Home?

“Then shouldn’t I sleep more?” The little fellow climbed down grumpily. Even though she had grown a lot bigger, she still had the temperament of a little girl.

Qianye said patiently, “Our house is a bit messy right now, we need to clean it up.”

“Don’t we have cleaners? Oh, you mean we have to fight?” The lass sobered up immediately. There were three things that held meaning for her—eating, sleeping, and fighting.

“We need to fight, but we have to be careful not to kill unnecessary bystanders. No spitting poison in our own home, okay?”

“Why can’t I spit poison? My throat itches if I can’t spray poison during fights.”

Qianye didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. The little girl had clearly awakened her innate talent and wanted to use her venom out of instinct. It also seemed that she would need to release the poison after a certain period of accumulation. Each mouthful of her poison would turn several kilometers of land into a dead zone, not something he could have at his Southern Blue base.

“Her poison might even kill Count Stuka, right?” Qianye thought to himself.

As Little Zhuji’s real father, Count Stuka was highly proficient in poison but powerful humans could still resist his poison. He was simply not on the same level as Little Zhuji. Song Zining felt that Zhuji wasn’t even related to the count, and that her egg had been placed in the hatching chamber for some reason.

After warning Zhuji repeatedly not to spit poison, Qianye brought her into Southern Blue.

The city was bustling, with caravans going in and out of its gates from time to time. Qianye, however, felt that the city was more desolate compared to when he had left. There were only trucks flying the colors of their merchant groups and none belonging to Dark Flame.

There weren’t a lot of people or cars on the main road at the moment, so the sentries saw Qianye and Zhuji from a fair distance. It was impossible to not see them since he was walking at the center of the main path. Even the cargo trucks had to make way for him.

A veteran in charge of keeping watch rubbed his eyes as he stared at Qianye, and then confirmed again through his binoculars. He suddenly threw them away, shouting, “It’s Qianye! Qianye has returned. Quick, close the gates and sound the alarm!”

The city walls were thrown into chaos as everyone ran about like frightened rabbits. The person who was supposed to sound the alarm was so frightened that the hammer slipped out of his hands several times before he finally managed to strike the bell. The resounding bell echoed at varying intensities, with neither depth nor rhythm, clear proof that the striker was weak from the trembling.

Sounding the alarm was easy, but closing the city doors would take some work. The city gates were equipped with a steam-driven kinetic mechanism, something Song Zining had worked hard to remodel after his arrival. Without mechanical aid, these ten-ton doors simply wouldn’t budge.

Southern Blue was a central trading city, headquarters to the Dark Flame Mercenary Corps, and also home to many stationed experts. There was no way bandits would dare to rob the city.

But with energy provided by the kinetic towers, there was no longer a need for experts to use brute strength. Now, closing the city gates was just a matter of flipping some switches and enough time.

The officer in charge of guarding the gate rushed up to the city wall, roaring, “What’s wrong?! Have you not closed the gates yet? You can forget about living after that man gets inside.”

The group of veterans atop the wall wore odd expressions but didn’t make a move. That officer was just about to act out when an aide tugged on his sleeves. “Are we really going to close the doors, Sire?”

“Do you want to die, otherwise?”

The aide said, “It’s because we don’t want to die that we should leave the door open.”

The officer was stunned. “Why?”

The aide said, “The door might be useful to people like us, but do you think it can stop that person? Once we close the gates, it’ll be obvious that we’re hostile. That person doesn’t even blink when killing. Many of us were present in the great battle back then, and submitted to him because we were terrified.”

“The battle where tens of thousands died?” The officer turned pale.

“That’s a bit exaggerated, but a lot of people did perish.”

“Then what do we do? The alarm has been sounded!” The officer was now panicking.

“Sounding the alarm is fine, as long as we don’t shut the gates. If that person wants to vent his anger, the ones in charge of the gates will be the first to suffer his wrath!”

The officer finally understood. “Go inform those masters in the city and keep ringing the bell until they hear us!”

The fervent alarm echoed through the entirety of Southern Blue. Confusion descended upon the city as soldiers began to mobilize. The reaction could be considered quite fast.

The city gates before Qianye, however, remained open, and the soldiers on the wall were nowhere to be seen. All of them were hiding in the tower and didn’t dare show their faces.

How could Qianye not tell that something had happened in Southern Blue? He sneered coldly, feeling that Song Zining had made the right guess. Judging from the disarray, however, the city wasn’t exactly united, either. At the very least, the one who had taken over Southern Blue wasn’t in full control.

Qianye rose into the air and took his place atop the tower, looking down at the city. “I am Qianye. Now that I’ve returned from the Great Maelstrom, those who shouldn’t be here will get one final chance to leave on their own. That’s the only way you’ll survive.”

Qianye’s voice wasn’t that loud, but it rang in the ears of everyone in the city. It was as though he were speaking beside them. Ordinary people sighed in astonishment, but most experts in the city looked terrified. It wasn’t hard to spread one’s voice throughout the city, but it was difficult to keep the volume uniform everywhere. Some careful thought would reveal just how terrifying this level of origin power control was.

Additionally, those familiar with Qianye knew that he was never ostentatious and would even remain hidden at most times. It was only Song Zining and Ji Tianqing showing their faces most of the time. But now, his style had changed quite a bit—the announcement seemed magnanimous, but in fact, it was not. The unrestrained experts of the neutral lands cared about their reputation the most. Even those who had been planning to slip away might stay back to fight after hearing such a claim. They would never be able to raise their heads after escaping in such a manner.

Some people couldn’t help but sigh at the thought of the person living in the Dark Flames headquarters.

Qianye’s voice had just faded away when a sinister voice erupted, “What gall! Who do you think you are to give me a final chance?”

A figure flew up into the air and stood across Qianye. The man seemed to be in his thirties, but the dark rings around his eyes made him look weak and older than he was.

Four more silhouettes flew up and formed an arced formation around the young man.

The young man became even more unrestrained after the arrival of these four people. He first roared until he was about to choke, and then said while pointing at Qianye, “Who do you think you are to make such bold claims? I like this city and I’ve taken it. What do you want to do? What can you do?”

The man’s finger was almost at Qianye’s nose, but the latter only asked calmly, “What happened to the people from Dark Flame?”

The young man said disdainfully, “What else? Most of them have submitted, some are in captivity, and a few stubborn ones were killed on the spot. What number one mercenary corps? Didn’t they still yield after I killed a couple of them? But you really didn’t train them well, only a handful of them were up to par. It got me so angry that I had to look for fun around the city.”

Qianye ignored the taunting. “What has happened to the workshops and merchants under Dark Flame?”

The young man laughed. “Even the mercenaries have no backbone to speak of, what can you hope from those merchants and craftsmen? They’re like dogs, whoever throws them a bone is their master.”

“That means they’re all under your command now?”

“Of course, all of them have sworn oaths,” the young man said proudly.

Qianye sighed in relief, and the tension on his face finally relaxed a bit. He scanned the four people behind the young man, saying, “These four are your bodyguards?”

“So what if they are? Use your dog brain and think, what kind of person must I be to be able to afford such bodyguards.”

Qianye cut him short. “They’re pretty weak, let me test them for you.”

He moved forward while speaking and threw a punch at a bearded, burly man.

This punch was neither fast nor vicious, and even the origin power fluctuation was nothing out of the ordinary. There was no semblance of martial complexity to speak of. The bearded man—an expert in fist arts—revealed a sinister smile. With a loud roar and thunderous momentum, he punched back with the momentum of an avalanche!

This punch was extremely fast, blasting Qianye’s fist within moments. It was several times bigger and arrived with several times the momentum.

The spectators gasped in astonishment. They wouldn’t be surprised if Qianye’s arm was broken on the spot.

The moment their fists collided, the bearded man sent waves of earth-shattering force into Qianye’s body. However, his smile froze up immediately afterward. The force he had meant to channel into the opponent’s body was stopped by a fist.

The impact was reflected back in its entirety, and his fist was suppressed immediately. The damage didn’t stop there—the bearded man didn’t even have time to scream before his entire body exploded into a bloody mist.

Without so much as a pause, Qianye threw a swift punch at another opponent.