I Got Cheated On and Ended Up in A Beast World

Chapter 164: Chapter 164: The King’s Decree

His large, heavy palm caught the cultivator by his throat, the sheer forward momentum of his strike driving the thin human male straight through the stone rear wall of the platform.

The solid rock exploded into fragments, throwing a massive cloud of gray dust and debris across the high stage.

"Elder Shen!" Wang’s growl echoed from within the dust cloud.

Elder Shen, who was trying to crawl down the side steps of the platform to escape, froze in place, his body shaking so hard he fell onto his stomach.

Wang stepped out from the gray dust, his left hand still holding the gray-robed cultivator by the neck.

The male was covered in blood, his black eyes wide with terror, his legs dangling weakly in the air as his spiritual core began to crack under the pressure of Wang’s grip.

With a sudden, brutal flex of his fingers, Wang snapped the cultivator’s neck, tossing the limp, empty body onto the stone floor boards like a sack of garbage.

He walked down the steps, stopping right over the crawling form of Elder Shen. He did not ask any more questions. He raised his silver sword and brought it down with a single, clean stroke.

*Thud.*

The head of the traitor rolled across the stone, coming to a stop right in front of the rows of lesser chiefs.

Wang stood in the center of the bleeding platform, his chest heaving with deep, ragged gasps as the silver fire around his body slowly settled back into his skin. His golden eyes were completely dark, filled with a terrifying, absolute determination as he looked down at the remaining leaders of the tribe.

Every single chief in the hall instantly dropped to their knees, pressing their foreheads flat against the cold stone floorboards, their voices shaking as they bellowed in perfect unison.

"We greet the Patriarch! Long live the White Tiger Sovereign!"

Wang did not look at them. He wiped the blood from his silver blade with his bare fingers, his eyes fixing onto the high northern window where the upper world peaks were visible through the crimson sky. His house was clean. His enemies were dead. And now, he had a king to hunt.

The silence that followed the execution of Elder Shen was deep, heavy, and absolute.

Wang stood on the blood-stained stones of the high platform, his silver sword held loosely in his right hand.

A single drop of dark crimson fluid gathered at the very tip of the blade, hanging for a fraction of a second before slipping off to plunge into the dust on the floorboards with a soft, hollow sound.

*Plop.*

Below the stage, over a hundred high-tier beast warriors remained pressed flat against the cold earth. Their broad shoulders were tense, their breathing shallow, none of them daring to lift their heads to look at the young man who had just dismantled the two greatest powers in the northern territory in less than an hour.

The large hall, which had been full of greedy shouting just moments before, now felt like an ancient burial ground.

Wang’s golden eyes slowly swept over the kneeling crowd. The silver fire that had wrapped around his body during the fight had settled back beneath his skin, but the raw, ancestral pressure vibrating from his spiritual core was still incredibly thick, making the air feel heavy and hard to swallow.

"Stand up," Wang commanded, his voice not loud, but carrying a sharp, metallic edge that rattled the iron chains holding the central braziers.

Slowly, the lesser chiefs and elders pushed themselves up from the stone floorboards. They stood in rigid rows, their large hands resting flat against the sides of their heavy armor, their eyes fixed firmly on the ground near Wang’s boots.

Even the strongest among them, males who had fought in the outer wars for decades, looked small and fragile under his steady gaze.

Wang turned his head slightly, looking toward Elder Chen, who was leaning heavily against a cracked stone pillar near the entrance.

The old soldier’s face was pale, his single hand shaking with exhaustion, but his eyes were bright with a fierce, burning pride.

"Chen," Wang spoke softly. "Bring the tribal ledger and the seal of the northern gates."

"Right away, Patriarch," Chen rasped out, his voice cracking with emotion as he bowed his head low, stepping away into the side chambers to fulfill the command.

Wang walked over to the high stone chair where Elder Shen had sat for the past ten years. He did not sit in it. Instead, he reached out with his left hand, his sharp claws extending just a fraction as he gripped the carved armrest of the seat.

With a sudden, casual flex of his large fingers, he tore the heavy stone arm completely away from the chair, tossing the shattered fragments onto the floor boards below.

"For ten years, this council has fed on the blood of our people," Wang said, his voice dropping into a low, gravelly rumble that traveled through every corner of the room. "You let the cultivators from the higher realms buy our lands. You let them build their arrays on our mountains, blinding our eyes and choking our spiritual cores. You thought that as long as your pockets were full of gold, it did not matter if the tribe withered into nothing."

He took a slow step forward, stopping at the very edge of the platform, looking down at a large, gray-furred chief standing in the front row—Chief Borask, a male who had long been suspected of taking bribes from Elder Shen’s treasury.

"Chief Borask," Wang called out.

The gray-furred male went rigid, his thick neck tightening as he forced himself to step out from the line, his head lowered. "I am here, Patriarch."

"Your sector controls the western pass," Wang said, his golden eyes narrowing slightly. "The pass that leads directly to the ascending spatial gates of the upper world. Two moons ago, a caravan of three hundred low-tier beast cubs was moved through your territory in the dead of night. They were chained, their spirits suppressed by the obsidian bells of the gray-robed cultivators. Did you see them?"

Borask’s large jaw trembled, a cold sweat breaking out across his scarred forehead. He gripped the hilt of his heavy iron axe until his knuckles turned white. "I... My Lord, Elder Shen provided a royal transit token. He said it was a diplomatic exchange with the southern valleys. I did not know..."

"You knew," Wang interrupted him, his voice flat and entirely devoid of mercy. "You knew they were being sold into the upper world to clear the spiritual mines for the manticore lords. You took three boxes of high-grade spirit stones to turn your face toward the wall while our children wept in the dark."

Borask dropped to his knees with a heavy crash, his armor plates clanking loudly against the stone. "Mercy, Patriarch! I have served this tribe for thirty years! My sons are fighting on the eastern borders! I was blind... I was foolish! Do not execute my lineage!"

Wang stared down at the kneeling chief for a long, agonizing moment. The lesser chiefs behind Borask held their breath, waiting for the silver blade to flash once more.

"I will not take your head tonight, Borask," Wang said quietly. "But your title is stripped. Your lands are returned to the common treasury, and your sons will be recalled from the border to oversee the clearing of the western pass arrays. If a single external cultivator steps foot in your sector during the next three moons, your entire house will burn. Do you accept this decree?"

"I accept! I thank the Patriarch for his boundless mercy!" Borask cried out, pressing his forehead against the stone three times before scrambling back into the crowd, his face pale with relief.

Wang looked back up, his eyes focusing on the entire gathering. "The rest of you will listen well. The Silver Tiger Tribe is no longer a marketplace for the higher realms. From this night onward, every contract signed with the human clans is void. Every array built on our ridges will be smashed to dust. We do not bow to the cultivators, and we do not sell our blood to the kings of the upper world."

He raised his silver sword high, the polished metal catching the harsh orange glare of the braziers.

"We are predators," Wang’s voice rose, turning into a deep, powerful roar that shook the loose dust from the stone ceiling beams. "We claim what is ours, and we protect what is ours. Clean your weapons. Train your young cubs. The sect is closing its gates, and anyone who tries to force them open will find nothing but iron and blood."

"Long live the Alpha King! Long live the White Tiger!" the warriors bellowed in response, their voices full of a sudden, raw heat that had been missing from the tribe for a generation.

They slammed the hafts of their axes against the floorboards, creating a rhythmic, deafening thunder that echoed far out into the dark valleys outside.