Lightning Is the Only Way

A couple of weeks later, Siral contacted Gravis again.

"I found a suitable target, Master," Siral said.

"Tell me about the Sect," Gravis answered.

"The Sect is called the Holy Judgment Sect, Master. They are a Sect of Weapon Cultivators that use the Brilliance Element for their support. Most of the Element-related Sects are affiliated with the Nine Elements Sect, and this is one of them."

"What about the Sect's philosophy?" Gravis asked.

"They act kind and righteous, but in reality, their rules are draconian. They strictly control the movement and actions of their disciples, stopping them from ever betraying them. Apparently, when the Sect had implemented stricter rules in the past, a lot of disciples had left the Sect, weakening it immensely."

"However, instead of lessening the restrictions of the rules, they doubled down. Anyone that enters the Holy Judgment Sect is bound by a Formation Array in their mind, which allows the Sect Elders and Sect Master to kill any disciple from a distance," Siral explained.

"How did you find this Sect?" Gravis asked.

"I entered a couple of assassination strongholds of Underworld and checked the missions, Master. Some of the disciples that managed to escape this restriction by paying a ton of money to the Life Sect to destroy the Formation Arrays in their mind pooled their resources to request a hit on the upper echelon of the Holy Judgment Sect," Siral explained.

Gravis' eyes gleamed. He needed some money right now.

"What's the reward?"

"100 million Immortal Stones for the Sect Master and ten million for every Elder. The Elders also act as Vice-Sect Masters, which means that there are five Vice-Sect Masters in total. All of them are in the Late Major Circulation Immortal King Realm. If you kill everyone, you can earn 150 million Immortal Stones, Master."

Gravis nodded. "Meet up with me, Siral."

"Yes, Master," Siral said.

Gravis directly went to the location of the Holy Judgment Sect and inspected their Sect. He wanted to see everything for himself.

With his Law of Perceived Reality, it wasn't difficult for Gravis to hide his Spirit Sense from everyone below the Immortal Emperor Realm.

When Gravis arrived, he saw a bright and friendly Sect. Everyone was talking politely and with a kind voice with everyone else.

However, Gravis was able to see through the façade of the weaker Cultivators. They were only putting up a front. In reality, they felt afraid and stifled.

Gravis also saw the bottles filled with small parts of Spirits, surrounded by a gigantic Formation Array.

Sure enough, everything that Siral said checked out.

After seeing everything he wanted, Gravis went to the Nine Elements Sect. However, he wasn't going there to visit it. No, he wanted to visit someone else.

"You said that your stronghold also acts as an assassination stronghold, right?" Gravis asked the bartender of Underworld.

"Yes. Would you like to request a hit?" the bartender asked.

"The opposite. I would like to accept a mission," Gravis said.

The bartender was pleasantly surprised. "No problem. Any missions you are interested in?"

"Killing the upper echelon of the Holy Judgment Sect," Gravis answered.

The bartender inspected Gravis.

Gravis was just a Late Major Circulation Immortal King, and he was intending on taking on one Peak Immortal King and five Late Major Circulation Immortal Kings in the confines of their very home?

That would be very difficult to achieve.

However, the bartender didn't care. It was Gravis' decision.

"Alright," the bartender answered. "I put you down for the mission. You have 100 years to accomplish it. Please pay 10% of the mission reward as a contracting fee. If you are successful, you will get the contracting fee back."

This was important since missions would be locked as soon as someone accepted one. Everyone in the world could accept the missions. They didn't need to be part of Underworld.

This restriction was put in place to stop the Sects from blocking their own missions. Like this, they would be required to pay a ton of money to Underworld every century. Missions like this were worth a lot of money, and a Sect would slowly succumb to such an insane expenditure.

"I will be done in less than a week," Gravis answered evenly as he paid the ten million Immortal Stones. That was nearly all of his money, but not for long.

"Quite a boast," the bartender answered. "I hope you can back that up."

"See you later," Gravis said, directly ending the conversation.

The bartender looked with amusement at Gravis as he left. Obviously, all of this had been done via voice transmission. While Gravis and the bartender had been talking about the death of a High-Rank Sect, the bartender was happily serving customers.

Gravis went back to the Holy Judgment Sect. When he arrived, he saw that Siral was already waiting for him.

"Master," Siral said with a bow.

"Late Major Circulation Immortal King," Gravis said. "Can you do it?"

"Yes, Master," Siral answered.

"Will the assassination serve as tempering for you?" Gravis asked.

"Yes, Master," Siral answered.

"Good," Gravis said with a nod. "Then wait near the southwest of the Holy Judgment Sect. I will lure an Elder out, and you can directly assassinate them. After you've finished the assassination, inform me. I will quickly return. You have to hide until then since the Sect Master will come very quickly."

"Yes, Master," Siral said. However, one could hear a slight trembling inside his voice.

This would be Siral's first tempering experience since he had become Gravis' servant.

Siral tempered himself by assassinating Cultivators more powerful than him. If the Cultivator survived the first strike, Siral would undoubtedly die, creating a powerful feeling of pressure and nervousness.

It was all or nothing for Siral.

Gravis teleported a couple of times to the southwest and found a Law Comprehension Area with three different Battle Laws for the Brilliance Element. All of these Battle Laws were level four Laws, which made them quite important.

There were some disciples inside the Law Comprehension Area, and it was overlooked by someone at the Mid Major Circulation Immortal King Realm. This person was obviously also a part of the upper echelon. Gravis checked out the person's aura and compared it to the small pieces of the souls inside the gigantic Formation Array. His soul was not part of them.

Gravis took out his saber.

BANG!

Then, Gravis charged forward and hit the Formation Array that protected the Law Comprehension Areas with all of his physical power.

The Formation Array shook violently, but it still held.

Obviously, Gravis wanted to make it seem like someone was attacking them.

Gravis had already changed his appearance and released the Inferno Element around him while unleashing several Battle Laws of the Inferno Element. This would cloud his own aura and make it seem like he was an Inferno Element Weapon Cultivator.

The overseer retrieved his weapon and quickly spotted Gravis. When he felt Gravis' Realm, his face whitened, and he quickly informed the Sect that a Late Major Circulation Immortal King was attacking them.

Gravis infused his saber with all of the Inferno-related Laws and unleashed a powerful strike. He had already reforged a normal saber to allow it to absorb the Inferno Element.

BAAAANG! CRK!

A violent explosion occurred, but it wasn't enough to break the Formation Array. It only cracked. This was an important Law Comprehension Area, and the Formation Array had to be strong enough to buy some time for the Sect's upper echelon to arrive.

BAAANG! BAAANG! BAAAANG! CRACK!

After three more attacks, the Formation Array broke, and Gravis charged in.

"I'm finished, Master," Siral transmitted to Gravis with urgency. "One of the Elders is dead."

When Gravis heard that, he knew that he didn't need to act anymore.

WHOOOOOOM!

Gravis unleashed his Will-Aura, and everyone was suppressed.

BANG!

Then, several bolts of Punishment Lightning left Gravis' hand as he annihilated everyone inside here. Sure, some innocent disciples were among the people present, but Gravis' identity was more important than sparing innocent lives.

Gravis immediately left and teleported a couple of times. He had to return to Siral.

After some seconds, Gravis saw with his Spirit Sense what was happening.

Siral was bombarded by attacks from several powerful Cultivators. They constantly shone Brilliance into the surroundings, making it difficult for Siral to escape. Siral was already heavily injured, and he would die in less than a second.

Whooop!

As long as Siral was inside Gravis' Spirit Sense's range, he could summon Siral directly into the Life Ring.

The Sect Master and Elders saw that Siral had vanished into thin air and looked with shock at his old location.

WHOOOOOM!

Gravis activated his Will-Aura and suppressed all of them. The Sect Master was just two levels above Gravis. He was helpless in front of him.

BANG!

Gravis unleashed some bolts of Divine Lightning, killing everyone present. He explicitly used Divine Lightning to make it seem like a powerful Immortal Emperor had become angry at the Sect. After all, no Immortal King could possibly know a level six Law. Even if the Nine Elements Sect employed someone that had the level six Law of Time, which was doubtful, they wouldn't be able to see Gravis' Realm.

They would only see that someone in disguise had unleashed a level six Law.

Gravis quickly pocketed all the wealth that the dead Sect Master and Elders had dropped after their death.

Then, Gravis retrieved an emblem and directly broke it.

BANG!

Gravis vanished. This had been the emblem that he had bought for 30 million Immortal Stones from Underworld.

Why?

Well.

SHING!

Just two seconds later, a Major Circulation Immortal Emperor from the Nine Elements Sect arrived. They had to protect their Sects, and if they couldn't, they had to take revenge.

The Immortal Emperor inspected the surroundings and felt the familiar fluctuations of the emblem Gravis had activated.

The Immortal Emperor gritted his teeth.

"Underworld!" he said quietly to himself with seething rage.