In a world where cultivators murdered their own kin for minor resources, an impoverished servant offering six months of savings to protect a friend was a rare sight. Lin Feng felt a rare warmth touch his cold heart as he looked at Da Zhuang's soot-stained face. He closed Da Zhuang's thick fingers back over the stone, gently returning it."Keep your stone, Da Zhuang," Lin Feng said softly, his voice calm and unyielding. "You earned it with your own sweat.""But Brother Lin!" Da Zhuang pleaded, tears brimming in his wide eyes as his chest heaved. "You don't understand!""Zhao Wei didn't come alone this morning!" Da Zhuang continued frantically. "He brought Gao Wu from the patrol squad, and they have wooden clubs and iron-bound rods!"Lin Feng stood up from the timber pile with slow, measured movements that showed no trace of fear. He rolled his shoulders, feeling his spine settle into effortless physical balance despite his empty Dantian. Although his body remained in the Eclipsed State

"Open the gate!" Lin Feng commanded coldly.Guard Captain Wei exchanged a brief glance with his fellow guard, then inserted a heavy iron key into the copper lock mechanism.A loud metallic grinding sound echoed through the granite pass as the double-leaf iron gate swung inward by four feet, opening a narrow passage into the fog-covered valley beyond.Lin Feng stepped through the threshold into Zone 3, leaving the border post behind.The temperature dropped by fifteen degrees Celsius as Lin Feng crossed into the Forbidden Zone. Thick grey mountain mist filled the narrow gorge, dampening the black soil and obscuring the surrounding pine trees.Sharp currents of residual Sword Qi drifted through the air, colliding with the rock walls and carving hairline fissures into the granite surfaces. To an ordinary cultivator, these ambient energy currents cut into skin and disrupted blood circulation.Lin Feng walked down the winding stone ravine for five hundred yards until he reached the mouth o

Lin Feng pulled a strip of thick linen from his inner pouch, wrapping the six-inch dark meteor steel fragment securely before placing it into his inner tunic pocket next to his chest.He remained cross-legged on the altar for the next six days, refining his newly opened fifth spinal node and integrating the eight hundred pounds of kinetic output force into his muscular execution patterns.The morning of the seventh day arrived.Thick grey fog drifted through the subterranean cavern as the final hours of the deadline expired.A heavy vibration shuddered through the subterranean rock layers of the cavern, originating from the direction of the front mountain gates in Zone 2. The physical vibration traveled eight hundred yards through the granite bedrock, causing loose pebble stones on the altar floor to rattle.The distant, rhythmic sound of three hundred heavy iron cavalry hooves striking the stone pavers echoed through the mountain pass, accompanied by the booming sound of iron-clad ar

Mo Yuntao drove his leather boots into his horse stirrups, leaping ten feet into the air as he channeled four hundred pounds of crimson Sixth Layer Sword Meridian Qi into his four-foot refined steel blade.The crimson energy compressed along the cutting edge, expanding to a width of three inches while Mo Yuntao executed a downward diagonal strike aimed directly at Lin Feng's left clavicle at a movement velocity of twelve feet per second.Lin Feng remained standing on the wet flagstones, tracking the downward trajectory of the steel blade while analyzing the ninety-degree angle of Mo Yuntao's right shoulder joint.Since his fifth spinal node had been completely unsealed during his meditation in the subterranean cavern, eight hundred pounds of physical kinetic force surged through his spinal marrow, allowing his central nervous system to process Mo Yuntao's aerial movement in fractions of a second.When the crimson blade descended within four inches of his left collarbone, Lin Feng shif

Lin Feng stood at the eastern edge of the sandalwood table, his left hand resting casually on the linen-wrapped hilt of his thirty-five-pound black iron sword while his dark pupils examined the elevation lines of the mountain pass."A defensive force does not require numerical parity when controlling a narrow granite pass, provided the terrain is fortified with an active kinetic boundary array," Lin Feng said, stepping closer to the map.Lin Feng reached into his inner tunic pocket, pulling out the leather pouch containing the ninety High-Grade Qi Stone vouchers recovered from Elder Liu Tianba, and placed it onto the center of the sandalwood map."Take these ninety vouchers to Uncle Zhu Tieshan's forge in Zone 1 immediately," Lin Feng commanded, turning his gaze toward Elder Yan Zhen. "Instruct him to melt down ninety High-Grade Qi Stones alongside twelve hundred pounds of high-density meteorite steel to cast twelve specialized array core pillars according to my exact metallurgical sp