As Li Xiaoyao unleashed his martial soul, he probably didn't even realize how calm and confident he appeared in that moment. The sense of control he felt was so profound that when the arrow came whizzing towards him, he simply tilted his head to the side. Without this level of confidence and razor-sharp composure, who else could pull off something like that?

With a single step, his figure blurred like a flash of light, instantly appearing in front of the crowd, rendering the arrows useless. His sword slashed out with precision so sharp it was terrifying. One martial artist had just begun to dodge when he saw a deadly sword strike descending from above. There was no escape—he was cut down in one swift motion.

"Release your martial souls! Kill him!" Nalan Xiong shouted, but his body instinctively backed away. As Li Xiaoyao approached, Nalan Xiong felt a deep-seated fear rise from within, especially when he locked eyes with Li Xiaoyao's unnervingly calm gaze. It sent chills through his soul.

Upon hearing Nalan Xiong's command, the others snapped back to their senses, and one by one, their martial souls burst forth. The night suddenly lit up.

A man behind Li Xiaoyao had a plant-type martial soul—a vine. This type of soul granted him flexibility, and when cultivated to high levels, the soul could even materialize, allowing him to ensnare enemies while making his body as soft as rubber, able to contort in any way.

He moved silently, like a creeping vine weaving through the air without a trace. Just as his hand was about to grab Li Xiaoyao, a sinister grin flashed across his face. But in that very moment, a blinding light pierced his eyes, and before he knew it, his life was swallowed by the sword's radiance.

A sword. Sharpened to the extreme, precise to the extreme, merciless to the extreme. There wasn't a single wasted motion. In an instant, another enemy fell.

Without pausing, Li Xiaoyao's movements continued. His sword cut through the night like a phantom, and as a flicker of blood splattered, another body dropped into the darkness.

At this point, martial artists at the eighth and ninth stages of the Qi Martial Realm couldn't last more than a single move against him. The precision of his strikes, the speed of his blade—it was all too much. They simply couldn't dodge.

"Got you!" A meteor hammer came whistling toward the back of Li Xiaoyao's head. If it connected, even if he didn't die, he'd be left completely incapacitated.

"Trying to dodge?"

Just as Li Xiaoyao was about to turn, a spear came whistling through the air, aimed directly at him with incredible force. He was caught between attacks, the timing impeccable. There was no way out—he was as good as dead.

"Kill."

With a soft growl, Li Xiaoyao let go of his sword. It flew from his hand and plunged straight into the chest of the man in front of him. The man froze, staring dumbfounded at the sword lodged in his chest. In his wildest dreams, he never would have expected Li Xiaoyao to abandon his weapon at such a critical moment.

Both were at the ninth level of the Qi Martial Realm. Sure, Li Xiaoyao was stronger, but they had the numbers. All it would take was one hit to seriously injure him. And injury meant death. In such a desperate situation, how could anyone anticipate Li Xiaoyao would dare throw away his sword?

The man's dying gaze locked onto Li Xiaoyao. In his final moments, he wanted to see Li Xiaoyao get smashed by the meteor hammer.

"Boom!"

A thunderous explosion ripped through the air, a sword gleam brighter than before cut through the chaos. Before the meteor hammer could land, the head of the man wielding it had already flown off. In Li Xiaoyao's hand was a soft sword, dripping with blood.

"So, that's how," the man muttered as he closed his eyes and collapsed.

At that moment, the severed head finally dropped from the sky. The rest of the attackers froze. That dazzling sword strike... none of them could have withstood it.

It was his sword-drawing technique. Every draw was lethal. The power unleashed in that split second was something no one at the ninth level of the Qi Martial Realm could hope to resist.

The crowd forgot to attack, but Li Xiaoyao didn't. One brilliant slash after another flashed through the night, and with each strike came the spray of blood. Not a single move was wasted. Every slash released its full potential.

By now, Li Xiaoyao had long discarded any notion of mercy. All that was left in him was cold composure and even colder indifference.

Nalan Xiong trembled as he watched one powerful warrior after another fall. These were elite fighters, at the eighth and ninth stages of the Qi Martial Realm. Even the city lord's mansion would consider them a formidable force. But here, they were nothing—falling like stalks of wheat, cut down at Li Xiaoyao's whim, one step, one kill.

What made his sword so deadly? And those eyes—so calm they terrified Nalan Xiong. In the heat of slaughter, Li Xiaoyao seemed to have become someone else entirely.

The sound of swords whistling through the air grew louder, drowning out the sound of the rain. In the space ahead, it seemed like nothing remained but the crisscrossing sword aura, ever-growing, ever stronger.

"Run."

Nalan Xiong snapped out of his shock, and only one thought remained in his mind: escape this demon. Without hesitation, he turned and bolted.

"Trying to leave now? Don't you think it's a little late?" The taunting voice pierced through the night, sharp and cruel. The sound of the sword had vanished, leaving only the splash of Li Xiaoyao's footsteps in the puddles behind.

Nalan Xiong froze in place, his body stiff. He turned to face Li Xiaoyao, forcing a smile that looked worse than a grimace.

"Li Xiaoyao, you know this has nothing to do with me, right? It was the young miss who wanted you dead. I was just following orders."

"I know." Li Xiaoyao nodded, which brought a glimmer of hope to Nalan Xiong's heart. It was as if he'd been given a chance at survival.

"That's why, when a dog is killed, it's nothing to be sorry about." Li Xiaoyao's next words made Nalan Xiong's body stiffen. A flash of light filled his vision—his last sight before it consumed him.

As Nalan Xiong's body collapsed, Li Xiaoyao's expression remained unchanged. He glanced over at the other bodies strewn across the ground, then turned and started walking away.

"Nalan Yanran."

His low voice echoed through the rainy night.

Li Xiaoyao didn't know how long he'd been walking, but eventually, he found himself in a desolate, dark field. Sitting cross-legged on the ground, a pale light shimmered around him, flickering but never extinguishing. The energy of the heavens and earth around him became tangible, flowing over his body. From the moment his dark soul stirred, Li Xiaoyao knew—he was about to break through.

It's said that a martial spirit is part of a cultivator's soul, capable of resonating with the world. When a martial spirit approaches its life-bound awakening, the cultivator can feel it coming.

Sitting there, Li Xiaoyao's brows furrowed. He felt something strange, something he couldn't quite explain. It was as though a mysterious force was calling out to him from beyond.

Moments later, a searing pain shot through him, tightening his heart. He knew the most dangerous moment had arrived.

Only those with unshakable willpower can undergo a life-bound martial spirit awakening. It's a universally accepted truth across the continent. No one questions it. Those lacking a strong will can never awaken their martial spirit.

The tearing pain grew sharper, more intense. Li Xiaoyao felt as if someone was ripping his soul apart, shredding it piece by piece. The agony of his soul being torn apart was so overwhelming that he bit down hard on his lip, drawing blood that slowly seeped from his mouth.

"The fucking pain... How can it hurt this much?" Li Xiaoyao had severely underestimated the agony of a martial spirit's life-bound awakening. Even after living two lives, the injuries he had suffered before were nothing compared to this. The pain of having one's soul ripped apart was beyond description—it was something no one could truly understand without going through it themselves.

The rain had finally stopped, but Li Xiaoyao was still drenched, though he couldn't tell if it was rainwater or sweat. He had forgotten everything else. All that remained was his struggle to endure the torment coursing through his body.

"Ahhh..." A hoarse scream escaped his lips. Just as he thought the pain couldn't get worse, an even more excruciating wave of soul-rending agony crashed down on him, making him wish for death.

"If I can't survive this, my martial spirit won't awaken. In this life, I'll continue to be trampled on, just like when my father and I were cast out of the family. Just like how people like Li Xin and Nalan dared to treat me as nothing, ready to kill me at their whim. If living like that is my fate, it's better not to have been reborn at all."

Li Xiaoyao gritted his teeth, pushing through the pain. His iron will cast the suffering aside. No one, not even the heavens themselves, could stand in the way of his determination to grow stronger.

The agony couldn't corrode his willpower. It felt like the worst had passed, and Li Xiaoyao allowed himself to relax slightly. His martial spirit's awakening seemed to be going smoothly now.

"Arghhh!"

A blood-curdling scream ripped through the air as Li Xiaoyao's entire body convulsed. Another surge of pain, even worse than before, tore through him. The agony was so intense that blood began to seep from his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.

"Fuck the God... fuck...fu.c..k.. holly sh—!..." He gasped, but before he could finish, his body seized up, and he collapsed to the ground, unconscious.