Chapter 2033 – Abandoning the Altar

Lu Yun’s warning resulted in great effect. The three hundred and sixty-five eyes of great dao that’d been searching for him returned to Cardinal Sacred Palace after meandering around for a few more circuits.

The Three Thousand were completely cowed by the outsider’s gesture. Who would’ve thought that the demons outside would possess such terrifying destructive power?? Cardinal Sacred City was the number one city in everyone’s eyes, but someone had easily destroyed it and looted all of its treasures?

No one regarded the situation with glee or schadenfreude. It was just as the outsider had said—if he could destroy Cardinal Sacred City today, he could destroy any city in the world tomorrow. He could even possibly slip into the Cardinal Sacred Palace and bring it down as well!

His methods left the cultivators of the world at a loss. Not even the palace’s sacred supreme could locate the outsider, leaving Lu Yun to a period of casual ease.

Having secured the resources of an entire Cardinal Sacred City and removed the sources of potential trouble, he could brazenly cultivate and raise disciples without reservation. Of course, he still exercised caution. Although the eyes of great dao had been recalled, the sacred supreme was on the move.

He’d delivered a resounding slap to the Cardinal Sacred Palace by destroying their city—the faction wouldn’t easily let him off for it. They’d recalled the eyes only out of concern for his terrifying methods and his usage of one word: sacrifice.

In the Three Thousand, sacrifices were an absolute taboo to cultivators. The moat was clearly defined between cultivators and mortals. One side obtained strength from cultivation and another from sacrifice. Cultivators did not readily interfere in the territory of mortals because of the existence of sacrifices.

Who knew what would happen if the outsider made good on his threat and sacrificed an entire city of cultivators? Not even the sacred supreme dared take the gamble. He had no choice but to recall the eyes, but that didn’t mean they’d given up.

At the same time, Lu Yun began an in-depth study of the sacrificial art. The Sacred Radiance altar had been fully repaired, but the tribe discovered that the altar didn’t seem as invincible as they once thought.

After practicing the tree ramming method, their current strength was far greater than what the altar sent them. There were also the mountain slamming, river dashing, and fire charging methods. While these notions also came from Lu Yun, he didn’t personally teach anyone anything. He just planted the ideas in their thoughts and allowed them free rein to contemplate and grasp the methods.

He merely started the job, leaving Sacred Radiance to figure out the rest. It was enlightenment, or sparking intelligence of a sort.

Cobwebs and dust covered the Sacred Radiance altar as no one maintained it anymore. The original purpose of the sacrifices was to worship the ancestors. Therefore, while the altar fell out of use, the temple in which the ancestors were honored still saw plenty of foot traffic.

Sacred Radiance completely abandoned their altar after three years and conducted no further sacrifices. They focused on various ramming methods, yet somehow didn’t realize that they’d become the mighty cultivators who could fly through air and earth.

The tribe’s development reached its peak. While its numbers didn’t increase by much, its members were all hale and hearty. Sacred Radiance territory also doubled from what it was before.

But for reasons unknown, their neighbors started furiously attacking the tribe, like they’d received certain guidance to do so. Not only that, but the strength that their neighbors received from their altars was far in excess of what they obtained before. It was greater than several times over!

Altars had become a primitive source of strength to the current Sacred Radiance. The tribe defeated eighteen major tribes and destroyed their respective altars after three months of grueling battle. Since it no longer sacrificed to its altar, the people of the eighteen tribes all, without exception, became slaves. They either helped establish more territory for the tribe or grow its numbers.

Under Lu Yun’s unobtrusive influence, Sacred Radiance was beginning to grow into a “nation”. This was an inevitable development over the course of a civilization’s growth.

The tribe’s current leader abdicated in favor of Lu Yun, who happily accepted. This was his ultimate goal as it was the only way to perfectly meld his dao heritage into the legitimate daos of this realm.

It was just as Fuxi had once done.

He’d tied his fortunes to the human race after becoming one of its holy emperors. He’d safeguarded the race for an eternity and was blessed by humanity’s fortunes in return to have Lu Yun resurrect him.

Lu Yun knew that if he wanted the tribe to truly proceed down the path of a developing cultivation, he would be besieged on all sides. Just breaking the tradition of sacrifice wasn’t enough, he had to become their strongest backer.

This was where the Disordered Empyrean Supreme came in.

She’d returned from her travels, complete crestfallen. Plainly, she’d once left some traces in this world, but someone had erased them.

Lu Yun guessed that she’d left a copy of shamanic dao somewhere, but that it was no longer present or intact.

“Are you.. teaching these people how to cultivate?” She assessed the situation as soon as she returned. “And.. and you broke their tradition of sacrifice?? Do you want to die??”

She shook, unable to believe what she saw. She hadn’t dared take things to this step in her time. She’d only dared surreptitiously nudge people down her desired path. To think that Lu Yun would need only three years to have the tribe abandon their altar and the tradition of sacrifice!

“I succeeded because I’m not afraid of death. You failed because you were.” Lu Yun looked calmly at her. “Be my backer and take care of any powerhouses that come. I’ll finish things off if you can’t handle it.”

“That’s right, you have the power of nihil on you. What, aren’t you going to save it for the World Heart?” the Disordered Empyrean Supreme sneered. The fragment of the Firmament Prison was at the World Heart. If Lu Yun obtained the fragment, he would be able to manifest the complete hell dao and fulfill his promise.

But if that power of nothing was consumed, his odds of gaining the fragment would drastically decrease.

“That’s why I need your help,” Lu Yun smiled faintly. “Be my backup so you can at least scare off the empyrean supremes that come poking their noses around.”

The Disordered Empyrean Supreme snorted irritatedly and ignored Lu Yun.