As he spoke, Chen Jiu stepped lightly forward—yet before that single step had even landed, his figure blurred inexplicably, and in the next instant he had already flashed across a span of several zhang, appearing directly behind Wei Zhao.

The Cangwu Sect of North Island's supreme movement art: Half-Step Shun.

And that was not the end of it. A fingertip of Chen Jiu's was now aimed at the back of Wei Zhao's skull, and a surge of incomparably fierce vital energy instantly condensed into an invincible divine weapon that shot forth—the Instant-Finger Kill.

Watching this from the sidelines, Xin Yi'an's heart leapt straight into his throat. Half-Step Shun followed by the Instant-Finger Kill—an assault like this left no doubt as to either speed or lethality. Facing an opponent whose depths he knew nothing of, Chen Jiu, this old monster of the Nascent Soul stage, was not showing the slightest hint of underestimation.

He was going all out, as though the man standing before him were a Nascent Soul monster of some other sect, a formidable foe of his own caliber!

Chen Jiu's attack could hardly be called slow—but unfortunately for him, his opponent was Wei Zhao. Even without that lunatic movement art of unparalleled speed, a single move made in the half-primordial-spirit state would have been enough to casually evade the Instant-Finger Kill.

Sure enough, Wei Zhao gave only the faintest sway and slipped past the Instant-Finger Kill with effortless ease.

"Hmph, your strength is indeed not weak—no wonder your words were so bold. But you may have dodged one strike; I wonder whether you can dodge ten?" Chen Jiu appeared high above Wei Zhao's head, looking down upon him, and at that moment every fingertip of his discharged a powerful burst of finger energy—the ultimate version of the Instant-Finger Kill: the Ten-Finger Consecutive Kill.

Ten streams of finger energy interwove into a dense, inescapable net of certain death, descending to envelop Wei Zhao completely, leaving him nowhere to hide.

"Heh, still rather confident, aren't you?" Wei Zhao's voice rose from above his head.

"Impossible!" Chen Jiu's face drained of color in an instant. He had clearly locked onto Wei Zhao's position with his divine sense; no matter how fast the other man might be, there was no way he could have withdrawn unscathed. So how had he suddenly appeared above him? What in the world was going on?

Only at this moment did the old Nascent Soul monster abruptly realize the truth: the other man might look no different from an ordinary person, but when all was said and done, he was a primordial spirit!

Chen Jiu's reaction was hardly slow—the instant he sensed something amiss, he tried to break away. But in the end, he was too late.

An enormous invisible black hand had already closed over his head. Within a few short moments, Chen Jiu's eyes swiftly turned hollow, then utterly vacant, and his whole body collapsed to the ground, not a flicker of movement left in it. The scene was a perfect mirror of what had happened to Chen Dongcheng before him.

Xin Yi'an was dumbstruck, unable for a long while to utter a single word.

From his vantage point as a bystander, this clash of titans had come with shocking abruptness—but it had ended with even greater abruptness. In his imagination, even if Wei Zhao truly were some extraordinary being, by any reasonable reckoning it should have taken a hard-fought battle to finish off a Nascent Soul monster. Who ever disposed of one just like that, the way it had happened here? Was this really still the invincible, overbearing Nascent Soul monster they knew?

"What are you standing there gawking for? Drag him out." Wei Zhao shot him a glance and gave the order.

"Drag... drag him out?" Xin Yi'an pointed tremblingly at Chen Jiu on the ground. Even unconscious, this was still the lofty Supreme Elder, a Nascent Soul monster standing at the very pinnacle of the entire Primeval Little Jianghu—since when did even such a being as this get treated like this?

"What else? Leave him here to mold?" Wei Zhao said, his expression turning strange instead. Then, with a pointed look, he added, "You know what comes next, don't you?"

"What comes next?" Xin Yi'an was still utterly at a loss. Everything that had happened today had been far too sudden; he had not been given the slightest mental preparation, and Wei Zhao had never said a word to him beforehand about any plan for dealing with it. At a time like this, he simply had no idea what ought to be done.

"The Supreme Elder's been taken down, and the Sect Master's whereabouts are still unknown. Isn't it obvious what comes next? Taking over the Cangwu Sect of North Island, of course. A power vacuum this large doesn't come along every day—surely you're not still thinking of letting someone else step in and fill it?" Wei Zhao said, looking at him.

Before coming to the Cangwu Sect of North Island, he had in truth had no designs whatsoever on the sect's internal power. That he had come this far was entirely the doing of circumstance; had Chen Jiu and Chen Dongcheng and their ilk not dug their own graves, Wei Zhao would not have minded coexisting with them peacefully. But now—now that even Chen Jiu, the Supreme Elder, had been reduced to this state, if he still failed to take over the Cangwu Sect of North Island, that would be far too hypocritical.

In any case, since he intended to establish himself in the Primeval Little Jianghu, the first order of business was to bring the Cangwu Sect of North Island firmly into line. Rather than let someone else rise to the top, the best person for Wei Zhao to install as its head was naturally Xin Yi'an. As for himself, he of course could not step forward in person; it would only be proper for him to become the powerful patron standing behind Xin Yi'an.

Otherwise, merely soothing public opinion would be no small headache—when all was said and done, he was an outsider, after all.

"Take over the Cangwu Sect of North Island? You want me to do it?" Xin Yi'an was thunderstruck at these words. He was nothing but a mere early Golden Core elder, dead last in the rankings. He had never imagined he could be rid of Chen Jiu, the Supreme Elder, much less that he would take over the Cangwu Sect of North Island—he would never have dared even dream of it.

"Afraid no one will submit to you?" Wei Zhao saw through his misgivings at a glance.

Xin Yi'an might be a good-natured sort who kept his head down to preserve himself, but the fact that he had thrown in his lot with Wei Zhao without a moment's hesitation when the crisis came showed plainly that this was no spineless mud that would cling to life at any cost. Deep in this man's heart lay a vast ambition.

"..." Xin Yi'an broke out in a sweat. Did that even need asking? With his meager strength, he would have trouble even mustering a few allies—as for actually rising to take over the Cangwu Sect of North Island, was such a thing even possible?

"What's there to hesitate about? Drag this thing out, and who would dare defy you?" Wei Zhao pouted, jerking his chin at Chen Jiu on the ground.

"That's right!" Xin Yi'an's eyes lit up at once. On his own, of course, he carried no persuasive weight—but this Supreme Elder on the ground was enough to overawe everything and everyone. "Might makes right" was no empty saying; now that even a Nascent Soul monster had been taken down, who in the sect would dare show the slightest disobedience?

The native faction, to say nothing of them—these people had long harbored all manner of grievances, open and hidden, only cowed into silence by the tyranny of Supreme Elder Chen Jiu. If someone could step forward and topple Chen Jiu, even if they did not cheer with both hands, most of them would hardly object; after all, this was not the same as an invasion by an outside enemy. It was an internal struggle within the sect, an internal affair.