Purgatory Mountain’s true great figures would forever be Purgatory Mountain Patriarch and the six Purgatory Mountain Great Elders.

For the sake of prolonging their lives for as long as possible, these six Great Elders and Purgatory Mountain Patriarch had consumed who knew how much medicinal goods that were extremely precious for even the entire world of cultivators. This type of Great Mang structure that was built on slavery made it so that Purgatory Mountain Patriarch and Great Elders were able to live for an extremely long amount of time. With several times the lifespans of ordinary people, Purgatory Mountain Patriarch had also done many things he found interesting.

One of these things was precisely to send specially picked Great Mang children to Yunqin when they were still extremely young, and then have these children grow up in Yunqin, enter Yunqin’s military.

This sounded no different from ordinary spy arrangements, but if this was only an ordinary spy operation, Purgatory Mountain Patriarch definitely wouldn’t have thought it to be interesting.

These arrangements of his, this spy project was filled with endless blood and bones.

He deliberately arranged for the deaths of many Great Mang people to raise these spies, using the lives of many more people to pave the road for these individuals.

The actual implementation naturally didn’t need him. Only, through the plans he created, these children went through a previously prepared path of death, so the military achievements they acquired would be naturally much greater than their peers. Even becoming true great figures in Yunqin shouldn’t be too difficult.

If many individuals like Di Choufei and Hu Piyi were actually Great Mang people, people from Purgatory Mountain, then just how interesting of a matter would this be?

That was why Purgatory Mountain Patriarch called these Great Mang children ‘Dark Nobles’.

Over this project’s many years, it indeed brought back great achievements. Some past Great Mang children indeed obtained extraordinary achievements in Yunqin, some of the most outstanding ones even obtaining statuses equivalent to Purgatory Mountain’s most important core disciples, some of Purgatory Mountain’s best techniques passed on to them.

Only, in the end, Purgatory Mountain Patriarch still discovered that he made an extremely simple mistake. Yunqin was still an empire where outstanding individuals rose in great numbers. Putting aside a genius like Wenren Cangyue, some of Yunqin’s younger talents, without any special help, still weighed down on these Great Mang Dark Nobles. Together with Green Luan Academy’s existence, most of the Dark Nobles who quickly accumulated contributions and rose up in ranks would draw attention to themselves, as a result having their identities as Great Mang spies deduced. That was why the investment and return for Great Mang never reached an equal level, let alone bringing back any astonishing benefits.

A planned life couldn’t keep up with the changes of the world. This was precisely the same reasoning as why Yunqin’s naturally superior golden spoons from rich and powerful families might not necessarily surpass bumpkins.

That was why many years ago, Great Mang already lost connection with that last batch of Dark Nobles. Even if it was Purgatory Mountain, they believed that all of those Dark Nobles who were selected had already completely died, admitting to the failure of this project and no longer carrying out anything similar.

Even if there were still Dark Nobles who were still alive, they were still Great Mang people who should be loyal to Purgatory Mountain Patriarch. At this type of time, they should have tried to assassinate Lin Xi like in Jadefall City, so why would he instead go against Purgatory Mountain, instead try to kill a Purgatory Mountain Great Elder? One had to understand that those chosen in the past weren’t selected by Great Mang’s late emperor, but rather by Purgatory Mountain. Moreover, after entering Yunqin, they had to do many things that made Purgatory Mountain feel that they were absolutely loyal, and only then could they inherit Purgatory Mountain’s true lineage!

However, right now, the cultivation techniques this dark red masked stern faced high ranking officer displayed and the level he reached on these techniques made Purgatory Mountain Patriarch certain that he was precisely one of Purgatory Mountain’s Dark Nobles!

This was undoubtedly betrayal, moreover a betrayal from his own past plans.

That was why when Purgatory Mountain Patriarch reached out his finger towards this stern high ranking officer, his tone already carried true hidden rage.

When someone of the highest level like him released even just a sliver of suppressed rage, the feeling it gave others was already as if the entire world suddenly became dark. It was as if there was a giant mountain that was about to immediately topple over.

The legs of all of Purgatory Mountain Divine Adjudicators were trembling.

However, this stern high ranking officer who was standing on the giant imperial carriage was instead exceptionally calm. When facing this berating from Purgatory Mountain Patriarch, he only calmly nodded his head. “Correct, I used to be a Dark Noble.”

Purgatory Mountain Patriarch reached out a finger, but then thought of something else. He restrained his anger, lowered his hand, and then raised his head slightly. He looked at this stern high ranking officer and asked, “Why did you betray me?”

“I never wanted to come to Yunqin and become a Dark Noble, but I didn’t have the power to choose. Just like the others, if I didn’t come to Yunqin, all of us, including our loved ones, would become slaves in Purgatory Mountain’s mines.”

The stern high ranking officer looked at Purgatory Mountain Patriarch with an ice-cold expression. “Only, this still isn’t enough to make me betray Great Mang. What truly made me decide to make you my enemy was that to make some of us become Dark Nobles, Purgatory Mountain sacrificed too many people. My best friend just happened to be among them.”

Purgatory Mountain Patriarch was a bit surprised. He began to think to himself… at this type of time, he even had enough time to think a bit.

After thinking for a bit, his head was raised a bit again. He completely restrained his anger, calmly saying, “Then this means that this was just something unexpected. If this type of unexpected event made you feel discontent… killing this type of Purgatory Mountain existence should also make your rage subside a bit. After all, you are a Great Mang person, a Purgatory Mountain disciple, which is why as long as you are willing… you killed him, so his position in Purgatory Mountain is yours.”

Purgatory Mountain Great Elder was originally an existence even more respected than Great Mang Emperor. Moreover, after this Purgatory Mountain Great Elder died, together with Zhang Ping, Purgatory Mountain would only have two Great Elders left. If this stern high ranking officer agreed to become Purgatory Mountain’s Great Elder, then he would definitely possess authority and might greater than what these Purgatory Mountain Great Elders normally enjoyed.

This was similarly an extremely enticing promise.

However, this stern high ranking officer instead shook his head without taking any time to think things over, saying indifferently, “Perhaps I should thank you. It was the power you granted me that ultimately allowed me to understand what I need to do. If I had to make the choice to return to being a Great Mang citizen, then it would definitely be a Great Mang without Purgatory Mountain, a Great Mang without you.”

“Your power was bestowed upon you by me, I can naturally take it back as well.”

Purgatory Mountain Patriarch bathed in the throne’s red light and then shook his head with a bit of disappointment. His voice was extremely calm, to the extent where even the past hint of suppressed anger disappeared.

However, the instant his voice sounded, his body seemed to have instantly grown by many times.

This type of growth was a misconception produced by the aura expanding around his body.

Countless waves of berserk and endless gales that would leave even sacred level cultivators feel terrified emerged between him and this stern high ranking officer.

Just now, when Purgatory Mountain Patriarch reached out a finger, there was no crazy gale like this that appeared. This meant that the current Purgatory Mountain Patriarch truly began to become angry, that only now did he find it a bit hard to control his anger.

The way of thinking of an existence like him was already completely different from that of an ordinary person.

Normally, there was no one who could talk with him on equal footing. Normally, no one rejected him or mocked him, which was why occasionally, when he heard rejection or mockery, he would even feel like it was interesting, he wouldn’t get angry. It would even more so make others feel that the self-restraint and mood of a great figure couldn’t be evaluated through normal reasoning, couldn’t be fathomed.

However, if everyone rejected him, no one viewed him as the highest level existence, so when he was rejected and mocked too much, someone like Purgatory Mountain Patriarch obviously wouldn’t feel like it was interesting anymore. His good mood would also naturally change to extreme rage.

The anger of ordinary people would only end up as suffocating pent-up resentment. However, his true rage instead turned into a crazy gale, turning into substance, becoming a purple-black flame.

When this flame took form in front of him, all of the flames still burning on the Devil Bamboo seemed like they were worshiping a king, fiercely subsiding, and then completely disappearing. They turned into fine vital energy, merging into this purple-black flame.

This process exceeded the limits of a Sacred Expert’s perception. This purple-black flame seemed to have shattered the limits of space itself as it descended towards this stern high ranking officer.

…

Purgatory Mountain Patriarch now revealed true anger. Moreover, he understood what type of Purgatory Mountain secret techniquethis stern high ranking officer cultivated. As such, the power he used right now was naturally even more powerful than the banner corner he previously sent at Xu Shengmo.

It was precisely this flame that directly crippled the legs of a powerful Purgatory Mountain Great Elder.

Over the years, this stern high ranking officer spent a lot of time pondering over a situation where he ended up facing Purgatory Mountain’s most powerful cultivators, how he would survive before someone like Purgatory Mountain Patriarch, or perhaps if he could find a way to at least block a single strike. That was why he only did one thing.

His body curled up as if he didn’t have bones.

His body’s sturdy black armor plating split open, revealing the inner armor inside that looked like it was made from earthen yellow rock. While he curled his body, this earthen yellow inner armor also curled up strangely, actually shrinking into a ball.

The stern high ranking officer’s body seemed like it curled up into an earthen yellow rock ball.

Purgatory Mountain Patriarch’s purple-black flames landed on the giant imperial carriage, landing on this earthen yellow rock sphere.

The black imperial carriage began to melt, the hard and cold metal melting into dazzling golden liquid, flowing down.

The earthen yellow rock sphere’s surface began to burn, turning into layer after layer of ashes. It floated on the golden metal liquid, rolling down the giant imperial carriage remains that now became entirely red.

Purgatory Mountain Patriarch’s brows furrowed.

Regardless of who it was who turned themselves into a ball, burned within a suffocating rock sphere, the feeling would definitely be terrible.

However, Purgatory Mountain Patriarch wanted to kill this traitorous Dark Noble. Right now, even though he could feel that the soul force aura of this stern high ranking officer became weak, what he was certain of was that this stern high ranking officer used this type of method to endure his strike, receiving injuries but not dying.

He thus became even more angry. He raised his finger again. A wave of even greater power rushed out from his fingertip.

Lin Xi’s fingers were already tightly attached to Big Black’s three bowstrings. Right at this time, he didn’t hold back his soul force at all, pouring out of his body with speed exceeding his own limit into Big Black’s three strings!