216: Chapter 217 Flying Sword VS Laser: Which is Faster?

Outside the mountain-protecting array of the Qingyun Sect.

Ten thousand meters in the sky, the silhouette of the luan bird, like a behemoth of the firmament, completely obscured the entire sky.

"What kind of monster is this? How dare you spy on our Qingyun Holy Land!"

In the void, the Nascent Soul cultivator who claimed to be the Qingyun Old Ancestor stood atop his flying sword. The iridescent sword beneath his feet traced mysterious trajectories in the air, truly looking quite imposing.

The Old Ancestor's beard fluttered, his gaze sharp.

"This is the mortal realm. Withdraw immediately, or I shall scatter your souls to the winds!"

He formed hand seals, chanting incantations, and a faint cyan phantom vaguely appeared in the void behind him.

"Jiang Chen, this old Taoist seems to be manipulating the surrounding spiritual energy, attempting to construct a high-energy field."

Academician Chen Shuyin pushed up her glasses, precisely analyzing the data on the console, "Although I don't understand the principle behind it, thermal imaging shows large-scale airflow compression occurring around his body."

"Don't worry about that."

Jiang Chen sat in the captain's seat, even peeling an orange in his hands.

He didn't even look up, watching the old Taoist striking a pose in the air, his tone full of impatience:

"His sword isn't flying as fast as a commercial airliner, is it?"

"I just scanned it. His flying sword's speed is around eight hundred kilometers per hour. It hasn't even broken the sound barrier; it's not even as fast as my drone from Mars Real Estate."

"Old Chen, lock onto him."

"Using the secondary battery on this level of monster is overkill. Let's just use the laser for a precision strike."

In the command center, the atmosphere instantly turned grim.

"Lock complete."

Academician Chen Shuyin tapped her fingertip, "Target distance five kilometers, lock-on time 0.01 seconds."

"Fire."

Jiang Chen calmly spat out a grape seed.

There was no warm-up, no light-and-shadow rendering, and no flashy spell fluctuations.

Only a low hum emanated from the emitter composed of photonic crystals inside the cannon barrel.

"Zzz—"

A deep blue laser, only as thick as a wrist, appeared out of thin air in front of the Qingyun Old Ancestor.

That was light.

That was a true, zero-latency, light-speed attack.

The Old Ancestor was gathering momentum, preparing to demonstrate what the "dignity of a Sword Immortal" meant. His flying sword had just traced a beautiful arc in mid-air, ready to strike at the luan bird like lightning.

However, the flying sword hadn't even had the chance to move.

That blue beam of light had already pierced through the air.

"Pfft!"

That was the sound of something being burned through.

The Old Ancestor's gaudy, golden protective qi, in the face of this purely physical strike, was as fragile as a thin sheet of plastic film.

The laser beam passed through the protective qi layer without any obstruction.

Immediately afterward, it precisely struck the top-grade flying sword beneath the Old Ancestor's feet.

"Clang!"

A shrill ringing sound echoed in the vacuum (of course, it had an energy shield).

That magical treasure, which had accompanied the Old Ancestor for two hundred years, snapped in two instantly under the impact of the high-energy laser beam, like a candle doused in strong acid.

The broken edge was molten hot.

The Old Ancestor's expression changed wildly. Due to the violent backlash from the magical treasure, a mouthful of golden heart's blood sprayed out, scattering into a mist of blood in mid-air.

"How... how is this possible?!"

The Old Ancestor widened his eyes, staring in terror at his magical treasure broken into two pieces.

He completely could not understand.

Clearly his flying sword had already reached the realm of "where the mind goes, the sword intent follows," clearly he had already anticipated the trajectory of that blue light, so why...

Why was the opponent's weapon so fast that he hadn't even formed the thought of "blocking" it?

"Old Ancestor!" "Grand-martial-uncle!"

Inside the Qingyun Sect's mountain gate below, thousands of disciples watched this scene, their souls nearly frightened out of their bodies.

Their legendary Nascent Soul Old Ancestor, who was said to be invincible under the heavens, that expert of the Three Realms who could even withstand heavenly lightning, was now falling straight from the sky like a kite with a broken string.

Most importantly, his magical treasure had actually been burned in two by an invisible stick (laser)?

This is just too un-cultivation-like!

"Jiang Chen." Academician Chen Shuyin looked at the disheveled Taoist tumbling in the air on the screen, her tone carrying a hint of a scientist's calmness, "The experimental conclusion is out."

"What conclusion?" Jiang Chen asked, chewing an apple without looking up.

"In all the world's martial arts, only speed is unbreakable."

"But this requires a premise."

"What premise?"

Jiang Chen turned his head, looking at the dumbfounded cultivators outside the window, and curled his lips into a cruel arc:

"The premise is that you have to be able to play with technology."

"No matter how fast a flying sword is, it's essentially mechanical energy of matter in flight; its speed limit is right there."

"And the speed of light is the physical baseline of this universe."

"Taking a sword to fight against the speed of light, this isn't just a question of courage; it's... a question of IQ."

Jiang Chen tossed the apple core into the trash can and gave a calm order into the communicator:

"Don't worry about him. Let him fall; just make sure he doesn't die from the impact."

"Notify everyone below: the Qingyun Sect is now under our management."

"Also, someone go check the mineral veins beneath their mountain gate and see if there are any spirit stone mines left. We're short on batteries for the upcoming spaceship upgrades."

Jiang Chen stood up, looking at the approaching sect main hall outside the porthole.

Cultivators? Are they very strong?

In his view, they were just a group of "high-level natives" who had mastered some kind of special energy but hadn't yet broken free from superstition.

As long as they were composed of matter and still obeyed the physical laws of this world, in the face of his heavy firepower... they were all just easy prey.

"Let's go."

Jiang Chen straightened his shirt, which was printed with "Convince People with Virtue," his tone as light as if he were going for a stroll in the park:

"Let's go down and teach them what — scientific cultivation — means."

"Those magical treasures of yours are indeed exquisite, but are they actually useful?"