Chapter 2183.2: Extermination

Ying Xiong was initial nascent soul and ready to cross over to mid nascent soul at any time. Lu Yun’s brand on his heart and mind was slightly weaker than the one on Ying Wu’s. After being attacked by the young man, Ying Wu’s current mentality was unbelievably fragile.

The golden core and foundation establishment gang members trembled when they thought of Lu Yun. The death of their leader with two kicks and the final blow from goodwill had caused deep trauma.

“That’s right, the Black Tortoises have a great number of experts. As strong as the young man is, he is only golden core. Big brother wouldn’t have died so easily if not for underestimating his opponent and failing to use his treasures,” Ying Wu forced out through grit teeth and spoke around the fear shaking his heart.

“Let’s go!” Ying Xiong set his jaw and stood up.

The second sister they mentioned was the dao partner of the Black Tortoise leader. It was due to this relationship that the Darkwater Gang could operate with such impunity in Fallen Leaf City. The Black Tortoise leader was peak nascent soul and half a step into soul projection. He would be the strongest of any third rank nation.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Lu Yun’s voice rang out. “Forty-five minutes is up. Since you haven’t disbanded, allow this young master to perform the deed.”

“You…” The two Ying brothers were scared out of their wits to see Lu Yun’s sudden arrival.

Whoosh whoosh!

Two rays of silver light flashed past, sending two heads of petrified fear shooting into the sky. Two headless bodies flopped to the ground as Lu Yun waved their storage rings to him, then burned the corpses in two balls of fire.

“There are quite a lot of treasures in the Darkwater vaults.” Golden light gleaming out of his eyes, Lu Yun headed in another direction.

Powerful formations protected the Darkwater vaults—formations that were jokes to the young man. Ones established by Great Xia cultivators might pose a challenge to him, but the ones from a fourth rank nation’s nascent soul cultivator might as well not exist.

Most formations were laid out according to the logic of the five elements in a continuous cycle of supplementation and counter. Others derived from this logic, such as illusion, slaughter, trap, or disorientation formations were based off of the five elements. One simply had to locate the nodes between the elements and break their cycle if they wished to dismantle the formation.

Of course, a formation with a complete cycle of the five elements would be considered a premier formation. The one safeguarding the Darkwater vault was just a protective one of metal giving rise to water.

When it came to formations, Lu Yun rather thought there should be ten formations of one potential, two principles, three essentials, four divisions, five elements, six directions, seven stars, eight trigrams, nine sectors, and ten orientations. It wasn’t just the five elements. If all ten could be combined together and ignite a grand influence over the world, that would…

Lu Yun shook his head, shaking his sealed memories back into place. Thankfully, it was just knowledge that’d slipped out and not memories. Many things would go wrong otherwise.

“Who dares trespass in Darkwater Gang forbidden territory!” Three latter golden core guards stopped Lu Yun as soon as he arrived in front of the vaults.

“While the gang’s strength doesn’t measure up to the former seven great clans of Darklake, they would be an elite faction regardless in the nation.” Lu Yun flashed in front of them, his fist moving like an illusion and spontaneously crushing all of their dantians and life force.

The Lu Yun of this lifetime didn’t show mercy or benevolence. Things were fine enough if others didn’t provoke him, but if they did, he turned into a mad dog that didn’t rest until he bit them to death.

He’d already given the gang a chance. If the two vice leaders had swiftly disbanded, he wouldn’t have bothered hunting them down.

Lu Yun sent out a surge of fire origin with one hand and directed it at the connection node between water and metal in the formation. Since fire countered metal, it immediately set all of the metal energy ablaze. As for water countering fire… an ordinary element of water evaporated when it met connate fire origin.

The entire formation collapsed when the five basic elements were dismantled.

Lu Yun was likely the only one who could employ this kind of method in Great Xia and the worlds of cultivation. It was similar to medicinal properties reformation—his own technique.

Darkwater Gang was just a tiny gang in Fallen Leaf City, so the formation safeguarding their vaults was but an initial third rank formation. It barely required effort to break, giving Lu Yun access a small vault roughly thirty meters across. Treasures and ingredients were randomly jumbled inside and there was a shelf in a corner that held roughly thirty storage rings.

Lu Yun swept all of them into the sword pagoda in his dantian without taking a close look. Apart from the ray of sword qi at its center, the sword pagoda was also a massive storage center. It was where he’d subdued the sword pagoda.

The space within was so marvelous that it could hold living beings in unbounded capacity. Lu Yun’s own storage ring likely would’ve proven inadequate to contain what was in the gang’s vaults.

After cleaning out what could be looted from the Darkwater Gang, Lu Yun scanned the entire area with the Eye of Nullification. He left content after determining there were no hidden vaults like the Lu residence.

While the gang’s wealth didn’t measure up to a trading company like the Ouyangs’, it was still quite stunning. There weren’t any rare or exotic treasures within, however. They’d probably all been turned over to the Black Tortoises.

……

“There’s a certain relationship between the Darkwater Gang and Black Tortoises. The Black Tortoises.. damn it!” Lu Yun suddenly frowned.

The Eye of Nullification broke through all obstacles. At his current level of cultivation, he could see for fifty kilometers in any direction, placing most of Fallen Leaf City in his line of vision.

But even so, he didn’t find it very useful. The Eye of Nullification only saw what was on the surface, it couldn’t see anything deeper.

Such as the information of the dead.

When he opened the eye to scan the Black Tortoises, the first to enter his eyes was the razed Cloudflow Inn. A deeply injured Long Aotian stood on top of the ruins while Wang Bu’er lay decapitated elsewhere.

“Speak, where is the young man?!” An aloof middle-aged man dressed in black armor grabbed Long Aotian by the collar. If it wasn’t for wanting information, Long Aotian would be dead as well.

“I don’t know!” Long Aotian exhaled explosively with a tragic air. They were out of the frying pan and into the fire. There was no hope of survival once the Black Tortoises had him in their grasp.

Long Aotian and Wang Bu’er came into sudden wealth with the storage rings that Lu Yun gave them. They’d planned to leave with Lu Yun when he came back. Unfortunately, the Black Tortoises came knocking before the young man did.

A woman with coldly beautiful features led the delegation—the dao partner of the Black Tortoise leader. Tears brimmed in her eyes as she sagged in front of Ying Xuanshui’s corpse.

“Big brother, I will obliterate whoever killed you…” she said emotionally as she trembled.

The man in black armor viciously slapped Long Aotian across the face when he heard those words. “Out with it, where did the murderer go?!”

“Kill him. The Black Tortoises will find him wherever he goes in this area.” Ying Yinshui stood up, whereupon she swayed and keened in a distorted voice, “Third brother, fourth brother! Whoever you are, I, Ying Yinshui, swear upon my dignity as a human being that I will exterminate you and yours!!”

Pfft!

She spat out a mouthful of blood while Black Armor paled. He quickly understood that Ying Yinshui had somehow sensed the deaths of her third and fourth brothers. She’d sensed Ying Xuanshui’s death not long after it occurred and rushed to the scene, finding Wang Bu’er and Long Aotian. Otherwise, the Black Tortoises wouldn’t be so quick on the scene even with receiving word.

Black Armor hesitated for a split second before turning his hand sideways like a blade and bringing it down on Long Aotian.

A chill gripped Long Aotian’s heart and he closed his eyes, waiting for death.

Pfft!

“AHH!!” A ghastly scream traveled into Long Aotian’s ears as the pressure lightened on his throat and he fell to the ground. He opened his eyes to see an apologetic Lu Yun and a wailing Black Armor with severed arms.

Lu Yun sighed as he looked at Wang Bu’er’s body. “I didn’t think that these siblings would have a Connection Talisman. This was my oversight.”

He originally intended to attract attention from the Black Tortoises through a disturbance at the Duskwater Gang. That would give Long Aotian, Wang Bu’er, and the employees of Cloudflow Inn enough time to retreat.

But Ying Yinshui had immediately come by due to the Connection Talisman.

“It’s you!” She realized as soon as she saw Lu Yun. The young man in ivory robes and a blue overcoat was the one who’d killed her brothers. “Kill him!!” she shrieked with a loss of all reason.

More than fifty Black Tortoise members had come with her, all greater than golden core. Three of them were nascent soul powerhouses, and all were on guard with Lu Yun’s sudden appearance. When Ying Yinshu shrilled her command, they immediately brought out their treasures and flung attacks at Lu Yun.

They’d gained a full understanding of Lu Yun’s actions before they arrived. If it wasn’t for Ying Xuanshui underestimating his enemy, he would still be alive now. In their eyes, a combined blow from sixty people was using a cannon to kill a mosquito.

“There’s something to the Black Tortoises, their concerted action shows signs of a basic battle formation.” Lu Yun raised his head to regard the flying swords with a frown.