Chapter 1234: Young Master Gong-Tu

Chapter 1233: Young Master Gong-Tu

Along the march, the dust billowed endlessly.

Mo Hua rode upon a new barbarian steed, one specially tamed for him by the Chasing Cloud (Zhuiyan) Tribe. Dan-Zhu too was on horseback, following closely behind.

All along the way, Dan-Zhu couldn’t help but glance at Mo Hua’s back, thoughts swirling in his heart. After a while, he finally spoke up.

“Sir…”

Mo Hua turned to look at him.

Dan-Zhu pondered for a moment, then said slowly, “Sir… regarding the Chasing Cloud Tribe—were you… actually reminding me of something?”

Mo Hua’s heart gave a faint stir; in an instant, he understood.

The chieftain of the Chasing Cloud Tribe had three sons.

Dan-Zhu’s father, the Great Chieftain of the Vermilion Sparrow Tribe, also had three sons.

Mo Hua had ordered Chi-Feng to snap the Chasing Cloud chieftain’s neck, killing him on the spot, then used words to “bewitch” Chi-Ju, supporting him to take the chieftain’s seat.

And Dan-Zhu—he too was the third son of the Great Chieftain of the Vermilion Sparrow Tribe.

In a sense, he too was being “bewitched.”

The Vermilion Sparrow Tribe was far stronger, far more complex than the Chasing Cloud Tribe; the two couldn’t even be compared.

Yet the problem before Dan-Zhu was essentially the same one that had faced Chi-Ju.

Dan-Zhu was kind-hearted, but also sensitive—a deeply perceptive and intelligent person.

Perhaps instinctively, he saw his own shadow in Chi-Ju.

Perhaps he also sensed that, in a certain sense, he too was merely—a “piece” on Mo Hua’s board, moved by unseen hands.

Only… this piece was far more important than Chi-Ju ever was.

Mo Hua sighed lightly in his heart.

This “disciple” of his—truly too inwardly sharp, too intelligent.

His kindness made his heart delicate, granted him a perception and insight beyond ordinary men.

And this, too, was one of the drawbacks of sowing Demonic Seeds upon the Dao Heart.

Imposed thoughts—no matter how subtly—would one day be sensed.

To those truly wise and enlightened, one could beguile them for a while, but never for life.

Unless he directly crushed their Spiritual-Consciousness and will, turning them into mere puppets.

Mo Hua gazed at Dan-Zhu calmly, his eyes clear and gentle. “Do you still remember,” he asked softly, “the questions I asked you back then?”

Dan-Zhu nodded faintly.

Mo Hua continued slowly, “You told me, once, that you had secretly vowed—to dedicate everything, that the Vermilion Sparrow Tribe may forever prosper and thrive; that its people may ever live in peace and abundance…”

“But suppose,” Mo Hua’s tone sank slightly, “that this prosperity must be built upon the slaughter of countless barbarian cultivators… upon oppression, exploitation, plunder—even the enslavement of the innocent…”

“Suppose that the power of the Vermilion Sparrow’s upper echelons must be fed by the blood of its lower clansmen…”

“Would you still desire such ‘prosperity’?”

Dan-Zhu fell silent.

That question—Mo Hua had posed it the first time they met.

Through all this time, he had buried it deep in his heart, unwilling to face it, because the question was too sharp.

Sharp enough to pierce through all his beautiful ideals, leaving only a cold, aching pain.

“If all of this is true…”

Mo Hua looked at him. “Then it means that if you wish for the Vermilion Sparrow Tribe to change—if you wish it to become truly strong—you must strike from above.

You must move against your father, your elder brothers, and the elders who favor you.

You must bear the infamy of being heartless and disloyal, and endure the pain of being misunderstood…”

“Can you do that?”

Dan-Zhu’s face went pale, filled with visible anguish.

He could feel, deep within, that Mo Hua’s words carried no deceit—only truth.

And precisely because it was truth, it hurt all the more.

Mo Hua’s tone was calm, almost detached.

“All people spend their lives chasing beautiful ideals, yet never reach them. Because to truly reach them, one must face problems that are difficult… and agonizing.”

“People long for beauty, but flee from pain and contradiction.”

“So most live their entire lives inside their dreams of beauty—and in the end, gain nothing at all.”

“Do you wish to live inside the vision—or to step into the thorns and the hellfire to make it real?”

Dan-Zhu fell into a long silence.

Mo Hua’s gaze softened.

“Before, I didn’t bring up these questions again because it was too soon. Some matters must be pondered in time. But now… time is running out. The great calamity draws near its conclusion. Soon, when we meet the people of your tribe—your father, your brothers—it will be both reunion… and reckoning.”

“In the most extreme case, you may even have to draw your blade against your father and brothers—fight to the death, without retreat.”

“To persist in your own path, even if it means brother against brother.”

“Or to choose fleeting harmony, abandoning your conviction.”

“How you choose—that’s entirely up to you.”

Dan-Zhu’s heart was torn in turmoil—reason and emotion waged endlessly within him; contradictions intertwined, leaving him unable to find peace for a long time.

After a long while, he raised his head and asked softly: “Sir… you won’t one day, secretly… kill my father too, will you?”

Mo Hua froze, a bit helpless.

Your father’s in the late Golden Core stage—if I could kill him, I’d already be in the heavens myself.

He said solemnly: “No.”

Only then did Dan-Zhu quietly let out a breath of relief.

Though “Sir” was only at late Foundation Establishment, after witnessing so many inexplicable “miracles,” Dan-Zhu couldn’t help but feel that—even if his father was late Golden Core—if Mo Hua truly wished to kill him, he might somehow manage it.

So when he heard Mo Hua’s promise, it was as though he had bought his father’s life back with his own words, and he felt a great weight lift from his heart.

(TN: 😂😂😂)

If Sir would not strike, then the rest of the conflict—he would face on his own.

Dan-Zhu fell silent for a while, then looked at Mo Hua earnestly.

“Sir, I still don’t know what I should do… but I’ll think about it carefully.”

Mo Hua’s eyes showed quiet approval. He nodded. “Good.”

Over the next half month, Mo Hua swallowed several more medium and small tribes.

One or two of them were unruly and savage, unwilling to submit.

But unlike the Chasing Cloud Tribe, they possessed no special talents.

So Mo Hua didn’t bother with gentleness—he used a bit of force, killed a few troublemakers, and the rest soon behaved.

A few days later, another incident occurred.

A barbarian soldier came to report—someone had died, and someone had fled.

The one dead was the beautiful concubine of the Young Lord of the Gongtu Tribe.

The one who fled—was that very same Young Lord of the Gongtu Tribe.

Mo Hua went to the scene.

The concubine’s garments were half torn; a dagger was buried in her chest, blood soaking half her robe, terror still frozen on her face.

Mo Hua’s expression darkened.

He had issued strict orders forbidding the barbarian soldiers from violating women—any offender would face the harshest punishment.

Yet after investigation, the truth surprised him.

No soldier had coveted her beauty or tried to force her, killing her afterward to hide it.

Both the Young Lord and his concubine were Mo Hua’s “guests.”

No one dared touch them.

The one who killed her—was none other than the Young Lord Gongtu himself.

Mo Hua frowned, thinking for a moment, and the picture became clear.

They had once been a “wealthy” couple.

When the Young Lord had power—handsome, noble, and rich—his concubine had adored him utterly, bathing in the luxury he provided.

But now, stripped of wealth and guards, living under Mo Hua’s shadow—he had become a fallen noble, a nobody.

In his heart, he was naturally unwilling—and furious.

But the one even more unwilling than him—was his beautiful concubine.

Once, she had been the treasured “pearl” adored by the tribe’s young chieftain, pampered beyond measure.

Now she was merely the concubine of a fallen noble, wearing plain clothes and eating coarse meals.

The more beautiful a woman is, and the more she has basked in the luxuries her beauty once brought, the harder it is for her to endure mediocrity.

And worse—she had seen someone far greater:

Dan-Zhu.

A peerless prodigy of the Golden Core realm, noble of birth, unmatched in talent and grace——he was leagues above the pampered young chieftain of the Gongtu Tribe.

Not to mention, Dan-Zhu had even “saved” her life once.

“Not seeing what is desirable keeps the heart untroubled.”

But people cannot help comparing.

And none suffer more than those whose hearts reach higher than heaven.

That beautiful concubine must have, day by day, thought of Dan-Zhu—and felt nothing but disgust for her own young chieftain.

Anger and jealousy festered in Young Chieftain Gongtu’s heart. Resentment built up over time—until, at last, he lost control.

He turned his blade upon the woman he had once cherished most.

With his own hands, he drove a dagger into the chest of the beauty he had once called his treasure.

When he regained his senses, it was already too late.

Impulsive and cowardly—such was the nature of this kind of pampered wastrel.

Terrified of punishment and condemnation, he fled.

Since he was merely a “guest” under Mo Hua’s protection, and Mo Hua had never restrained him, it wasn’t difficult for him to find an excuse and slip away.

That things had turned out this way left Mo Hua oddly contemplative.

But his sentiment didn’t last long—for calamity was at hand, and he bore the responsibility of tens of thousands of barbarian cultivators.

He still had to divine the Heavenly Secrets of the Great Wilderness, chart the balance between life and death—his Divine-Sense already on the brink of exhaustion each day.

He had neither the time nor the energy to mourn over such trivial matters of love.

After all, they were but fleeting acquaintances—there was nothing more he could do.

So Mo Hua put the matter out of his mind.

Until a few days later, when he once again came upon the young chieftain’s body.

Gongtu was dead.

After murdering the woman he loved, he had fled Mo Hua’s territory—only to die in the end, unable to escape his own doomed fate.

He perished by the roadside in a barren mountain.

Everything on him had been looted.

Even his skin had been flayed off—his body left hanging by the road like a stray dog.

Had Mo Hua not been a master of the Heavenly Secrets and attuned to the man’s aura, he would never have recognized that lump of mangled flesh as the once-proud Young Chieftain of the Gongtu Tribe.

Mo Hua stood in silence, sighing at the cruel fickleness of fate.

To be born a young chieftain—perhaps that had been his fortune.

But to live in an age of chaos—that was his misfortune.

Fate’s cruelty spares no one.

In peaceful times, such a man could live in luxury, basking in his tribe’s protection.

But in years of calamity, beyond the title of “young chieftain,” he was nothing.

Without troops to rely on, and unable to withstand the torment of ordinary hardship, he was fated to die in the wilderness—unnoticed, unmourned.

Before true catastrophe, both beauty and wealth are as fragile as glass.

Mo Hua sighed softly, then ordered the body buried and a simple grave marker erected.

Afterward, he used divination to trace the cause and found the culprits—a band of wandering barbarian cultivators, roaming the chaos, killing all they met and seizing whatever they could.

Mo Hua ordered them executed—thus avenging the fallen young chieftain.

Among their stolen spoils, he found the chieftain’s travel bundle.

The food inside was long eaten, and most other items ruined—only a single token remained.

It appeared to be the Gongtu Tribe’s young chieftain’s command token.

Mo Hua didn’t know its purpose and simply tossed it into his Storage Ring, giving it no further thought.

In the following days, Mo Hua’s forces grew stronger—their numbers swelling to forty thousand.

In sheer manpower, that was only comparable to a sub-division of a great tribe.

But in fighting strength—even excluding Lu-Gu, that late-Stage Golden Core—they rivaled the main force of a third-grade tribe’s central division.

Of course, this was counting the current state of those tribes—after the Royal Court had already conscripted their elite soldiers for its war against the Dao Court.

The barbarian power of the Great Wilderness had already been “harvested”—shorn down like a field of cut grass.

Now, at this point, Mo Hua had to think seriously about finding a place to settle his people.

There were many hard battles ahead, and even more difficult formations to construct.

He needed a foundation—a secure base to stabilize before expanding further.

Yet his current location lay south of the Hengduan Mountain Range, bordering famine-stricken lands—not suitable as a rear base.

After some thought, Mo Hua decided he had no choice but to push northward.

Although by observing the heavens and sensing the qi of the land, he could tell that the north was steeped in slaughter—a battlefield where great tribes clashed—still, he had already devoured all the “small fish” nearby.

If he wished to continue growing, northward expansion was his only path.

Thus, Mo Hua led his people to march north.

After many days’ travel, they drew close to the towering Vermilion Bird Mountain Range—its cliffs sheer as if cleaved by heaven’s blade.

In the flow of Heavenly Secrets ahead, faint red light flickered.

Mo Hua could sense that beyond those mountains lay a place of bloodshed and carnage.

He ordered his followers to camp outside the range, intending to scout ahead personally.

Knowing the danger of this mission, Mo Hua chose his companions carefully—bringing along Lu-Gu and Chi-Feng, the two strongest Golden Core cultivators under his command.

The three of them set out under cover of night, moving toward the Hengduan Mountains.

But before crossing the range, as they passed near some small tribes, Mo Hua noticed something unusual.

He could smell faint traces of blood in the air.

And hidden within that blood scent—a subtle, foul aura of malevolent intent.

“Evil Will?”

Mo Hua’s eyes narrowed slightly. He turned to Lu-Gu and Chi-Feng. “Something’s wrong.”

Lu-Gu and Chi Feng exchanged a glance, both frowning.

Mo Hua said: “Put on the concealment robes I gave you.”

Chi-Feng obeyed immediately; Lu-Gu seemed reluctant, but did the same.

Mo Hua, pretending to follow suit, donned his own robe—then led the two deeper into the darkness, toward a nearby tribe.

As they approached the tribe, Mo Hua’s gaze hardened.

It looked, at first glance, like a normal little tribe.

But soon—it wouldn’t be normal at all.

Because in the air hovered a wisp of an Evil God’s Divine-Sense—and within that Divine-Sense lurked a desire to devour humans, a hunger that stirred an uncontrollable urge in one’s heart.

Worse still, that Divine-Sense seemed to be growing stronger.

Mo Hua frowned, expanded his Divine-Sense, and followed its thread—until he reached the central plaza of the tribe.

There stood a crude stone idol.

It was deep into the night, and before the idol crouched a black-robed figure, half-merged into the shadows, tracing strange symbols on the ground.

Mo Hua quietly approached from behind, craning his neck to see what he was drawing.

The black-robed figure was wholly absorbed—yet something about him was off. His eyes gleamed red with madness, his fingers dipped in blood as if controlled by unseen hands, painting intricate, gruesome runes upon the ground—bloody sigils forming an eerie, mysterious formation.

His expression was one of extreme focus—almost reverence.

And just as he was lost in his work, a calm gentle voice suddenly spoke beside him:

“Who taught you to draw formations runes like this?”

(End of this Chapter)