Chapter 280: Weakness

Xue Wei was aware that a fight was going to break out after declining the young master of the Baili family, but he was not too worried about it.

The worst case scenario was that he would have to transform, but he was no longer in Chang’an. Beasts were not frowned upon here. Although they were considered inferior to the multi-eyed experts, they were not hated.

At the same time, he had not heard anything about Sovereign Beasts while being here, so it was likely that they were unaware of their existence. Since they did not know about them, Xue Wei felt no fear about being captured; instead, he would just be categorized as a stronger Primordial Beast.

Sensing Xue Wei’s calmness, young master Baili felt uncomfortable, but after considering the amount of people he had on his side, he quickly regained his confidence again.

Sneering, young master Baili gestured for his men to surround Xue Wei, his face was menacing, and he was looking anything but pleased.

“Don’t refuse the toast only to be forced to drink a forfeit!” he said, his voice remaining calm and collected despite its raised volume, while his eyes were filled with malice.

“Do you have what it takes to threaten me?” Xue Wei asked with a slight smile on his face as he looked at the young man, mockingly. He could not help but feel that the experts in Yan Dalu were rather confusing.

All of the people surrounding him were Earth or Sky Knights, but they were all spiritual energy cultivators, and thus their physical strength was severely lacking.

Still, they had spread out and prepared to attack him, the spiritual energy beginning to materialize in the air around them, but Xue Wei stayed as calm as before.

Within his body, both the golden and the azure dragon spirits were on alert. They were pouring spiritual energy and Qi through his meridians, getting ready to burst out at any moment.

Although his spiritual energy was only at the third layer of the Earth Knight rank, thus quite a bit beneath the Sky Knight rank, he was still not to be belittled. He had the golden dragon and the blood of the Azure Dragon flowing through his veins. He was more than capable of jumping across realms to fight those stronger than him.

Still, if he wanted to fight this group of experts, then he had to fight in his original form. It was simply the only way for him to confidently overpower the number of experts that were surrounding him.

Having reached this conclusion, Xue Wei quickly allowed for the azure dragon spirit within his core to spread the energy throughout his body. His figure started to expand, and azure scales erupted from his skin and claws appeared on his hands and feet.

Xue Wei was not hesitant at all and decided to fully take on the form of an azure dragon.

His body was so massive that it could hardly fit in the square anymore. His transformation happened in mere moments, and it shocked the spiritual energy users that had thought that beating Xue Wei would be as easy as taking a walk in the park.

Spiritual energy had some advantages in a fight where there was a distance between the two parties, but now that he was this massive, it was impossible for them to back away. And, since none of them had strengthened their bodies or focused on Qi, they would be squashed as easily as flies.

Xue Wei was not actually interested in the intrigues of the capital within Yan Dalu or the struggle between the three major families, but he hated being threatened.

“So tell me, were you planning on killing me or just beating me up?” Xue Wei asked with a mocking tone. His body coiled around itself, and he observed the ones who had previously surrounded him now turning pale from fear.

“W-we… we… we wanted to convince you to work… w-work with us… We did not… d-did not want to beat you…” one of them managed to splutter out, trembling with fear. The one who had finally spoken was one of the followers, but he was not dumb and understood that if he said that they wanted to beat him up or to kill him, they would be done for. They would get a beating if they were lucky, but if their luck ran out, their lives would be forfeited.

A gleam appeared in Xue Wei’s eyes. “Usually I would kill anyone who saw me in this shape,” he said with a drawl in his voice, dragging out the words and scaring the life out of the people present.

“But I am no longer in Chang’an, so I guess that things could change.” He seemed as if he was mulling over their fates, and the ones surrounding him quickly agreed to his words out of fear.

“Great dragon, please do not be insulted by our behavior.”

“Great dragon, this lowly one could not see how important your esteemed self was, please be magnanimous and let us off.”

“Great dragon, please be the bigger man… o-or dragon… and let us free, we have eyes, but failed to see Mount Tai.”

Just like this, all of them kept calling out, but the killing intent within Xue Wei was still growing. He did not believe for one second that they would leave him alone, but he had to take other things into consideration.

If he killed them, then the Baili family would come after him. However, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that beating them would also make the Baili family come after him, as thrashing them would invoke their ire and be a slap in their faces.

Since killing or beating them would make him at odds with the Baili family, then he had two options. One was to kill them and just get it over with, and the other was to just let them go.

Actually, there was only one option. Having been threatened, there was no way that he was just going to let them go, and thus he had already chosen to act.

Being in dragon form, he could still use the martial art skills that he had been given by Xiao Lei, a benefit of being a half-breed, and he did not hesitate at all.

Forbidden Rush!

Xue Wei activated the movement technique and coiled around the first person that he could.

With a slash of his magnificent claws, the head was severed clean from the body. He then released him, letting the body collapse to the floor, and painting a pool of red underneath him.

Azure Light Finger!

A beam of energy erupted from his clawed hands and shot into the forehead of the young Baili master.

The speed of his attacks were so fast that no one had any time to react to this sudden eruption of violence. The one who had his head severed never even noticed what had happened to him, and the young Baili master died with his eyes wide open, still filled with shock.

He had just barely witnessed his follower getting beheaded by the time his own head was suddenly hit by a beam of energy, his mind previously filled with utter disbelief, but now enjoyed a peaceful existence splattered over the ground.

The rest of the people who had been surrounding Xue Wei were now petrified with fear. They no longer had any intention to attack him. Instead, they wanted to flee for their lives. But how could they—who had not cultivated their bodies at all—really be faster than this Xue Wei, who was in the shape of an azure dragon, and who was further enhanced by his usage of some blindingly fast movement technique?

Flashing around like a fish through water, Xue Wei executed one person after another. Anguished wails could be heard throughout the square, but no one was silly enough to come closer.

Although others heard these cries for help, they did not want to be involved, and thus stayed away. It was not until the entire place had turned silent that they dared venture towards the square in front of the forbidden area.

What they saw shocked them. There, in the midsts of a square that was dyed red with blood, stood Xue Wei. His eyes glistened with an azure light, and his face belied nothing but indifference, as he lifted his hand to examine the blood that was streaked all over his body.

He was once more in the shape of a human being, and he was now wearing his red clothes. Anyone who saw him felt their scalps turn numb.

Lifting his head, Xue Wei looked at the many people who were on their way towards him, and he flashed a smile that was not really a smile. The group of people who had appeared was filled with fear, fearing that they would be the next people blooming like roses on the ground, blood running from their bodies and turning into rivers.

Xue Wei remained casual and indifferent. He did not mind being noticed killing these students as he knew that the Baili family would know it was him either way, so he just flashed a smile before he stepped through the blood and left the square, every step he took leaving a bloody footprint on the ground.

“The people of this land are quite easy to deal with,” he muttered to himself as he remembered how easily he had handled a Sky Knight spiritual energy user.

He held quite a strong advantage since he had Qi and physical strength on his side, alongside speed that was unrivaled in the entire continent.

He could catch up to the spiritual energy users while they were still gathering their energy, and make quick work of them before they could even notice it.

This was also the reason why spiritual energy was seen just as being beneficial on the other continents, but not the focused energy. Qi was, after all, the universally acknowledged energy that experts cultivated.

The reason that it was not so acknowledged in Yan Dalu was due to the fact that all Qi martial art techniques, scriptures, and other things had long since been lost. Now that Xue Wei was here, however, as he started sharing his collection, things were starting to change.

While Xue Wei was busy thinking about the changes the Qi would make to Yan Dalu, he returned to his courtyard and quickly entered his own room, not wanting to let the others see him covered in blood.

He was completely indifferent to the ruminations of what had happened earlier; the killing was nothing much to him, and while he was cleaning up, he paid no more attention to it. Unfortunately, Yan Dalu had been too calm for many years, murder was highly frowned upon, and it was something that happened extremely rarely.

In this case, it was especially so, since the dead person was a young master of the Baili family. Although he was not the heir, he was still quite an important figure of the younger generation and a direct descendant of the family’s head.

When rumors about the murder started spreading, everyone went cold fearing what might happen. What would the Baili family do to retaliate, and who would come out on top in such a fight?

The elders of the academy caught wind of the rumors quite fast, and although they were quite shocked, they quickly put it behind them. They had such a massive problem with the dysfunctionality of the Soul Tower that they simply did not have the time to deal with a murder at the current point in time.

Not to mention the conflict of interests, since they also wanted Xue Wei to solve an issue for them. However, the issue seemed to be growing more and more troublesome, and thus they soon gave up all hope of him being able to help them.

Xue Wei finished his bath and returned downstairs just as casually as he usually did, only to find that Bai Tianyi, Lin Xiao, Hei Gou, and Xue Luoluo were all sitting in the lounge looking at him with queer expressions on their faces.

“He definitely did it on purpose,” Bai Tianyi said with a sigh as he saw the carefree face of Xue Wei.

“I think he got bored of not being chased,” Hei Gou continued with a nod of his head.

“He is not thinking about consequences at all,” Lin Xiao agreed.

“You bullies, my older brother is always right!” Luoluo said with her cheeks puffed up in an adorable way as if she was scolding the three other men.

“How’d you know?” Xue Wei asked, still not displaying any signs of regret or annoyance. He was just surprised that they knew about it already.

“The entire academy knows,” a voice came from the entrance. Yuan Bailong came in through the door and looked at him with a helpless laugh.