Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

Black Fire Stone was a bit uneasy.

It was said that only the demons whose hearts were pure and loyal to their ancestors would see the Pantheon of Demons in the clouds.

Black Fire Stone thought that he deserved better—he had always been loyal to his ancestors.

Although he was not very clear who his ancestors, namely Pangu, Gonggong, Kuafu, Houyi, among others, were and what they did exactly, was he not the one who paid the most ‘ancestral tax’ every month? Also, he had been obedient and never violated any of the ancestral rules that the lords had told him.

This is all that silly woman’s fault!

Black Fire Stone cursed in his heart. Because of anxiety, his eyes were packed with blood streaks quickly.

Noticing that he was the only one in the entire Brute Hammer Troop who could not see it, Black Fire Stone felt that his eyes were red and swollen and that the world was swirling before him. In his fury and apprehension, he seemed to see a colorful glow in the middle of the clouds.

“I see it! I see it now!”

Black Fire Stone did not know what the ‘glorious Pantheon of Demons’ looked like, but he was weeping in excitement.

“That is the Pantheon of Demons, our destination in the sea of stars!”

The gold-horned lord was waving his hammer while he roared, “Let’s go, warriors! Show the cunning, cowardly human beings the awesomeness of the blood descendants of Pangu!”

At the front, countless crimson fireflies were leading the way. The Black-Horned Loading Bulls, the Shooting Star Iron Bulls, and the Iron-Tailed Brute Bulls… all the bulls seemed to be exuding flames. The demonic energy spurting out of their nostrils condensed into rolling red clouds in midair!

Together, they launched a messy, disordered charge toward the sentry posts of the human beings.

Black Fire Stone’s head had been burned by the nervous stimulant. Lust for killing was quickly replacing his calmness. It was even more difficult for him to picture what the ‘glorious Pantheon of Demons’ looked like right now.

According to the lords, as long as he fought valiantly, he would be able to ascend into the glorious Pantheon of Demons, and he would never have to worry about how to till his barren farmland that was rife with Venomous Thorny Grass and Double Tailed Scorpions. There was endless ambrosia in the Pantheon of Demons. He would need to farm no more, mine no more, and just enjoy his life every day!

Black Fire Stone had no idea what ‘ambrosia’ was. He only guessed that it must be something very delicious.

But Black Fire Stone did not even know what ‘something very delicious’ actually tasted like. Since he was born, everything Black Fire Stone ate could barely keep him fed. His food had never been anything remotely close to delicious.

For some reason, in the last moment of his consciousness, a shining, greasy grilled chicken suddenly jumped out.

It was a picture of a human village that he had seen in his illusions.

It was a big, big, big village—so big that Black Fire Stone did not even know how to describe it. He had forgotten all the other details about the village, except for the greasy grilled chicken that was being roasted carefully and appeared succulent with oil dropping down nonstop. The picture had been etched to his brain, and he even remembered the burning sound when the grilled chicken oil dropped to the firewood vividly.

At every tough night in the military camp, after missing his wife and his two children, Black Fire Stone had been pondering one question. How did the grilled chicken taste exactly?

Was it as fresh as ‘Bitter Grass Bug’ or as crisp as ‘Red Fern Root’?

Of course, Black Fire Stone had seen chicken and captured chicken before, but he had never had the privilege to eat one because they were too precious.

Moreover, the lords did not allow them to. The lords declared that bulls were born to eat grass. At the very least, black-blood bulls should eat grass. They could get a few bugs to fill their stomachs but nothing more. It was an ancestral rule.

If he ate meat and violated the ancestral rule, he would not be able to go to the Pantheon of Demons after he died. Not just him, his wife and his children would be forbidden, too.

I wonder, is there grilled chicken in the ‘glorious Pantheon of Demons’? The ancestors will allow me to feast upon meat there, won’t they?

Black Fire Stone thought a lot of things as he rushed forward.

The black-blood soldiers did not carry weapons or armor. Their mission was to charge at all the sentry posts, bastions, and fortresses after they were teleported to the Heaven’s Origin Sector and clear the obstacles for the following troops of the coalition army. Or rather, they were asked to stuff the firing posts with their body.

Black Fire Stone was running fast. His burning head made him feel as if his blood was boiling. He seemed to have grown wings, and his soul gradually left his ugly, clumsy shell.

Thinking about the greasy grilled chicken, he was more and more energetic. Like a roaring gust, he quickly surpassed all of his companions, including One Ear, and charged at a human sentry post that was protected by more than ten crystal cannons.

A confused smile popped up on Black Fire Stone’s face, but he shook his tail toward One Ear in retaliation for his friend’s mockery a moment ago.

That was just One Ear, whose limbs were so soft that the guy could never outrun him. What a great waste of the muscles! No wonder his wife chose to marry him instead of One Ear, whose horn was thicker and bigger.

If I really make my way to the Pantheon of Demons in the sky and meet grilled chicken, I will certainly save half for my wife and kids!

Black Fire Stone frowned. With the few active braincells he had left, he pondered carefully how he could smuggle a grilled chicken out of the Pantheon of Demons.

He had never stolen anything in his life before!

One of the crystal cannons in the human sentry post in front of him shot out streams of dazzling, colorful brilliance, exactly the same as the ‘glorious Pantheon of Demons’ he had seen in the clouds a moment ago.

This is odd. Why is the Pantheon of Demons in the middle of human beings’ cannons?

Black Fire Stone was baffled. Then he found himself flying high in the sky. His mouth was suddenly sticky, wet, and sour.

Is this the taste of grilled chicken?

Black Fire Stone struggled, trying to roll his tongue to taste the fabulous flavor more carefully.

He straightened his arms and waved crazily in midair, hoping to snatch the greasy, delicious grilled chicken.

…

In the human sentry post on the other side of the battlefield, a sentinel, with a long beard and a big red nose that betrayed his drinking problem, was watching the dense, continuously growing red spots on the light beam. He spat on the ground and mumbled, “I’m truly f*cking unlucky.”

After the Battle of Dawn, since most of the towns and military bases of the federation on the Grand Desolate Plateau had been demolished, it was impossible to maintain a long supply line or to build an enormous war base in the north of the Grand Desolate Plateau.

Now, the federation had retreated to the Giant Blade Pass, where the elites were gathered. In the meantime, more resources would be dedicated to the construction of the crystal suit legions.

On the vast desert in the north of the Grand Desolate Plateau, the only defenses were the sparse sentry posts.

The sentry posts were established not for the purpose of resistance but to send out alarms and the details of the intruders when the army of demons appeared.

The federal soldiers in the sentry posts knew their responsibility and their fate when the demons came.

But that was how a war went. The magical equipment of the Star Glory Federation was not so developed that it could completely replace the sentinels on the Grand Desolate Plateau, where the spiritual and magnetic environment was complicated.

The only thing that the federal army could do was reduce the duty duration of every sentinel, who would be replaced every seven days.

For every sentinel, as long as they were on duty for seven days, they would be given a one-month holiday and allowed to reunite with their family.

But the sentinel here had been on duty for seven and a half days.

The guy who was supposed to take his place had encountered a thunderstorm on his way, which had damaged his carrier. The vehicle was undergoing emergency maintenance. Therefore, the sentinel was forced to persist for one more day.

But the intruders were already here.

The sentinel was trembling hard. All of his fingers were dancing. He was apparently a thickheaded, unemotional man, and yet he was crying sadly like a little kid who had been wronged.

“F*ck!”

Crying, the sentinel cursed, “F*ck! F*ck! F*ck!”

The sentinel injected a sedative into his neck while crying before he picked up a cigarette. Then, he turned on the crystal processor and quickly inputted everything that he observed.

As the data and pictures were sent to the rear in the form of waves, the sentinel was more or less relieved, only to find that his snot had almost dripped to his lips.

The sentinel wiped off his tears and snot with his dirty sleeve. Then, he brought out his personal crystal processor from his pocket. As if he were touching the most precious gem in the world, he triggered a light beam.

This place was the frontier of the Grand Desolate Plateau. The electromagnetic environment there was too complicated for the soldiers to talk to the heartland of the federation directly. Besides, the federal army had its regulations, too. Soldiers were allowed to bring their crystal processor but not be connected to the Spiritual Nexus.

What the sentinel triggered was just a 3D photo stored inside the crystal processor.

In the photo was a smiling girl whose hair was curled and two vigorous boys.

The bigger boy was even grimacing at him.

The sentinel smiled. Then he suddenly recalled that he had told his wife that he had quit smoking. He hurried to extinguish the cigarette and picked his teeth with his tongue. It was not until then that he kissed the illusionary mystic rays, breaking them into shattered ripples.

The sentinel put the crystal processor down. He turned around and picked up a crystal cannon.

Such fixed crystal cannons could be controlled by the central crystal processor in the sentry post. He only needed to sit in front of the light beam and monitor the progress.

However, the sentinel still changed one of the crystals cannons from the auto mode into manual mode.

Generally speaking, a crystal cannon required three soldiers to be operated manually.

But the sentinel gritted his teeth and bashed the crystal cells into the magazine with all his strength.

Hum! Hum! Hum! Hum!

Electric arcs were dancing on the three rails of the crystal cannon, which spread to his arms and ripped apart his skin, flesh, and nerves!

The tears of the sentinel turned red. Glancing at the broken ripples on the light beam for the last time, he took a long breath and moved his head to the scope of the crystal cannon. With his left eye narrowed, he locked onto the demon that was leading the charge.

It was a mad bull.

He was running so fast that bloody sweat was seeping out of his body. The bloody sweat was then vaporized by the heat, making his enormous body even more hideous.

The mad bull was grinning hideously. His eyes, which were about to bulge out of his head, were brimming with madness. Bright yellow saliva was flowing out of his mouth, suggesting that he had been starved for a long time.

It was not hard for the sentinel to imagine what would happen when such a devil marched into a town.

The sentinel touched the trigger rune array of the crystal cannon hard with his fingers, or rather, fingerbones, before he mumbled, “Bring it on, b*stards!”