by Translator: BornToBe; Author: Ordinary Magician (平凡魔术师); Licensed From: 17k
The Eastern Wasteland Bell disappeared. Huo Long had also disappeared. Everything had disappeared. The world returned to normal, as if everything that had just happened had just been an illusion.
Long Chen shook his head, only now recovering from his shock. He finally understood just how terrifying the Eastern Wasteland Bell was.
It was in a broken, half-dead state, but it was able to subdue this terrifying Earth Flame, seemingly without expending any effort.
He gulped. This was a legendary divine item. It was truly powerful. If it was at its peak, wouldn’t it be powerful enough to destroy the entire world?
But such a terrifying existence had ended up in such a miserable situation. Just what secrets were hiding behind this? Long Chen couldn’t ask, as even if he did, the Eastern Wasteland Bell wouldn’t answer.
“It has devoured the Blood Incinerating Lion Flame and descended into slumber. It will take a while for it to absorb all that energy; after all, the Blood Incinerating Lion Flame is many times stronger than it. On the other hand, if you had allowed the Blood Incinerating Lion Flame to devour it, not only would its battle power have rapidly increased, but it would have been able to fight very quickly. Ah, old people really talk a lot!” The Eastern Wasteland Bell suddenly mocked itself.
“Many thanks for your good intentions, senior. I’m just too stupid and obstinate. I can only live like this for the rest of my life,” laughed Long Chen, comforting the Eastern Wasteland Bell. Although he hadn’t listened to it, he still accepted its intentions.
“Fine, although I find this character of yours a bit inconceivable, it seems this kind of a character makes it easier for you to win other people’s trust. It’s not necessarily a bad thing. Let’s go; this Blood Incinerating Lion Flame was your greatest gain here, and once Huo Long awakens, you’ll get a pleasant surprise,” said the Eastern Wasteland Bell.
Long Chen nodded. He truly had gained a great deal. In fact, he even felt like his own luck wasn’t that bad.
The Earth Flame had released a wave of flame energy every now and then from here. His guess was that the mother dragon had been too weak while incubating eggs, but she had forcibly absorbed the flame energy to cultivate. After all, that flame energy only came every now and then, so it was very precious to the Earth Dragons. But in her weakened state, the encroachment of the flame energy must have disrupted her aura, shattering her Neidan and causing her to die.
Once he returned atop the mountain, Long Chen suddenly saw a group of people around the Earth Dragon’s corpse. He frowned and quickly rushed over.
Chapter 851 The Origin of the Ancient Races
“Stop! This Magical Beast’s corpse was found by our Wind Leopard race! If you’re smart, you’ll immediately scram!” shouted someone upon seeing Long Chen come. These people were extremely tall, while their ears and noses were similar to a leopard.
Long Chen actually did know about the Wind Leopard race. They had been at the same entrance as him. Ouyang Qiuyu had introduced them to him.
“Laughable. You found it, so it’s yours? Then I say that the Immemorial Path was found by me. So according to you, the Immemorial Path is mine?” sneered Long Chen. Just looking at their arrogant manner irritated him.
These ancient races felt themselves to be above the human race. In truth, Long Chen also looked down on them, because they were actually the descendants of humans mating with beasts.
They possessed the human race’s blood, but they also possessed the blood of ancient beasts. The strength of their physical bodies was many times stronger than an ordinary human cultivator due to that influence, giving them a large advantage.
There were some ancient beasts who possessed pure bloodlines. They were not called Magical Beasts. Instead, they called themselves Xuan Beasts, and they were able to transform into a full human form.
In ancient times, there had been a period of peace when human experts had intermarried with Xuan Beasts, birthing children that had inherited a portion of both their strengths.
Later, for some unknown reason, there had been an immense battle between the Xuan Beasts and the human cultivators. Their relationships had also fractured.
That caused an awkward consequence. The descendants of the two sides had ended up being abandoned. Neither side accepted them.
Then for some other unknown reason, the Xuan Beasts had declined. Many of them had disappeared. As for the human race, they had also been greatly weakened. The ones possessing both their bloodlines ended up becoming the greatest force back then. They had called themselves the ancient races. It was said that they had led the Martial Heaven Continent for quite a long time.
Ouyang Qiuyu guessed that the only reason that had occurred was because an immense war had been fought between the humans and the Xuan Beasts. Their inheritances were severed as their elites fell. As for the ancient races, they had become the greatest benefactors.
Later, the human race had finally erupted after being suppressed by the ancient races for too long. An intense war was fought. During that prolonged war, the human race gave birth to several shocking experts, allowing them to suppress the ancient races.
In the end, the ancient races had no choice but to compromise. The two sides formed an agreement, saying neither side would attack the other. As a result, the battle between the human race and the ancient races had only just ended when the human race’s interior fragmented again.
Back then, a portion of the human race had said that they should destroy the ancient races while they could. They wanted to pull them up by the roots and make them completely extinct.
There was another portion who thought there was no need to slaughter them all. Even if they won and the ancient races were exterminated, it would cost them dearly. And after all, they still possessed a blood connection.
As a result, the disharmony in the human race grew more and more. In the end, weapons had been raised. They had met on the battlefield. One side felt that the other was being excessively merciful. They were leaving behind a disaster for their descendants that would sooner or later erupt. The other side felt that their opponents were too cruel. The ancient races weren’t Magical Beasts. Even if they couldn’t be treated as humans, they couldn’t be treated as beasts.
After all, the ancient races’ numbers had been enormous back then, and their appearance was similar to humans. They had women and children. How could they bring down the butcher’s knife on them? Why not give them a chance so that there could be peace?
In their fury, the experts who had proposed slaughtering them directly left the human race’s army and began a slaughter of the ancient races on their own. Their numbers were too low, and so they were unable to face the ancient race’s army head-on. The only thing they could do was target their weaker members.
Those weaker members were the ancient race’s women and children. An enormous number of them were slaughtered by those human experts. They were extremely vicious, and any member of the ancient races would be slaughtered. They said that enemies were enemies, and they wouldn’t give them time to grow.
Their actions infuriated the ancient races and the human race. Both sides joined together to handle them. As a result, through numbers and power, those vicious human experts suffered defeat after defeat.
Just as they were about to be exterminated, a heaven-shaking reversal occurred. Back then, the void had been ripped apart. A black figure had appeared in the sky and saved those people.
Those people swore that they would make the foolish human race pay a price for their actions. As a result, they formed the Corrupt path. As for the black figure that had saved them, it became their Corrupt God.
After a brief moment of peace, once the Corrupt path had rested and restored their power, they began to launch attacks against the Righteous path.
The Corrupt path had suddenly gained extremely terrifying cultivation techniques that increased their power through slaughter. Their cultivation speed was horrifyingly fast.
The Righteou
s path attacked back, but the Corrupt path fought guerilla warfare. After killing everyone in one place, they would disappear.
The Righteous path suddenly realized, they weren’t just killing people; they were also capturing children. Without even thinking about it, they knew they were raising them to be their new experts.
At that time, the Righteous path had realized that the situation wasn’t good. Continuing like this wasn’t a solution. They had to think of a way to stop the Corrupt path. But the Corrupt path was like the wind, and their lair was hidden.
Due to this, the Righteous path asked the ancient races for help. The ancient races had quite a few experts that had inherited divine abilities from the Xuan Beasts. They could assist the Righteous path in finding the Corrupt path’s lair, and then they could work together to exterminate them.
But what infuriated the Righteous path was that the ancient races actually refused to help. Later, they realized the Corrupt path was only targeting the Righteous path. They didn’t attack the ancient races.
That enraged the Righteous path mightily. When the Corrupt path had slaughtered the ancient races, it was the Righteous path that had saved them. But now that the Corrupt path was targeting the Righteous path, they actually chose to be spectators.
The ancient races’ conduct was infuriating, but after so much time, they had recovered a great deal of their power.
The Righteous path couldn’t possibly wage a war against the ancient races while fighting the Corrupt path. Quite a few of them wished they really had exterminated the ancient races, but they were helpless about it.
The only thing that the Righteous path could do was fiercely increase their own strength. The fortunate thing was that the Righteous path had countless experts on their side. They established more sects and recruited more disciples, doing their best to raise them.
It went without saying that the Righteous path’s numbers were many, many times that of the Corrupt path. Now that the Righteous path went all-out against the Corrupt path, the Corrupt path immediately suffered a grave blow. Their experts were cut down in droves, and they vanished without a trace.
A few millennia after they vanished, the Righteous experts thought that the Corrupt path had already collapsed from the grave injury they had been dealt. As a result, they had once more begun their melodramatic storyline: internal strife.
Thousands of sects began to get arrogant, refusing to submit to anyone. They crazily expanded their territory, snatching resources and fighting against other powers.
Therefore, just as they were fighting amongst themselves, the Corrupt path suddenly invaded again. Through thousands of years of recovery, the Corrupt path had reached a terrifying level of power. With the Righteous path in their chaotic state, they were dealt a miserable blow by the Corrupt path.
But in the end, the Righteous path simply had too many experts. The Corrupt path had killed so many of their number, snatching all their resources, but they weren’t able to get a complete victory.
The Righteous path had finally awakened. They gathered their supreme powers, supervising them in battle and reconciling their differences. Any powers that refused to listen would be attacked by the rest of the Righteous path.
Although there were still many small struggles, the Righteous path had calmed down. Once the conflict grew to a certain level, powerful and mysterious existences would come out to stop them, mediating the conflict.
With the precedent of the ancient races, Pill Valley also took action. Originally, Pill Valley had been a power of the Righteous path. But then they gradually became independent. To get the greatest profit, they would do business with any side, Righteous or Corrupt.
When they announced their independence, it caused huge waves. Although countless Righteous experts had protested, Pill Valley had still continued with it.
At the same time, another sect suddenly also declared their independence: the Huayun Sect. They established the Huayun auction houses under their banner.
Because Pill Valley was too enormous and controlled the essential medicinal pills, the Righteous path could only accept their independence despite their protests. If they had continued protesting, then Pill Valley would refuse to sell them medicinal pills. But the Huayun sect was different. On the very day they declared their independence, they were beset by countless Righteous experts. A bloody battle had erupted, and the Huayun Sect’s core had been heavily damaged. The Righteous path refused to allow a second Pill Valley to appear.
But the Huayun Sect was tenacious. A few decades later, they once more appeared. As a result, they were once more destroyed. Then the cycle continued, but each time they reappeared, their power would be greater than before.
On the seventeenth time that they appeared, a truly heaven-shaking battle had been fought. Countless experts had fallen, but this time, the Huayun Sect remained standing. The Righteous path was finally afraid.
The Huayun Sect had far too much money. Each time they were destroyed, they would spend an exorbitant amount of money to invite new experts. In fact, they even hired runaways and criminals to use suicidal attacks.
It could be said that the Huayun Sect’s foundation was built through money and lives. Later, the Huayun Sect gradually spread throughout every inch of the Martial Heaven Continent. Any place that had alchemy guilds also had a Huayun auction house.
It was like the Huayun Sect was competing with Pill Valley. In the beginning, Pill Valley had disdained the Huayun Sect, but then it had developed at a shocking rate, making them speechless.
When Pill Valley finally wanted to suppress the Huayun Sect, they found that the Huayun Sect was already everywhere. Most importantly, the Huayun Sect also accepted poor people, and so their religious beliefs were easier for people to accept.
They believed in the Wealth God. They had billions of believers, because it was the Huayun Sect and their Wealth God that had saved them from poverty. It was because of the Huayun Sect that those poor people had managed to step onto the path of cultivation. Their devotion was almost frightening.
If they tried to suppress the Huayun Sect with brute force, they would immediately receive the unfearing attacks from the Huayun Sect’s billions of disciples. Just thinking about that was intimidating.
Therefore, the Huayun Sect had also formed. They along with Pill Valley and the ancient races were existences beyond the Righteous and Corrupt paths.
But although the ancient races announced that they were neutral, they felt a profound hatred for the human race, especially the Corrupt path. They still remembered when they ruled this world. But now they had to stand on the same level as the inferior human race. So they would often provoke the human race, as they always tolerated it. That made their arrogance greater and greater until they stopped giving a damn about the Righteous path’s people.
“Long Chen, if you still don’t scram, you’ll never be able to scram in this life,” said one of the Wind Leopard’s experts, killing intent surging out of his eyes.
Chapter 852 Once More Running Into Her
“This Earth Dragon was killed by me. If you don’t want to die, you’ll hurry up and fuck off.” Long Chen ignored his threat.
“What a joke. You can kill an eighth rank Magical Beast? If so, you would have long since proclaimed yourself the hegemon of the Immemorial Path. Since you want to die, I can only help you out.” The Wind Leopard’s experts refused to believe this Magical Beast was killed by Long Chen. That was simply impossible.
They were filled with killing intent. Their movements were as fast as lightning, and they all shot at Long Chen at the same time. Their fingers had steel-like claws growing out of them. Runes sparkled on them, and their sharpness was comparable to Treasure items. They immediately attacked together, aware that Long Chen was powerful due to what had happened right before the Immemorial Path had opened.
Long Chen snorted and slashed his broadsword. He found that after he had reached the twelfth Heavenstage, his spiritual yuan had grown by several tim
es. With his powerful spiritual yuan, it took him no time at all to use Split the Heavens. He could use it like it was an ordinary saber blow. A huge ray of sword-light slashed down on them.
BOOM! Those Wind Leopard experts’ expressions immediately changed. It was clearly a random blow from Long Chen, but it had locked all of them down. They hastily defended. But as a result, blood filled the air. Those claws that could compare to Treasure items were like rotting wood in front of Long Chen’s sword.
Only one person survived and fell back, vomiting blood with his arms disfigured. He was completely shocked and unwilling to believe this.
He was a rank three Celestial, and an innate one at that. There was no need to doubt his power. But he wasn’t even able to receive a single blow from Long Chen.
In truth, he really was powerful. If Long Chen wanted to defeat him, it would take some effort. Even if he didn’t summon the battle armor, he would at least need to summon the divine ring.
Regretfully, this guy had looked down on Long Chen too much. Seeing that it was just a random blow from him, he also hadn’t used his full power, thinking that it was just a testing move.
As a result, he lost out immensely. He was just about to summon his Cry of the Heavenly Daos, but Long Chen didn’t give him that chance.
Like a phantom, Long Chen appeared right in front of him. His sword pierced directly through this guy’s head.
The thunderforce on the broadsword directly destroyed his soul. He was killed instantly.
“If I didn’t kill the few of you, I wouldn’t have even been able to sense that I have gotten stronger.” Long Chen pulled out his broadsword and sighed emotionally. As soon as he had advanced to the twelfth Heavenstage, Little Snow had brought him to fight an Earth Dragon. The Earth Dragon was too terrifying and had completely suppressed him. To Long Chen, it felt like he hadn’t gotten any stronger at all. Now that he had killed an innate rank three Celestial in just two moves, he finally experienced his strength.