All the Fingers followed Aldrian to an area near the mansion that had a small forest. This forest surrounded the mansion, acting as a barrier between it and the rest of the city’s residential areas. Because of this, the mansion remained secluded despite being located within the city.
They stood at the forest’s edge, wondering why Aldrian had brought them there. As they watched, he turned to face them.
"I’ve heard of the reputation of the Nine Fingers of the Thunderous Shadow Pavilion and couldn’t help but want to experience it firsthand. The forest before you will serve as the site for that."
Then, he continued, "You will try to kill inside the forest. Use everything you have—don’t hold back."
Aldrian turned his gaze toward Arson Vuran. "That includes you."
Hearing Aldrian’s words, all of them were astonished. Even Arson looked at him with a strange expression. What is it this ti? Why would his master do sothing like this?
To be honest, he was also curious about his master’s ability to defend himself against assassination attempts. They had all heard of Aldrian’s overwhelming prowess in direct combat, so much so that Arson believed even if he and the other Fingers worked together, they would ultimately fail to take him down.
But assassination was different. It relied on clever and cunning thods to eliminate a target. The victim often wouldn’t even realize death was upon them—sotis, they wouldn’t even realize they were already dead.
The Third to Ninth Fingers turned to Arson, waiting for his command. But he simply glanced back at them before speaking.
"You heard him. Kill him with everything you’ve got. I don’t care how you do it—just follow the master’s orders."
He didn’t understand what Aldrian intended, but he would act accordingly.
The others nodded and turned their gaze toward Aldrian. In an instant, their entire presence shifted, they beca like ghosts. Their auras vanished completely, and their presences masked so thoroughly that even the wind seed undisturbed by their movents.
Although they stood right in front of him, fully visible to his eyes, Aldrian couldn’t sense them at all. It was as if they had rged with the environnt itself. This was what made assassins truly terrifying—if they could conceal themselves to the point where only the eyes could perceive them, then their ability was beyond extraordinary.
If they were to hide, their target would be dead before even realizing it.
Aldrian was genuinely impressed by what he witnessed, though not entirely surprised. These were the finest assassins of the Thunderous Shadow Pavilion, and all of them had reached the Emperor stage.
The only way to track them beyond his line of sight was to rely on his domain.
"Now," he said.
In an instant, all the assassins vanished, leaving Aldrian alone.
He smiled at the sight and waited for thirty seconds before stepping forward into the forest. These assassins were truly killing machines, following orders without hesitation. One command from Arson was all it took, they executed it without question. Just monts ago, they had released their killing intent toward him before disappearing completely.
Aldrian hadn’t walked far, only about 500 ters when he suddenly stepped on sothing. Before he could register what it was, thin darts shot toward him from the nearby trees behind him.
Sensing the incoming darts, he instinctively reached out to catch them. However, his danger sense flared, warning him. Without a mont’s hesitation, he ducked just as two flying daggers sliced through the air, narrowly missing his head. They stabbed themselves into the ground just a step ahead of where he had been standing.
The darts nearly struck him due to his slightly delayed reaction, but he managed to block them with his spatial shield. As they collided with the barrier, they lost all montum and fell harmlessly to the ground.
However, Aldrian had no ti to relax—he sensed another deadly attack incoming.
This ti, he saw an assassin drop down right above of him, a dagger aid straight for his head. Just as the blade was about to strike, the assassin’s body suddenly froze in midair.
Suspended in space, unable to move, he hovered above the ground, his expression filled with shock. Then, he heard Aldrian’s voice.
"Truly impressive. In just thirty seconds, you’ve already set up a trap like this. Your adaptability is remarkable, you also ensure the target never expects what’s coming next. Just as they think they’ve defended against one attack, you follow up relentlessly until the kill is secured."
Aldrian’s gaze sharpened. "Good... but still not enough to kill ."
Aldrian then placed his hand on the assassin’s head and sent a surge of lightning energy through him. The assassin convulsed as pain wracked his body, not only from being electrocuted but also from the searing agony within his very soul. Aldrian’s lightning directly attacked his soul.
Unable to withstand it, the assassin lost consciousness. The mont Aldrian released his spatial lock, his body dropped limply to the ground.
Kneeling beside him, Aldrian began casting his slave seal, the Everlasting Demonic Follower. Once the process was complete, he rose to his feet and continued deeper into the forest.
A satisfied smile played on his lips. This was his true purpose in bringing the Fingers here. Beyond demonstrating his overwhelming power and proving that the many rumors about him were more than just stories, he had another goal—to cast his slave seal on the rest of the Fingers as well.
Although all the assassins operated under Arson’s direct orders, Aldrian was not ready to place his full trust in them without proper safeguards. These people would now serve under him, but he needed ti to assess their loyalty.
They were seasoned killers, having taken countless lives, and if they ever turned their backs on him, they could beco a threat, not to him, but to those around him. That was his real concern.
As he walked another kiloter, he sensed a slight disturbance in the wind. Reacting instantly, he kicked behind him, deflecting a set of flying needles aid at him. However, the attack didn’t end there.
A faint tremor ran through the ground, and before he could fully process it, a figure burst forth from beneath him, erging right under his face.
Because of his position after kicking behind him, Aldrian had to tilt his body, bringing his head closer to the ground. The assassin seized this mont, aiming to pierce his eye with a dagger. At the sa ti, he sensed arrows incoming from the side.
In that split second, everything around him seed to slow down. He slapped the dagger away just before it could reach his eye and twisted his body to the side, narrowly avoiding the arrows as they flew past him.
It was just like the ti he had faced Elena, when she had suddenly attacked him out of nowhere upon their first eting. Back then, every ti her strikes ca close to landing, the world around him had seed to slow.
After much reflection, he had finally found the answer.
Ti.
With his focus heightened, he realized he could slow down ti for a split second. The first ti he noticed this, he was astonished, he had never felt himself comprehending the ti laws.
But then he rembered sothing.
It all traced back to when he first comprehended the thread of origin. What if, in that mont, he had unconsciously grasped the ti laws as well?
That was the only explanation for why he could sense ti itself and manipulate it, even if only briefly.
From everything recorded on the continent, he had never heard of a cultivator comprehending ti laws. He knew ti laws because of the vast knowledge that had surfaced in his mind over the years through countless visions. This was the power of ti laws, one of the most elusive and difficult laws to comprehend.
Aldrian didn’t give the assassins a chance to recover. He grabbed the hand erging from the ground, lifted the assassin’s entire body, and slamd him hard onto the surface.
The assassins hadn’t expected their combined surprise attack to be evaded so effortlessly. The one who had been hiding underground felt the force of the impact rupture his organs, dizziness overtaking him.
Without wasting a mont, Aldrian turned his gaze toward another direction. Using the power of gravity laws, he forced another hidden assassin, concealed within the high bushes, to drop heavily to the ground.
He dealt with the assassin beneath him first, sending a surge of lightning through his body to render him unconscious. Then, without pause, he teleported toward the second assassin, who was struggling to escape. However, under the force of gravity, his movents were slow and sluggish, his body too heavy to flee.
Aldrian delivered a swift punch to the assassin’s gut before slamming his head into the ground, knocking him out instantly. Just as he had done with the first assassin, he cast the Everlasting Demonic Follower on both of them before continuing deeper into the forest.
He walked and walked, yet no disturbances ca.
Thirty minutes passed—nothing happened.
An hour passed—still nothing.
He deliberately refrained from using his domain sense. If he activated it fully, he would detect every movent instantly, but that would take away the challenge. Instead, he wanted to test the sharpness of his senses and instincts against assassins of this caliber. This was as much a trial for himself as it was a hunt.
After walking for a while, he finally sensed sothing—sothing fast, moving straight toward him!
He wanted to trap it with his spatial technique, but before he could act, sothing suddenly erged from the ground beneath his feet—binding him in place!
Chains wrapped tightly around his legs, holding him firmly. Just as he tried to react, he sensed a figure erging from the trunk, as if the tree itself had co to life. In an instant, the figure leaped onto him and slashed at his neck.
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