Chapter 1613 - Identity Exposed

In the next instant, one glowing orb after another shot out and drilled into the surroundings, making sure no one could block the martial soul's power, no matter how deeply they tried to hide.

The snake-scorpions lunged without the slightest hesitation, tearing into everything they saw, including the Santi Tribe.

The Santi Tribe's chieftain roared furiously, "Liu Wuxie, what is the meaning of this? You cooperate with us, and you cooperate with the Snake-Scorpion Clan as well?"

"You can only blame yourself for not stopping Chu Zhongtian," Liu Wuxie replied with a cold snort.

The Santi Tribe wanted to use the Immortal Slaughter Palace to get rid of him, but that plan would have never worked. Liu Wuxie had kept a trump card to counter them. He only withheld the Snake-Scorpion Clan until now because he had been guarding against the Santi Tribe all along.

Since that was the case, there was no longer any reason to keep pretending at cooperation.

"Kill them all and seize the Heretic God's remains!"

As the glowing orbs detonated, wave after wave of powerful shockwaves tore outward.

Tian Can intercepted Chu Zhongtian successfully, but Tian Can couldn't kill his opponent easily in a one-on-one fight.

"Tian Can, hold him off for fifteen minutes," Liu Wuxie said. After the mass detonation of the martial souls, hardly anyone remained standing in the camp.

With the Snake-Scorpion Clan swarming in, the disciples and elders suffered devastating casualties. Only Chu Zhongtian remained standing, and Tian Can had him locked in battle.

As for the Santi Tribe's chieftain, he had already burrowed underground to search for the Heretic God's remains. If he found it first and relied on the remains to make his breakthrough to the Immortal Realm, he would become Liu Wuxie's nightmare because he would stop at nothing to hunt Liu Wuxie down.

Even with Tian Can's cultivation at the Quasi-Immortal Realm, he wouldn't be able to fight an immortal.

Liu Wuxie turned into a streaking meteor and plunged underground. He had already locked onto the Heretic God's remains with Ghost Pupil so that he would reach it far faster than the Santi Tribe's chieftain.

Having comprehended the Great Five Elemental Mythical Art, the fragment of the Great Dao of Earth rendered him unstoppable upon the land.

The earth around Liu Wuxie rippled like water, parting effortlessly to form a passage. The Santi Tribe’s chieftain was not so fortunate; even as a Quasi-Immortal, he still had to batter through stone and soil by force.

The ground shook violently. Each punch the Santi Tribe's chieftain threw produced a thunderous rumble and blasted apart huge slabs of rock.

The underground mine started collapsing, burying miners alive as shrill screams tore through the darkness.

"Liu Wuxie, the Santi Tribe...once the palace lord arrives, all of you will die!" Chu Zhongtian cursed through clenched teeth, yet he could do nothing to stop them. The moment he tried to break away and intercept Liu Wuxie, Tian Can forced him back.

For ordinary people, fifteen minutes meant only fifteen minutes. For top-tier experts, fifteen minutes was enough to accomplish countless things.

The aftermath of the battle continued to demolish surrounding structures, shredding every arrangement the Immortal Slaughter Palace had laid out.

At the same time, the Immortal Slaughter Palace fell into uproar the moment they learned Liu Wuxie was hiding on the Serene Peace Star. No one could understand how he had infiltrated it.

Their investigation eventually led them to the realization that Liu Wuxie had been hiding among the thirty-two disciples dispatched to the Serene Peace Star. The camp forbade entry and exit, and anyone transported to the Immortal Slaughter Palace arrived via the teleportation array, making it impossible to infiltrate the planet beforehand.

Sima An and the others gathered, faces twisted with rage.

"Damn it! How the hell did Liu Wuxie manage to enter the Immortal Slaughter Palace and fool every single one of us?"

Experts had thoroughly investigated every disciple's background, yet they still found nothing. They hadn't even begun recruiting new disciples, so that no newcomer could have slipped in.

That meant the problem originated within the Immortal Slaughter Palace itself. They immediately rechecked all thirty-two disciples they had dispatched, and the trail soon pointed to Meng An.

"Bring Meng Hong over!"

They had already investigated every other disciple, and none of them showed any issues.

An elder hurried off to summon Meng Hong. At that exact moment, the elder guarding the Heavenly Aquatic Pool finally couldn't endure it any longer. The Heavenly Aquatic Pool's energy still hadn't recovered, and it had begun to wither rapidly until every last trace of energy disappeared.

The remaining energy inside the Seven-Treasure Glazed Stone could no longer sustain the massive Heavenly Aquatic Pool. The sect master wasn't in the sect either, leaving everything to Sima An.

The elder entered the main hall with a grim face and dropped to his knees. "Elders, there's an issue with the Heavenly Aquatic Pool."

The Heavenly Aquatic Pool formed the Immortal Slaughter Palace's foundation, and the sect would plunge into decline if anything truly went wrong.

"What's the problem?" Sima An asked, his heart sinking as he spoke. He immediately sensed the situation had grown worse than he had imagined, as disasters never came alone.

News had just arrived that the Serene Peace Star was under siege. The Santi Tribe had breached the camp, and countless elders and disciples had fallen. Now the Heavenly Aquatic Pool faced trouble of its own, and a suffocating shadow loomed over every elder in the hall.

Niu Yichang staggered as a premonition rose in his chest. After all, he alone had brought Meng An into the Heavenly Aquatic Pool recently.

The elder had no choice but to grit his teeth and speak the truth. "All the energy from the Heavenly Aquatic Pool is gone. It's nothing but just an ordinary pool now."

"Let's go take a look at it ourselves," Sima An said, rushing out of the main hall.

The Serene Peace Star was under attack, but it remained nothing more than a planet producing astral crystals. The Heavenly Aquatic Pool, however, was the Immortal Slaughter Palace's foundation, and they couldn't afford the slightest mishap there.

As all the elders reached the Heavenly Aquatic Pool, all they could do was stare at it in disbelief.

"How could this happen?" Gong Yangbo staggered and nearly collapsed to the ground.

If the pool's energy was gone, then someone had drained the Seven-Treasure Glazed Stone's energy as well.

Niu Yichang's unease grew heavier as Sima An raised his hand and pulled the Seven-Treasure Glazed Stone out of the pool.

Sima An concluded after a brief examination, "Someone completely devoured the Seven-Treasure Glazed Stone's energy recently." His investigation showed that it had happened within the past ten to fifteen days.

"Could it be Meng An?" Gong Yangbo asked. He suddenly remembered how Meng An had been soaking in the Heavenly Aquatic Pool when they had come to stop Elder Niu, yet they hadn't noticed any decrease back then.

Sima An still lacked direct proof, so he turned to the elder responsible for guarding this place. "Has anyone else entered the Heavenly Aquatic Pool recently aside from Meng An?"

"Aside from Elder Niu, who brought his disciple over ten days ago, no one else has set foot in the Heavenly Aquatic Pool," reported the elder responsible for the Heavenly Aquatic Pool. Only Niu Yichang had used his identity to force his way in.

Now that the truth was in the open, he could only disclose everything.

Everyone turned to stare at Niu Yichang.

“Why are you all staring at me? Even if I tried, there’s no way I could absorb all the energy in the Seven-Treasure Glazed Stone,” Niu Yichang argued.

Even at the pinnacle of the Heaven Gaze Realm, he could never contain that immense energy inside his body.

"Where's Meng Hong?" Sima An yelled, a killing urge rising in his chest.

A messenger arrived, dropping a bombshell that drew another wave of sharp inhalations. "Elder Sima, I have bad news! Elder Meng has committed suicide."

That confirmed it. Meng Hong had long conspired with Liu Wuxie, and Meng An had never been Meng Hong's nephew at all. Meng An had been Liu Wuxie.

Fan Gaojie punched the air in frustration. "Damn this Meng Hong! Damn this Meng An!" Without Meng Hong, Liu Wuxie would never have infiltrated the Immortal Slaughter Palace in the first place.

"Niu Yichang, what do you have to say now?!" Gong Yangbo roared.

Niu Yichang couldn't escape responsibility, as he had forced his way to take Liu Wuxie into the Heavenly Aquatic Pool.

"I'm responsible for bringing him into the Heavenly Aquatic Pool, but all of you were present on the day of the assessment. None of us realized that Meng An was Liu Wuxie. So are you saying that you are not equally responsible for letting him into the sect?" Niu Yichang asked. Guilt weighed on him, but he refused to carry every ounce of blame alone.

Everyone who oversaw the assessment shared responsibility.

Gong Yangbo pressed, trying to corner Niu Yichang completely, "Only because you insisted on doing things your way, Liu Wuxie gained access to the Heavenly Aquatic Pool. He wouldn't have unleashed such chaos by merely infiltrating the Immortal Slaughter Palace, and he would have eventually left."

No one would believe it if they heard a single man had thrown the entire Immortal Slaughter Palace into chaos, yet that had become reality. Before long, the world would learn Liu Wuxie had infiltrated the Immortal Slaughter Palace, devoured the Seven-Treasure Glazed Stone's energy, and unleashed havoc on the Serene Peace Star.

The Immortal Slaughter Palace had suffered an enormous blow, and even with its deep foundation, it could not endure losses like this forever.

"Blaming it all on me now that a disaster has struck?!" Niu Yichang shot back. Guilt gnawed at him, but he couldn't tolerate Gong Yangbo's tone.

"Everyone, cut it down. Our priority is to find Liu Wuxie and kill him to salvage our losses," Sima An scolded, putting an end to their bickering. Arguing further would only turn them into a laughingstock.

The two glared at each other, then finally fell silent.

"It now depends on whether the palace lord can kill Liu Wuxie. If he can't, our losses will be catastrophic," Fan Gaojie said with a deep frown.

A heavy boulder seemed to press down on everyone's hearts in the room. Fifteen minutes had nearly passed, and they could only pray it wasn't already too late.

By destroying the teleportation array, Liu Wuxie had severed their route to rescue.

Sima An and the others didn't dare to rush over. First, someone had destroyed the teleportation array. Second, they feared the possibility of Liu Wuxie feigning an attack to lure the Immortal Slaughter Palace's experts away from their headquarters. He could then have others strike the sect itself. If that were to happen, they had to hold the line here, or their losses would be catastrophic.

News of the Heavenly Aquatic Pool spread through the sect in an instant. When the disciples heard it, their faces went blank.

They couldn't believe Liu Wuxie had been hiding right under their noses.

Meanwhile, the battle's shockwaves spread beyond thirty thousand miles, and Chu Zhongtian fought with true fury. Even so, against an old monster like Tian Can, his battle experience fell short.

Liu Wuxie was only at the pinnacle of the Earth Immortal Realm, but his speed had already surpassed the Santi Tribe's chieftain. Each punch the chieftain threw demanded tremendous effort that split slabs of rock apart.

Liu Wuxie moved differently. With the Great Dao of Earth's fragment supporting him, the stone parted on its own, and his speed surged as he dropped more than a hundred meters underground like a falling star.