Chapter 87: Public Opinion Like a Blade! The Ancestor’s Dao Heart Cracked!

The air in the great hall seemed as if someone had sucked away the last trace of warmth—it was cold enough to freeze the bones.

True Lord Xuantian stood motionless upon the high platform, looking like a stone statue that had weathered for a thousand years.

His eyes were hollow, as though his soul had not yet returned from that earth-shattering moment just now.

He couldn’t understand—truly couldn’t understand…

Those Elders who had always treated him with the utmost reverence, who didn’t even dare to breathe too loudly in front of him—how could they suddenly have the courage to join hands and take his strike head-on today?!

Were they not afraid of death?

Or rather… what kind of bewitching potion had that little brat Chu Feng fed them?!

At that moment, the deathly stillness was torn apart by an exaggerated cry.

“Ahhh! Elder Liu! Elder Wang!”

Chu Feng’s face was full of “panic,” as he leapt forward in haste, fumbling to help the nearest Liu Changqing. His manner suggested that if he were even a moment late, the heavens themselves would collapse.

“Why would you do this! For a junior like me—it’s not worth it, not worth it at all!”

He chanted those words under his breath, but his hands moved quickly—he fished out a few pills from his storage pouch. The concern in his eyes, the emotion in his expression—tsk, tsk—anyone who didn’t know better would have truly thought he was some righteous young man, heart aching for his elders.

Liu Changqing lay sprawled on the ground, his internal organs twisted in pain, spasms wracking his body.

But when he caught Chu Feng’s meaningful glance—hah—he immediately understood.

Acting? Who didn’t know how to act?

If this play was performed well, wouldn’t their standing in the Group soar straight to the heavens?

He gripped Chu Feng’s hand, coughing up blood foam as he spoke in a voice so weak it could break, yet filled with unyielding righteousness.

“Cough… President Chu… you… you are the future of our Qingyun Sect… We old bones… how could we stand by and watch the Ancestor… in a moment of confusion, destroy the Sect’s very foundation!”

“That’s right!”

On the other side, Wang Xuanfu also struggled to his feet. He wiped the blood at the corner of his mouth roughly, face full of tragic determination, his voice trembling.

“Old Ancestor, you have been in seclusion for a hundred years, you might not know! President Chu is no fiend!”

“He is the great benefactor of our Qingyun Sect! It was him who gave us old fellows, who had been stuck at bottlenecks for centuries, hope of breaking through!”

“It was him who made sure even outer disciples have pills to consume, spirit stones to spend—lives to look forward to!”

“If that palm of yours had truly struck down, the one you would’ve killed wasn’t just Chu Feng—it would have shattered the hearts of everyone in Qingyun Sect, destroyed our entire future, Old Ancestor!”

Their words were so heartfelt and moving that even those who listened felt tears pricking their eyes.

Look—just look!

What did it mean to be the backbone of a Sect?

Elder Wang and Elder Liu were the very definition!

To protect the Sect’s future, to shield President Chu, they dared to face the might of the Ancestor himself—what immense courage and loyalty!

True Lord Xuantian listened to their words, watching this grand act of “loyal ministers shielding their lord.” His face went from pale to blue, from blue to purple, and finally black as ink.

Future? Hope? Benefactor?

He felt a buzzing in his skull, like a swarm of flies crashing madly about, sending his thoughts spinning. What nonsense was this?

A petty trickster, who used deception and cheap theatrics to sway hearts, was now the Sect’s “hope”?

A group of traitors who dared stab their Ancestor in the back for mere petty profit were now called the “backbone” of the Sect?

Everything he had built over a thousand years of arduous cultivation—the order of hierarchy, the supremacy of strength—all of it was shattered into dust in this very instant.

His Dao Heart—that firm, unshakable Nascent Soul Dao Heart that had weathered centuries—gave off a faint, brittle crack.

It fractured. A fine, but hideous crack.

He began to doubt life itself—to doubt the world.

Could it be… that I was wrong?

The path of ascetic purity and hierarchical order I have upheld for millennia… has it truly gone out of fashion?

Has the world really become such that whoever can paint the grandest dream, shout the loudest slogan—that person represents “Heaven’s Dao”?

As True Lord Xuantian’s Dao Heart faltered, caught in a spiral of self-doubt, the roar from outside surged again, like a tidal wave threatening to lift the entire roof off the hall.

Zhang Daniu’s trademark booming voice rang among tens of thousands of shouts, striking True Lord Xuantian’s heart like a hammer.

“Please, Ancestor, follow Heaven’s will and heed the people’s heart!”

“Please, Ancestor, rescind your decree and return us our Group!”

“President Chu is innocent! Long live the Ascension Group!”

Each chant was sharper than the last, cutting deeper and deeper.

They cried of “Heaven’s will” and “the people’s heart,” yet this so-called “Heaven’s will” was clearly Chu Feng’s idea, and the “people’s heart” was nothing but their greed bought by pills and spirit stones!

Yet—he could not refute a single word.

Because this power—was real. So real, so vast, that even a Nascent Soul Ancestor like him felt suffocated beneath it.

At that moment, Chu Feng moved.

With “deep sorrow,” he fed pills into the Elders’ mouths, then slowly stood, turning toward True Lord Xuantian with a gaze full of pain, respect—and even a touch of pity.

“Ancestor, do you see it now?”

His voice was not loud, yet it carried a strange power, spreading clearly through the hall and silencing all the noise outside.

“This is not this junior’s manipulation. This is the will of the people, the tide of the times…”

“You are a Nascent Soul powerhouse, your magic can reach the heavens. You can kill me, Chu Feng, and you can slaughter every Elder here…”

“But can you kill all those tens of thousands outside—those family members who only wish to grow stronger and live better lives?”

He paused, his tone heavy, pressing on everyone’s hearts like a great stone.

“Ancestor… please stop.”

“That strike of yours just now—it did not shatter this junior’s body…”

“It shattered the hearts of everyone in Qingyun Sect!”

“When hearts are broken… they are hard to mend again…”

Those words struck like an invisible hammer, smashing directly onto True Lord Xuantian’s already cracked Dao Heart.

Pfft—

True Lord Xuantian could no longer suppress the surge of blood in his throat. He spat out a mouthful of crimson that splattered across the floor, shockingly vivid.

His tall figure swayed, his spirit and vitality drained away—as though he had aged hundreds of years in an instant.

He had lost.

Utterly and completely.

Not in spells, not in cultivation—but to something he could neither comprehend nor resist—

that invisible yet omnipresent force called… “the people’s heart.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep