Rise of Humanity

by <unknown>

  And when Heaven Monster Li Jun was able to walk over safely, the impact on their state of mind was immense!

  But what Yu Xuanji and Hu Qimei did not know was —— the Ming King divine eye on the first pontoon had already been plundered by Zhong Yue and no longer existed. Hence, Heaven Monster Li Jun was able to cross the pontoon without being attacked since there was nothing there to attack him in the first place.

  Soon, Heaven Monster Li Jun had already set foot on the fourth pontoon, striding towards the fifth platform where Yu Xuanji and Hu Qimei were currently situated.

  Most talented monsters would usually require over twenty days to pass all five stages of the inheritance test, with most of even dying halfway through. However, Heaven Monster Li Jun had just cleared all of them in less than an hour!

  Hu Qimei suddenly had an idea when the Heaven Monster Li Jun stepped on the sixth platform to size up the inheritance on the platform. She exclaimed out involuntarily, “Heaven Monster Li Jun ... saint city lord’s disciple!”

  Heaven Monster Li Jun shifted his gaze towards her and his brows rose in interest, “Oh? Why would you say that, Qimei?”

  “The totem inheritance on these walls are complicated and profound. I suppose that not even a god would be able to glean the secrets behind them with merely a glance or two?”

  Hu Qimei held her gaze for moments before saying, “But you just took a quick glance and passed them easily, without even making a single mistake. This can only mean that you didn’t comprehend the secrets with a glance yourself, but that you have already received the inheritance on the pontoon! The only one who could learn the【Monster God Ming King Art】are the disciples of the saint city lord! Hence, you’ve been the saint city lord’s disciple before this whole farce even began! ”

  Yu Xuanji came to the same conclusion and responded, “Heaven Monster Li Jun, the saint city lord sent you here to monitor us! ”

  Heaven Monster Li Jun smirked as he said, “Junior Martial Brother Yu and Qimei sure have quite the intuition, being able to surmise so much information just by watching me crossing over the pontoon. That's right, my teacher is the saint city lord and I am his fifth apprentice. My teacher taught me the【Monster God Ming King Art】. Surely, I would be very familiar with the totem patterns and there would be no need for me to study them anymore.”

  Yu Xuanji and Hu Qimei felt a chill tingle down their spines. Their voices were trembling as they spoke, “Since the saint city lord is selecting for a closed door disciple, then why did he still send you over?”

  “Monitoring you was merely one of the reasons my teacher sent me here, the real reason I was sent here was to see if anyone of you Qi Practitioners could completely attain the【Monster God Ming King Art】. If there is, then naturally, he will take them in as a closed door disciple.”

  Heaven Monster Li Jun smiled as he said, “My teacher loves and adores talent, and he also needs someone talented enough to acquire the complete【Monster God Ming King Art】for him. Other than that, he knows that the creature that crawled out from the Black Mountain secret realm did not simply die and disappear. It is still lurking in the shadows, waiting for the right time to make a move. With the Black Mountain secret realm now open again, that creature will surely cause trouble again, and will definitely send his subordinates to gather information. Therefore I was charged to monitor that creature’s subordinates. As for the third reason….”

  He smiled slightly as he continued, “Although I am his disciple, but I was not officially inducted as his closed door disciple. Therefore, I still need to make a name of my own. If you lot can’t prove to be of any use and die here instead, then he will announce to the world that I will be taken in as his closed door disciple. ”

  Yu Xuanji and Hu Qimei’s blood ran cold. Heaven Monster Li Jun had cultivated the【Monster God Ming King Art】long ago, with his prowess, he could definitely be called the strongest among those in the level of Rebirth!

  Yu Xuanji and the others were kept in the dark, fighting among themselves for the spot of the closed door disciple, even nearly dying for the opportunity, while the other over sixty monster young experts were dead. And in the end they were just fools being played like a puppet on strings. This made them very unsettled!

  Hu Qimei pursed her dry lips as said, “Why did you only come now, Heaven Monster? Why did you wait until the end of Long Yue’s and King Teng’s battle. Why did you wait until after King Teng was dead, to appear?”

  Heaven Monster Li Jun was silent, Yu Xuanji’s eyes gleamed and he smirked, “The more death there is, the lesser the competition. After all, there is only one mother that could supply the breast milk. If she had twin babies, the babies would invariably have to compete for the milk. Who would know if he could have still held the glory of the strongest Rebirth Qi Practitioner after the other babies have cultivated the【Monster God Ming King Art】? Incidents of junior martial brothers supplanting the senior martial brothers, with the latter then being slowly forgotten, relegated to living forever under the shadows of the ones they used to call juniors ... this happens more often than one would think. Therefore, instead of having a fair competition, would it not be simpler to eliminate all the other contenders, and end up as the sole winner. Am I right, Li Jun?”

  “Your opinion of me is too low.”

  The Heaven Monster Li Jun sarcastically smirked and shrugged, “Although I’m exactly having the same thought, but fortunately I have a good reputation among the saint city, who would believe you even if you told them so? ”

  He walked towards the sixth platform of the pontoon and grinned, “Consider yourselves lucky, I won’t let every Qi Practitioners who entered Black Mountain secret realm die, for no other reason than to avoid rousing the saint city lord’s suspicion that I have no room in my black heart for competitors. So, I’ve decided to spare some of the more benign weaklings to curb suspicion. Hmmm ... what luck you two have, otherwise, you would already be dead.”

  Chapter 135: -The God's Treasure |

  He’s going after Brother Long Yue!

  Yu Xuanji and Hu Qimei’s brows fluctuated violently as they stared at Li Jun’s back. Hu Qimei gritted her teeth and said, “I have a strong urge to stab this brat from the back and pierce a hole in his heart!”

  Yu Xuanji shook his head and lamented, “Once he gets out there, he’ll be the saint city lord’s closed door disciple and cultivate under his guidance, soaring the nine skies thereafter. It’s impossible for us to ever catch up to him. In truth, we are just here to accompany the prince in his study trip, what a pity so many experts died….”

  Hu Qimei’s heart was also soaked in bitterness, “After we get out, we’ll spread the word and reveal to the world all of his sinister acts and machinations, to crush and trample on his reputation!”

  “That is, if the other monsters believe our words.”

  Yu Xuanji shook his head and said, “We are merely just two wretched losers, petty bugs. Whereas the Heaven Monster Li Jun is the strongest expert of saint city. His reputation in the saint city is simply beyond reproach, his influence is high and he is favored by countless monsters. His words would undoubtedly be placed above our own.”

  Hu Qimei also thought of the reputation the Heaven Monster Li Jun held in the monster race, and her heart began to be engulfed in powerlessness.

  The Heaven Monster Li Jun’s reputation was flawless, his looks and his temperament as perceived by the world was impeccable – generous, kind and charitable. He also enjoyed a vast circle of acquaintances. Every one of his appearances in the saint city would incite a clamor of adulation, and innumerable monsters of all ages or identity would erupt in a furor to cheer for his name in fanaticism.

  Even the saint city lord himself would not incite such a commotion. The air the saint city lord brings was majestic and dignified, stern and dominant; the other disciples of the saint city lord were nowhere close to being able to give rise to any sort of remotely comparable scene as Li Jun would.

  An
d most importantly, he was the disciple of the saint city lord. If the saint city lord also corroborated his statements, who would ever dare to play the contrarian?

  Furthermore, even if the saint city lord knew that he killed Zhong Yue, how seriously would he be punished over a dead man?

  The two of them were lost in their anxiety, and all of a sudden, the pontoon and platforms shook violently. The monster god Ming King palace was also quaking vigorously. Then, the roof tiles, brims, walls, stones, and pillars all flew into the air!

  Heaven Monster Li Jun’s face changed drastically, he stopped his steps, tensed his muscles and stood still in preparedness. Yu Xuanji and Hu Qimei also didn’t dare move at all either. They leaned down onto the grounds of the platform. Suddenly, the sky spun and the earth goes round —zheng zheng zheng— the pontoons collapsed on their own while the platforms clashed and merged with each other.

  All of a sudden, the pontoons, platforms, and the monster god Ming King palace vanished. And they were sent back to the same spot they were once at, facing a huge palace with the hundred and eight steps stone stairway in front of them.

  The palace was returned back to its original state, exactly like how it was as before.

  “Could it be that Long Yue has touched and triggered something, causing the palace to return to its original state?”

  Heaven Monster Li Jun locked his brows, he strode into the palace and as he started to move, his gait increased faster and faster, but no matter how many steps he took, he was always a step away from the palace entrance. Ultimately, it was as if he had never moved in the first place!

  Cold sweat rushed out of his forehead, suddenly, his speed broke through the sound barrier to continue bolting forwards. Regardlessly how immense his speed was, he always remained a single step away from the palace!

  Heaven Monster Li Jun released a furious bellow at his inability to enter the palace. It was only a few moments later, where he finally stopped and calmed down before turning around to leave.

  “So this is forcing me to kill you outside?”

  He mumbled lowly as he quickly walked down the stairway, “Good, then I shall kill you in the saint city!”

  “This is … a mini teleportation portal?”

  Zhong Yue walked down the stairs, it was a half mile journey before a little stone platform suddenly appeared into his eyes. The stone platform was surrounded by stone pillars, the carvings they carried on their surfaces were nearly identical to the ones on Xin Huo’s teleportation array formations!

  Xin Huo was surprised, he flew out and said, “This is really a teleportation portal, but way smaller than the ones I placed. This one, it can only teleport one a few miles away at most.”

  “A few miles of distance, then that’ll bring me deep underneath the Black Mountain? The treasure that the monster god Ming King was tasked to guard by the monster emperor ... could it be in the underground of the Black Mountain?”

  Zhong Yue’s heart thumped and he walked into the teleportation array formation. The stone pillars started to buzz lowly, and all of a sudden, the totem carvings on the pillars gleamed brightly and formed a curtain of light —Wongg— the light rays then converged into a door at the middle of the array formation. Vaguely, he could still see that another door was forming beyond the one in front of him, linking the two doors together like the ends of a vestibule.

  Zhong Yue exclaimed in curiosity, he walked into the door and strode towards the one on the other end.

  He took two or three steps, walking through the other door to arrive at a space that was not the marvelous-looking underground world anymore.

  Zhong Yue measured the surroundings — the sky was round and the earth was flat. It was as if he was placed in an upended pot. On the ground was a quadrangle altar that was around a thousand feet long and the sky was also a thousand feet high.

  Around the altar was a vast expanse of space, Zhong Yue lowered his sights and looked down. Beneath the altar was a gigantic big round ball, one that was fully engraved with totem patterns, and there was a transparent tube that linked the two together.

  While below the big ball, was a huge and grandiloquent dome that resembled the sky itself. A dome that was purely formed by the god-level totem patterns!

  Zhong Yue looked further down, through the transparent dome, and vaguely he could vaguely see the scenery beneath it.

  “DEVIL SOUL FORBIDDEN LAND!”

  His heart thumped in shock, there was another Devil Soul Forbidden Land beneath the dome. It had the same layout as the one underneath Swords Gate — a huge thumping heart, with thick and sturdy blood vessels extending in all directions, amidst a graveyard of black coffins each towering thousands of feet high from underground!

  The devil souls were slumbering in their coffins, from time to time, they would reveal their humongous white bones; while the bony white skeleton beast gods were crouching on the blood vessels, standing overwatch over the corpse demons.

  The corpse demons were toiling in their work, from afar, the scene resembled an ant colony shuttling back and forth.

  This was an integrated, complete Devil Soul Forbidden Land, the one in Swords Gate underground had its seals loosened, but this one, it was operating stably and steadily. Its seals were still in their peak condition!

  “Another tomb in the forbidden land!”

  Xin Huo gazed at it and questioned in puzzlement, “This is a sacrificial tomb, the one underneath Swords Gate is also another sacrificial tomb. The main tomb chamber surely wouldn’t be here, so where could it be located at? And who exactly is resting inside of it?”

  Zhong Yue was also scrutinizing the surroundings carefully, he said, “But this is different from the one in Swords Gate. The one underneath Swords Gate has a huge sword piercing down to the heart through the mountain, and because of that, the seals were loosened. But there is no such sword in this one.”

  There were so many unresolved questions in his heart. Who were all these sacrificial tombs buried for? What kind of existence was it whose death would warrant the sacrifice of so many gods?

  On this planet, how many more similar sacrificial tombs existed? Other than the Great Wilderness and the East Barren, were there any more of these?

  What are these fragmented devil souls of the gods searching for? Where were their spirits kept? What treasure was it that the monster god Ming King was tasked to guard?

  Where did that huge sword that resides underground in the Swords Gate come from? And why is it piercing into the heart?

  Such questions were what caused his mind and also Xin Huo’s to turn in confusion. The little flame was bewildered unresigned at not knowing what had happened in the period of time was in slumber.

  What was the ball on top of the dome? The god-level totem carvings were connecting the dome with the ball, and it seemed like the ball was the core of the array formation that sustained the dome. And there was a transparent tube that connected the ball and the altar. It seemed like it was transporting something.

  Behind Zhong Yue was the teleportation portal door that was facing right at the altar. He was supposed to be in the underground of the Black Mountain, but now as he looked around, there was not a single granule of soil or stone, nor were there any lava or magma — this did not look like the underground but more of an independent space of its own!

  The altar was tall and high, obstructing his sight from reaching to what’s on it.

  I suppose there should also be an altar like this underground of Swords Gate? But how is it that until now, there is still no one who has discovered it? Oh yes … this should be a created space established independently of the rest of the world. I was only able to reach here through the teleportation portal. And as far as of now, no one in Swords Gate has ever discovered the altar teleportation array formation in the underground. It’d be impossible to find this place just by scanning for it with psyche!

  Zhong Yue looked carefully at the big round ball below, its surface was fully engraved with totem carv
ings, profound and abstruse, he could not understand a thing at all.

  The totem carvings were dense and concentrated, sealing the whole ball, but his eyes could still vaguely perceived that there were something lurking in the ball.

  Zhong Yue squinted his eyes and focus his sights at it. Suddenly, from the totem patterns on the ball surface, a very narrow and thin slit cracked open, giving him the chance to take a glimpse at the tip of the iceberg of secrets within the ball!

  Zhong Yue exclaimed in shock, the hair all over his body bristled up, and he nearly lost his balance to almost fall onto the ground.

  It was only a glimpse he had, but yet with it, he saw countless enormous gods and demons contained within the big round ball!

  The gods and demons, their bodies were mutilated as if they were tormented through endless pain, their countenances ferocious but also contorted in that pain. Tiny streams of essence leaked out from their bodies, following the tracks of the transparent tube to ultimately flow into the altar!

  “It’s the spirits!”

  Xin Huo saw it as well, despite his vast array of knowledge, the scene he had just witnessed before his eyes still sent a chill down his spine. He shouted out involuntarily, “That ball, it confines the gods’ spirits! These gods that died as a sacrifice, their spirits were sealed in this big round ball!”

  Zhong Yue’s heart trembled, the gods he managed to glimpse were the spirits – countless god spirits that were gathered in the big round ball. The totem patterns on the big round ball were disintegrating their spirits, decomposing them into nutrients as sustenance for the altar!

  Sacrificing countless gods as obeisance to gather their spirits together ... just what is it that they are nurturing?

  Zhong Yue recollected his thoughts, inhaling a deep breath of air and striding forward onto the altar, It’s time to know what’s on the altar!

  He walked onto the stairs and gradually, he could see figures of the god statues — they were different from those he had seen before. The godly statues he picked up previously were all carrying an indomitable spirit, majestic and dignified. They could instill fear and awe into the lower-class beings.