"Go," said Caelan, "and tell your Supreme Leader he's welcome to come here anytime to demand an explanation." His eyes didn't move from Tamashi. "I'll be waiting.""The arrogance on you." Tamashi ground her teeth. "Just because you're a little strong you think you're the greatest thing in the world. You'll regret this.""We'll see." A brief pause. "And pass this along as well—I feel insulted. The Sacred Sword Sect sent only two weak representatives here, and one of them doesn't even know how to behave properly in someone else's space. If your Supreme Leader wants to settle this, I'll be more than happy to welcome him."Tamashi didn't answer.Not because there was nothing she wanted to say—but because it was already very clear that no words that could come out of her mouth tonight would move her position in this room to anything better than where it already was.She then helped Baruga to his feet, led him toward the door, and they left.Tamashi would tell the Supreme Leader everything,

The question didn't sound like a threat, didn't sound like a test—just a plain question, in the way of someone who genuinely wanted to know the answer.But the nine people in front of him couldn't receive anything coming from this man's mouth as plain tonight.They looked at each other.Xului?That name needed no long introduction in the cultivation world—not because everyone knew a great deal about him, but precisely because everyone knew very little, and that little was already enough to make the name feel different from other names mentioned in cultivation history records.Believed to be the first cultivator. No one knew his origins. No one could confirm whether he still existed or had long since ceased to. A name that lived more inside books than inside conversations.The old man with long white hair from the White Cloud Sect quietly set his chopsticks at the side of his bowl."In my entire life," he said, in a measured tone, "I have never heard any direct news of this person's ex

His face showed his eighties—undeniable lines, hair gone fully white. But the way he stood wasn't the way of someone in their eighties.This was the way of someone whose body had long since stopped following the rules of age that applied to everyone else. His robes were clean white with blue edges that gave off an extremely thin golden sheen under the room's light—a sheen not from metal or added ornament, but from something that had fused with the fabric itself over years of being worn by someone whose spiritual energy seeped into anything that spent enough time in contact with him.Robes of that quality weren't made. They were formed—from time, and from who wore them.Baraha stood in front of the treatment table.His eyes dropped to his grandson's right hand.The hand had been partially treated—the broken bones beginning to be stabilized by the healers working quickly—but the original condition was still readable from the position now starting to be corrected.The angle of the break,

Sidila took one step forward, her eyes no longer able to be called controlled in any way."You're going to die in the most painful way there is!" Her voice came out in a way different from that of a mother—this was the voice of someone who had lived long enough inside a sect that had never taught that there were limits to what could be done to an enemy."We will break every bone in your body one by one. We will make sure you're still conscious when the next one snaps. And when you beg for mercy—we won't listen. We will make you cry blood until there is nothing left of what you call yourself."Then the figure appeared.Caelan stood in front of the gate, directly facing the thirteen people before him. His hands at his sides, his posture carrying no excessive tension, as though everything had already been prepared and it was simply a matter of waiting for things to follow the order he had anticipated."Try it then."Baruka heard those words.And something inside him no longer wanted to w

Baraha rotated his body—a full rotation, not a half—with the momentum accumulated from ten previous attacks that had found no target, all of it converted into one spinning slash that brought the blade from right to left at a speed far surpassing everything that had come before.Caelan didn't dodge this one.The black sword with its gold veins rose horizontally—receiving that slash at the center of the blade.KRING.Two swords held at their respective positions, with two people bearing the pressure that came from that meeting.Their eyes met above the blades holding each other.Baraha looked at Caelan in a way that had no hesitation in it—but there was something stirring behind that look, something that had only just begun to exist since ten consecutive attacks had each failed to find their intended target.Caelan looked back. Without any excessive expression.Two seconds.Then Baraha pulled his sword back and leaped backward—one long leap that returned him to his starting position, la