Immortal of the Nine Realms

Shi Zhan followed closely behind Fang Chen like a loyal sidekick, his face thick with flattery.

”Brother Zhou, let’s spar for a few more moves. After exchanging pointers with you during this period, I feel like my cultivation has improved.”

Fang Chen couldn’t be bothered to pay him any mind and continued strolling through the local market. The market was only about a hundred li away from the mineral vein. Although it was called a market, its population density was not small, numbering several million, making it a regular-sized small city.

Months had already passed since they joined North Wind Ridge. During that time, Fang Chen had participated in battles of various sizes, repelling dozens of waves of attacks from the Flame Race.

Through Old Fei, he had gained an understanding of the Flame Race’s strength. Just like the human race, the Flame Race had Saints backing them. The difference was that the Flame Race possessed as many as over a dozen Saints.

Within the Divine Realm, the strength of the Flame Race was noticeably superior to that of the human race, and for all these years, the human race’s primary adversary had precisely been the Flame Race. The two clans had been at war for who-knows how many years. As for the underlying reason, there was a theory that the human race today refused to acknowledge.

It was said that in the earliest era, the human race were slave soldiers of the Flame Race. By a stroke of luck, someone obtained a Sacred Scripture and eventually rose to the Saint Realm. As a result, the human race managed to escape their fate of enslavement. Every time the Flame Race attacked, they would continuously humiliate the human race with this claim. The human race naturally would not acknowledge it, which left this as a mere rumor that could not be verified.

”Brother Zhou, what’s so fun about strolling through this market? There isn’t even a single divine ability user here. It’s all a bunch of martial artists. It would be better to go back and exchange pointers with those veteran soldiers...”

Seeing that Fang Chen was ignoring him, Shi Zhan tried to egg Fang Chen into sparring with the veterans to test their supernatural abilities.

Fang Chen still paid him no heed, merely walking up to a wall where thousands of lifelike portraits were posted.

Shi Zhan curiously examined the portraits on the list. ”Oh, this is the Luoxue Alliance’s wanted bounty list.”

Nearby pedestrians cast respectful, somewhat fearful glances at Shi Zhan and Fang Chen. Most people in this market were just mortals born in the Divine Realm. Those who were slightly stronger had obtained the inheritance of the Foundation Building ancestor and gained martial cultivation, but they still could not transcend into the realm of divine ability users.

As for the fugitives on the list, the weakest were at the Awakening Realm. They were not existences ordinary people could capture. Therefore, those who typically lingered beneath the bounty list were almost entirely divine ability users.

”Brother Zhou, do you want to accumulate military merit by tracking down the fugitives there? To be honest with you, this isn’t a good idea. They are even more dangerous than the Flame Race,” said Shi Zhan.

He pointed at the highest portrait on the wanted list. ”Look at the leader of the fugitives, Fang Lie. This guy is a Half-Saint, and his abilities are unfathomable!”

Then, his finger suddenly froze, and he awkwardly glanced at Fang Chen. ”Brother Zhou, uhm... you should be able to see, right?”

Fang Chen nodded without speaking, merely studying the portrait of Fang Lie. He had a buzz cut, looked in his twenties, and had a rather genial smile hanging on his face. He was without doubt the strongest existence within the Fang Clan. He was the creator of the Ancestral Lie Fist, and the Half-Saint being hunted by the Luoxue Alliance.

Below Fang Lie, there were over a dozen other wanted powerful experts of the Fang Clan. They were likely the Fang Clan’s Three Limit Breaking Steps experts. None from the ninth transformation made the list. It was unknown whether the Luoxue Alliance felt they weren’t worthy, or if there was some other reason.

Fang Chen suddenly spoke. ”Shi Zhan, I heard you mention before that your family also has a Half Saint? What kind of abilities does a Half Saint actually possess?”

”What kind of ability does a Half Saint possess?” Shi Zhan blanked out for a moment. He glanced at Fang Chen with surprise, then suddenly fell into thought. Finally, he answered, ”I’m not too sure either. A Half Saint’s divinity... all I can say is that they are incredibly strong, but as for exactly how strong, I’ve never personally seen a Half Saint make a move. But I’ve heard that upon reaching the Half Saint Realm, a person’s lifespan spans hundreds of thousands of years at the absolute minimum. That’s practically no different from true immortality...”

Fang Chen asked casually, ”Then what do you know about Half Saint Fang? Since he has already reached the Half Saint Realm, how did he end up becoming a wanted fugitive?”

”I do know a thing or two about Half Saint Fang. I heard the elders in my family bring him up during their chats,” said Shi Zhan, looking emotional.

Fang Chen smiled. ”I’d love to hear the details.”

This guy’s status was countless times higher than that of a Great Zhou Envoy Division. Even though his own cultivation was low, he was still born into a Half Saint family. He could always access sources of information that ordinary people couldn’t reach.

”Half Saint Fang is actually not very old. In fact, you could even say he’s very young. It was probably only five or six thousand years ago that he started making a name for himself in the Luoxue Alliance? I heard that back then, he had also just arrived in the Divine Realm and was assigned to.... Let me think...”

A look of contemplation appeared in Shi Zhan’s eyes. Finally, he clapped his palms together and exclaimed, ”Ah, I remember now! He was assigned to the Envoy Division of the Babel Tower, and then he started racking up illustrious military merits in the war zone over there. He broke through all the way from the First Foundation Building Realm to the Third, and finally entered the ninth transformation!”

Fang Chen noted. ”The ninth transformation.... That’s still a very long way to go from the Half Saint Realm.”

”Yeah, but it was precisely starting from that time that this Half Saint Fang obtained a treasure. No one knew about it at first. It was only later, when he used it to exchange a few moves with Saint Luoxue, that the news spread like wildfire throughout the Divine Realm, and many foreign races came to know about it.”

A hint of envy surfaced in Shi Zhan’s eyes. ”That treasure is called the Eighteen Heavens Prison Tower. From that point on, Half Saint Fang’s cultivation advanced by leaps and bounds. He broke through the ninth transformation, broke his limits, and then joined the ranks of the Half Saints. Right now, among our human race, he is one of the three Half Saints with the highest chance of ascending to the Saint Realm.”

Pausing for a moment, he sighed softly in amazement, ”Even my own ancestor, Half Saint Shi, didn’t make it as one of those three, yet my ancestor became a Half Saint tens of thousands of years earlier than Half Saint Fang...”

Suddenly, someone nearby let out a soft exclamation of surprise. ”Your ancestor is Half Saint Shi? You are a descendant of the Shi family? Why did you run all the way over here?”

Fang Chen had noticed a group of people approaching a while ago, and they were now looking up at the wanted list along with them.

Although Shi Zhan’s temperament had shifted and restrained a bit due to his loss to Fang Chen, that was only targeted toward a select few. Hearing someone interrupt now, he looked at the speaker with cold impatience. ”What if I am a descendant of the Shi family? What does that have to do with you?”

Having said that, his gaze scanned the group alertly. ”As for you all, since you know of the Shi family, you should also be divinity users. You aren’t soldiers of North Wind Ridge, so who are you? What are you doing here? You couldn’t be spies sent by the Flame Race, could you!?”

Because the human race and the Flame Race had been fighting for far too many years, members of both sides had defected to the other. There were quite a few humans who turned to the Flame Race, and there had even been incidents of Half Saints betraying their own race.

”Watch your mouth. Calling us spies of the Flame Race? Even if you are a descendant of the Shi family, you will have to pay the price for your words,” someone within the opposing party barked sharply, divinity fluctuations that far exceeded the Awakening Realm surging from him.

Shi Zhan was stunned, seemingly not expecting the other party’s cultivation to be so high.

Fang Chen withdrew his gaze from the wanted list, intending to offer a few polite remarks before taking Shi Zhan back to North Wind Ridge. However, the moment he caught sight of the leading person’s facial features, he too was stunned.