CHAPTER 221: THE CLASH AT THE WRECKAGE

The night air was thick with smoke.

The mangled FBI van hissed as metal cooled, flames licking at its shattered frame. Cracked asphalt, torn earth, and the smell of burning oil filled the roadside ravine where the wreck had landed.

A broken car door suddenly exploded outward, blasted aside by a force that left shockwaves rippling across the grass.

From within the flames stepped Hutton.

His clothes were scorched and torn, but not a single scratch marked his skin. His light brown eyes gleamed fiercely, golden currents flickering behind them. Each breath he exhaled carried a faint distortion in the air — the pressure of a Nascent Soul cultivator.

Across the wreck, another figure emerged.

Elias—the World Class cultivator—walked out of the fire as though it were made of warm sunlight. His suit was in tatters, revealing faint silver lines glowing beneath his skin: a defensive cultivation lattice that shimmered like mirrored lightning.

He dusted ash from his shoulder in annoyance.

"What an inconvenience. The driver was incompetent."

Two FBI agents groaned on the ground nearby, crawling away from the burning wreckage. Farther off, a police officer coughed, his legs crushed but alive.

But none of them mattered.

Not now.

As Hutton stepped towards Elias, energy swirling around him like coiling mist with a murderous intent.

"Let’s finish what should have never begun."

Elias smirked.

"You were better off dying in your last life. This time, I’ll make sure the your soul doesn’t get the chance to be reincarnated again."

He raised his hand — the air screamed as a spear of lightning materialized.

Immediately after, Elias thrust the lightning spear forward, the attack blasting a trench across the ground. Hutton swayed aside — no wasted movement — and slammed his palm forward.

’He is at the same first phase of the Nascent Soul stage as me’ Hutton thought grimly as he muttered.

"Heavenly Palm Series — First Form: Mountain-Shattering Push."

A shockwave detonated from Hutton’s strike, ripping apart the incoming lightning and sending a wave of force barreling into Elias.

Elias skidded back, boots carving lines into the earth.

His expression hardened.

"So you’ve stepped into Nascent Soul... impressive. But still a child."

He blurred.

The next instant, he appeared directly in front of Hutton.

Lightning wrapped around his arm as he aimed a palm strike at Hutton’s heart.

Hutton blocked—barely. The impact blasted him back twenty meters, smashing him into a fallen tree and cracking its trunk.

The ground trembled. The surviving agents screamed and crawled farther away.

Hutton wiped a trace of blood from his lip and exhaled.

Then a calm, cold focus settled over him as he thought.

’Seems like I will have to use my trump card’

Immediately after, He stepped forward once—his foot landing with a resonant thoom.

"Heavenly Palm... Third Form."

A golden aura burst from his entire body, spiraling upward like a rising sun.

Elias’s eyes widened.

"Impossible—at your age?! At your stage?!"

Hutton vanished.

A palm manifested from thin air, slamming into Elias’s ribs with earth-shattering force. His body bent unnaturally as he tore through tree after tree before crashing against a boulder, splitting it in half.

The dust hadn’t settled before Hutton appeared in front of him again.

"Fourth Form — Heaven’s Descent."

He brought both palms down.

The ground cratered. Trees uprooted. The shockwave flattened the nearby police cruiser that had followed the van.

Elias staggered to his feet, coughing blood, eyes blazing with fury.

The silver runes under his skin flickered violently.

"You... damn... monster..."

Lightning swirled around him, condensing into a massive vortex.

His aura spiked to to the second phase of the Nascent Soul stage, shaking the entire forest.

"Now DIE!"

He hurled the full force of his cultivation — a storm meant to annihilate everything within a hundred meters.

The world went white.

But Hutton did not retreat.

He centered himself, palms glowing gold.

"Fifth Form..."

The ground lifted under him as spiritual power surged.

"Celestial Sundering Palm."

A golden palm print larger than a house formed behind Hutton before collapsing into his real palm.

Then—

He struck.

The golden palm tore through the lightning storm, ripped apart Elias’s strongest technique, and slammed into the World Class cultivator’s chest.

A silence fell.

Then—

BOOOOM!!!

The explosion shook the ravine, sending waves of dust and debris rolling across the road.

When the light cleared, Elias lay half-buried in a crater. His chest was caved in, ribcage shattered, silver runes flickering and dying like broken circuits.

He looked up at Hutton — disbelief in his fading eyes.

"How... can a entry level Nascent Soul... overpower my strongest attack...?"

Hutton walked to the edge of the crater, looking down at him with a calm that felt colder than death.

"Because this time... I decide my fate."

He raised his hand one last time.

Elias tried to speak — but too late.

Hutton’s palm descended gently, almost respectfully.

The ground trembled as life left the World Class cultivator’s body.

The man who directly orchestrated Hutton’s death in his previous life...

was finally gone.

’But since he is part of the Dorne family, that means they are also involved in my death’ Hutton suddenly thought with a solemn look on his face as he exhaled, standing in the silence of the destroyed ravine.

The FBI agents stared at him in fear... awe... and uncertainty.

He turned toward them slowly.

The smoke from the wrecked van drifted upward in thin, twisting sheets. Then Hutton began to take one slow step toward the three surviving agents — two FBI, one local police — all of them trembling, hands raised, eyes fixed on him like he was some primordial beast wearing human skin.

He opened his mouth to speak.

But the words never came.

A sudden pressure dropped from above — heavy, suffocating, deliberate.

Thud.

A black-booted foot landed on the asphalt behind him.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

More footsteps. Dozens.

Hutton froze.

The FBI agents froze.

From the smoke stepped men in black suits — identical suits, identical posture, identical unreadable faces. Their movements were synchronized with military precision. Each one radiated an aura so intense that the air hummed.

Peak Nascent Soul.

Every single one of them.

Within seconds the wreck site was surrounded, a perfect circle of silent power. Even the very atmosphere bowed to them. The agents collapsed to their knees involuntarily, gasping for breath under the oppressive qi.

Hutton’s expression tightened.

Then the final figure appeared.

He did not walk out of the smoke — he split it apart just by moving through it.

Aurelian Dorne.

The head of the Dorne family.

He was tall, broad-shouldered, wearing a deep charcoal suit that made the world around him seem paler. His eyes were a cold silver-gray, sharp enough to cut steel. And behind those eyes burned an ancient fury.

The men in suits bowed their heads as he passed.

He stopped ten feet in front of Hutton.

The silence was absolute.

The wind dared not blow.

Then—

"You’re calm. Interesting. Most men tremble when Death stands before them."

Hutton held his gaze.

"I’ve met Death before."

Aurelian’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully.

"Yes... you have. In fact — more than once."

Hutton’s pulse paused for half a beat.

Aurelian tilted his head slightly, studying him as though examining a rare specimen.

"Regiment Leader Taylor . Commander of the Falcon Regiment. Killed in the third year of the World War while fighting for your home country. Sabotage via betrayal."

Hutton’s blood ran cold.

Aurelian continued, unblinking.

"And somehow... impossibly... reincarnated as Hutton Maxwell."

The FBI agents stared at Hutton, horrified, confused, unable to believe what they were hearing.

Hutton didn’t respond.

His hands curled slightly at his sides.

Aurelian’s gaze sharpened.

"You killed my son."

It wasn’t a question.

It was a verdict.

Hutton’s expression didn’t change.

"He attacked me. And he almost killed innocent people in the process. If there’s blame, it falls on—"

Aurelian raised a hand.

Every Dorne bodyguard instantly shifted stance.

The pressure multiplied.

Aurelian smiled — a small, humorless, terrifying smile.

"Spare me the morality speech. I don’t care how it happened. What I care about... is that you stole something from me."

He stepped closer, until he was a single pace from Hutton.

"My blood. My legacy. A piece of my immortal line."

Hutton did not flinch.

Aurelian’s voice dropped into a razor whisper.

"And yet... I cannot kill you."

Hutton’s eyes narrowed.

"Why?"

Aurelian straightened.

"Because the Alliance has ordered your capture alive. Because the God Crystal belongs to the entire World Class Assembly. And because... your reincarnated existence has implications none of us can ignore."

The FBI agents looked at each other, speechless.

Aurelian waved a hand casually.

In an instant, five of his men stepped forward.

Peak Nascent Soul, suffocating aura.

They didn’t attack, didn’t threaten — just stood close enough that escape became impossible.

Aurelian’s final words fell like a thunderclap:

"Hutton Maxwell... by decree of the American World Class Alliance and the Dorne Clan, you are now in our custody."

He turned away.

"Bring him."

Two cultivators placed firm hands on Hutton’s shoulders — not hostile... but overwhelming.

Hutton considered resisting.

For a heartbeat, golden qi flickered under his palms.

But then—

He sensed them.

All of them.

Twenty-three peak Nascent Soul cultivators surrounding him.

And Aurelian himself — a half-step beyond, brushing the edges of Soul Transformation.

He closed his eyes.

Not yet.

Not here.

Hutton relaxed his shoulders.

The agents watched helplessly as the men in black guided him forward. And obviously, Aurelien was well aware of there presence.

And without a second thought, Aurelian spoke without turning

"I want no witnesses."

And so, the entire Dorne entourage vanished into the smoke-choked night with Hutton right after silencing the surviving FBI agents and the policeman.