At this, the several Great Qian Grandmasters all showed pleased surprise. Everyone knew Wutong Mountain's cultivators were haughty beyond measure. They hadn't expected Senior Tang, though of Perfected Master Qingfeng's teacher-lineage, to be so humble — earlier he'd said that meeting the Gold-Eyed Lion Emperor, he could assure his life with the treasure his master bestowed; now that he'd truly met it, it had become that he could cut it down one-handed.

"You're blustering big talk here — does your teacher know?"

The Gold-Eyed Lion Emperor stood with folded arms, and far from angered, actually laughed aloud.

Tang Yuan glanced at his right arm, the chill in his voice thickening, and raised a brow at the Lion Emperor. "Care to try?"

As the words fell, three streams of red light abruptly shot out from his waist. Thumb-sized, shaped like lotus seeds, yet crystalline and translucent, flame-tongues rising within them. The next moment, those lotus seeds bored into his mouth. With a crack, he bit them viciously to pieces.

In an instant, Tang Yuan's hair danced wildly, like surging flame, even his gaze several shades more savage. As the remaining two lotus seeds entered his mouth, the skin beneath his snow-white lapels abruptly split open, magma-like liquid gurgling in the gashes, staining his flesh a sheet of blood-red. The surrounding aura turned violent in an instant. The terrifying temperature began scorching everything in sight to char.

The several Great Qian Grandmasters closest to him even had to summon their path infants to resist the leaking of his aura.

Tang Yuan looked impassively toward the Lion Emperor, then the corner of his lips curved into a savage arc. He extended a hand and crooked a fingertip at the other. "Come on."

"Hss."

Such an arrogant expression — where now was the steadiness from Demon-Suppression City?

Xu Wanyun summoned her path infant, her palm gripping the sword-hilt hard. For the first time she felt so truly the gap between herself and a genuine prodigy. The rolling, sweeping flame-waves alone left her somewhat breathless.

She instinctively asked the lower-realmed Shen Yi, "With this treasure's…