Jiang Chen’s reaction gave the others pause. They quickly realized what his words meant and clustered in his direction in response.
“Are you sure there’s someone there, Jiang Chen?” Yan Wanjun asked in a low voice.
The young man responded with silence and a deadly glare towards an empty patch of space. His certainty was quite obvious in his actions.
Sinister laughter sounded from the void.
“Pretty sharp kid. I was rather well-hidden, but you noticed me anyway, eh?” Someone slowly stepped out from the source of the laughter, causing a number of ripples in the dimensional fabric. He wore a brown cloak, but his face was as indistinct as the starry night sky. His actual appearance was completely concealed.
The aura alone of this new challenger was incredibly intimidating. Jiang Chen instinctively assigned grand origins to him. He was at least a demigod, if not a god proper.
The man stood in the air with an insubstantiality that made him seem only half-there.
Jiang Chen’s Evil Golden Eye fired an aureate spark that sped through the air like an arrow.
“Haha, trying to use an ocular skill on me, pal?” The mysterious man shook his head. There was a luminous crest before his face, blocking Jiang Chen’s optical ray. The two energies collided in a burst of light before dissipating.
Such a splendid exchange captivated Elder Shun and Chu Xinghan. They admired Jiang Chen’s skills even more for it.
“Who are you?” Jiang Chen was a little taken aback. His Evil Golden Eye was a commonly used method of his, and it rarely failed to deliver.
Even if he couldn’t petrify someone with a single hit, he could at least stun their consciousness, momentarily dazing them. Incredibly, this mysterious man in a mysterious cloak had countered his attack! This was a definite first.
Jiang Chen was hardly discouraged though. His ocular strike had been a test, rather than a full-on assault.
“Haha, who do you think I am?” The man in the cloak had a voice as cold as iron. It was forbidding to hear.
“You must’ve taken part in the massacre of House Yan!” Jiang Chen shot back frostily.
“Heh, that’s not hard to guess.” The cloaked man made no effort to deny the accusation.
“You’ve been hidden here all this time?” Yan Wanjun blurted out in surprise.
The cloaked man laughed softly. “Indeed. I’ve pretty much been here the entire time. Old Man Yan, you came here a few times, but you never suspected a thing. A venerated elder of House Yan? Not much to look at, at the end of the day.”
Yan Wanjun was ninth level empyrean realm. It was incredibly shameful for him to be derided as worthless.
“Why… why did you not kill me as well?” he demanded with some exasperation. “You dared slay the entirety of House Yan, so why did you falter here?”
Despite his sadness, he found this rather odd.
“To do so would be as easy as breathing. You come from House Yan yourself, so it would only make sense… is that what you think?” The cloaked man chuckled. “However, I have my reasons.”
“You better give your reasons for killing so many,” Jiang Chen stated coldly. “Otherwise, you can forget about leaving today. Call out your companions too.”
The man in the brown cloak blinked. “Oh? You think I have friends here?”
“Three more of you,” Jiang Chen shot back. “But I don’t think you’re the lot in charge. Where is your master?”
The man in brown was amazed. Jiang Chen had pointed out many more details than he’d expected. “Interesting, interesting,” he roared with laughter. “I didn’t expect House Yan to have someone as clever as you. It deserved destruction, but it’s not totally worthless at all. Brothers, come forth!”
Three more appeared in the air as his words sounded. They wore cloaks and disguises as well, though in different colors than the brown-cloaked man. One wore crimson, one wore azure, and the last, silver.
They bore different auras as well, enough to distinguish them at a single glance. Regardless of that difference, their cultivation levels were similar to each other.
Jiang Chen supposed that all four were demigods. Four of them appearing all at once was rather astonishing.
Any faction in Myriad Abyss would find it difficult to produce that number at the drop of a hat. Even the ten sacred lands couldn’t accomplish such a feat. Moreover, these four had a master!
It was a very good conjecture that the quartet before him and their missing master were the ones that’d been responsible for the massacre.
“Boss, is this kid from House Yan?” the blue cloak spoke up.
The brown cloak, who seemed to be first among his company, smiled. “If I might hazard a guess, this kid is House Yan’s son-in-law… the young lord of the Eternal Sacred Land.”
Jiang Chen braced himself. These enemies were better informed than he thought. They knew the affairs of Eternal Divine Nation well.
“Oh? Then he’s…”
“Shut up!” The brown cloak quickly put a stop to a possible information leak.
Realizing his error, the blue cloak coughed with some embarrassment before quieting down. He wasn’t angry about his comrade’s rebuke in the slightest.
Jiang Chen was rather curious where these strange cloaked men came from. Their ambiguous secrecy was intriguing.
Yan Wanjun, on the other hand, flared with fury. He glared hateful daggers at the four, ready to pounce recklessly at any moment.
“Calm yourself, Elder Wanjun. None of these four are ordinary cultivators. I reckon they’re all demigods, in fact.” The young man hastily messaged his friend’s grandfather upon seeing the latter’s impulsiveness.
Though Yan Wanjun didn’t become any less angry, he did feel his mind clear a little. Carelessness against four demigods would only mean defeat for him.
To put it bluntly, he would be more of a liability. If he made a mistake here, he would lose both grandson and granddaughter. There had to be a reason these four hadn’t struck him down already, and he needed to find out why.
Cupping his fists, Jiang Chen asked once more. “If you know my identity as well as Elder Wanjun’s, you should be noteworthy individuals in your own right. In light of that, House Yan wouldn’t dare anger you gentlemen. Why have you exterminated the house, pray tell?”
