36: Chapter 36 Your Majesty, do you recognize this piece of iron?

The Imperial Capital of Great Xia, its long streets winding like dragons.

The midday sun was blindingly bright, causing a sense of unease. Vermilion Bird Street, usually bustling, was now deathly silent as countless terrified eyes stared fixedly at the sky.

"Rumble—"

A gray ravine violently tore through the clouds; it was the trail left behind by a sonic boom.

Without slowing down in the slightest, that gray shadow plummeted like a falling meteorite, crashing straight toward the hundred-acre, majestically somber Manor of the Marquis of Zhenbei in the north of the city.

"What... what is that?"

An old man at a roadside tea stall rubbed his eyes. Before he could finish his sentence, the loud crash arrived.

BOOM!

Smoke and dust billowed up, and rubble flew everywhere.

The manor's main gate's imperial-bestowed purple-gold nanmu plaque, inscribed with "Manor of the Marquis of Zhenbei," instantly exploded into a cloud of wood chips.

And upon that bare gate beam, an indistinct mass of flesh and blood appeared.

It was a person.

Or rather, it had once been a person.

That mass of mangled meat was being stepped on ruthlessly by a foot wearing a worn-out cloth shoe. Its human form was long gone; only the fragments of dark-gold soft armor reflected a piercing light under the sun.

That was the protective treasure armor of the Young Lord, Lu Feihu.

Ye Feng retracted his foot. The gray sword wings on his back flapped slowly, stirring up a suffocating, bloody wind pressure.

He tilted his head slightly, his gaze passing over the mess in the front yard to look at the middle-aged man standing with his hands behind his back in the central courtyard.

Lu Zhen.

The Marquis of Zhenbei of Great Xia, and one of the executioners of the massacre years ago.

Lu Zhen didn't spare a single glance at the mangled meat that was his son. There wasn't even a hint of grief for his son's death on his face; there was only the coldness of a hunter watching a prey fall into a trap.

"Fifteen minutes faster than I imagined."

Lu Zhen's voice was soft, yet it clearly spread across the entire long street. "Since you've come, don't think about leaving."

He lightly tapped the ground with his toe.

"Hum!"

The ground of the entire Marquis's manor sank three inches without warning.

Countless ink-black incantations crawled out from underground, instantly sealing off the space within a hundred-zhang radius.

The sky darkened, and the Spiritual Qi in the air seemed to be sucked dry by a pump, vanishing completely.

A third-grade ultimate killing Formation—the Spirit-Severing Purgatory.

"Sizzle, sizzle..."

The black incantations were like maggots on a bone, climbing onto Ye Feng's protective Sword Qi and making a sound like a branding iron searing flesh.

Ye Feng felt his body grow heavy. The circulation of Spiritual Qi in his body instantly became as difficult as pushing a millstone, and charred marks from corrosion began to appear on his skin.

This Formation was designed to refine a person alive into blood.

"In the Spirit-Severing Formation, even a Golden Core Cultivator can only wait for death." Lu Zhen finally revealed a cruel smile. "Little bastard of the Ye family, I will use your bones to make soup."

Ye Feng did not speak.

He only frowned, as if he had smelled something unpleasant.

The next second.

Whoosh!

The wings on his back slammed shut. Countless gray Sword Qi feathers intertwined, wrapping him entirely within and transforming him into a massive gray sword cocoon.

The incantations frantically eroded the sword cocoon, making a harsh grinding sound.

The smile in Lu Zhen's eyes deepened: "Struggling in vain."

However, three breaths later, his smile froze on his face.

The sword cocoon was not being refined; instead, it was... vibrating.

An eerie suction force erupted from the center of the sword cocoon.

The black incantations that had been frantically attacking Ye Feng were now like fish caught in a whirlpool, uncontrollably pulled into the sword cocoon.

Ye Feng sat cross-legged in the center of the sword cocoon, his Chaos Devouring Sword Body fully activated.

His Meridians felt as if strong acid were being poured into them, burning with pain.

But the moment this Formation power, strong enough to corrode steel, entered his body, it was shredded and purified by the overbearing gray Sword Qi. Finally, it turned into the purest energy, replenishing the consumption from his previous forced activation of the sword wings.

As long as it was energy, there was nothing this body couldn't consume.

"Tastes a bit sour. Bad review."

Ye Feng snapped his eyes open, and the sword cocoon instantly exploded.

He did not retreat but instead stepped forward. His figure was like lightning as he pushed through the pressure of the sky-filling incantations, instantly appearing before the Formation's core—a half-person-tall obsidian suppression stone.

He clenched his right hand into a fist, veins bulging on his arm. The gray Sword Qi was compressed to its limit on his knuckles.

"Shatter!"

He threw a punch.

Simple, crude, and unreasonable.

Crack!

The obsidian, which was strong enough to withstand a full-strength strike from the Golden Core Stage, actually became like fragile glass under this punch. It was instantly covered in spiderweb-like cracks and then exploded with a bang.

The black incantations filling the sky instantly dissipated.

Pfft!

Lu Zhen, whose mind was linked to the Formation, suffered a backlash. He spat out a mouthful of blood and retreated three steps, a hint of horror finally appearing in his eyes: "This is impossible! You..."

Before he could steady himself, a brilliant golden light suddenly erupted in the sky.

A massive golden phantom materialized out of thin air, standing ten zhang tall. It looked down at Ye Feng below, its majestic voice like a great bell, making one's eardrums ache.

"Audacious madman! To dare commit murder in the Imperial Capital and disturb the national destiny—you deserve death!"

Old Ancestor Situ.

The guardian of the Imperial Family, a will projection of a Golden Core Realm powerhouse.

If it were an ordinary Cultivator, seeing this guardian deity would have already frightened them into kneeling and begging for mercy.

Ye Feng looked up at the high-and-mighty phantom, a savage grin curling on his lips as he spat out a mouthful of bloody saliva. "Old geezer, when I was being ambushed outside the city just now, you played dead. Now that I'm about to kill someone, you jump out to play the hero?"

"Who do you think you are?"

Before his voice faded, the sword wings on Ye Feng's back suddenly spread and exploded.

Swish, swish, swish!

Thousands of gray feathers condensed from Sword Qi detached from the wings at this moment, swirling upward like a storm of pear blossoms.

The target was not Old Ancestor Situ's phantom, but the three thousand Black-Armored Iron Cavalry currently swarming from all directions, attempting to surround the Marquis's manor.

Puff, puff, puff, puff!

The sound of blades entering flesh was so dense it made one's scalp tingle.

Those elite cavalrymen, who were usually overbearing and tyrannical, didn't even have time to scream before they were turned into blood-red hedgehogs by this overwhelming rain of swords.

Blood gathered into a river, dyeing the stone steps in front of the manor red.

Old Ancestor Situ's phantom trembled with rage, but because his true body was in secluded cultivation and could not arrive in person, he could only watch this asura-like scene.

"Lu Zhen! Why haven't you acted yet!" the phantom roared.

Lu Zhen wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth.

He flipped his palm, producing a palm-sized black jade bottle, and crushed it.

Clatter!

There was no expected flood; only a single drop of black water fell out.

But the moment this drop appeared, the surrounding space showed distorted ripples.

A single drop of water weighed over a thousand catties.

Mystic Nether Heavy Water.

It was a supreme yin substance refined from the extreme cold abyss; a single drop could crush mountains and freeze the Divine Soul.

The water droplet expanded with the wind, transforming in an instant into a hundred-zhang-wide black water curtain. Carrying a terrifying weight that could crush everything, it pressed down toward Ye Feng's head.

Ye Feng felt every bone in his body creaking under this heavy pressure. The bluestone slabs beneath his feet instantly turned to powder, and his legs sank deep into the soil.

He couldn't dodge.

Since he couldn't dodge...

Ye Feng snapped his head up, his jaw opening as if dislocated, and a beast-like low growl escaped his throat.

The Chaos vortex within his body reversed frantically, and a terrifying suction force erupted from his mouth.

"Then I'll just eat it!"

Under everyone's horrified gazes, that youth actually opened his mouth and swallowed that Mystic Nether Heavy Water—which was enough to crush a Golden Core Cultivator to death—along with the extreme cold Death Qi contained within!

Gulp.

The sound of swallowing was clearly audible.

Ye Feng's body was instantly covered in a layer of black frost. His face was as pale as paper, and he stood frozen on the spot.

"Seeking death!" Lu Zhen laughed maniacally. "Once the Mystic Nether Heavy Water enters the stomach, you will surely die—"

Burp—

A loud burp interrupted Lu Zhen's wild laughter.

The frost on Ye Feng's body shattered inch by inch, and an eerie flush appeared beneath his skin.

That violent extreme cold force rampaged through his body, but it was overbearingly ground and pulverized by the Chaos Sword Body, transforming into a surging torrent that crashed against the solid Realm barrier.

"Tastes... a bit salty."

Ye Feng licked his lips, his eyes flashing with sharp light.

A thunderous muffled sound echoed from within his body.

Divine Sea Realm Peak... broken!

A terrifying aura belonging to the Foundation Establishment Stage erupted from within him.

With a casual wave of his hand, he used suction to pull a golden token of unknown material from a pile of mangled meat.

The token was warm to the touch. Amidst the swirling sand and the smell of blood, it faintly emitted a low dragon's roar.

Ye Feng gripped the token tightly, his gaze piercing through the prosperous capital to look toward the distant and desolate north.