiangang cried out involuntarily, "You have just ascended the immortal path, yet your physical body can withstand the true fire head-on?"

"Not really,"

Chen Huangpi shook his head and said, "I could resist it even before I cultivated. But your true fire burns quite fiercely—my throat feels a bit dry, and I'd like some water to moisten it."

"What?"

Song Tiangang said in utter terror, "Your physical body was this formidable even before you cultivated? What on earth are you?"

As he asked this,

Chen Huangpi could not be bothered to waste any more breath.

Glancing at the Void-Piercing Divine Sword in his hand, he saw the Tribulation Eye still pleading piteously.

With no other choice, Chen Huangpi stored it away into the Soul-Summoning Register, letting it recuperate properly.

Song Tiangang's expression flickered.

He suddenly roared toward the true fire of humanity: "True fire, protect me!"

Immediately following, the true fire of humanity surged back instantly, wrapping around him in a tight cordon.

It guarded him securely like stars surrounding the moon.

"Without that sword, what will you use to kill me?"

"Are you relying solely on that demonic tree phantom of yours?"

Song Tiangang laughed out of extreme anger, "I am backed by the golden seal and possess mortal fortune; you can trap me, but you cannot kill me! I advise you to let me leave, or else the Qinghe Song family will absolutely not let you off!"

"The Daikang imperial court will not let you off either!"

The Qinghe Song family alone might not let him off,
but at this moment, to stay alive, he had no choice but to gamble that Chen Huangpi would feel some dread.

Chen Huangpi looked at Song Tiangang, who was cowering inside the true fire of humanity, as if looking at an absolute fool.

This person was rather bizarre.

Why on earth would he think that without the Void-Piercing Divine Sword, he couldn't kill him?

Aside from the Void-Piercing Divine Sword,
he possessed another weapon that was far more handy to use.

Though it possessed no miraculous power,
even when infusing essence or channeling black smoke, it showed no reaction whatsoever.

It was simply hard enough.
As long as one had enough strength, one could even dig a massive pit out of the Desolate Mountain with it.

Thinking of this, Chen Huangpi silently pulled out his mattock.

Then, mustering all his strength, he brought the sharp pick end crashing down mercilessly toward Song Tiangang's head.

(End of this chapter)