Chapter 556 481: [Arranging Backup Plans, Long Time No See]

The war at the Eight Celestial Passes.

It was far more intense than the one at the Seven Days Pass.

Wu Dao had only just finished his first battle after entering the Eight Celestial Passes half a day ago when Mountain and Sea rallied its forces and launched another fierce assault.

This was highly unusual.

Hongyuan had suffered losses, but so had Mountain and Sea. Both sides needed time to recover.

But ever since Wu Dao entered the Eight Celestial Passes,

Mountain and Sea had become like a pack of rabid dogs.

They gave no quarter, no time to breathe.

They frantically attacked the All Heavens Pass Realm of the Eight Celestial Passes, seemingly determined not to stop until they broke through.

Wu Dao didn't think he was important enough to warrant this.

It wasn't just the Eight Celestial Passes.

The Nine Heavens Pass was receiving the same treatment.

The pressure on the Overlords and the All Heavens Lord was mounting daily, forcing them to continuously call in more Power from their home bases to reinforce the defenses.

'Is Mountain and Sea going for a final, decisive battle?'

Wu Dao could smell the ever-increasing Tribulation Qi in the escalating conflict, and the sense of urgency in his heart grew a few notches more severe.

It wasn't enough.

His current strength.

It was far from sufficient to scheme through the Great Tribulation, and his only escape route, a Dao Artifact, was nowhere in sight.

'There are some things I need to prepare for in advance.'

As the crisis loomed ever closer,

Wu Dao remained calm and began to set up a series of contingencies and preparations for the future.

On the tenth day after entering the Eight Celestial Passes,

the Wushi Incarnation was still fighting on the front lines.

Wu Dao's Main Body created more Emperor Realm Incarnations and sent them scattering into Shanhai Pass, where they silently headed toward the various forbidden zones of the All Heavens Pass.

His Incarnations below the Great Emperor realm,

on the other hand, left Shanhai Pass.

They seemed to be doing nothing, just wandering aimlessly and irregularly throughout the All Heavens.

In truth, everywhere they went,

he would leave a seed behind.

'The eyes where the Tribulation Qi of the All Heavens gathers, like those on the scale of the Burial Realm, possess a certain ability to interfere with and shield the Great Dao.'

'If the field is large enough,'

'perhaps it could achieve the effects of a Dao Artifact to some extent. However, Cultivators are most wary of Tribulation Qi eroding their own civilization, which is why the All Tribulation Masters did not choose to hide themselves in the eyes of tribulation.'

'But for me,'

'there's no difference between Tribulation Qi and non-Tribulation Qi.'

Having come to this realization,

Wu Dao took out a trump card he had obtained long ago and personally made a trip to Hongyuan.

After finishing his preparations,

he severed this piece of memory.

He completely forgot about it.

After that,

Wu Dao set up another series of contingencies. His Incarnations roamed the forbidden zones of the tribulation eyes in the All Heavens, and even the endless, infinite Sea of Chaos.

This was to ensure that if he failed in the future,

he would still have a chance to turn the tables and start over.

He who takes no thought for the distant future will find sorrow near at hand.

He had never been one to charge in recklessly with the thought that if he couldn't win, he might as well die.

In his past life, if his path forward hadn't been cut off,

if he hadn't been trapped in a cage with absolutely no hope for the future,

he wouldn't have taken such a desperate risk.

'Hm? What is this!'

Half a month after entering the Eight Celestial Passes,

one of Wu Dao's Incarnations wandering the All Heavens was in the Border Wilderness of the Profound Yellow World when it suddenly sensed a long-lost, familiar aura in the Magnetic Field!

Puzzled,

he immediately rushed toward that region without any hesitation.

...

「Profound Yellow Celestial Domain」

Immortal Dynasties contended for supremacy, and national destinies clashed.

Throughout history, the great figures of Profound Yellow had come one after another, brilliantly illuminating the long sky of history. They schemed for their nations and the world, fought for destiny and the Great Dao, never ceasing.

Even in the Border Wilderness of the Celestial Domain's borderlands—

a backward area where not even the Saint Realm existed—countless kingdoms still fought endlessly for supremacy over destiny.

Recently, however,

things hadn't been going well in the barren borderlands of the Profound Yellow Celestial Domain. From time to time, they would suffer bloody massacres at the hands of the Dragon Hunting Tower and the Human World.

That's right.

Those two bastards.

Although they had been beaten so badly by the Primordial Sect that they no longer dared to compete with them for spoils, and their main forces had retreated into Shanhai Pass,

they had still left a small contingent behind.

In the Border Wilderness of the All Heavens Border Wilderness,

they engaged in petty theft, scavenging the trash that the Primordial Sect looked down upon.

It really proved the old saying:

The more glorious you once were, the more wretched you become.

Having fallen to such a wretched state,

Wu Dao couldn't be bothered with this bunch of beggars.

They were already eating trash. You couldn't very well go and steal their trash, could you? A man has to have some conscience.

However, just because the Primordial Sect didn't care,

didn't mean the All Heavens didn't.

The Zuyuan Alliance had been established for a long time, but because the Primordial Sect was too formidable, the alliance had never achieved any notable results, enjoying resources and privileges for nothing.

So...

if they couldn't deal with the Primordial Sect,

couldn't they at least deal with you two bastards?

The Human World and the Dragon Hunting Tower, reduced to eating trash, became the perfect scapegoats for the Zuyuan Alliance to "kill the innocent to claim merit."

The Zuyuan Alliance knew they only dared to scavenge, so they often placed numerous spies in the garbage dumps of the All Heavens.

The moment they saw the Dragon Hunting Tower and the Human World sneaking out, they would immediately charge in, beat them down, and hunt them. After killing them, they would label them as Primordial Sect members, counting it as a meritorious achievement.

After all, these factions

were all guilty of the same unscrupulous deeds.

Every last one of them deserved to die. No one would cry foul for the Human World or the Dragon Hunting Tower, or investigate the convoluted details.

The Dragon Hunting Tower and the Human World were furious.

'Damn you, Primordial Sect!'

'You get to feast on delicacies and run rampant,'

'while we have to eat trash, take the blame, and be your punching bags, getting beaten down by the All Heavens every day!'

'Are you even human?!'

In their extreme anger,

the Human World and the Dragon Hunting Tower continued to be angry, then continued to eat trash, and continued to be the scapegoats, punching bags, and victims.

For instance, right now...

BOOM!!

A Venerable World exploded!

A violent light of rules and order flashed across the surrounding world cluster. A battered group of Dragon Hunters fled from the shattered space-time, escaping farther away without looking back.

Behind them,

another group of elite Great Venerables wearing the standard Daoist Robes of the Zuyuan Alliance charged out, chasing them relentlessly like maggots clinging to bone.

"Primordial Sect spawn, surrender and face justice!"

At the same time,

the men from the Zuyuan Alliance were still roaring in anger, their shouts shaking the world clusters along the way, informing everyone that they were hunting down the Primordial Sect.

"We are...!"

A Venerable at the very back of the Dragon Hunter group was so angry his face turned green.

BOOM!

But he was given no chance to explain.

Another Zuyuan team lying in ambush up ahead charged out and instantly blasted him into tribulation ash.

"Fuck it, let's fight them to the death!"

Among the Dragon Hunters at the front,

a savage, bloodthirsty voice cried out.

A Great Venerable with red hair and red eyes, his face as ferocious as Purgatory King Yama, couldn't stand this injustice. An aura of Hell rolled off his body.

"Don't be reckless!"

A few people at the front turned and shouted at him.

The leader's face was grim. He continuously threw out various escape-type Supreme Treasures, leading the group to break out of the encirclement once again.

However...

CLANG!

Amidst a deafening sound like a great bell,

the group of Dragon Hunters were jolted back from space-time, stumbling out in a sorry state. They found that they had, at some point, fallen into a Space-Time Array.

It was as solid as a Divine Wall, and as scorching as a furnace.

It seemed designed to refine them to death within it!

"Run, why don't you? Keep running!"

Outside the space-time furnace,

a Zuyuan Alliance Quasi-Emperor with eyes like a hawk's emerged from the hidden void, staring with utter disgust at the immobilized Dragon Hunters inside.

This group of Dragon Hunters,

though a bit strange—

their realms and strengths didn't match—

the difference between a Great Venerable and a Quasi-Emperor was like heaven and earth.

No matter how heaven-defying they were, they couldn't hope to escape from his grasp.

"Heh, a Faith Channel?"

Suddenly,

the Zuyuan Alliance Quasi-Emperor noticed a Great Venerable inside the furnace trying to open a Faith Channel. He sneered, and with a turn of the Divine Fire Furnace, he erased the channel completely.

To deal with the Human World and the Dragon Hunting Tower,

as well as the Primordial Sect,

the Zuyuan Alliance had equipped its members with many good things. This Divine Fire Heaven-Sealing Furnace was specifically designed to seal space-time and Faith Channels.

'Our great vengeance is yet to be had, and yet we are to be executed here?'

The portly leader of the Dragon Hunters sighed, his expression bleak and unwilling. The others also clenched their fists tightly.

A blood feud, a hidden identity.

They had spent every day in endless torment, all for the hope that one day they could stand tall and proud before their former enemies.

To return everything they had once suffered.

For this,

they dared not slack off in the slightest.

Even while lurking in the darkness, they constantly improved themselves in the cracks, reaching a realm in just a few short years that they would have never dared to dream of before.

Unfortunately...

it was a matter of fate and circumstance.

Even though they had been careful enough,

they were still targeted and captured by hunters. Against a Quasi-Emperor, no matter what tricks they pulled, there was no possibility of resistance.

If nothing unexpected happened,

today, their great dream would truly come to nothing.

'I wonder what heights that monster has reached by now?'

Utterly disheartened,

the leader of the Dragon Hunters once again recalled that sky-supporting figure who had stunned his entire life.

He was not the Celestial Treasure Master,

but he was greater than the Celestial Treasure Master.

Back then, in that Land of the End of the Dharma,

he had managed to reach a height unprecedented in the All Heavens.

Having come to a stage as grand as Hongyuan, he was a dragon roaming the world, a swan returning to the heavens!

'We, who are so far inferior to him,'

'are about to step into the Quasi-Emperor realm in such a short time.'

'As long as that illogical monster is not dead, he will surely leave us far behind again, becoming unparalleled in this generation once more.'

'I wonder,'

'if that target of our speculation from a few years ago...'

'...could really be him.'

"Who's there?!"

A terrified roar, fierce on the outside but cowardly on the inside,

rang out without warning.

It interrupted the lead Dragon Hunter's complex, final thoughts. But since he was suppressed, he couldn't know what was happening outside.

BZZZT—

All of existence seemed to tremble for an instant.

In that briefest of moments,

the portly leader of the Dragon Hunters felt the Divine Fire Furnace suppressing them vanish silently, like a stain being wiped from a piece of paper.

The previous roars,

everyone who had surrounded and tried to kill them,

also seemed to have suddenly evaporated from the face of the earth. A deathly silence replaced the earlier clamor.

BZZZT!

Before the Dragon Hunters could even be shocked,

the trembling occurred again.

This cluster of worlds instantly turned to nothingness.

His everything—body, soul, thoughts, consciousness, macro and micro Magnetic Fields—was frozen in time. The surrounding space-time had its pause button pressed.

In the silent, empty darkness,

Wu Dao slowly walked out. He looked down at the perfectly still space-time and the group of Dragon Hunters within it, then accessed their thoughts and consciousness.

In less than the span of a thought,

with a slight shift in his gaze, Wu Dao caused the Life Magnetic Fields of more than a dozen Dragon Hunters to dissipate into nothingness, leaving only the last five old acquaintances.

He confirmed their Magnetic Field information.

They weren't fakes.

The only difference

was that, aside from the portly Dragon Hunter in the lead, the others seemed somewhat similar yet not quite the same.

BZZZT—

Sensing a Great Emperor descending in a distant universe, Wu Dao waved his hand and disappeared into the distance, taking the five people trapped in 'time stasis' with him.

WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH—

In an unknown corner of the vast Sea of Chaos,

Wu Dao released the space he held in his hand, deactivating the static space-time field around the five. Their macro and micro Particles became active once again.

Their thoughts and consciousness

picked up right where they left off in the previous moment of terror.

But when they realized they were in the Sea of Chaos and not in mortal danger, the group quickly calmed down.

"Thank you, Great Emperor, for saving our lives."

The portly Dragon Hunter didn't understand

why anyone would save them, given the Dragon Hunting Tower's reputation, but he still respectfully thanked the mysterious figure before him, whose information he could not perceive.

'To instantly erase a Quasi-Emperor,'

'and bring us to the Sea of Chaos...'

'Such methods...'

'...are only possible for a Great Emperor.'

"Heh..."

Wu Dao looked at the familiar strangers before him, feeling a little emotional. He then removed the cognitive-obstructing field and smiled at King Bao Tong, Prince Nanyang, and the others.

"Long time no see. You've become strangers."