Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

The skinny, sharp-jawed old man was named Su Jiuzhen. He was an important figure in the Temple of Immortals as well as an ace assassin of Black Spider Tower. Although he was merely at the peak of the Building Foundation Stage, he was adept at disguise, poison, assassination, curses, and various other dark arts.

At least seven Core Formation Stage Cultivators had been killed by him. None of them were battle-type Cultivators, but they had all been elders of major sects who were protected by numerous body guards wherever they went.

It was by no means an easy task for Su Jiuzhen to break through the protection and assassinate them. He had been known as ’Killer of Cores’ ever since.

Although Huangpu Shiyi was in the Core Formation Stage, he was a pure refiner with limited combat ability. He was definitely no match for Su Jiuzhen if the two of them were engaged in a fight.

Moreover, the man had spent quite a few years in the Temple of Immortals. Therefore, Huangpu Shiyi was very polite to him. He asked courteously, ”Master Su, what is your opinion?”

Su Jiuzhen’s voice was annoying to listen to, like iron needles scratching glass. ”It won’t be difficult to convert Li Yao.

”He is a young man who was born and raised in the edge of the sector. He has been wandering away from society basically his whole life. How much feeling would he have for ordinary people? Chances are that he has already slain some of them when he was traveling in the sea of stars!

”You saw his performance in the Skyhill Sword Seminar, too. He was brutal, aggressive, and merciless!

”Such a young man must be proud and desire to be acknowledged by other people.

”Also, it’s safe to infer from that fact that he trained crazily with Purple Ring Sword Ants that he is a maniac who is interested in nothing but magical equipment!

”As long as you lure him with magical equipment and the arts of refining, with a few lessons, I’m sure that he will recognize who he really is and embark on the path of immortality!”

Pausing for a moment, Su Jiuzhen then continued. ”As for Huangpu Xiaoya, she is the tricky one. I fear that she has a deep misunderstanding about Immortal Cultivators. We’d better make preparations for the worst. She is your blood niece, but you won’t hesitate when the moment comes, will you?”

Huangpu Shiyi smiled. ”Why would I? Now that I’ve joined the cause of immortality, mortal affairs have nothing to do with me. What can the mundane relationship of the ordinary people do for us? Moreover—”

He looked at his withered hands with mixed feelings and said gloomily, ”It’s high time that this pair of useless hands are changed!”

…

Inside a well-decorated cabin that was almost similar to the room of a luxury hotel, two single beds were on opposite sides of room. In the middle of the room was a barrier.

At night, when the barrier was triggered, the room would be split into two independent halves. No one could see or hear what was happening on the other side of the room.

In the day, when the barrier was canceled, the room would become a large suite again.

Huangpu Xiaoya had been pacing to and fro ever since she was locked into the room. At one point, she was gritting her teeth angrily, then sobbing in a low voice, and then screaming and yelling. In the end, she couldn’t bear it any longer and put a Cosmos Ring on her finger.

Li Yao had been lying on his bed quietly with his hands as the pillow and his eyes closed. He seemed to be sleeping, but he suddenly interrupted before Huangpu Xiaoya took action. ”If I were you, I wouldn’t touch the Cosmos Ring.”

Huangpu Xiaoya was dazed. ”Why?”

Li Yao replied, ”Why do you think they didn’t ask us to submit all our Cosmos Rings? As Cultivators, we have dozens of secret arts that can hide Cosmos Rings everywhere inside our body. Unless they mince us into pieces and dig into our every bone, they can never be certain that we are clean of Cosmos Rings.

”But right now, we are still of use to them, and they cannot resort to such violent methods. So, they could only pretend to be generous.

”I’m sure that there are more crystal cameras and detectaphones in this suite than hairs on my legs. If you are so desperate to reveal your Cosmos Rings, why don’t you just speak to Huangpu Shiyi and tell him how many Cosmos Rings you’ve brought and what kind of items are inside?”

Huangpu Xiaoya was a gifted genius but only in refining. She was quite inexperienced when it came to dealing with people. Realizing that Li Yao’s words did make sense, she was at a loss and wept silently on her bed.

Li Yao stopped talking to her and resumed his meditation. He seized every second of every minute to make his cells seethe with fury!

Huangpu Shiyi was right about one thing.

In a few days, many people would die, and much blood would be shed.

Huangpu Xiaoya sobbed for a long while. Seeing that Li Yao was indifferent the whole time, she gnashed her teeth. ”Do you have any idea how many people were killed in the explosions of the Skyhill Domain just now? The two fallen floating mountains alone were enough to cause tremendous casualties! Why are you so calm? Do you not feel sorry for them at all?”

Li Yao seemed to be asleep. He didn’t reply until a long while later. ”I grew up in the relics of the ancient battlegrounds at the edge of the sea of stars. I didn’t know who my parents were. It was nothing unusual for me to not see another living soul for a couple of months. The only things that accompanied me were cold scraps of magical equipment and a dead silent universe.

”It was not until I came to the Skyhill Domain that I saw such a large number of people. There were even more than all the people I’d ever met in my entire life.

”Should I feel sorry that these people died? Maybe I should.

”But the thing about sadness is that it cannot be forced. I have no tears. Should I try to squeeze some out?”

”You—”

Huangpu Xiaoya was so angry that she didn’t know what to say.

Li Yao’s eyes suddenly shone. He rose up, walked to a table, and groped around its edge. With a fascinated face, he leaned down and started operating carefully.

Huangpu Xiaoya was surprised. ”What are you doing?”

Li Yao made a ’shh’ sound and said, ”Don’t disturb me. I’ve found a detectaphone. But it is very delicately embedded into a complicated alarm system. If I make an error, the alarm system will be triggered, and everybody on the starship will hear it!”

Huangpu Xiaoya was dazed. ”Didn’t you say just now that there are countless crystal cameras and detectaphones inside the room? If so, won’t all our actions be monitored by them? What’s the point of dismantling it?”

Li Yao chuckled and said, ”You don’t understand. This is a game that Huangpu Shiyi is playing with us. He, of course, knew that we would discover the crystal cameras and detectaphones. He also set up a labyrinth-like alarm system on purpose. He intends to see how good we are and whether or not we can dismantle the crystal cameras and detectaphones without triggering the alarm system!

”Hehe. Huangpu Shiyi is a genius that you only get to see once in your life. I’ve always dreamed about competing with experts such as him!

”I didn’t expect that my dream would come true today. Let me see with my own eyes how magnificent Huangpu Shiyi’s methods are!”

Huangpu Xiaoya was about to go mad. ”So many people died right in front of your eyes just now, and a lot more will be involved in the schemes of the Temple of Immortals. And all you’re thinking about is a competition with Huangpu Shiyi?”

Li Yao raised his head. He glared at Huangpu Xiaoya like an infuriated animal. She was too scared to continue.

Li Yao scoffed and said, ”Huangpu Xiaoya, I’m very disappointed in you.

”As a refiner, magical equipment is the most important thing in the world. No matter how the outside world changes, your belief and determination must not falter!

”Your mind is so easily stirred, and you don’t even know better than that. How were you planning to defeat me?

”I was kind of looking forward to the match against you. But right now, it is lucky that we were captured by the Temple of Immortals. I have found an opponent who is more suitable and won’t waste my time, unlike a useless person such as you!

”Besides, my trump cards have all been seen through. Even half of my crystal suit has been taken away. I can defeat neither Black Stone nor White Dew, and now there are two of them. What else can I do except study the magical equipment?

”If you are bored, you can come and study it together with me.”

Huangpu Xiaoya blurted, ”Uninterested!”

Li Yao was still peaceful. ”It’s fine that you don’t want to study the magical equipment. Why don’t you tell me the event that took place five thousand years ago, which Huangpu Shiyi mentioned just now? Was the human civilization of the Flying Star Sector based on planets in the beginning? I am not familiar with that part of history.”

It was something that had baffled Li Yao for a long time.

In the territory of the Star Ocean Imperium ten thousand years ago, the Heaven’s Origin Sector was at its edge. It was the poorest and the most undeveloped area in the entire imperium. Therefore, few relics and heritages from the Star Ocean Imperium had been discovered in the Heaven’s Origin Sector.

It had taken the Cultivators of the Heaven’s Origin Sector ten thousand years to gather and analyze the treasures from various Occult Orbs so that the civilization could be developed to such an extent.

Different from the Heaven’s Origin Sector, the Flying Star Sector was almost the center of the Star Ocean Imperium. Since an important military base had been established here, a lot of debris of ancient battlegrounds resulting from the war that caused the fall of the Star Ocean Imperium could be found. It would be logical to assume that many relics and heritages could be easily discovered.

By common sense, the humans here should’ve been able to restore their civilization to the glory of the Star Ocean Imperium after grasping the knowledge of the past. At the vest least, it should have been much more developed than the Heaven’s Origin Sector.

However, after staying in the Flying Star Sector for such a long time, Li Yao had realized that the Flying Star Sector was on par with the Heaven’s Origin Sector. In regard to crystal processors and crystal suits, the Flying Star Sector had a slim advantage. But the Heaven’s Origin Sector had quite a lot of technology that the Flying Star Sector didn’t know about, too.

As for the crystal warships and star fortresses of the Flying Star Sector, they were indeed more powerful than their counterparts in the Heaven’s Origin Sector. But they were merely larger in size and firepower. Their fundamental technologies were still the same.

What was it that had stagnated the development of the Flying Star Sector and made it as underdeveloped as the Heaven’s Origin Sector, which was in a poor and remote constellation?

Li Yao had studied it carefully, only to find that all the records about the events of the Flying Star Sector five thousand years ago were ambiguous. There seemed to be a missing two thousand years in the Flying Star Sector’s history.

Files were few about what happened during the time. But after two thousand years of blankness, just like a big bang, countless crystal warships and space towns appeared out of nowhere in the universe!

It seemed that the Flying Star Sector had a major decline five thousand years ago.

According to Huangpu Shiyi, the human civilization of the Flying Star Sector used to be based on planets. So why did they flee into space five thousand years ago? What did it have to do with the decline of the civilization?

Huangpu Shiyi also declared that Cultivators and Immortal Cultivators were ravens and crows, to which Huangpu Xiaoya had no rebuttals. That was quite odd, too.

The history of the Flying Star Sector was indeed full of secrets after secrets!