Chapter 1096 – Their Individual Trump Cards

As expected, the first challenger was someone from the Seven Sons who had haughtily proclaimed that they would crush Ye Qingyu under their feet. His sword radiance was like lightning and seemed like it could kill instantly while his cultivation was indeed very terrifying.

However, Ye Qingyu showed no signs of countering with an attack of his own.

A ray of flowing light appeared behind him and his sword moved gracefully to block Meng Wuyou.

"I'm Lin Yutang from the Human Race headquarters and I'll be challenging you," a clear voice rang out.

The person who had attacked was one of the leaders of the White-robed Divine Guards, Lin Yutang.

Clink! Clink! Clink!

Countless sword lights clashed loudly against each other.

Sparks flew everywhere.

They moved apart after the initial clash.

They were evenly matched after the initial exchange of blows.

"Lin Yutang? Leader Lin Yutang, have you pledged your allegiance to this crazed demon Ye Qingyu as well?" The sect master of the Four Stars Sect said angrily, "Are the White-robed Divine Guards in cahoots with Ye Qingyu to do evil?"

He was a middle-aged man with black beard and hair and who looked very authoritative. He was dressed in bright red ancient robes and looked very imposing. When he spoke, his words carried such authority that it brooked no defiance.

"The mandate of the White-robed Divine Guards has always been to weed out evil and protect the order of the Human Race, so why do you say that we're in cahoots?" Lin Yutang said sternly and held his sword horizontally in front of him. "Furthermore, Lord Ye Qingyu is the third deputy spokesperson of the Human Race, so wouldn't it be reasonable for the White-robed Divine Guards to obey his orders?"

"Humph," the sect master scoffed and his brows arched in anger.

Meng Wuyou smirked coldly and said, "Your innocence has yet to be proven and no one knows if you had a hand in Ren Puyang's death. Instead of staying at the Alliance of Domains to reflect on your actions, you have stirred up even more controversy with your appearance here. This is a gross dereliction of your duty and you deserve death, so I will destroy you on behalf of the Human Race today."

Then, sword light appeared once more and his deadly moves surged.

He was not considered the best amongst the Seven Sons of the Four Stars Sect, but he was very quick to anger and also very ruthless. He was well-known for being merciless to his opponents and since there was no goodwill left between the Four Stars Sect and Ye Qingyu, he no longer had to show mercy and would be able to freely hack his opponents into pieces with his sword. In the past few millennia, the Four Stars Sect had ruled supreme over the others sects and had only submitted to the Human Race headquarters of the Alliance of Domains in name only. Did anyone actually expect them to beg weakly for mercy when their opponents were right at their doorstep?

Lin Yutang said calmly, "The wise man knows he knows nothing while the fool thinks he knows it all... there's no need for me to explain. Let's battle."

A dazzling splendor exploded from the long sword in his hand.

The battle started once more.

Moments later—

The sect master's lips moved imperceptibly as though he was saying something, but no one else could hear what he said.

Another ray of flowing light shot forth from the Four Stars Sect's camp.

"I'm Kong Wuyu, one of the Seven Sons of the Four Starts Sect. I'd like to challenge Leader Lin Yutang."

Another expert from the Seven Sons of the Four Stars Sect stepped forward to join forces with Meng Wuyou to defeat Lin Yutang.

There were several in the crowd who thought that this was a shameless move.

However, this was exactly how the Four Stars Sect had always behaved – they had always used their strength or ganged up in numbers to bully the weak. This was certainly their disciples' favorite technique.

The Seven Sons of the Four Stars Sect were even more extreme. They had once challenged an elder of the Human Race together and at first, they battled him one after another in quick succession, but after they realized that they could not defeat him, they joined forces to attack him and claimed that 'the Seven Sons of the Four Stars Sect are one body and all seven of us would attack the one person as one just as we would do the same against an army of a million.' After they ruthlessly killed that Human Race elder, they went around showing off their deeds…

The corners of Ye Qingyu's mouth curved upward slightly.

His challenge against the Four Stars Sect had not been a hasty decision and he had carefully planned this operation, so he was obviously prepared to face their shameless techniques.

A ray of sword light flashed and shot out from behind him.

This sword force moved like a rainbow and was surprisingly on par with Lin Yutang's.

"I'm the Tang Chong from the White-robed Divine Guards. Kong Wuyu, you'll be up against me."

A muscular figure in white armor stood imposingly. He was one of the four main leaders of the White-robed Divine Guards of the Human Race, Tang Chong. His sword light moved as realistically as a sword and danced around the skies like a silver serpent. As it scattered across the skies powerfully, he managed to block Kong Wuyu.

Boom! Boom Boom!

An intense and fierce confrontation broke out in the void.

Another expert from the White-robed Divine Guards?

The expressions of those in the crowd changed.

Within the Four Stars Sect's camp, the eyes of the sect master, the Four Stars Holy Girl and many elders of the sect had clouded with confusion. The possible implications behind the appearance of these two White-robed Divine Guards who had aligned themselves with Ye Qingyu was a little hard to determine.

The Four Stars Holy Girl suddenly laughed and said, "I've heard that Ye Qingyu is on good terms with both Lin Yutang and Tang Chong. These two guards used to be the close confidantes of Ren Puyang in the past. Now that Ren Puyang is dead, these two men are just like weeds bobbing on a river or like dogs without a master. They had probably thrown their support behind Ye Qingyu earlier which explains their appearance today… They are merely two warriors who failed to see the larger picture and failed to recognize who would win today – they are not worth a mention."

The upper echelons of the Four Stars Sect all heaved a sigh of relief at her words.

Her words made a lot of sense.

They highly doubted that someone like the third deputy who held the t.i.tle in name but wielded no authority would be able to command the entire Human Race headquarters at the Alliance of Domains and convince them to go on such a rash punitive expedition with him.

After giving some thought to this matter—

Swis.h.!.+ Swis.h.!.+

Two more figures stepped forward from the Four Stars Sect's camp and moved as fast as lightning.

"I'm Lu Wuqing of the Seven Sons!"

"I'm Huang Wuming of the Seven Sons!"

Another two experts from the Seven Sons of the Four Stars Sect issued consecutive challenges.

They were one of the weapons and resources that the Four Stars Sect could count on.

They had many highly-skilled experts of the same level and Ye Qingyu had yet to fully mature, so even if he had one or two experts on his side, their sect still had strength in numbers, so he would never be able to truly be flexible in his battle strategy and would ultimately be forced to battle them head-on. This would then deplete his yuan qi and leave him in a miserable state.

A ruthless smile appeared the faces of several upper echelons of the sect.

However——

Swis.h.!.+ Swis.h.!.+

Another two rays of flowing light shot out from behind him to block the attacks of Huang Wuming and Lu Wuqing. They were both extremely strong and managed to stop these two experts from the Four Stars Sect.

"I'm Fang Bule, leader of the White-robed Divine Guards."

"I'm Jin Zhiyi, leader of the White-robed Divine Guards."

Those two White-robed Divine Guards did not give a long self-introduction but the crowd and the higher-ups of the Four Stars Sect immediately recognized them since the leaders of the White-robed Divine Guards were all well-known throughout the Vast Thousand Domains and they were recognized as the elite experts of the Human Race. Even Jin Zhiyi who had always kept a low profile and was never involved in any controversy also once had his moment in the spotlight.

The appearance of the two men immediately caused the atmosphere to change.

If Lin Yutang and Tang Chong had allied themselves with Ye Qingyu because they were on good personal terms with him, then the appearance of Fang Bule and Jin Zhiyi completely dispelled this theory. Everyone knew that Fang Bule had once clashed with Ye Qingyu and Jin Zhiyi was definitely someone who would only act on the orders from the Human Race headquarters and would never attack simply because of personal ties or any other reason.

Everyone immediately came to the same conclusion after the appearance of both men——

This was not a personal crusade by Ye Qingyu alone against the Four Stars Sect.

It could possibly be… the intention of the entire Human Race headquarters!

There was a vast difference between those two scenarios.

The Four Stars Holy Girl felt as though someone had given her a hard slap and her astonishment was clearly written all over her face.

The expressions of the upper echelons of the Four Stars Sect clouded over with worry and they no longer looked as relaxed as they had been earlier.

Everyone knew how powerful the headquarters of a single race could be. The Human Race headquarters was not any weaker than the Four Stars Sect, whether it be in terms of resources or the number of experts. The appearance of the four main leaders of the White-robed Divine Guards was enough to explain certain things but now, everyone was curious to know exactly how many people within the Human Race headquarters had allied themselves with Ye Qingyu and how much support had the headquarters thrown behind him?

The sect master's expression became very grave and even a little dark.

With a slight wave of his hand, the remaining three experts of the Seven Sons transformed into rays of flowing light and joined the fray.

Another ray of flowing light shot out from the divine temple to stop those three men.

It was the haughty young man, Lu Wei.

He stood proudly in his green robes and his silver sword in his hand.

This young man's aura and mannerisms were simply astonis.h.i.+ng. He managed to single-handedly stop three people from the Seven Sons with the silver sword in his hand. The sky was filled with his dazzling sword radiance that rained down like starlight and it was so powerful that he did not seem to be at a disadvantage even though he was facing three opponents alone.

"Hmm? Who's that?"

"I've never seen this young man before."

"Could he be Ye Qingyu's disciple? Wait, but their swordsmans.h.i.+p techniques are different."

The experts throughout the land who were watching this battle from a distance were not as shocked by Lu Wei's appearance as they had been by the four main leaders of the White-robed Divine Guard, but they were surprised by how strong this young man was since he managed to single-handedly stop three experts from the Seven Sons. Their curiosity was piqued and they couldn't help but try to guess his ident.i.ty.

Those who knew his true ident.i.ty immediately turned pale.

The Four Stars Holy Girl was one of them.

She knew that Lu Wei was the grandson of that elderly Quasi-emperor.

If Lu Wei was here, did that also mean that the elderly Quasi-emperor also supported Ye Qingyu and his decision to launch a punitive expedition on the Four Stars Sect?

During the past one to two years, the elderly Quasi-emperor had emerged powerfully to suppress many foreign races and human forces, but he had not attacked the Four Stars Sect, so those at the Four Stars Sect a.s.sumed that the elderly Quasi-emperor had chosen to co-exist amicably because he was afraid of the Quasi-emperor of the Four Stars Sect. Yet, now it seemed that their a.s.sumptions were wrong and this elderly Quasi-emperor had instead chosen to make the Four Stars Sect his final target and decided to crush them in a single move after he had made the necessary preparations.

The Four Stars Holy Girl was no longer as calm as she had been before and even started to look a little fl.u.s.tered.

The sect master's face had darkened even more.

The situation was clearly much worse than they had initially expected.

The elderly Quasi-emperor could possibly be in their midst with full oversight of the battlefield, but was keeping himself hidden.

Then, another voice rang out from the divine temple.

"The sect master of Four Stars Sect, the battle has already begun. Why don't you join the battle and let's have a battle to resolve this," a slim and handsome figure slowly walked out from the divine temple to stand next to Ye Qingyu as he issued a challenge to the sect master.