Chapter 158: Commotion
The Grand Hall of a Thousand Stars, a masterpiece of spatial architecture that seemed to hold the very cosmos within its vaulted ceilings, pulsed with the rhythmic hum of a hundred thousand high-level cultivators.
The atmosphere here was heavy with the intoxicating soup of premium spirit wine, the savory aroma of dragon-liver delicacies, and the sharp, electric tension of apex politics.
Chu Xueyu, the Ruthless Empress, gave a subtle, regal nod to her son, her gaze was a mixture of maternal pride and imperial command.
Beside her, Leng Shuang and Feng Yuyan took a coordinated step back, retreating into the shadow of the throne to allow the spotlight to fall squarely on the young man who had just rewritten the hierarchy of the Shen Clan.
Haoran stepped forward to the edge of the obsidian dais.
"Greetings, great powers of the Imperial Capital—"
He did not need a voice-amplifying artifact; his voice on its own, carried by his profound Qi, resonated in the ears of every guest with the clarity of a temple bell.
He offered a concise greeting, thanked the representatives of the Immortal Sects and Immortal Clans for their presence, and with a simple, elegant gesture, invited them to partake in the festivities.
It was a short speech, devoid of the flowery, long-winded rhetoric common among the nobility, but its brevity only underscored his absolute confidence.
The hall erupted in a thunderous applause that shook the chandeliers made of captured starlight.
Once the formalities were concluded, the four of them took their designated seats.
Immediately, the "private" gathering became a battlefield of social maneuvering.
The leaders of major powers, sovereigns of vassal kingdoms, and elders of influential sects began to swarm the dais.
They approached in a curated line, offering toasts of thousand-year-old jade nectar, presenting scrolls of ancient techniques, and showering Haoran with congratulations that sounded more like hymns of worship.
At the periphery of the elite circle, tucked away near a pillar carved with the likeness of a cosmic dragon, Luo Mingye was struggling.
She was hopping on the balls of her feet, her impressive figure, her large breast, noted by many nearby male Cultivators, is shaking with every frantic movement as she tried to peer over the sea of heads.
"Urgh... this is impossible!" she groaned, her green eyes scanning the crowd with increasing frustration. "I can’t see a thing! At this rate, I won’t even be able to get within ten paces of Young Master Shen, let alone offer him a toast. What’s the point of being the granddaughter of a Saint if I’m stuck behind a wall of lousy, power hungry hypocrites?"
Xia Mengyao, standing beside her, subconsciously nodded, although her expression was more composed, but her eyes held a trace of the same disappointment.
She had wanted to see the man who had mastered a secret technique of others n a single glance once more, and most importantly, to judge whether she would agree with her friend’s decision to choose Shen Haoran as their partner.
Xiao Chen, standing behind them like a brooding shadow, watched their fixation with a heart that was rapidly blackening with jealousy.
Every time Luo Mingye mentioned Haoran’s name, or Xia Mengyao looked toward the dais with that contemplative gaze, he felt a sting of inadequacy that he translated into cold fury.
’Damn you, all of you young masters!’ he thought, his fingers digging into his palms until blood nearly surfaced. ’You are just a parasite who relied on your mother’s milk and your clan’s gold to reach this height. You didn’t crawl through the mud! You didn’t earn your strength through blood and betrayal! Just wait... one day, I will be the one on that throne, and I will trample your precious Shen name into the dirt!’
He then took a step forward, trying to interpose himself between the girls and the distant sight of Haoran.
"Lady Mengyao, why don’t we just wait outside?" he suggested, his voice sounding forcedly calm. "This place is suffocating. It’s crawling with two-faced hypocrites and sycophants who only care about licking the boots of the powerful. It’s beneath your dignity to be part of this circus."
As he spoke, he tentatively reached out his hand, intending to take Xia Mengyao’s wrist and lead her away from the "temptation" of the Shen Heir.
Xia Mengyao, however, moved with the fluid grace of a sword-master as she took a subtle step to the side, appearing to merely adjust her stance to see the stage better, but the result was that Xiao Chen’s hand grabbed nothing but empty air.
"Mingye used her grandfather’s precious connections to bring me here," Xia Mengyao said, her voice cool and neutral. "I don’t want to be rude to her or the hosts by leaving early. It would be a slight against the Shen Clan’s hospitality. But, Xiao Chen, if you find the atmosphere so disagreeable, you are free to leave on your own. I won’t hold it against you."
Xiao Chen stood frozen, his hand still awkwardly outstretched as he felt the eyes of several nearby guests on him, the mocking, judging eyes a superior looking at the inferior making a fool of himself.
He felt a wave of heat climb his neck, his throat tightening as he slowly retracted his arm and scratched the back of his head, trying to play off the rejection as a casual gesture.
"Hahaha!" Ye Fang let out a sharp, bark-like laugh, stepping forward with a malicious glint in his eyes. "The lady is right! You should have just stayed in the stables where you belong, Xiao Chen! Although the Shen Clan is generous enough to allow some ’dogs’ to eat in the hall, that privilege is reserved for pedigreed hounds, specifically groomed and trained for the occasion. Stray curs like you, who smell of the shit and piss, aren’t the same species. You’re polluting the air, honestly."
"You—You! You bastard!" Xiao Chen exploded.
The accumulation of the day’s humiliations reached a breaking point as be lunged forward and grabbed Ye Fang by the collar of his expensive, silk robes.
"Are you looking for a fight!? I don’t care who your father kr grandfather is, I’ll break every bone in your body!"
Just then, the unexpected happened.
Ye Fang didn’t fight back. Instead, he used the momentum of Xiao Chen’s grip to propel himself backward before he went limp, his collar tearing with a loud, dramatic *Rrrrrip!* as he tumbled to the polished jade floor.
He skidded several feet, clutching his chest and let out a series of convincing, pained groans.
Xiao Chen stared at his empty hands, then at the "injured" noble on the floor.
He looked utterly confused. He hadn’t even thrown a punch! He had barely exerted any strength!
’Is this... that touching porcelain scheme?!’ he thought, his mind reeling. ’These natives are so cunning!’
Having lived two lives, the first as a jaded salaryman on Earth, Xiao Chen was intimately familiar with "insurance scams" and "false accusations."
He had been tricked by these types of theatrics before, but he hadn’t expected a high-ranking noble in the Prime Origin Realm to resort to such "lowly" mortal tactics.
"Help! Help!" Ye Fang wailed, his voice carrying far across the hall. "This barbarian! This servant is attacking me! He’s trying to murder a member of the noble line in the middle of the feast!"
The commotion was like a stone dropped into a still pond as the swirling crowds of guests halted, and hundreds of thousands of eyes, some curious, some annoyed, some predatory, turned toward the corner where the conflict was unfolding.
At the high table, Haoran was in the middle of acknowledging a toast from a regional governor when the disturbance caught his attention.
He turned his golden gaze toward the back of the hall. With his enhanced vision, he immediately recognized the silhouettes of Luo Mingye and Xia Mengyao—the two girls he had encountered back in the Supreme Inheritance Realm.
His eyes then shifted to the two boys at the center of the scene, and even though he didn’t recognize them, he believes that they are either a protagonist or a villain.
’Only those two types of men ever get this close to heroines,’ he mused, his expression darkening into a cold, clinical curiosity.
Why did he assume that? Because they are near the heroines, and only those type of men can get close to the heroine, the others woul barely even approach them.
Why did he assume these girls are heroines? Because they are with that one protagonist in the inheritance realm.
Haoran’s brows furrowed. He felt a cold prickle of annoyance. ’To think you actually have the nerve to cause a commotion in my own territory, on my day of triumph.’
Slowly, the crowd parted like the Red Sea.
Under the heavy, suffocating gaze of every powerhouse in the room, Shen Haoran stood up and began to walk toward the disturbance.
Back on the floor, Ye Fang was internally gloating as he lay there, pretending to be wounded, but his thoughts were a manic dance of triumph.
’Hehehe, Xiao Chen, are you angry? Are you confused? Good! The angrier you are, the happier I become! You might be the protagonist of a book, but I have a System of my own! Your opportunities, your destiny, your girls... I’ll take them all and leave you with nothing but the dirt!’
As Xiao Chen stood over him, trembling with a mixture of rage and the realization that he had been perfectly set up, the temperature in the room seemed to drop by twenty degrees.
A shadow fell over the group, long and regal.
"What is happening here?"
Haoran appeared.
His voice was not loud, but it held the authority of an absolute monarch as he looked down at the "injured" Ye Fang and then at the "aggressive" Xiao Chen, his three-colored soul pulsing subtly beneath his skin, waiting for the first lie to be told.