Volume 1, Chapter 217 – What Does “Fully Equipped” Mean?

“Listening Rain…”

Standing behind Li Hanyi, Liu Ruyan gazed at the longsword, her eyes filled with shock.

This was the first time she had ever seen the Grand Elder summon her bonded flying sword!

“Our Yaochi Immortal Palace has been established for barely more than a year.”

With Listening Rain in hand, Li Hanyi pointed its tip toward the Xuanming Sect’s sect-protecting grand formation below.

Her voice was not loud, yet it carried an inviolable authority that reached every member of the Xuanming Sect with perfect clarity, as though she were making a declaration to the entire Southern Region:

“The Palace Master is benevolent. She imparts the Dao, teaches her disciples, and protects those under her care.”

“As the Grand Elder of Yaochi Immortal Palace, safeguarding the Palace Master’s foundation and protecting the disciples under her is my duty.”

“Today, I shall use this sword to tell every faction in the Southern Region…”

With a slight turn of her wrist, the starlight and frost patterns flowing across Listening Rain’s blade suddenly blazed brighter!

“Those who offend Yaochi Immortal Palace shall be slain. Those who harm our disciples or their kin shall answer to the entire sect!”

The instant her final word fell:

“Buzz!”

There was no earth-shaking buildup, no dazzling burst of light.

Li Hanyi merely raised her arm slightly and casually swung Listening Rain at the sect-protecting grand formation below.

Yet as that strike descended…

The gloomy miasma hanging over the Nether Soul Mountain Range for a thousand li around was instantly ripped apart as though by an invisible giant hand!

The sky abruptly brightened, sunlight spilling across this land that had never seen it year-round!

An indescribably sharp sword intent burst from Listening Rain’s tip, like an ancient ferocious beast awakening from its slumber!

That sword intent was neither simple cold nor pure starlight.

It fused the ultimate qualities of both, becoming a cold, pure gray-white sword radiance!

At first, the streak of light was barely a chi long, but the instant it left the sword’s tip, it swelled against the wind!

It transformed into a gray-white sword rainbow stretching across heaven and earth, a hundred zhang long!

Wherever the sword rainbow passed, space let out faint yet teeth-grating cracking sounds, as though unable to bear the strain.

It left behind a thin black scar that refused to close for a long time!

It was proof that space itself had been cleaved apart by the sword intent and was temporarily unable to heal!

The Xuanming Sect’s sect-protecting grand formation had weathered countless storms and was said to be capable of withstanding the combined bombardment of several Tribulation Transcendence experts.

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Yet before this gray-white sword rainbow, it was as fragile as thin ice beneath the blazing sun!

“Skreee!”

An unbearably shrill sound of scraping and tearing rang out!

The moment the gray-white sword rainbow touched the translucent barrier, there was no stalemate and no contest of strength.

Like a hot knife through butter, the barrier was effortlessly and cleanly sliced in two!

The sword rainbow did not slow. Following the gash it had opened in the barrier, it plowed through everything in its path and slammed into the heart of the Xuanming Sect’s mountain gate!

“Rumble, rumble, rumble!”

The earth shook, the mountains trembled, and the sky seemed to split apart!

Wherever the sword rainbow swept, the Xuanming Sect’s magnificent halls, built from sturdy black stone and yin iron, collapsed, shattered, and vanished one after another as though they were made of paper!

Whether they were the residences of high-ranking disciples, pavilions housing scriptures, or workshops for refining corpse puppets…

Before that single strike, all of them were reduced to dust!

Many Xuanming Sect disciples had no time to flee, while others tried to block the attack with artifacts or corpse puppets.

The instant the sword rainbow’s aftermath swept over them, the disciples, their artifacts, and their corpse puppets were rapidly covered in gray-white ice crystals from the inside out.

Then, without a sound, they crumbled into icy dust and scattered away!

Not one of them even managed to scream!

Just one strike!

The Xuanming Sect’s mountain gate, a foundation passed down for tens of thousands of years, was forcibly split down the middle by that gray-white sword rainbow, leaving a bottomless ravine several li long!

On either side of the ravine lay wrecked buildings, spreading ice, and utter silence!

The sect-protecting grand formation shattered completely, its motes of light dispersing.

“Pfft!”

“Urgh!”

The formation had been forcibly broken, and the resulting backlash sent the several elders presiding over it spitting blood in unison, their faces deathly pale.

Mingyue stared at the apocalyptic scene before her.

At the horrifying sword scar that had nearly split the Xuanming Sect in two, her body began to tremble uncontrollably.

Was this the true strength of Yaochi Immortal Palace’s Grand Elder?

The Xuanming Sect was finished!

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“You brazen fiend! How dare you destroy our sect’s foundation!”

“You’re courting death!”

Just as everyone in the Xuanming Sect was left shaken to the core by the might of that strike, two roars filled with shock and fury exploded from the deepest reaches of the sect!

Immediately afterward, two figures wreathed in towering corpse qi and Yin baleful energy shot toward Li Hanyi like cannonballs!

They were the Xuanming Sect’s ancestors, the Two Netherworld Elders, both at the middle stage of Tribulation Transcendence!

At this moment, neither retained the slightest trace of their earlier calm.

They had watched their sect suffer devastating damage from a single sword strike, watched a foundation built over tens of thousands of years crumble in an instant. Their eyes were bloodshot, and their killing intent boiled over!

Corpse qi churned around the old woman, forming a vicious ghostly claw a hundred zhang wide that came crashing down from above!

The old man directly summoned a “Heavenly Corpse” more than a zhang tall, radiating the aura of late-stage Tribulation Transcendence!

This Heavenly Corpse had clearly been refined from the remains of a Tribulation Transcendence expert. Tempered over several centuries, its body was incomparably tough.

Under the old man’s control, it charged at Li Hanyi.

As it threw a punch, space twisted in its wake, and Yin lightning exploded!

Two enraged Tribulation Transcendence experts, along with a Heavenly Corpse comparable to one!

Such a force could annihilate the vast majority of sects in the Southern Region in an instant!

Yet in the face of their joint assault, Li Hanyi’s expression did not change in the slightest.

She did not even look at the howling ghost claw or the Heavenly Corpse’s devastating fist.

She merely turned the wrist holding Listening Rain.

The starlight and frost patterns flowing across Listening Rain’s blade abruptly separated and surged outward!

The starlight rose, forming a slowly rotating phantom of stars above Li Hanyi’s head.

Starlight poured down, enveloping the hundred-meter radius around her!

The gigantic ghost claw came crashing down and struck the phantom of starlight as though it had hit an invisible wall of copper and iron.

It produced a piercing scraping sound but could not advance a single inch. Instead, the starlight continuously dissolved and purified it, rapidly reducing its size!

Frost patterns drifted through the air and coiled around Listening Rain’s blade before transforming into countless ice-crystal sword threads, each as fine as a cow’s hair yet incomparably sharp.

As though alive, they wove together into a vast net that covered the sky and descended upon the Heavenly Corpse!

“Hiss, hiss, hiss!”

The ice-crystal sword threads struck the Heavenly Corpse, producing a teeth-grating sound of cutting and slicing.

The Heavenly Corpse’s body, which could withstand even heaven-rank artifacts head-on, was cut into and penetrated by countless ice-crystal sword threads.

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Like a candle thrown into a blazing fire, dense white cracks rapidly appeared across its surface!

The cracks spread with astonishing speed. In the blink of an eye, they had covered the Heavenly Corpse’s entire arm and were creeping toward its torso!

The old man’s face changed dramatically. He could clearly feel the connection between himself and the Heavenly Corpse being forcibly severed by a strand of sword intent!

The Heavenly Corpse’s movements became incredibly sluggish and stiff!

“Break.”

Li Hanyi’s cool voice rang out again.

She swung Listening Rain once more at the Two Netherworld Elders.

Sensing the power of that strike, neither dared to take it lightly. Each swiftly summoned an earth-rank artifact to block it!

But with a gap of several minor realms between their cultivation levels and an entire major rank between their artifacts, how could they possibly withstand a fully geared Li Hanyi?

Within just a few breaths, their artifacts shattered!

“Pfft!” “Pfft!”

Two muffled groans rang out almost simultaneously.

They were not loud, yet they seemed to strike directly at the hearts of everyone in the Xuanming Sect!

Like kites with severed strings, the two plummeted straight from the sky and crashed heavily into the ruins below. Whether they lived or died was unknown!

Silence.

A deathly silence filled the scene.

Every surviving disciple and elder of the Xuanming Sect, including Deputy Sect Master Mingyue, stood as though frozen in place, staring blankly at the pristine white figure still hovering in the air.

At the two ancestors who had fallen like dead dogs!

At the horrifying sword scar that had split their sect in two, and at the rubble strewn across the ground.

The first sword strike broke the formation and destroyed the sect.

The second severely wounded two Tribulation Transcendence ancestors!

This was Li Hanyi, Grand Elder of Yaochi Immortal Palace!

Being fully geared was no joke!

Li Hanyi slowly put away Listening Rain, and the sword intent around her quietly faded.

Her calm gaze swept over the people below before settling at last on Mingyue’s bloodless face.

“Today, I destroyed your mountain gate and severely injured your sect’s two ancestors as a warning.”

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“If there is a next time…”

She paused. What she said next made every person in the Xuanming Sect feel as though they had fallen into an icy abyss:

“The Xuanming Sect need not continue to exist in this world.”

With that, she did not spare them another glance and turned away.

“Ruyan, we’re leaving.”

“Y-Yes, Grand Elder!”

Liu Ruyan came back to her senses from her overwhelming shock and hurriedly answered, her voice carrying a faint, barely perceptible tremble.

She took one last look at the Xuanming Sect’s mountain gate below, which looked as though it had been ravaged by a heavenly disaster.

At the Xuanming Sect members who had once struck terror throughout the Southern Region, now trembling like quails.

Never before had her desire for strength burned so fiercely!

The two women transformed into streaks of light, one white and one azure, and vanished beyond the horizon in an instant.

Only long after their figures had completely disappeared did the rift in the gloom above the Nether Soul Mountain Range, torn open by Li Hanyi’s sword strike, begin to slowly close.

Sunlight was cut off once more, and Yin baleful energy again permeated the air.

But within the Xuanming Sect’s mountain gate, that horrifying sword scar, several li long and bottomless beyond sight, remained alongside the ruins covering the ground like the deepest mark of shame, branded into the heart of every Xuanming Sect member.

Mingyue stood rooted to the spot in a daze, looking at her devastated sect and the heavily wounded ancestors.

She knew that the Xuanming Sect’s accumulation of tens of thousands of years had been gravely damaged by this disaster.

And all of it stemmed from Mingquan’s selfish impulse.

“Clean up the site… This matter is not to be spread outside!”

Her voice hoarse, she issued the order. Then, as though all strength had been drained from her body, she slowly closed her eyes.

But how could this possibly remain hidden? The various forces across the Southern Region would soon come to understand one ironclad rule:

Yaochi Immortal Palace must never be insulted.

Its disciples and their kin were even more untouchable.

This was the rule Li Hanyi had established for the entire Southern Region today!

Nothing could serve as a more effective warning to others.