Chapter 3467: A Bounty In The Form Of Retaliation

"And why you?" a sect patriarch asked. "You are strong and talented, yes, but there are countless strong cultivators with talent like you."

Lin Mu did not hesitate. "I have destroyed things that should not exist. Evil inheritances. Corrupted beings. Entities that fed on worlds. Those behind them were bound to notice."

A low growl passed through the chamber.

"So it is retaliation," an old woman with silver eyes said. "They dare call this ’their’ justice."

Xiong Tian rose slowly to his feet.

"They have not only offended you," he said, his voice carrying weight that pressed down on everyone present. "They have offended all of us."

His gaze swept the hall.

"They dared to act under our watch. During our tournament. Against guests under our protection."

His fist clenched.

"This is no longer a personal matter."

One by one, others stood.

"The Dead Needle Abyss has long been a stain," said a Transcendent from one of the sects of the Eastern Immortal Court. "We have tolerated them for too long."

"They have crossed a line," another added. "If they can strike here, they can strike anywhere."

Xiong Tian raised his hand.

"From this moment onward," he declared, "the Dead Needle Abyss and all affiliated powers are declared enemies of the Martial Fist King Sect."

A wave of killing intent surged through the hall.

"Kill on sight," he continued. "Capture if possible. Extract everything."

Several sect leaders immediately echoed the declaration.

"My sect will do the same."

"So will my clan."

"They will have nowhere to hide."

Messages began to be sent out through jade slips, Emergency transfer imprints, and Immortal Court channels. Orders rippled outward across worlds like shockwaves.

An Immortal Court envoy posted to the Martial Fist King World nodded grimly. "We will escalate this. These groups have defied the Court for too long. This gives us further justification."

The discussion did not end quickly.

Strategies were discussed. Information was exchanged. Hidden bases were marked. Old grudges resurfaced. By the time the meeting concluded, an entire day had passed.

When Lin Mu finally left with his companions, the world felt heavier.

Back at their private residence, night had fallen.

Daoist Chu approached Lin Mu with a grave expression. "The sect is preparing emergency teleportation arrays."

Lin Mu looked at him. "So soon?"

"Yes," Daoist Chu replied. "Given the scale of what has been revealed, staying in one place is dangerous. Too many eyes. Too many variables."

Elyon nodded from nearby. "Tracking techniques will follow. We need to break the trail."

Lin Mu was silent for a moment, then nodded. "Within the week, then."

Daoist Chu exhaled. "I will finalize the routes."

As they parted, Lin Mu looked out toward the city.

The world had shifted.

And there would be no turning back.

The week passed in a blur of preparation, quiet tension, and unspoken resolve.

For Lin Mu, departure was nothing new. He had crossed worlds, walked through sects and empires, and left behind more people than he cared to remember. Yet this time, there was a weight to it that he had not felt in a long while. The events surrounding the assassination attempt had shaken more than just the political balance. They had shaken his companions.

Most of all, they had shaken Meng Bai.

Meng Bai had not slept properly since the night on the lake.

The memory replayed in his mind over and over. The calm conversation. The gentle smiles. The tea that tasted faintly sweet. The creeping numbness in his meridians. The moment he realized his Qi would not move. The dagger against his throat.

And then the sudden salvation.

Every time he remembered how close he had come to death, his chest tightened.

He had always known he was Lin Mu’s disciple. He had always known that being close to Lin Mu meant danger. But knowing and experiencing were two very different things.

He had almost died.

And worse, his death would not have been his alone.

He was Lin Mu’s weakness.

That realization gnawed at him more fiercely than any blade.

So he trained.

Relentlessly.

From the moment he woke until exhaustion forced him to sit, he pushed himself. He circulated his Qi until his meridians screamed. He practiced formation arrays until his fingers trembled. He sparred until his body ached.

But he did not stop.

Not once.

He knew his talent lay in formations, in understanding structures, in manipulating patterns of energy. But what good was that if he could be subdued before he could even activate a talisman?

He needed a foundation.

He needed a body.

Lin Mu had shown him what true body cultivation could achieve. Blueback had shown him another path. The Demon races had shown yet another.

Meng Bai spent hours poring over the blueprint Lin Mu had copied of the Lapis Link Body Array Totemic Art. He traced the lines, memorized the circuits, and tried to understand the logic behind linking apertures and flesh through runic structures.

But every conclusion led him to the same wall.

It required a preexisting body cultivation foundation.

It was not something he could simply graft onto himself as he was now.

So he looked elsewhere.

The Demons.

Their tattoos were not just decoration. They were cultivation. From birth, many demon races inscribed their bodies with marks that guided growth, reinforced flesh, and harmonized bloodlines with Dao. But those tattoos were deeply tied to demonic bloodlines and Dao structures incompatible with humans.

Normally.

Meng Bai refused to accept "normally" as a limit.

He began to dissect demon techniques through books, records, and anything Lin Mu or Daoist Chu could provide.

He analyzed the structure of demonic tattoos, searching for universal principles that could be adapted. He scribbled diagrams across scrolls, built small experimental arrays on jade plates, and even tested harmless prototypes on spirit beasts under supervision.

Every failure only pushed him harder.

Lin Mu watched from afar and said nothing.

He knew this stage.

He had walked it himself.

There was no shortcut through the storm inside Meng Bai’s heart. The young man needed to forge his own resolve into something tangible.

Stopping him would only shatter that process.

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