Lu Gu’s magic weapon was a great bone saber for slaying demons.

Can Gu’s magic weapon was a pair of beheading crescent axes.

Most barbarian inheritances were not so complex. They primarily cultivated the body, focusing on physical strength and combat.

The two cultivators, both in the late Golden Core stage, each wielded their magic weapons and engaged in close-quarters combat in the valley. Between each strike of saber and axe, the Golden Core’s energy solidified, pulverizing earth and wood, plunging the world into chaos and darkness.

They were like two humanoid monstrous beasts, rampaging everywhere.

Lu Gu’s strength was naturally greater than Can Gu’s, but only by a limited margin. Furthermore, battles between late Golden Core cultivators were full of unpredictable changes, so Lu Gu did not have a guaranteed victory over Can Gu.

After more than six hundred rounds of fighting, the entire valley was warped, yet neither side had gained an advantage.

Lu Gu then recalled Mo Hua’s instructions:

“If you can’t defeat him within six hundred rounds, don’t drag it out anymore. Feign defeat and lead Can Gu to Luoshi Mountain, a hundred li to the north.”

Feigning defeat—these four words spelled “humiliation” for Lu Gu.

Out of a general’s pride, he was unwilling to do such a thing.

However, he felt guilty for not listening to Mo Hua earlier, which had ignited the conflict. And at this moment, he truly could not defeat Can Gu quickly. Lu Gu had no idea what consequences would follow if he continued to disregard Mo Hua’s words.

Lu Gu gritted his teeth. During his fight with Can Gu, he revealed a flaw. Can Gu seized the opportunity and struck an axe into his back, drawing copious blood.

Lu Gu cursed and turned to flee.

Can Gu was momentarily stunned, sensing something was amiss but unable to pinpoint what it was.

He knew Lu Gu—a man with brute strength, strong vanity, who valued victory and honor above all else. Such a person would never resort to a despicable act like “feigned defeat.”

Can Gu never imagined that a great general like Lu Gu would shamelessly feign defeat. Therefore, seeing Lu Gu flee with injuries, Can Gu was only startled for a moment before his heart swelled with joy, and he cried out:

“Worthless Lu Gu, my defeated opponent, don’t run!”

Upon hearing this, Lu Gu wished he could turn around and fight Can Gu to the death, but he ultimately suppressed his anger and fled headlong.

Lu Gu endured the taunts and did not look back.

Can Gu became even more convinced that Lu Gu had truly made a mistake. Without further hesitation, he activated his escape technique, an ominous white mist swirling around him, and pursued Lu Gu.

Lu Gu remained silent, focusing solely on fleeing.

Before long, the two, one chasing and one fleeing, crossed a hundred li and entered Luoshi Mountain.

Luoshi Mountain was narrow, with jagged rocks and dim surroundings.

Seeing this, Can Gu grew suspicious. “Did this Lu Gu flee here, or did he intentionally lead me here? Is there an ambush hidden in this place?”

But he was in the late Golden Core stage, already a top-tier cultivator in the third-grade mountain realm. What could they possibly use to ambush him?

Lu Gu’s faction had no other late Golden Core grand cultivators.

Other ordinary mid-Golden Core cultivators were no match for him either.

That being said, Can Gu still felt a surge of wariness. He dared not pursue further and even considered retreating.

Lu Gu turned back and sneered, “Can Gu, you good-for-nothing, if you don’t kill me today, I will surely flay you alive, tear out your tendons, and grind your bones to dust another day.”

At his words, Can Gu’s desire to retreat intensified.

Lu Gu cursed under his breath, his back still bleeding, then brandished his demon-slaying great bone saber and engaged Can Gu in battle.

His moves were vicious, his strikes lethal, a fight to the death.

Can Gu was completely suppressed by Lu Gu for a time.

Just then, ridges suddenly appeared on the ground, and layers of mountain rock shattered.

Can Gu’s face changed; he knew he had fallen into an ambush.

But the aftershocks of the explosion, though they reached him, caused no pain or discomfort. Can Gu couldn’t help but sneer, “A second-grade holy pattern, trying to kill whom?”

And in this brief moment, Lu Gu activated his demon-slaying bone saber, pushing the energy in the blade to its limit, even coating it with a layer of blood-red light.

A superior barbarian saber technique: *Yao Po Gu Dao*.

The might of this saber strike did not appear overly flamboyant on the surface, but all its power was contained within the blade.

Golden Core energy wrapped around the saber’s edge.

Fast to draw, fast to strike, fast to kill—this was the essence of a superior technique for barbarian body cultivators, not seeking splendor, but sheer lethality.

Can Gu’s face turned pale. “Trying to fight to the death?!”

He did not want to fight Lu Gu to the death, but in an instant, Lu Gu’s *Lu Yao Po Gu* blade had already come slicing down.

Can Gu had no choice but to activate his beheading crescent axes and his superior dao technique.

On the axe magic weapons, a pair of blood moons floated, and the surrounding winds swirled like woven threads.

Their magic weapons clashed head-on. The ground instantly collapsed, the forest turned to ashes, and the mountain rocks pulverized.

Yet, neither side gained an advantage.

Lu Gu gradually increased his power, and Can Gu countered little by little.

As both sides’ energy swirled like a vortex, locked in a stalemate, Can Gu suddenly felt an anomaly behind him, a chilling sensation permeating him.

He dared not turn his head, only caught a glimpse with his peripheral vision, and saw a giant hand resting on his shoulder.

Can Gu was greatly startled.

Who?!

Who could approach him, a late Golden Core general, from behind without revealing the slightest aura, and remain undetected until now?!

Can Gu tilted his head, looking behind him with one eye, and saw a familiar, imposing face.

This face, he had once been very familiar with, even feared.

This person had overshadowed him his entire life.

But now, this face was cold and lifeless, its eye sockets deep and black, glowing with an eerie blue light, looking incredibly terrifying and chilling.

“Shi Gu! You’re not dead?!”

Can Gu’s soul instantly fled in terror. The thought of Shi Gu standing behind him, gripping his shoulder, made him feel weak all over, his courage completely vanished, and his energy severed.

Opposite him, Lu Gu seized this opening, let out a fierce roar, and brought his saber down hard.

Can Gu, half-dead from fright by Shi Gu, was powerless to resist and could only try his best to twist his body away.

With a flash of blood-red saber light, an arm was forcibly severed.

Can Gu let out a beast-like howl of pain. At this moment, Shi Gu’s massive, icy hand was also closing in on his throat.

Although the force was not great.

Yet, in his pain and panic, Can Gu still felt an inexplicable fear.

Only now did he realize this was a deadly trap.

Shi Gu hadn’t died at all; he had come for revenge!

Lu Gu and Shi Gu, these two brothers, had intentionally set a trap to dismember him in this valley!

No! I’m going to die!

Can Gu’s pupils trembled, and he suddenly erupted with a strong will to survive, directly activating the *Bai Gu Man Jia* on his body and initiating self-detonation.

The *Man Jia* exploded, pushing back Lu Gu and Shi Gu, who was merely a corpse to begin with.

Seizing this momentary window, Can Gu fled like a madman, dashing away.

He feared being left behind by Lu Gu, and even more so facing the fiend Shi Gu. Thus, he pushed his escape technique to its absolute limit, transforming into a wisp of white smoke and vanishing.

Lu Gu pursued Can Gu.

However, before leaving, he glanced back at his elder brother’s silent, mountain-like colossal corpse. He saw his brother standing in the darkness, like a demon god, and saw the eerie blue glow in his brother’s deep black eye sockets.

A cold glint flickered in Lu Gu’s eyes, but he said nothing. Instead, he activated his movement technique and continued to pursue Can Gu.

After Lu Gu and Can Gu left, a long time passed before a bright blue figure slowly emerged in the pitch-black night.

It was Mo Hua.

Mo Hua looked at the two figures, one chasing and one fleeing, mentally assessing the situation, and nodded slightly.

Then he turned his head and glanced at Shi Gu’s body.

In the dark night, Shi Gu stood before Mo Hua, like a small mountain, his presence daunting.

But Mo Hua knew that the “Shi Gu” before him was merely an empty shell.

The Small Spiritual Core Array could only provide limited control and extremely weak propulsion.

The Shi Gu before him had almost no practical combat ability, other than using his former prestige to “scare people.”

“If only he truly had combat power—”

Mo Hua looked at Shi Gu’s corpse, a faint light flickering in his eyes.

On the other side, Lu Gu did not pursue for too long, because he simply couldn’t catch up.

Can Gu fled too quickly, without the slightest hesitation, because he knew that once he slowed down and fell into the encirclement of Shi Gu and Lu Gu, he would almost certainly die.

As for why only Lu Gu was pursuing him, and Shi Gu made no moves,

In the throes of life-or-death escape, Can Gu had no time to ponder such things. Under the accumulated prestige of Shi Gu when he was alive, he only wanted to flee, daring not to think of anything else.

Lu Gu also remembered Mo Hua’s instruction: “Don’t pursue a cornered foe.” So, after chasing for a while and realizing he truly couldn’t catch up, he turned back.

Because there was a larger situation to manage.

In such a major battle, if General Can Gu fled in defeat, his troops would almost certainly collapse.

Many barbarian soldiers from Can Gu’s tribe had scattered, but quite a few also remained.

Lu Gu declared that as long as they surrendered, their past transgressions would not be pursued. They would not be killed or punished, nor would they be demoted to barbarian slaves. In addition, he spoke some very “generous and popular” words.

These words, naturally, were also taught by Mo Hua.

This time, Lu Gu dared not improvise or disregard the instructions.

And Lu Gu was originally a general of the Shugu Tribe, his prestige even surpassing Can Gu’s. With his words, most of the defeated soldiers from Can Gu’s tribe surrendered one by one.

Lu Gu indeed kept his word, not punishing them. Instead, after reorganizing, he incorporated these barbarian soldiers into his own ranks.

While Lu Gu was reorganizing the barbarian soldiers, Mo Hua was doing something else.

He wanted to make a preliminary attempt to liberate the barbarian slaves of the Great Wilderness.

But such a matter could not be rushed; it had to be done step by step. Mo Hua planned to start with the barbarian slaves who had surrendered from the Shugu Tribe.

In his capacity as a Shaman, he gathered these barbarian slaves and, with a solemn expression, said:

“You are sinners, you are slaves.”

“You have either committed defiling crimes in this life, or impure blood flows within you.”

“You are slaves, you are servants. You live at the bottom of the Great Wilderness, never seeing the light of day. No one cares whether you live or die.”

“But now, the Divine Lord has given you an opportunity for ‘rebirth.'”

“You only need to convert to the Divine Lord, pledge allegiance to the Divine Lord, and in the coming war, slay enemies or diligently labor for the Divine Lord to earn merit. Then the Divine Lord can pardon your sins and allow you to become his ‘servants.'”

“As servants of the Divine Lord, as long as you believe in the Divine Lord and act according to the Divine Lord’s will, then no one but the Divine Lord can condemn you again. No tribal cultivator shall arbitrarily beat, scold, or even kill you.”

“Though you are servants, you are servants of the Divine Lord.”

“As long as you honor the Divine Lord’s name, you can openly walk upon the lands of the Great Wilderness—”

These words caused a violent tremor among the barbarian slaves.

They had never imagined encountering such a thing, nor had they ever thought that the Shaman Lord could bestow such a grace upon them.

They did not know whether these words were true or false, but they all knelt on the ground, bowing to Mo Hua and saying:

“Thank you, Shaman Lord, for your grace.”

“Thank you, Divine Lord, for your forgiveness.”

“Shaman Lord is enlightened.”

“Divine Lord is immortal.”

The multitude of barbarian slaves created a thunderous roar, shaking the hearts of all present.

Dan Zhu’s heart surged with excitement.

This was the will Mo Hua had been instilling in him, and now this vision had finally unveiled itself.

But Lu Gu, Chi Feng, and some other Golden Core cultivators of the Shugu Tribe frowned. They vaguely felt that something was amiss in these words about “divine authority,” but for a moment, they couldn’t quite figure out what was wrong.

Amidst this atmosphere, Can Gu’s tribal forces were largely assimilated by Mo Hua and Lu Gu.

Lu Gu’s military strength further increased.

And Mo Hua’s influence and power also rose further.

The barbarian cultivators he directly or indirectly led under the name of Shaman now numbered over three hundred thousand.

Mo Hua had also, in a truly meaningful sense, acquired the prestige and influence of a “Shaman” over a considerable area.

The next step was to send troops to attack the Great Chieftain of the Shugu Tribe.

If they killed this supreme ruler of the Shugu Tribe and absorbed the remaining forces, then the Shugu Tribe could directly change its surname.

However, attacking the Great Chieftain presented an irreconcilable contradiction.

Mo Hua’s current power structure largely relied on Lu Gu, as well as the barbarian soldiers, cultivators, and slaves of the Shugu Tribe.

Most of these were people of the Shugu Tribe.

Having them fight against other Shugu tribal members, vying for territory, might not be a big problem, as there were many inherent conflicts within the tribe.

But asking them to attack the Great Chieftain—that was outright “rebellion.”

The Great Chieftain was the supreme leader of the Shugu Tribe, recognized by the Shugu Patriarch, and a symbol of the Shugu Tribe.

“Attacking” the Great Chieftain was tantamount to rebellion, to forgetting one’s ancestors, an unforgivable crime.

Even the most confused ordinary Shugu barbarian cultivator understood this basic principle.

If these Shugu barbarian cultivators knew that their purpose was to attack the Great Chieftain,

Then this army would instantly disintegrate.

Lu Gu, eager for revenge but at a loss, found Mo Hua with a solemn expression.

Mo Hua calmly sipped his tea and asked Lu Gu, “Have you heard of ‘purging the ruler’s inner circle’?”

“Purging the ruler’s inner circle?”

Lu Gu, having never heard of it, was momentarily confused.

Mo Hua then said, “Our purpose for this expedition is not to attack the Great Chieftain, but to attack Can Gu.”

“Can Gu, upon defeat, will certainly take his confidants and seek refuge with the Great Chieftain.”

“You will pin all the blame on Can Gu. Say that the Great Chieftain is old and was misled by Can Gu, who harmed your brother. You are here to help the Great Chieftain eliminate the villain and kill Can Gu.”

“Afterward, you will lead your troops into the main camp, kill the Great Chieftain, and claim that Can Gu murdered him, expressing your profound grief.”

“Then you will kill Can Gu to avenge the Great Chieftain.”

“Later, I will have someone suggest your promotion to Great Chieftain. After all, you killed Can Gu and avenged the Great Chieftain, and you are the strongest in the tribe.”

“This way, you will have your revenge openly and legitimately, and you can become the Great Chieftain, with both fame and justification.”

Mo Hua’s tone was calm, as he spoke methodically.

Lu Gu stood dumbfounded, unable to fully grasp it for a long time.

“But—” Lu Gu frowned, “What if the Great Chieftain directly hands Can Gu over to me and tells me to withdraw my troops?”

Mo Hua shook his head. “The Great Chieftain is not stupid. He knows better than anyone that he cannot hand Can Gu over to you and cut off his own arm.”

“What if he really does hand him over?” Lu Gu asked.

Mo Hua replied, “Then you will win over Can Gu, blame all the crimes on the Great Chieftain, and then promise benefits to trick Can Gu into joining you to kill the Great Chieftain together.”

“Can Gu, betrayed by the Great Chieftain, will surely be filled with anger and will likely turn against him—”

“After killing the Great Chieftain, you will then kill Can Gu as well, pinning the blame on Can Gu. The result will still be the same—”

Mo Hua’s tone was flat, as if he were discussing everyday matters.

Lu Gu, however, felt a chill to his core. He stared blankly at Mo Hua, thinking that perhaps only Mo Hua’s face was pale.

His heart, liver, and all his internal organs were utterly black.

Even the blood he bled would probably be black.

“This person must be a demon—”

Lu Gu thought silently to himself.

After all, someone who could be this “evil” probably wasn’t human—