The man chuckled softly, not speaking immediately, but gently plucking the strings of the zither in front of him, causing a melodious sound to resound around.

"Then I wish you success!"

"I will definitely succeed!" the king said confidently.

"King, the higher you stand, the harder you fall, remember my words!" the man said blandly. "For the waves of the Yangtze River push against each other, and you will surely be stranded on the sands!"

"It depends on what kind of waves they are!"

"If it’s that little fellow you just mentioned, you’ll nip it in the bud, won’t you?"

"Exactly!"

The man smiled again, "Sometimes, the more you want to nip someone in the bud, the harder it is for them to die. Additionally, the more you wish to stifle someone, the faster they grow at a terrifying speed!"

"The Evil Lord back then was a living example!"

"The Evil Lord is in the past!" The king said heavily, "Such a person is rare to come by in a hundred years, I don’t believe another could arise!"

"Nothing is absolute," the man said leisurely. "Besides, don’t be too arrogant, for the road ahead is long. It’s hard to say who will live and who will die."

"Leave a thread; perhaps you have a chance of survival."

"What, have you changed professions to fortune-telling now?"

"If I had known fortune-telling, would I end up in this situation?"

The king chuckled softly, "Indeed, if you knew fortune-telling, you wouldn’t have been trapped here by me."

"Alright, you can leave now; I want to be alone for a while!"

"By the way, Ye Xunhuan’s surname is Ye, and your surname is Ye too, does it give you a sense of closeness?"

"Yes, very close!" The man said seriously, "I’m even praying for him to defeat you!"

"That way, regardless of who he is, at least he has the surname Ye; perhaps we were family five hundred years ago!"

"I hope your dream comes true."

With that, the king got up and left, and at the moment he stood up to leave, the man’s hands were once again placed on the strings, beginning to gently pluck them.

The elegant and melodious string music echoed throughout the empty valley, while birds began to appear in the sky, flying in mid-air.

But in the next moment, the birds in the sky began arranging themselves to form a character.

That character was ’King’!

Then, the birds changed and turned directly into ’Leave’!

If the king were to witness this bizarre scene in the sky, he would surely be in for a shock.

This old thing’s musical mastery is growing deeper and deeper; perhaps he could kill with sound from the strings!

Unfortunately, the king did not notice the changes in the sky and left the empty valley directly, as if he had never appeared.

At this moment, a man in a cyan robe, wearing a mask with a ferocious face, suddenly floated over from somewhere, standing entirely on a flower in a sea of blossoms, holding a jade flute!

"Don’t appear here again; go to where you came from!" the man said while playing the zither. "The king may have grown suspicious."

"In the future, don’t be so active!"

"He doesn’t have the time to mind me, and everything now is just speculation!" the masked man said softly, "By the time he truly discovers, it’ll be too late for everything!"

"And I won’t give him a chance to discover me; besides, he’s very busy now, too busy to mind other things!"

"Is that so?"

"Of course!" The masked man said resolutely, "There’s a fellow in the shadows; I haven’t figured out who it is yet, but it’s certain that he has a significant background!"

"He’s always been working behind the scenes; I suspect he has some grand scheme, maybe wanting to take the king’s place!"

"These things are not for me to worry about or handle!" the man said blandly, "You should leave now; don’t come here again!"

"Since you’re not welcome here, I’ll leave, take care of yourself!"

With those words, the man vanished like a specter, disappearing into the air, as if he had never appeared!

"Is twenty or so years of peace finally going to be completely shattered?"

The man murmured to himself as he stared at the place where the masked man disappeared.

...

Meanwhile, in a remote yet tranquil forest in the capital, Ye Xunhuan seemed to have entered a realm of solitude, standing there without the slightest fluctuation of energy, visible but untraceable, like his presence was intangible.

Everything appeared eerily bizarre to the extreme!

The next moment, Ye Xunhuan suddenly stretched his arms, and an extraordinary light immediately shot from his hollow eyes, and he moved!

"Swish!"

With a single leap, Ye Xunhuan jumped directly into the air, while his right hand swiftly swung out!

"Bang!"

The fierce gust of his palm struck heavily against a nearby tree, causing it to crash down with a boom!

Immediately, Ye Xunhuan’s right hand shook, gripping the three-foot green peak swiftly, then slicing down at once!

"Boom..."

As the sword fell, a muffled sound echoed, and the ground seemed to have been laid with explosives, suddenly bursting open while dust flew up.

Then Ye Xunhuan descended from mid-air, while the sword in his hand swiftly swung out again.

This moment, the sword in Ye Xunhuan’s hand seemed to be given life, gracefully wielded, while his whole figure became enigmatic.

In an instant, countless afterimages whistled through the forest, with flashes of cold light speeding through the air like lightning.

At this moment, the sword in Ye Xunhuan’s hand had reached an eerie extreme, unfathomable, with no one knowing where a swing would lead or where another one would emerge.

If Longshou were here, witnessing the scene would certainly leave him deeply shocked.

Because Ye Xunhuan’s swordsmanship at this moment became incredibly brilliant, or rather, untraceable, as if slashing at will!

Yet precisely because of this wilful slashing, it became completely indefensible.

Meanwhile, Ye Xunhuan’s speed was terrifying to the extreme.

Bear in mind, Ye Xunhuan previously was almost like a cripple, but now it’s as if he’s been reborn, regaining his strength entirely and seemingly skyrocketing in power.

If Longshou knew this, how could he not be astonished, given how short a time it’s been!

Currently, Ye Xunhuan has wholly entered a selfless, forgetful realm, as if the whole world only has him left.

He’s completely immersed in his own world, or rather, he’s entered a profound, mysterious realm!