Chapter 1826: Tortoise Shell

“There’s no rush,” Lu Yun shook his head. “The god of Mount Tai has yet to use everything at his disposal. You are the ace up my sleeve, so we’ll take care of things as they come.”

From the formation of Nihil Homeland to the appearance of New Nihil Homeland, then to the outsiders attacking Dragon Formula Academy, every step of the way had been part of Lu Yun’s plan.

It was all for this moment, to ignite conflict between the outsiders and redirect their attention elsewhere. They would be so preoccupied that they wouldn’t have energy to wonder what was happening here.

The timing was ripe and the six hells had grown as one after twenty thousand years. It was time to physically combine them together and forge the only origin hell.

Lu Yun wasn’t afraid of the outsiders attacking this spot—the strongest powerhouses of the Land of Reincarnation were gathered here. Him refining the only origin hell didn’t conflict with chief world interests either.

He was only afraid of the outsiders taking advantage of this opportunity to attack the fourth realm, seize the world of sequence, and claim the seed of nothing.

Jiang Chen wouldn’t leak the events taking place here because his goal was the world of sequence as well. Once their struggle over hell became public knowledge, it was highly likely that someone else would end up with the world of sequence.

He was livid that the powerhouses of the chief worlds had restricted him from the Land of Reincarnation. His people couldn’t enter the fourth realm and he couldn’t project himself through his dao palace. Only his disciples could enter after the orders of the fourth realm were made complete—they’d paved the way for him to project his will inside.

Thus, Jiang Chen had no choice but to work with the god of Mount Tai.

Mo Yi and the Dao King flawlessly prevented any hint of the fight from escaping. Everything remained completely concealed. Though the grand battle took place in the secondary worlds, the powerhouses of the chief worlds were scrambling around in a panic due to the latest development with the Lifeline Talisman. They had no consciousness to spare for probing the secondary worlds.

Lu Yun had carefully crafted his plans to ensure that everyone would be misdirected. The time he’d fought for in the fourth realm was supposedly to eke out enough breathing space for local powerhouses to grow into their power. Anything would help against the chief worlds.

In actuality, he was gaining time for himself to refine hell.

He’d grown over the past twenty thousand years and accumulated various plans, contingencies, and tricks. So had the god of Mount Tai done the same, thus, Lu Yun’s ambitions hardly went unnoticed.

Since the mountain god was here, he’d surely made a plethora of preparations.

Fuxi found some room to maneuver as Jin Naluo and Carmine Eternal attacked the zombie emperor. He called upon the Dragonquake Scripture and summoned the dragons of the secondary worlds, turning them into tangible dragons that tore at the Bag of Corpse Refinement.

The stream of zombies immediately stopped.

“Damn you Jiang Chen, is that all you’ve got?!” the mountain god bawled.

“My primary body can’t enter this land, what else do you want?!” Jiang Chen’s response rang with some schadenfreude. He wasn’t worried about the situation at hand—he had his own plans as well.

“What else do you want?” The mountain god immediately calmed down. He blocked Daoist Ingress’ sword and took three steps back, allowing the man to pass through. That conveniently cleared the way for Daoist Ingress to attack the corpse god.

The corpse god hated her current situation—that battle flag was the bane of her existence. Although Tianqi wasn’t that strong, he could fully keep her in check. When she was attacked on two sides, she was forced to retreat.

“Damn you, you broke my heart in your past life and now you want to kill me in your reincarnated life!” A deep bitterness sparkled in her ruby red eyes.

“Stop acting like that, old zombie. I severed my ties with the mountain god’s reincarnated form long ago,” Tianqi sneered. “You’re nothing good either. When the mountain god decided to kill you, you went along with his plan so you could plot against him. But what are you plotting? There doesn’t seem to be anything in the fourth realm that’s of use to you.”

“Don’t waste your breath, it speaks with a certain beguilement that can devour your heart and mind,” Daoist Ingress grumbled. Four rays of sword intent rose around him and assembled into a massive sword formation. He spun his sword and stabbed it toward the zombie emperor in the air.

“Let me help you, Daoist Eternal!” Daoist Ingress and Carmine Eternal were old friends; they were hailed as the two greatest troublemakers in the human dao era. When Carmine Eternal developed in the Blood Sea, Daoist Ingress—then Daoist Yuyu—stood guard over her until she hatched from her egg and had the strength to protect herself.

When Daoist Ingress destroyed the connate treasures of the various races and slaughtered the emperors of human dao, thereby sparking the war of Emperors Fall, it’d been Carmine Eternal who stepped forward to help. The two extracted the great daos from the emperors and fashioned the foundations of immortal dao.

Now that he saw her struggle with the zombie emperor, he immediately leapt to her aid.

“Grand-master, come help me!” Tianqi snapped to wakefulness upon Daoist Ingress’ reminder. There was indeed a strange seed that was new to the bottom of his heart, and he’d likely come under the corpse god’s control if they kept fighting.

“Coming, I’m coming. You haven’t learned to keep yourself in check even in death, old zombie! How dare you try to seduce my disciple! No wonder the god of Mount Tai wanted to crush his most cherished flower!” Wahuang shook off the mountain god and took out an embroidered silk ball, slamming it down on the corpse god.

Caught off guard, the ball smacked her head and the corpse god paused for a split second. That was enough for Tianqi to trap her with a roll of the battle flag.

....

“Give me your skeletal form,” Jiang Chen said when the corpse god was incapacitated.

“Fine!” There was no room for the god of Mount Tai to hesitate. The corpse god was out of commission and the zombie emperor was also restrained. That left the rest of the group free to mob the mountain god.

A bloom of Hadal Bonefire accompanied the skeleton. Jiang Chen threw back his head with laughter and projected his will into the bony body. This was another one of the mountain god’s contingencies. A mere projection of a supreme’s will was easily destroyed, but that wasn’t the case if it was housed in the hadal skeleton.

The god of Mount Tai refined Hadal Bonefire from nine beings that’d grown to the fourth realm. It rivaled hellfire and the skeleton was coalesced from Hadal Bonefire. He’d originally prepared it for himself, but since he’d reformed a body over the past twenty thousand years, he didn’t need it anymore.

To Jiang Chen, this skeleton was an unparalleled battle zombie. Hadal Bonefire exploded when his projection sank into it. Instead of helping the mountain god or the corpse god, he charged Fuxi.

“Well met!” Fuxi stopped dismantling the Bag of Corpse Refinement and materialized a tortoise shell that was the size of a palm. He smashed it at Jiang Chen.