403 - 409
Chapter 403: I will not be an Immortal!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
At the same time Su Ming went through the pain of the threads crawling into his heart, bumps appeared on various spots of his body.
These bumps were almost the exact same as the bumps that had previously exploded in the sky, causing him to no longer look like a human.
The pain made Su Ming's laughter grow louder. His body shot into the air with one leap, and as the Dragon of Earthen Aura continuously shrank, he started forming seals with his hands. Once he entered the head of the dragon, he brought the Dragon of Earthen Aura with him while charging towards the sky belonging to the Immortals.
As the sixty-seven bumps exploded in the sky, the sixty-seven black cicada like insects with wings growing from their backs charged out!
As these strange insects screeched, they charged towards the Dragon of Earthen Aura. They all crashed into each other in the sky once again. Booming sounds echoed in the air once more. The Dragon of Earthen Aura had already completely flown off the ground and did not care about those insects crawling into its body, neither did Su Ming care about the intense pain in his body. With the Dragon of Earthen Aura, he charged towards the sky belonging to the Immortals.
"Di Tian, if you can bring down heavenly punishment, then I would rather destroy heaven itself and destroy my blood as an Immortal forever. I will no longer be an Immortal!"
As the red-haired Su Ming howled in fury, he crashed into that sky along with the Dragon of Earthen Aura. Booming sounds reverberated through the air. Ripples, waves, and cracks started appearing in the sky!
Yet similarly, that Dragon of Earthen Aura started shattering inch by inch. Once it rammed its entire body into the sky, it crumbled and started dissipating. Su Ming coughed out a huge mouthful of blood. There was not a spot on his body that did not hurt. His entire body was covered by a large amount of bugs, and the aura of death started coming off his body.
As for the sky belonging to the Immortals, it only suffered a ring of cracks, and those cracks were rapidly recovering right as he watched.
"Thine appearance was a mere incident. It is finished. Thy soul shalt disappear under the punishment of six upon seven days. All shalt return to its original state."
"Finished? Not just yet!"
Right after Di Tian said those words, the red-haired Su Ming called out with a strange voice. He spoke that despite having his entire body torn apart by the swarm of black insects, despite having the boils bursting apart on him, despite having the nine threads shredding his organs, and despite having a dense layer of aura of death emanating from his body.
"I remember now. I am not Su Ming… I am Hong Luo! I am the Progenitor Hong Luo!"
Su Ming's eyes were originally closed, but at that moment, he opened them, and there was a brilliant light shining within them. Right at the instant before his soul disappeared, his originally faded memories suddenly cleared up as he was pushed towards his death.
He remembered his identity! He remembered his own name!
"I am the Progenitor Hong Luo, I am the son of the Emperor of Immortals. Aren't I right, my beloved senior brother, Di Tian?!" Su Ming's eyes sparkled, and his body trembled. Immediately, his divine sense shot out and pushed all those insects ten feet backwards, but they were not injured. Those insects rushed towards him once again.
"I remember now. You were wary in the past, that's why you didn't dare kill me but sealed me in Destiny's body! I remember now! Destiny… Haha! Is this body Destiny's body?
"I remember now. This is the land of the Berserkers. This is the home world of the first God of Berserkers… Once the first God of Berserkers passed away, you invaded this place with the others to execute the plan to kill the second God of Berserkers. When you came back, you brought with you a pair of babies. One of them was dead and the other alive. The one alive must be in whom my soul is residing at this moment!
"He must be the baby personally named by my father after he examined it himself!" The red-haired Su Ming spoke with an eerie voice.
Di Tian's expression remained aloof. He did not speak but simply lifted his right hand to point at the red-haired Su Ming. Immediately, the boils on Su Ming's body rotted away, and the insects around him swarmed towards him and crawled into those rotting spots. As they devoured in frenzy, the nine threads in Su Ming's body also pierced through his heart!
The aura of death enveloped the red-haired Su Ming, and a strange smile suddenly appeared at the corners of his lips.
"My dear senior brother, could you perhaps have forgotten about this one Art I have with me..? This is also the reason you couldn't kill me, right..? Because of the Origin ancient Art we have as members of the Immortals' royal family!
"Enduring Ten Lives!"
The moment the smile appeared on the red-haired Su Ming's lips, all his life force abruptly disappeared and he breathed his last. However, the instant he died, his disappeared life force immediately reappeared, and this time, his presence became much stronger.
Those black insects that had crawled into his body immediately fell back and exploded outside his body, turning into a large amount of black fog that tumbled backwards. His body started rapidly recovering. The rotting wounds caused by the boils instantly healed. Even the nine threads that had crawled into his body were once again forced under the layer of his skin, and they looked as if they were about to be forced out of his body as well.
"When I say you must die, then you must die, because… there can be no two rulers! " Di Tian's expression still remained unchanged. He said those words unhurriedly, but the moment he spoke them, the recovery of the red-haired Su Ming's life force came to an abrupt halt.
Not only was it forced to a stop, it also started showing signs of reversal. The recovered wounds appeared once again, and the nine threads that had been forced under the skin crawled into Su Ming's body once again. The black insects that had shattered and dissolved into black fog around him appeared out of nowhere, and gathered together to turn into the sixty-seven tiny black insects once again. Then, as if time had went back, they charged towards Su Ming.
"This is the ancient Art that is only inherited by those possessing the blood of the royal family of the Immortals. You actually mastered it..? Looks like my father's fate was grim…" The red-haired Su Ming's face was pale as he spoke bitterly.
"You should not have awakened. It is still long before the seal is to be released. Now, I have restored order, and everything has returned to normal." Di Tian spoke calmly and lifted his right hand, swinging it at the red-haired Su Ming.
Immediately, a gust of wind from emptiness itself appeared before the red-haired Su Ming. The instant it touched his body, he was surrounded by the aura of death. A large part of his body started decaying. The black insects tore at his flesh, and his organs had already been pierced through by those threads. There was only a hint of his life left, and that hint was also rapidly fading.
As the wind from Di Tian's swing landed on Su Ming's body, a gust of red air immediately spread from Su Ming's eyes, ears, nose, and mouth that turned into an illusory figure behind him. The appearance of that figure was different from Su Ming's. He had a handsome face that gave off a strangely enchanting feeling. That… was the real Hong Luo!
At that moment, his illusionary body was rapidly fading away. As his soul was forced out of Su Ming's body, those insects in Su Ming's body crawled out simultaneously to charge at the soul. The nine threads also flew out and seeped into Hong Luo's disappearing soul. At the same time, the sixty-seven boils manifested on Hong Luo's illusory figure, and they were rapidly bursting apart.
"Am I about to die..? Is this how it feels to die..? But I don't regret it!" A dazed look appeared the illusory figure of Hong Luo's soul before he started laughing loudly.
As the soul was separated from Su Ming's body, the wind that was blowing against him surged inside in an overbearing manner, causing the injuries suffered by his organs to instantly recover. The rot on his body also disappeared immediately, causing him to return to the exact same manner before he was injured. The power within his body also started clearing away all of Hong Luo's power, the power which had made him become powerful so swiftly.
All of this was happening just as Di Tian had said. He wanted to restore order. He wanted to return everything back to the state before this accident happened, forcing everything to act according to his will. He would not allow anymore accidents to happen!
Yet right at the instant Di Tian's power started restoring things to thier original state in Su Ming's body, Hong Luo, in his daze as he continued disappearing, seemed to have seen something, and a blank look immediately appeared on his face. A glint suddenly shone in his eyes, and he immediately turned his eyes to look towards Su Ming, who had his eyes tightly shut.
"Destiny… Destiny… I understand now, Di Tian, I understand now! So this is your plan! If that's the case, before I die, I will help him!" Hong Luo suddenly laughed loudly. A strange light appeared in his eyes, and the instant his body disappeared, the illusory figure of his soul suddenly erupted in flames.
"The ancient legacy of the blood kin of Immortals - Path to Life!"
As Hong Luo laughed, the illusory figure of his soul continued burning. At that moment, only his head was left, and two rays of dark light shone in his eyes before they flew out and landed on Su Ming's body.
All of this happened too quickly, and for the first time, Di Tian's expression changed. He lifted his right hand and pointed forward. The instant those two rays of dark light closed in on Su Ming, they immediately shattered into dark sparks before scattering away.
Yet at that moment, those scattered dark sparks gathered up together once again, and with a speed Di Tian could not stop, they shot into the center of Su Ming's brows.
Instantly, the energy of the dark sparks erupted in Su Ming's body with a bang, crashing against Di Tian's force that was clearing up the power within him. Those two waves of force clashed against each other in his body, causing blood to trickle out of the unconscious Su Ming's mouth and his body to pummel down the ground. Right then, even Di Tian did not notice that under the guidance of the dark light left behind by Hong Luo, Su Ming was plummeting towards the mountain in the land of the Shamans underneath, right at the octagonal altar at its top, and straight towards the stone coffin at the center of the altar.
At that moment, even as the illusionary figure of Hong Luo's soul burned and gradually disappeared midair, his laughter and his voice continued echoing endlessly in the world.
"I have practiced Daoism for thirty thousand years… Now I shall turn back and become a mortal, I will not be an Immortal!" Hong Luo's ancient voice gradually faded away, but his words echoed in Di Tian's ears, and they also echoed… in Su Ming's soul!
Su Ming's body landed on the coffin at the center of the octagonal peak of the tower with a crash. Blood flowed out of the corners of his mouth and fell on the coffin.
With an expressionless face, Di Tian turned around and walked towards the peak of the mountain on the ground, or more precisely, towards Su Ming lying at the cover of the coffin at the center of the octagonal altar.
His Emperor's robe had already become dull. Even his crown had lost its golden glow. A large amount of wrinkles had appeared on his face. At that moment, he no longer looked as if he was a middle-aged man. Clearly, the fight against Hong Luo was not as easy as he had made it seem.
"All is over."
Di Tian landed on the octagonal altar, but the instant he got closer to Su Ming, for the first time, his expression drastically changed!
Because he saw a pair of eyes!
Su Ming had opened his eyes!
Chapter 404: Big Brother
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The sky was blue and there were white clouds floating past. The sight was gorgeous…
However, the icy coldness beneath his body, the freezing wind around him, his eyes, which he could not open, and the sharp stabs of pain spreading through his body caused the blue in the sky to only be a color only from his memories and the white clouds to only be a figment of his imagination.
Once everything was torn apart, then what remained was loneliness, grief, and fear that he could not speak of.
"Today is a good day. Big brother, the sky is blue, and there're a lot of white clouds up ahead. Look, that cloud is like a rabbit, and that one is, um… that one kind of looks like a grey wolf."
The tender voice by his ears seemed to make the darkness before his eyes gradually disappear. That voice ripped apart all the shadows and the blue sky returned. There was also a rabbit shaped cloud in the sky. By its side, there also was the cloud in the shape of the wolf.
"Ah, big brother! That cloud looks like you, it really looks like you. There's a cloud by its side, that one's like me." That young voice was the only warmth in that dark world of his. It was also that voice that was explaining the differences of colors to him. It was telling him what was black, what was blue, and what was white.
Every single time that voice spoke, he would stop feeling cold, he would stop feeling lonely, he would stop feeling that there was an innumerable amount of days filled only with night in this endless darkness.
Even if the pain in his body was becoming increasingly more difficult to bear, even if once in a while, he would feel as if there was someone cutting into him to squeeze out his blood, he did not feel that it was unbearable. As long as he could hear that voice often, if he could just listen to that voice for eternity…
"Big brother, cultivation is so tiring. I don't want to be a Cultivator anymore, but father said we must become Cultivators or else you will die. Big brother, don't die. I'll continue with my cultivation. It's not tiring at all…"
'It's not tiring? If it's not tiring, then why does her voice sound so weak? I can't see it, but I can sense it. She's very tired… Is my death related to her cultivation? Father… is it that cold voice? If it is, then don't listen to him, every single time he comes, I go through so much pain I want to die.
'He called me Destiny. Is that my name? It should be, it shouldn't be…'
"Big brother, it's a clear day outside. Ah, the weather has been clear for a very long time. You must really like sunny days, that's why the weather is this way."
'Is the weather clear? Silly girl. The only senses I have left in my body are my hearing and my touch. You're holding an umbrella, but it's not covering my feet. Those water droplets on my feet must be rain. It should be. I heard from others talking that it has been raining for a month.'
"Big brother, I saw other big sisters… Mm, they're really pretty, but why am I so small? I'm only younger than them by a year. Ah… but I still look like a child.
"But big brother, you look really handsome. Heh heh, I heard from my senior sister that she likes being beside you. Big brother, you have to wake up soon, alright..?
"Father said you're about to wake up soon, but I've been hearing him say that since I was young."
'They like being beside me? But every single time those senior sisters of yours come, a large amount of my presence would disappear. Silly girl, it's not me they like, they just like coming here and absorbing the Immortal qi from my body. I heard them mention it when they were chatting. They thought I couldn't hear it.
'Silly girl, all the people who come here harbor ulterior motives towards us. I heard far too many of their conversations…'
"Big brother, father has been acting really strange lately. He… hits me often… I've been working really hard in my cultivation. I've been listening to his requests and helping his other sect members train. They surround me every single time, and when we train together, I feel my body becoming weaker…
"I can feel that their gazes are different when they look at me. It's as if… they're looking at a medicinal pill."
'Those damn Immortals. Once I open my eyes and I can move my body, I'll kill all of you! I don't care if you absorb my Immortal qi, but how could you lay your hands on her as well?!
'She's still just a child! How could you do this for your own cultivation?! How could you?! Is it not enough that you're absorbing mine? All of you have my Immortal qi in your bodies!
'I swear, if I ever stand up, then I will definitely make all of you pay!'
"Big brother, I'm really tired today… let me lay down beside you. I'm… really tired…"
'Sleep. I'll protect you. I'll transfer my power as an Immortal into your body so that you won't be tired tomorrow.
'If only I could see, then I would be able to tell the difference between day and night, then I could find you among the sea of people around us and hold your hand… Wouldn't that be wonderful?
'If only I could stand up, then I would be able to fly with you in the sky, then I could go to the end of the sky and earth with you… Wouldn't that be wonderful?
'If only I could speak, then I would be able to laugh with you, then I would be able to point at the sky and draw the blue sky and the white clouds…. Wouldn't that be wonderful?
'But I can't. I can't see, I can't move, I can't speak. The world I see is dark. There are no colors. The only thing I feel is pain and loneliness.'
"Big brother, I've been feeling really sleepy lately. I feel that I've become shorter. I don't look pretty anymore… No one likes me, I can tell… You're the only one who'll stay by my side, right..?
"Big brother, does it hurt? Don't be sad. I have a dream, once my level of cultivation rises, I'll take you away…"
'Silly girl, it's useless. I know them. He's not your father, neither is he my father. His name is Di Tian.'
"Big brother, I won't be able to see you for some time. They… They're taking me to a place… Once I come back, I'll come see you again.
"Big brother, you have to wake up soon…"
'I can feel your tears on my body. I can sense that cold gaze looking at me while you're crying.'
"Fei Er, we have to leave now."
'That cold voice echoing in the air gradually faded out. My world turned dark once again. I can't hear her voice anymore. There is no more blue sky, no more white clouds.
'There is only emptiness, loneliness, cold, rain, snow, the chilling wind, that endless pain, and those disgusting people absorbing my power and their revolting presences.
'I also feel time flowing past. I don't know how many years have passed by. That voice I heard by my ears never appeared again… My time has been dark like this ever since.
'I want to open my eyes. I have to open my eyes, because I want to search for you… I want to search for the blue sky that belongs to me. I want to see what shade of blue the sky has, and I want to look for the voices filled with joy.
'I want to go back, because so many years have passed by, and I have lost all contact with you. Where are you..? My sister, are you well?
'I want to speak, because I want to ask all of them how you are now. You… mustn't end up as I am now.
'Because… you are my eyes. When Di Tian brought those two babies back with him, you were the one alive, and I was the one dead.'
A dream.
Su Ming opened his eyes and saw the sky, the clouds, the colors in the world. In his mind, the dream that brought him grief still lingered. Confusion appeared in his eyes, but that confusion only lasted for an instant before it turned into deathly stillness.
Those were a pair of deadly still, terrifyingly calm eyes!
The instant Di Tian saw those eyes, his forever calm heart shuddered!
Su Ming looked at Di Tian and sat up slowly from the coffin, the scar left behind on Dark Mountain was shining with a blood-red light at that moment. That light caused Su Ming to be filled with a strange and eerie air.
The instant he saw Di Tian, his pupils shrank. A countless amount of pictures suddenly flashed past in his eyes and eventually stopped at a void filled with endless darkness. Over there was a middle-aged man who did not wear any Emperor's robe, just a long robe, and he was sitting cross-legged on a gigantic head.
The person wearing the Emperor's robe right now, standing before him, was incredibly similar to that middle-aged man in the void!
"Di Tian, we meet again."
Su Ming lowered his head and rubbed the center of his brows. A barely noticeable glint flashed past his eyes and he sat up on the coffin. His hair was no longer red and had returned to its original shade. The mark of the peach blossom was still there at the center of his brows, but it had become much dimmer.
Di Tian's pupils shrank for the first time. He did not speak, merely stared at Su Ming as if he was observing him.
Su Ming rubbed the center of his brows with his left hand, then the instant his gaze swept past the coffin by his side, his heart trembled for some unknown reason. It was as if his heart had been emptied out, and a pain that was almost akin to the pain of asphyxiation rose within him.
He saw those scenes filled with darkness once again. Everything in the dream and that young voice… Su Ming's heart trembled. He was greatly confused by everything before him. He only remembered that he was struck by Madam Ji's Peach Blossom Fiend and that thing had stirred the most primitive desire in his body.
Once he went to White Bull Tribe, he forced that urge down and struggled to return to his cave abode. Before he lost control of himself, he used Han Mountain Bell to seal himself up, then sank into a long coma. Even if he occasionally woke up, he remembered that he was still in Han Mountain Bell.
When he opened his eyes again after the last time he fell unconscious, he saw the person that had made his heart tremble. The man wearing the Emperor's robe was the person who had appeared sitting on the head when he went through that unknown amount of years in the void - the person he saw when Han Mountain's ancestor Possessed him.
This person's appearance made Su Ming's heart tremble. Originally, he should not have been able to control this sudden change of emotion, but for some unknown reason, he managed to control it, and in a very ingenious manner to boot, and it was all done subconsciously. It was as if this was a natural ability that was waking up within him right then.
But that was not all. Su Ming also noticed that his head seemed to be much clearer than before. There were some unfamiliar yet strangely familiar scenes flashing in his mind. They felt like memories he'd had since a long time ago but which had been sealed up, and right then, these memories were showing signs of recovering upon his waking.
It was especially so the instant he saw the coffin. The strong feeling made him pat the coffin lightly while looking calm on the outside. That one pat immediately made the coffin's lid shatter and disappear in an endless amount of shards, causing the thing inside to be revealed clearly.
There was a stone statue lying in the coffin, and that statue was of a girl. She had long hair and did not look incredibly pretty. There was a hint of pain on her face, and that look was enough to make others grow compassionate towards her.
Her petite figure did not seem to have grown fully. She seemed to only be around fifteen or sixteen years of age, but there was an ancient look on her face that could not be hidden away, and it clearly showed her true age.
That statue looked incredibly vivid, containing almost everything that could be found on the girl. Clearly, this was not the work of an ordinary person.
The now awakened Su Ming looked at the stone statue in the coffin and his heart roared loudly. This was the first time he saw this girl, but for some unknown reason, he instant he saw her, extreme pain struck his heart. The young voice from his dreams echoed in his ears once again.
"Big brother, the sky is blue…"
"Big brother, I'm a little tired…"
"Big brother, they're taking me to a place. When I come back, I'll come see you…"
"Big brother, hurry up and wake up…"
Chapter 405: Gate to the Void
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Su Ming looked at the stone statue of the petite girl in the coffin. As he looked at her face, that young voice traveled forth from his memories to his ears, causing a hint of sorrow to appear on his face.
"You're awake." Di Tian remained silent for a moment before he spoke calmly. The hint of shock that appeared previously on his face had disappeared by now. He became aloof once again.
"I remember her…" Su Ming mumbled. He suddenly understood. That dream was perhaps… not a dream.
The sorrow in his eyes gradually became stronger and it would not disappear. His eyes glistened and tears fell down from his eyes, falling onto the stone statue.
At the same time, the instant those tears fell on the stone statue, new scenes appeared in his mind… In those scenes, Su Ming saw himself, and that himself had red hair and red robes.
He saw his red-haired self walking out of the cave abode and drawing out earthen aura to turn it into a crimson dragon. He saw himself absorbing power from a large amount of powerful warriors in the land of the Shamans wherever he went, not even letting go of some of the powerful ferocious beasts he could find…
He also saw his red-haired self heading to Autumn Sea Tribe and sealing the heavens with just a lift of his hand. Once he also sealed that Zong Ze in the sky, he brought his hands down and sealed the land, and once he sealed all the members of Autumn Sea Tribe, he walked towards the Sacred Lady of Autumn Sea Tribe, then picked Wan Qiu up and left the place with his red hair dancing in the wind.
Su Ming saw that Art of the Dragon Subject, Yin Simurgh, saw the entire procedure of his red-haired self casting that Art with Wan Qiu. If was as if Hong Luo's trip during those short few days was flashing past Su Ming's eyes at a much faster pace.
He also saw his red-haired self fighting against the old Immortal and the halberd from the sky executing him in an incredibly domineering way, and also… himself casting the Art of the Dragon Subject, Yin Simurgh on the long-haired woman...
Right up to the moment the sacred mountain of the Shaman Tribe appeared, right up to the moment Di Tian appeared and engaged him in that earth shattering fight. Eventually, his memory stopped at the instant Hong Luo's soul disappeared, while laughing and sending into his body… the Path to Life!
"I have practiced Daoism for thirty thousand years… Now I shall turn back and become a mortal, I will not be an Immortal!" That boisterous laughter stirred up layers of ripples in Su Ming's mind, and when it eventually disappeared, it turned into a hoarse and ancient voice.
"Listen up, boy. I have a deep grudge against Di Tian, but his strength has surpassed what I remember. I don't know how long I have been sealed away, and now I'm about to die as a mortal, but I'm not willing to!
"I am the son of the Emperor of Mortals. With the legacy Art of the royal family - Path to Life, I give you the power to release your seal. This Art will become stronger the higher your level of cultivation is, and it will help you break the seal on your memories!
"It can also transform your blood and let you possess the purest blood among all Immortals… Within that blood rests all my Dao, my Arts, my divine abilities. All of them will belong to you!
"I'm burning up what little remains of my life to cast this Path to Life and send you to the coffin. I can sense that the coffin is very important to you… Don't bother about the threat of facing Di Tian alone. I've already thought about the way to help you solve that problem. As long as you can hear these words, then it'll definitely succeed!
"The Path to Life can only be passed down to one person in each generation of the royal family, and once it's mastered by that person, no matter how talented the others are, they won't be able to learn it. This is a dead set rule! All the scions of this Art can only cast this once in their lives. It doesn't contain any offensive abilities and can only be used to pass down the inheritance…
"That's why Di Tian doesn't know the Path of Life. He also doesn't know that this Art can open the Gate to the Void, which can relocate you! This is originally a path to escape for us in case an emergency happens while we're passing down the inheritance. I left a mark at the place I woke up previously, and the gate can send you back there…
"Once the Gate to the Void opens, Di Tian won't be able to interfere with his power. The Path to Life can also cover up your presence, causing Di Tian's divine sense to be unable to find you.
"Then you'll have a period of time where you'll be truly free… I didn't use this Art earlier because there is only one chance for me to cast it, and if there is no scion for me, I couldn't cast it anyway… Besides, if I used this Art to escape, it'd still be difficult for me to escape being sealed, and I might not have a chance to wake up again. I would… rather die!
"The Gate to the Void is in your heart. Call it, and it will open! Your level of cultivation isn't high, but when you become a powerful warrior someday, help me take my revenge. Kill Di Tian!"
Su Ming felt a sharp stab of pain in his head and those scenes instantly disappeared. In truth, he felt that a long time had passed since the scenes appeared right up till they disappeared, but that lapse of time was just his mind replaying those memories. To outsiders, it only lasted for an instant.
Before his death, Hong Luo's voice had traveled with the Path to Life and avoided Di Tian's divine sense to imprint itself on Su Ming's mind. Only when Su Ming woke up would he be able to hear it.
As he stared at the stone statue in the coffin, Su Ming lifted his right hand and grabbed the edge of the coffin in a death grip.
"You shouldn't have awakened. Your current appearance makes me… very disappointed… Hong Luo was an accident, and I've already restored order. Sleep, Destiny…" After a period of silence, Di Tian spoke slowly.
Yet the instant his words left his mouth, Su Ming turned around swiftly and stared at Di Tian with his deadly still eyes.
"No one can seal off my memories again, and neither can you!" A strand of hair surrounded Su Ming's right index finger without anyone noticing it. This strand of hair was the materialization of the power of a jab from the God of Berserkers, and strangely, when Su Ming's body was under Hong Luo's control, that strand of hair had disappeared as if it had dissipated. Even Hong Luo had been unable to notice it.
Yet now, as Su Ming's will returned, that strand of hair also reappeared on him.
It did not release any sort of presence when it appeared either. That was why even Di Tian did not pay any attention to Su Ming's right hand seizing the coffin. Naturally, he also did not see the extra strand of hair on his finger.
This was Su Ming's trump card. It was also the source of why he could stay calm even after he met Di Tian. He had already decided. The power of that one jab from the God of Berserkers, the power that he could not find in himself to use, on this day, he would use it once!
Even if he did not know whether he could kill this Di Tian when he used this power, this Di Tian that even Hong Luo could not win against, and even if Hong Luo had already made perfect preparations for him to flee before dying.
However, Su Ming did not want to leave just like that!
If he did not want to, then there was no need for him to say anything else!
Di Tian stared at Su Ming with an aloof and expressionless face. The instant Su Ming looked at him, he lifted his right leg and took a step towards him.
"As my son, not only did you disappoint me, you're still acting as childishly as ever!" With that one step, a wave instantly shot out of from beneath Di Tian's foot. The strength of that wave was so powerful that it closed in on Su Ming in an instant.
A mighty pressure that could not be challenged swiftly descended on Su Ming, pinning him to his spot. Once the wave swept past his feet, Su Ming shuddered and coughed out a mouthful of blood.
"Kneel!"
Di Tian's powerful divine sense and willpower gathered on Su Ming's body, making him feel as if there were heavy mountains pressing on him, causing cracking sounds to appear from his knees, and they started trembling violently.
"What right do you have to make me kneel?!" Su Ming gritted his teeth and lifted his head to glare at Di Tian. His legs remained straight. Sharp stabs of pain shot up his body, but they could not make him surrender.
"You rebellious boy. I brought you up, and you refuse to kneel? Kneel down!" Di Tian walked towards Su Ming and closed in on him. At that moment, there was only thirty feet between the two of them.
As Di Tian's aloof voice spoke up, with a bang, blood poured out of Su Ming's knees. He staggered. That mighty willpower and pressure felt as if they had physical substance as they pressed on him, and it was not something he could control with his will. His heart might not kneel, but as that pressure continued pushing him down, his right knee started falling to the ground.
But the moment his knee was about to touch the ground, Su Ming pressed his left hand on the floor and seized it, causing his right knee to hang one inch above it.
"Besides having power that surpasses mine, what else do you have over me?! You can make my body kneel, but you can't make my heart do the same!" Su Ming lifted his head and glared at Di Tian with bloodshot eyes and blood trickling down his mouth. Those deadly still eyes made a deathly still calmness also appear on his face.
"Today, you can make me kneel before you with your power, but in the future… I will definitely make you pay back several fold for what you did today! And it won't just be you, I will make your entire Immortal Tribe kneel under my feet! I will make you lower your head before me!
"I will definitely do it!" Su Ming declared with gritted teeth, his determination clear in each and every one of his words. At the same time, he called out the Gate to the Void in his heart.
Di Tian's expression did not change even a single bit in the face of Su Ming's words. He moved to within twenty feet of Su Ming and stared at him coldly, who was only one inch away from kneeling down. He looked at the veins popping on his face, at the blood on his knees, at him resisting the endless amount of pressure, which was causing a numerous amount of blood capillaries to appear on his left hand, which was pressing against the ground.
"I don't need your heart submitting to me as well, it's enough if your body kneels," Di Tian stated slowly, lifting his right hand and moving to point at the center of Su Ming's brows swiftly. Once that finger fell, then everything would return to the state it was in several days ago. Su Ming's memories would be sealed up once again, and when he woke up once more, he would still be confused about his past and future.
There would also be a pair of eyes behind him constantly watching his every move.
However, the instant Di Tian lifted his finger and was about to touch Su Ming's brows, suddenly, his expression changed. A power that did not belong to Su Ming, a power that seemed like the cold emptiness in the world erupted forth from his body.
That power was so great that the instant it erupted, it made Di Tian's finger freeze. It was as if that power was fighting against him, and within a short few breaths, Di Tian let out a muffled groan and took a step backwards.
With that step backwards, the wave surrounding the area around Su Ming instantly disappeared. The divine sense and pressure pressing on his body was bounced off right away.
As that power erupted from his body, distortions appeared in the emptiness behind him. An oval shaped, gigantic vortex formed up!
At the same time that vortex appeared, all the movements in the world froze!
Chapter 406: Soar to the White Sky!
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
The instant the world froze, a suction force came from the oval-shaped vortex behind Su Ming. However, it was only absorbing Su Ming alone. All the other substances in the world were of no interest to it.
Di Tian stared at Su Ming and at the gigantic vortex behind him. For the first time, his expression became steely. Without a hint of hesitation, he began forming seals with his right hand and pointed at Su Ming with one finger.
"With the blessings of heaven, by my orders, seal off the sky and earth!" The moment Di Tian's words were spoken and as he pointed forward, the vortex swirling behind Su Ming showed a brief moment of pausing, however, that pause only lasted for an instant before it returned to normal and continued swirling rapidly.
However, during the instant it froze, a freezing glint appeared in Di Tian's eyes. He took a swift step forward, and that step allowed him to appear before Su Ming right at the instant the vortex stopped moving and the power of Illusory Yin [1] in the world froze, he lifted his right hand and moved to seize Su Ming.
"You rebellious boy, come out!"
Killing intent shone in Su Ming's eyes. As he moved back, he lifted his right hand and pointed towards Di Tian's incoming palm. That finger was Su Ming's right index finger. It was the finger wrapped with the strand of hair that was the manifestation of the power of the God of Berserkers.
Right when Su Ming pointed at Di Tian, the strand of hair on his finger started burning. A burst of power that belonged to the first God of Berserkers erupted forth.
That power was filled with a domineering presence which stood superior above all else. At the instant that power descended in the world, even the operation of the Gate to the Void was affected, as if it was about to crumble under that power, and this was just some of the power that had spilled out. If Su Ming had pointed at the gate itself, then the Gate to the Void would have definitely not been unable to withstand that pressure.
At that moment, the person who had to withstand that power was Di Tian!
"First God of Berserkers' presence?!" Di Tian's face had a drastic change of expression, along with the appearance of shock, which had seemed to not be part of his repertoire!
Due to the might of the first God of Berserkers, unless the people had bore witness to it with their own eyes, then all manner of divine senses trying to explore the matter of Su Ming obtaining the power of the God of Berserkers during that moment were pushed off relentlessly.
Besides, due to the uniqueness of the deity statues of the Berserkers descending, the Immortals would rarely release their divine senses at that moment to bring trouble to themselves. Even Di Tian's projection would let the old man in the Great Tribe of Freezing Sky make most of the decisions because his intelligence was suppressed. That was why he did not have much understanding of Su Ming obtaining the power of the God of Berserkers.
The old man in the Great Tribe of Freezing Sky might have heard some rumors about it, but since he did not see it for himself, he did not know that such an endless amount of rumors would fly all over the land of the Berserkers. Some of these rumors spoke about Su Ming, while the others spoke about someone else. Not only did these rumors talk about Su Ming obtaining the power of the God of Berserkers, but they also talked about his power increasing so much that he had become a powerful Berserker in the Berserker Soul Realm.
There were even some who said Su Ming had obtained the same Enchanted Vessel as the God of Berserkers did in the past. All these rumors were baseless and most of them were incredibly exaggerated, hence most of the people would frown and be dubious about it once they heard it.
That's why, while the old man had regarded this piece of information seriously, he still just made a decision to continue observing Su Ming. It was also why Di Tian's projected clone did not have too much knowledge regarding this!
As Su Ming swung his finger down, the hair on his finger started burning away rapidly. Su Ming saw that there was a black hole the size of a fist around his finger. That black hole moved along with his finger, and the instant it appeared, the frozen sky became dimmer in an instant.
This portion of the sky was not the only one affected. It was the entire sky above the land of the Shamans, the entire sky above the Land of South Morning, even the sky above the Dead Sea, and even spreading to an area so wide they had no idea of knowing how big it was. All of it became dull at that instant.
The dull look in the sky was because all manner of light started gathering in the black hole next to Su Ming's finger with a speed that was unimaginable and a manner that was incomprehensible.
It caused the area around Su Ming to be filled with a piercing light as if all the light in the world had been drawn over in an instant. The earthen aura in the ground also started trembling.
It was not just the Land of South Morning that was affected though, the earthen aura of the other continents beyond South Morning, and even the continents of the Berserker Tribe floating above the Dead Sea started trembling. Then with the same manner and speed as the light in the sky, they appeared in the black hole around Su Ming's finger and were sucked inside swiftly.
The black hole around the finger absorbed the light in the sky and the aura of the earth. With the world contained within it, Su Ming pointed at Di Tian, whose expression had drastically changed at that moment.
"The power of the World Plane! This is the power of the World Plane belonging to the first God of Berserkers!" Di Tian's expression started changing rapidly, and he started retreating hastily. His hands worked to form seals, and he pointed at the heavens with his right hand while pointing at the earth with his left. A voice akin to thunder fell off his lips.
"Power of the first God of Berserkers? Very well, when you were alive, I had not completed my Dao. When I completed my Dao, you already disappeared. The members of the Berserker Tribe believe you to be dead, but I know that you haven't died. Your power had reached the peak of a timeline [2] and you can't improve anymore, that's why you chose to disappear and search for other World Planes with great timelines!
"All the timelines of the worlds form a timeline, and you, who have absorbed all the sources of the worlds, who have reached the peak of the great timeline, show me just how strong you are!
"Today, your power has appeared. It might just be a hint, but I'm also just a projected clone. Let's see just who is stronger between us!" As Di Tian retreated and pointed to the sky and earth with his hands, he let out a low shout.
"Soar to the White Sky!"
As Di Tian let out that roar, a brilliant white glare suddenly shot out from his right hand in that dull world. The brightness of that white glare caused the darkened sky to appear just as white!
That white belonged to the white of the clouds. When it appeared in the sky, with Di Tian's right hand as the center, the endless amount of white light gathered together… and a white sun appeared in the sky he was pointing at!
It was like a gigantic asteroid slowly descending from the sky. At that moment, it had only revealed a small portion of itself, and it was already causing the land of the Berserkers to tremble, the black Dead Sea to roar, and the hearts of numerous people to tremble in fear.
In fact, if the entire Land of South Morning lifted their heads to look up, they would find a gigantic white sun that looked like an asteroid in the sky!
The white glare shining from the sun had practically turned into the most brilliant ray of light in the world!
This scene looked like the apocalypse had arrived today! The sky looked as if it was going to shatter. Cracks appeared on the ground, and due to the movements and roars from the Dead Sea, the speed of the Eastern Wastelands traveling forth instantly increased by several fold!
If it continued with this speed, then it would not take ten years for it to crash into the Land of South Morning. There was a high possibility that the time taken would shrink by a large margin.
Di Tian's face was pale. His Emperor's robe was burning, and the same thing was happening to his crown. They were engulfed in white flames. His skin started withering away at a rapid speed, but as those things burned and his skin withered, the presence of his body became even more shocking.
He started lifting up the hand pointing towards the ground slowly, and his right hand, which had caused day to arrive, slowly fell down. Those two hands were continuously closing in on each other, as if they were about to touch.
His left hand symbolized the power to soar, and his right hand symbolized the day. This continuous breach of distance was the act of soaring!
As Di Tian executed that Art, his appearance instantly turned to that of an old man, and he was still swiftly withering away. His entire appearance now made him look like a corpse, but the brilliant light and monstrous amount of fighting spirit had ignited a life in his eyes.
As Su Ming watched Di Tian's unimaginable strength and that unbelievable Art, he suddenly understood something with a trembling heart. If he did not have the power of the God of Berserkers, then he would have been unable to escape through the Gate to the Void!
Hong Luo might have been powerful and had left behind a way for him, but even he did not expect that Di Tian would possess… a power equivalent to that of the first God of Berserkers!
'He's so powerful… Will I be able to surpass him..?' Bitterness rose in Su Ming's heart. He looked at Di Tian. The strand of hair on his right index finger was rapidly burning away, but… it seemed to be lacking something compared to that great presence and terrifying divine ability of Di Tian.
"It's lacking a soul… it's without life…" Su Ming took a deep breath and quelled the bitterness that arose within him due to Di Tian's might. He mumbled softly, then with quick thought, he lifted his right hand. Using his finger as a pen, he drew a line at Di Tian!
"Berserker Obliteration…"
With the power of the God of Berserkers, the instant that one Berserker Obliteration was drawn, Di Tian's pupils shrank. He let out a low growl, and right at that moment, his hands touched!
"The place where I was born still did things according to the laws of the universe. When I was born, the Berserkers had weakened�� If the heavens are heartless, then we will all be separated. The earth was heartless, and it made my Dark Mountain die…" Su Ming closed his eyes. His blood started boiling and burning hotly in his body.
"If the heavens have eyes, then why do they never see that my world is plunged into eternal darkness? If the deities have souls, then why did they divide the sky and seas to the south and north?
I kept my duty to the heavens, so why did they not let me see the darkness of night? I kept my duty to the deities, so why did they tear me into pieces and scatter my memories?!"
With Su Ming's drawn line, the burning hair on his finger started shining with a strangely captivating light. That light flashed and was completely different from the light it gave off when it burned previously. It was as if this time, as it burned, it now possessed a soul, a hint of life… a will!
An even stronger presence erupted forth from that burning strand of hair. The power of that presence caused the white sky to tremble as well, and it caused a pair of eyes to appear in the space above the sky!
Those were a pair of tightly shut eyes!
"If the heavens don't have eyes, then I will step on it and watch myself seal the heavens! If the deities don't have souls, then I swear I will slaughter the deities and become the Emperor!"
Su Ming opened his eyes swiftly. The instant he did so, the gigantic pair of eyes in the sky also opened up. It was also at that moment that Su Ming's Berserker Obliteration sliced through the heavens. Once it connected with Di Tian's hands, it crashed into the light emanating between his palms.
The rumbling sounds made it seem as if two worlds had collided into each other, and the tremors that appeared because of it caused a bang to go off in Su Ming's head and he coughed out a huge mouthful of blood. A great force rammed into his body and he immediately fell backwards, straight into the Gate of the Void behind him that was still unstable and looked as if it was about to crumble at any moment.
His mind instantly faded out. Before he lost his consciousness, he saw Di Tian, who had borne the brunt of the Berserker Obliteration he cast with the power of the God of Berserkers. His Emperor's robe was torn, his crown had shattered. The white sky had melted and turned into white rain that poured all over the Land of South Morning.
He also saw Di Tian freezing in midair. Blood lines appeared on his body. His expression was extremely odd, and he looked as if he was deeply regretful, as if he had gained an epiphany about something, as if he was overcome with melancholy. Eventually, he closed his eyes, and his body became transparent. He gradually dissipated…
"One of these days, I will definitely surpass Di Tian!" Su Ming mumbled bitterly and closed his eyes.
End of Arc Two.
Translator's Notes:
Man I sure as heck wish to end this chapter coolly with just 'End of Arc Two', but it just had to be ruined with a Translator's Notes.
Anyway...
1. Illusory Yin and later on, Materialize Yang: Mentioned in Renegade Immortal.
2. 一劫 (yi jie) is translated as 'timeline', because from what I understand from this text and from what I can find, this 一劫, if broken down word for word, means 'one disaster'. Highly unlikely in this case. But after some digging, I found that in Buddhist terms, 一劫 means a looooooooong period of time, and the length of the timeline depends on the category. Below is the long explanation.
This 劫 is divided into three category - (小) small, (中) medium, and (大) big. 大劫 is translated as great timeline, obviously.
Apparently, a person's lifespan begins straight at 80,000 years old, and with each century, you cut off one year of your age, and you continue cutting until you have 10 years of your life left, and then, you add one year to your age once every century until you get 80,000 years to your age again. That is called a small timeline.
A medium timeline is made of 20 small timelines, and four medium timelines form a great timeline.
SO.
A small timeline, is 15,998,000 years, and a great timeline is 1,279,840,000 years. (Not my calculations, I gave up when the numbers went up somewhere in the millions)
If you say that something has been around for a great timeline, then it's used to describe that this thing has been around for a very, very, very long time, and most likely will never perish.
Chapter 407: Glaciers in the Dead Sea
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Arc Three: His Name Shakes Through the Eastern Wastelands
It was cold. Just like the feeling he'd had in that dream…
Cold surrounded him. He could not open his eyes. It was dark all around. This was a very familiar feeling from his dream. It was quiet all around him, so quiet it was rather terrifying. There was not a hint of sound that could be heard.
Besides the cold and the dark, there was nothing else.
'If her voice appears and tells me that the sky is bright now and the clouds look like rabbits… wouldn't that be wonderful?
'But there isn't. That voice still hasn't appeared. That cold is becoming even more freezing. I can't move. I can feel pain continuously surrounding me, but I'm slowly becoming numb towards it… Am I asleep..?
'Who… am I..?'
Time was slowly flowing away. It was unknown just how much time had gone by.
This was a black seabed. There was not a hint of light. This was the deep parts of the sea. There were numerous gigantic ice blocks here. Due to the uniqueness of the seawater, these ice blocks did not float on the sea. Instead, they stayed at the seabed quietly.
Perhaps more accurately speaking, this was not the seabed. This was a glacier… The true seabed was right underneath the glacier. That part… was the deepest part of the sea, and few know exactly how far down it was.
Above that glacier was the black sea. Only the people who had ever been to this place would know exactly how high it was.
There was a protruding ice mountain on the glacier. It was not tall, only about one thousand feet. It was entirely black. No one knew whether that was its original color or whether it was dyed black by the sea.
If anyone looked at it from a closer distance, they would be able to see faintly that there seemed to be something sealed in that ice mountain… If anyone stood there with enough power and a powerful divine sense to see through the ice mountain, then that person would be able to see that there was an oval vortex about one hundred feet in size sealed inside.
That vortex gave people a feeling that it was a gate. It in itself was dark and was sealed within the ice mountain.
By the side of the vortex was a body, which was also sealed within. He was not standing but lying with his eyes closed, and because he was sealed, he was like a statue.
This was a young man with long hair and a pale face. There was a faint mark of a peach blossom at the center of his brows. He wore a torn long robe and there was a dark red patch at his knees. It was frozen blood.
In fact, there were also blood flecks at the corner of his lips. They were also frozen up by the ice.
There was a strand of hair wrapped twice around his right index finger, as well as a red ring on his finger. He looked bitter, but his brows, which were in the shape of blades, gave people a feeling that he was a resolute person.
He lay there quietly and continued to be frozen...
… right up to this day. At the black seabed, within the black ice mountain, cracking sounds rang out from the layers of ice enveloping the young man's body, though they did not shatter.
Yet clearly, although the young man frozen within the ice mountain did not open his eyes, there was a faint hint of life emanating from his body.
Naturally, that person was Su Ming!
He had woken up, but he could not open his eyes or move his body. The chilling presence had already filled up his entire body.
"Where… am I..?"
Su Ming closed his eyes, and his divine sense slowly spread out. The instant it touched the layer of ice, it immediately sensed an obstructive force. The power of that obstructive force caused Su Ming's divine sense to only be able to reach several dozens of feet before it could no longer go farther.
'It's all ice all around me, and… the Gate to the Void?' Uncertainty rose in Su Ming's heart. He remembered Hong Luo mentioning that the Gate to the Void would bring him back to his cave abode, but the ice in this place told him clearly that this… was not his cave abode!
'Could it be that Di Tian's final Soar to the White Sky stirred up such a powerful energy after clashing with the power of the God of Berserkers that… some changes happened to the Gate to the Void..?'
Su Ming quickly found the answer. Taking away the possibility of Hong Luo lying, this was the most likely answer.
There was no need for Hong Luo to hide the truth about this, so an answer formed in Su Ming's heart.
However, when he began to feel certain of his answer, new questions popped up in his heart.
'The Gate to the Void… why does it exist? From what I understand about this gate and from what Hong Luo said, it should have disappeared after relocating me.
'But now… even though I can't send my divine sense too far, I can sense that Gate to the Void near me. What is the reason for this..?' Su Ming pondered over it, and after a long while, he forced down his doubts and circulated the power in his body quietly.
This was the first time since he woke up that he went to sense his level of cultivation. When he woke up earlier, due to Di Tian's presence, Hong Luos's words, and the scenes he saw in his dreams, he did not think about going to sense his own power.
At that moment, as he was surrounded by silence and knew that he should be frozen in ice, Su Ming's heart gradually calmed down. When he went on to sense his own power, information started flowing into his mind as if it had been pumped into his head...
It was Hong Luo's Dao during his life, his divine abilities, his Arts, his understanding towards his own cultivation, and all his knowledge towards the Immortal Tribe and their entire cultivation method.
Su Ming's heart trembled. As he felt through this information, a huge wave stirred up in his heart. It crashed into his soul so harshly that he only recovered after a long while.
'Is this the Immortal Tribe..? Three Steps to Heaven… It mixes the sources of multiple worlds and turns it to the sun of a timeline…' More bitterness rose in Su Ming's heart, but similarly, a wave of resolution also formed!
'I once said that I would definitely surpass Di Tian… now, that thought hasn't changed. One of these days, no matter what sort of price I have to pay, I will definitely obtain the power to surpass Di Tian!
'When the time comes…' Su Ming's heart slowly calmed down. He circulated the power in his body, and as time passed by, his flesh gradually did not feel as cold anymore. Life started growing in abundance in his body, and as he recovered, his divine sense also started spreading to a wider area. The power of the obstructive force also became weaker.
Then one day, Su Ming's divine sense shot out of the ice mountain and started spreading in all directions. It instantly covered nearly ten thousand lis of that black seawater, and that short distance was because there was a similar obstructive force in the black seawater. Over there, besides the obstructive force in the water, there was also a pressure that oppressed divine senses, or else, Su Ming's divine sense would have been able to spread to an even wider area.
Once he sent his divine sense ten thousand lis away, Su Ming saw where he was. He saw the glacier on the seabed, saw himself in that ice mountain along with the Gate to the Void. Similarly, he also saw the black seawater.
However, his divine sense could not continue spreading until he would send it out of the seawater. It was as if compared to the seawater, the area covered by his divine sense was just a small part of the vast sea.
Su Ming opened his eyes.
The layer of ice enveloping his body was slowly melting, causing him to be able to open his eyes. However, he still could not move. He looked at the black seawater beyond the layer of ice and confusion appeared in his eyes, but soon, that confusion disappeared.
'Could it be the Dead Sea?!' Su Ming's pupils shrank.
He pulled back his divine sense. He then covered the area around his body with his divine sense and sent some of it towards the sealed Gate to the Void. After taking a closer look at it, Su Ming found some clues.
'When the Gate to the Void was going to relocate me, Di Tian's power interfered with its energy, causing the destination of the relocation to be thrown off track, and it sent me to the ice under the Dead Sea...
'However, due to Di Tian's power and this ice sealing it up, it didn't disappear. Instead, it's as if it had gained physical form and was made to stay in the world.
'If that's the case… if it is operational, then can it activate its relocating abilities and send me back… to my cave abode?' A pensive look appeared in Su Ming's eyes. The power of Berserker Bones erupted from his body and spread through his body. Cracking sounds rang out, and the ice layer encasing him immediately cracked. However, it had only started cracking. He was still a long way from escaping.
Su Ming frowned and closed his eyes. After a moment, he opened them, and at the instant he did so, profundity filled his gaze. A brilliant light shone in his eyes, and the small person that looked exactly like him sitting at his Dantian region also opened his eyes.
With a bang, the ice encasing Su Ming trembled once again due to the different power that erupted from his body. It was a different power from the power of the Berserker Tribe. While that power did not cause more cracks to appear, the cracks that had originally been there started spreading out.
These two different sorts of power caused two different changes. Su Ming's eyes sparkled, and he gained a new understanding towards his current level of cultivation.
'The power of the Berserker Tribe is strong and fierce, that is why it could make the layer of ice crack. The power of the Immortal Tribe is a lasting sort of power and is also gentle, that's why it made those cracks stretch…'
By changing the types of power multiple times, after a few days, the layer of ice encasing Su Ming's body shattered, causing him to regain mobility.
However, only the interior part of the layer of ice shattered, the external layer was still around, and it looked like a gigantic shell. The ice around Su Ming was also rapidly growing. Before long, it would turn into a mountain that would seal him up once again.
'From the descriptions of the Dao Hong Luo gave me as his inheritance, the small human in me is called a Nascent Soul. The level of cultivation belonging to the Immortal Tribe in me should be called the Nascent Soul Stage.
'However, the Nascent Soul Stage isn't really that strong. It absolutely can't compare to Di Tian. But with his powerful divine sense, Hong Luo had allowed this body to cast most of his divine abilities… If that's the case, then it seems that divine senses are the core of the Immortal Tribe!
'Hong Luo might have died, but in the Dao he left me, he also passed to me a lot of divine abilities and Arts. It's a pity… all of them require powerful divine sense before I can execute them.
'But there are some Arts that can be casted in the Nascent Soul Stage… such as…'
A glint appeared in Su Ming's eyes. He took a swift step forward, and his body disappeared in an instant. When he reappeared, he was already several dozens of feet away from where he previously was.
It might just be several dozens of feet, and Su Ming could close that distance with that same amount of time with his speed, but he was not using any hint of the power belonging to the Berserker Tribe. He was only using the Immortals' divine abilities!
"Short distance warping…" Su Ming mumbled softly. As he mulled over it, he spread his divine sense once again. This time, he did not check the black seawater beyond the ice mountain. Instead, he swept his divine sense through the glacier.
Suddenly, his expression changed. Within the area of his divine sense, he saw numerous living creatures frozen and sealed up within the endless glacier!
These creatures were almost always sealed at a certain distance away from each other!
Chapter 408: Gate of Relocation
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
In the rather remote spot where White Bull Tribe and Black Crane Tribe were located in the land of the Shamans in South Morning, something had happened to them during these few days that horrified the two tribes.
White Bull Tribe's terror stemmed from Su Ming. He might have left that day, but what the Patriarch of White Bull Tribe had done had sparked the people's anger. Most of the members of the tribe believed that sending their women out for an outsider to satisfy his urges was a great humiliation. They would rather fight and kill than go through this.
Besides, to most of the people, they believed that if they worked together, there was still a chance for them to kill Su Ming. That was why they were skeptical towards their Patriarch's actions.
Even though it had not truly happened, that grudge and skepticism had been planted in their hearts like seeds. The monkey-faced old man in White Bull Tribe knew about it, but he could only remain silent.
Compared to the cruel methods the other Patriarchs employed to control their tribe, the old man was attached to his tribe from the bottom of his heart. Fortunately for him, that grudge and skepticism only lasted for most of the month, and it gradually disappeared a little when that incident that terrified the entire White Bull Tribe transpired.
The reason for this was because of a member of White Bull Tribe venturing out of the tribe alone. That person was a young man, and he had with him the hot-bloodedness and recklessness of that age. He was also the partner of two among the three women who were sent out at that time.
He came to Su Ming's cave abode alone, but when he arrived, he found, to his shock, that the entire mountain range… had disappeared! Everything was gone. The spot where the mountain range and cave abode had been had turned into a flatland. There was no sign of any destruction around the place. It was as if there was no mountain over there to begin with…
When the young man returned to the tribe and the entire White Bull Tribe learned about it, the monkey-faced old man brought some men with him to where Su Ming's cave abode was located previously. After close inspection, confusion also appeared on the old man's face, but it was swiftly covered by the terror towards the unknown.
Not only did the mountain range disappear, even the Shaman Crystal vein had disappeared…
The monkey-faced old man looked at the vast and empty land. For some unknown reason, fear suddenly rose in his heart. It was as if there was a murderous aura looming in the quiet of this land. It made his heart tremble, and he immediately brought his tribe members back to the people. Then with his status as the Patriarch, he placed a gag order on all the tribe members. He forbade all his people from speaking about it, and all those who went against his words were punished severely!
He had a feeling that the strange phenomenon that appeared in the land of the Shamans over the past few days, especially the gigantic white sun that had manifested in the sky was somewhat related to this strange incident. However, he did not have any proof for this, only a feeling that it was that way.
Black Crane Tribe had also sunk into a state of terror similar to that of White Bull Tribe, but it was slightly different. The disappearance of their tribe leader, and Madam Ji, who left and never returned, all of these were a clear sign, telling them that the person who took over the Shaman Crystal vein was not an ordinary person.
In fact, the Patriarch of Black Crane Tribe had also brought some people to the place quietly in hopes of investigating. Yet he saw the exact same sight as the people from White Bull Tribe. That was an empty flatland, a completely different sight compared to what he remembered.
The looming murderous aura in the place also caused the Patriarch of Black Crane Tribe to feel shaken to the core. He quickly left and told his tribe members to treat that place as forbidden grounds.
Due to the disappearance of the Shaman Crystal vein, Black Crane Tribe and White Bull Tribe also lost their reason to fight against each other.
Time passed by slowly…
A month later, a fiery red ape charged towards the place from the distance. It was momentarily stunned by the empty plains and circled through the place multiple times in search for something…
Eventually, it found that the place had really turned into empty flatland. The cave abode and the mountain range that was once there were gone, even the only person who was amicable to it was gone.
Yet it did not give up. Instead, it lived around the area and would occasionally check the place, trying to search for a way to enter.
All of these people did not know that in truth, the cave abode and mountain range had not disappeared. It was still there, but Hong Luo had cast that divine ability of his and hidden it away, causing other people to be unable to see or sense it, much less touch it. It was as if it had turned into a dimension that was separated from the world.
Within that dimension and beyond the mountain range were two corpses on the ground. More accurately speaking, it should be three corpses, but Madam Ji's corpse had already turned into pieces, and her appearance could no longer be seen.
One of the two remaining corpses was Madam Ji's puppet, who was also her husband, Ji Yun Hai. The other one was the dried up corpse belonging to the tribe leader of Black Crane.
What was left besides them were the numerous black beetles on the ground. These small insects lay on the ground unmoving, but there was not a hint of death that could be found on them. It was as if they were only deep asleep.
The only thing that could be seen flying about in the area was a black line. It was the strange, small snake belonging to Su Ming. That snake was pacing about in the air, occasionally letting out screeching sounds, as if it was searching for something, but it could not find it.
Eventually, it flew to a small virescent sword lying in the bushes not too far away and laid down beside it, occasionally letting out small cries as if it was calling out to something.
The cave abode in the mountain range was beside it, and there was a gigantic medicinal cauldron placed in one of the chambers. The power of the world from all around was still surging into it, causing the medicine inside to go through its slow refinement.
In another stone chamber was an old Berserker, who was lying there unmoving, but his eyelids were shivering; he was showing signs of struggling to open his eyes and wake up.
Yet right when he gathered all his power to open his eyes, the small snake lying in the grass outside the cave abode lifted its head and hissed. It stared at its Master's cave abode, and moved swiftly, swimming through the grass before immediately flying up.
When it flew up, the three Spirit Plunders lying around the area were brought up and charged towards the cave abode, crossing through all the paths before appearing in the stone chamber where the old man's body lay. The small snake let out a sharp shriek, flung its body, and the three Spirit Plunders instantly flew towards the top of the old man's head, floating above him in their original positions.
The moment those Spirit Plunders reached him, the old Berserker had actually managed to open up his closed eyes a slit. A low growl that sounded like that of a beast fell from his lips.
At the same time the small snake hissed above the old man, a chilling glare appeared in its eyes. With one swift move, it charged towards him and bit down fiercely on his arm. Immediately, a gust of black smoke spread through the old man's arm, and once it covered his entire body, the old man let out a disgruntled growl. He closed his eyes once again.
The small snake stayed by his side and observed him for a while before flying out of the cave abode and returning to the small virescent sword's side. Then, when it was back there, it occasionally lifted its head and cried out, calling out to something. Its voice echoed in the air…
'This is my home' was what it felt. Everything had to remain in its original state for Master to return…
Before its Master returned, it would protect this place, even if it was for eternity.
Besides, unless there was no one who had a divine sense that surpassed Hong Luo's, then no one in the entire Land of South Morning would be able to find this mountain range. And there was practically no one in the Land of South Morning whose divine sense could surpass Hong Luo's. As for Di Tian, he had already scattered away!
Hong Luo might have died, but his seal was still around. It might be weakening slowly, but it would still take several hundreds of years before it completely disappeared.
Time continued trickling, and in the blink of an eye, Su Ming had already had already been gone from this place for half a year…
During the past six months, White Bull Tribe and Black Crane Tribe did not pay attention to that disappeared mountain range most of the time. Peace returned to their tribes, and there were practically no fights between them. Instead, during the past half a year, they were making preparations to migrate.
If they were to migrate alone, it would be difficult for small tribes like theirs to not run into any sort of danger in the vast land of the Shamans. That was why even if they wanted to move, most of them would wait for slightly larger tribes migrating, and they would join those people when they passed by their place.
Even though they might lose some of their people, but this was the only way for more of their people to survive.
On the day half a year later. Midnight.
A sudden, strong ray of light appeared in the dark sky. That light only lasted for a moment before it disappeared. It might have caught quite a lot of people's attention, but when they focused their gazes over there, the light had already disappeared without a trace.
At the same time that ray of light appeared, the small snake lifted its head swiftly at the disappeared mountain range located right between White Bull Tribe and Black Crane Tribe. Watchfulness shone in its eyes and it continued hissing while keeping its gaze fixed on the empty spot several thousands of feet away from it.
At that moment, a ball of dark light had appeared over there. The ball of light brought with it a mighty pressure that caused the grass on the ground to bend its back, because out of nowhere, a gust of wind began to blow against them.
There was also a large amount of freezing air coming from within that dark ball of light. That freezing air fused with the wind and caused ice to appear on the ground all around the light, and it started spreading outwards slowly.
The small snake did not let out a single sound. It lay on the grass and glared at the dark ball of light coldly. This was where its Master's cave abode was. Right then, its Master had left the place, and if any outsider trespassed into the land, the snake would definitely protect the place.
In truth, during the past half a year, that was what it had been doing. Almost once every few days, it would go and bite that old Berserker so that the person would be in a constant state of weakness but would not die.
It remembered that this was the duty given to that monkey, but now that the monkey was not around, the snake took its place.
At that moment, the small snake's gaze turned colder. It was waiting and was observing just what that dark ball of light was. Time slowly passed by, and after the time of the burning of an incense stick, the ball of light gave off a brilliant flash and its shape changed. That spherical shape gradually turned into an oval, and as it let out an even stronger amount of pressure, fine cracks appeared on it.
Cracking sounds came from within, and during that instant, a person walked out of the oval-shaped light. When he stepped out, the chilling air instantly grew thicker by several fold, causing the area to instantly turn bone-chillingly cold!
The small snake charged out rapidly without a sound. Its eyes sparkled and its poisonous fangs slipped out, but right when it was about to deliver the killing blow on that person with its bite, the killing intent in its eyes suddenly disappeared, and it was replaced by surprised delight. It shrank its poisonous fangs back and let out cries of joy while dashing towards that person.
That person was naturally Su Ming!
At that moment, his face was rife with excitement. When he lifted his right hand, the small snake immediately flew right onto his palm and started crying out happily at him. At the same time, due to his arrival, an unimaginable amount of freezing air that seemed to come from his body spread through the ground, immediately covering the entire land around the area in a thin layer of ice.
Chapter 409: Refining a Puppet
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Su Ming lifted his left hand and pushed against the vortex behind him through the air. Immediately, a large amount of freezing air spilled out from his body and enveloped the gate. Rumbling sounds reverberated in the air, and immediately, the Gate to the Void turned into a giant ice block.
Once he was done, Su Ming let out a happy laugh. He looked at the small snake on his palm. He might have not seen it for only half a year, but to him, he had gone through a lot of things during the past six months. It felt like a long time had gone by since he left the cave abode till he came back.
The small snake cried out and hissed on Su Ming's palm. The freezing look in its eyes had been replaced by joy, and it lowered its head to snuggle at Su Ming's palm.
It was too small, only as thick as his finger, and once it started doing something like this, it looked rather adorable.
Su Ming sucked in a deep breath. He might have returned to his cave abode, but the freezing air in his body had not completely dissipated. As it continued spreading from under his feet, the ground at a circular area of several thousands of feet with him as its center was instantly covered in ice. Wisps of white mist rose in the air and floated about, causing the temperature in the area to immediately be reduced by a large half.
That was not all. A large amount of water droplets appeared on Su Ming's body. Those water droplets seeped out of his skin and looked like sweat, but in truth, he knew that those were the results of the freezing air in his body.
A glint appeared in his eyes. All his pores immediately closed up, and at that instant, the freezing air spreading outwards died down somewhat. There were still faint wisps of cold air though.
'I can't let all the freezing air in my body leave, or else it'll take me a long time to get used to the temperature again if I ever go to the glacier at the seabed of the Dead Sea,' Su Ming thought in his heart.
He lifted the small snake and moved his right hand to his shoulder. Once he did so, the small snake immediately flew up and landed on his shoulder, lying down there, looking as if it was lounging on his shoulder.
Su Ming looked at his familiar cave abode, and the excitement in his eyes gradually disappeared. When his gaze fell on the two corpses on the ground, his eyes lit up with a freezing glare.
"Ji Yun Hai…" Su Ming looked at the thin, dried up corpse, and could not help but remember what had happened during his fight with Madam Ji. He walked towards Ji Yun Hai's corpse at an unhurried pace.
Crouching down, he placed his hand on Ji Yun Hai's corpse. After observing it closely for a few moments, a pensive look appeared in his eyes, then he dipped his head down to look at the large amount of black beetles that had not died but had only fallen into deep sleep scattered around Ji Yun Hai's corpse. The strength of these small insects left an incredibly deep impression on Su Ming that day.
'I wonder how many years it has been since Ji Yun Hai died and he was turned into a puppet by Madam Ji. She has died now, and if I could control this puppet, then it'd be able to help me when I go to the glacier!'
Su Ming lifted two fingers and picked up one of the black beetles on the ground, bringing it up to his face. He observed it for a long time.
'This bug… isn't a puppet. How did Madam Ji control it?' Su Ming stared at the small bug for a long while before his eyes suddenly lit up. He looked towards Ji Yun Hai's corpse.
'Could it be that these insects aren't controlled by Madam Ji but by Ji Yun Hai? Even if Ji Yun Hai had been turned into a puppet, the insects are still affected by their own instincts, right?'
Su Ming lowered his head and looked at the red ring on his right hand's finger. With a sparkle in his eyes, he stood up and started pacing about outside his cave abode, a frown between his brows.
Sometimes he would look pensive, and at other times delighted, but eventually, his mood became one of uncertainty. It was as if there was something that made it difficult for him to make a decision.
After the burning of an incense stick, Su Ming came to a halt and turned his head to the side, looking at the oval-shaped vortex that sent him back here, placed not too far away from him - the Gate to the Void.
That gate was floating there quietly, covered in ice. It had already turned into a huge block of ice.
'I have no idea how long I've been unconscious, but judging by the changes in the cave abode, once I add all the time together, it shouldn't have been more than a year since I left… and I was in the glacier for about three months after I woke up…'
Su Ming remembered himself being at what seemed like the bottom part of the Dead Sea and the things he went through during the past three months in that dark world in the glacier.
He used half a month to walk out of the glacier for the first time, but right when he walked out, the pressure of the black seawater immediately fell on him, and it was incredibly difficult for him to even move one step.
Then he used another one and a half months to somewhat get used to the pressure in the sea so he could walk about one thousand feet. Once he took each step, he had to lift his foot quickly, or else it would be instantly encased by the glacier. This made it incredibly difficult for him to stop on the glacier, and he had to constantly make sure he kept moving at a fast pace.
At a spot eight hundred something feet away from the ice block where he was previously was the closest thing sealed in the glacier among the countless other living beings there, and he had sensed it earlier with his divine sense.
It was a ferocious looking man with green scales covering his entire body. That man was sixty feet tall and his muscles had swelled up as if there was a shocking amount of power contained within. He had his left hand clenched in a fist, and he held a gigantic club in his right hand.
Su Ming had no idea what that club was made of. It was entirely black, and there were nine sharp teeth sticking out of it. It left a savage impression on people, and at the same time, there was also an air about the club that would leave fear in people's hearts.
That gigantic spiked club was clearly a treasure!
After several days of observation, and once he was certain that the frozen man no longer had a hint of life left in him, he used half a month to test out all sorts of methods to break through that ice. In the end, he had only managed to crack several inches of the ice, and once he stopped, the cracks would automatically close up.
With Su Ming's current level of cultivation, leaving a crack of several inches was already his limit. He was also puzzled by it. After all, he could break through the ice that had encased him, but it was taking him a lot of effort just trying to break that layer of ice sealing the man.
Once Su Ming pondered over it, he obtained his answer - the cause was the length of time the both of them were sealed!
From the unique characteristic of him instantly being frozen the moment his feet landed on the glacier, it was clear that it had not been a long time since he was sealed in his block of ice, which was why he could break out of it. However, it was different for the ice encasing this man. It must have been around for ages.
If Su Ming wanted to break the ice in which the man was sealed, then he needed a higher level of cultivation. After hesitating for a moment, Su Ming used half a month to dig out the Gate to the Void from the ice. Once he examined it for a moment, he went through the gate and returned to the cave abode.
While staring at the Gate to the Void, Su Ming frowned.
'Judging by the Immortals' system, I'm now at the early stage of the Nascent Soul Stage. I don't know what Realm these Nascent Soul Cultivators would be if compared to us Berserkers… but from what I can sense, it should be around my current level now… However, the power of the Immortals is lasting and they're skilled in using divine abilities…
'If that's the case, then I can still make some assessments.' Su Ming averted his gaze from the Gate to the Void and started thinking.
'The early stage of the Nascent Soul Stage is around my current level, where I have four Berserker Bones… if it's the mid stage, then I guess it would be about the level where I have more than ten Bones? If this assumption is correct, then the late Nascent Soul would be equivalent to when I have twenty something bones, and the Soul Formation Stage among the Immortals should be the initial stage of the Berserker Soul Realm…
'That should be it. An epiphany is required for the Immortals' Soul Formation. If the Nascent Divinity is born from the body, then it would be an existence that surpasses the Nascent Soul. As for the Berserker Tribe, once we reach the Berserker Soul Realm, we can manifest our very own statue of the God of Berserkers.
"If I make this comparison, one of them is the Nascent Divinity in the body, and the other is the statue of the God of Berserkers outside the body. They both have similarities!
'As for the Soul Transformation Stage, which is above the Immortals' Soul Formation, that would be… the middle stage of the Berserker Soul Realm! Then in the Immortals' system, the peak of the First Step, Ascendant, should be the latter stage of the Berserker Soul Realm.
'The Immortals' system has a Illusory Yin and Corporeal Yang state between the First Step and the Second Step. Judging by that case, then this Illusory Yin and Corporeal Yang is equivalent to the full great completion of the Berserker Soul Realm. If they manage to breakthrough, then according to their system, the Immortals will truly arrive at the Second Step!
'It's a pity that the Berserkers' cultivation system has been cut off after the Berserker Soul Realm. But there's definitely a similar Realm among the Berserker Tribe to the Immortal Tribe's Second Step!' Su Ming closed his eyes, and after a long while, he reopened them.
'I'm practicing both the Immortals and Berserkers' cultivation methods… but it's a pity, I can't combine these two powers. When I cast the Immortals' Arts, the power of the Berserkers will fall silent, and when I use the power of the Berserkers, I can't cast the Immortals' divine abilities… besides my divine sense operating as usual, I can't use any other Arts.
'Still, even so, if I use them alternately, then my battle prowess… will be stronger by a large margin compared to when I was half a year ago!' Su Ming clenched his fists. Once he swept his gaze past the land, his eyes fell on the dried up corpse belonging to the tribe leader of Black Crane.
Su Ming walked towards him. He looked at the corpse coldly, and eventually stared at the person's right leg. There was a wound over there that had clearly not recovered, along with a gigantic, dead scorpion.
'This person is the one I injured from Black Crane Tribe.' A chilling glint appeared in Su Ming's eyes. He had been quite puzzled before about Madam Ji's arrival. That distinct killing intent was clearly directed towards him.
Both White Bull Tribe and Black Crane Tribe were suspects. However, in his heart, Su Ming held more suspicion towards Black Crane Tribe. When he saw the tribe leader's corpse, a cold sneer appeared at the corners of his lips.
Madam Ji's appearance had made Su Ming experience many things during the past half a year. There were good things and bad things, but his narrow escape from death made it impossible for him to let Black Crane Tribe, who was the instigator for Madam Ji's arrival, off!
Su Ming's eyes were freezing cold. With a swing of his arm, he brought Ji Yun Hai's corpse and the sleeping black beetles back to his cave abode, along with the small virescent sword that came flying towards him automatically with a whistle.
Once he returned to his cave abode, Su Ming immediately went to the stone chamber with the medicinal cauldron. When he saw that everything was as it was, he felt relieved. Then he went to the stone chamber with the old Berserker.
Once he saw that the old man was now covered head to toe in black, and his body was filled with bite marks, Su Ming was momentarily stunned. The small snake on his shoulder immediately lifted its head with a pleased look on its face, looking forward to being praised for its deeds.
Su Ming smiled. Once he swept his gaze past the old Berserker's body, a glint of curiosity appeared in his eyes.
'I'm not a Soul Catcher. Trying to create a Soul Catcher Puppet will be very difficult for me… but now that I have the Immortals' power… Hong Luo had some divine abilities he left with me that can allow Nascent Soul Cultivators to cast their own puppets…' Su Ming stroked his chin, then sent a thought to the small snake on his shoulder.
The small snake immediately flew up and charged out of the cave abode, floating in midair while keeping vigilance of its surroundings, protecting Su Ming.