The ruler of Human Emperor City, the supreme being of this place, was only at the second level of the Emperor Realm!
If someone hadn't seen it with their own eyes, no one would have believed it. Zhu Qing clearly hadn't expected this either—she was visibly stunned. Her cultivation was comparable to the third level of the Emperor Realm, so she had seen through the Human Emperor's true depths at a glance. His second-level cultivation looked almost laughable to her. Moreover, the Human Emperor had clearly grown old. Though she couldn't tell his exact age, his vitality had already begun to wither. In other words, the second level was his absolute peak—he had no room left to advance, and his cultivation would only decline as time went on.
That unstable, hollow aura was the best proof!
"How dare you! The Human Emperor sits above—why do you not kneel!"
A sharp, feminine shout rang out. It was the beautiful woman standing at the uppermost position on the right side who struck first. In the entire great hall, only she and the Third Prince possessed nine-leaf bodies, but her cultivation exceeded the Third Prince's by a full level—she had the strength of the second level of the Emperor Realm.
Of all the royals present, she could be considered the strongest. The Human Emperor's cultivation was nominally the same as hers, but his strength had already begun to slip. She, on the other hand, was in the absolute prime of her life, with enormous room for growth. Given the right opportunity, it wasn't out of the question for her to advance to the third level of the Emperor Realm.
Yang Kai glanced sideways and let out a cold snort. "Your Human Emperor City has some truly strange customs—kneeling before everyone you meet. How come I don't see you kneeling before me?"
The Second Princess stepped forward, her expression frigid, and a powerful aura surged directly toward Yang Kai. "I am the Second Princess of Human Emperor City. If I were to kneel before you—could you even bear it?"
Yang Kai stood unmoved, his tone arrogant. "Every prince and princess in this city is nothing but passing clouds to me. In my eyes, whoever has the bigger fist is the one who gets to stand tall and speak. The Eldest Prince has already been beaten into a whimpering dog by me—let alone some so-called Second Princess."
The Second Princess's phoenix eyes narrowed slightly, glinting with a dangerous light. "So then, you think your fist is pretty big?"
Yang Kai studied her for a moment with genuine deliberation, then scoffed. "At the very least, it's bigger than your chest."
A chorus of snickers erupted from the assembled princes and princesses. They couldn't help but find this outsider's tongue viciously sharp. The Second Princess had always been supremely confident in her cultivation, never deigning to so much as look at any of the other royals—several of the higher-ranked princes included. Unfortunately for her, being female was a critical flaw. Had she been a man, she would likely have been the predetermined successor to the throne long ago.
But precisely because she was a woman, she lacked the credentials for true arrogance. Her backside wasn't particularly shapely, her chest wasn't particularly full, and aside from a decent face, there wasn't much else worth mentioning.
Yang Kai's words had struck the Second Princess squarely in her sore spot. Her face turned an ugly shade of iron-blue, and she snarled through gritted teeth, "Kneel!"
The moment the word left her lips, she thrust her hand upward. A mass of emerald-green light shot forth like an arrow from a bow, materializing above Yang Kai's head in the shape of a massive palm that slammed downward with tremendous force—as though she meant to crush him to his knees by brute strength alone.
"I think you're the one who should be kneeling," Yang Kai huffed coldly. In the same breath, he pulled Zhu Qing behind him with one hand while making a simple seal gesture with the other. An identical burst of emerald-green luminescence bloomed outward. The glow was no larger than the Second Princess's projection, but it was undeniably brighter and far more condensed.
Every royal in the hall changed color.
The light rocketed upward and merged directly into the giant emerald palm. Before everyone's eyes, the palm abruptly reversed its direction and bore down toward the Second Princess. At first glance, it looked as though the holy technique she herself had unleashed was now turning against its caster.
The Third Prince's eyes narrowed. A sense of crisis unlike anything he had ever felt crept through his heart. He quietly glanced upward, where the Human Emperor sat with an impassive expression, his half-lidded eyes making him look as though he had already dozed off.
Mountain-like pressure plummeted from above. The Second Princess's face twisted into a mask of agony, and a series of creaking, cracking sounds echoed from within her body as her frame slowly began to sink.
She fought back with everything she had, desperately channeling her power, trying to resonate with the Holy Tree—but some invisible, alien force was interfering with the connection, keeping her from establishing a link no matter how she strained. She was forced to rely entirely on her own strength to endure.
For the first time, she experienced what it felt like to be oppressed by a holy technique. The man opposite her clearly had lower cultivation than she did, yet through this technique alone, he could toy with her as if she were a puppet. An unprecedented wave of humiliation crashed over her, flushing her face red. She could only clench her teeth and shout, "What are you all standing around for?! Help me!"
The stunned royals finally snapped back to awareness and were about to intervene when Zhu Qing spoke in a calm, flat voice: "I'd like to see anyone try."
As her words fell, a massive crimson dragon projection billowed out from her body. The red dragon stretched over thirty zhang long, coiling through the great hall—its enormous form filling nearly half the entire Human Emperor's palace. Its dense, almost corporeal dragon might saturated every corner of the space, making bodies go cold and breaths come short. Atop its proudly raised head, two colossal dragon eyes reflected all things, radiating an inviolable authority that brooked no defiance.
Everyone froze, staring blankly at the titanic dragon silhouette. The sound of gulping echoed through the hall.
The Human Emperor, who had been as steady as a mountain, finally opened his half-lidded eyes. A startling brilliance blazed from what had appeared to be murky orbs as he lifted his gaze to meet the dragon's eyes. In that instant, spiritual energy surged violently throughout the hall.
The crimson dragon threw back its head and roared—a sound so thunderous it shattered the eardrums of several weaker royals, sending them stumbling sideways as gale-force winds ripped through the chamber.
By unleashing the full power of the Dragon Clan's origin force, Zhu Qing's strength had catapulted beyond the third level of the Emperor Realm. Even with the Holy Tree's protection, the assembled royals could gain no advantage whatsoever.
The Second Princess, already struggling to hold on, was in an even more wretched state. Her connection to the Holy Tree had already been severed by Yang Kai, and now the dragon might crashed into her like a physical blow. Her body buckled, and one knee slammed into the floor.
Her face went white as snow in an instant. A crushing sense of humiliation flooded her heart—a feeling worse than death itself.
Human Emperor City had stood for over a hundred thousand years. The royal clan had enjoyed sole supremacy for generations upon generations, cultivating an air of lofty superiority that permeated every aspect of their existence. Only commoners had ever knelt before royalty. This was the first time in recorded history that a royal had knelt before a commoner.