I Can Only Cultivate In A Game

Victor sensed the shift in the air before their arrival and decided to get out of the courtyard.

Up ahead, the six eldest members of the family, each a senior elder or branch leader—faced him as he stepped out.

They were an impressive group by local standards. Elder Qin Mu, the first among equals, carried the rare air of a late-stage Nascent Soul cultivator.

Beside him stood Bai Xian, the chief Bai representative whose Qi aura quivered with barely restrained anger, around early Nascent Soul.

The four other elders hovered between the middle and early Nascent Soul stages. All of them combined could muster a decent force, or so they assumed.

"Fang Chen," Elder Qin Mu intoned with an overbearing voice. "You've stirred unrest in our family, incited rebellion, freed slaves, and have undermined every plan we put in motion. We demand answers: who are you, and by what right do you sabotage us?"

The chamber doors closed behind him with a resonant thud.

Fang Chen offered them a slight bow that was almost too casual. "You've asked the wrong question," he said softly. "You should be asking how a nobody—someone with no history, no promotion records, no family lineage—came to walk among you."

Murmurs spread across the surroundings as Elder Bai Xian cheeks flushed with indignation. "We have documents! We have registers! Every disciple's history is recorded in the family archives."

"And yet," Victor replied while spreading his hands, "there is no entry for Fang Chen. You welcomed a stranger with open arms, and now you blame me for your mistakes."

The elders immediately felt more enraged than earlier.

He had been under their nose this whole time and no one ever figured it out.

"Evidence suggests you have been at the crux of every fault line in our unity."

Victor gave a half-smile. "I destroyed the chains around the necks of the ones you enslaved. I merely returned your stolen humanity."

"That's enough!" Elder Qin Mu's palm blazed with condensed Qi.

"You demon of deceit! This elder will now invoke your retribution by crippling your cultivation."

Now Victor knew it was game time because he couldn't go against any of them while suppressed.

As Elder Qin Mu charged in with his arm wickedly outstretched, Victor took a slow breath, lifted his chin, and let the suppression pill's effect ebb away.

Beneath his calm guise, his Qi suddenly exploded in a controlled crescendo, radiating outward like waves across water.

He shifted into a low stance, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

A soft rumble resonated through the surroundings as his thrust his palm out to meet Elder Qin Mu's strike.

Bang!

Both blows met with a thunderous boom, causing sand and dust to scatter in every direction as the ground beneath their feet cracked.

The gathered elders stiffened upon witnessing this.

When the dust cleared, Elder Qin Mu had shifted back by four paces while Victor was still standing at his initial position.

"Behold, the truth," Victor announced.

In an instant, he unleashed a vibrant pulse of violet-tinged energy... which was the unmistakable aura of a mid-stage Nascent Soul cultivator, enriched by the unique resonance of his Void Emperor bloodline.

Gasps echoed. Several elders staggered back, clutching their chests as if the revelation had struck them physically.

Bai Xian's mouth fell open. Bai Yao hand shot to a talisman at his belt. The mightiest among them, Elder Qin Mu himself, angled his head as his eyes widened.

He swiftly lowered his trembling right arm and put it behind him, unwilling to accept the travesty playing out before his eyes.

"Impossible," Elder Qin Mu breathed. "You—"

Victor held up a finger. "Don't finish the sentence. Yes you were fooled."

Without further preamble, Elder Qin Mu lunged once again, lifting a roaring torrent of stormlight Qi from the heavens.

He was anguished that this youngster had made a fool of him and everyone else; and now he wasn't going to go easy.

Lightning crackled around his blade, splintering the wooden dais behind Victor with explosive force.

Victor did not dodge.

Instead, he spun, twisting into the attack, and absorbed the strike with a single palm.

He channeled the energy deep into his dantian, shifting the attack with his Void Qi to another location entirely.

Then, with the ease of stretching a hand to pick a flower, he swept his leg in a low arc, sending Qin Mu sliding across the floor and splintering stone in his wake.

The other five elders sprang forward at once with their Qi coalescing into a ring of wind and flame which surged toward Victor from all sides.

His eyes narrowed as he inhaled.

A smile cracked his lips. "Is this the best you have?"

With a flick of his wrist, he drew his sword and spun 95 degrees with the blade extended.

[ Shadow Crescent Strike Activated ]

A radiant tendril of cresent shaped shadow Shadow spread across his blade in tye process of spinning.

In the same instant, Darkness lanced through the surroundings, slicing the ring of attackers in two.

The wind gusted as two elders went tumbling backward with their robes shredded.

Bai Yao lunged with a talisman flare sending arrows of sealing light shooting toward Victor.

The runes burned bright and for a moment, it was fire against shadow but Victor simply rotated his blade in a spiral, igniting it with Dragon-Breath.

When he swung, the talisman bolts evaporated like mist before dawn as a dragon shaped flame swept forward powerfully.

Within seconds, the greatest melee the annexed family had ever faced on its own grounds erupted in chaos.

Sparks flew. Roaring incantations filled the air. Dust swirled around broken pillars. Yet Victor remained at the center, poised like a viper ready to strike.

Elder Bai Xian screamed and formed a crescent of earth around her which was a barrier meant to trap and crush.

Victor stepped forward with his blade outstretched and then sent out another shadow cresent strike.

The earth shuddered and split apart instantly, causing the residue energy shockwave to send Bai Xian skidding across the floor.

Elder Qin Mu eyes blazed with fury as he got to his feet. "You—how—"

"You are barely at the mid stage Nascent Soul Realm... howww?!!"

Victor sheathed his sword with a snap that echoed through the surroundings.

"Do you even know who I am?" he questioned softly but loud enough for everyone around to hear.

"I am the same Fang Chen you chased out one year ago. The one you tried to get rid of just because I taught your bratty young master a lesson," Victor chuckled.

Elder Qin Han's eyes suddenly widened in disbelief. It couldn't be, right? It couldn't be the same qi Refining realm weakling he nearly killed on a rooftop a year ago... no it was impossible... how could he have gone from qi Refining realm to Nascent Soul Realm in one year?

It has to be a joke...

Not only did Fang Chen power level skyrocket beyond disbelief, he also looked different and gave off an aura of one with a powerful bloodline.

"As you might be able to tell... I am not the same as I was before," Victor grinned while observing their expressions.

"Now decide if you'll continue to rule with bloodstained hands… or if you'll beg forgiveness and call for reinforcements you'll never find," he added.

Victor stood still, calmly waiting for their replies despite the torrent of qi swirling around him.

"How dare you!" Elder Qin Han's voice suddenly boomed.

As the very man who had once driven Fang Chen from Lingyun Town a year before, he couldn't accept that this junior strength had become overwhelming.

Qin Han's eyes blazed with indignation as he summoned the family's signature art: the Iron Mountain Stance with his feet rooted as his body bristled with condensed earth qi.

Victor smirked, he had given them the opportunity to retreat, now no one could blame him for how things went.

In the blink of an eye, he vanished with Shadow Blink and reappeared behind the elder.

He struck with Phantom Moon Slash, turning into a bunch of afterimages that struck from multiple angles at a time.

But Qin Han was no novice.

Although, he had been taken by surprise earlier, he was no longer underestimating Victor.

His own cult­ivation art flared as he spun around, pinpointing the exact position of the attack and blocked Victor's strike with the Mountain's Heart Palm.

The collision rang out like thunder causing qi to fracture around them in sparks of reddish-brown dust.

Victor staggered back a step but recovered instantly with a small grin flickering across his features.

"Sure you are at the Nascent Soul Realm..." Qin Han admitted while stepping forward after snapping out of his reverie. "But you're no match for me still."

Victor's eyes glowed a faint violet. He flexed his fingers, gathering qi into a cruel crescent shape. "Let's put that to the test."

With a sudden surge, Victor unleashed Shadow Crescent Strike; causing darkness and light to entwine as a curved blade of shadows shot forward.

Qin Han's eyes widened as he recalled how powerful that attack was and he slammed both palms down unleasing an explosion of earth qi, which shattered the strike into rough fragments.