As the masked figure called Seventeen approached, Wei Wuyin and Su Mei's gaze shifted towards him. This masked man was at the Sixth Stage of the Qi Condensation Realm, one of the weaker of the eight, and he emitted a formless killing intent.
Su Mei frowned, but she didn't panic. Wei Wuyin was at the Eighth Phase, a bonafide Godlord figure, and Bai Lin could one-shot Mortal Gods with relative ease. Therefore, she remained entirely unconcerned.
"Lord Wei, it seems they've targeted us." Her words were mostly unnecessary, but it made Wei Wuyin come to a slight realization; Su Mei had just ascended and her foundation was unstable. She didn't have a powerful body like him to make up for the weakness or fragility of her Heart of Qi at the moment it was undergoing transitions.
He softly sighed, but gave her a soft nod in comfort. When he arrived in the Heavenly Wu City, he wanted to act as a tourist and avoid complicated conflicts or relations. He even decided to keep his Godlord cultivation base concealed during his trip to remain low-key. At most, he'd exert the prowess of a Mortal God or allow Bai Lin to take action.
However, an assassination group like this definitely can not be allowed to live or be given warnings. If he took action, he had to ensure he eliminated them all with extreme prejudice.
They were often trained in very elusive and strange methods, such as placing a tracking mark beneath his nose from a long distance. If he held back, even though he felt himself superior, he could still lose his life.
When he recalled the two female assassins who struck at him in his home, and how if he was at or just a little above their cultivation level, his life could've been lost, he knew what he had to do.
Kree!
Bai Lin softly cried as she eyed the masked figure approaching. Her eyes revealed a hint of disdain and battle intent. Those golden orbs of hers started to sparkle with power and emit blinding light. A single order and she would launch a devastating attack.
Wei Wuyin rubbed Bai Lin's feathers, as he did, his spiritual sense obliterated the tracking mark hidden beneath her feathers. "Calm down. Protect Su Mei, I'll handle this."
When those words were said, they instantly pacified Bai Lin's battle intent, and she released a small sound of acceptance and a bit of reluctance. To her, did Wei Wuyin even need to act against such insignificant characters? She was more than enough and even she disdained to act.
Laughing inwardly after noticing Bai Lin's thoughts, he leapt off her back and faced Seventeen.
Seventeen was a trained warrior and skilled assassin. He had a history filled with killing and survival that could make the most battle hardened men squirm in their sleep. Beneath that mask, he was calmer than the eye of the storm as he faced Wei Wuyun.
He summoned his weapon. A thin sword with a blade that seemed to be composed of crystal. It radiated a rainbow sheen and gave off a lively feeling as if it could evoke changes within the world. Wielding it, he got within thirty meters of Wei Wuyin and prepared to swing and unleash an attack.
"What?!" He abruptly halted his attack as he realized that Wei Wuyin had vanished from his sight. His spiritual sense instinctively went into action as he surveyed the surroundings. His eyes bulged as he located Wei Wuyin, his body reacting naturally as he dashed forward with his full might.
Without any hesitation, he slashed behind him with a qi wave. It gave off characteristics of a crystal and even the surrounding air suffused with rainbow-ish colors.
Wei Wuyin had appeared behind him, his eyes calm. "So, he can't even react to five percent of my speed." As he calmly assessed, he tried to get a gauge of his strength. He had moved rapidly, circled around Seventeen, and appeared directly behind him. This was without a qi art to bolster himself or a spiritual spell to hinder his opponent's senses.
This was purely physical speed from his fleshy body.
The wave of rainbow qi appeared before him, but he only casually reached out with his right hand and met it. It collided with the flesh of his palm without an ounce of qi supporting it, and he clenched his fingers fiercely. The resulting force from that action caused the rainbow qi to shatter into bits and pieces.
It was dispersed into nothing.
"My body was refined by the Sublime Energy of Elemental and Saber energies after my breakthrough. This is truly too low-level in comparison." Witnessing how casual his actions were, and how exerting a fraction of his force eliminated an attack so easily, he began to get a slight sense of his strength.
With two Divine Spirits that further reinforced his fleshy body with their inherent energies, he had no real way to gauge his power. Now that a conflict had arisen, he wanted to take this opportunity to understand. With a grasp that only contained a tenth of his strength. It was like caressing cotton.
Seventeen's bulging eyes became even more enlarged after his spiritual sense witnessed Wei Wuyin's casual and effortless actions. His heart throbbed as he came to an immediate understanding. The figure before him was a Godking!
Only those at this realm would be able to effortlessly use their mortal bodies to disperse his attack. His heart dropped several dozen degrees in temperature, as he turned towards the leading figure and relayed his message with a glance.
The leader figure trembled slightly and looked at Wei Wuyin. At this moment, it realized that they had miscalculated off of faulty intel.
If Wei Wuyin was a Godking then he took a casual watcher approach before because he had no true relations with Prince Zhen. Otherwise…
Wei Wuyin didn't know their thoughts nor did he care. "Let's see if you can defend against five percent of my strength," he kicked off and like a teleporting shadow, appeared before Seventeen with a clenched fist. Just the action of clenching his fist caused the air to gravitate towards his palm.
Seventeen felt death. Without hesitation, his mask fractured and his robes started to expand in size. He was initiating the act of self-detonation! In the face of absolute power, the most you can do is take your enemy with you. If they were too strong, then as long as you took a bite of flesh from them, you can die with a smile!
Wei Wuyin's eyes flashed as he saw this. Without pausing, he punched with more power than he originally intended. Before an explosion could occur, Seventeen's body and Heart of Qi exploded upon contact with Wei Wuyin's fist. The accumulated energy could not find a release, but there was an explosion.
Boom!!
Seventeen's body became a mist of blood, guts, bones, and fragments of flesh.
Not a single drop of blood or flesh landed on Wei Wuyin as his black martial robe remained pristine.
"I hate assassins. They are too decisive," he helplessly sighed. These people had killed countless others, were often brainwashed by an organization, and had no qualms with throwing away their lives. After all, the profession itself likely had the highest mortality rate than any other. If one didn't steel their heart with the readiness to die, becoming a good assassin was a pipe dream.
In fact, they'll only die faster.
Su Mei saw all of this happening, and she couldn't help but marvel. The difference between the chaotic and trying fight beneath the sanguine skies and Wei Wuyin's simplistic actions drew a sharp comparison between phases.
Poof!
A black cloud of smoke emerged beneath the sanguine skies, and the black masked figures started to disappear within the smoke. They were vanishing as they launched their final attacks.
"They're retreating?!" Prince Zhen was startled. His current state was not good. There were all sorts of injuries on his body and his reserves of qi were nearly drained. He had even resorted to multiple life-saving treasures, but those figures countered each and every one, completely prepared for his various means. If it wasn't for his own high combat power, he likely would've died by now.
Li Di and Li Tian were just as shocked. Li Di even had an arm severed at the shoulder, and Li Tian was struggling as her stomach had bloody marks indicating a deep injury that could've bisected her. The enemy was well-prepared, and despite less than a minute of time having passed, they were at a severe disadvantage.
Even when one of the Mortal Gods departed, they were pressured to their limits. Perhaps if that Mortal God remained, they would've lost their lives by now.
Wei Wuyin saw the black smoke and shook his head. "If you didn't place a tracking mark or attack me, I would've let you kill the prince and escape, but now…" His eyes flashed with a cold light as he retrieved a saber from his storage ring. This saber was one that he'd stolen from Jade Circle City. I mean, was gifted.
"One, two...seven." His words were like a child counting with his fingers, casual yet focused. He had located all seven concealed and nearly invisible figures. His spiritual qi circulated as he struck out with seven swings, each carrying a piercing saber qi.
The rays of saber qi didn't enter the black smoke but scattered in different directions as they seemed like tracking missiles with eyes. They weaved through and shifted trajectories, but they were definitely following those assassins as they seemed to take every action to evade.
Prince Zhen's eyes widened as he witnessed Wei Wuyin take action. Those rays of saber qi were sharp and profoundly powerful. Even he wasn't sure if he could defend against a single one.
This was saber qi tempered by elemental origin energy, incredibly pure yin-yang energy, had reached the sublime level, and infused with spiritual strength. Even if it was to be compared with another Godlord's Saber Qi, it would be nearly a dozen times stronger. Let alone when facing Peak Mortal Gods.
Ptuu!
Six simultaneous spurts of blood gushed out from six locations as the rays of saber qi met the necks of each of the masked figures. They couldn't even defend themselves as its swiftness and power was beyond their limits.
They emerged from their stealthed states as headless corpses.
Wei Wuyin frowned as he watched the saber he wielded crumble into dust. It was too weak to handle his fierce spiritual qi.
He turned his attention to the seventh ray of saber light and sighed. The leader of those black masked figures vanished. He didn't know how he or she had evaded his attack or if they were injured or killed. The ray of qi and the aura of the leader had vanished abruptly like they had entered a storage space.
Shaking his hand, he removed the faint traces of crumbled metal from his hand.
"Well, this is why I hate assassins." Assassins had all sorts of unknown stealth, killing, and escape methods, making them far more troublesome to kill than others. They were also capable of consistently killing those above their cultivation level, even if their foundation were weaker than their opponents.
For example, they seemed to be communicating in a way that Wei Wuyin's spiritual sense couldn't discover.
He had wanted to eliminate them all in hopes to avoid becoming a future target. He regretted not using Element in his attack, but even if he did, he still wasn't sure it could kill the leader of that group if they possessed means to jump into a different space
In fact, his inclination to use a normal saber was unusual. Aware of how the Heavenly Daos functioned, was it possible the leader had used up her karmic luck to influence his decision? Was it even possible?
He deeply frowned as he recalled the True Soul of Sin. Could this relate to avoiding the Heavenly Daos subtle influence? If so, then that meant he was still vulnerable to its influence until he entered the Realm of Sages and cultivated a soul immune to its influence.
Prince Zhen's eyes lit up as he saw the corpses of six assassins. When he noticed that Wei Wuyin had bloody mist still lingering in the air, he realized that seven of those masked men were killed by him.
"A Godlord? Or...a Godking? No." As he recalled the sublime saber qi, it didn't have the trace of Qi Essence, so it was definitely a Godlord. However, the level of attack definitely exceeded any Godlord he'd ever seen before.
Wei Wuyin didn't bother inspecting the corpses. Assassins had all sorts of means and methods to prevent their identities from being revealed or their possessions from being stolen. Some didn't even wear storage rings and left spiritual spell traps on their bodies. He much rather avoid that.
As he decided on his next course of action, Prince Zhen and the twin guardians approached.