"Since Shi Tianhao has turned over a new leaf, then this is the best outcome."
Pang Jie continued slowly. "From the perspective of the Divine Lands, Shi Tianyi and his mother did something good for the world on that fateful day. Besides Shi Tianhao, Shi Tianyi was made that day as well. Instead of one unprecedented prodigy, now there are two. The standards of the human world of cultivation have been greatly enhanced ever since."
"If we look back at the event after a thousand years, the benefits that the human world of cultivation would have reaped since then would have been limitless."
Lin Feng did not even look at Pang Jie. He shifted his gaze to the Xuanlin Holy Man and asked, "Is this the Great Void Sect’s position?"
The Xuanlin Holy Man replied quietly, "If not?"
Lin Feng chuckled a little. "Therefore, according to you guys, I should dig out his eyes for my disciple. A single Man with Polycoria will become two then, no? The only problem is, his eyes are not worth my attention at all."
"I want whatever he took from my disciple back then – in full."
"Anomalies that happen during the formation of the Purple Pill after the erection of the Supreme Spiritual Crucible on top of the Supreme Spiritual Altar will lead to certain consequences later on. These consequences shall reveal themselves during the ascension to the nascent soul stage – I know what these changes are, and I’m sure the Great Void Sect knows as well."
The Xuanlin Holy Man and Pang Jie frowned a little.
Everybody showed expressions of doubt upon hearing these words. This included the Prince Xian of the Right and the Gambling Holy Man, amongst other immortal soul stage powerhouses.
Shi Zongyue’s expression changed slightly, as if he suddenly recalled something important, and his gaze became a lot more solemn and serious.
Lin Feng’s expression was plain but his eyes were a lot colder. "Shi Tianyi stole the Natural Supreme Spiritual Altar away from my disciple, Shi Tianhao, when he was still a tiny kid. Shi Tianyi’s legacy as an unprecedented prodigy, or perhaps a God that’s descended upon the earth? Everything was built at the expense of my disciple."
"Tianhao’s life was in danger and his parents escaped with him. Even then, they were pursued by members of the Yu Family."
"Tianhao joined my sect afterwards to ply the trade. The Yu Family never gave up – they attempted to murder him three times after discovering his real identity."
"His parents returned from the Void Battleground with much effort, and right about when their family could finally be reunited, his parents were pursued with intentions to kill again."
Only at this point did Shi Zongyue and the others finally realize why Lin Feng acted so aggressively and took the initiative to launch an assault on the Yu Family and violently flatten their entire estate.
Such things could not be denied. The Soul-Searching Technique was something of demonic origins and a technique humans typically shunned. If the need for it did arise, the Yu Family and the Shi Family could only confess truthfully.
Nobody doubted Lin Feng’s ability to do something like this as they watched his ice-cold eyes.
A female cultivator from the Great Void Sect behind the Xuanlin Holy Man pondered momentarily before opening her mouth. "Pursuing Shi Tianhao’s parents with the intention to kill them is indeed unforgiveable. The perpetrators should be punished."
"When all those things happened all those years ago, Shi Tianyi was also still a kid. His mother was the mastermind behind everything. If I’m not wrong, this person has already been captured."
"In recent years, Shi Tianyi has been thinking a lot about his family junior. I’m sure he will be happy to find other ways to compensate Shi Tianhao."
The female cultivator from the Great Void Sect continued. "They will both become unprecedented legends in the cultivation world – there is no doubt. If either one is lost in one way or another, the human world of cultivation would have experienced an unimaginable loss."
Lin Feng’s eyes swept over her with an indifferent gaze. "According to what I know, Shi Tianyi has not shown a single trace of regret in his behavior in recent years. He is also completely aware of everything that’s happened all those years ago – every single detail, the reason why it happened and the outcome of it all. Furthermore, when he discovered the secret about my disciple’s Supreme Spiritual Altar, he reported to his mother and subsequently devised that devious plan of theft."
"You can say all you want that he has repented or whatever. That’s okay – all he has to do is return what he took from Shi Tianhao."
"What is it? He can only admit that he has stolen something but is unwilling to return it?"
The female cultivator’s breath stopped momentarily. Beside her, Pang Jie asked quietly, "Are you telling me you wish to ruin Shi Tianyi?"
Lin Feng’s expression was as calm and composed as ever. However, his eyes became ever colder. "If he was able to ruin my disciple all those years ago, then he must have expected this day to come."
"If my disciple can keep himself together and rise again after he faced calamity and complete ruin, then why can’t he?" Lin Feng laughed coldly. "Tianhao almost lost his life back then. As for Shi Tianyi, at his current level, his life won’t be threatened if he returned what he took."
Pang Jie’s brows furrowed. "How can this be the same? Shi Tianyi is already in the nascent soul stage!"
After this was said, Shi Zongyue and the Prince Xian of the Right were both astounded.
Especially so for Shi Zongyue. He had just met Shi Tianyi not too long ago, and even though he knew that Shi Tianyi was cultivating in a place that sped up time he also knew that Shi Tianyi’s real age was not even seventeen.
Ascending to the nascent soul stage before the age of seventeen – this was truly unprecedented. Perhaps God had descended upon the human race. Shi Tianyi was really living up to his reputation has a legend that had never appeared before in history.
Now that he was under the Great Void Sect, his future was truly boundless. He was destined to become one of the main players – if not the dictator – of this era.
Lin Feng’s expression remained unchanged. He said plainly, "You said it as well. He’s already a nascent soul stage cultivator so he’s quite durable. As for my disciple, Shi Tianhao, he was only a little infant all those years ago wben his Supreme Spiritual Altar was stolen. Do you know how much pain and suffering he had to go through?"
Lin Feng’s eyes scanned everybody present as he carried on. "Shi Tianhao is my disciple now, so I will seek justice for him."
"If somebody owes Shi Tianhao then this person shall return whatever it is that’s owed. If this person is unwilling, then I will beat him until he does." Lin Feng pointed to the pile of rubble that used to be the Yu Family ancestral ground. "There are some things that are just not open for negotiation or compromise."
The Xuanlin Holy Man waved his sleeve as he stared Lin Feng in the eye. "This is not justice that you seek – this is tyranny and the demands are highly unreasonable. Your taste for vengeance and payment in blood and the brutality of your actions have brought you to a level that’s close to the Satanic Way."
He stood upright in the void as an intimidating aura spread all around, much like that which would come from the dictator of the world.
He was not exactly one with heaven and earth, but neither was he entirely independent from them. Rather, he was one dictating it all.
Even Lin Feng’s Great Heaven Flaming Emperor spell body grew unstable under the pressure of the energy.
Lin Feng smiled faintly as the gargantuan spell body that was formed from pure golden fire began to collapse and crumble as it transformed into an entire ocean of Grand Sun Primordial Fire.
The sea of fire suddenly split in two and opened up a path. At the end of the pathway, the void began to crack as purple gas surged outwards as a young man clad in purple stepped out from within – it was Lin Feng’s original body.
There were two other people with him, however. One of them was a middle-aged man, and his whole being resembled gray clouds on the verge of becoming a thunderstorm. Explosive and violent power lay hidden and dormant inside all the peace and calm.
Everybody recognized this person. He was the leader of the Purple Clouds Sect, the Thunderclouds Holy Man.
The Purple Clouds Sect had always been on fantastic terms with the Celestial Sect of Wonders. The fact that the Thunderclouds Holy Man was travelling together with Lin Feng was no surprise. Rather, it was the person with Lin Feng who drew most of their attentions; he was an elderly man with a sword aura that seemed to open a stairway into the sky as it pierced the heavens. It felt like this sword aura could overcome all obstacles, and this man could continue the path up the stairs all the way to the Nine Heavens.
"The Celestial Sword Elder?" Pang Jie exchanged a glance with the female cultivator as they began to frown.
The person with Lin Feng and the Thunderclouds Holy Man was the Celestial Sword Elder from the Heavenly Master Sword Sect.
Even though there was no real proof, everybody with a certain degree of access and exposure to highly classified information knew that the Heavenly Master Sword Sect had always been supported, partly in secret, by the Great Void Sect. This was the only reason why they could stably maintain the second-highest status within the Nine Heavenly Sword Alliance and follow closely behind the Mount Shu Sword Sect.
The Celestial Sword Elder actually showed up Lin Feng right when he was engaged in conflict with the Great Void Sect. There were just too many possibilities.
However, no matter which possibility was considered, it was nothing good for the Xuanlin Holy Man and the others.
Lin Feng sauntered forward in his original body. He looked at the Xuanlin Holy Man in the eye and said, "The Satanic Way? You could not have been more wrong. If you want to talk about the Satanic Way, then the person standing beside you is the one that has truly been initiated."
His hands waved in the air as he spoke. A light shadow flew out and hovered in midair.
Within the light shadow was a young man wearing white. There was white cloud engraved on his shirt.
Everybody could tell that this person no longer had a physical being. What they saw right now was a form that came about only after soul was refined and re-forged repeatedly with a secret method.
From the moment he saw this person, Pang Jie’s eyes closed ever so slightly.
This young man in front of him was Pang Jie’s direct junior. He was Chen Gang, the disciple of the Great Void Sect who went up Mount Kunlun to seek Lin Feng out and cause trouble for him.
Before everything happened, Chen Gang willingly allowed Pang Jie to plant a curse on his body. When the time arose, Pang Jie could steal away Chen Gang’s physical body through a secret ritual spell and immediately forge an avatar to defeat an adversary that Chen Gang was unable to handle by himself.
The problem was that Pang Jie’s spell was intercepted by Lin Feng, and Chen Gang’s soul was also imprisoned by Lin Feng and was eventually re-forged into the Unholy Marionette.
Typically, if the secret ritual spell failed, the sacrificial target would lose both the soul and the body. However, Pang Jie did not expect Lin Feng to discover a way to keep Chen Gang and imprison his soul.
Lin Feng used the Fences of the Heavens technique to intercept Pang Jie’s ritual spell back then. This was a spell that Lin Feng invented, and had never been seen before in the history of the Divine Lands.
When the female cultivator saw the state that Chen Gang was in, she flared up in fury. "The River Style Primordial Water, the Unholy Marionette?! You actually refined a disciple of the Great Void Sect into an Unholy Marionette? You are indeed of the Satanic Way!"
Lin Feng replied calmly, "The reason why I forged him into an Unholy Marionette was because I wanted to save his life. Besides this, there was no other way."
"This was because back then, he was being sacrificed by somebody else, which would result in the destruction of his soul and the taking over of his physical body. I forged his soul into an Unholy Marionette in other to preserve it."
Upon hearing words like ‘sacrifice’ and ‘destruction of his soul’ caused the Xuanlin Holy Man and the female cultivator to frown in displeasure.
The corner of Lin Feng’s mouth curled into a faint smile. "So, who do you guys think is the person that tried to do that?"
The Xuanlin Holy Man took a deep breath as he stared straight into Lin Feng’s eyes but remained silent.
"So let’s see, who’s the one that’s really of the Satanic Way?" Lin Feng clapped his hands together and directly released the Unholy Marionette spell cast upon Chen Gang’s body.
However, the mana that was cast upon Chen Gang’s soul triggered memories in the deepest recesses of Chen Gang’s soul and displayed everything in vivid frames in front of everyone.
Lin Feng was casting spells in front of everyone with nothing to hide and did not fake anything at all. He released the Unholy Marionette spell and was no longer in control of Chen Gang.
Everybody present were immortal soul stage cultivators and everybody could tell that Lin Feng did not do anything fishy.
There was no need for him to lie anyway as all he had to do was present everything the way it was originally.
The frames flashed by quickly. Everybody saw Pang Jie imprinting the curse on Chen Gang’s forehead. Everybody saw Pang Jie channeling the sacrificial ritual to direct Pang Jie into Chen Gang’s physical being and to take over it afterwards.
Everyone watched in shock at what they saw. Even though Chen Gang was willing, Pang Jie ultimately tried to sacrifice and steal the soul of a junior from his own sect. Such action was extremely hurtful to the reputation of the Great Void Sect as the number one holy ground of the Divine Lands.
Especially so when everybody saw, from Chen Gang’s memories, that he was not the only one that Pang Jie had engraved the curse upon!
In the next moment, everybody’s gazes were concentrated on Pang Jie and the Xuanlin Holy Man.
All sorts of expressions flashed across everyone’s eyes – appalment, astonishment, speechlessness, mockery… They were all like sharp blades cutting gaping gashes, again and again, upon the glorious reputation of the Great Void Sect.
Lin Feng placed his hands behind his back and smiled faintly.
"So now, tell me, who’s the cruel and brutal one?"
"Who’s of the Satanic Way?"