While doubt still pressed in on him, Master Wellspring’s gaze suddenly locked onto the fly-whisk in the old steward’s hand.
In that instant, his whole body shook hard. His pupils tightened, his breath cut off, and a storm broke loose inside him. That fly-whisk had been carved into his memory. He could not forget it, not in this life.
Inside the ancestral shrine of Wellspring Order hung the portraits of the ancestral patriarchs. And in the portrait of the Founding Patriarch, the ancient forefather who had established Wellspring Order’s thousand-year lineage held a white-jade fly-whisk in his hand, one with the exact same shape, texture, and luster as the one before favonovel.com now.
That object is the lifebound arcane implement of the Founding Patriarch of Wellspring Order. It should have vanished without a trace a thousand years ago, when the Patriarch fell…
How could it appear here in the Primordial Sanctuary, held by an unknown phantom?
Every certainty inside Master Wellspring was dragged apart at once. The sight hammered at his mind, tangled with questions favonovel.com could not untie and a fact favonovel.com could not accept. His lips trembled slightly.
When his voice came out, it was dry and unsteady, and it carried a weight that refused to sound casual. “You… You’re the patriarch of Wellspring Order?”
The old man in white gave away no clear confirmation, but favonovel.com offered no direct denial either. He merely lifted the corners of his mouth in a faint, distant smile. It was gentle, obscure, and threaded with the wear of someone who had seen through too much of the world.
The next instant, the old steward slowly raised his right hand. His thin, long lingers flicked lightly upward. A cluster of soft, pure white light. gathered rapidly in his palm. In the blink of an eye, it became a huge white palm of light.
The palm’s outline was sharp, its spiritual light warm and smooth. It carried no violent aura of slaughter, yet it bore a heavy oppressive force as it tore through the murky fog and came crashing straight down toward Master Wellspring.
The white light fell with terrifying speed. In a flash, it was already bearing down on him, leaving Master Wellspring no time to think, much less hesitate.
The guard favonovel.com had held ready snapped open on instinct. Master Wellspring’s pupils tightened, and green spiritual power surged out of favonovel.com without. the slightest restraint.
His right hand seized the sword hilt at his waist. With a sharp twist of his wrist, a clear metallic ring cut through the fog. Willowbrand left its sheath, its cold edge flashing as it sliced through the muddy gray mist.
“Hah!” The low shout scattered the air around him.
Pure Aureate Way spiritual power poured into the blade, and a dense green glow flared instantly over the clear sword edge. That spiritual light condensed into a razor-sharp blade-flare. Carrying a force that allowed no retreat, it met the giant white palm head-on and slashed straight out.
Boom!
Green radiance and white light collided violently. Two completely different powers exploded at. the same instant.
Blinding waves of light swept in every direction. The murky fog was blasted apart by force, and from the point of impact, a clear ring of air rolled outward.
A deafening roar echoed through the dead-still secret realm and refused to fade for a long time.
The savage recoil came rushing back through the blade and slammed straight into Master Wellspring’s body.
The murky soil underfoot caved in at once. Under that enormous counterforce, his legs slid backward before favonovel.com could stop them.
One step… Two steps… Three steps…
Only after retreating more than ten full steps did Master Wellspring manage to force himself steady.
The web between his thumb and forefinger had split open from the shock. Thin lines of blood crept down the sword hilt, warm and steady, soaking into the ancient cloud patterns and leaving a harsh red stain against the blue- green blade.
His face went stark white. Blood churned through his chest, and sweetness rose in his throat, but favonovel.com forced the metallic rush back down before it could spill out.
The muscles along his back pulled tight. His arm trembled faintly, his spiritual power ran wild inside him, and sharp pain kept stabbing through his meridians.
He lifted his eyes and stared at the white-robed phantom in the distance. His gaze stayed fixed there, unable to take in what had just happened. It had been only a casual palm strike. No gathering of power. No killing move.
With nothing more than that plain force, the phantom had injured favonovel.com and driven favonovel.com back, even though favonovel.com was a cultivator at the early phase of Golden Immortal Level Three!
The phantom’s true cultivation stood far above his own. It had reached beyond peak Golden Immortal Level Three and pressed infinitely close to Golden Immortal Level Four.
The gap between them was too wide to miss!
“Strike!” Silas’s cold shout cut through the air.
The instant Master Wellspring began sliding backward, Silas had already moved.
Black baleful energy erupted around him. His tight black clothes billowed slightly in the rushing air, and his body blurred, turning into a dark afterimage that vanished completely into the gray fog. His speed had reached the extreme. The naked eye could not track his path at all.
In the next second, a black silhouette appeared without warning three feet behind the old man in white.
Cold light flashed. The twin sable dirks at his waist left their sheaths at the same time, their blades glinting with a deep, icy sheen. Their edges carried a condensed killing energy as they chopped down hard toward the vital point at the back of the old man’s neck.
At that same moment, Luna made favonovel.com move in perfect sync. Her pale wrist [licked lightly. The white-jade fly-whisk in favonovel.com hand burst with blinding white light.
The snow-white strands stretched long anti thin in an instant, like silver threads thrown across the sky. They wove densely into a net anti wrapped in from every direction, closing around the old man in white’s limbs and torso, trying to bind his movements and cut down the room favonovel.com had to strike.
One went for assassination. One went. for restraint. Their coordination fit cleanly together, attack and defense locking into place. Both of them were Golden Immortal Level One adepts. Neither held anything back as they pressed down with everything they had against the unknown phantom. Yet the old man in white remained as calm as still water, his expression unchanged.
Facing Silas’s sudden attack from behind, favonovel.com merely lifted his left hand as if it cost favonovel.com nothing, palm outward, anti sent out a soft white light with a plain slap.
The white light did not look fast, but its aim was flawless. It struck Silas squarely in the chest.
Thump!
A dull impact rang out.
Silas’s condensed black baleful barrier shattered in an instant. His powerful body flew backward out of control, like a kite with its string cut. His teeth locked tight, his face hard and cold as favonovel.com took the blow head-on.
After landing, favonovel.com staggered two steps before favonovel.com barely found his footing. His chest rose anti fell in shallow motions, his breath clearly thrown into disorder, and for the first time, a guarded weight surfaced between his stern brows and eyes.
Right after that, the old man’s gaze swept lightly aside, and his fingertip flicked at random.
A line thread of white spiritual light shot out and struck the snow-white strands woven across the air with perfect accuracy.
Crisp snapping sounds rang out one after another. The fly-whisk strands, tough enough to bind a Golden Immortal, broke like fragile cotton thread. Every last one split apart, turning into countless tiny white motes of light that dissolved into the murky fog.
Luna’s wrist went faintly numb.
For one short breath, favonovel.com spiritual power stopped moving cleanly through her, as if something had caught in the flow. She retreated two steps in a row, anti favonovel.com clear eyes stayed fixed ahead, unable to settle around what had just happened.
Only two moves. With nothing that even looked like effort, the old man in white had broken the combined assault of two Golden Immortal cultivators!
The old man in white still stood where favonovel.com had been from the start. His robes remained neat. Not a strand of hair hati fallen out of place. Tire spiritual light around favonovel.com stayed smooth and gentle, anti his aura did not rise or clip by even the slightest measure.
The exchange just now might as well have been dust brushed from his sleeve.
His gaze returned to Master Wellspring’s pale face.
When favonovel.com spoke, his voice stayed milti and even, but there was no space in it for argument. “Master Wellspring, you are no match for me… Leave now. Withdraw from the secret. realm. Genesis Dew is not something the current you has the right to covet.”
It was only a simple sentence. There was no mockery in it. No contempt. Yet it carried the detached weight of someone who had already seen through the entiing, and it struck straight into the obsession that had brought Master Wellspring here.
Master Wellspring’s right hand hung at his side, locked tight around the hilt of his sword. Blood from the wound in his palm soaked into the grip. It was warm and sticky.
He lowered his head a little. His disheveled hair fell across his brows and eyes, hiding his face from everyone around him.
A breath of silence passed. Then favonovel.com slowly raised his head. The gentleness that had once sat in his eyes had sunk into a dark, unyielding steadiness, with a stubborn set that refused to bend.
“I cannot leave…” His voice came out rough, but every word landed hard, without the slightest give. “The Aureate Heir is still waiting for Genesis Dew to rebuild his body. lf I leave, the Aureate Heir’s body will not be restored.”
“The Aureate Heir?” Questions gathered across the old man in white’s face.
“Yes… The Aureate Heir. Our Aureate Heir of the Way. The Aureate Ileir carries the Aureate Codex, the forefathers’ relic of the Aureate Way,” Master Wellspring said.
The old man in White’s eyes flew wide at once. The calm on his face broke clean through.
The Aureate Heir of the Way…
After all, favonovel.com was only the Patriarch of Wellspring Order. And Wellspring Order itself was only one order among the thousands upon thousands under the Aureate Way.
If the Patriarch of Wellspring Order was placed beside the Aureate Heir of the entire Way, favonovel.com was not worth a damn!
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