The Return of the Condor Heroes: Starting with a Suicide Note and Conquering All Realms

On Luoyan Slope, the wind and snow raged fiercely.

Lin Yuan stood with his hands behind his back, his deep gaze piercing through the swirling snowflakes and landing on the figure dressed in white, though slightly disheveled.

"You've practiced the Nine Profound Techniques in the wrong direction."

Fu Junzhuo gripped the sword hilt tightly, her knuckles turning white from the force. She stared intently at the gray-robed youth before her, gritting her teeth, "Your martial arts are unparalleled, I admit defeat. But the supreme martial arts of Goguryeo are not for the people of the Central Plains to dictate!"

Lin Yuan ignored the humiliation and hostility in her eyes, his tone as calm as if stating a truth: "The Nine Profound Great Art emphasizes controlling the sword with the spirit, a glorious and righteous path. Yet you have abandoned the essential for the trivial, practicing it as an assassin's method to conceal one's aura. It's utterly laughable."

These words struck Fu Junzhuo like a hammer blow, hitting her vitals precisely. This was the top secret of her assassination mission, yet it had been seen through in an instant.

"You think you can sneak into the Jiangdu Palace and take Yang Guang's head with your mediocre swordsmanship?" Lin Yuan took a half step forward, his oppressive aura making Fu Junzhuo gasp for breath. "Yang Guang is not only surrounded by the armored Yuwen Clan, but also by experts from the Yin Gui Sect of the Demonic Clan, who have already formed an impenetrable wall around him. You can't even remove the hidden moles on the outside; going in is just suicide."

Fu Junzhuo's face turned deathly pale. Her prized trump cards and schemes were, in the eyes of this mysterious young man, as transparent and fragile as child's play. Her pride was utterly crushed in that instant.

"Let's make a deal." Lin Yuan withdrew his suffocating gaze.

"What...deal?" Fu Junzhuo's voice was dry and hoarse.

"Go to the abandoned Taoist temple south of Yangzhou and guard the gate for me, clearing out the scum." Lin Yuan turned around, his gray Taoist robe fluttering in the wind and snow, leaving the three of them with an insurmountable silhouette. "Three days later, I'll let you see with your own eyes how the emperor of the Great Sui Dynasty kneels on the ground."

Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling exchanged a glance, their instincts honed by their street-smart past leading them to make the best decision of their lives in an instant. Their knees buckled, and they collapsed to their knees in the snow with a thud.

"Brother Immortal! We two brothers are just worthless lives, we'll follow you from now on, leading your horses and pulling your stirrups!" Kou Zhong shouted at the top of his lungs.

Lin Yuan did not turn around. His figure seemed to shrink to an inch, and he disappeared into the vast snowstorm in a few steps.

Fu Junzhuo stared blankly in the direction he had disappeared, her hand gripping the sword limply. She knew that this trip to the Central Plains had completely changed everything.

……

Jiangdu, the main hall of the imperial palace.

The golden cauldron was filled with the fragrance of sandalwood, but it could not suppress the deathly silence and fear that filled the hall.

"Useless! A bunch of useless trash!"

With a furious roar, Yang Guang kicked over the rosewood imperial desk in front of him. Memorials and writing brushes scattered all over the ground, and the civil and military officials knelt down in fear, trembling with fear.

In the center of the main hall, the once arrogant Yuwen Huaji lay sprawled on a stretcher like a dead dog. His chest was horribly sunken, he was barely breathing, and he didn't even have the strength to groan.

"Three thousand elite Xiaoguo soldiers were crippled by one person! All that Ice Profound Strength that you, Yuwen Huaji, always boast about has gone to waste?!" Yang Guang's eyes were bloodshot, like an enraged lion.

"Your Majesty, please calm your anger."

A sinister voice suddenly drifted from the shadows of the main hall. An elderly man with a withered face, dressed in a wide Taoist robe, slowly stepped out. It was Bi Chen, an elder of the Yin Gui Sect of the Demonic Cult.

"Since that madman specifically requested the extremely cold and extremely yang items from the national treasury, Your Majesty may grant it to him." A venomous smile curled at the corner of Bi Chen's lips.

Yang Guang turned his head sharply, staring intently at him: "How can the foundation of the Great Sui Dynasty be handed over to a mere commoner? Where is my dignity?!"

"Of course it won't be given away for free." Pi Chen smiled coldly, a cruel glint in his eyes. "The rare treasures from the national treasury will still be loaded onto the cart. But in a hidden compartment within the carriage, I'll fill it with ten thousand catties of Western Region flaming oil. I'll personally escort the cart, and if he dares to show himself to inspect it, the moment the tinderbox is lit... even if he's a grandmaster like Ning Daoqi, his flesh and blood will be burned to ashes by me!"

Yang Guang's eyes flashed violently, and a violent killing intent boiled in his chest.

"Very well! Issue my decree: mobilize 100,000 elite troops to surround the south of Yangzhou so completely that not even a fly could escape!" Yang Guang ordered sternly. "I will ensure he dies a horrible death!"

……

Three days later. An abandoned Taoist temple in the south of Yangzhou.

The wind and snow grew increasingly violent, cutting like knives and causing excruciating pain.

Lin Yuan sat cross-legged beside the dry well in the backyard. Within his dantian, dark golden liquid internal energy flowed slowly like a vast ocean. The innate true energy route of the "Longevity Manual," which seizes the creation of heaven and earth, had perfectly merged with the Nine Yin Laws.

Within a three-foot radius around him, it seemed as if a world of its own had formed. Not a single snowflake could fall—the moment they approached, they were instantly vaporized by an invisible, terrifying heat, leaving not even a trace of moisture. The barrier of a Grandmaster's realm was as thin as paper before him.

Outside the Taoist temple.

Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling huddled behind the broken threshold, shivering, clutching wooden sticks. Fu Junzhuo, on the other hand, leaned against a section of the courtyard wall with her eyes closed, clutching her long sword.

Suddenly, Fu Junzhuo opened her eyes wide: "You're here."

The ground began to tremble violently. At the end of the snowstorm, a massive, breathtaking convoy slowly approached. Without any flags, hundreds of heavy wagons were pulled by strong warhorses, their deep ruts crushing the snow into black mud.

Behind the convoy, a massive, dark array of armored soldiers, like a vast ocean of steel, completely surrounded the Taoist temple. The chilling aura of the 100,000-strong army pressed the dark clouds in the sky down several feet.

The convoy stopped outside the Taoist temple. The air was filled with an extremely pungent smell of grease.

On the lead carriage, Pi Chen, dressed in ordinary official robes, arrogantly jumped down from the carriage shaft. He didn't even glance at Fu Junzhuo and the other two guarding outside the gate, but instead channeled his inner energy to send his voice far into the backyard of the Taoist temple:

"The Emperor of the Great Sui Dynasty has sent a treasure; please come out and inspect it yourself!"

The backyard was deathly silent, save for the howling of the wind and snow.

A glint of ruthlessness and madness flashed in Pi Chen's eyes. Without another word, he raised his right hand high and brought it down with a fierce chop: "Ignite it!"

With a "whoosh!", hundreds of guards simultaneously ripped off the waterproof tarpaulin covering the carriage, revealing a dense array of black wooden barrels underneath. Dozens of tinderboxes were thrown into the barrels without hesitation.

"boom--!!!"

Ten thousand catties of fierce fire oil from the Western Regions were instantly detonated in an extremely compressed space!

That was no ordinary flame; it was a dark red death soaring into the sky. A wall of blazing fire rose from the ground, and thick, black, toxic smoke shot into the heavens like a monstrous dragon. The terrifying shockwave of the explosion utterly destroyed the remaining walls of the temple's front courtyard, and hundreds of carriages instantly transformed into a massive fireball, its gaping maw consuming the entire temple!

On the outer perimeter, within the ranks of 100,000 elite troops, war drums thundered.

"kill!!!"

The deafening shouts of battle seemed to threaten to completely overturn the city of Yangzhou.

At the moment of the explosion, Fu Junzhuo's scalp tingled. She grabbed Kou Zhong with one hand and Xu Ziling with the other, and frantically fled to the outer perimeter with all her might.

She turned back in horror to look at the sea of ​​fire that could ignite even snowflakes. With such a powerful explosion of oil, coupled with the highly toxic fumes produced by the burning, even if three grandmasters stood right in the center, there would be absolutely no chance of survival!

Pi Chen stood three zhang away from the edge of the sea of ​​fire, the intense flames reflecting red onto his withered old face. He spread his arms and let out a chilling, maniacal laugh like that of a night owl:

"Hahaha! What kind of bullshit 'Crossing-the-River Fierce Dragon' is that! Faced with overwhelming firepower, it couldn't even utter a scream before being burned to ashes!"

After laughing, Bichen turned around triumphantly, preparing to fire a signal arrow towards Jiangdu to report back.

Just as he turned around...

At the very center of the inferno, a strange and terrifying suction force suddenly emanated.

The raging flames that were spreading wildly and devouring everything in their path now seemed to have met their true king! The firelight, heat, and even the toxic smoke that were enough to melt steel were frozen in mid-air.

Pi Chen's laughter abruptly stopped, as if he had a handful of sand stuck in his throat. He turned around sharply, his pupils shrinking to the size of pinpoints in an instant.

The once invincible sea of ​​fire was forcibly torn open by an invisible force, creating a passage!

Instead of advancing, all the flames retreated, pouring back towards the epicenter of the explosion!

At the end of the passage, a large hand burning with dark golden flames reached out without warning.

The speed was so fast that it exceeded the limits of the laws of physics. Before Bi Chen could even activate his proud demonic protective energy, the large hand had already gripped the back of his neck like an iron clamp, lifting him into the air.

Deep within the sea of ​​fire, a pair of cold, dark gold vertical pupils, as if from a god, glowed faintly.

"Oil for intense heat?"

Lin Yuan's voice came from the firelight, devoid of any warmth, yet carrying a sense of oppression that made Bi Chen's soul tremble.

"Barely enough to be an appetizer for me."