Rather than opposing Chu Feng, Yaojiao Xue Ran went along with him enthusiastically instead: "Yes, yes, yes, Sister Tingyu, Brother Chu Feng is our guest. When a guest makes a request, you really shouldn't refuse."
"Well… fine then." After a moment of hesitation, Yaojiao Tingyu finally reluctantly agreed.
And so, led by Yaojiao Xue Ran, Chu Feng and the others took the leftmost path and entered that side hall.
The side hall was resplendent and magnificent, its walls especially extraordinary to behold — they seemed to conceal hidden treasures within, making them all the more alluring.
This was no simple side hall. It was practically a treasury.
But Chu Feng had already seen through it. Those walls that appeared to hide precious treasures were nothing but bait — they were clearly a trap mechanism, and anyone who touched them would be in for a terrible fate.
Chu Feng suspected that once the mechanism was triggered, venomous insects would appear. So upon entering, he simply stood at the doorway with a smile, watching Yaojiao Xue Ran and the others venture deeper without saying a word.
Seeing how opulent the hall was yet finding no statue of the Dragon King, Yaojiao Tingyu also seemed to sense something was wrong. She and the pacifist Martial Emperor both stood beside Chu Feng near the entrance, refusing to go further inside.
"There's no statue of the Dragon King here at all, Yaojiao Xue Ran. I think your father must have misremembered. Let's leave," Yaojiao Tingyu said, a note of anger in her voice. She already knew she had been deceived.
"Perhaps I did misremember. But these walls really are beautiful." With those words, Yaojiao Xue Ran's eyes flashed with a vicious gleam. He then unleashed a thunderous palm strike, and as martial power surged forth, it coalesced into a massive golden fist that slammed into the wall with a deafening boom.
BOOM— When the fist struck, the wall didn't just crumble in an instant — a substance resembling molten lava erupted from within the surrounding walls, flooding over Chu Feng and the others in the blink of an eye.
"Yaojiao Xue Ran, what are you doing?!" Panic seized Yaojiao Tingyu. She had realized that the red substance was no ordinary lava — it was composed of countless red insects packed together.
The insects were tiny, no larger than ants, yet they burned with a fierce crimson hue and contained terrifying power.
"Haha, what am I doing? I'm taking your lives!" Yaojiao Xue Ran threw his head back in laughter. Now that things had come to this, there was no need to hide any longer, and his vicious nature was fully exposed.
"What? You want to kill us? You did this on purpose — you deliberately lured us here to harm us!" Yaojiao Tingyu's face was filled with shock, as was the pacifist Martial Emperor beside her.
They had both known that Yaojiao Xue Ran's character was questionable, but they had never imagined he would attempt to eliminate them. Slaying one's own kind — that was one of the gravest taboos of the Yaojiao royal clan.
"That's right, you've figured it out. I am going to kill you all. But what good does knowing that do you now? You're about to be burned to ashes by these Hellfire Insects — dead beyond any hope of recovery! Ahahaha!" Yaojiao Xue Ran's face twisted into a hideous grin as he laughed maniacally.
"Are you sure you're not joking? These little insects can kill us? They don't look threatening at all." As he spoke, Chu Feng actually reached down and grabbed a handful of Hellfire Insects, tossing them playfully in his palm and squeezing them with deliberate force.
Some of the insects were even crushed in his hand, turning into scorching red liquid that flowed across his skin — yet they couldn't harm him in the slightest.
"How is this possible?!" The sight left Yaojiao Xue Ran dumbfounded.
These legendary, extraordinarily vicious Hellfire Insects not only refused to attack Chu Feng — they let him toy with them as he pleased? What on earth was going on?
Were all the terrifying rumors about these Hellfire Insects nothing but lies?
"Why is this happening? Could these Hellfire Insects be fake?" Confused and bewildered, a first-grade Martial Emperor from the war faction reached out just like Chu Feng, grabbing a large handful of the flame insects and squeezing them hard.
BOOM— The moment he squeezed, the Hellfire Insects in his hand detonated. In an instant, the exploding insects transformed into scorching hot liquid that sprayed outward, engulfing him entirely.