Chapter 2331: One Person
Upon hearing Lan Xian's words, Fan Shun respectfully replied, "This junior knows this."
Lan Xian looked back at the members of the Jiu family. "The summons to the battlefield are of the utmost importance. Don’t make any more trouble."
With that, Lan Xian vanished.
The members of the Jiu family all heaved sighs of relief. They shot angry glares at Fan Shun, but not one person dared to make another move.
Fan Shun did not even look at his attackers, and he simply continued traveling towards the location that everyone was being summoned to.
Lu Yin had conscripted the entire Fifth Mainland and ordered them all to gather in one location. However, gathering countless people together in one place naturally led to various conflicts. Old hatreds and grudges were exposed, but a single roar from the massive jiao silenced the entire region in an instant. No one had the courage to act up, and so the gathering continued in silence.
Lu Yin stood atop the jiao’s head, watching as countless people gathered. One after another, Semi-Progenitors and Envoys arrived, as well as Enlighters, Hunters, and countless weaker cultivators. Everyone present obeyed Lu Yin, as he was the sole ruler of the Fifth Mainland.
As more and more people gathered, more and more eyes filled with reverence, fear, and even fanaticism fell onto Lu Yin. Regardless of whether the gathered people hated or supported Lu Yin, at this moment, everyone could only obey him. There was no need for Lu Yin to even consider if he had any enemies present, nor to think about balancing the various parties against each other, not even after the ancient powerhouses from the Heavens Sect era were thrown into the mix. Even if every single person had their own plans and schemes in play, at this moment, all of them had no choice but to listen to Lu Yin.
Seeing the massive numbers of people arrayed before him, a surge of pride surged within Lu Yin’s chest. That pride transformed into aurelian force that erupted from his body, burning the void as it spread. It reached three miles, ten miles, a hundred miles, and then a thousand miles. It kept spreading, further and further. 3,000 miles. 5,000 thousand miles.
The void warped and churned as it burned thousands of miles away from Lu Yin, looking like paper thrown into a fire. Lu Yin stood at the center of a blazing realm of space.
The endless arrogance exploded within Lu Yin's heart. He clenched his fists. Finally, his aurelian force stopped spreading. There was a bang, and it suddenly encompassed everything within a million miles of Lu Yin.
Given the size of the entire universe, a region of millions of miles was less than a drop of water in the ocean. However, when Lu Yin condensed his aurelian force back on himself, its density far surpassed anything that he had been capable of using in the past.
Lu Yin had once Possessed Hen Ye. That Possession had allowed Lu Yin to comprehend the void god level of his domain and even surpass Mr. Tang’s level of mastery. Lu Yin’s domain was no longer inadequate for his level of strength.
At this moment, seeing the strength of the entire Fifth Mainland gathered before him, seeing both humans and astral beasts obey his orders had stimulated his pride. The resulting emotion had helped Lu Yin break through his aurelian force.
He could not even guess how powerful his aurelian force had become now.
Lu Yin pulled his hand back, and his aurelian force retracted until it completely disappeared.
Aurelian force was a very powerful ability, and Lu Yin felt that his aurelian force had reached the level where he could solely rely on it to challenge a seven or eight-tribulation powerhouse. Still, Lu Yin’s aurelian force was only aurelian force. What he truly wanted to acquire was the purple-black substance that Hen Xin possessed. That was the next level of battle force that existed beyond even aurelian force, and so far, Lu Yin had only seen two people possess that level of battle force: Hen Xin and Ancient God.
It was clearly impossible to acquire the method to achieve the next level of battle force from Ancient God, which meant that Hen Xin was his only option.
However, that matter would have to wait until after the Perennial World was handled.
***
In the Perennial World’s Dominion Realm, the Progenitor level corpse kings that had been fighting with Bai Wangyuan and the other human Progenitors retreated as soon as Xia Shenji went to the Fifth Mainland.
Before Bai Wangyuan and the others could even recover from their battle, Xia Shenji had returned.
The battle with Lu Yin in the Fifth Mainland had not lasted very long, and Xia Shenji had quickly sent one of his clones back to the Perennial World.
"Why are you back? Have you already dealt with Lu Xiaoxuan?" Wang Fan asked as he looked at Xia Shenji in surprise. "You aren’t the main body."
Xia Shenji's clone spoke, his expression downcast as he shared the details of the battle in the Fifth Mainland.
Bai Wangyuan and the other Progenitors remained silent. As they listened, an uncontrollable killing intent billowed up in their hearts.
Bai Wangyuan sneered. "Some tiny three-tribulation Envoy managed to force you to retreat, Xia Shenji? Should I be happy that you revealed his strength quickly, or upset that it still took you so long to find out?"
Wang Fan softly commented, "He’s still just a three-tribulation Envoy. Once he passes six tribulations, or even becomes a Semi-Progenitor, will anyone at all be capable of restraining him?"
The man looked over at Xia Shenji's clone. "Who did that Champions’ Stage belong to?"
The clone replied, "If my guess is right, it should be Lu Jian’s."
"Lu Jian? He should already be dead." Progenitor Long was surprised.
All of them had been born in the same era, and while Progenitor Long had taken much longer to become a Progenitor, the innate longevity of the White Dragon Clan had given him the time needed to become a Progenitor. In truth, Progenitor Long had been born before any of the other men’s parents had even been born. Naturally, Progenitor Long had known Lu Jian.
Xia Shenji's clone replied, "I thought of him because he was the only person from the Lu family who achieved any true level of mastery in Old Fu’s cultivation method. Lu Jian could not have become a Progenitor, but it seems that Old Fu’s cultivation method allowed him to do just that. There’s no other way for him to have managed to force me back."
"So you faced Lu Jian, the jiao, and E Chi, who was summoned from the Champions’ Stage. That would have certainly been a difficult battle." Bai Wangyuan’s eyes locked onto the clone. "But even all of that should not have been enough to stop you from killing Lu Xiaoxuan."
Xia Shenji stared back. "Try it for yourself and find out."
"You still want to go to the Fifth Mainland?" Progenitor Smoke's voice was suddenly heard as she arrived. She looked at Xia Shenji with open interest. "It looks like you had a rough time there."
Xia Shenji glared at Progenitor Smoke. "You already knew about Lu Xiaoxuan's capabilities within the Fifth Mainland, but you didn't stop me. You were already certain that I couldn’t kill him, weren’t you?"
Progenitor Smoke arched a brow. "Am I obliged to explain myself to you?"
"You!" Xia Shenji became furious.
Bai Wangyuan stepped forward and moved to Xia Shenji's side. "I'll go with you. Lu Xiaoxuan must die."
Xia Shenji nodded and then moved to leave, not even looking at Progenitor Smoke again.
Progenitor Smoke frowned. "The Aeternals pulled back just now to let us fight among ourselves. If you go to the Fifth Mainland, there will definitely be a massive war, and the only ones who will benefit is Aeternus."
"If Lu Xiaoxuan doesn’t die, he will remain a constant danger to humanity," Wang Fan retorted.
Progenitor Smoke’s voice grew cold, "I can prevent him from starting a war among humans. If war will benefit Aeternus, he won’t be willing to fight."
"He won’t want to start a war between humans?" Bai Wangyuan looked over at Progenitor Smoke. "If you can prevent him from doing that-"
The man suddenly stopped, and everyone turned to look at him, waiting for him to continue.
Hope arose within Progenitor Smoke as she stared at Bai Wangyuan.
Finally, Bai Wangyuan’s head rose. "I want him dead more than ever."
"Why?" Progenitor Smoke felt quite puzzled.