Despite not being yelled out, the word ‘freeze’ reverberated across the skies as loudly as if it had been. And for the metal-type Early-stage Soul King, in particular, the word might as well been a clap of thunder that had sounded off in his ears!

Perhaps not just his ears. It reverberated into his mind and slammed his soul with enough noise to shake it!

“Whoos.h.!.+”

The violet streak of light from earlier flew through the skies while the Early-stage Soul King was dealing with the aftermath of hearing that word. And by the time he shook it off, the violet streak of light was already upon him!

“Pcht!!”

Left without any time to properly defend himself, the metal-type was perforated through the chest by the bolt of lightning!

The golden light around his person crumbled away in a spray of red mist. Eyes dimming in light, the Soul King began to fall back down towards the ground… 

An instant kill!!

The attacker behind the move hadn’t even shown themselves before an Early-stage Soul King was killed off!

“Boom!!”

An explosion erupted from above the metal-type Soul King’s head upon his death as the giant ‘volcano’ came smas.h.i.+ng into the golden sawtooth blade. The golden weapon was smashed apart in a matter of moments while the ‘volcano’ continued onwards to the lightning python!

“Rumble!!” The rumbling sounds grew even more intense as strands of lightning arced out from the python this way and that like a cascading waterfall smas.h.i.+ng down onto a large surface.

The purple-robed elder’s eyes widened at the sight of the object hitting his python. Lepaing back, the elder decided to forget about his attack to focus on the person heading on over from the south.

    ……

Jing Mingfeng took a cautious moment to look around himself now that all dangers were seemingly neutralized. “Ol’Bai?!” He cried out, stunned by the familiar presence.

Who else could it be but Bai Yunfei to drop by right in front of him?

Having killed its mark, the Heaven’s Thunder came flying back around to Bai Yunfei. Likewise, the giant volcano transformed back to its original size to float right next to him. “Are you alright?” Bai Yunfei asked.

It was with genuine concern that Bai Yunfei asked the question, and Jing Mingfeng couldn’t help but feel a tinge of grat.i.tude stir in him. “Haha!” He barked with laughter, “I’d have been in trouble if it weren’t for your good timing. A little too good timing in fact. Maybe you were hiding off to the sides and waiting for the best time to s.h.i.+ne? If I was a lady, I’d probably be in your arms already…”

“You’re definitely fine if you can joke around like that…” Bai Yunfei muttered under his breath, “Tell me, Mingfeng. What was the real reason you came to Swallow City? What’s all this?”

His eyes swept from the murderous-looking elder in purple robes to the other side where multiple people were fleeing one after another.

The snickering smile on Jing Mingfeng’s face faded away. “Well…” He sighed, “There’s nothing much to hide anymore. I just didn’t want to get you involved…Grandfather and my goals were to come to Swallow City and…exterminate the Qin!”

“Exterminate the Qin?!” Bai Yunfei’s eyebrows flew straight up on his forehead. “You have to be joking?!”

“Do you really think I’m joking with a sight like this?” Jing Mingfeng waved at the sight to the west with a bitter laugh. “My grandfather’s fighting patriarch Qin right now. If he can just kill him, then the rest of the Qin will…not be a problem…”

“Patriarch Qin?” Bai Yunfei asked. His eyes traveled to the west in idle curiosity. “The secret deep within the mines had to do with the patriarch? Was that why you were down there? The patriarch was most likely closed away to try and breakthrough to become a Soul Emperor. You came to stop him before that, right? It’d be the easiest time to kill him.”

It was Jing Mingfeng’s turn to ask the questions, “No way…” He gaped, “You could guess even that?!”

“But that’s too dangerous for you…” Bai Yunfei continued on, “It’s unclear if senior Jing will be able to win over patriarch Qin. And you’re here fighting against multiple Soul Kings by yourself, aren’t you a little too hasty to die?”

“The original plan was for me to run away actually…” An embarra.s.sed Jing Mingfeng replied. “Grandfather has a way to escape detection after he kills the patriarch, but I had some bad luck and got found out. Doesn’t it look like I was in the middle of running away?”

“Then what now?”

“Well!” Jing Mingfeng sighed. “You shouldn’t have done anything, Ol’Bai…You should’ve pretended you didn’t know me. They can’t find me if I run away, but you’re different. You’re going to be the Qin’s enemy now…”

“Do you really think I’d watch as you fight for your life by the sidelines? Am I even a brother to you?”

“Of course you are!” Jing Mingfeng retorted, “But…but this is a family matter. It’s not a good thing to get involved, these aren’t easy enemies you can just kill and be done with…”

“Getting involved or not isn’t important. I can’t just ignore the matter now that I’ve seen it. Besides…I’ve already earned myself a deep ‘grudge’ from the Qin. It’s not going to make much of a difference.”

“Oh, so you really did kill the two Qin brothers?” Jing Mingfeng’s eyes widened, “What in the world happened there?”

“You know about that? They killed themselves in front of me, but I didn’t do anything. I’m being framed…”

“Framed? Why? And by whom?

“Now’s…not the time to be talking about it.” Bai Yunfei watched two different streaks of light towards them from behind the elder. “Let’s talk about it later, our enemies just increased.”

Bai Yunfei had a decent grasp of what was going on now that he asked those questions. The people fleeing from the ground below were well above the hundreds, and most of them were Soul Exalts and Soul Ancestors. A portion of them was still fighting against several people—to which Bai Yunfei recognized as being members of the Qin. 

Jing Mingfeng came here to make trouble with the Qin, but what about the rest of these people?

Bai Yunfei’s mind danced with that question as he tried to find an answer, but he couldn’t find one. While he had been paying attention to the people down below, several Soul Kings were already coming closer and closer to this area.

“You’re right, time to go!” Jing Mingfeng spoke somewhat urgently.

He was prepared to fly towards the opposite direction of the newcomers when Bai Yunfei stopped him. “Not that way.”

“Why no—oh…” Jing Mingfeng was in the middle of asking when he froze up at the sight of multiple streaks of light coming from the direction he had been planning on going for.

“Is that…Qin Long?!” He cried out.

……

“Isn’t that…Bai Yunfei?! But how?!”

Two streaks of light were flying from the south to get to where Jing Mingfeng was. It was Qin Long and Qin Pingzhi. Behind them were Soul Kings such as the lord-mayor of Swallow City, Yan Tianxing. It was with great shock that the two of them took notice of Bai Yunfei’s presence in front of them.

The murderous intent in Qin Long’s eyes deepened, but his attention was concentrated elsewhere towards the Emperor’s Phenomenon. He managed to suppress his urge to go after Bai Yunfei and flew towards the purple-robed elder after noticing him.

“My lord!!” The elder cried out at in first in joy. “The patriarch’s breakthrough was stopped by that Jing Wuying! The two of them are fighting now! The previous headmaster, Qin Shu, Qin Jian, Qin Xin, Qin Kun, and even Qin Kui are dead! That person there is Jing Wuying’s companion!!” He spoke to him using Soul Communication.

“What?!”

Qin Long came to an immediate halt as the weight of the elder’s words fell on him...

He was dazed for a while as if he was in a dream. He hadn’t even been as shocked at the news of Jing Wuying appearing and battling the patriarch than hearing news of this. His father was…dead?!

First, it was his brother Qin Hu. Then his sons Qin Shoufeng and Qin Shouhao. And now…even his father, Qin Tian?!

Not even half a day went by and yet there was already so much tragedy. How could anyone possibly take news like that?!

His father had been a Late-stage Soul King! A powerful individual for even Soul Kings!! How…how could he possibly die?!

“My lord! Now’s not the time to be disheartened! We might not be able to fight in the battle with the patriarch, but we can’t let Jing Wuying’s companion get away! That fire-type Soul King appeared just now, he must be a helper! He killed Qin Kun when he appeared! We’ll regret it if we don’t kill the both of them right now!”

The purple-robed elder clearly didn’t recognize Bai Yunfei and only thought of him as someone related to Jing Mingfeng.

Qin Long’s body trembled as if awakening from a deep trance. His eyes were filled with nothing but angry as he glared at both Bai Yunfei and Jing Mingfeng before letting out a furious roar!

“You’ll…all die!!”