Chapter 149: Chapter 148: I Used So Much Force, How Are You Still Alive?

"Senior! We’re willing to hand over everything we’ve found!"

A shout erupted from the crowd, and it was echoed by many other voices. It seemed everyone now understood their predicament.

Any thoughts they’d had of fleeing, charging the line, or even snatching the other side’s storage pouches had completely vanished.

From the moment the giant boulder was lifted, their only thought was survival.

But as the boulder flew toward them and then came crashing down...

BOOM!—

After the ground stopped shaking, miserable screams echoed from the pass of Flying Serpent Gorge.

The boulder didn’t stop after impact. Carried by its remaining momentum, it continued to roll deep into Flying Serpent Gorge.

SQUELCH! CRUNCH!—

The boulder was like a millstone of flesh and blood, crushing countless bodies as it rolled, accompanied by the nauseating, wet sound of bursting pulp.

By the time its momentum faded and it slowly came to a halt, the boulder, having rolled for dozens of yards, was coated in a thick layer of bloody paste, flesh, and bone.

’I put so much effort into that, how are some of them still alive?’

Wu Chen squinted. In the boulder’s wake, anyone left was either dead or grievously wounded.

Even a glancing blow would have shattered bones and torn tendons, given their Meridian Passage Realm physiques.

But there were several hundred of them, and he had only thrown a single stone. Killing forty or fifty people was about the most it could do.

Just as Wu Chen was considering whether to toss another boulder, the survivors, their courage utterly broken, scrambled and crawled to a stop about ten feet before him. They kowtowed, slamming their foreheads into the ground and holding their pouches high.

Clearly, they had given up all thoughts of resistance.

"Not bad."

Wu Chen nodded, quite satisfied with their performance.

He had originally thought this group would flee into Flying Serpent Gorge to hide after the boulder attack.

That would have forced him to leave Xue Hongling to guard the pass while he hunted them down one by one.

Now, it seemed things wouldn’t be so troublesome.

With a small group setting an example, the remaining hundreds found it quite natural to kneel as well.

Wu Chen looked at the terrified masses kneeling before him and said amicably,

"I won’t make things hard on you. We’ll go for a fifty-fifty split of everything you’ve gathered in the gorge."

"Thank you, Senior, for sparing our lives!"

"Of course, we’ll do as Senior says!"

Joy flickered across their faces as they collectively breathed a sigh of relief.

’A fifty-fifty split? You should have just said so from the start! I would’ve been first in line! Why cause such a huge scene?!’

They quickly formed a line to hand their pouches to Wu Chen, not daring to hide a single thing.

"A fifty-fifty... split?"

Xue Hongling was just now recovering from the shock of seeing Wu Chen lift and throw the massive boulder, watching it crash into the crowd like a meteor.

She rubbed her stiff face. Listening to the exchange between Wu Chen and the crowd, her brow furrowed in confusion.

’All that effort just for a fifty-fifty split?’

But since Wu Chen had already made his decision, she couldn’t very well say anything. She was about to step forward to help.

Then she saw a Blood Evil disciple, who had just received his pouch back from Wu Chen, standing frozen on the spot with a stunned expression.

He looked down at his pouch, which had been full just moments ago but was now nearly empty. He looked as if he’d been struck by lightning.

"Senior..."

He asked in disbelief, "This is a fifty-fifty split?"

"That’s right. It’s a fifty-fifty split."

Wu Chen replied coolly, "You get five percent. I get the other ninety-five percent."

"What, is there a problem?"

Xue Hongling, who had been about to walk over and help, felt her knees go weak.

’You call *that* a fifty-fifty split?’

A moment ago, she’d thought Wu Chen was being far too merciful by splitting the loot evenly.

Now she saw there was no mercy at all. He was practically stripping them down to their underwear!

But she knew this cut was so ruthless it might just provoke the crowd into a furious backlash.

So, she quietly rested her hand on the hilt of her blade, ready for any sudden killing intent.

But to Xue Hongling’s surprise, in response to Wu Chen’s question, everyone simply shook their heads. No one dared to resist; they just silently presented their pouches.

The image of the giant boulder crashing down was clearly seared into their minds.

Besides, from their perspective, the secret realm had only been open for a few days. The end was a long way off.

Even if they were cleaned out now, they could just go somewhere else and earn more Contribution Points.

But if they chose to fight... They remembered the boulder that had hurtled out of the sky, and the piles of bloody paste in the gorge behind them.

The men were terrified, their manhood shrinking to the size of a pea.

They knew fighting meant certain death, while just staying alive meant they could still gain something later. So, faced with Wu Chen’s... unique interpretation of a "fifty-fifty split," they could only lower their heads and accept it.

"You, you, you! And you! Out here!"

But there were too many of them, and Wu Chen had no patience to collect the spoils one by one, so he pointed out a few people in the crowd.

The men who were singled out had no idea what was happening. Their faces turned ashen, as if they’d been marked by the King of Hell himself, and they stumbled forward, trembling.

"Honored Senior..."

Their legs shook as they bowed and scraped, their faces plastered with fawning smiles.

Wu Chen tossed a storage pouch to each of them. "Collect everything, according to the terms I just laid out."

"Don’t worry, Senior, we guarantee we’ll complete the task!"

The four men’s eyes lit up as they instantly grasped the situation.

They took the storage pouches and turned to face the crowd. Their backs straightened, their noses went up in the air, and they roared:

"Damn it, hurry up and hand everything over!"

"You’re not keeping much anyway, so just give us all of it!"

"What are you muttering about, you brat! You got a death wish?!"

"..."

The four of them were impossibly arrogant, immediately upping the ante and making the decision for Wu Chen: they wouldn’t leave a single scrap for anyone else.

When someone dared to mutter a complaint, a sword sheath came crashing down on their head, leaving them bloodied and beaten.

But still, no one dared to fight back.

No one was afraid of these four men. They were afraid of the man standing behind them, Wu Chen, who was currently whispering to the young woman at his side.

He was the true source of their fear.

Watching the four men at work, Wu Chen couldn’t help but grin.

He didn’t stop them, though. His entire reason for picking them out was to divide the crowd in the first place.

He just hadn’t expected the tactic to be quite so effective; he could already feel the crowd’s hatred shifting towards the four enforcers.

One could easily predict what would become of these four after they left Flying Serpent Gorge.

"See? What did I tell you? They’re only brave when bullying their own kind."

Wu Chen chuckled, looking at the dazed expression on Xue Hongling’s face.

"People like them have no guts when it comes to facing outsiders, but when it comes to dealing with their own..."

"They have plenty of guts for that!"

Xue Hongling: "..."

Watching everything unfold exactly as Wu Chen had predicted, Xue Hongling was at a loss for words.

"So... you’re in the Organ Refining Realm?"

After a long pause, Xue Hongling came to a conclusion, one she felt more and more certain was correct.

Even though the rules of this secret realm suppressed the aura of the Organ Refining Realm, a physique that had been nourished by such an aura was far beyond what someone at the Perfection stage of the Jade Bone Realm could ever hope to match.

Only a body from the Organ Refining Realm could possibly have the strength to lift and throw that boulder.

Then again, she felt that even the Blood Evil Elders outside the secret realm would have a hard time casually tossing a boulder like that based on physical strength alone.

Wu Chen just smiled and said nothing.

’I really can’t say,’ he thought. ’After all, who knows what realm I’ll reach by the time this trip to the secret realm is over.’

’The less said, the better.’

Seeing he wasn’t answering, Xue Hongling began toying with a lock of hair that had fallen across her chest and said softly,

"If you really are in the Organ Refining Realm, then you have even less reason to be so reckless and come here."

"You should be focusing on your cultivation, biding your time and building your strength."

"You have to understand, the deeper we go into this secret realm, the stronger the people we’ll encounter. Even with your Organ Refining Realm physique, I doubt you could withstand a simultaneous attack from a dozen cultivators at the Perfection stage of the Jade Bone Realm."

"And as for my problems, you don’t have to worry about them. Even if I end up at the Blood Palace, I’ll find my own way out..."

"..."

Wu Chen didn’t answer. He sat on his chair, quietly listening to the young woman’s chiding.

It wasn’t until she finished that he began to ponder her words.

"The Blood Palace?!"

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