CH 1980

The Plumed Empyrean Supreme’s last replica fragment vanished into the air before Lu Yun could react.

Thus marked the third empyrean supreme of the chief worlds. He’d sunk without a ripple into the vast river of time and the only thing that proved he’d once existed was his own arrow stuck in his skull.

“Don’t you want to know what he said to me?” Jin Huo said meaningfully to Lu Yun.

“No,” he shook his head. “I am only a high supreme who can deploy a grand supreme’s strength because of a divine weapon. I don’t want to attract the karmic repercussions of an empyrean supreme.”

He raised his eyes and looked at the black skull hanging over them. Although the Plumed Empyrean Supreme was completely dead, traces of his existence remained. With the strength of that kind of august personage, who knew if he would be reborn at some time or place in the future?

The Disordered Empyrean Supreme had been reborn through her father’s skull. The Plumed Empyrean Supreme’s own skull was fully intact and right here.

“You’re a smart one,” Jin Huo curled her lip. “It would indeed be empyrean level karmic repercussion. You’re better off not knowing.”

However, Lu Yun caught a slight shift in her expression. Although she’d been resurrected and grasped two thirds of the order of life, she’d resembled more a living corpse up to this point. There had been life in her eyes, but it was drowned out by bafflement and helplessness.

She was alive without a purpose.

Although she spoke of reviving the tree god, she didn’t see any hope in doing so. But now, Lu Yun saw vitality bloom in her, changing her from a living corpse to someone fully present in the here and now. She seemed much more awake and animated.

Hope.

The past Jin Huo had been consumed with despair. She didn’t know why she lived and had accepted Lu Yun’s condition because the instincts of the dead propelled her.

Now she had hope, and Lu Yun didn’t pry.

There was a world inside the skull that connected the burial mound to the tomb of the shamanic ancestor. When they set foot inside the skull, they were transported away into an unknown world.

“Do you have a method to revive the tree god?” Lu Yun couldn’t help his curiosity after all.

“Didn’t you want to avoid karmic repercussions?” Jin Huo chuckled.

“The tree god isn’t an empyrean supreme,” he grumbled. He’d noticed Jin Huo’s eyes growing brighter, which caused him to worry.

A door made of white bones stood in front of them, the bones woven like they were bamboo. Neatly arranged, they formed a modestly sized double door. It was roughly twenty-two meters tall and sixteen meters wide. The doors were open—someone had been one step ahead of them and already gone inside.

“Someone’s arrived before us, which is why the tomb qi has been vented.” Lu Yun was in no hurry despite the tomb of the shamanic ancestor being on the other side of the door.

“Do you think the person that came first—whether it’s the god of Mount Tai, the Disordered Empyrean Supreme, or the one from the darkness—do you think they saw the fragmented will of the Plumed Empyrean Supreme?” he suddenly raised. “How can a stray thought anticipate your arrival? Could the Plumed Empyrean Supreme see the future and knew that you would walk through his skull to access the tomb?

“If he was really that all-knowing, would he have died here, especially to his own arrow?”

“What are you getting at?!” Jin Huo paled with horror.

“The empyrean supreme from the darkness knows I’m here. He knows that I took the fruit of life and death, and that I revived you. He has no plans to ally with the humans. As an empyrean supreme, how would he not know that they’re stuck here? He said all that for my ears.”

The elder giant could sense Lu Yun’s arrival through their shared bloodline. Meanwhile, the land of darkness had listed Lu Yun as a threat. One of their peak grand supremes went to the trouble of personally plotting against him, so would their empyrean supremes be ignorant of what he represented?

That empyrean supreme likely had his own ways of determining where Lu Yun was.

“All of this and the fragment from earlier is a trap, including. Maybe the Plumed Empyrean Supreme really was here once, but someone’s definitely modified what he left behind!

“A personalized transmission? Heh, more like something designed to draw my curiosity!” Lu Yun narrowed his eyes.

“It was fake? Are you saying that what the empyrean supreme told me, that his way of resurrecting the tree god, is fake?” Jin Huo’s expression turned very unpleasant.

“No, it’s very real.” Lu Yun shook his head. “Traps are used to kill, but will fake bait attract prey? You could tell that the tombstone’s owner had done something to me, so how can you not tell if someone in front of you is telling the truth or not?

“The real method can bypass the Land of Reincarnation and revive the tree god! But that method is like a delicious morsel of meat hung in a trap. Just one bite will doom you to the point of no return!”

“Yun Yi made countless plans and created numerous contingencies in pursuit of her ultimate goal. Even now, I have no idea what she wants to do…” Lu Yun sighed. “The dark empyrean supreme is on another level compared to her. He wants to kill the Disordered Empyrean Supreme, you, and me. He’ll scheme against us in unexpected ways and kill without drawing blood.”

There were great karmic repercussions involved in killing. Generally speaking, the stronger one was, the less one wished to be plagued by karma. Thus, those with high cultivation levels generally set up traps within traps to avoid taking action themselves.

Only when all of their plots were sprung and schemes revealed would they show themselves to reap the fruits of their labor. True powerhouses were unwilling—not unable—to be entangled with karma. It took too much time and effort to digest karma, diverting their attention away from pursuing their great dao.

That was why so many of them took disciples and created personal factions. They could integrate their great dao into the chief worlds and obtain the recognition of heaven and earth, but also send out their juniors to take care of these trifling matters for them. This way, the heavyweights could avoid forming further karmic relationships.

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“Let’s go.” Lu Yun looked at Jin Huo. “If I could resurrect you, it won’t be hard to resurrect the tree god.”

“I know,” she nodded. “But the Land of Reincarnation is a place for the injured to recover. If the dead return to life there, will they still be themselves?”