"Hah! You think you can escape?" The man's voice was rough and booming, yet his hands were anything but slow. After Elder Qiu's warning, his speed only increased instead of flagging.
Lu Yi didn't even have time to react before the man's palm cracked down on his skull. With a sickening crunch, Lu Yi hadn't even managed a scream—his head tilted to the side and he crumpled to the ground, dead on the spot.
Zhao Mang was terrified out of his wits at the sight of such savage brutality. He urged the three-headed giant python forward with every ounce of strength he had—even the strength meant for nursing—and hurled it at his lunging opponent.
As for himself, he transformed into a streak of light and fled toward his master, Elder Qiu.
Consort Dan had already experienced the power of the three-headed python firsthand. Seeing it barrel toward the burly man, she couldn't help but call out, "Watch out!"
The man looked faintly surprised. He glanced at Consort Dan, then broke into a broad grin. "No need to worry—just watch me. What a kind-hearted little girl."
The man let out a strange laugh, spread both arms wide, and unleashed the Dragon Slayer Hands, charging directly to meet the three-headed python head-on.
"Break!"
His fist hammered down on the crown of one of the python's heads.
BOOM!
The top of the python's skull was smashed to pulp in an instant.
The man didn't stop for even a heartbeat. He struck again and again—punches and kicks raining down—and the remaining two pythons, with almost no resistance to speak of, were utterly destroyed.
Consort Dan watched the terrifying display with cold shock creeping up her spine. She felt a grudging admiration for the man's abilities. Those three-headed pythons had just had her in a desperate struggle, yet he had dismantled them as easily as swatting three little fish.
Even Elder Qiu stood gawking, dumbstruck by the overwhelming scene.
For a moment, he nearly forgot that his own disciple Lu Yi had just been slapped to death by this man. He yanked Zhao Mang behind his back and transmitted a voice message: "When the fight starts, you flee immediately. Don't linger!"
Zhao Mang froze. "Master, how can I abandon you and run?"
"Don't be foolish! If you leave, I have my own ways to get away. If you stay, I'm the one who won't be able to leave." It was plain to see that Elder Qiu valued this disciple deeply.
"You two—we've never met before, yet the moment you show up, you strike my disciple dead. Isn't that going a bit far? Give me your names and let's see whether my Tianhe Palace can afford to cross you!" Elder Qiu was seething with barely contained rage.
"Tianhe Palace?" The two men let out strange laughs. "Heard of it."
Elder Qiu's face darkened. "Since you know the name of my Tianhe Palace, yet you slaughter its disciples without cause or provocation—how do you plan to settle this debt?"
"Settle what debt? With whom?"
"Old man Qiu, we'll be sending you along with him—what debt is there to settle?"
These two were none other than the Geng brothers, dispatched by Jiang Chen. The moment Jiang Chen had arrived at the Dan Qian Palace, he had sent the Geng brothers ahead to the Treasure Tree Sect to assess its current situation.
The Geng brothers' cultivation—one at the peak of the ninth level of the Emperor Realm, the other at the ninth level of the Emperor Realm—was more than enough to run roughshod across the Myriad Phenomena Region.
Even Elder Qiu himself had only reached the ninth level of the Emperor Realm. Either one of the Geng brothers could have matched him single-handedly.
With both brothers fighting together, suppressing him was a foregone conclusion.
Moreover, behind the Geng brothers stood the sprawling Glazed King City. They had absolutely nothing to fear. Tianhe Palace? It didn't even register as a concern.
On top of that, they had seen through the power dynamics at the last Dragon Tiger Gathering. Tianhe Palace was nothing but a lackey of the Emberfire City, just as the rumors said.
And since Emberfire City was the mortal enemy of the Glazed King City, there was no reason whatsoever to show Tianhe Palace any courtesy.
If it had been any other sect, the Geng brothers would have thought twice. But precisely because they had heard the words "Tianhe Palace," they showed no mercy.
Elder Qiu nearly coughed up blood from rage. In his entire life of roaming the jianghu, hardly anyone had dared speak to him with such brazen contempt.
And he was an elder of the Tianhe Palace, no less.
Tianhe Palace, whatever its faults, was still a publicly recognized first-rate sect of the Upper Eight Regions! Among the human territories, it was one of the most illustrious powers in existence.
But no matter how furious he was, he assessed the current situation and calculated that he and Zhao Mang together would absolutely not be a match for the two men opposite them.
Today's battle absolutely could not be fought.
"Brother, stop wasting words on them. This old man belongs to Tianhe Palace, yet he's skulking around a backwater like Treasure Tree Sect—he can't be up to any good. Kill him and offer his head to the Young Master."
"Heh heh, I'm just afraid that bald old head won't interest the Young Master much. Let's go—finish him off!"
The Geng brothers had never been saints or compassionate souls. They had come under orders to carry out a full purge of anyone squatting in the Treasure Tree Sect.
The two brothers split left and right, transforming into twin streaks of light as they flanked Elder Qiu from both sides.
Elder Qiu bellowed, "Zhao Mang, run first!"
Zhao Mang panicked. He grabbed for an escape talisman and moved to activate it. But at the very instant he tried to invoke it, the exact same thing that had just happened to Consort Dan happened to him.