Harem Master: Seduction System

Chapter 483: The Search for the Warlords

Inside the smoking volcanic rift, the howling wind seemed to vanish completely from Feng Xiao’s ears as his eyes locked onto the three-dimensional projection floating above the Void-Echo Recording Crystal.

The recording showed a narrow, snow-choked mountain ravine at night, illuminated by the blinding flashes of high-tier martial domains and elemental magic.

In the center of the snowy ravine, four Late-Stage Martial King generals of the Rising Sun Empire—clad in dark red demon-faced samurai armor—were fighting desperately for their lives against four women whose faces were only partially veiled by battle-hoods that had been torn or blown back by the shockwaves of their own attacks.

Feng Xiao’s breath stopped cold in his throat.

Even if he went blind in one eye, he could never mistake the two women dominating the left and center of that snowy battlefield!

The first woman floating gracefully above the snow—her long silver-white hair streaming in the freezing gale, her breathtaking, icy face calm and merciless, and her massive, curvy chest rising beneath a form-fitting dress of azure-blue silk and frost armor as she wielded an ancient ice longsword—was unmistakably Grand Elder Yun Lan of the Frozen Cloud Asgard!

Every sweep of her blade unleashed the signature Mystic Ice Phoenix Sword Qi of her sect, yet her cultivation was no longer at the Peak Grandmaster or Early Martial King stage where Feng Xiao remembered her—she was fighting at the absolute peak of the Late-Stage Martial King realm, effortlessly freezing a Rising Sun Martial King solid before shattering him into ice shards!

And right beside Yun Lan, moving like a crimson-and-gold lightning bolt through the snow as seven-colored serpent flames and corrosive royal venom melted a second samurai general’s armor off his bones, was Queen Cai Wei of the Tagor Desert!

Her proud, wild, devastatingly beautiful face and golden vertical pupils were clearly visible in the firelight—and flanking Yun Lan and Cai Wei on the right were two other stunning Late-Stage Martial King women: one wielding royal Eastern Sea water-dragons (Princess Hai Lan), and the other executing the pure Spirit-Sword arts of the Western Desert (Mu Qing)!

“Yun Lan… Cai Wei?!” Feng Xiao stumbled half a step forward on the obsidian rock, his voice cracking with sheer, incomprehensible shock as he stared at the projection. “Why… why were Yun Lan and Cai Wei fighting at the Eastern Iron-Cloud Citadel eight months ago?! And how did both of them reach the Peak of the Late-Stage Martial King realm?!”

“Keep watching,” Corbin said coldly, pointing a scarred finger toward the center of the glowing projection. “Watch what happens when they finish killing the guards—and look at the man they kneel to.”

In the spatial projection, as the last of the four Rising Sun Martial Kings fell dead in the snow and Shrine Master Saito was pinned to the ground below Frost-Fang Peak, a tall, broad-shouldered man stepped forward onto a raised shelf of rock.

He was no longer wearing the stooped posture of a weak healer; his dark, gold-embroidered coat billowed in the mountain wind as swirling rings of violet-gold Archmage mana and the phantom roar of an ancient Spirit-Lion bloodline radiated from his frame, while he casually reached into Shrine Master Saito’s skull to extract his soul.

And then, as the tall man turned half-profile in the moonlight, Grand Elder Yun Lan, Queen Cai Wei, Princess Hai Lan, and Mu Qing all glided immediately to his side—not as distant allies or equals, but dropping gracefully to one knee around his boots with expressions of warm, intimate, unmistakable reverence as the man reached down to casually stroke Queen Cai Wei’s bare cheek and cup Grand Elder Yun Lan’s chin in his palm!

When Feng Xiao saw the face and the glowing ruby eyes of that tall man standing in the snow, it felt as though a ten-thousand-ton mountain had crashed straight down onto the top of his skull!

*BOOM!*

The eight rings of Heavenly Flame orbiting Feng Xiao’s body exploded outward in an uncontrolled, chaotic blast that vaporized a thirty-foot circle of basalt rock around his boots!

“ALARIC?!”

The name tore from Feng Xiao’s throat in a hoarse, blood-curdling roar that echoed off the glacial peaks for ten miles!

His eyes bulged with bloodshot veins as he stared at the handsome, chiseled face and ruby eyes in the crystal projection—the exact same face as the “wandering scholar Alaric” who had sat in Ling Ying’s pavilion at the Yao Clan’s Secret Realm, who had traveled for weeks in the imperial convoy beside Princess Gu Ling, and who had smiled politely while massaging the Imperial Consorts and Gu Ling behind closed doors!

“So you know his name too,” Corbin said, his eyes narrowing in sharp surprise at the sheer, volcanic intensity of Feng Xiao’s reaction. “He goes by Alaric Steele. Inside Azure Fall City, he posed as a weak, harmless traveling physician under the protection of Imperial Consort Xian, Imperial Consort Shu, and Noble Consort Cui Yulan while secretly controlling the entire army and keeping Yun Lan, Cai Wei, Ya Su, Lin Ruoli, Hai Lan, and Mu Qing hidden inside his private estate!”

Corbin assumed Feng Xiao was reacting solely because he recognized the man who had taken Yun Lan, Cai Wei, and Ya Su.

Corbin had no idea about Princess Gu Ling—because Gu Ling had already returned to Profound Gu City before the Azure Fall City siege and had never appeared on the battlefield in Corbin’s recording crystal!

Yet inside Feng Xiao’s mind, a horrifying, sickening avalanche of memories from eight months ago was crashing together with blinding, suffocating clarity!

‘He wasn’t a mortal scholar!’ Feng Xiao’s mind screamed, his hands trembling so violently that drops of blood from his clenched palms hissed and evaporated in his palm-flames. ‘He was a Peak Archmage—a monster stronger than a Peak Martial King—the entire time at the Yao Clan’s Secret Realm and in the Ten-Thousand Peaks Calamity Forest! And he had already taken Ya Su, Yun Lan, and Cai Wei BEFORE he ever showed up at the tournament!’

Wait.

If Alaric Steele was a predatory monster who had specifically hunted down Ya Su, Yun Lan, and Cai Wei—three women closely connected to Feng Xiao—why had Alaric appeared at the Yao Clan’s Secret Realm right alongside Ling Ying?

Why had Alaric invited Princess Gu Ling into his private courtyard for dinner?

Suddenly, every single detail that Feng Xiao had foolishly brushed aside eight months ago came rushing back like poisoned daggers stabbing into his heart:

He remembered how Gu Ling’s cultivation had suddenly skyrocketed to the Late-Stage Martial King realm overnight—and how she had told him with a bright, grateful smile that it was because of a “miraculous meridian-broadening massage” performed by her good friend Alaric!

He remembered standing out in the dark training grounds of the Silver River Province estate, listening with his spiritual sense while Gu Ling lay inside Alaric’s bedchamber for hours—making muffled, breathless cries and choking whimpers while Ling Ying’s voice calmly narrated something about “opening her lower Yin gate” and “deep internal friction”!

He remembered standing outside Gu Ling’s silk tent in the Ten-Thousand Peaks Calamity Forest on their very last night together before she abandoned him—hearing the rhythmic creaking of wood, the wet slapping sounds, Gu Ling’s gasping, trembling voice claiming that a female guard was rubbing wet beast-marrow over her body, and then that deafening, earth-shattering scream of hers right before he left!

And even worse—two months ago, when Feng Xiao had contacted Gu Ling through the spiritual resonance stone from the northern border, her breathing had sounded just as heavy, breathless, and uneven while she claimed she was in “high-temperature meridian seclusion” somewhere in the central provinces!

“No… NO! AAAAAHHHHH!”

Feng Xiao clutched both hands to his head as his knees nearly buckled on the scorched obsidian rock, a wave of black blood-qi and berserk eight-colored fire erupting from his mouth as he coughed up a mouthful of scarlet blood onto the stone!

‘Ling’er… my Ling’er!’ Feng Xiao’s heart felt as if it were being fed into a meat grinder, tears of boiling blood and bottomless rage stinging his eyes. ‘That bastard wasn’t giving her a medical massage! He targeted Ya Su! He targeted Yun Lan! He targeted Cai Wei! And at the Yao Clan’s Secret Realm, he used Ling Ying to get his filthy hands on my Ling’er! Did he put a slave seal on her?! Did he use some demonic mind-controlling hex or hostage threat to force Ling’er, Cai Wei, and Yun Lan to obey him?!’

To a proud “Son of Destiny” like Feng Xiao, his mind flatly refused to accept that his pure, devoted childhood sweetheart Gu Ling, the righteous Sect Master Yun Lan, or the fierce Queen Cai Wei could ever willingly fall in love with or submit to another man unless they had been drugged, blackmailed, or enslaved by some vile, unorthodox spell!

“I will kill him!” Feng Xiao roared at the sky, his voice trembling with such homicidal madness that the volcanic magma pools around the rift bubbled violently. “I will tear Alaric Steele’s flesh off his bones inch by inch and burn his soul in my Heavenly Flames for ten thousand years! Where is he right now?! Is he still in Azure Fall City?!”

Seeing Feng Xiao pushed into an absolute, murderous frenzy—even beyond what Corbin had hoped for—Corbin stepped forward and caught the Void-Echo Recording Crystal as the projection deactivated.

“Calm your Qi for ten breaths and listen to me, Feng Xiao, unless you want to get both of us killed and leave your women in his hands forever!” Corbin snapped sharply.

Feng Xiao whipped his head around, his bloodshot eyes glaring at Corbin like a rabid dragon. “You think I am afraid of dying?!”

“Dying carelessly won’t save Yun Lan, Cai Wei, Ya Su, or whoever else he took from you!” Corbin countered coldly. “Listen to the facts I spent the last seven months gathering! First, Alaric Steele himself is at least at the Peak Archmage and Half-Step Emperor combat level. Second, inside Azure Fall City and Cloud-Mist City, he has Noble Consort Cui Yulan and seventy thousand soldiers of the Northeastern Vanguard protecting his estates, backed by multiple Half-Step Martial Emperor royal guards! Third, for whatever reason—whether through soul-seals, blackmail, or mental hexes—Yun Lan, Cai Wei, Hai Lan, Mu Qing, and at least two other Arch-level women fight fanatically to protect him!”

Feng Xiao’s chest heaved raggedly, blood dripping from his chin as the cold reality of Corbin’s intelligence forced a sliver of sanity back into his boiling brain.

Even at the Peak Martial King realm with eight Heavenly Flames, if Feng Xiao charged alone into Azure Fall City against seventy thousand soldiers, Half-Step Martial Emperor palace guards, and his own brainwashed women, he would be cut down before he could break the inner courtyard wards!

“Then how do we break his turtle shell and isolate him?!” Feng Xiao hissed through bloodstained teeth.

“Look at the other two women who were kneeling beside Yun Lan and Cai Wei in that recording crystal,” Corbin said, holding up two fingers. “Princess Hai Lan of the Eastern Sea, and Mu Qing of the Western Desert. Those two women are the exact reason Sea Devil Long Chen and Soul Eater Qin Wu fought a war that tore two prefectures apart last year! Neither Long Chen nor Qin Wu has any idea that while they were fighting each other, Alaric Steele snatched both of their women away!”

Feng Xiao’s eyes flashed fiercely. Even though he had once viewed Qin Wu and Long Chen as rivals, right now both of those ruthless warlords were Peak Martial Kings with monstrous trump cards who had been played for fools by the exact same man!

“Where are Long Chen and Qin Wu now?” Feng Xiao demanded.

“Since General Bao halted their war last year on Emperor Huang Long’s orders, the Emperor has kept both of them on a tight leash as special vanguard commanders,” Corbin replied, pulling a folded leather map from his coat. “Over the past six months, Long Chen’s sea-raiders and Qin Wu’s desert elites were ordered to march north through the central plains to reinforce the border against the Rimefrost Imperium. According to the military dispatches I intercepted last week, both Long Chen’s column and Qin Wu’s column are scheduled to pass through the outer staging valleys of Cloud-Mist Province fifty days from now to resupply before reaching the northern front!”

At the mention of Cloud-Mist Province, Feng Xiao’s heart skipped a beat.

Through his resonance stone, he had traced the relay tower of Gu Ling’s last transmission to none other than Cloud-Mist City!

“Cloud-Mist Province!” Feng Xiao breathed, his fists clenching until his fingernails drew fresh blood. “My childhood sweetheart—Princess Gu Ling of the Gu Clan—has been staying in Cloud-Mist City for the past several months! If that bastard Alaric is targeting her there, or holding Hai Lan and Mu Qing in his central-province strongholds while his main army is still up north in Azure Fall City—!”

“Then Cloud-Mist City is where we find the truth and catch him away from his seventy-thousand-man border army,” Corbin finished with a cold, lethal smile. “Ride south with me tonight. In fifty days, we intercept Long Chen and Qin Wu outside Cloud-Mist Province, show them this recording crystal, and bring all four of our blades down on Alaric Steele’s neck at once!”