Spirit Ruin, Sword Coffin, Blind Swordsman

After the massacre, Li Guanqi looted the entire North Sea Temple. He even tore out the island’s only spirit vein.

Unfortunately, the vein was of poor quality and nearly depleted. He extracted only about a hundred and ten high-grade spirit stones from it.

He sighed. “I’m spending faster than I’m earning these days…”

Especially now that he had a dragon by his side, which was a bottomless pit for spirit stones. If Nine Heavens relied only on the surrounding spirit qi, its strength would never grow.

Just like with the Immortal Crane Alliance, anyone in the North Sea Temple who had shown malice toward him was killed outright. The rest had their cultivations crippled.

After Li Guanqi’s battle against the Immortal Crane Alliance, his power had risen dramatically. No one in the North Sea Temple could stand against him, not even their early Divine Transformation Realm leader. A mighty expert of that realm had been forced to his knees beneath his burning barrier of heavenly fire, begging for mercy.

Two factions annihilated in a row. Overnight, Li Guanqi’s name spread far and wide. Many who once wanted his head now thought twice. More and more factions grew wary of Li Guanqi’s vengeful personality.

Behind him trailed a growing line of corpses bound by chains of lightning. This time, his injuries were lighter. Though he was covered in blood and his wounds looked gruesome, they were superficial injuries.

Sitting cross-legged on Nine Heavens’ head, he mulled over his recent progress. He had sensed several messages being sent out the moment he appeared at the North Sea Temple.

He suspected that a lot of the people hunting him, like Third Elder Lin Jian of the Immortal Crane Alliance, were connected. The senior figures of both the North Sea Temple and the Immortal Crane Alliance probably knew each other.Which meant…

The six sects he had asked Tang Ru to investigate were likely in cahoots. If that were true, his plans for revenge would need to change.

A cold glint flickered in his eyes. He stroked his chin in thought, tapping the air idly with his left hand as he pieced together his next move.

Meanwhile, several elders sat in an ancient and mysterious pavilion, dimly lit by flickering candles that cast dancing shadows across their faces.

Bam!

The hunchbacked leader slammed his palm onto the table. “Wei Xian is dead! The old man from the North Sea Temple is dead too! The factions he destroyed were both from our group! That means the Bloody Butcher’s coming for us next!”

The elder’s white hair gleamed faintly in the candlelight. His dark-gold robes shimmered as he hunched even lower, his back bowed as if crushed beneath an invisible mountain. Fear flickered in his eyes.

The others fell silent. They hadn’t expected things to turn out the way they did. Countless cultivators across the entire Daxia Territory had joined the hunt for the Bloody Butcher besides themselves. They could not believe that Li Guanqi had killed the entire Immortal Crane Alliance without mercy just because of a jade slip on one of their bounty hunters.

Seeing everyone silent, the leader’s temper flared. He glared at the people below and barked, “I warned you not to act recklessly, but none of you listened! Now look where that’s gotten us!”

His words stirred a wave of annoyance. One elder with sunken cheeks glared back at him, his hoarse voice dripping with contempt. “Don’t act innocent! You were the ‌most enthusiastic when we discussed hunting the Bloody Butcher. What now? Suddenly you’re scared?”

The leader’s face went pale. He huffed but didn’t argue.

Everyone remembered why they had gone after Li Guanqi in the first place.

Their six factions weren’t large, but they weren’t small either. The rewards were incredible, enough to take their factions to the next level. More importantly, it was a chance to curry favor with the Mo family.

An elder seated near the door narrowed his eyes. He grimaced, his voice deep and resolute. “There’s no point in arguing now. It’s clear he’s the vengeful type. We’re all in this together. If one of us falls, the rest will follow. If we want to live, we must stand united. So what if he’s strong enough to kill an early Divine Transformation Realm cultivator? He’s still at the Nascent Soul Realm. There’s no way he can take all of us.”

The others’ eyes brightened. One leaned forward slightly. “You mean to…”

A luminous barrier shimmered into place around the pavilion, completely concealing the rest of their discussion.

When the elders finally dispersed, the heavy atmosphere had lifted significantly. The four remaining factions began to move.

Word of Li Guanqi destroying two sects with Divine Transformation Realm leaders had already spread. The disciples of the four remaining factions lived in constant fear. If not for the protective arrays sealing their sects, many would have already fled.

The shadow of death hung over them.

More than a thousand people had died between the two destroyed factions.

The Bloody Butcher’s name haunted their thoughts. Every time they looked up at the sky, they half-expected to see him descending from above.

Rumors began to spread among the disciples. If Li Guanqi had destroyed only the Immortal Crane Alliance, they could have dismissed it as random vengeance. But attacking the North Sea Temple next? That felt deliberate.

After some investigation, people found that elders from the Immortal Crane Alliance and the North Sea Temple were both involved in the hunt for Li Guanqi. And they belonged to the same group.

Countless people were terrified of Li Guanqi.

Meanwhile, Li Guanqi slowly rose to his feet. Lightning flared around him, his aura sharp and unrestrained.

He was now half a step into the Divine Transformation Realm!

His gaze sharpened as he looked up at the surrounding void and murmured, “So they’ve come already? The Mo family… or someone else?”

He tapped Nine Heavens lightly with his foot. With a flash of purple light, the dragon transformed into a bracelet, coiling around his wrist in slumber.

Dressed in white, Li Guanqi stood in the void, calmly gazing ahead.

Buzz!

An old man in glowing navy blue robes appeared before him.