Elder Sun’s aura surged out, and a huge cyclone appeared behind him.

That cyclone was only a couple dozen meters in diameter, and furthermore, it wasn’t a perfect circle. Instead, it seemed to be squashed slightly.

Most importantly, that cyclone was a cyclone, and completely different from Long Chen’s divine ring. Long Chen’s divine ring was translucent, its light similar to a rainbow.

But this cyclone Elder Sun had condensed was vaguely solid, almost like congee.

Long Chen’s jaw dropped. Looking at that ‘divine ring’ behind Elder Sun, he was filled with disbelief.

Seeing Long Chen’s shock, Elder Sun laughed madly. “How is it? Are you shocked? This Superior Must Kill Rebel divine technique you taught me is a hundred times stronger in my hands!”

Elder Sun could sense that after the ‘divine ring’ behind him appeared, all the surrounding spiritual qi could be absorbed by him.

That was something fundamentally impossible for him to do previously. With such a cultivation technique, his cultivation speed would skyrocket.

Most importantly, he had been stuck at the peak of Bone Forging for many years now. But once he had formed this ‘divine ring’, he had clearly felt his bottleneck loosen a great deal.

According to his estimation, it wouldn’t be long before he could advance to Meridian Opening, becoming an expert on the same level as Tu Fang. Then, he could roam anywhere under the heavens.

In fact, he was even having an urge to start up his own sect. With that kind of strength, he was qualified to start up a second-tier sect. Why would he need to be mistreated here?

And so the first thing he thought of was Long Chen. Just thinking of Long Chen made him clench his teeth in anger.

He knew that Long Chen’s relationship with senior apprentice-brother Wan was pretty good. Currently, senior apprentice-brother Wan was in seclusion, and so he had just gotten a worker to secretly send Long Chen a letter for Long Chen to meet him here.

And Long Chen had actually come to meet him. That delighted Elder Sun. As long as he could kill Long Chen now, he could keep this cultivation technique secret to himself.

Long Chen looked at Elder Sun with a complicated expression. He sighed. “How did you end up doing this?”

“Haha, of course I just followed that cultivation technique you gave me. Did you really think I was senile? I easily saw through your little trick!” sneered Elder Sun.

“What do you mean?”

“What do I mean? Hehe, the technique you gave me really is not bad. You deliberately marked what direction I was supposed to circulate my qi.

“When I saw that, I was extremely curious why you would so meticulously mark that. Then I realized you were trying to trick me, and that the path you indicated had been reversed!

“Hmph, I’ve lived for almost a hundred years. Did you think your insignificant trick would work on me? I tested that reversed circulation path, and as I expected, it worked perfectly! Brat, now you can die contentedly!” said Elder Sun sinisterly.

Long Chen really was absolutely shocked. In reality, the technique he had given Elder Sun had been completely real. The circulation path had also been completely correct.

But this old fellow hadn’t trusted him and had actually modified a part of it. It was no wonder his ‘divine ring’ was so bizarre.

Long Chen sighed. “Looks like in your pettiness, you ended up misjudging me. The cultivation technique I gave you was completely real. I didn’t modify any of it.”

“Hmph, do you think saying these things right before you die will change anything?”

Long Chen was too lazy to bother with him. But this Elder Sun really was a prodigy. Even though he was circulating the technique in reverse, he was still able to form a divine ring. That really was out of his expectations.

Elder Sun’s aura was incredibly powerful now. It was at least several times stronger than before. With that kind of strength, he absolutely could kill Long Chen easily.

And yet Long Chen’s expression didn’t contain the slightest panic. He was completely calm, with only a trace of pity.

“Did you know? As soon as I received your letter, I knew that it was you. Senior apprentice-brother Wan has just been promoted to become an Elder. If he really wanted to talk to me, he definitely wouldn’t arrange for a meeting like this. He would have paid a personal visit,” said Long Chen.

“Hehe, unfortunately, you’ve still come,” said Elder Sun disdainfully.

“That’s right, I still came. That’s because I’m very curious why someone who should have already died was still able to fake a letter. That’s why I came.”

“What do you mean?” Elder Sun first stiffened before raging.

“What I mean is that you should have already died. The fact that you’re alive is quite surprising to me, so I wanted to come take a look,” explained Long Chen.

Elder Sun didn’t know why, but looking at Long Chen’s calm expression, he felt a trace of terror.

“Stop wasting time. Just die!”

Elder Sun roared and his aura exploded out. He sent a palm crashing at Long Chen.

BANG!

Blood spurted through the air.

Elder Sun blankly stared at his own body. He was now lying on the ground.

From the chest down, his body had completely disappeared. The ground around him was covered with blood and flesh.

Long Chen slowly moved aside a large shield that he had just placed in front of him. Looking at the gore on the shield, he hesitated for a moment before just directly throwing the shield away.

“What… is… going on…?” Elder Sun only had two arms and a head now.

An ordinary cultivator would definitely be dead already, but Elder Sun was a Bone Forging expert, and there was a great deal of energy contained within his arms. He would be able to hang on for a moment.

However, he was definitely doomed to die now. The energy in his arms would only be enough to sustain him for a short moment.

“Ugh, really, why bother? The technique I gave you was completely correct. If you had just cultivated it properly, you would have gotten to die within your own home. But by circulating the qi in reverse and then calling me out here, were you planning on disgusting me one last time with your death?”

“Long Chen, I admit defeat. I’m about to die, so can you at least let me understand my own death?” Elder Sun was completely ashen now.

He felt as if he had died too wrongly. His last desire was to know why he had died.

Long Chen hesitated for a moment. In reality, Long Chen truly detested this fellow. In fact, Elder Sun had just been wanting to kill him.

With his temperament, did Elder Sun really think Long Chen gave a damn if he died without understanding?

But looking at the current Elder Sun, a grand eight-temper Bone Forging expert, dying just like this, Long Chen couldn’t help but sigh.

“In truth, you just died because of your greed. In this world, there are some things that will never be yours, and if someone forcibly tries to take them, he’ll end up like you are right now.

“Have you not heard that I’m a cultivator without a Spirit Root? In reality, I don’t just not have a Spirit Root, I also don’t have a Dantian.

“My cultivation technique is something that only people without a Dantian can cultivate in. People with a Dantian who attempt to reach Qi Condensation with this technique will be like an ignited firecracker, and their Dantian will automatically explode.

“If you had just followed the correct circulation, you would have had just the slightest chance to survive. But even if you could survive, your Dantian definitely would not have.

“But you decided to be a smart-ass, training in it with a reverse circulation. That resulted in that incredibly weird cyclone ring of yours. You thought that weird cyclone was correct?

“I’d guess that as soon as you succeeded, you didn’t even test your power before impatiently asking me to come here.

“That little circle of yours might have appeared formidable, but that’s just an external force. As soon as you attempted to use it, that had required your Dantian.

“The instant your Dantian attempted to draw its power, that external power flooded your Dantian, and then, bang! You exploded.”

Long Chen had really given him the correct circulation path of the Nine Star Hegemon Body Art. But that circulation method was only for the use in Qi Condensation. It was something that was used for preparing to condense the FengFu Star.

Elder Sun naturally didn’t know that there could be someone who could cultivate without a Dantian. And so he had attempted to modify the technique. Long Chen really had to admire Elder Sun’s stupid courage.

To be able to form that weird ring by reversing the flow of qi was definitely not bad. Long Chen really had not expected that.

Long Chen went and grabbed Elder Sun’s spatial ring. He took out the four black zirconiums, placing them on the ground.

“Look carefully at these four words,” said Long Chen.

“Must Kill Rebel Superior. Are you an idiot?”[1]

Elder Sun finally realized the truth. He had really completely fallen for Long Chen’s trap. Glaring at Long Chen, his eyes were filled with hatred and unwillingness.

“Long Chen, you little bastard, you’re just a devil! Even when I’m dead, I’ll definitely still haunt you in the middle of the night! Just you wait…”

Elder Sun finally ran out of energy, dying. But even after he died, his eyes were still ferociously glaring at Long Chen.

Patting off the dust, Long Chen muttered to himself, “Damnit, why does everything always happen to me? Even in death, he still wants to scare me. Too bad for you, but my guts are not that weak.”

Looking around, he found a hole and directly tossed Elder Sun’s remaining body parts inside. Then he just randomly kicked a bit of dirt into the hole, burying him.

“You’re definitely just a piece of crap, but once a person dies, all their debts are over. Luckily for you, you at least gave me some good stuff before dying. So I won’t bicker with you. I’ll bury you here, and the business between us is settled. If you really refuse to accept that and become some evil spirit, come find me at any time. I’ll definitely teach you a couple new techniques that will let you really rest in peace!”

Long Chen didn’t waste any more time here and returned to the monastery. Within this secluded valley, occasionally bursts of autumn wind would blow by, almost sounding like sobbing.

Three days later, the monastery sent out news that Elder Sun had disappeared. But there wasn’t much shock towards his disappearance.

That was because Tu Fang had announced that Elder Sun had already resigned from his Elder position and left voluntarily.

That caused everyone to feel that it was no wonder Elder Sun had been acting oddly the past few days. He had constantly been rushing around, and he had even sold off his possessions for low prices. It seemed that he had decided to change jobs.

As for why he wanted to change jobs, nobody found it that odd. Ever since his display in that battle, his status had plummeted.

His reward was cut in half, and his lucrative post as head of Xuantian pavilion had also been taken away. It was obvious that there was no further path of advancement for him within the Xuantian Monastery. The fact that he would leave was just normal.

Although Tu Fang didn’t know how Elder Sun had just disappeared, Tu Fang could guess that it was just his fate. Elder Sun must not have wanted to have a long life since he had dared to fight against a Divergent.

And so Tu Fang had suppressed this matter, not wanting it to affect the monastery’s regular operations.

Long Chen was also well aware of that. He suspected that Tu Fang had figured out some clues, but he also didn’t care.

It had already been a month since the battle, and everyone’s cultivation bases had been soaring. However, he was still stuck in the same bottleneck. That was definitely unacceptable. He had to cultivate.

After saying goodbye to Tang Wan-er, Long Chen went alone to a familiar mountain where black clouds always gathered.

[1] The name of this technique and the pun the author is making don’t really translate into English. In order, these are the characters that are written on the stones: 逆弒殺必. It is a phonetic pun, sounding the same as 你是傻逼, meaning “You’re an idiot.” I tried to do a kind of pun on words with the English.