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Woongg!!
The hologram started with Duan Li sitting cross-legged atop of what seems to be like a giant boulder atop of a mountain.
"Hmm?" the Emperor said as he seemed to notice something different about Duan Li on that hologram.
That Duan Li seemed to be much older as compared to the one standing down there!
What"s going on?
The image recording then zoomed outwards, revealing the boulder to actually be the remains of a colossal monster!
The Hermit King cla.s.s monster, Crastesauros!
At this point, the Emperor"s countenance turned serious as everyone else"s expression were dumbstrucked.
...
Woongg!!
The image recording played until the end finale, where the whole Tian continent and the world was engulfed in flames by the Sun Dragon as the hologram slowly dissipated.
Silence..
The Emperor, his Supreme Knight, Liu Sheng Juan and Duan Li"s party, all were showing complicated expression and emotion!
"I ask you, is this image recording real?" the Emperor turned to Duan Li as his voice grew extremely heavy and radiated out pressure that could make one sweat buckets.
"I dare not fabricate anything at all in front of your Majesty!" Duan Li replied swiftly.
"This is from what I"ve experience during my second trial.. Senior Teachers Ling Yu, w.a.n.g Guozhi and Ran Yang could testify this matter for me." Duan Li added as all three Senior Teachers nodded.
"As the one whom had supervised the Second trial personally myself, I bear witness that this image recording and everything that had transpired in it is 100 percent real and is no illusion." Ran Yang said with a solemn expression.
"We witnessed everything as well ourselves during that time and could testify that Senior Teacher Ran Yang is telling the truth." w.a.n.g Guozhi and Ling Yu added.
The Princ.i.p.al nodded, "I can vouch for them as well. Furthermore, as I practiced the Spatial arts skill, I could see that there were no image tempering within it at all. In addition, I was there during his First trial and beared witness to the awakening of the Yidara Millennium tree whom called himself as Ancestor Zong, about how he said that Duan Li was not bounded by the strings of fate and Ancestor Zong"s premonitions of the future that matches this image recording!" he said.
Hearing this, the Emperor went silent once again and then turned to Liu Sheng Juan.
"What do you think?"
Liu Sheng Juan shook his head.
"Honestly, for the first time, I find myself to be stumped as well."
"But from what I"ve seen so far, everything was devoid of lies and had only contained the truths.. your Majesty should realize this as well, as we cultivate the same optical arts under our master that enabled us to do just that." he answered.
In fact, even though he said it like that, Liu Sheng Juan himself were still trying to wrap everything around his head as well.
The image recording was definitely real, but to think that such an event would actually happen in the near future?!
Even Duan Li"s party couldn"t believe what they saw as their tumultuous emotions ran amok inside their mind.
Since Liu Sheng Juan, the only person whom could act so casually here and seemed to be trusted by the Emperor had said it like that, then the whole thing must be real then!
Silence..
"Let"s view it objectively then." Liu Sheng Juan spoke out after a while with a sigh.
"First, was that we found out that our Duan Li here would reach the legendary realm in the near future, the Immortal Ascension realm! This could be said as a very good news for our Jiu Empire, even the t.i.tan race seemed to fear him!"
When the Emperor heard this, he nodded in agreement.
"Indeed! To think that I could witness an Immortal Ascension realm expert and his heaven-defying means myself, no wonder they are called as the true immortals.. such battle prowess on that realm was nothing short of terrifying!"
"And I seemed to recall them calling him as the Supreme General as well. That"s the highest Commander rank in the military.. I guess that"s a fitting t.i.tle for the Strongest man that was feared even by the t.i.tans!" the Emperor"s expression finally lightened up a bit as he chuckled.
Both the Princ.i.p.al and Vice-Princ.i.p.al turned to look at Liu Sheng Juan from behind and couldn"t help but to shook their head while smiling at each other.
No matter how hateful the latter"s personality were, this was the kind of person Liu Sheng Juan was!
Even when the facts were laid bare in front of him that such a bleak future was waiting for them soon, he would not despair in the slightest and would only think of it as just another puzzle that he had to solve!
This was also how they were saved from the catastrophe few years back then which had almost overrun the entire Jiu Empire. It was a pity that despite Liu Sheng Juan"s best effort, they couldn"t save everyone and had to make some difficult choices.
Even Meng Yue, Duan Li"s mother, the rising star of the Empire back then, ended up in her current state..
Looking at Duan Li from the side emotionally, they each thought subconsciously within their minds;
"Does he know..?"
Liu Sheng Juan then continued speaking;
"Second, was that this event will happen roughly in 8 years from now on. Since we now already knew about this, we could mount some preparation as soon as possible. Most of the development plans would have to be changed however."
The Emperor cupped his chin as he pondered for a moment.
"Very well, we will have to overhaul some of our future plans in order to counter the supposedly impending doom for us. I refuse to believe that we will have the same tragic fate and that this revelation was brought to us for a reason!"
The Emperor stood up from his seat, his hands clenched into a pair of fists as he declared;
"The reason being is that we will survive this time!"
This one sentence of his was filled with immense power and determination behind it, rallying the hearts of anyone that had despaired back to hope!
Everyone nodded as their eyes now gleamed with powerful confidence in it!
Since we already knew this, we just have to change the outcome!
"Third, is that our master has long taught us both that in every action, there is always equal reaction as well. Therefore, since we are going to change the future, I a.s.sume that it would not be for free? Isn"t that right, Duan Li?" Liu Sheng Juan said as he turned to Duan Li.
What he mentioned was the thing called "Universal Balance". Since things were already predetermined, if they wanted to change it, those would definitely come at a cost!
"That"s right, I"ve consulted with Ancestor Zong about this, and he told me that there exists the "Artifacts of Time" for every changes made to the future!" Duan Li answered.
He then explained what the Artifacts of Time was to everyone.
...
"I see, so the reason why the upcoming monster stampede this time around was so ma.s.sive is because you have started to change the future.." the Emperor said as he pondered.
"In that case, we could only a.s.sume that, because we have come to know about the future and we now try to overcome it by approaching things differently, there would yet be some other form of retaliation from "Time" towards us later on." Liu Sheng Juan said and cupped his chin.
Various thoughts were sprung inside his mind as he finally came to a conclusion.
"In order to ensure that the ripple-effect from this does not spread too wide, it would be for the best that only us here knows about this. This helps to prevent ma.s.s panic and avoid unnecessary convoluted retaliation from "Time" which would be far too much for us to handle." he said.
"Furthermore, since the citizens would be following your Majesty"s direction without any question, we could actually prepare thoroughly without them having to know the exact reason why." he added.
"However your Majesty, what about the other Empire? If we reinforce and develop our military further, the others would sure come to notice this and might misunderstood our intention. Shouldn"t we also tell them this as they too were part of "that" future?"
The Emperor nodded.
"Indeed, they might misunderstand as to why we are bolstering our defences. But this in turn would make them prepare beforehand as well, thinking that another world war was about to start. But don"t worry, I will find the right moment to meet with the Emperors of respective Empires to tell them regarding this, so leave that to me." the Emperor replied.
He then turned towards Duan Li.
"Your worth now have overshoot far from my previous expectation. If I said before that you might be favored by the heavens on the first agenda, right now, I am starting to think that the heavens are watching over you and your actions closely instead."
"Every single individual has their own fate decided upon birth, and all of us now might have been fated to die 8 years later. But because of you, an existence that was not bounded by the strings of fate has appeared to reveal the secrets of the future to us, at this very moment, I feel that only you could somehow remold our wheels of fate away from tragedy!"
The Emperor said solemnly.
Fate, that was something akin to the secrets that should only be known by the heavens themselves, forever unreachable for mortals like them, no matter how strong their cultivation realm were to become.
But since now they already had a closer peek at their fate, then perhaps heaven themselves wanted to give them chances to change it!
And if that is indeed so, then they could only strive to show their capabilities for such an expectation!
As the saying goes, a single ant might not be able to kill an elephant, but a million could.
"From now on, do your best to reach the Immortal ascension realm faster. We now know that this realm of legends is possible to be attained by you. Only then, would I be able to convince the other Emperor of what is to come for all of us!" the Emperor said as he tilted his head to the ceiling, appearing to gaze through the the sky itself.
However, at this moment, Duan Li suddenly remembered something.
"Umm.. to be honest, at the rate I am cultivating, reaching the Immortal ascension realm in just a few months would not be an issue at all.. my real aim is to go beyond that.. and release all 9 shackles of mortality!"
"I don"t know how powerful my battle prowess would be beyond the realm of Immortal ascension, but if I managed to cultivate all the way until the 9th shackle, then I am quite confident that even a thousand Sun Dragon could be wiped out with just a flip of my palm!" Duan Li said energetically.
Pu!
...