The road to Hua Shan was silent. The air between Lu Feng and Bai Li remained thick with an unspoken tension, a fragile thing born from Fairy Lingxi’s visit. Bai Li’s hand rested on the hilt of her divine sword, her knuckles white. Her loyalty was a blade, and her jealousy had sharpened its edge. She would kill anyone who dared stand between her and her lord.
Lu Feng was a statue of calm. His face, impassive and cold, betrayed nothing. But beneath that placid surface, a storm of sovereign power gathered, waiting for the moment to be unleashed. The Hua Shan Sect had tried to break his limbs. They had colluded with the Su family to humiliate him. They had tried to take the woman who was, for a time, his wife. They were a loose thread in the tapestry of his past. Today, he would pull it.
They did not announce their arrival. They simply appeared, two figures materializing from the mountain mist before the imposing gates of the Hua Shan Sect. Two guards, clad in the sect's proud blue and white robes, straightened up, arrogance etched on their faces.
"Halt! Who are you? The Hua Shan Sect does not receive vagrants."
Lu Feng didn't even grant them a glance. He continued walking. Bai Li’s eyes flashed with cold light.
"Did you not hear me?" the guard shouted, stepping forward to block their path. "Kneel and state your purpose, or suffer the consequences!"
Lu Feng waved a hand, a gesture as casual as shooing away a fly. An invisible force, heavy as a mountain, slammed into the two guards. They didn't fly back. They simply crumpled, their bones cracking as they were forced to their knees, their faces pressed into the dirt. They choked, unable to breathe, their Inner Qi scattered into chaos.
Ignoring their gurgling sounds, Lu Feng and Bai Li stepped over them and into the sect’s main courtyard. The sound of a hundred disciples training filled the air, the sharp crack of wooden swords and disciplined shouts echoing off the walls. Their sudden, silent appearance brought the training to a halt.
"Who dares trespass on the sacred grounds of Hua Shan?" a senior disciple roared.
Then, a familiar voice cut through the tension, dripping with venom and disbelief. "You!"
Young Master Murong emerged from the main hall, his handsome face twisted into a sneer of contempt. He saw Lu Feng, and his memory instantly supplied the image of the head-bowed, silent trash from the Su family. Rage followed his shock.
"The dog of the Su family! You actually dare to show your pathetic face here?" Murong laughed, a harsh, grating sound. "Did you come crawling to beg for scraps? Or did Xue Yao finally kick you to the curb for good?" He swaggered forward, his followers parting for him like a wave.
"Guards! Disciples!" Murong bellowed, pointing a finger at Lu Feng. "This piece of trash offended me once before. Seize him! Break his arms and his legs! I want to hear him scream!"
Several of the braver disciples drew their steel swords and charged, their faces grim. They would earn favor with the Young Master today.
Lu Feng still hadn't spoken a word. He looked at the charging men, and his eyes were voids. He did not move. He did not raise a hand. He simply released it.
A sliver. A mere fraction of the Dragon Sovereign's pressure.
The world went silent. The air turned to lead, thick and crushing. The charging disciples froze mid-stride, their eyes wide with primal terror. Their swords clattered from nerveless fingers onto the stone courtyard. A collective groan escaped them as they all collapsed, not to their knees, but flat on their faces, pinned to the ground by an authority their martial souls couldn't even comprehend.
Young Master Murong, with his superior cultivation, lasted a moment longer. The pressure slammed into him, and his true essence roiled in his meridians, trying to fight back. It was like a candle trying to fight a hurricane. His face went deathly pale, sweat beading on his brow. His legs trembled violently, then his knees buckled with a sickening crack. He fell to the ground, gasping for air, staring at Lu Feng not with contempt, but with pure, unadulterated horror.
This was not the powerless son-in-law. This was a demon. A god.
"What… what are you?" Murong choked out, his arrogance shattered into a million pieces.
"You are not worthy to ask," Lu Feng said, his first words echoing with absolute finality.
Just then, the doors to the grand hall burst open. The Old Sect Master of Hua Shan rushed out, his face a mask of fury. "Who dares cause a disturbance in my—" He stopped. His words died in his throat. His eyes locked onto Lu Feng, and the suffocating, world-ending pressure made his own Grandmaster-level cultivation feel like a joke. He felt like an ant before a celestial dragon.
His eyes, wide with dawning terror, darted from Lu Feng's indifferent face to the peerless, cold beauty of Bai Li beside him. Then he saw it. Tucked into Lu Feng's belt was a small, unassuming black iron token, carved with a dragon devouring the sun. The Dragon Order.
The Old Sect Master’s face drained of all color. His mind emptied of all thought save for one: survival. Without a second's hesitation, he threw himself forward, not just kneeling but performing the most subservient kowtow, his forehead smashing into the hard stone.
"This humble servant of the Hua Shan Sect greets the Dragon Sovereign!" he cried, his voice trembling with fear. "Forgive our ignorance! We did not know the Lord of Jianghu had graced us with his presence!"
Silence. A thousand disciples, pinned to the ground, heard those words. Their minds broke. Dragon Sovereign? Lord of Jianghu? This was the trash son-in-law their Young Master had mocked?
Murong’s world imploded. "Father! What are you doing?!" he shrieked, his voice cracking. "Get up! He's just Lu Feng! He's a worthless—"
"YOU IMBECILE!" the Old Sect Master screamed, not even lifting his head from the floor. "You have doomed us! You have doomed the entire Hua Shan Sect! Kowtow to the Sovereign and beg for your life!"
Lu Feng’s cold gaze finally settled on the pathetic form of Murong. There was no anger. No satisfaction. Only the indifference of a god looking upon an insect. "You wanted to break my limbs," he stated, the words a simple fact, yet they carried the weight of a death sentence.
The Old Sect Master slammed his head against the ground again and again. "My Lord, please! Mercy! He is a fool! A blind, arrogant child! I will cripple him myself for his offense! Please, spare our sect!"
Lu Feng ignored the groveling old man. He looked at Murong. "A debt," he said softly, "must always be paid."
He lifted one finger. A flicker of Inner Qi, so pure and so fast it was invisible, shot across the courtyard and struck Murong. It was not an attack that broke bone or tore flesh. It was infinitely crueler. Murong let out a bloodcurdling scream as the energy ravaged his body from the inside, shredding every one of his meridians, turning his cultivated true essence into poison. He convulsed on the ground, his power draining away like water from a shattered vase.
In a few seconds, it was over. Young Master Murong, the proud heir of Hua Shan, was now a true waste. His cultivation was gone forever. He was less than a mortal, a cripple for life.
Lu Feng turned his gaze to the still-prostrated Old Sect Master. "Your sect harbored an ant that dared to challenge a dragon. From this day, the Hua Shan Sect is dissolved. Its name is erased from the annals of Jianghu. All its wealth, its manuals, its spiritual herbs… they belong to the Dragon Order now."
The sentence was delivered without emotion, but it was absolute. The legacy of a five-hundred-year-old sect, destroyed with a single breath.
The Old Sect Master could only weep, his body shaking uncontrollably. "As… as the Sovereign commands."
Lu Feng turned to leave. The matter was concluded. But as he did, a frantic shout came from the gates. A carriage, driven recklessly, skidded to a halt. A figure in fine silks stumbled out, her face pale and desperate. It was Xue Yao.
She had heard the rumors of a great power descending on Hua Shan and had rushed here, a terrible premonition gripping her heart. She arrived just in time to see the entire sect on their faces, to see the man she chose, Murong, writhing on the ground like a broken worm, and to see her ex-husband, Lu Feng, standing over them all like a king passing judgment.
The regret she had felt before was a tiny stream. This was a tsunami that drowned her soul.
Lu Feng gave her a single, dismissive glance, then turned his back and walked away, Bai Li following silently at his side.
As they passed through the shattered gates, Bai Li’s voice was a low whisper meant only for him. "My Lord, I just received a message from the Shadow Guard. Gui Ying’s scouts have been located."
Lu Feng's pace did not falter. "Near the First Emperor’s tomb?"
"No, my Lord," Bai Li replied, her voice grim. "They were found in Jiang City. They have been watching the Su family residence for three days."
Lu Feng stopped dead. The air for a hundred meters around them instantly dropped below freezing, and the killing intent that erupted from his body was so pure, so terrifying, that it cracked the very stones beneath his feet.