Fang Chaoyun was furious.
This old man had always been short-tempered. In the beginning, Song Fei wanted him to cultivate Confucianism to refine his temperament, but clearly, it wasn't very effective.
"Senior Martial Brother Fang, you… Master isn't here right now. If you also abandon your duties here, the war will be delayed!" A young man stood in front of Fang Chaoyun, earnestly trying to persuade him.
This young man named Tang Jie was also one of Song Fei's disciples.
Among Song Fei's disciples, Tang Jie couldn't be said to be very eye-catching. He wasn't as talented as their youngest martial brother Lu Yang, and his strength couldn't compare with Fang Chaoyun and Shi Yeyan. He hadn't even reached Realm Level yet.
However, Tang Jie was quite famous and popular because he was an all-rounder who could do anything.
There seemed to be nothing in the world that Tang Jie couldn't learn, but once he got started, he would encounter all kinds of difficulties if he wanted to delve deeper into the subject, never able to achieve mastery.
Therefore, his martial brothers always asked Tang Jie to help whenever they were busy. This was also the case right now.
It's just that the matter Fang Chaoyun asked Tang Jie to help with was a bit too important, so important that not even Tang Jie himself dared to accept—Fang Chaoyun wanted him to supervise the Great War between the two worlds.
"You can do it." Fang Chaoyun glared furiously, his tone leaving no room for objection, "Gu Nan bullied me like this. If I can't make him pay a price, how will I have any face to see Master?"
Fang Chaoyun received news of Lin Huan's death immediately and also knew where he died.
So without another word, this old man planned to leave the Great War to Tang Jie while he himself returned to Graceful Heaven to mobilize all his troops to attack… Mm, No Name Change til Unified Dao Realm.
Fang Chaoyun did have a clear-cut separation between public and private affairs. Lin Huan's death at Gu Nan's hands was a personal grudge, so he didn't want to delay the Great War, let alone abuse his authority for personal gain by commanding unrelated personnel to attack Gu Nan.
He just wanted to hand over the authority in his hands and have his own Graceful Heaven take action.
Fang Chaoyun's heart was indeed filled with rage, but he wasn't carried away by his anger.
He'd already suffered a loss in Gu Nan's Divine Kingdom before and was fully aware that Gu Nan would be particularly powerful with the blessing of his astral world, so he decided to attack Gu Nan's astral world directly.
As long as he destroyed Gu Nan's astral world or even weakened the degree of its blessing, Fang Chaoyun was sure he could suppress the opponent.
Tang Jie, however, was extremely anxious. He was just a normal, weak Star Ruler, yet why did Academic Heaven choose him of all people for this? But Fang Chaoyun told him that Academic Heaven had already decided on Tang Jie as this Great War's commander-in-chief.
So Tang Jie had no choice but to say, "In that case, I hope Senior Martial Brother can resolve your personal matter as soon as possible."
"Junior Martial Brother can rest assured." A cold glint flashed through Fang Chaoyun's eyes. "It won't take long."
...
Once again, Gu Nan proved through practice that the Myriad Heavens and the World of Gods were the same in essence.
He was also affected by preconceptions and subconsciously believed that the target of the Second Round's blood sacrifice should be a god, but he didn't expect the name "Fang Chaoyun" to appear instead.
"Looks like the Second Round's mission selection is determined based on the location of the Evil God Temple?" Gu Nan rubbed his chin, thinking about the implications behind this.
In other words, the Evil God Temple inside the Divine Kingdom was indeed a corporeal existence that could truly reflect this world.
But putting aside the element of being from the Myriad Heavens, Fang Chaoyun was indeed a very suitable target.
He was quite strong—the Dao of Confucianism had exceedingly diverse abilities but just wasn't suited for head-on battles. Moreover, he had a rare background.
The total number of direct disciples of Unified Dao cultivators wasn't actually much higher than the number of Unified Dao existences themselves.
At this moment, Yan Xiaoxiao's voice suddenly rang out in Gu Nan's heart, "Teacher, Xue Ren is here."
...
Gu Nan and Xue Ren were sitting across from each other in a small pavilion in the Divine Kingdom, while Gu Nan was leisurely pouring himself tea.
"I thought you were in serious isolated cultivation and wouldn't come out even if the sky fell down," Gu Nan chatted with a smile, as if everything else never happened.
Xue Ren chuckled. "If I still didn't come out, the Heaven-God Alliance would break up."
"Isn't there still that old man?" Gu Nan casually replied while drinking tea.
Xue Ren just shook his head, having no intention of elaborating. Instead, he said in a heavy voice, "Lingyang told me what happened over there… This whole matter was planned by you. You'd also planned to attack Imperial Glory Heaven long in advance, didn't you?"
Gu Nan glanced up at him and asked unhurriedly, "So what if I did?"
Seeing that Gu Nan didn't deny it, Xue Ren finally revealed a look of regret and slowly stood up.
He took out the longsword from his waist and said in a low voice, "Originally, I shouldn't be furthering internal strife in the face of an approaching catastrophe, but I must give Taisheng an account. One strike. After one strike, you and the Heaven-God Alliance will go their separate ways."
Gu Nan didn't even budge but revealed a smile of interest. "Looks like you didn't forcibly cut short your isolated cultivation. You made a breakthrough?"
There was neither sadness nor joy on Xue Ren's face. "Just in time to test my breakthrough on you."
As he finished speaking, the longsword in Xue Ren's hand already thrust out. Anyone familiar with Xue Ren would definitely be stunned.
Because this strike actually contained an unprecedentedly fierce sword intent!
Everyone knew that Xue Ren had always been a representative of the new swordsmanship, while the existence of sword intent was one of the biggest symbols of traditional swordsmanship.
Perhaps Xue Ren also cultivated sword intent back when he was younger, but this sword intent was so intense that even a high-level Star Ruler who single-mindedly cultivated swordsmanship might not be able to possess it!
In order to ascend to Unified Dao in ten years, Xue Ren finally put aside his stubbornness and tried to integrate the new and old swordsmanship styles to find a new path of his own.
But to be able to cultivate his sword intent from zero to this point in less than two years, he was indeed the strongest swordsman in the Myriad Heavens!
The sword thrust heading for Gu Nan looked no different from a mortal's attack. It moved slowly and leisurely without any law fluctuations.
Only the person directly facing this strike could feel the countless calculations behind the sword's path.
No matter which direction Gu Nan moved in or what response he made, the sword would immediately change accordingly. Because all variations in the sword's path had already been accounted for by Xue Ren.
This sure-hit sword was Xue Ren's sword path.
But in front of Gu Nan, this was akin to trying to charm the blind with one's good looks.
Because Gu Nan didn't budge at all and allowed the longsword to freely pierce his chest. The terrifying sword intent burst out and shattered all his internal organs, bones, and veins in an instant.
"You…" Xue Ren looked surprised. Gu Nan didn't even use the power of his astral world. Could it be that he wanted to die?
Could it be that Academic Heaven really was coercing him into doing their bidding, but Gu Nan didn't want to help the enemy, so he chose to die at Xue Ren's hands?
However, Xue Ren quickly discarded this thought. Because he then saw Gu Nan slowly get up, and his body, which was originally soft due to bone loss, was quickly returning to its original shape.
"Still a bit short of Unified Dao." Gu Nan said blandly, "Now then, why don't you also take one punch from me?"