16: The Zhao family apologized and regretted their actions.

The news of the Li Family's destruction swept through every corner of Qingyang City like a Category 12 hurricane in just half an hour.

The Clan Chief of the Li Family, Li Zhentian, is dead!

The Li Family's strongest trump card, the spirit-breaking divine crossbow, was destroyed by Chu He with a single thought!

All the Li Family Elders bowed their heads in submission!

The Li Family's century-old foundation was shattered in a single day!

The Li Family's Young Lord, Li Wei, had his cultivation crippled and was thrown onto the streets to become a beggar!

Each piece of news was like a bombshell, leaving everyone dizzy and their minds shattered.

Especially Chu He's method of “killing the body and punishing the heart,” which sent shivers down countless people's spines.

He chose not to slaughter the entire Li Family, but instead used a more cruel method to thoroughly trample the Li Family's century-old dignity and reputation into the mud, leaving them to be infamous for ten thousand years.

This method was even more terrifying than mere slaughter.

For a time, the entire Qingyang City changed color at the mention of “Chu.”

The name Chu He became an unmentionable taboo in everyone's hearts.

And at the center of this storm, the most terrified and despairing was none other than the Zhao Family.

Zhao Family, council hall.

The atmosphere was even more oppressive than it had been in the Li Family.

The Clan Chief, Zhao Wuji, sat on the main seat with a pale face, cold sweat incessantly dripping from his forehead.

The teacup beside him had been replaced seven or eight times, but his lips were still cracked like a parched riverbed.

Below the hall, more than a dozen Zhao Family Elders were all restless, as if sitting on pins and needles.

“Have...have you all heard?”

Zhao Wuji spoke with difficulty, his voice hoarse as if abraded by sandpaper.

No one answered.

But everyone nodded silently.

“The Li Family... is finished.” Zhao Wuji seemed to have used all his strength just to utter these three words.

“That Chu He... he... he's simply not human! He's a devil! A devil!” an Elder finally couldn't help but say, his voice trembling.

“That idiot Li Zhentian! I told him long ago that a Foundation Establishment Stage Cultivator is not someone we can provoke! He wouldn't listen! He insisted on setting up some Hongmen Banquet! Now look, he's lost his own life, and dragged the entire Li Family down with him!” Another Elder beat his chest and stomped his feet; rather than cursing Li Zhentian, he was venting his own fear.

“What's the use of saying all this now?” Zhao Wuji interrupted them irritably. “The Li Family is finished, next, it will be our Zhao Family!”

This sentence instantly brought the entire hall to a dead silence.

Indeed.

When the Chu Family's assets were divided, his Zhao Family was the main force.

When the engagement was broken off and Chu He was humiliated, his daughter Zhao Yanran was the vanguard.

The mistakes the Li Family made, his Zhao Family made just as many!

If Chu He could destroy the Li Family with such ruthless methods, how could he let his Zhao Family off?

“Father! Father! What should we do! What should we do!”

A young Zhao Family disciple was directly scared to tears, kneeling on the ground and hugging Zhao Wuji's leg.

“Clan Chief! We... we should escape! Flee Qingyang City tonight! The world is vast, there must be a place for us to hide!” an Elder suggested.

“Escape?” Zhao Wuji gave a bitter laugh. “Do you think we can escape? How wide a range can a Foundation Establishment Stage Cultivator's Divine Sense cover? The moment we step out of the city, we'll probably be flattened into a pulp by a single slap!”

“Then... then what should we do? Are we just going to sit here and wait for death?”

A sense of despair spread throughout the hall.

Just then, a maid stumbled in.

“Clan... Clan Chief! This is bad! Young Miss... Young Miss she...”

“What happened to Yanran?” Zhao Wuji's heart tightened.

“Young Miss she... she fainted directly after hearing about the Li Family's matter!”

Zhao Wuji's vision went dark, and he almost fainted too.

He staggered to the boudoir in the back courtyard.

He saw Zhao Yanran lying on the bed, her face bloodless, her breath weak, with several physicians frantically applying needles beside her.

Zhao Wuji looked at his once proud daughter, now in such a state, and felt both heartache and deep regret.

Back then, if he hadn't tacitly approved, how could Yanran have gone to the Chu Family's grand ceremony to tear up the marriage contract and humiliate Chu He?

One wrong step leads to a cascade of errors!

It was all because he, the Clan Chief, was blinded by greed and lacked discernment, pushing the Zhao Family and his own daughter into this abyss of eternal damnation!

“Clan Chief, Young Miss fainted due to extreme anger attacking her heart, coupled with emotional agitation. Her life is not in danger, but... but she will probably need a long period of recuperation.” The physician wiped his sweat and said cautiously.

Zhao Wuji waved his hand, dismissing them all.

He sat by the bed, looking at his daughter's pale face. After a long time, as if he had made some decision, he suddenly stood up.

“We can't wait any longer!”

A look of determination flashed in his eyes.

“Waiting for death is a dead end! Taking the initiative to seek forgiveness might offer a glimmer of hope!”

He quickly walked back to the council hall and issued orders to all the Elders.

“Grand Elder! Immediately go to the storeroom and pack all the valuable items of our Zhao Family: Spirit Stones, Medicinal Pills, Magical Artifacts, everything into boxes!”

“Second Elder! Go to the accounting office and sort out all the land deeds and property deeds of our Zhao Family, especially those taken from the Chu Family back then!”

“The rest of you, come with me and change into plain clothes!”

“We are going to the Chu Family, to offer a 'thorn-bearing apology'!”

Zhao Wuji's decision stunned all the Elders.

Making them kneel and apologize to that former waste?

This... where would they put their faces?

“Clan Chief! Think thrice!”

“Yes, Clan Chief! Our Zhao Family is also a century-old aristocratic Family, you are the head of the Family, how can you...”

“All of you, shut up!” Zhao Wuji roared, his eyes bloodshot. “Face? How much is face worth? Is life more important, or face?”

“Do you want to end up like Li Zhentian, losing your head before you're willing to bow?”

This remark silenced everyone.

Indeed, compared to life, face was nothing.

Soon, the entire Zhao Family mobilized.

In less than half an hour, a procession consisting of a dozen large boxes and all the core members of the Zhao Family was assembled.

Zhao Wuji took off his luxurious Clan Chief's robes and changed into plain coarse linen clothes. He even emulated the ancients, having someone find a thorny branch and carrying it on his back.

He led dozens of members of the Zhao Family, walking step by step, heavily, down a silent street, under the complex gazes of the city's residents, towards the Chu Family's gate.

Upon reaching the Chu Family's entrance, Zhao Wuji neither knocked nor approached.

He simply tidied his clothes, then, three zhang away from the main gate, he knelt down with a heavy thud.

The Zhao Family Elders and disciples behind him all followed suit, a dense mass of kneeling figures.

“Sinner, Zhao Family Clan Chief Zhao Wuji!”

Zhao Wuji took a deep breath, and with all his strength, he kowtowed loudly towards the Chu Family's gate!

“Leading the entire Zhao Family, I have specially come to Senior Chu, to seek forgiveness!”

His voice echoed throughout the entire street and also reached inside the Chu Family compound.

The entire city was once again in an uproar!

Following the Li Family, the Zhao Family, one of the four great Families of Qingyang City, also knelt!

Everyone craned their necks, watching the tightly closed vermilion gate of the Chu Family, awaiting Chu He's reaction.

However, a quarter of an hour passed.

The gate remained motionless.

Half an hour passed.

The gate remained tightly closed.

One hour, two hours... the sun gradually rose higher, scorching the earth.

Zhao Wuji and dozens of members of the Zhao Family knelt on the hot bluestone slabs, their backs drenched in sweat, their knees long since scraped raw and bleeding.

But no one dared to move, no one dared to complain.

They just knelt, waiting for that gate, which would decide their fate, to open.

And this long ordeal, in full public view, was itself the most cruel form of punishment.