Chapter 753 – Ashes (6)

Jeong Yeon-shin felt as if he had blinked his eyes. World Tree’s interior, pitch black with surroundings shrouded in darkness. The only senses he had properly regained were his upper energy center spirit and right arm, yet at this moment’s surprise, the illusion arose that he had moved his eyelids.

Trudge.

Footsteps.

Temperament oozed from them. Arrogance and pride.

Throughout Jeong Yeon-shin’s experience, footwork most befitting the word insolent. Steps imbued with Heavenly Demon Sovereign Step. In a place where nothing could be seen or heard.

[Obeying Heaven’s Wandering Immortal…?]

—Your intent is quite cute. As if you’ve seen someone you couldn’t see.

A composed voice, yet for some reason Iron Demon Spring Lord Ji Gang-hyeon didn’t respond. No presence, as if there had only been the abyss from the start.

That talkative man.

It was a place where nothing was visible besides Myriad View Place’s screens. It was difficult to gauge where Ji Gang-hyeon was. Only feeling that he had left his place in the meantime.

Then Little Heavenly Demon Invincible asked.

—Where are you looking?

[Can you sense my presence?]

—Obviously.

A voice faintly tinged with laughter. It also felt somewhat like mockery. It was definitely Little Heavenly Demon Invincible.

—There’s nothing I can’t sense. My senses are different.

That voice.

It wasn’t the form of intent. Though it echoed like a reverberation, it was definitely spoken aloud. A voice that seemed to spread from the throat into a cave.

[Obeying Heaven’s Wandering Immortal?]

Jeong Yeon-shin was stunned.

He still hadn’t regained sensation in his entire body. That’s why he had been speaking with intent.

—That strange alias.

Her voice drew closer. Jeong Yeon-shin’s senses observing Myriad View Place also flowed sideways. Simultaneously it began to appear. A spot dimly brightening.

He saw her shadow.

—It grates on me.

Trudge, trudge.

With each step, darkness lifted. As if lantern light melted into the footprints. As the sound drew closer, the appearance becoming brighter in whitish light clusters.

She had let pitch-black hair hang down on a snow-white collar scarf, and her silver mask rippled with dreamlike light. Soon the mask disappeared with a light gesture.

An incarnation of the demonic.

With that appearance in this space, it could be called the pinnacle of unorthodox paths. Regardless of Jeong Yeon-shin’s disbelieving gaze, at this moment Yelu Zhen licked her lips.

“The tree’s shade is thick. Well, since it’s outright inside the tree’s body, how could it be otherwise?”

[…You maintained your form with only unorthodox path studies and upper energy center sensation? You of all people…?]

“See.”

It rang like a complete declaration.

Hwaak!

His whole body’s sensation brightened like a candle flame. Soon Jeong Yeon-shin realized. That she had grabbed the back of his head and pulled down so their foreheads touched.

Resonance of upper energy center spirit.

Woong…

Warmth spread from touching skin to touching skin. A feeling of mixing each other’s minds, and soon the darkness covering Jeong Yeon-shin was swept away. And the corner of Yelu Zhen’s mouth rising crookedly.

“This is right. Just now that face would have been a waste.”

“Little Heavenly Demon Invincible.”

“We’re both upper energy centers about to die, but anyway the spirituality is intact. The energy sensation to operate internal energy… seems like it would return when the path outward opens.”

Or did the tree take it, she muttered composedly. Her conduct felt transcendent toward all matters.

Jeong Yeon-shin suddenly realized.

“Your lifespan has ended.”

“I’ve lived quite long. Anyway, right now your senses can’t keep up with me, little brother. You’re dull.”

Was teasing Jeong Yeon-shin enjoyable? As always, mockery hung at Yelu Zhen’s lips, but now it somehow felt exhilarating.

Jeong Yeon-shin quietly asked.

“What does that feel like?”

“Should I say it feels like the top of my head opened? The sense of liberation is considerable. No wonder the immortals’ last words were ‘ascension to immortality.'”

Her whisper continuing like an echo. How exhilarating must it have been for Taoism’s Zhongli Quan and Lu Dongbin…

Jeong Yeon-shin, who separated his forehead from hers, slowly raised his head. Just as he had only emitted intent with the power of spirit among essence-energy-spirit until now, his whole body now moved with Yelu Zhen’s upper energy center spirituality. It felt like floating on clouds.

He lowered his gaze.

The Ming Cult Leader who had drawn infinitely close to the Heavenly Demon was looking up at him. Was she displeased with the difference in eye level? A face with brow slightly furrowed.

Then suddenly seeming quite amused by the current situation, she raised one corner of her mouth.

“The fortuitous encounters I’ve bestowed on my brother are quite numerous, but after this foolish elder sister’s death, how will you navigate the dusty jianghu? Only my brother left alone has become pitiful.”

“Coming in without even a retreat route.”

“There’s nothing to look back at on roads already traveled. Same when the time comes to die.”

She turned her body.

“What people should see last is a hill. People who had been looking at the same scenery in the mound formed by their lives.”

Yelu Zhen snapped her fingers sharply.

Hwaak!

The footprints she left burned like suns. It was only an instant until Myriad View Place’s darkness was torn in all directions. What was revealed afterward were endlessly circularly connected stairs.

‘Myriad View Place…!’

The place Jeong Yeon-shin had been was its peak.

“But since I haven’t particularly achieved anything… going round and round back to my brother. Goodness, the life of a jianghu martial woman.”

Yelu Zhen seemed like a chief mourner at a funeral with few condolence visitors. Though only her back was visible to Jeong Yeon-shin, a somewhat awkward face was drawn.

“Since we’re at World Tree, let’s look around thoroughly. Who knows? It’s a place vast enough to make you vomit, so maybe there’s a Life Gate or weakness or something…”

Jeong Yeon-shin shook his head.

“It won’t work with unorthodox path solutions.”

“Mm?”

“I heard from Taoist Sanfeng. That World Tree would someday bear true fruit.”

“Last time you exchanged hands with our sect’s founding patriarch, now Zhang Sanfeng? At that point, you must have also heard Bodhidharma’s Buddhist chants.”

“……”

“……?”

“World Tree’s fruit is Taoist Sanfeng’s arrangement. It’s also the last means the tree will choose when earth energy is depleted.”

“Only incomprehensible words.”

“You’ll understand. In the end, what I need are two things. You’re one of them. From now on, let’s debate with me through demonic path studies.”

“This elder was needed? How did you know I’d come here?”

“You’re the only one who understands me.”

Jeong Yeon-shin roundaboutly expressed that he was a human with not a single friend. Little Heavenly Demon Invincible seemed satisfied.

She asks.

“Who is the other one?”

Without answering, Jeong Yeon-shin only turned his head. A wall difficult to distinguish as tree bark or marble caught his gaze. Myriad View Place’s mechanism formation was attached to its center like a large plaque. While illuminating noble clan masters under a sky where dawn had somehow broken.

It seemed to be World Tree’s summit. About a hundred mixed men and women of all ages, essentially the same temperament as the main fortress’s General Administration Office.

—Radiant Art Bond’s spirit energy passed to Desolate Fortress Grand Administrator. Blood Guardian Leader Hyeon Won-chang’s injury confirmed. Practically out of combat.

—Enter The Divine Sword Master Praising Earth Sword Duke is exchanging hands with ‘Enter The Divine Spear Master’ Dream Flight.

—Maintain Blood Guardian Leader Hyeon Won-chang as third priority kill target, but defeat that energy first. From now, those receiving Radiant Art Bond’s energy like Iron Cavalry Horse Lim Jin-ming… temporarily register at the top of the kill list. Transmitting positions to Seventeen Halls warriors.

—Clan Leader, second defeat to Fighting God. Total five hundred sixty-six exchanges? Eight exchanges increased. The main trunk also seems to be pushing regeneration ability more strongly.

—The northwest horizon distorted. Heavenly Steel Light Armor… scale twenty-three thousand eighty-six or more! Demon Realm martial military forces! Blue Complete Guest and Yellow Complete Guest, abandon Lazy Flame Dragon and behead Vajra first!

—Seventeen Halls, all sally forth.

An elegant composure was felt. Even those shouting urgently didn’t seem to truly be in a crisis of survival. As befitting those holding all under heaven’s earth energy in their hands.

Jeong Yeon-shin stared at the wilderness spreading beyond their shoulders. A direction clearly south.

The earth’s axis was shaking. In the distance, golden lightning flickered like a net, and the sight of it repeatedly being torn apart.

Literary Star’s giant approached while stamping the ground with long legs. An appearance greatly scorched by lightning bolts several times, yet approaching World Tree with overwhelming speed enough to scatter pale breath left and right.

Someone at the summit thundered.

—Literary Star, who sold out his tribe and became Desolate Day Extinction’s confidant… is close at hand.

A reaction as if they had only been preparing for that. The words that immediately followed were the same.

—Heaven-reaching Bow Count.

—Not now. I’ll only target Divine Sword Group.

—What about Northern Darkness Fist Marquis?

—Her breath stopped. Innate true energy loss confirmed too. Divine Sword Deputy Group Leader Jin Myeong-jo to the top of the kill list…

—Golden Thunder elder doesn’t seem to have detained Literary Star. Let’s deploy the unified tribes recruited from jianghu too. Is Qingcheng Sect Leader still fumbling in vain?

—Yes, there are strange aspects. If it’s Clear Cloud Crimson Cloud’s Nature Sword, each peerless master should be producing results every moment…

—Same when competing with Heaven Mound Guest.

—Seventeen Halls, will collide with Literary Star shortly.

The southern wilderness was being filled with shimmering waves. Sword radiances of blades, with Spirit Energy Layered Sword contained in all weapons. The number of those covering the ground while flying with lightness skill like Grass Treading Step numbered ten thousand.

At that scale, they didn’t appear as a crowd.

Like harvest season forests expanding their territory far. Even on land where Mencius Unwavering was deployed, they were all masters performing internal energy operation with their bodies and weapons.

Overwhelming martial military forces.

The reason all kinds of imperial dynasties and royal houses could be established on jianghu people’s land despite martial forest existing under heaven.

Around then Jeong Yeon-shin was sitting facing Yelu Zhen. For debate.

“Me and Literary Star?”

“Yes.”

“That all the people most needed by the current Desolate Fortress Lord are from Northern King’s background. Thank goodness it’s here, but if Divine Sword Group heard…”

“I don’t put family in strategies.”

When he thought even after uttering it that it was trash-like conduct of all under heaven.

Wudeuduk.

A bone sound spreading from Jeong Yeon-shin’s ears. Tearing agony also arose. Without checking with a mirror or anything, he felt it. That his ears had sharpened slightly.

‘Is it starting now?’

World Tree’s Bone Shrinking Art.

Yelu Zhen laughed while pointing a finger.

“Just when I thought your words were quite severe, you received heavenly punishment. I’m fortunate to die before changing to that appearance.”

“You must have come to extract me, so cooperate.”

“How?”

“I must overcome the fruit.”

“Earlier you said it was an arrangement for little brother?”

Colorless lightning flashed in the eyes of Yelu Zhen who retorted blankly. She answered her own question.

“That fruit, is it World Tree’s Primordial Spirit…?”

“Correct, Primordial Spirit technique. I’ve suffered from it a lot. So much that the principles were spontaneously learned, and what the world must face last is also World Tree’s Primordial Spirit. In other words, a person.”

“…I personally thought your master was World Tree’s fruit.”

“She almost became so. Not now.”

Meanwhile, Jeong Yeon-shin gradually felt doubt. When would Iron Demon Spring Lord Ji Gang-hyeon return? There was much to discuss with him.

The lips of Yelu Zhen, who had been gazing at him fixedly, moved.

“Aren’t you looking too far ahead?”

“What?”

“The world seems likely to collapse before reaching there. The battlefield isn’t even being sorted out. Even just glimpsing it briefly was quite dizzying.”

“……”

“Look at the countenances your martial lineage must face without you. At minimum a nation. Not to mention long-eared peerless masters, what about the martial military forces of masters who draw all under heaven’s earth energy and even engage in regeneration? Are those bastards confident for no reason?”

“A good strategist equals a nation.”

Jeong Yeon-shin spoke calmly. Only then did Myriad View Place’s scenery reflect in Yelu Zhen’s eyes that raised their head. It was a viewpoint overlooking a vast wilderness.

Several hemisphere-shaped ground formations reaching one hundred zhang in diameter had been created.

The martial military forces that had created forest-like domains were nowhere. Shattered metal pieces, bone fragments pressed deep into the ground, half-burned clothing hems, and blood-reddened earth were all.

Smoke rose everywhere.

A giant shadow repeatedly cast shadows through those gaps. There was no one else. The giant’s silhouette exuded primordial intimidation and advanced while staggering slightly. Some great cause seemed to move his legs.

Brief silence spread.

—……

Even from World Tree’s summit, no particular voices rang. Same throughout inside and outside. The only person whose mouth opened was Jeong Yeon-shin.

“The tree’s clan changed the word unity to their liking, but originally unity for people has many forms. A couple’s marriage is so, sects joining is so, entering under someone’s tutelage can also be major unity in life. Rather, this side is correct.”

“……”

“I’ll show World Tree humanity’s jianghu.”

At this moment, Myriad View Place’s scenery.

It was right after Grand Administrator Lim Jin-ming flew toward Literary Star with lightness skill. From Lim Jin-ming’s hands where whitish radiance gathered, Jeong Yeon-shin’s form flickered like a mirage.

“I take Literary Star as family.”

It was the prelude to Primordial Spirit.