Chapter 392: Don’t Advance! Don’t Advance

Chapter 392 -284: Don’t Advance! Don’t Advance

Hu Lan’s message:

“Or her ancestors were outsiders!”

Tang Wen’s breath caught in his throat. ‘Outsider status is hereditary?’

Hu Lan had previously said, “The Huang Family cannot leave Ganshan City.”

‘Was this what she meant?’

‘But what’s the difference between an outsider and a local?’

‘Aren’t they all just people?’

…

Tang Wen’s thoughts were a tangled mess, and he couldn’t grasp the crux of the issue.

He decided to just keep reading:

“This is a very strange, illogical illness, or rather, a curse.”

‘A curse?’

“The major Fourth Grade Influences call it the ‘Earth Curse’.”

“The reason for the curse’s manifestation is baffling. Ancient texts record the saying, ‘The water and soil of a place can only nurture its own people.'”

“Many clans discovered that if a Martial Arts Clan with a long lineage were to move and live thousands of miles away, it wouldn’t be long before both they and their locally born descendants would often fall victim to the ‘Earth Curse’.”

“Speaking of which, you’ve probably guessed by now that this is why the Three Great Families of the Inner City cannot leave the sphere of influence of Ganshan City.”

“Likewise, the same goes for our White Tiger Tribe.”

“Ganshan City is already far enough for us.”

Tang Wen felt a sense of bewilderment.

‘The Earth Curse?’

‘And is that what “the water and soil of a place can only nurture its own people” is supposed to mean?’

He instinctively looked down at the ground beneath his feet.

‘This land beneath my feet… hmm, take the entire Northwest Land for example.’

‘Does the Northwest Land only nurture people of the Northwest?’

‘Does it refuse to nurture people from the east, south, and north?’

‘Not only does it not nurture them, it curses them?’

‘If that’s really the case, doesn’t that mean the land itself possesses its own will, or is even alive?’

‘No, to be precise, it’s that the “land” of each individual region has its own will.’

‘They can like certain people and dislike others.’

‘And they’re all very single-minded—they like the locals and hate the outsiders.’

‘They even hate the children born to outsiders.’

‘It feels like some kind of criminal syndicate fighting for territory and suppressing “outsiders.”‘

Tang Wen found it utterly absurd.

If the person explaining this wasn’t Hu Lan, he would have been certain they were spouting nonsense.

‘How could such a strange curse possibly exist?’

There were still many more messages from Hu Lan:

“Many families have expended immense energy, manpower, and resources to solve this problem.”

“First, how far is considered ‘foreign’ land? If you have children with a local, are you still considered an outsider? If so, what if your daughter-in-law is also a local? After a few generations, will this ‘curse’ disappear?”

Once people became aware of this problem, they continuously tried to solve it.

Tang Wen nodded to himself. ‘If I were to research it, I would also start with these two aspects.’

He could still understand an outsider being rejected upon arriving in a new place.

But for a child born and raised in that same place to also develop the illness after growing up was simply illogical.

‘Assuming there’s a “Will of the Earth” orchestrating all this, would it have to create countless clones to stare at every outsider household and compile their family trees?’

He shook his head, casting aside his wild thoughts, and continued reading.

“Many years later, everyone discovered that ‘far’ and ‘near’ don’t seem to be determined by distance. In other words, one might become an ‘outsider’ simply by moving to live thirty miles away, on the other side of a tall mountain.”

“The curse doesn’t manifest immediately.”

“Many cases have shown that the ‘Earth Curse’ only comes for ‘outsider Martial Artists’ when they break through a Martial Arts Realm in the new land—that is, from the Seventh Grade to the Sixth Grade, or from the Sixth Grade to the Fifth Grade.”

“The same applies to their descendants.”

“The reason I use the Seventh Grade as an example is because for descendants below the Seventh Grade, the symptom of heart pain is very mild and difficult to detect.”

“The competition to advance from the Eighth Grade to the Seventh Grade Extraordinary Realm is already fierce.”

“Because of this strange illness, many people lose all hope of ever breaking through to a higher Martial Arts Realm in their lifetime.”

Hu Lan’s explanation was very detailed.

The stronger they were, the more severe the pain!

This description matched Xia Qingge’s symptoms.

Furthermore, her explanation added a greater degree of logic to the situation.

Ordinary people practicing Martial Arts lacked famous teachers, resources, and Contemplation Methods.

Reaching the realm of a Martial Artist was already a one-in-a-hundred achievement.

Even if an outsider broke through to the Extraordinary Realm and their heart started to hurt, it would be dismissed as a coincidence.

The same was true for breaking through to the Sixth Grade.

Therefore, this symptom didn’t receive much attention at first.

It wasn’t until some powerful, well-established clans with long lineages began to migrate outwards.

Their clansmen and descendants began falling ill one after another.

Only then did the clans realize something was wrong.

With such a dense concentration of cases, they initially thought they had been poisoned.

Thus, they struck out in all directions, attacking potential enemies.

This once stirred up countless bloody storms.

As time passed, and as this symptom repeatedly appeared among the great migrating clans, people ruled out many causes. Countless people died, and an unknown number of families were destroyed. Finally, they were shocked to discover that migrating to a foreign land might be the main reason for the outbreak of this illness.

Tang Wen didn’t know the exact process of how the “Earth Curse” was confirmed.

But he could guess that it must have involved enduring countless storms and tribulations.

Only then could the ancestors of humanity determine the cause of the illness.

His gaze returned to the Unity Mirror.

When he saw the next line of text, Tang Wen was shocked once again.

“In the depths of the Ten Thousand Mountains where my race resides, there are multiple entrances to an underground world.”

“Every time a beast tide or a Demon disaster erupts…”

“…even with the might of the White Tiger Race, we suffer heavy losses.”

“In the past, we have even faced several crises that threatened our entire race with extinction.”

Tang Wen was dazed for a moment.

Suddenly, many things clicked into place!

For example, why did the White Tiger Tribe defend the perilous lands of the southern Ten Thousand Mountains to the death, never retreating?

Looking at the current geographical locations:

From the Silver Wolf Territory in the north to the Ten Thousand Mountains in the south.

In his eyes, both were barren lands.