“Whoosh!!”

Two black jets of light shot through the doorway at once. One of them threw something darkish-green at Bai Yunfei and scattered in a way like crushed stone or sand at him!

It was some kind of soul armament shaped like a needle, and quite strong too, based off the aura radiating from it. Without a pause in his step, Bai Yunfei raised his right hand and stopped the soul armament dead-on. With a ‘clink’, the soul armament sparked against his glove and was caught effortlessly!

“Crack…”

His fingers grabbed hold of the soul armament at once. Clutching it into his palm, Bai Yunfei exerted just enough force and crushed it into pieces!

“Hrghh!!”

A pained cry erupted from one of the jets of light. That soul armament had actually been one the person had spent years using. It was his soulbound armament, and the destruction of it caused a great amount of damage to his soul.

One second later and the two people were now fully visible in the room. They were dressed similarly to the first one, the first person being a sharp-chinned elder of the Early-stage Soul King level, while the second was a short middle-aged man of the Late-stage Soul Exalt level. The broken soul armament had belonged to the first man.

As violent as their initial assault was, their momentum died out the moment it failed. In response, both of Bai Yunfei’s hands flared to life with fire so he could provide a swift counterattack.

Two ‘thuds’ later, and the two men slammed into the wall just like their comrade had done. And just like their comrade, these two men were unconscious by the time they hit the floor.

……

One hand supporting Ye Zhiqiu, Bai Yunfei hogtied the three men together and prepared to leave the place. His soulsenses told him that there was a commotion up above, but his ears were already telling him that a series of footsteps were on the way towards his location.

“Master Zhiqiu!!”

The two parties came across one another when Bai Yunfei had just exited the underground and stepped foot into the sunlight. Guards surrounded him from all sides, each one of them surprised to see Bai Yunfei and the unconscious three behind him. They looked hesitant, as if not sure of what to do in this case.

“Hmph!!”

Based off their expressions, Bai Yunfei decided these men must’ve known what had happened to Ye Zhiqiu the entire time. His anger spiked once again in his unwillingness to speak with them. Stepping forward, he decided to move forward as if they weren’t even there.

A single footstep from him froze every guard to where they stood. Like statues, they could only watch in futile horror as Bai Yunfei strode toward the main hall of Ye Manor.

Bai Yunfei came across many people in his path, guards, servants, maids, and other employees. But none dared block his path, so he was able to walk into the halls quickly before he glanced upward to the end of the hall.

“Who dares force their way into my manor! Your head will roll for this!!”

A furious roar echoed throughout the hall as a crimson beam of light shot at Bai Yunfei. It was a Soul King with a crimson-red warblade ready to lop off Bai Yunfei’s head.

Narrowing his eyes, Bai Yunfei prepared to let go of the three corpses to deal with this person when Ye Zhiqiu suddenly cried out, “Yunfei, wait! He’s my dad!!”

“What?!”

His right fist paused in the air for a fraction of a second before he decided to deflect the warblade and land a punch onto the incoming person’s chest. Punching the man back, he watched as the figure staggered several steps back before collapsing to the ground. Without wasting any time, Bai Yunfei quickly strode forward to seal off his acupoints to prevent him from being able to do anything else.

“My lord!!”

Many of the servants cried out in horror at the sight of the man being incapacitated so easily. The terror they had for Bai Yunfei had suddenly skyrocketed.

His soulsense was telling him that Li Chengfeng and the others were already here, so Bai Yunfei decided to wait. He kept his eyes on the man, who Ye Zhiqiu had said was his father.

“Brother!!”

Someone cried out from the entrance of the hall. Ye Zhiyun came running through the halls to reach her brother’s side while Li Chengfeng and the others followed shortly behind.

Helping Ye Zhiqiu to a nearby chair, Bai Yunfei asked, “How are you feeling?”

The man was looking much better than before, but it still took some effort for him to shake his head, “It’s nothing a good rest won’t heal. Thank you for saving me, Yunfei….”

“Friends shouldn’t be so polite with each other.” Bai Yunfei slapped the man’s shoulder empathetically. “Now, can you tell me what’s going on? I can see these three are soul refiners, why are they…?”

He didn’t finish his words, but his eyes trailed over to Ye Zhiqiu’s father, Ye Cheng. The way he saw it, it felt like there was some kind of relationship between the two.

A downcast expression entered Ye Zhiqiu’s face. “Yes, they’re soul refiners. I had never known that my father would…ugh!!”

Bai Yunfei grew silent. Choosing not to question Ye Zhiqiu anymore, he grabbed hold of the middle-aged man and seized hold of his head at once with his left hand!

“What conspiracy do you have here!!”

He roared. At once, the Charm Bracelet lit up as Bai Yunfei entered the man’s soulspace. He was soulscanning him!!

There was no resistance, as expected from the differences in strength. The man convulsed as the memories were being forcibly drawn from his soul, and soon, his eyes rolled to the back of his head and his aura had ceased.

Bai Yunfei took his hand away so the man tumbled to the ground, dead.

“....”

He said nothing as he processed the information he just received. Soon, he turned to the Early-stage Soul King, who had only just woken up, so he could repeat the process.

A second corpse dropped to the ground, but Bai Yunfei had yet to be satisfied. He turned to the last one, the Soul Exalt. As he reached his hand out…

“Wa—wait, don’t kill me! I’ll talk, I’ll talk!”

“I don’t care.” Bai Yunfei replied, slamming his hand onto the man’s head and striking him dead.

He already got what he wanted, and there was no way the information from a Soul Exalt would be richer than what he got from the Soul King. Keeping him alive was pointless, and killing another soul refiner had only benefits instead of detriments.

It filled every single worker in Ye Manor with horror to see Bai Yunfei kill the three soul refiners without mercy. No one dared say a word, not even Ye Zhiyun, who had decided to hide behind her brother and cower.

Having combed the memories of two Soul Kings, Bai Yunfei had more or less a good idea of the entire thing, such as why things had gone the way in the Ye.

As it turns out, the Ye had actually been in the Soul Refining School’s sights for a while. They converted Ye Cheng well over a decade ago and planned to have him act as a ‘traitor’ for their plans. But then when Ye Zhiqiu joined the Crafting School, the Soul Refining School decided to alter those plans and wait until he was proficient enough at the craft before stealing the secrets from him. The yellow-faced man had been in charge of this and decided to start the plan and extract the secrets when Ye Zhiqiu returned home two months ago.

It was fortunate that Bai Yunfei was here now of all times. The plan should’ve been canceled when the attack on the Crafting School failed, but the Soul Refining School had forgotten about their operation with the Ye and failed to give the yellow-faced refiner any additional instructions. In his panic about what was going on with the school, the man had been planning to simply just use Soul Puppetry to get what he wanted before returning to the school.

Soul Puppetry wasn’t always the best technique to use. It was a technique that destroyed one’s sense of self and shattered memories. Based on one’s skill with it, they could control a person’s actions, but not necessarily get all the knowledge they wanted. For this refiner, Soul Puppetry was something of a last resort.

“……”

Gathering his thoughts, Bai Yunfei sighed. “Zhiqiu, your father, he…is being controlled, by Soul Puppetry. He’s no longer the same as he was…”

Ye Zhiqiu slumped, sorrow filling his body at the news. He thought he had been prepared for it, but hearing it still hurt. “Is there possibly a way to save my father, Yunfei?”

Bai Yunfei shook his head, “Soul Puppetry’s a dark dark technique, I’ve never found a way to undo it…”

Then all of a sudden, the curious voice of Huangfu Rui spoke up, “Brother Yunfei, this uncle seems to be controlled, should…should I save him?”