Chapter 160: Built on the Lives of Others, the Du Clan

Translator: Minotauruz

A mutated Basilisk Fruit? Ye Xiuwen’s heart shuddered. He finally understood why this Basilisk Fruit looked so different and special. In fact, he had attempted to store the mutated Basilisk Fruit into his Interspatial Ring during the battle earlier, but to no avail. This must also have been a by-product of the Basilisk Fruit’s mutation.

This was precisely why this group of people knew that Ye Xiuwen possessed a Basilisk Fruit right now.

He clutched tightly at the Basilisk Fruit in his hands, and a trace of hesitation flashed across his eyes.

If he had been alone, he would have refused that young lady’s request without any hesitation. He would never compromise, even if that meant fighting another arduous battle with the group of people before him.

This was because compromising and admitting defeat was not something that the disciples of the Heavenly Peak would ever do. Furthermore, that lady was obviously humiliating him. How could he just take things lying down like that?!

That said, he knew that his little martial sister had been severely injured and was relying solely on him right now. The consequences could potentially be disastrous if he chose to act recklessly.

Just as his heart was deeply tangled by these deliberations of his, Jun Xiaomo, with her head still hung low, whispered, “Don’t give it to her.”

“Xiaomo?” Ye Xiuwen lowered his head and looked at Jun Xiaomo lying in his bosom.

“Martial brother, don’t give it to her.” Jun Xiaomo lifted her head slowly as she locked eyes with Ye Xiuwen and repeated again.

“Alright.” Ye Xiuwen softly responded. At the same time, he retrieved an Escape Scroll from his Interspatial Ring and discreetly stuffed it into Jun Xiaomo’s bosom. This was his final Escape Scroll.

When push came to shove, he had to at least be certain that his little martial sister would be able to get away from the fight safely.

The rims of Jun Xiaomo’s eyes reddened and grew warm and moist. At the same time that she received the Escape Scroll, she also clutched tightly onto Ye Xiuwen’s wrist.

It might have been her willfulness or her headstrong personality, but when she heard that young lady call Ye Xiuwen “ugly”, her heart swelled with immense rage.

A notion of tearing up that young lady’s vulgar lips immediately crossed her mind!

The lady on the other side didn’t hear the contents of the conversation between Jun Xiaomo and Ye Xiuwen. She only saw Ye Xiuwen remain taciturn as he stood where he was. After some time, she could hardly hold herself back as she mocked, “How about it? Is this decision really that difficult? I’ll tell you the truth – whether you’re willing or not, you’ll still have to cede that Basilisk Fruit to us either ways. If you know what I mean, then be good and hand it over right now. Otherwise, you might find a few more scars added to that already ugly face of yours.”

Jun Xiaomo’s eyes reddened again – this time with anger! Every statement by this vulgar young lady had been targeted at the scar on her martial brother’s face, and her final statement was the last straw that broke the camel’s back!

“Martial brother, let me down, please.” Jun Xiaomo coldly stated.

Ye Xiuwen furrowed his brows.

“Don’t worry. I’m no longer in much discomfort.” Jun Xiaomo patted Ye Xiuwen’s arms.

She was telling the truth here. Ye Xiuwen had earlier fed her with several high-quality recovery pills. Thus, despite her relatively severe injuries, her recovery had been fairly quick.

Ye Xiuwen noticed the determination in Jun Xiaomo’s eyes, and he said no more as he slowly let Jun Xiaomo back down to her feet.

Jun Xiaomo had always been nestling in Ye Xiuwen’s bosom earlier, so the other group had failed to see her appearances clearly. But now that she stood squarely before the entire group of disciples, her appearances immediately became clear for all to see.

When that young lady who had earlier been provoking Ye Xiuwen with her scathing remarks saw Jun Xiaomo’s appearances, she could barely contain herself.

She had initially thought that the lady in the arms of an ugly man could only be another ugly person. Who would have expected her appearances to be so pleasant... No, it was not just pleasant – Jun Xiaomo was far more beautiful than that lady herself!

This vicious lady hated people who looked more beautiful than her.

A trace of jealousy surged from the depths of her eyes, and that young lady immediately retrieved a whip from her Interspatial Ring as a vicious thought crossed her mind – It’s fine. That lady’s appearances are going to be ruined within a few moments.

But when it came to hatred and contempt, Jun Xiaomo’s heart possessed far more of these than that group of people combined. This was something that the other group was completely unaware of.

That’s right, hatred and contempt. As soon as Jun Xiaomo saw with her own eyes the appearances of the other group of people, her heart not only roiled with profound contempt, an immense, incisive hatred also swelled up from the depths of her heart.

This was because the disciples standing before her right now belonged to one of the eight great sects that had persecuted her in her previous life. They were the Du Clan! In particular, the vicious lady and that male cultivator standing beside her had been two of the main perpetrators who had caused her disfiguration in her previous life!

This young lady’s name was Du Lianqin, while the male cultivator’s name was Du Yongxu.

The lady must have been referring to Du Yongxu when she had called out “brother Xu” earlier.

Although Du Yongxu possessed a handsome and striking appearance, Jun Xiaomo was extremely clear that under those deceptive appearances of his was an incredibly black heart which pumped vile, dirty blood throughout his body.

In fact, Du Yongxu was not where the problem lay – it was the entire Du Clan.

Despite the valor and dignity enjoyed by the so-called eight great sects, the truth of the matter was that each of these sects possessed several dark secrets of their own. Of these secrets that each of the eight great sects possessed, there was one pertaining to the Du Clan that was practically an open secret. At the very least, everyone within the eight great sects knew of this matter.

The Du Clan thrived on human sacrifices.

The main reason why the Du Clan’s disciples generally possessed fairly strong and equal cultivation levels was a result of these human sacrifices. In the eyes of the Du Clan, these human sacrifices were existences that were akin to livestock and poultry – they could be killed and harvested at any time they wished.

The Du Clan would habitually pick out four to five years-old children from the mortal world who had an affinity or talent for cultivation and groom them to become their own human sacrifices. They would use the pretext of accepting disciples to pick out these children, and they would even invest a considerable amount of spiritual pills and medicine on these children to elevate their cultivation levels.

These ignorant and muddleheaded children would invariably rejoice and celebrate at finally having taken the first step onto the path of cultivation and immortality. Yet what they were unaware was the fact that they had just taken the first step onto the path of certain doom.

The day that these children realized their cultivation potential would also be the day that Death knocked on their door.

When that time came, the Du Clan would toss these children into a massive formation array and activate it. Thus, they would refine the spiritual energy within these children and transfer them onto the bodies of the Du Clan disciples.

The transference of spiritual energy was an incredibly painful and arduous process. But once the formation array had been activated, the fate of these human sacrifices would be sealed – there was no way of escape from within. The formation array would slowly but surely drain out all the spiritual energies from these children, until each and every one of them had finally withered up completely.

This largely accounted for why the Du Clan’s disciples invariably possessed fairly high cultivation levels.

In other words, it can be said that the Du Clan’s empire of success had been built on a foundation of souls and bones of young men and women.

Viewed in this light, it was therefore hardly a surprise that these Du Clan members would immediately think of robbing Jun Xiaomo and Ye Xiuwen given that there were only two of them. After all, each and every single person within the Du Clan, from top to toe, possessed a tainted heart. How could there possibly be room for the existence of a pure and kind-hearted disciple? Jun Xiaomo glanced over at the group of Du Clan disciples with a contemptuous and disgusted gaze, as though she had just seen something dirty.

Du Lianqin was outraged by Jun Xiaomo’s gaze. She raised her voice and yelled, “What are you looking at?! If you continue to glare at us like that, I’m going to gouge out your eyeballs right here, right now!”

“Ah, I’m just looking at how the Du Clan disciples of the eight great sects are so vile and vicious!” Jun Xiaomo rebuked bluntly.

“You!!!” Du Lianqin would never have expected Jun Xiaomo to guess their identity with just one glance. Her heart immediately began to thump with unease.

Could it be that they also belong to another clan within the eight great sects? It can’t be, right? If they were part of the eight great sects, why would they look like they’re in such a tragic state right now?

Although the eight great sects were fraught with their discreet strife and pursuits for power, they had to maintain a clean and pristine appearance on the surface. After all, the overall strength of each of these eight great sects were about the same. If any two sects ended up having an internal strife or conflict among themselves, the parties benefitting from such strife would almost certainly be the other sects.

Thus, there was an unwritten rule that these sects would adhere to, particularly when they sent their disciples out of the sect on travels – as long as they encountered someone else from within the eight great sects, they would do their best to avoid conflict with each other so as to prevent any potential escalation of the matter to an inter-sect conflict.

Standing beside Du Lianqin, Du Yongxu had also thought about this. He squinted his eyes as he sized up Jun Xiaomo and Ye Xiuwen. Then, he nevertheless decided to err on the side of caution as he made a fist and palm salute and asked, “Dare I ask which sect these two fellow cultivators hail from?”

Although he had made a fist and palm salute as he asked his question, the facial expression on his face revealed a look of disgust – he meant no politeness or respect at all.

Jun Xiaomo was thoroughly annoyed seeing this. She picked up a bunch of her hair and curled it around her fingers as she smirked, “Don’t you want to know?”

After a protracted pause –

“I’m not telling you. You can guess for yourselves.”

This was the first time that Du Yongxu’s face felt as though it had been thoroughly stripped off his face and trampled upon. A glimmer of indignation immediately surged from the depths of his eyes.

Du Lianqin found this young lady before her incredibly vile and upsetting. How could she treat her dear brother Xu with such disrespect? Thus, she gnashed her teeth as she bellowed with indignation, “How dare you treat our kindness with such disrespect?! You’re asking for it!”

“Oh? Kindness? I’ve never seen any kindness from you people so far. From the outset, you had aggressively requested my martial brother to hand over the mutated Basilisk Fruit to you, and you’ve even called my martial brother ‘ugly’. If you think that all of this is ‘kindness’, then let me extend a portion of this ‘kindness’ right back to you – martial brother’s face is only like this because of an injury since childhood. This is something that is out of his control. Compared with martial brother, the Du Clan are the ones who are truly ugly and possess a vile heart – even your blood must be black! I mean, how many innocent young lives do you think each of you have taken so far?”

“You!” Du Lianqin was thoroughly enraged right now, “I can’t be bothered where you’ve come from anymore. Since you dare to humiliate our clan, you’d best be prepared to die! So what if you’re part of the eight great sects? Even if the two of you perish here today, we can cover our tracks so well that no one will even be able to find your corpse!”

As she finished speaking, Du Lianqin made her move against Jun Xiaomo.

“Hmph. Humiliate the Du Clan? I’m only stating facts here!” Jun Xiaomo coldly refuted as she promptly retrieved several talismans from her Interspatial Ring.

If Jun Xiaomo had not been afraid of even Situ Cang to begin with, how would she be fazed by these greenhorns from the Du Clan?

Ye Xiuwen did not immediately move to protect Jun Xiaomo because he could see what kind of cultivation that female cultivator possessed. She was only of the ninth level of Qi Mastery. On the other hand, Jun Xiaomo possessed formidable talismans that more than made up for her cultivation level deficiencies. There was no way that Du Lianqin would be able to overcome Jun Xiaomo.

Furthermore, Ye Xiuwen was being vigilant of the others standing behind Du Lianqin right now.

Moments later, Du Yongxu’s eyes gleamed coldly when he noticed how Jun Xiaomo was battling on equal grounds despite her injuries.

Thus, Du Yongxu coldly “responded” to Jun Xiaomo, “Fellow cultivators, you leave us no choice with your stubbornness. You alleged that the Du Clan has killed several innocent people. Then let me expound some greater truths to you – this cultivation world has always been one ruled by the strong and the strong only. Those people’s existences are not worth anyone’s considerations at all. The weak will always be abandoned by their fate!”

As he finished speaking, he signaled to his martial brothers and charged towards Ye Xiuwen and the rest.

Du Yongxu had already hardened his heart – he was going to kill and rob these people!