Grand Ancestral Bloodlines

"Is this all your Martial God Clan has?" Ryu asked.

The streets beneath him were littered with ice coffins. The enforcers who had wanted to do something about Ryu breaking the rules, suddenly felt that they couldn't act at all. It was one thing if Ryu was just breaking them, but the fact that he was challenging the youths of the younger generation made it a different matter entirely.

If they tried to subdue Ryu now, what message would that send?

To make matters worse, they were still having a hard time seeing through Ryu's cultivation. One had to remember that grasping the cultivation of an enemy relied on both experience and feel. But, the further Ryu deviated from normal cultivation, the more and more difficult it was for others to see through him, especially when he was barely trying.

The current Ryu wasn't even using his own qi. Every tap in the air he made caused a swarm of cold atmospheric qi to surge forward, freezing the opponent in an instant. Aside from a bit of his own Focus Qi that was used up—an amount that was almost instantly replenished by the prayer mat—he wasn't using up any of his energy at all.

"Do you think that the ones you actually want to battle would come out just because you said so?" Isemeine snorted with disdain.

However, she never expected Ryu to answer seriously.

"Yes." Ryu said plainly. "If they don't, it only means that they aren't the ones I would want to battle anyway."

As though on cue, three blazing auras, each just as voluminous as the next, tore a path through the winding city paths. Soon enough, they grew tired of this and leapt onto the buildings, leaving devastation in their wake without a care.

Ryu's brow raised. '8th stage Path Extinction Realm experts.'

Every single last one of them had white gold hair and eyes. By this point, Ryu was certain that this was all that would appear in this region. Clearly, the Berserk and Silver Touch branch members did not reside here.

Unfortunately, that made it unlikely that the core of the Martial Gods was here as well. Why would their Throne be located in a place where only a third of them resided?

However, Ryu didn't mind. In fact, this only gave him a better opportunity. If he had to travel to each one of their cities, that was exactly what he would do.

"That's Mazello. That one is Ragnar. The last is Throgg."

The three youths flashed, their figures vanished and appearing atop a building just below Ryu.

"Mazello is ranked 89th. Ragnar is ranked 91st. Throgg is ranked 84th."

"Hey, Isemeine. You're helping an outsider learn all of our secrets? Did he fuck you that good?" Ragnar quipped.

"Yes." Isemeine grinned fiercely, her aura flaring up. "You could say that my man is quite well endowed. You could also say that his fist is pretty big too."

The three young man narrowed their eyes. It seemed that they had forgotten that Isemeine wasn't a normal woman. This was definitely not how the script was supposed to go.

She was supposed to get embarrassed. Then Ryu was supposed to lose his temper and do something stupid. After that, he would lose and they'd all gain a hilarious story to tell.

But, this fiery tempered woman was really too unpredictable. It only made them more annoyed because they had all wanted the first taste of her.

"By the way, where are you ranked?" Ryu suddenly asked.

"Me?" Isemeine looked down on the three before her with disdain. "I'm rank 97th despite being in the 1st stage. They're too pathetic."

"I see." Ryu nodded.

With a casual motion, he tapped a finger forward.

The pupils of the youths constricted. However, their auras surged, their reaction speeds not lagging behind in the slightest.

The sound of cracking ice resounded as the three young men retreated swiftly. Ugly expressions contorted their faces as they watched even the qi they had been controlling around themselves turn into particles of ice.

"Your ranking system is a mess." Ryu commented. "Why fuse potential and combat prowess into one list."

"The list isn't supposed to take combat prowess into account at all, at least not initially." Isemeine replied. "However, when someone breaks through and their potential is ranked, they're then allowed to be challenged by those who aren't satisfied. When you lose, you fall down a rank and someone else replaces you."

Ryu chuckled. "So, let me guess, you probably debuted in the top three then lost more than 90 times?"

Isemeine glared at Ryu. If he was going to pretend to be her man, shouldn't he do a better job of letting her have some face?

"And I assume that these three are among the few you lost to, hm?"

Isemeine's glare only intensified.

"I guess that means I should protect your honor?"

"Aren't you having a little too much fun with this?!" Isemeine finally snapped.

Ryu smiled. "It's been too long since I've come home."

Ryu's aura surged, a grand grimoire appearing above his head. The temperature continued to plummet, ice crystals flowing like snakes in the heavy wind. It felt like a winter wonderland was descending as the falling snow became heavier, but there was nothing peaceful or beautiful about it to the three young men that faced Ryu.

"I'm sorry to say, but unless your Dao Pedestal Realm Heirs begin to appear, none of you stand a chance against me, least of all three who can't even step into the top 50."

Ryu's voice boomed over the city once again, howling harsh winds growing in speed.

Isemeine rolled her eyes. 'How could you possibly know that? You have no idea how strong our true geniuses are. Arrogant bastard.'

That was right. Ryu had no idea how strong they were. But, not only did he snub his nose at those at his cultivation Realm, even those an entire layer above him were being effectively ignored.

However, the result seemed to side with him. Ryu didn't even activate his grimoire when the mere tempest of accumulating ice qi froze the three youths solid.

Ryu turned his gaze toward the distance. The longer this went on, the more he wondered just when it would get interesting. Sure, becoming a Throne was his goal… But before that, he didn't mind burying every so-called genius the Martial God Clan had.

Still, at that moment, Ryu felt that a gaze was locked onto him.

His vision pierced through the over 100 kilometer distance, through a broken window and landed on an old man with both his eyes closed.

Ryu's lip curled.