Chapter 1851: Sneak Attack
The announcement that the Progenitor of Secret Arts had betrayed humanity caused the Sixth Mainland to descend into chaos. The Daosource Sect began to thoroughly investigate people from the Progenitor of Secret Arts’ Territory, and Bu Kong’s betrayal was also brought to light.
At the same time, the Fifth Mainland did not remain idle. They needed to immediately respond to the Progenitor of Secret Arts’ betrayal, as he had betrayed all of humanity, not merely the Sixth Mainland.
The overseers’ council had to hold an emergency meeting, and Lu Yin received a message from Arch-Elder Zen to partic.i.p.ate in the emergency council meeting.
The Hall of Honor could not get involved in anything related to the Sixth Mainland’s Progenitor of Secret Arts, but those in the Outerverse who were loyal to the Progenitor all needed to be strictly investigated. Even more importantly, the Seven SkyG.o.ds had failed in their attack on Burial Garden. With the sole exception of Whiteless G.o.d, all of the SkyG.o.ds were dead for the moment. Arch-Elder Zen’s intention when calling for the emergency council meeting was to have the overseers call upon the entire Fifth Mainland to attack the Neohuman Alliance.
The Hall of Honor had already located many of the Neohuman Alliance’s strongholds. Most of the SkyG.o.ds were dead at the moment, and Whiteless G.o.d alone would not be able to accomplish too much. The Neohuman Alliance needed to be culled as much and as quickly as possible.
There were numerous things that needed to be dealt with, and Lu Yin’s gadget received countless messages. By the time he looked up, Tong Yu had already disappeared.
A ma.s.sive amount of information had been sent to Lu Yin, but he had long since mentally prepared himself. Many suspicions had formed in his mind after he learned that Bu Kong had taken on the ident.i.ty of Yang Kong.
Even though the Progenitor of Secret Arts"s betrayal was a shocking event, Lu Yin had not found it unbelievable. He had already known that Bu Kong was not dead, and it was not much of a stretch from there to guess that the Progenitor of Secret Arts" attack on Aeternus Nation was nothing more than a farce. Fortunately, some form of Progenitor Chen’s strength had been inside Burial Garden, or else the place would have been destroyed and all of the inheritances that it held would have been lost forever.
Burial Garden was currently sealed, but that did not mean that it was impossible for it to open once again in the future. Still, no one knew what had happened to the unfortunate ones who had been trapped within Burial Garden.
Lu Yin activated his gadget, and the display almost instantly showed all of the other overseers. Arch-Elder Zen had called for the council to convene immediately, and given the current situation, Lu Yin did not dare slack off.
In a rare show of unity, there was no dissent during the overseers’ meeting. All of them were in agreement on what needed to be done. The Sixth Mainland needed to be contacted, and people needed to be sent out to keep an eye on the black hole that protected the Fifth Mainland. At the same time, the Neohuman Alliance’s various strongholds were revealed to the universe, and they all needed to be eradicated as soon as possible.
The council sent out numerous edicts as fast as possible.
At the same time, the Sixth Mainland’s Daosource Sect showed a similarly quick reaction in the Outerverse. The three Semi-Progenitors who had been hidden within the Daosource Sect all moved out, and every cultivator from the Progenitor of Secret Arts’ Territory was ordered to stay put. A cursory glance would see chaos reigning over the entire Fifth Mainland, but there was an order to this chaos.
After only a few days, many of the Neohuman Alliance’s bases had been destroyed. The Hall of Honor had already known about all of these places, but they had left untouched due to fear of retaliation from the Seven SkyG.o.ds. At this time, the Hall of Honor could act boldly.
In Gaia"s Swamp, Lu Yin and the Warden sat across from each other.
The Warden was so enormous that Lu Yin could not even see the colossal giant’s head. In fact, all Lu Yin could see were the Warden’s toes.
Next to Lu Yin was a jug, but it was similarly ma.s.sive and looked more like a house.
There was a bang as another jug slammed into the ground. The Warden let out a long breath. "So, you weren’t the one who planned the Second Nightking"s prison break?"
Lu Yin replied, "Of course not! At best, I simply harvested from someone else’s labor, but you can’t blame me for that. I even warned you about the escape attempt before anything happened."
This was something that the Warden did not want to hear, as Lu Yin had indeed given the Warden fair warning before the riot started, and Lu Yin had even been quite clear on who was involved in the scheme. The Warden really could not blame Lu Yin for what had happened, and he could only blame himself for not being powerful enough to stop the prisoners from escaping.
The more the Warden thought about this, the worse he felt. He hefted the jug of liquor and downed a ma.s.sive gulp. Lu Yin had no idea if it was intentional or not, but when the Warden drank, a great deal of the liquor spilled and fell onto the floor of the castle. As the alcohol rained down, each drop was large enough to drown Lu Yin.
He pursed his lips and simply forced the rain of liquor aside. "Where"s Lǜ Cha? Is she not coming back?"
The Warden slammed the jug back onto the floor. "The Specter clan attacked and killed Lǜ Yan because he told you about the location of the Neohuman Alliance’s Innerverse headquarters. Thanks to you, that woman nearly killed me."
Lu Yin coughed. "That can’t be blamed on me, as I have a duty to eliminate the Neohuman Alliance."
The Warden was still upset, and he took another drink.
Lu Yin felt no remorse for his actions, but he did wonder if the Warden would be able to hold himself back if he learned that he had slept for so long because of Lu Yin.
"Why did you come back here? There should be nothing in Gaia’s Swamp that can interest you, and Lǜ Cha won"t be coming back," the Warden grumpily demanded.
Lu Yin replied, "I came here to absorb some death energy."
He made no attempt to conceal this fact.
The Warden was stunned. If anyone else had said this, they would have been captured and locked up long ago, but there was no way that the Warden could move against Lu Yin for such behavior. He had already been investigated by the Interstellar Supreme Court, and it had been determined that Lu Yin could absorb death energy without negative consequences.
"If you don’t have anything else to do here, then just leave. Catastrophe always seems to strike whenever you visit me." The Warden was still quite upset.
Lu Yin politely excused himself and left. He had no more time to waste at Gaia"s Swamp. It was important for the Great Eastern Alliance to partic.i.p.ate in exterminating the Neohuman Alliance’s bases, and there was also all the items that had been stole- no, the items that had been purchased from the people who had emerged from Burial Garden through the exits in the Great Eastern Alliance’s territory. Lu Yin was certain that there was some good stuff to be found.
Only a few days had pa.s.sed, and yet many of the Neohuman Alliance’s strongholds had been wiped out. Both the Fifth and Sixth Mainland had been bold in their actions.
As far as Arch-Elder Zen and the others were concerned, Whiteless G.o.d was the only one of the Seven SkyG.o.ds left, and that meant that there was essentially no threat.
However, all of them had underestimated Whiteless G.o.d. After all, Whiteless G.o.d was the only one of the SkyG.o.ds to have access to Aeterna, the Neohuman Alliance’s list of human traitors.
…
The Fifth Mainland had pulled out of the Outerverse’s Ironblood Weave because of Lu Yin’s plan. The Sixth Mainland had subsequently sent people to protect the weave and stop the Astral Beast Domain from invading the Outerverse. Fortunately, they had promptly sent out someone to replace the false Ancestor Autumnfrost; without that precaution, the Astral Beast Domain would have already invaded the Outerverse.
Ancestor Autumnfrost had been replaced by an Imprinter by the name of Qiu Xu. While he was not a World Imprinter, he was right at the cusp of becoming one, and he had managed to block the a.s.sault of an astral beast with a power level of more than 800,000 that the Celestial Demon Empire had sent to Ironblood Weave.
Recently, Cemetery Keeper had also arrived in Ironblood Weave, and he had become the most powerful expert in the entire weave. Qiu Xu had joined forces with Cemetery Keeper, and the two of them had almost managed to force the Astral Beast Domain out of Ironblood Weave.
The Sixth Mainland was not the same as the Fifth Mainland’s Human Domain. The Sixth Mainland had more experts and more resources, and they were also innately able to suppress cultivators from the Fifth Mainland.
Countless astral beasts fought against people from the Sixth Mainland in outer s.p.a.ce. Bloodstained planets and uncountable corpses floated about. Ironblood Weave’s fortresses had all been destroyed.
The fortresses had once been important barriers that allowed the Fifth Mainland to block the astral beasts’ invasion, but the Sixth Mainland did not bother to rebuild them. Their goal was to force their way into the Primal Zone and launch an invasion on the Astral Beast Domain instead of remaining on the defensive.
Cemetery Keeper was calmly standing tall in s.p.a.ce. There was a corpse on his back.
No one nearby dared to approach the man, as his battlefield was one for those with the strength of a World Imprinter. Cemetery Keeper was actually engaged in a fierce battle with an astral beast that looked like a praying mantis, though a greatly enlarged one. It was astoundingly fast, and Qiu Xu had already been injured by the creature. If Cemetery Keeper had not stepped forward, Qiu Xu would have already died.
There was a boom, but the corpse on Cemetery Keeper’s back blocked an attack from the right side. The astral beast slashed at the corpse with an invisible attack, and it continued traveling past the corpse, slicing everything that it touched to pieces.
This attack already surpa.s.sed a power level of 800,000, and yet it could not destroy the corpse.
Cemetery Keeper moved forward, and one corpse after another suddenly began to appear. One of them was suddenly struck by something. Cemetery Keeper instantly switched places with that corpse and lashed out with a palm strike. A black palm print twisted the void as it shot out and struck the head of the astral beast that looked like a praying mantis.
This single palm strike managed to beat the creature back, and its wings cracked. "What an interesting creature."
Cemetery Keeper’s eyes snapped open, and he stepped forward again. He continuously switched places with the numerous corpses that were sprinkled throughout this region of s.p.a.ce.
The astral beast wanted to dice the corpses to bits, but doing so was too difficult. Each corpse was incredibly tough, and they could even be compared to power vessels.
Before long, the astral beast disappeared, and Cemetery Keeper started to collect his corpses that had been scattered across outer s.p.a.ce. The Sixth Mainland had won this battle as well, and it would not be long before they forced their way into the Primal Zone.
Qiu Xu appeared behind Cemetery Keeper. The Imprinter’s face was a bit pale. "We’re not far from the Primal Zone. We should gather our strength and push forward!"
Cemetery Keeper replied in a cold voice, "The Celestial Beast Empire is not an easy opponent. If not, there is no way the Fifth Mainland’s Hall of Honor would have been content to remain on the defense and not press their own a.s.sault."
"The Fifth Mainland can’t compare to our Sixth Mainland at all." Qiu Xu contemptuously spat out as he stood beside Cemetery Keeper, who frowned. He was not accustomed to having living beings so close to him, though fortunately, there was half a meter between the two men. "The Progenitor of Secret Arts betrayed humanity, and there is a Neohuman Alliance fortress rather close to Ironblood Weave. Go wipe it out."
Qiu Xu agreed, "No problem."
He then turned around to leave, but then he suddenly swung a hand to attack Cemetery Keeper. Cemetery Keeper was startled, and he reflexively raised his own hand and released a Dead Man"s Palm.
Boom!
The noise was loud enough to cause the void to tremble, and many cultivators looked over.
The Dead Man’s Palm blew Qiu Xu away, and the black energy from the attack entered the Imprinter’s body. His skin was quickly riddled with dark spots of corrosion.
Cemetery Keeper glared at the man with cold eyes. "What are you planning?"
Qiu Xu spat out blood, but he still sneered. "Cemetery Keeper, you"re dead!"
The man then forced his injured body to move, and he fled Ironblood Weave.
Cemetery Keeper was about to give chase, but his expression suddenly and drastically changed. There was something very wrong, and he quickly realized that he had been poisoned! His body began to quickly age. He pulled out numerous corpses to protect him, and the area became completely filled with corpses.
One of the corpses suddenly aged and started to decay. It was eventually reduced to nothing more than dust, and another corpse quickly followed suit. Cemetery Keeper gritted his teeth. "Everyone from Justice Manor, bring out your full corpse inventory!"
Corpses began to appear everywhere in s.p.a.ce. There were thousands of them, and their numbers only rose. However, the more that appeared, the more that became dust. As this happened, the cultivators from Justice Manor quickly refined the fresh corpses in s.p.a.ce into their corpse puppets. The process was slow, but it was the only way that they could maintain their inventory of corpses.
In a blink of an eye, thousands of corpses had been reduced to dust, and Cemetery Keeper’s hair had turned white. A crazed look appeared in his eyes. Just what poison could be this terrifying? He was not even able to transfer it!
When people from Justice Manor refined corpses, the corpses were basically an extension of the cultivator’s body. It was common knowledge in the Sixth Mainland that there was no point in trying to poison people from Justice Manor, as they could transfer even the most toxic venom to one of their corpse puppets.
The corpse puppets were extensions of their bodies, so it was usually a simple matter to transfer poison into a corpse. This process should have been even easier for someone like Cemetery Keeper, as he was a powerhouse at the cusp of becoming a Cosmic Imprinter.