After recapturing the Spiritual Medicine vault, the Second Sacred Lord's injuries recovered swiftly. When he learned that the Sacred Land had turned the tide entirely because of Jiang Chen, the Second Sacred Lord's last lingering doubts about the young man evaporated completely. He truly recognized the extent of this youth's power.
Under the Sacred Land's rallying call, the various factions briefly regrouped and then turned their weapons around, joining the Sacred Land's campaign to punish the traitors.
In just a few days, the army of suppression swept through the entire Divine Capital and encircled it completely. Although the imperial family had a contingent of die-hard loyalists, under the overwhelming tide of events, many forces that had previously answered to the imperial family defected one after another, leaving only a small fraction of loyalists still putting up a desperate last stand.
However, under such circumstances, the imperial family's resistance was essentially meaningless. They held out for less than half a day before the imperial palace was completely breached.
The Emperor, protected by a handful of loyalists, made a final death throe struggle, but it was all to no avail. As for the Emperor himself, he had originally planned to disguise himself and slip out of the Divine Capital, but the entire city was sealed tighter than a drum, and as the Emperor himself, every move he made was watched by countless eyes.
Before he could even leave the Divine Capital, he was reported and intercepted by Sacred Land experts who had been lying in wait. And just like that, the Emperor was captured alive with virtually no resistance.
The Emperor's capture and imprisonment dealt the most devastating blow possible to the anti-Sacred Land alliance.
The factions that had originally been prepared to fight to the bitter end suddenly lost all their fighting spirit.
Even the Emperor had been captured. Was there still any point in their resistance?
Thus, one of the alliance's two pillars of power was severed, leaving only the Xiahou clan still clinging to a desperate last stand.
The Xiahou clan's fighting strength, however, far surpassed that of the imperial family. After all, the Xiahou clan had been quietly building their power for so many years, and the fact that they had risen to the point of threatening the Sacred Land spoke to deep reserves of strength.
Though the previous clashes had dealt significant damage to the Xiahou clan, they had not struck at the foundations. The Xiahou clan's main fighting force remained considerable.
But the Eternal Sacred Land clearly had no intention of repeating the anti-alliance's mistakes. They understood the principle of rooting out evil completely.
Moreover, unlike the anti-Sacred Land alliance, the Sacred Land was not riddled with selfish agendas, sending only cannon fodder to die. Instead, the Eternal Sacred Land took the lead, with the Sacred Ancestor himself charging at the very forefront.
Jiang Chen and the Vermilion Bird divine bird naturally served as the main strike force as well.
Jiang Chen had little interest in dealing with the imperial family, but he was absolutely eager to take on the Xiahou clan. Given the depth of his enmity with the Xiahou clan, only the total annihilation of one side would serve as an end to their feud.
If he didn't destroy the Xiahou clan, they would sooner or later turn on him. Jiang Chen had no intention of repeating the anti-Sacred Land alliance's downfall.
Strike the snake without killing it, and you'll suffer for it.
On the Xiahou clan's side, they had the Yunlang Sect and another first-rate aristocratic family as close allies—equivalent to the fighting strength of three first-rate factions combined.
Such fighting strength was nothing to scoff at.
Without exaggeration, these three forces combined would be more than capable of going head-to-head with the Eternal Sacred Land.
But the forces crushing them now were not limited to just the Eternal Sacred Land—they also included the various other factions that had defected to the Sacred Land's side.
These factions all wanted to earn merit before the Sacred Land, eager to atone for their past wrongs. Combined with sects like the Zhongguang Sect, which had long harbored deep hostility toward the Xiahou clan, the fighting will on display was extraordinarily fierce. The pressure bearing down on the Xiahou clan was immense.
One after another, several of the Xiahou clan's strongholds were eliminated in succession.
All the forces of the Yunlang Sect and the other first-rate family had by now retreated to the Xiahou clan's headquarters.
Though the Xiahou clan's headquarters could not compare to the Sacred Land's near-impregnable fortress, it had been meticulously constructed as a stronghold.
Combining the natural terrain with an intricate array of formations, the Xiahou clan's headquarters was well-suited for defense and difficult to assault. Taking it with ease was clearly not a realistic prospect.
However, as the army continued to gather, troops from every direction kept arriving. Over the past few days, the number of forces converging on the outskirts of the Xiahou clan's headquarters grew ever larger.
The number of powerful experts increased as well.
One could say that the Sacred Land side's manpower and fighting strength had now reached roughly three times that of the Xiahou clan.
With such a disparity in strength, a direct confrontation would likely see the Xiahou clan destroyed before they could mount any meaningful resistance.
But, relying on the Xiahou clan's headquarters to put up a desperate fight, they could still just barely hold their own for a time.
Yet inside the Xiahou clan's headquarters, not a single person felt at ease. The mood was an utter far cry from before.
Previously, when they had besieged the Sacred Land, they had held the clear upper hand and enjoyed a position of advantage. Their morale had been correspondingly high.