Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
“It’s terrible! It’s terrible!”
“What shocking news!”
“It’s been exposed that those so-called Exploding Heavens Faction Inns in the Fire Country for the past few years are all fake!”
“The real sovereign of the Exploding Heavens Faction is here trying to maintain the order of the Imperial City! His name is Zhong Kui, and he calls himself our city inspector!”
“He’s terrifying! As soon as he appeared, he instantly killed several Original Infant Stage fighters!”
“To finish it off, he has slain the shopkeeper of the fake Exploding Heavens Faction Inns with a chain! He’s now dragging the corpses down the street!”
…
Suddenly, the whole Fire Nation’s Imperial City fell into chaos. Xu Que was dragging a chain with a corpse slowly down the street. Behind him, countless people followed at a distance. They were dying to see the action, but dared not go too near.
When the Imperial guards arrived, they were too afraid to ask a single question. Instead, they immediately turned around and rushed to the palace to report the news. Several shops operating in the Imperial City with signs identifying them as of the Exploding Heavens Faction were horrified at the news. They hurriedly closed their stores, as the blood drained from their faces.
However, that did not stop Xu Que.
He had just reached a weapons store called the Exploding Heavens Faction Weaponry. While the shop gates were closed, with his powerful soul strength he had sensed peoples’ presence within the shop. With a flick of his chain, he smashed the store gates with a huge bang! The people inside were so frightened that they fell paralyzed on the ground.
“You…what are you doing? We work for the Lord! You…” The shopkeeper tried to speak, but he before he could finish, Xu Que had already thrown the iron chain at him.
Whip!
The hook pierced his chest and the shopkeeper collapsed with a muffled sound. With a pull backward, Xu Que dragged him out of the shop, spilling blood all over the floor.
“Order is to be maintained! Garbage should stay in the garbage dump!” said an expressionless Xu Que. He waved his hand and a huge barrel appeared, into which he threw in the bodies of the two shopkeepers. Then, he continued to move toward the next store.
Several beaters and servants in the shop were scared out of their wits, but finally sighed in relief when he left. Xu Que had let them off, killing only the shopkeepers. After all, most of these servants and beaters were deceived, thinking that they were working for the Exploding Heavens Faction. Thus, Xu Que had no reason to blame them. However, the people in charge were in the know. These people must be punished, none of them could be forgiven!
Operation Counter Counterfeit, it a war until everyone’s afraid of it!
Bang!
Next, Xu Que went directly to a building named Exploding Heavens Faction Bookstore. He instantly smashed the door. To his surprise, there were several scholars sitting around writing manuscripts. Xu Que took a casual glance and was instantly furious. These people were fabricating the history of the Exploding Heavens Faction, shaping it into an unsightly and warped fiction. Some were even writing of them as a repulsive force that did only evil!
“Useless bums!” Xu Que bellowed and threw the chain at the scholars!
Boom!
The entire bookstore collapsed within seconds. Xu Que tore out several bloody bodies from the ruins and tossed them into the garbage can.
“Whoever shames the Exploding Heavens Faction will be hunted down and killed, no matter how far away they may be!” Xu Que growled as he marched onward. On this day, he had cleaned out every single fraudulent shop in the Imperial City swindling in the name of the Exploding Heavens Faction. What he did threw the Imperial City into chaos, and many people were too frightened to go out.
“It’s so scary!”
“That Zhong Kui from the Exploding Heavens Faction is a real death reaper!”
“Have you heard the news? Not just Zhong Kui, but even Xu Que’s dog has reappeared!”
“Really?”
“True as toast! Someone saw that the dog rushed into a sham Exploding Heavens Faction restaurant, robbed all their food, then spit so much saliva on the shopkeeper that he drowned!”
‘Holy cow! Can that even be done?”
Slam!
“That’s what it did!”
…
Night may have fallen, but Xu Que’s operation Counter Counterfeit was far from over. He had just met up with Buttface. Now that they had cleaned out all the shops on the surface, it was time to track down the cultivators who, under the name of the Exploding Heavens Faction, had scammed and swindled all the citizens!
Buttface had collected many reports from the market. All of which were the names and information of cultivators who had claimed to be part of the Exploding Heavens Faction.
“Lad, according to a warm-hearted, undisclosed member of the public, Lu Ben Wei, as well as my own organizing skills, these people can be roughly divided into four or five groups of forces. They are all distributed in the outskirts of the city, each occupying a territory!” Buttface said excitedly with a map in hand. He was always the happiest when an operation put him in the limelight.
“Come, we’ll continue with the cleanup!” Xu Que took over the map from Buttface’s hands. After checking the distribution of forces, he quickly headed toward the outskirts of the city.
The night soon turned pitch-black. Xu Que and Buttface came to a territory outside the city. Back when he had left, it was simply a barren hill. Now, it was filled with gleaming lights and many manors. All of the buildings were luxuriously decorated. It was apparent that all these took a lot of manpower and resources!
“Crap, young lad, this isn’t fair! Why are these imposters of the Exploding Heavens Faction living more comfortably than us?” Buttface barked indignantly.
“Then we will destroy it!” Xu Que sneered, as he flung his chain!
Boom!
Immediately, the main door of a manor collapsed. Then, after some rustling, many figures emerged from the manors.
“How dare you barge into the First Branch of the Exploding Heavens Faction!” came a robust roar.
Xu Que sneered coldly, his gaze fixed at the mansion in front of him. From his soul strength telepathy, he sensed that in the mansion’s basement, there were a lot of frail mortals and cultivators. The most harrowing fact was that all who were held captive were women! Xu Que didn’t need more information to guess what they were doing.
“The world may change, but chaos and debris continue to flow! You people are a bunch of damn garbage!” he said with a cold voice as he flung the chain. The long iron chain shone coldly in the faint moonlight. A wisp of Bone Freezing Fire climbed the chain, sweeping straight ahead!
Boom!
Dozens of cultivators who rushed ahead froze into ice the instant they were hit by the freezing fire. With a sweep of the cable, they all burst into icy smithereens.
“What?” Those who came from behind stood in disbelief, their faces horrified.
“You…who are you?” Some people shrieked as they stared at Xu Que.
Xu Que smiled, devoid of all emotion, “Zhong Kui of the Exploding Heavens Faction!”
As his voice fell off, an even bigger cold fire consumed the whole manor.
“Damn! Fantastic,my boy, now that’s refreshing! You have crushed the court!” Buttface shouted excitedly.
Xu Que was too lazy to reply to this idiot. He quickly entered the manor and freed all the women in the basement. To his relief, they had not been humiliated by the counterfeiters as he had thought. They were brought here as blood sacrifices to help those scums practice demonic arts!
Xu Que explained to them that the manor people were just imposters of the Exploding Heavens Faction. He then supplied them with a lot of medicine before leaving for the second territory. However, Xu Que couldn’t believe his eyes when he reached there. The second territory was simple and rundown. Many houses that the cultivators lived in were temporarily constructed, surrounded by flags that had a variety of slogans on them.
“The Exploding Heavens Faction is invincible!”
“The Exploding Heavens Faction is mighty!”
“The Exploding Heavens Faction are all Sovereigns!”
“Join the Exploding Heavens Faction and reach the peak of life!”
“The Exploding Heavens Faction appears; all they leave is a thread and a single needle!”
“The Exploding Heavens Faction goes to war, not a blade of grass would grow!”
“The Exploding Heavens Faction commoner is so handsome!”
The myriad of colorful slogans was inserted all over the mountains. Together they looked just like rows of bullet comments on videos, leaving Xu Que in a daze. Strangely enough, in this small territory, there were many wounded cultivators lying all around. The rest who were unhurt were all busy helping them heal.
“Well, what’s with this situation? Are there other people cracking down on these imposters too?” Buttface was shocked.
Xu Que’s expression turned serious, then he shook his head slightly, “No, from these slogans, I can confirm that they are the real advocates of the Exploding Heavens Faction. They are the real talents of our faction!”
“What? How did the talents of the Exploding Heavens Faction fall into this sort of living conditions?” Buttface was taken aback.
Pa!
Xu Que gave Buttface a slap on the head and glared, “You don’t know anything! Isn’t it obvious that they’ve been played? The real supporters of the Exploding Heavens Faction are a group of naive, kind, and simple children. They suck at conspiracies, that’s why they are now like this!”
“Gosh, how do you know they are all real supporters?” Buttface asked, displeased.
“By intuition! Ask them, if you don’t believe me!” Xu Que laughed as he entered that territory.