Chapter 2181.2: A Familiar Despair

The uncannily handsome young man caressed the golden orb in his hand. Marquis Origin left it when he departed as he wasn’t confident in his chances of returning unscathed from the Celestial Realm Battlefront. Hence, the orb remained behind.

Bam bam bam!

Several figures flew backward from the hall’s doors—the guards to the palace. A tiny slit dotted each of their throats, their nascent spirits crumbled, and their bodies devoid of vitality. Their eyes, however, still sparkled with the watchful light of carrying out their duties.

Plainly, they hadn’t even known they were dead when death collected them.

The young man jerked his head up with shock and saw a white shadow float inside like a ghost. It was an eighteen-year-old young man dressed in clean white robes, a meter of hair flowing casually behind him. His face was tinged with an unnatural pallor, bestowing a different kind of air to his delicately shaped features. A blood-red flower in his hand made for a slightly jarring sight—it was an extraordinarily beguiling flower.

The flower’s petals were long and thin, so red that they seemed like it’d just fed on blood and was about to drip with it.

The newcomer’s eyes were without focus and his footwork strange. They created no sound as they connected with the ground and brought him to the young man in golden robes.

“Those of the Origin Sect nearly killed Fengxian Wu in the Jade Ruins Realm.” The young man spoke in a slightly hoarse, soft voice. He lifted his head and looked at Golden Robes with an unfocused gaze. “The Iron Guards have already killed that disciple and Fengxian Wu is unharmed.”

Slowly flushing deep red, Golden Robes stared fixedly at the newcomer’s cheeks.

“Does your Origin Sect really have nothing to do with the Origin disciple who attempted to assassinate the Human Emperor, but was killed in turn by his guards?” The young man mumbled to himself as he cocked his head.

“You go too far, White!” Golden Robes—Yan Beixing, eldest son of Marquis Origin—shot to his feet.

Assassinate the Human Emperor? He was the greatest powerhouse of Great Xia and his might dominated the realms. Who could possibly assassinate him?

Anyone else who spoke such ludicrous words would be dead for the offense, but White was an exception.

“What do you want?” Yan Beixing could tell that White was here to win one back for Fengxian Wu. While the two didn’t have a relationship, they were connected through her grandfather, King Fengxian.

“Is that the Lu inheritance orb in your hand?” The blankly staring eyes shifted toward the golden orb in Yan Beixing’s hand.

“The Lus?” Yan Beixing sneered. “So you want the inheritance orb? The Origin Sect has received official conferment from the Human Emperor and recognition from the heavenly book. We are one of the thirty-six marquis of Great Xia and as such, the inheritance orb belongs to us.”

White didn’t respond.

“Hmph.” Yan Beixing was an immortal while White was just a nascent soul cultivator. The difference between the two was as if heaven and earth, but Yan Beixing was very cautious of his visitor.

Whoosh!

White suddenly shifted in front of the young man. The breathtaking flower in his hand blossomed with a scintillating ray of blood light.

One petal, two petals, three petals..

Dancing gently through the air, blood-red petals enveloped Yan Beixing. Suffused with a unique beguilement, they were unearthly and preternaturally red. Deep-rooted fear flashed through the young man’s eyes.

White reached out and gently caressed the golden orb in Yan Beixing’s hand.

Snap!

The tiniest of cracks sounded as something seemed to break within it. A smear of blood floated out of the inheritance orb and dissipated in the air. White then gathered the petals together with a wave of his hand, condensing them into one petal that returned to his flower.

He left the hall with a turn.

Yan Beixing sagged with relief as sweat poured out of his brow. His uncommonly handsome face was frozen with fear.

“That pervert has the ability to kill immortals, but willingly lists himself alongside Jiang Feng, Qin Qianxue, and Mo Qiyue..” Yan Beixing’s eyes widened with horror when he looked down at the inheritance orb in his hand. “He.. destroyed the Lu bloodline left in the orb..”

His eyes nearly spat fire, but he was unable to seek out White for revenge. The inheritance orb was a Lu heirloom to begin with, so there naturally were traces of the family’s bloodline within.

The Origin Sect was able to confirm Lu Tianling’s movements through the bloodline resonance of the orb and use the factions of the Jade Ruins Realm against him. Now that it’d been broken for no reason, the sect would find it very difficult to locate Lu Tianling again if he moved elsewhere.

They didn’t care about Lu Tianling, but they ardently desired the immortal weapon in his hand. The Origin Sect was a marquis-level faction, not a king-level faction. The law enforcers of the various worlds of cultivation had no need to pay them any attention.

“Servants, attend to me!” Yan Beixing roared.

....

The one hundred thousand cultivators gathered in Immortal Burial Valley had slowly dispersed. After Fengxian Wu departed, Mo Qiyue exchanged a few words with Lu Yun before leaving as well. A stony faced Terra Demon stood wordlessly behind Lu Yun.

Lu Yun approached the crater at the center of the valley and considered it in silence. He hadn’t been back since he left a year ago as the matter was too complicated. It wasn’t something that the current Lu Clan could participate in. If it hadn’t been for Fengxian Wu’s insistence on visiting, he wouldn’t have sent Terra Demon. While parts of the family had visited at various times, they hadn’t done so in such a high profile manner.

All of the cultivators here were now highly aware of Terra Demon’s might. They scattered when they saw him accompany a young man to the crater, deeply afraid that he would suddenly want revenge.

Lu Yun ignored them as purple radiance flashed through his eyes. The combat art of heavenly dao—Eye of Nullification!

Everything beneath the valley was made apparent to him and gravity filled the young man’s eyes.

“Although this Eye of Nullification isn’t as useful as the Spectral Eye, I can still see decently clearly with it.

“Eh? What’s the Spectral Eye?” Lu Yun shook his head. “We go!” He retracted the Eye of Nullification and left without hesitation.

“Is something amiss at the bottom, young master?” Terra Demon also turned grave when he saw the young man’s reaction.

“Amiss? Of course there’s something amiss!” Lu Yun took a deep breath. “Terra Demon, convey my orders to have the family’s members swiftly pull out of the area. The Lu Clan is forbidden from taking one step into Profound Wing!”

Terra Demon shook, it was his first time ever hearing Lu Yun speak in such a tone. He immediately executed Lu Yun’s command without hesitation.

“Senior brother.. the sword pagoda suppressed those things. It looks like it wasn’t a treasure left by myself for a future me, but a treasure left to suppress them..” Lu Yun murmured at the sky.

A familiar, yet foreign despair suffused his heart. He seemed to see that in the near future, this world of immortal dao civilization would be swallowed by endless ghost zombies and turn into a land of death and despair.

It would ultimately be consigned to nothing.

“No matter what, we cannot remain in the Jade Ruins Realm. I need to find another place as soon as possible.” Lu Yun shook his head, then suddenly thought of something else. “The Human Emperor, eight kings, and thirty-six marquises have entered the Celestial Realm Battlefront to call upon the heavenly book. Has the emperor perceived something?”

Sky had immediately saved him when he ran into danger in the sword pagoda and helped him claim the treasure. None of it was a coincidence.

“But even so, will a mere Human Emperor be sufficient against those things?”

....

Fallen Leaf City was situated on the southern border of Dark Orchid Empire and sat at the foot of the biggest mountain range in the Jade Ruins Realm. It bordered Darklake Empire.

It was of moderate size, but it sat on a sizable spirit vein. Though it was just a small city in Dark Orchid Empire, the density of its ambient qi almost rivaled the capital of Darklake.

Fallen Leaf Mountain was also incredibly rich in resources, spirit herbs, mines, and low level spirit beasts abounded. Thus, it was a very busy city and the web of factions within quite complicated.

Lu Yun handed the family’s daily affairs over to Terra Demon and traveled alone to this border town. He’d originally planned to stabilize the family, raise Darklake to a fourth level empire, obtain the right to enter the Celestial Realm Battlefront, then leave the family to make some additional preparations.

But after he saw what was buried beneath Immortal Burial Valley, there wasn’t a moment to waste. He needed to improve his strength before anything else. With Terra Demon in residence the Lu Clan, the family was as solid as Mount Tai. They had a few treasures that Lu Yun left behind and Terra Demon’s own strength. Even empyrean immortals wouldn’t find it an easy time if they came.