In wrath.

The great and majestic mortal world, the nine heavens and ten lands.
A bustling world, happy cultivation.
When Chu Liang opened his eyes and found that he had become a disciple of the Shu Mountain Sect, and that he possessed a strange pagoda, he set foot at once upon a road he had never imagined.
From the thirty-six peaks where morning mist rises, he would one day return after slaying a dragon eight thousand li away.

Ding Mountain Marquis sat on a hillside, smiling as he waited for the performance to begin.
He wore an immaculate brocade robe of white, with cloudlike temples and a faint beard, handsome and refined in bearing. His son took after him; the Ding Mountain household had always been blessed with good looks, and their elegant features were indeed not poor.
All the people of South Pass City knew that the Ding Mountain Marquis was obsessed with seeking immortality and the Dao, so few had any chance to see him. Thus many kept glancing this way again and again.
From behind the pearl curtains, the Ding Mountain Marquis looked down upon the sea of people below and suddenly let out a cold sneer.

Mortals?
Nothing but ants.

Born to a house of nobles, surnamed Xia from the cradle, he could be said never to have tasted the hardships of the world. But from a very young age, he had lost interest in everything of the mortal realm. He believed only cultivation could bring transcendence.
For a seeker of the Dao of his exalted birth and middling talent, the great cultivation world already had a fairly uniform attitude. They might grant him an outer-sect status and bestow techniques upon him, but they would not accept him as an inner disciple.
Because of his princely status, he could never, like ordinary disciples, risk his life for the sect in exchange for support; nor could he endanger himself to seize resources for his own use. To take in such a disciple would be no different from taking in a lordling. No top-tier immortal sect would be willing to do such a foolish thing.

Thus, all these years, though the Ding Mountain Marquis had devoted himself to the Dao, he could only linger outside the gate of the mainstream cultivation world, longing for entry but never obtaining it.
He could only deplete the accumulated wealth of the entire marquisate over many years, exchanging it for vast quantities of resources, and raise himself to the sixth realm.
But now, to break through the earthly barrier was already as difficult as ascending to heaven; the seventh realm and the inquiry into the Dao seemed utterly beyond reach. And yet he refused to give up, even at the cost of turning to unlawful means for gain.
He felt no guilt at all about selling women to the Eastern Territory. In his eyes, commoners were no different from cattle, horses, pigs, or dogs; even the imperial house was merely a little more noble than livestock. If it could aid his great cultivation enterprise, let alone sell them, even slaughtering them all would not make him blink.

He had never cared to attend or appear at the ordinary mortal amusements of South Pass City, having spent all these years in secluded cultivation. The reason he had come today to watch Xue Lingxue's performance was that he harbored a faint fantasy about her.
If his son could become close with Xue Lingxue, then he would count as having formed in-law ties with the South Melody Pavilion. The mainstream cultivation world, from which he had all these years only ever managed to peer in without entering, would finally open its doors to him.

Moreover, news had come quietly from the palace that Shen Qingyan of the South Melody Pavilion was a likely candidate to become the Crown Princess, and in the future would probably be the Empress. Xue Lingxue and Shen Qingyan were of the same generation and on good terms; if his son could latch onto that connection, it would lay a broad and open road for the future.
The reason the Ding Mountain household was so "poor" was not precisely because in this remote southern region they were unused and deprived of power and office, possessing only a hollow nobility without substance.

He was thinking far ahead, though whether Xue Lingxue would take a liking to his son remained uncertain. On that point, he was quite confident, for his son had inherited his good looks, and even possessed crafty and pleasing ways that he himself lacked; with the son's royal status, he was by no means beneath Xue Lingxue. There was certainly much to be done.
That was why he had personally come to today's performance, intending that after the show ended, he would go meet Xue Lingxue himself and personally help his son draw nearer to her.
With such thoughts in mind, he sat here smiling, waiting for the show to begin.

And then.

He saw an absurd scene.

His precious son, on whom he had pinned such high hopes, came flying toward him in a streak from afar, with a beam of sword light in pursuit. When he drew near the stage, he was bound by a scarlet radiance and tied into an indecent posture before crashing onto the platform... and the young sword cultivator chasing after him was still holding up his sword and ordering him to confess.
The audience below, watching the spectacle, was boundless, numbering far beyond ten thousand.
The Ding Mountain Marquis, whose expression had long been as still as a well-sheathed pond, rarely revealed a look of shock and fury. He sprang to his feet at once, clearly because the scene had exceeded anything he had imagined.

I was still sitting here waiting to go on the show.
And my son has become the show?

...

Chu Liang held Xia An down with his sword, forcing him to confess under the gaze of the masses. His robes were soaked through with blood, and his imposing aura was truly fearsome.
Xia An had just witnessed Chu Liang's instant killing of Lu Shixiong; the lingering fear in his heart still had not subsided, and he only wished he could shout that he confessed, pleading for heavenly pardon.
But just as he was about to lift his head and cry out, he heard a familiar, steady shout.

"How dare you!"

A gust of white wind arrived in an instant, and another figure of great noble bearing appeared upon the stage. It was none other than his father, the present Ding Mountain Marquis.
After a brief pause, more than a dozen expert martial artists immediately leaped down as well, all of them marquisate guards, surrounding Chu Liang in the center.

Chu Liang pressed the blade tightly against Xia An's neck, his expression calm as he stared at the Ding Mountain Marquis without the slightest fear.

The Ding Mountain Marquis looked at this blood-soaked youth and, for a moment, actually felt that his gaze burned. He immediately frowned and said, "Do you know what you are doing?"

"Carrying out justice on behalf of Heaven," Chu Liang answered indifferently.

"Heh..." The Ding Mountain Marquis met him with a gaze carrying even greater pressure. "Spouting nonsense and falsely accusing the imperial family—do you know what crime that is? Men, take him down!"

He did not care in the least about his son beneath Chu Liang's sword; he directly ordered the guards to seize the man!

Chu Liang gently turned the blade that was pressed against Xia An's neck, and at once a line of blood appeared. Xia An cried out loudly, "Father! Don't! Save me! Save me!"

But the Ding Mountain Marquis remained utterly unmoved. He merely raised the force of his energy, and the overwhelming pressure bore down on Chu Liang like a mountain upon his shoulders!

Chu Liang clenched his teeth tightly, feeling as though he might be crushed by that force at any moment. Without the Red Name Sword, the difference between the sixth realm and the third realm was indeed as vast as mountains and seas. Merely this pressure alone left him almost unable to move!

Yet the surrounding marquisate guards were already closing in. At this moment, aside from taking the young marquis down with a single sword strike, he had no other means of resistance.
If not for the fact that the guards around him were also somewhat hesitant, afraid to act too boldly at once, he might have been subdued in an instant. After all, though the Ding Mountain Marquis was putting on the appearance of not caring about his son, who could guarantee that if someone were the first to rush in and act, causing Chu Liang to kill the young marquis, the Ding Mountain Marquis would not afterward vent his wrath?
Thus the guards' steps were still somewhat hesitant as they moved forward, but no matter what, they would eventually have to advance.

Just at this critical moment, a shout rang out from the side.

"Stop!"

Like thunder exploding, a figure landed briskly at the center of the stage.
He was broad-browed and wide-eyed, appearing youthful, with a face full of vigorous yang energy. He came to a solemn halt in the midst of the scene, pressed both hands to either side to steady the situation, and said to the Ding Mountain Marquis, "Marquis, please calm yourself. No one should make a move. Give me some face."

The Ding Mountain Marquis fixed him with a frown. "And who are you?"

The youth answered, "I am Lin Bei."

Get out of here.