Chapter 5:
Seeing Qin Xuan’s reaction, Qin Chuan immediately understood—news of Qin Feng’s death hadn’t yet spread through the Qin family.
With a faint smile, Qin Chuan calmly said, “I’ll count to three. Leave the money for repairing the gate, then get out of my sight. If you do that, I might let you go. Otherwise…”
“Hahahahaha… what did I just hear?”
Qin Xuan was stunned for a moment, then exchanged glances with the two attendants behind him before bursting into laughter.
He pointed at Qin Chuan with his right hand, laughing so hard he nearly lost his breath. After a while, he wiped the tears from the corners of his eyes, as if Qin Chuan’s words had genuinely made him laugh that hard.
Once he composed himself, Qin Xuan sneered, “You think you're still someone important? Do you still imagine you’re the Qin family’s young master?”
Qin Chuan remained expressionless. He ignored the laughter and began counting.
“Three.”
“Two.”
Seeing this, Qin Xuan’s expression gradually turned cold, and an uneasy feeling rose in his heart. Before Qin Chuan could finish counting, he suddenly shouted, “Da Hu! Er Hu! Break his legs! I want to see how long he can keep acting tough!”
The two men beside him grinned viciously and began walking toward Qin Chuan. Though just servants, Profound Energy surged faintly around their bodies—they were both at the 2nd stage of Body Refinement Realm. In their eyes, a crippled Qin Chuan with no bloodline and a destroyed dantian was no threat at all.
At that thought, both of them punched toward Qin Chuan at once.
“One.”
As soon as he said it, Qin Chuan’s figure vanished and then burst forward.
Bang! Bang!
Two muffled booms rang out. Before the two servants could react, they were flung away like sandbags and crashed to the ground over ten meters away, their fates unknown.
It all happened in an instant—over before it even began.
“This can’t be real… Your cultivation?!”
Qin Xuan’s pupils contracted in disbelief. He simply couldn’t accept what he was seeing.
Qin Chuan didn’t respond. He only looked silently at the dumbstruck Qin Xuan.
“Don’t get ahead of yourself!”
Qin Xuan’s face twisted with rage. With a furious roar, he unleashed the full power of his 8th stage Body Refinement Realm. A pale white glow radiated from his palm.
“Profound Tiger Palm!”
A tiger-shaped phantom appeared above Qin Xuan’s head—this was a mid-grade Yellow-rank martial skill he had practiced for a long time. On the Tianyuan Continent, martial skills were ranked Heaven, Earth, Profound, and Yellow, with upper, middle, and lower grades.
Qin Xuan had cultivated the mid-grade Profound Tiger Palm to the minor mastery level. Its power was enough to defeat even a 9th stage Body Refinement Realm opponent.
“Go to hell!”
As the tiger shadow formed, Qin Xuan’s confidence surged. He channeled all his Profound Energy and lunged at Qin Chuan.
Qin Chuan sneered coldly. Without using any martial technique, he simply wrapped his hand in Profound Energy and met the attack with a single punch.
BOOM!
In the blink of an eye, fist collided with palm. A powerful shockwave exploded outward, stirring up clouds of dust.
Qin Xuan was sent flying by the impact, crashing heavily to the ground.
“Ahhh! My hand!”
Moments later, a blood-curdling scream echoed through the courtyard. Qin Xuan’s entire right arm had been twisted out of shape, lying limp at his side.
“P-Profound Realm?!”
Qin Xuan lifted his head and stared in terror at Qin Chuan, who stood unmoving after that single blow.
He saw it clearly—Qin Chuan hadn’t used any martial technique. Just his raw physical power alone had crushed Qin Xuan’s Yellow-rank technique.
There was only one possibility—he had stepped into the Profound Realm.
Before Qin Xuan could recover from the shock, a foot suddenly pressed down hard on his chest.
Qin Chuan looked down at him and mocked, “Weren’t you going to cripple me just now?”
The noise in the courtyard had already attracted many servants from nearby.
“Didn’t they say Young Master Qin Chuan’s dantian was destroyed? How could he still defeat Young Master Qin Xuan like that?”
“Could it be that the destruction of his dantian was a ruse to flush out traitors in the Qin family?”
“Shh! That’s not something we should be talking about. Looks like Young Master Qin Xuan is in deep trouble…”
The servants whispered in disbelief, their eyes wide with shock.
Xiaolan had just put down her cooking utensils in the kitchen when she heard the commotion. She came out just in time to witness the scene. Her mouth formed a round "O" in surprise.
Only now did she realize that all those rumors about her young master losing his strength were lies. He was still as powerful as ever!
…
“Brother Chuan! I was wrong! I’ll pay for the gate! Please let me go just this once!”
His right arm ruined, Qin Xuan was pale with pain, begging repeatedly for mercy.
“Oh? You know you were wrong now?”
Qin Chuan let out a cold laugh. “If you weren’t lying under my foot, would you ever have admitted you were wrong? I gave you a chance earlier, but you didn’t cherish it.”
As he finished speaking, he stomped down—breaking Qin Xuan’s left leg.
“AHHH!”
A pig-like scream tore through the air.
“Brother Chuan… y-you’re my blood brother! Please… tell me what I need to do to survive!”
Cold sweat poured down Qin Xuan’s face. He stammered, shaking with fear. For the first time in his life, he felt how close death could be.
Qin Chuan paused thoughtfully, then smiled and asked, “So how do you plan to compensate me for the gate?”
“Five hundred spirit crystals! I’ll give you five hundred spirit crystals!”
It was just a wooden gate—it would cost at most fifty spirit crystals to fix. Five hundred was already far more than enough, or so Qin Xuan thought.
“Oh?”
Qin Chuan smiled and slowly raised his foot, shifting it toward Qin Xuan’s most vulnerable area.
“I suggest you think carefully before answering.”
It was clear he wasn’t satisfied with that offer.
“One thousand five hundred spirit crystals! And a bottle of Heart-Clearing Pill and a bottle of Spirit-Nurturing Pill! That’s everything I’ve saved over the years—take it all!”
Qin Xuan nearly screamed his offer. He was terrified that even a moment’s hesitation would lead to Qin Chuan crushing his life completely.
He wasn’t lying. Though he was the grandson of the Fifth Elder, the Qin family was large, and every member received limited monthly resources. Most of it had gone toward his own cultivation. Saving up that much was no easy feat.
“Heart-Clearing Pill, Spirit-Nurturing Pill…”
Qin Chuan pondered. Pills were divided into nine grades, with each grade split into low, mid, and high quality. These two pills were both 1st-grade low-tier pills. Though not particularly rare, they still held value—each could fetch several hundred spirit crystals.
With a smile, Qin Chuan said, “Alright. I’ll give you half a cup of tea’s time.”
Qin Xuan trembled. He understood Qin Chuan’s meaning instantly and yelled toward the gate, “Go to my courtyard! Under the tree, there’s a box buried there—bring it!”
Among the gathered servants, a few were from Qin Xuan’s courtyard. They quickly ran to fetch the box. A short time later, one of them returned with a wooden box still covered in dirt and handed it to Qin Chuan.
Qin Chuan glanced inside and found everything matched what Qin Xuan had promised. He nodded indifferently and said, “You may leave.”
Before Qin Xuan could say anything, a few servants quickly lifted him and carried him away in a panic.
The other onlookers also scattered quickly, not daring to linger.
Looking down at the two pill bottles left behind, Qin Chuan suddenly remembered—when he parted ways with Empress Yaoxi, she had handed him a book titled Origin Core Scripture.
She had said that owning a treasure like the Heaven and Earth Spirit Furnace but not knowing how to refine pills was a complete waste.
She even remarked that the so-called pills of this world were little more than clumps of medicine with some effect and hardly worthy of being called real pills.
According to her, even the most basic recipe in that scripture could easily outperform the pills of this realm.
Given her strength, there was no reason to doubt her—especially since they had already shared the most intimate of bonds.
That made Qin Chuan even more curious about the Origin Core Scripture.
“It’s time to study this book properly. Let’s hope it lives up to the hype.”
With that thought, Qin Chuan looked at the two pill bottles in his hand, eyes flashing with light, and turned to leave the Qin family estate.