The crowd had nothing to say when his eyes fell upon them. The domineering stomp earlier overwhelmed them with dread and apprehension.

The Eternals present wouldn’t dare to provoke Hundred-days Daoist but Li Qiye did so in such an overbearing manner. Who wouldn’t be afraid of him right now?

The gazes of fear had a mix of admiration. Everyone understood that Fiercest was unfathomable, far above their station.

No one could match him in a one-on-one scenario. In fact, taking one move or two from him could prove to be impossible.

The brilliant True Emperor, the impressive deer merchant, and the four Esteemed Kings with their cornucopia of treasures felt great pressure.

They have swept through the realms before and never been afraid of trouble. But Li Qiye resembled a monster whose shadow engulfed them. There was no escaping.

They had plenty of heaven-defying means that could allow them to take down foes above their level. However, their confidence dwindled before Fiercest.

Their only option was to work together or he would kill them one by one. They needed to use their best moves and not let him get a second of breath.

Thus, during this silence, they have been secretly discussing among themselves. The crowd had no idea of this clandestine communication method.

Li Qiye smiled: “If you all won’t step up, then I’ll be the one picking then.”

“Looks like you are truly fearless but we’re not that easily bullied either.” The emperor’s powerful voice answered back.

He walked out of his camp with a great shadow behind him, making him look even more majestic.

“Puresword True Emperor!” Some even shouted at his sight.

Most have only heard of him until now so his first appearance attracted everyone’s attention.

“Immaculate.” Both his friends and enemies sighed and said: “A prodigy like that truly deserves the position of an emperor.”

He wore a simple green robe without needless trinkets and jewels. The upper right of the robe had a sword engraving. Tall and attractive even without exerting his imperial aura, a crane among a flock of chicken even if he weren’t an emperor.

Where he stands became the center of the world. Each of his actions was commanding as if he was the master of the universe.

Those who didn’t like him were still in awe of his stately appearance.

Li Qiye gave him a quick look and asked: “You’re Mu Shaochen’s brother, right? I’m sure you have heard of his last message.”

The emperor’s eyes turned cold after his little brother was brought up. There seemed to be countless swords forming in his pupils. They turned into a frightening maelstrom primed to tear the world apart. Though he didn’t show any rage, everyone could sense the tempestuous aura from him.

No one knew what Mu Shaochen has to do with this, unaware of his death.

The emperor coldly uttered in a certain manner: “Whether it be our personal feud or the overarching situation, only one of us will leave this place alive today.”

“No, I’ll be the only one leaving this place alive.” Li Qiye gently shook his head.

“Are you sure?” A faraway voice joined in: “We, the four Esteemed Kings, highly doubt your ability to keep us here.”

An old man in a golden robe appeared next to the great gourd. His robe seemed to be made of metal despite looking so light. It emitted a blinding glow with rays that could blind the spectators.

***

“An Esteemed King.” Someone quietly said.

Their gourd has been here for a long time but the four kings didn’t come out. This made the spectators very curious. They have been stealing glances several times at the gourd during the event.

“What about the other three?” Someone stretched out their neck to try and see inside the gourd.

“That’s the Four Esteemed King.” An ancestor gave this person a strange look. [1]

“Shouldn’t it be four people? It’s the four Esteemed Kings.” This person didn’t quite understand.

The ancestor looked straight at him and said: “Who told you that it was four people? Four Esteemed King is a single title referring to the master of Hidden Grotto.”

“What, how does that make sense?” The person responded.

In fact, the majority of the crowd didn’t expect this either.

“I thought the same way, that there are four kings.” People exchanged glances. This was their first time hearing about this.

***

“You can doubt all you want.” Li Qiye only glanced briefly at this newcomer and smiled: “You’ll believe how true and precious my words are once you’re a corpse on the ground.”

“We’ll see who will be the corpse. It’s too early to celebrate.” Another old voice joined in.

An old man came out of the forest. His hair and beard were completely white, evident of his old age. Nevertheless, his spirit remained youthful.

. Some of my previous usage of “four kings” or “the kings” in the narrative passages might be wrong now in terms of grammar. It works in Chinese since the author can just say that the entire title is just one person, but when I swapped it to pronouns for brevity and readability, it’s all messed up. I might have used “one of the four kings” to describe the speaker too. Sigh, and this is hard to edit because the readers aren’t supposed to find out till now, so the previous usage is technically right. Maybe I’ll just keep the mistakes the same