The soldiers found nothing and had no choice but to let Ye Liuyun go. The assassin heard the report, saw no issue, and ordered the men to stand down—then quietly tailed Ye Liuyun again.

Once outside the city walls, Ye Liuyun boarded his flying boat and left. The assassin hesitated only a moment before chasing after him and forcing the boat to halt.

Ye Liuyun stopped the craft, pretending to be cowed by the killer’s aura, and answered questions with practiced deference. After two perfunctory queries, the assassin simply released a soul projection straight into Ye Liuyun’s sea of consciousness to perform a soul-search.

“You really insist on courting death.”

Ye Liuyun sighed, froze time, branded both of the assassin’s souls with slave seals, and stowed him in his spatial world. Only then did he recall Chilian, the Demonic Lion, and the flying boat, before tearing through the void at full speed toward the nearest planet still harboring killers.

Controlling a single assassin might alert the Fire-Seal Dynasty to his true goal, so he decided to grab a few more—let the dynasty think he was merely exacting revenge.

The moment the first assassin vanished, the dynasty noticed. Orders shot out; every nearby killer was rerouted to intercept. With his golden pupils, Ye Liuyun spotted them coming from surrounding planets long before they arrived.

“Well, that saves me some legwork.”

He gave a wry chuckle, taking Chilian and the Demonic Lion on a circuit of the desolate-sea border planets, scooping up the incoming killers as he went.

The Fire-Seal Dynasty redeployed its men to block and pursue based on his route. Ye Liuyun simply treated them as live sparring dummies to hone his spatial power: personally seizing some with soul force, while letting Chilian and the Demonic Lion jointly kill two.

Their teamwork was smooth—Demonic Lion located the targets, Chilian’s crimson pupils cast illusions to lock them down, then drained their bloodlines. The pace was decent, but Ye Liuyun considered killing wasteful, so he limited the executions to what was needed to muddy the royal court’s suspicions.

Passing one city, they were halted by the local garrison commander for inspection; Ye Liuyun seized the chance to brand the commander as well, gaining another information channel and keeping Liu Sheng safely hidden.

He fled a bit farther, then used a black teleportation tower to return to the Ferry-Bridge star system. There he captured several Unity Six and Unity Seven cultivators to gather intelligence, rounded up a few more killer-team members, and finally received coordinates from his first clone before teleporting away.

To the Fire-Seal Dynasty, it looked like deliberate retaliation; they merely dispatched more elite cultivators to the two locations without launching a wider manhunt.

Reunited with his first clone, the two split up again to complete their respective tasks. Without assassins dogging them, everything proceeded smoothly.

Ye Liuyun kept Chilian and the Demonic Lion inside; working alone, he reached the royal capital shortly. Both clones had finished scouting and were also converging on the city while continuing to snatch targets.

The thralls they had planted quickly funneled in fresh intelligence.

The dynasty’s defensive focus remained on the Desolate Sea and the Ferry-Bridge system. In Ferry-Bridge, a new bandit leader had already been groomed and was uniting the scattered bands.

The Chen clan had sent another team to the Desolate Sea to hunt Ye Liuyun, found nothing, and returned empty-handed. The Void Pill Sect had given up searching for the disguised “Jin Chengshan.” The He and Fan clans had both stood down.

Ye Liuyun figured that, after a little more time, he could strike at the mines and medicinal fields again.

The Fire-Seal royal capital was truly imposing: it sprawled across a full tenth of the planet. Outer and inner walls hundreds of zhang high formed a titanic stone rampart. Daily patrols on the outer and inner circuits exceeded a hundred thousand troops.

Dense forests covered the outer city, including a vast royal hunting ground. The outer city also housed the praetorian’ main barracks and expeditionary forces—two hundred thousand active guards and another two hundred thousand reserves drilling in formation.

Commoners lived in the outer districts; the inner city belonged to great clans and powers. The Chen clan, Void Pill Sect, and Myriad Transformation Sect all maintained compounds here for easy contact with the court. Even second-tier houses like the He and Fan clans had residences.

Inside the inner city, every inn and restaurant was a palace of carved beams and painted rafters. Ninth-realm experts were everywhere; Ye Liuyun estimated that, should war erupt, these experts alone could form an entire army.

The sight left him repeatedly marveling at the dynasty’s might.

“With strength like this, I’d need decades to bring the Fire-Seal Dynasty down.”

He checked on Yu Xiaofeng and the others: their cultivation had already reached late Dominator Nine, solid progress.

They needed opponents of similar rank to temper themselves and consolidate their realms.

“When I have time, I’ll take them to the Iron-Horn system for live practice,” he mused, already planning ways to raise his generals’ strength.

The capital’s gates were lax; no one questioned passing cultivators. Disguised as a wealthy young master, Ye Liuyun entered without drawing a single glance.

Once inside the city, he headed straight for a trading house called the Sacred Flame Pavilion. His first goal was to buy a map of the royal capital, get a feel for the layout, and then pick himself a convenient place to stay.

A young woman named Qingyu greeted him.

“I’m Qingyu, a guide here. Whatever the young master needs, I’ll be happy to help.” She offered a polite curtsy.

“Then I’ll trouble Miss Qingyu,” Ye Liuyun replied courteously, making no move to refuse her assistance.

“You look unfamiliar, sir. May I ask your name? You’re from out of town, aren’t you?” Noting his refined bearing, polite speech, and calm expression, Qingyu guessed he wasn’t from an ordinary family. She led him deeper inside while making small talk.

“My surname is Li. Miss Qingyu has sharp eyes. How long have you worked as a guide here?” Ye Liuyun chatted casually, taking in the pavilion’s layout.

The ground floor held everyday goods—ordinary resources, pills, weapons, treasures, and daily necessities—nothing particularly eye-catching.

Seeing his lack of interest, Qingyu felt a spark of delight. The more discerning the guest, the pricier the purchases—and the fatter her commission.

She smiled. “Young Master Li, I’ve been guiding here for three years. I may not have other talents, but I never forget a face.”

Ye Liuyun nodded; she clearly knew the place well.

He spoke evenly, “Since Miss Qingyu knows her way around, that’s perfect. I’d like a map first, to understand the capital, and then choose a residence that’s convenient for getting around.”