It all began inside a small chamber on the outskirts of Blue Emerald Island, within a little hut near a cliff edge, where towering waves crashed rhythmically against the shore. This hut was shabby. Several planks, nailed to the window frames, covered the windows, and the door on the sides of the hut were similarly sealed. Vines had overtaken the structure, making it look half-submerged in a sea of reddish-green foliage. Large, numerous trees grew to the side of it, as if the hut had once been filled with countless seeds of trees that had spilled to its sides. Though it looked abandoned, anyone who could see this hut would certainly think that, once upon a time, it had belonged to someone extraordinary.

The key here was "if they could," for not many could.

Subtle formations protected this little hut. Mortals would forget ever seeing it, and even cultivators would have a hard time finding it. Hence, this hut was a perfect place to hide and wait.

Inside this tightly shut hut, two cultivators sat cross-legged. One tended a small cauldron filled to the brim with a brown, mud-like liquid, several herbs swirling within. The man looked young, his eyes sharp, and he concentrated intensely on succeeding with the pills he currently made.

The other cultivated the qi from the air around him. He cultivated a scripture that combined the qi from the sea and the trees, so his current location was quite optimal. Although, compared to his chamber in the sect, the qi here was thin and difficult to control. Nonetheless, he could not complain.

Both were disciples of the Three Great Sects of Blue Emerald Island—or rather, former disciples, since the Nether Lotus Sect had destroyed those three sects almost two months ago. Currently, the former members of these three sects moved together as a resistance with a single goal, which was to recapture their lands.

Scattered across Blue Emerald Island were hundreds of bases containing the resistance. Communication between them was smooth, and they were trying to recuperate their power before launching their attacks against the Nether Lotus Sect, which currently rampaged across the island. Their planned attacks were not yet decided, but all of them, whether elders or disciples, knew it would not be too long. They were unwilling to let the Nether Lotus Sect occupy their land for even a second longer, after all.

While the date of their main attack remained undecided, their plan of action was roughly twofold. One was to harass the Nether Lotus Sect occupying the entire island by raiding their warehouses, ambushing their disciples, polluting their waters, and even releasing prisoners they intended to refine into pills, whilet he second was to gather reinforcements.

Their first plan was more or less still ongoing, while the second had actually made no progress. It seemed that not only Blue Emerald Island had fallen to the Nether Lotus Sect, but plenty of other islands had fallen too.

Truth be told, the remaining members of the former Three Great Sects were quite numerous. The force of the Nether Lotus Sect on this island, while greater, was not overwhelmingly so. If they decided to fight head-on, they had a fifty percent chance of winning. The problem was that the Nether Lotus Sect could receive reinforcements from its main sect in just a couple of minutes, thanks to a ferocious cultivator named Han Jiulao.

Unlike any teleporter, his range was wide, and he could teleport with other people too. Granted, the number of people he could carry was no more than three, but it still posed a big problem if Han Jiulao transported one of the Six Elite Elders to crush their enemies. Hence, they needed a strategy centered around hindering Han Jiulao.

The plan to do that was still up in the air. After all, people with space affinity were rare, and no one from the three sects knew anything substantial about teleportation. Still, the initial plan was to handle Han Jiulao first before launching any large-scale attacks. While the Han clan still had more than twenty teleporters—an absurdly large number—no one was greater than Han Jiulao.

The two cultivators inside the hut prepared in their own ways. They were inner disciples from one of the Three Great Sects, and while both wanted to be the one to kill Han Jiulao, their senior—one who possessed an affinity for shadow and was a master of ambush—was better suited for the task. Granted, the news from their seniors had been quite bleak. After all, the Han clan was right in the middle of the Nether Lotus Sect's main territory, and he struggled even to enter that territory, let alone sneak in and kill Han Jiulao in his sleep.

That was until the senior urgently contacted them again.

Today, with a trembling but excited voice, he delivered earth-shattering news.

"Han Jiulao is currently gravely injured! I repeat, he is gravely injured! I heard that the young master of the Nether Lotus Sect was angered by him and tried to kill him!"

An opportunity had suddenly appeared!

"Brother, did my ears mishear, or has a golden opportunity suddenly arrived?" the alchemist asked.

The other looked calm, but he too was excited. "Your ears are not wrong, brother. It seems even the heavens support us!"

They feverishly contacted every base they could and spread this great news.

In less than thirty minutes, the news had spread like wildfire among the remnants of the three great sects. Less than two hours later, a plan to retake Blue Emerald Island was conceived, and then, less than an hour after that, the true rulers of Blue Emerald Island were ready for war.

***

In one of the pill refineries of the Nether Lotus Sect, a demonic cultivator stood atop a balcony, overseeing a process that would earn him enough sect points to finally purchase the Supreme Blood Claws Technique. This demonic cultivator wore a black cultivator robe with blood patterns on it, his sash the color of gold, and his long, red hair flowed like a river of blood. He grinned from ear to ear, his eyes manic, and a vile aura accompanied by the stench of blood permeated from him.

He liked to introduce himself as Blood Beast, and indeed, he was a beast.

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In the open field before him, in the middle of a complicated formation, stood a single giant creature that looked as if it were made from several blobs of meat smashed together. It had two small, weak and scrawny hands like those of a scholar, while its two small feet tanned and looked like those of a farmer. Its face cried rivers of blood from its two empty eye sockets. Its mouth, gushing out a river of blood, let out wails like those of small baby whales. Behind this three-meter creature, hundreds of people looked at it with various expressions: anguish, sadness, rage, fear, and many more. After all, this hideous creature that emitted a foul smell like rotten blood was their children. Skinned, ripped, and smashed together into one.

Blood Beast could not help but cackle. When he did, a man with tan skin and black eyes stared at him with cold, murderous intent, his face twisted as if he wanted to tear Blood Beast's neck with his bare teeth—which was good, very good.

This specific recipe to create a Blood General was, in a way, inferior. After all, instead of using cultivators, he was using mortal kids. But he had perfected this recipe so the Blood General he created, while initially weak, could have the potential to grow stronger. And this recipe's special ingredient was the parents' negative energy. The stronger their feelings, the more the formations hidden beneath their feet captured their energy, and this, in turn, would give that creature, the seed of his personal Blood General, higher potential.

"More, more!" Blood Beast exclaimed, while channeling qi to a specific formation.

Instantly, the Blood Creature stopped wailing. Its empty eye sockets looked around meaningfully, and its hideous face looked confused. Then, when it saw the man who had been staring daggers at Blood Beast, the creature, in a gentle voice, said, "Father?"

As the creature talked, the man looked at it with a flabbergasted expression. "S-son? I-is that you? You, you're still alive?"

"Father? My eyes feel weird. I can see you, but I cannot see you? Oh no! Am I going blind? Do I need to use spectacles like Fatty Guo? Damn, is it karma? I should not have mocked him so much!"

"Son!" The man rushed to the Blood Creature with glistening eyes, then with both his hands, he clawed at the creature, as if trying to dig his son from the slab of meat.

"That hurts! Father, stop, stop!" The Blood Creature began to cry, like a small child whose feet were broken yet still tried to walk. The father, upon hearing the scream of pain from the creature, stopped tearing its flesh, but when he saw a glimpse of his son's face inside the meat—an illusion, the result of an array formation—the father shouted, "Hang in there a moment!" before tearing at the creature more ferociously.

At one point, the other parents saw illusions of their children emerging from the flesh as well, and they too tried to dig their children out. Soon, their hands, feet, faces, and bodies were drenched in blood.

The Blood Creature, meanwhile, screamed bloodcurdling shouts. Its voice was now an overlapping of children's sounds. They begged their parents to stop hurting them, saying sorry, and screaming uncontrollably, as if their parents were beating them ruthlessly until their limbs broke. Blood Beast made sure the illusion was convincing enough, and even he could see some parents crying uncontrollably while trying to dig their children from the Blood Creature, conflicted by the situation.

To extract the most anguish, he needed to create hope, and this play would turn more and more violent after the formation scattered some more hallucinogenic substance into the air. Blood Beast looked forward to the next step, where the parents, in their maddened state, would begin crying rivers of blood and severing their limbs to "make up" for the children they were hurting, when suddenly, a huge explosion occurred behind him.

Blood Beast narrowed his eyes. This compound, which functioned as a pill refinery, indeed handled volatile substances. The extract of Blood Spirit was so destructive that even a faint trace of Yang energy would make it explode.

"Those incompetent fools!" Blood Beast snarled.

Unlike those cowards who decided to mask their cultivation, Blood Beast was true to his chosen path. While it was more dangerous, this, in turn, made him one of the most proficient in the demonic arts, especially for refining pills or creating undead minions. The people assigned to him were not like him, and so, they needed to be taught how to handle all the materials, and even then, they seemed to make many mistakes.

"I should refine one of them into a pill as a punishment!"

Blood Beast glanced at the proceeding ritual, calculated that there was time before the next step, and turned his body, intending to rush toward the source of the explosion. But even before he took a single step, a yellow thunderbolt punched through a wall, destroying it into a cloud of dust and debris. The thunderbolt moved so fast and straight toward his face.

Upon seeing that attack, Blood Beast's manic eyes widened in surprise, and he reflexively swung his hand to deflect the attack. But the reflex was the wrong move, since the thunderbolt was so strong that when it hit his right hand, his hand exploded into a rain of blood. Instantly, Blood Beast roared in pain. He looked at his right hand, which had been mangled, with some white bones protruding from his skin.

"Who dares to attack me?!" he shouted.

"Blood Beast, you fiend, I'll kill you!"

A cultivator wearing a blue robe and white pants flew through the destroyed wall. He flew through the air on a flying sword, brandishing a white straight sword. His face twisted into a rage-filled expression, and his eyes were so cold and murderous that he looked like a terrifying demon.

Blood Beast instantly gathered the blood mist around him and activated his enchantment technique. Instantly, his body was shrouded in red mist, his destroyed hand began regenerating, and he whipped his left hand toward the flying cultivator, each finger coated in blood.

"Now!"

Blood Beast anticipated that his fingers and the sword of his enemy would meet. Instead, the enemy stopped abruptly, making his fingers hit only air, and he lost his balance a little. This mistake was big, because two hands suddenly emerged from the ground, destroying the floor near Blood Beast's feet, and caught his feet so fast that the two hands looked like cobras. Then, the hands pulled Blood Beast down, until he was submerged into the floor up to his knees.

The cultivator with the flying sword rushed again, this time unleashing a real strike that bit at Blood Beast's neck. The cultivator wanted to behead him, but unfortunately for him, Blood Beast was tough.

Blood Beast snarled and tried to shake off the cultivator holding both his feet. To escape, he decided to sever his own feet and use the blood mist to pull himself back. Soon, the cultivator still holding his severed feet emerged from the ground.

This man had a bald head and wore an orange monk outfit with a giant bead necklace around his neck. Unlike the cultivator with the flying sword, he had a calm expression, but even Blood Beast knew that beneath it lurked a ferocious storm.

Blood Beast gritted his teeth, and from there, a fierce fight between a demonic cultivator against a righteous cultivator and a monk occurred. Their moves were swift. Each of their attacks destroyed walls and floors; some roofs even collapsed. Moreover, many fights raged inside and outside the compound. Various cultivators with varying abilities fought against demonic cultivators from the Nether Lotus Sect.

Their fight was destructive and chaotic. Many people were successfully beheaded, blood spurting from their necks. Some were charred beyond recognition. Some had purple skin and died from agonizing poison. Some were cut in two.

The dead were not only from the Nether Lotus Sect; native cultivators from Blue Emerald Island also died.

Similar fights happened around the same time across the entire island. If anyone had been looking from the sky, they would have seen various explosions and destruction occurring all over. The island itself trembled. The air filled with a cacophony of chaos and destruction.

The war had just begun.

Yet, the destruction was not spreading entirely. There were still no billowing fires.

But soon, it would happen.

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