350: Chapter 360 I hate your lack of courage! The Emperor personally ordered your arrest!

Mu Linglong left the Misty Path in disappointment.

Aunt Han could not calculate the specific location; in this vast territory of the Ten Thousand Sword Ancient Clan, trying to ferret out that rotten piece of wood was like looking for a needle in a haystack.

Meanwhile, in front of the small house.

Deduction Saint Han Ying sat slumped in her rocking chair, looking utterly dejected. She stared at the scattered divination swords on the ground with hollow eyes, still deeply lost in self-doubt.

"I am the Heavenly Absolute Sword Body with an Innate Severed Meridian! I am destined in this life to never be able to engage in Dual Cultivation with a man, and it is even more impossible for me to bear offspring... How could there possibly be an omen of having many children?!"

Deduction Saint Han Ying muttered to herself, "Could something be wrong with the divination swords?"

However, these divination swords were the Innate treasures she used to comprehend the Dao of Deduction, and they had long since been connected to her Bloodline. How could they possibly go wrong?

If the divination signs were not wrong... then where exactly was the problem!!

"A child..."

Deduction Saint Han Ying's fair fingers gently stroked her flat lower abdomen. She gazed at the quiet small house, lost in a daze: "Will this old bag of bones... really have a child?"

Thinking about how she, an old virgin who had kept herself pure for millions of years, might one day have a big belly, two strange blushes instantly appeared on Deduction Saint Han Ying's elegant and noble face.

...

On the other side.

Mu Linglong, having just walked out of the misty territory, suddenly halted her steps.

She discovered that under an ancient pine tree not far ahead, a towering figure stood with hands behind his back, quietly waiting for her.

"Father..."

Upon seeing Patriarch Mu Chuan, Mu Linglong's mood sank even further.

Patriarch Mu Chuan did not speak, only nodding slightly.

The two of them walked silently along the mountain path, one after the other.

"Linglong, do you hate me?"

After walking for an unknown amount of time, Patriarch Mu Chuan suddenly spoke.

His tone was as calm as water, revealing neither joy nor anger.

Mu Linglong followed behind Patriarch Mu Chuan, not answering immediately.

After a long while, she bit her lip and spat out one word:

"Hate!"

Patriarch Mu Chuan stopped in his tracks. Mu Linglong stopped as well.

The father and daughter tacitly maintained a distance of three meters between them.

These three meters seemed like a chasm between the two.

"I have failed you..."

Patriarch Mu Chuan turned around, looking at his most beloved daughter with a complex expression. His majestic tone carried a hint of deep loneliness and exhaustion.

"No! You have not failed me!"

Mu Linglong suddenly raised her head, her eyes like clear springs filled with stubbornness and fortitude:

"You are the Patriarch of the Ten Thousand Sword Ancient Clan! If sacrificing me to enter a marriage alliance with Sword Emperor Mountain can preserve the Family and protect the billions of people behind the Blood-colored Passage... I, Mu Linglong, am willing to go!"

"What I hate is not that you treat me as a bargaining chip... What I hate is that you won't fight!"

Mu Linglong's words struck out like a sharp sword.

She appeared delicate, but in reality, her heart, forged by the Glazed Sword Body, was stronger than anyone else's!

Upon hearing this, Patriarch Mu Chuan's breathing hitched slightly.

"I don't blame you, but I hate that you don't exhaust every means to achieve a Breakthrough to the Middle Stage of the Great Emperor Realm!"

Mu Linglong's eyes reddened as she said loudly: "I know the difficulty is unimaginable, akin to ascending to heaven! But you are a Sword Cultivator! As a Sword Cultivator, shouldn't you be pressing forward, risking your life to give it a try?!"

"But from you, I cannot see any of the determination and sharpness that belongs to a Sword Cultivator! I only see a Clan Patriarch who chooses to compromise and endure humiliation for the sake of the survival of all living beings!"

"Clang!"

The soft sword at Mu Linglong's waist seemed to sense its master's emotions, emitting a crisp and impassioned sword hum.

Like its master, it yearned to break through its shackles and advance further!

The mountain path once again fell into a deathly silence.

Patriarch Mu Chuan looked deeply at his daughter.

It had been a long, long time since anyone dared to speak to him so directly.

But he admitted that Linglong was right; every word pierced his heart.

He had been stuck at the Early Stage of the Great Emperor Realm for far too long.

He was from the same era as Wuji Sword Emperor, yet Wuji Sword Emperor had left him far behind.

If not for the good fortune of Wuji Sword Emperor back then, which gave him the opportunity to enter the Trial of the Sword, he feared he would have struggled to even reach the Great Emperor Realm.

He still remembered Wuji Sword Emperor's evaluation of him back then: his Innate talent was acceptable, but he lacked a shred of the fighting spirit to risk his life.

He had long since resigned himself to his fate, believing that the Early Stage of the Great Emperor Realm was the end of his life's journey.

For nearly ten million years, he had poured all his energy into managing the Ten Thousand Sword Ancient Clan.

Although he had not stopped Cultivating, he truly had not been going all out for the Dao of the Sword, disregarding everything, as he had in his youth.

"You are right. If I could have let go of everything back then to give it a fight, even if it meant a nine-out-of-ten chance of death, perhaps today's outcome would be completely different."

Patriarch Mu Chuan did not evade reality and admitted it generously.

Hearing her father's sigh, the stubbornness in Mu Linglong's eyes finally turned into a hint of sorrow.

"I will for the sake of the Family, marry Young Master Yifeng."

Mu Linglong gritted her teeth, "But before that, I need the Family to use all its intelligence resources to help me find someone!"

If she did not vent this frustration, her heart as a Sword Cultivator would never be able to reach clarity!

With only a few months left until the opening of the Sword God Domain, and this being his daughter's final request, Patriarch Mu Chuan naturally had no reason to refuse.

"Very well. I will personally take action and use all forces to help you find this person in the Sword Domain." Patriarch Mu Chuan nodded without hesitation.

Hearing that her father, a Great Emperor, was willing to personally take action to find someone, a glimmer of hope flashed through Mu Linglong's heart.

"It is this person! Aunt Han calculated just now that he is within the territory of our Ten Thousand Sword Ancient Clan!"

Mu Linglong hurriedly handed the portrait of the young man in white to Patriarch Mu Chuan, while describing him through gritted teeth: "He is a rotten piece of wood who only knows how to act aloof and doesn't play by the rules! After you find him, do not directly hurt him; just imprison him! I want to teach him a lesson myself!"

Mu Linglong did not forget to describe in detail the ink-wash sword style that Su Jin used, as well as that monstrous embryonic Domain.

"Oh? He possesses a Domain while only at the Heavenly Immortal Realm?!"

Patriarch Mu Chuan took the portrait and, listening to his daughter's description, a flash of shock crossed his eyes.

He carefully examined the portrait, and the more he looked, the more he felt that the young man in white holding a black sword in the painting had a cold and arrogant temperament, and was definitely no ordinary person.

"This child is a Prodigy. I fear... he is not weaker than that Prodigy in a coir raincoat you brought back." Patriarch Mu Chuan exclaimed with genuine admiration.

"Him?!"

When Mu Linglong heard her father actually comparing the rotten piece of wood in the painting with Su Jin, she immediately became like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, huffily retorting loudly:

"Dad, what nonsense are you spouting! That ill-mannered rotten piece of wood who only knows how to spank people... is not even fit to carry Su Jin's shoes, okay!"

"Su Jin is a true Sword Cultivator who directly trampled through the Heavenly Ladder and does not fear the threats of Sword Emperor Mountain!"

Mu Linglong crazily disparaged one while praising the other, then turned her head huffily and flew towards her Immortal Palace without looking back, preparing to stabilize her Realm.

Left in place, Patriarch Mu Chuan looked at his daughter's departing back and shook his head with a mix of amusement and helplessness.

Looking at Linglong's gnashing-teeth yet concerned attitude, the weight of this person in the painting in her heart seemed to be much heavier than she herself imagined.

"Come here!"

Patriarch Mu Chuan put away the smile on his face, and his eyes regained the majesty of a Great Emperor.

He suddenly threw the portrait in his hand into the air, and the portrait instantly turned into thousands of phantoms, speeding off in all directions of the Ten Thousand Sword Ancient Clan!

"Transmit my Great Emperor's order!"

"Except for the necessary Cultivators guarding the Blood-colored Passage on the front line! All members of the Ancient Clan, everyone stop your seclusion, and mobilize the entire army!"

"Use all means to find this person in the painting within the territory!"