Chapter 178: Chapter 67: Human Touch and a Surprise Attack

The man’s name was Tang Chen, a Cultivator of the Tang Clan. According to him, he was not part of the main family; he had only recently begun his Cultivation after showing some aptitude during the Spiritual Energy Revival.

Forget harming people, he hadn’t even been exposed to the Ghost Control Skill yet.

A Transcendent of this level would find it nearly impossible to lie under Su Zhou’s Spiritual Pressure. He could perceive the flow of a person’s Spiritual Qi and their emotional shifts, so the movements of their muscles and blood were, of course, crystal clear to him.

From Tang Chen’s confession, a clear picture of the Tang Clan’s leadership and their recent activities began to form in Su Zhou’s mind.

The Tang Group’s power structure was very traditional—or rather, old-fashioned and somewhat corrupt. The family’s core was the Direct Lineage, which held the Extraordinary Inheritance. The other branch families revolved around them, providing support. The Direct Lineage offered the protection of their power, and in return, the branch families used various means to sustain the family and the Cultivation of the Direct Lineage.

Of course, this was a choice born of necessity in the era before the Spiritual Energy Revival. After all, resources were limited, and they had to consolidate their power to raise an Awakening Tier Cultivator in every generation. Moreover, the line between the Direct Lineage and the branch families wasn’t strict. When an heir of the main family lacked Cultivation Talent, a talented child from a branch family would be adopted to become the new Direct Lineage.

Over three hundred years ago, during Zhengguo’s most difficult period, the Tang Clan had even tried inbreeding to preserve the family’s talent for Spiritual Power.

’They really took the wrong path.’

Su Zhou couldn’t help but shake his head at this.

According to the knowledge about Spiritual Power that Yara had imparted to him, Su Zhou knew that while parents’ bloodlines certainly boosted a child’s aptitude for Spiritual Power, and two Cultivator parents could indeed guarantee their offspring would possess this aptitude, it offered no guarantee as to the *level* of that talent.

In other words, even with genius parents, their children were, at most, guaranteed to meet their race’s minimum threshold for being able to cultivate. Their potential, however, was as random as that of a child born to ordinary parents. The only exceptions were Extraordinary Species that were not of flesh and blood and were born naturally Extraordinary. Furthermore, the minimum threshold varied for each race and could not be generalized.

And why was that? The reason was simple.

Because in reality, all living humans, from beggars to saints, were descendants of those who adapted to Spiritual Power in the Ancient Era. Those who couldn’t adapt had gone extinct tens of millions of years ago.

If you traced any family’s ancestry back far enough, you were bound to find a genius. The real challenge was finding someone who truly couldn’t cultivate even a shred of Spiritual Power. This randomness in talent was likely an evolutionary trait the human race developed in a high-Spiritual Qi environment to ensure the survival of its bloodline. It guaranteed that even the dullest of parents could potentially give birth to a prodigy.

In short, the Tang Clan currently had three High-level Awakening Cultivators, five who had just reached the Awakening Tier, and seventeen Spirit Awakening Cultivators. Today, it was Tang Chen’s branch’s turn on duty.

In other words, the Tang Clan’s strength was equivalent to three Grandmasters, five Tierless Postnatal Martial Artists, and seventeen ordinary Martial Artists from the Divine Wood World... Of course, combat strength couldn’t be calculated so simply. After all, every Martial Artist in the Divine Wood World was a battle-hardened veteran who possessed Secret Skills.

The upper echelons of the Direct Lineage hadn’t appeared at the company recently. Tang Chen himself had heard that they had returned to a small village on the outskirts of Hengcheng City. That small village was Tang Family Village, their ancestral home. Su Zhou quickly learned the village’s address from him.

’Is that really all the strength they have?’

After hearing everything, Su Zhou felt an almost irrepressible sense of disappointment. He scratched his head. ’I didn’t see that coming.’

In truth, he knew that this level of strength wasn’t weak at all. Before his trip to the Divine Wood World, Su Zhou himself had only been at the High-level Awakening stage, and his combat skills were far from polished. If he had been besieged by these people wielding firearms or Spiritual Artifacts, he might have actually been in for a tough time.

Besides, the entire Hundred Schools faction in the Divine Wood World had fewer than thirty Grandmasters in total. The fact that the Tang Family could field three of them was a testament to their deep-seated foundation.

’But Earth isn’t like the Divine Wood World, after all. Inheritances have been broken, production capacity is still underdeveloped, and the general populace lacks a foundation... I originally thought the Tang Clan would have at least seven or eight High-level Awakening members.’

It wasn’t that Su Zhou looked down on the Tang Clan. Rather, for someone like him who was on the verge of advancing to the Extraordinary Tier, the Tang Clan was just too weak. It left him with no sense of anticipation; Su Zhou felt he could probably wipe them out with one hand... But then, a second thought made him happy again. ’It’s a good thing the evil ones are weak. At least it means they can’t harm as many people!’

Now that he had the information he needed, Su Zhou continued to project his voice through the wall to Tang Chen. "You’ve been very cooperative. I won’t kill you, but I’m afraid I’ll have to knock you out for a while."

"No problem, no problem!" Tang Chen, who felt like his life had been hanging by a thread, felt his tense muscles relax the moment he heard he wasn’t going to die. But then, he subconsciously asked, "But... could... could you let me use the restroom before you knock me out?"

The moment the words left his mouth, Tang Chen knew he’d messed up. His heart seized in panic. He knew he’d asked a stupid question—so what if he wet his pants? Was his pride more important than his life?! ’Why did I have to open my big mouth!’

’Besides, from the sound of it, this master who came from who-knows-where seems to be here specifically for the Direct Lineage... In the days to come, nobody is going to care whether some ordinary Cultivator wet his pants!’

But just as he was on the verge of tears, he heard a frank reply.

"Be quick about it."

...Huh? ’This... This master’s personality is nothing like his aura. He seems pretty easygoing?’

Once the weak-kneed Tang Chen finished, Su Zhou even generously allowed him to sit on the toilet in an adjacent stall before knocking him out with his Spiritual Power. Such was the humanity of a true Knight!

Immediately afterward, Su Zhou used his Thunder Technique to jam the cameras again, transformed into a Gale, and left the building, speeding off in the direction Tang Chen had given him.

「At the same time.」

In Tang Family Village stood a large, exquisitely decorated courtyard, its entrance guarded by two large stone sculptures.

A cold wind blew, causing the heavy snow to glisten under the lights. Inside the main hall of the residence, deliberately dimmed lights flickered.

As light and shadow danced, a dozen or so coffins could be seen piled in a corner of the sinister hall, each one covered in Talismans.

Eight figures dressed in deep blue, mystically-patterned robes stood in the center of the hall. They circled a corpse, which was emaciated from starvation but had been washed clean. Chanting Witchcraft in low, bizarre tones, they sprinkled Spirit Water, appearing to be in the middle of some sort of ritual.

The corpse appeared to have been starved for a long time before finally succumbing. There were ligature marks on its hands, and its expression was twisted and horrifying, as if it had died while roaring curses.

The three leaders were completely unfazed, showing no reaction. They even seemed to find it natural and unremarkable. The other five, younger Cultivators, however, wore expressions of nervousness and revulsion, their humanity apparently not yet extinguished. They had yet to acclimate to such a bizarre ritual and its ’materials.’

The ritual was led by the three leaders, with a stern-faced, middle-aged woman in command. Gray Spiritual Qi coiled around her as she guided the Spiritual Power of the other seven Cultivators, transforming it into streams of Spiritual Talismans that flowed into the starved corpse. Faintly, one could see that after the Talismans entered the body, they mostly converged in the abdomen, causing the shriveled stomach to gradually bloat.

After some time, the three middle-aged leaders were still fine, but the five younger Cultivators’ Spiritual Power was running low, and they could not continue. The lead Sacrificial Lord paused the ritual, sealed the now-vile corpse, and declared a temporary rest.

After the five young Cultivators withdrew, one of the leaders, a man who looked to be in his fifties, lit an e-cigarette. He took a puff and sighed, "Eldest Sister, Third Uncle, is it really okay to team up with those guys from the Spirit Summoning Association to refine these Hungry Ghosts? If the Government finds out, the consequences... will be unthinkable."

"Unthinkable?"

The female Sacrificial Lord remained silent, but the other man, an old fellow whose hair was starting to go white, snorted coldly. "You’re in your fifties and still so indecisive... Don’t you get it?" he berated. "The Spiritual Energy Revival is here! But even with it, our family’s inheritance can, at most, reach the Spirit Lord level—what the Government now defines as the Extraordinary realm... and even that requires luck!"

"And the Zhengguo Government can pull out more than thirty Paths of Divinity and Paths of Immortal Ascension. And that’s just the power they’re showing on the surface!"

At this, the old man’s eye twitched, and he slapped a coffin in frustration. "Before the Spiritual Energy Revival, everyone was at the Awakening Tier. We behaved ourselves, kept a low profile, and the Government tolerated us being cooped up in a single city. But now? Forget The Saints, who have probably already reached the Extraordinary Tier. In another six months, when the Spiritual Energy Revival intensifies, all those old professors and Tutors from the major Academies will break through to Awakening Peak, and some even to the Extraordinary Tier!"

"Do you think that when they can casually dispatch a traveling Tutor who’s at Awakening Peak, the Government will still tolerate a Cultivation Family like us—a local power that’s made some minor trouble and tried to act like local tyrants?"

"Third Uncle is right." The female Sacrificial Lord nodded slightly in agreement. Her voice was a little hoarse, but her tone was firm. "Besides, we don’t have the power to refuse them... The Government is a Dragon. Massive, transnational Mysterious Organizations like the Spirit Summoning Association and the Continuous Prayer Meeting are Sea Flood Dragons at the very least. We’re just worms. We can’t refuse either side. Our only choices are to stick out our necks and wait for the axe, or obey."

"What’s more, they’re willing to arrange an escape route for us, allowing us to move our foundation and resources to the central region of the World Island. All we have to do is use our family’s Secret Technique to refine some special Hungry Ghosts for them... Who’s there?!"

Suddenly, a violent whistling sound tore through the air outside the courtyard! Without a moment’s hesitation, the female Sacrificial Lord shot to her feet. She snatched a Bone Carved Pistol wrapped with eight Talismanic Ribbons from behind her back and barked a warning. The two male priests at her sides instantly grabbed their own Copper Magical Artifacts—a mirror and a bell. A sinister, shadowy shield materialized around the trio, faintly linking them in an Array Formation with the Sacrificial Lord at its core!

But in the next instant, their expressions froze, and they stood rooted to the spot.

Because, amidst the roar of an approaching gale and the CRUNCHING, CRACKING sound of the wall and ceiling shattering, the three of them saw it: a giant stone lion statue, weighing at least two or three tons, hurtling directly toward them from the courtyard entrance like a meteorite!

"What the—?!"