One person: Starting with the Rumble-Rumble Fruit, his grandmaster uncle emerges from seclusion.

"You wouldn't be trying to renege on your promise regarding that half-volume 'Divine Control Technique,' would you?"

Abe Masaya closed his folding fan and tapped it lightly in his palm.

He didn't show much anger or disappointment because the plan failed.

As the core heir of a prominent family.

He is much more realistic than a pure researcher like Kenji Tsuchimikado.

"Mr. Yan is too kind. The Great Japanese Empire values ​​its reputation above all else. Even if the ceremony did not take place, the body was indeed delivered by you, so the reward will naturally be in full."

Abe Masaya turned around and looked down at the bottom of the sinkhole.

His gaze swept past the soldiers who were cleaning up the mess.

It landed directly on the young man standing at the edge of the altar, covered in blood, with his head bowed.

"Although the gods did not descend, we have not gained nothing today."

Abe Masaya pointed at Zhang Tianyi from afar, a cold smile playing on his lips:

"Shogun Tokugawa, tell your men to shut up their useless tempers. Look over there."

"That's the legendary Master Tian Shu, who supposedly made the North China military lose face."

Tokugawa Kenichi followed his gaze, his eyes narrowing slightly.

"This kind of genius, who appears only once in a hundred years in the Taoist school, is no less valuable than a vague and ethereal deity."

Abe Masaya's tone was cruel:

"He had already exhausted his true energy in order to break the barrier. Now that the protective golden light has dissipated, he is at the end of his rope."

"Capture him alive."

"Cut open his body and brain to examine them, and bring them back to the homeland. This would be the most valuable asset in the history of the Empire's research on Inhumans!"

Upon hearing this, Tokugawa Kenichi's eyes immediately flashed with a greedy and fierce light.

This is a genuine military achievement!

"Everyone has one!"

Tokugawa drew his command sword from his waist, pointed it directly at Zhang Tianyi, and loudly ordered:

"Stop cleaning up the scene! Surround that Chinese Taoist priest!"

"Capture him alive at all costs!"

……

"Crash..."

Hundreds of soldiers, bayonets at their heels, changed direction swiftly, like an ant colony following a command.

They approached the figure at the edge of the altar step by step.

The gleaming bayonets gleamed with a chilling aura under the searchlight.

however.

Zhang Tianyi was at the center of the encirclement.

But it was as if they didn't hear the noisy footsteps and the sound of gun bolts being pulled back around them.

He kept his head down.

The stray hairs on his forehead were soaked with sweat and blood, sticking to his cheeks in strands.

Those eyes, which once always held a hint of nonchalance and a touch of mockery, had now lost all their luster.

His gaze remained fixed on the little girl lying quietly on the yin-yang symbol in the center of the altar.

"Big brother...you should go quickly..."

"Your mother won't be able to find you..."

In my mind.

The little girl's weak yet pure voice echoed again and again.

The sound and Lao Ba's last words, "Leave me a chicken leg," overlapped eerily.

Once.

One more time.

It was as if they were mocking his arrogance and his incompetence.

"Ah……"

Zhang Tianyi lowered his head and let out a hoarse chuckle.

He slowly raised his bloodied and mangled hands.

Looking at the dried bloodstains on his palm.

"Old man..."

In his heart, Zhang Tianyi whispered to his master, who was far away in Longhu Mountain.

“You always say that cultivating the Tao is about achieving tranquility and non-action, and about following the principles of Heaven.”

"You told me to suppress my temper and follow the rules."

"But old man, look at the state of the world."

Zhang Tianyi slowly closed his eyes.

A tear, mixed with the blood on her cheek, silently slid down her cheek.

“I followed the rules, and I suppressed my temper.”

"The results of it?"

“They drained Lao Ba’s blood right in front of me.”

"Now, right in front of me, they've completely destroyed the soul of this little girl who saved me."

Zhang Tianyi's breathing became extremely slow.

So slow that even the sound of a heartbeat seemed to stop at that moment.

The lock that he had always tried to cover up with reason, the precepts of his sect, and jokes.

The moment that single tear fell.

Thoroughly, completely crushed.

"To hell with inaction and quietude!"

"To hell with following the natural order!"

When Zhang Tianyi opened her eyes again.

There was no longer any emotion in those eyes.

There was no sadness.

There was no anger.

All that remained was emptiness and deathly silence!

"Since this is so unfair..."

"Then there's no need to keep this broken sky."

……

"Don't move! Hands up!"

Two Japanese soldiers at the front, bayonets at the ready, approached Zhang Tianyi.

They looked at the Taoist priest who was bowing his head and remaining silent, and shouted at him.

But, just as they finished speaking...

"Tick."

A drop of water falls from the rock wall of the sinkhole.

Just as the water droplet was about to hit the ground.

air.

It solidified.

An indescribable, terrifying pressure.

Without any warning, from Zhang Tianyi's seemingly exhausted body...

Released with a bang!

"Sizzle—!"

An arc of electricity, almost entirely black, shot out from beneath Zhang Tianyi's feet.

The two heavily armed soldiers didn't even have time to retract their stern expressions.

The rifles in their hands, the uniforms they wore, and their blood and bones.

Upon contact with that black arc of electricity.

It turned directly into gray dust and dissipated with the wind!

Not a single drop of blood was shed.

Just like that, it vanished into thin air!

"Wh...what?!"

The Japanese soldiers who were preparing to encircle the enemy from behind froze on the spot as if they had seen a ghost when they saw this scene.

On the viewing platform halfway up the mountain.

Abe Masaya's folding fan fell to the ground with a "thud".

At that moment, his eyes were wide open in extreme horror.