Chapter Seventy: A Brilliant Stratagem! Shaking the World with Might! [Five Thousand Words!]

[This simulation requires the expenditure of one million Walking Points, but you currently only have six hundred thousand, which is insufficient to deduce the opponent’s location.]

Upon seeing the deduction prompt, Lin Qiye was quite surprised. “There’s actually a special method of concealment? If he doesn’t show himself, it will be impossible to find him.”

At his words, Zhu Yuheng’s face showed disappointment.

“Is there really no way to find out where that foolish wolf is secluded?”

“Truly, there isn’t.”

“However… looking at it another way, the seclusion spot is so well hidden—it means the Wolf Lord cannot possibly come out to provide aid. In other words, there’s no one in the Wolf Clan’s imperial palace who can stop you and me from rampaging through it. This is a good thing; we can sweep through the entire palace like lightning and set it ablaze!”

Lin Qiye’s gaze was ablaze.

Having listened to his analysis, Zhu Yuheng’s beautiful, phoenix-shaped eyes shimmered with killing intent. She drew her crystal sword, and with two fingers of her left hand, gently traced the blade. A chill glimmer drifted across her eyes, the sword gleamed like frost and snow, and her gaze grew even more piercingly cold.

“Let the whole palace pay the blood price for that foolish wolf shattering my heart!”

Her voice was icy.

At the same time, Lin Qiye reached into the void, summoning the Crimson Blaze Ring-Handled Sabre, which spun down into his grasp.

This blade, which had reaped over a million lives, was saturated with bloodlust and bristled with murderous energy. A frigid blue glow trembled and flowed along the blade, as if the weapon itself was excited, eager for more blood.

With the blade in hand, Lin Qiye said nothing. He moved like a specter through the palace halls.

Splashes of blood, sliced throats, rolling heads, the thud of bodies hitting the ground—one after another, these sounds echoed through the silent night.

If one looked closely, one would see that Lin Qiye’s slaughter was as fluid and natural as a butcher expertly carving an ox—graceful, effortless, almost artistic.

Witnessing his elegant and dashing style, an inexplicable sense of competitiveness arose in Zhu Yuheng’s heart. Her features grew colder, frost swirling around her as she swiftly darted ahead of Lin Qiye.

Her crystal sword danced, unleashing countless sword shadows. Each one sent hundreds, even thousands, of icy wind blades slicing through the air and space, severing their enemies in an instant.

In a matter of moments, the ground was littered with corpses.

Standing shoulder to shoulder with Lin Qiye, Zhu Yuheng arched her brow and glanced at him, as though boasting of her own achievements.

But the commotion and scent of blood finally attracted the patrolling Imperial Guards nearby.

Eight thousand peak Golden Core patrolling guards converged, their white dragon-scale armor clattering as they moved.

“Where did these rats come from, daring to commit murder in our Wolf Clan’s imperial palace! Seize them! Keep them alive and flay them for one hundred and eighty days—let them beg for life, unable to find death!”

The commander of the guards shouted and gestured forward.

Eight thousand peak Golden Core patrolling guards surged forth, overwhelming as locusts, swarming toward Lin Qiye and Zhu Yuheng.

“Let me handle this!” Zhu Yuheng stepped forward, her sword shadows fanning out.

In an instant, a massive cerulean flood dragon hundreds of meters long erupted from the void, plunging into the formation of the Imperial Guards!

With a thunderous explosion, the dragon shattered, releasing an extreme, icy chill that swept over the eight thousand cultivators.

The guards had no time to evade; in a heartbeat, they were transformed into ice sculptures, utterly devoid of life.

With a flick of Zhu Yuheng’s hand, the ice statues shattered.

“How was that?” she asked, seeking praise.

Lin Qiye applauded. “Impressive—very impressive!”

Zhu Yuheng smiled softly. “I can do even better!”

With that, she raced toward the palace depths.

As for Lin Qiye, his speed was too great—he flitted through the surroundings, leaving swathes of soldiers for Zhu Yuheng. But in truth, the number of wolves he slew was twice her tally.

And as he killed, Lin Qiye also played arsonist—setting alight the bedding and other flammables within the wolf palaces.

Within a minute, flames roared high behind the pair.

From above, one could see that amid the pitch-black, moonless night, a savage “fire dragon” erupted from the Eastern Extreme Hall, driving straight into the heart of the palace…

On this blazing dragon, wild tongues of flame—dozens of meters high—danced furiously. Even a mere lick from these flames could spawn a smaller fire dragon.

The little fire dragons spiraled over the splendid halls, crazily devouring everything in their path, spreading madly with crackling glee…

At times, they would merge with others, combining into new, ferocious dragons that surged toward distant buildings.

Destruction! Destruction! Burn everything to ash!

If these fire dragons could speak, they would howl their madness—or perhaps even more wildly.

In just five minutes, half the palace was a sea of fire, waves of flame drowning the halls. Massive beams, ten meters tall, crashed down with thunderous roars.

“Fire! Fire! Put it out, quickly!”

“No! It’s not a fire—it’s an attack! Defend against the enemy!”

“Enemy attack!”

“What nonsense! Are you trying to die?”

“Hurry and fight the fire!”

On the palace square, the Left Commander of the Imperial Guards slapped aside a panicking soldier.

“Our Wolf Clan has prospered for ten thousand years! What fools would dare seek death in our imperial palace? There are a hundred thousand peak Golden Core Imperial Guards within the palace! Ten military camps outside, with ten million strong—are they all useless?”

“How could we let the enemy set a fire in the palace? Are you looking down on us?”

“Put the fire out now—spread no more false reports, or I’ll twist your head off!”

Cursing, the Left Commander gestured, and behind him, five thousand perfectly arrayed peak Golden Core cultivators emerged from the void.

“General, what’s going on? Why has the palace suddenly caught fire?”

“Something feels wrong…”

The Left Commander shook his head. “Some prince must have gotten drunk and caused this. Put it out first.”

“As you command!”

The five thousand cultivators responded in unison.

But the next moment, Zhu Yuheng appeared.

She rode a thousand-zhang-long cerulean ice dragon, flashing into the heart of the five thousand-strong formation.

This ice dragon, spanning several kilometers, was one of Zhu Yuheng’s trump cards—it consumed thirty percent of her spiritual power to summon. Normally, she would not use it lightly except in the most critical moments.

But with Lin Qiye as her support, Zhu Yuheng felt utterly secure and summoned her trump card without hesitation.

The colossal ice dragon crashed into the ranks of the five thousand Golden Core cultivators, unleashing an unparalleled chill. They shivered uncontrollably, their brows, noses, and eyes coated with thick frost—even the spiritual power in their meridians was frozen, blocked like a river in midwinter.

“Not good!”

“General, save us!”

Five thousand faces turned pale with terror as they cried for help.

But the killing power of Zhu Yuheng’s trump card was unimaginable—even a Seven-Heaven Gate expert dared not take it head-on, let alone these cultivators.

Hardly had they pleaded for help when thick frost spread from their hearts to their limbs. In the end, their terrified faces were frozen solid, turning them into five thousand statues of ice.

Suspended in the air, Zhu Yuheng waved her hand, shattering all the statues. Without a doubt, the five thousand peak Golden Core guards were annihilated in an instant.

“Instant… instant annihilation?”

The Left Commander, who had opened three Heavenly Gates, felt his legs go weak, chilled to the core. Without a shred of fighting spirit, he turned to flee for his life.

But Zhu Yuheng’s power far outstripped his. A sword shadow flashed, shattering his heart in an instant. He crashed heavily to the ground.

But even with his heart destroyed, he did not die immediately, instead crawling desperately away, leaving a long trail of blood behind him…

Zhu Yuheng shook her head coldly. “I’ve slain one Imperial Guard commander—how about you?”

“The eighty thousand peak Golden Core cultivators charging from the other side have all been wiped out by me. The twenty-eight triple-Heaven-Gate experts, the main defenders of the palace, are also dead—I finished them off instantly. I estimate the palace’s entire fighting force has been wiped out.”

At these words, Zhu Yuheng raised her eyebrows in surprise.

“In just that short time, you killed twenty-eight triple-Heaven-Gate cultivators and eighty thousand Golden Core elites?!”

“Yes,” Lin Qiye replied with ease.

Zhu Yuheng fell silent. ‘Damn, is the gap really that big? I burned thirty percent of my power, but he’s still in perfect condition!’

She drew a deep, quiet breath.

Of course, Lin Qiye had no idea her competitive spirit was once again churning.

He gazed into the distance. “Next, let’s set more fires—burn the palace to the ground.”

Zhu Yuheng nodded.

And so, the two of them set fires throughout the palace. The grand palace, which had flourished for over ten thousand years, was ablaze from all sides.

Within the halls, maids, eunuchs, princes, and consorts fled in panic and terror, but there was nowhere to escape—every direction was a sea of fire. The flames surged like dragons, wave upon wave, swallowing all life within the palace. There was no escape—only death in the boundless inferno.

…

“The flames are beyond control now. Even if hundreds of thousands of Golden Core cultivators come to fight the fire, they’ll only retrieve charred bodies, not a single survivor,” Lin Qiye calmly analyzed.

“It seems we only took a quarter of an hour to burn the entire palace?” Zhu Yuheng estimated, with a dashing smile in her phoenix eyes reflecting the raging firelight.

Lin Qiye nodded. “To be precise, twelve minutes.”

Indeed, it had only been twelve minutes since Lin Qiye killed Tang Song and Xiao Can.

In those twelve minutes, all the palace’s defenders had perished, the entire palace drowned in a sea of flames, the night illuminated as if it were day.

A smile finally appeared in Zhu Yuheng’s eyes. “At last, I’ve vented my anger!”

Lin Qiye smiled as well. “Let’s hurry—there are more than ten million Wolf Clan Golden Core cultivators in the army camps outside the capital. We have only ten minutes—burn the entire city, then find a place to enjoy the view and watch their impotent fury.”

His demeanor was calm—eerily so. Zhu Yuheng, infected by his composure, followed coldly behind.

Both were supreme cultivators at the Seven-Heaven Gate level; from north to south, east to west, they killed any who blocked them in an instant.

Ten minutes later, the entire Wolf Clan capital was engulfed in flames.

At that moment, over ten million Golden Core cultivators surrounded the city in a dense blockade.

“Don’t let even a fly escape!”

“Who could possibly be so bold as to set fire to the Wolf Clan’s capital?”

“How could anyone dare attack the palace itself? Aren’t they afraid of heaven’s wrath?”

The five Wolf Kings stared in shock. No matter how they imagined it, they could not believe anyone had set the capital and palace ablaze. Judging by the ferocity of the fire, millions of residents would perish, and the princes and consorts within would all be reduced to ash—a devastating loss.

“Could it be a human cultivator?”

“What human would dare? Surrounded as they are, they’re doomed! Even if they had a hundred lives, they wouldn’t attempt it.”

“Who, then?”

The Wolf Kings fell silent, unable to fathom it.

At that moment, outside the city, atop the thousand-meter-high pyramid altar, Lin Qiye and Zhu Yuheng stood side by side, gazing out at the rings of cultivators encircling the city and the inferno that consumed it.

“Seventeenth, why don’t we burn every Wolf Clan city, one by one? For the wound that foolish wolf gave me, I’ll exact vengeance a thousand, ten thousand times over,” Zhu Yuheng proposed with excitement sparkling in her eyes.

Lin Qiye smiled, about to reply, when he caught sight of a blood-red, sinister bronze mirror set at the center of the pyramid altar.

Curious, he approached, and Zhu Yuheng’s attention was drawn as well.

“Is this the switch for the blood-red barrier the Wolf Lord raised?”

They spoke their guess in unison.

“What do you think, Seventeenth?”

Lin Qiye nodded. “Yes.”

He studied the mirror for several dozen seconds, quickly mastering its controls.

This bronze mirror could communicate with three blood-red evil dragons. With a single thought, it could project the images from the altar to the entire Great Qin Universe.

“An interesting toy—probably left by the Wolf Clan’s ancestors. It’s embedded in the altar, so it’s hard to take, but I may as well play with it.”

A thought entered Lin Qiye’s mind.

A vast blood-red curtain then appeared in the sky of the Great Qin Universe.

Within it, the Wolf Clan’s capital blazed furiously; over ten million Golden Core cultivators surrounded it like layers of black dots, while hundreds of thousands more ferried water in vain attempts to quell the flames. Strangely, the more water they poured, the fiercer the fire became—flames soared dozens of meters high.

The six hundred million subjects of Great Qin stared in utter bewilderment.

“What’s going on? Where is this? Is that the Great Qin capital?”

“Impossible! Has the Wolf Clan already burned our capital? Does this mean we’ve lost the war?”

“Surely we’ve lost—didn’t they kill the Human Clan’s Luck Dragon recently?”

“Humanity’s decline is inevitable now!”

“No! We had just begun living a good life—my son was accepted into the Academy of Technology, we get monthly stipends…”

Many ordinary people were incredulous, some breaking into tears.

“Heaven, please protect Great Qin—protect the Seventeenth Prince, don’t let him die, he’s a good man…”

“He truly is. We’ve only had a single good year, but it’s been better than a lifetime. Please, let him come to no harm!”

Countless people across the empire silently prayed for Lin Qiye.

In the imperial palace, the old emperor and the eunuch Cao exchanged baffled glances, unable to interpret what the blood-red screen intended to convey—after all, they had never seen the Wolf Clan’s capital.

But when they focused on the small black dots, the emperor’s heart skipped a beat.

“That’s over ten million Wolf Clan Golden Core cultivators!”

“So this is a Wolf Clan city, then?”

“Judging by its size, it must be a major city!”

The emperor was astonished, and Eunuch Cao, upon a closer look, gasped sharply.

“It really does seem so! But why would the Wolf Lord show us this?”

The emperor shook his head. “I don’t know… no idea what they’re up to.”

At the border fortress, the three generals of the Meng family furrowed their brows.

“Should we intervene to stop the Seventeenth Prince and the Valkyrie? They’re the ones who set the fire, aren’t they? Running into the Wolf Clan’s heartland to burn their city—their courage is boundless!”

The three generals were deeply unsettled and uneasy.

“It looks like they’re surrounded, though—over ten million Golden Core cultivators could wear down even Eight-Heaven Gate experts! Could the Seventeenth Prince and Valkyrie… fall here?”

At this, Old General Meng pounded his chest in anguish.

“I said they shouldn’t go, but they insisted, promising nothing would go wrong! And now look!”

He was so agitated, he nearly fainted.

But in the next instant, the image shifted and Lin Qiye and Zhu Yuheng’s voices came through.

“Idiot, do you know how to use this? Zoom in—closer! That foolish wolf, can’t you see him clearly?”

Lin Qiye coughed lightly. “I’m getting used to it.”

As he spoke, the image swept rapidly, showing Lin Qiye and Zhu Yuheng standing upon the altar, surveying the inferno below.

The fire, too, was sharply visible, as were the expressions of the Wolf Kings and their warriors—anger, dread, worry, and seething humiliation.

There, Lin Qiye’s cool and handsome profile appeared in the blood-red screen, making him seem even more imposing.

He smiled faintly.

“My people of Great Qin, do you see? I, the Seventeenth Prince of the Empire, and the Valkyrie herself, have penetrated deep into the Wolf Clan’s heartland—slaughtered twenty-eight half-step Nascent Soul experts and over a hundred thousand peak Golden Core warriors, then set the imperial palace ablaze!”

“The sea of fire you see in the distance? That is the Wolf Clan’s capital and palace! Within it, all the Wolf Lord’s princes, consorts, kin, and millions of Wolf Clan citizens have been burned to ashes!”

“Though we are but two, our victory is beyond doubt!”

“This is the first battle in which humanity has triumphed. It will not be long before we win the thousandth, the ten thousandth—until we have eradicated the Wolf Clan!”