A Will Eternal

When Mistress Red-Dust’s divine sense was shattered, Chen Hetian detected it. First, he looked out at the Wildlands, then he looked down at the huge eye, his expression that of amazement.

Obviously, he had also detected the True Spirit Resonance....

A true spirit could call upon the quintessence of its voice to unleash a True Spirit Resonance, but would usually only do so in extremely dire circumstances. It was quite draining on the true spirit, but was incredibly powerful, so much so that even a deva would be forced to go all out to defend against it.

Although the True Spirit Resonance from moments ago had not been fully powered, it had been enough to destroy Mistress Red-Dust’s divine sense, and would definitely have been very draining to the true spirit.

The true spirit and its pagoda were closely connected to the Starry Sky Dao Polarity Sect, and in fact, only a few people knew the true origin of the true spirit, one of those people being Chen Hetian. The truth was that it... came from Heavenspan Island in the Heavenspan Sea!

To the riversource sects on the four branches of the Heavenspan River, Heavenspan Island was like a supreme entity. In the mortal world, emperors were often supported by noble ministers, and the relationship between the four riversource sects and Heavenspan Island was much the same. The sects were the nobility, and Heavenspan Island was the imperial palace!

Heavenspan Island was also the home of the Celestial. Naturally... he was the ruler of the lands of Heavenspan.

And now, the true spirit who had been convinced by Heavenspan Island to guard the Great Wall had suddenly acted in this way.... As a result, Chen Hetian couldn’t help but look with glittering eyes at the more than 90,000 soul spheres, and Bai Xiaochun.

“It’s protecting its food.... Mistress Red-Dust was just unlucky to send her divine sense over right in this moment. As for this Bai Xiaochun, how did he get his hands on so many vengeful souls…? He’s certainly full of secrets.” Over the years, Chen Hetian had secretly been paying close attention to Bai Xiaochun. Whether it was his Soul Convergence Pills or his exploding pill furnaces, he had watched over everything carefully. He had even sent some Soul Convergence Pills back to the sect for them to analyze. Of course, he had done all of these things very carefully; he knew that running investigations into members of the five legions was a sensitive task.

Even as Chen Hetian pondered these things, Bai Xiaochun grandly swished his sleeve.

“Open up!” he roared. Instantly, all of the 90,000 soul spheres vibrated before bursting open. Clouds of souls immediately poured out, filling the entire city and then pouring out beyond it.

30,000 meters. 300,000 meters. 3,000,000 meters. 30,000,000 meters.... In the blink of an eye, the cloud of souls spread out to cover all creation!

It was such a shocking event that it wasn’t just the cultivators of the five legions in Great Wall City who were astonished. Even people in World City noticed what was happening, and their expressions flickered in surprise.

It was the same in the Wildlands, where the savages and soul cultivators were completely flabbergasted.

“What’s going on!?”

“Heavens! What... what is that?!”

As the cloud of souls spread out, shocking everyone in the area, the eye atop the tower began to tremble as if in excitement. Then, bright rays of light erupted from the eye, almost as if the true spirit felt that the previous absorption method was too slow, and that it needed... to come out into the open!!

The shining light rapidly converged down into a single point, which then flew out of the eye and transformed into a bat!

It was partially translucent, with bright red eyes, and after it came out into the open, it threw its head back and roared, causing an enormous, shadowy figure to appear in the sky above it.

That shadowy figure was also a bat, so big it filled the entire sky. As soon as it appeared, it took in a deep breath which caused heaven and earth to tremble as the cloud of souls began to move. They almost looked like tide waters as they moved inexorably toward the enormous bat.

The ordinary cultivators of the five legions were trembling in shock; never before had anyone been privy to the fact that there was a bat inside of the huge eye!!

Although Bai Lin and the other four generals had been aware of it, they had never personally seen it, and therefore, all of them were also gasping in astonishment.

Heaven and earth distorted as the massive cloud of souls was absorbed by the gigantic bat. The process took approximately two hours, after which the enormous shadowy bat looked around with cold but contented eyes. A moment later, it ignored everything else around and allowed its gaze to focus on Bai Xiaochun. Within that gaze was approval, and also a sort of newly-acquired closeness.

A moment later, the image of the bat transformed back into a dot of light that returned to the huge eye.

Bai Xiaochun was a bit taken aback by everything that had occurred, having never imagined the act of turning in a few souls would result in such a scene.

Now, he hovered there, heart racing amidst the quiet as all gazes shifted from the huge eye to him.

He blinked a few times, mind racing as he tried to come up with an explanation. Meanwhile, his identity medallion in his bag of holding began to vibrate with unprecedented intensity. Startled, Bai Xiaochun pulled out the medallion and scanned it, whereupon his eyes went wide.

“So many!!”

The battle credits in his identity medallion were currently skyrocketing. Within moments, it passed the point necessary to receive a promotion to major general, and still kept going. Soon, he had enough for two such promotions! Only then did the total begin to slow.

The staggering number of battle credits was such that Bai Xiaochun’s eyes nearly popped out of his skull. His heart began to beat rapidly, and although he wasn’t actually sure exactly what he could get with so much battle credit, he was sure that it was definitely enough to become a major general.

Clearly, the true spirit in the huge eye was very pleased with him....

Bai Xiaochun looked excitedly at his battle credit, and forgot any plans of trying to explain the situation. Holding his identity medallion high above his head, he shouted, “I want a promotion to major general!”

The surrounding cultivators were stunned.

“What... what did he just say? Major general!?”

“Bai Xiaochun wants a promotion to major general?!?!”

“This is astonishing! Whether it was the cloud of souls, or the actions of the eye, or his request for a promotion, this... all of this... Heavens! Bai Xiaochun is definitely going to become a legend!!”

“He’s actually handing in souls to become a major general?”

In almost the same moment that the words left his mouth, the battle credit in his identity medallion was reduced by roughly half.

Then, blinding light shone out from the medallion, as Bai Xiaochun’s rank as listed inside was altered. Before, he was a colonel, but now he was... a major general!

However, attached to the title was another word: acting.

After all, the rank of major general was a very important one, and was essentially the highest rank any ordinary cultivator could achieve within the five legions. The five generals and the deva patriarch all had to ratify the decision and submit it to the true spirit, whereupon a report would be sent to the Starry Sky Dao Polarity Sect.

Another factor to consider was that there were currently no open slots for major generals within the five legions. If a new major general were to be promoted, one of the previous major generals would have to be transferred away.

It was a complicated process that required numerous formalities. Therefore, when Bai Xiaochun spoke the words out loud, and the crowd began to clamor in response, Chen Hetian, Bai Lin, and the other generals immediately felt headaches coming on.

Sighing, Chen Hetian transmitted his thoughts to Bai Lin and the generals. “Well, what do you all think? How do we handle the situation?”

However, none of them had any idea what to do; this sudden turn of events had been completely unexpected.

If Bai Xiaochun had used some other means to rise through the ranks, they might not have needed to consider the matter. However, his actions had caught them completely unprepared. Not even Bai Lin, who had actually attempted to stoke Bai Xiaochun’s ambitions in the first place, could ever have imagined that he would actually become a major general so quickly.

Much of their shock stemmed from the fact that from the moment the Great Wall had been built until now, Bai Xiaochun was the first person to ever hand in enough souls to be directly promoted to major general.

Seeing that nobody else was saying anything, Bai Lin braced himself and said, “Well, I think Bai Xiaochun clearly has the skills necessary. I don’t see any problem.”

“This is not children’s game!!” Chen Hetian replied angrily. The rank of major general was far too important to be taken lightly. However, there was no way to deny that Bai Xiaochun had earned it. Refusing to acknowledge the legitimacy of the promotion would be preposterous.

Meanwhile, Bai Xiaochun was not very happy. Unaware that Chen Hetian and the generals needed to approve the promotion, he couldn’t help but feel a bit irritated that he was listed as only an acting major general.

“Senior Bat, this isn’t very sincere of you!” he said loudly. “I gave you a whole bunch of souls! I mean... there were more than 1,000,000,000!! And you only made me an acting major general?!” Not willing to give up so easily, he raised his voice and continued, “If you act like this, then why should I turn in more souls later? And what about all the other Fellow Daoists here? Why should they turn in souls if they can’t trust that they’ll be rewarded properly?!” The huge eye glittered as if in thought. After a few breaths worth of time passed, and even before Chen Hetian and the others could finish discussing the matter... a message appeared within the identity medallions of all cultivators of the five legions.

“Bai Xiaochun has been promoted to the rank of major general!” The true spirit had gone over the heads of Chen Hetian and the generals to directly report the matter to the Starry Sky Dao Polarity Sect!