Pursuit of the Truth

Su Ming looked at the changes in his body calmly, taking noted of how he was turning into a bat as his body rotted away and disintegrated. He felt the wings rapidly growing out of his back, and with a whoosh, those wings unfolded behind him. Once they were stretched out, it showed up that they were hundreds of feet long. This gave Su Ming a strange, enchanting air.

’A bat…’ He smiled faintly. This caused him to remember the Fire Berserkers and the Wings of the Moon, which he saw when he was still young.

’The outward appearance is rather similar, but what is inside is completely different.’ Su Ming closed his eyes and did not bother about the changes in his body. He continued letting time pass by.

He had no idea how much time had passed, but when he opened his eyes once again, his body had turned completely into that a big black bat.

It felt incredibly real, so real that even Su Ming could not help but feel slightly shaken.

’The bat, just like the one I saw on the right palm of that malicious ghost when I was outside Dao Avenue Mountain. However, illusions of this level aren’t strong enough to affect my intellect.’

Light flashed past Su Ming’s eyes. He let out a cold harrumph, and the sun, moon, and stars in his eyes spun rapidly. Immediately, he shuddered, and flesh as well as blood rapidly grew back on his body.

From the distance, he looked to be rapidly changing from the bat into a human. The process lasted for only the span of a few breaths, and at the instant Su Ming stood up, he was no longer a bat, but had returned to his original body.

Almost at the instant he did that, the ground, which Su Ming knew was really a gigantic palm, trembled, and he sensed something familiar. The five fingers of the palm were rapidly furling back with loud booming sounds, intending to crush his body inside the palm.

’Since it’s an illusion, then I’m omnipotent in this place.’

A glint shone in Su Ming’s eyes. He leaped up from the ground and charged towards the sky at full speed. As he rushed up, the world rumbled.

The first finger charged towards Su Ming from above. That finger replaced the sky, and as it descended on him, it closed in on him instantly. Su Ming’s expression remained calm, and when he lifted his right hand, a sun manifested in the air. When he extended his left hand, the moon appeared. As he moved forward, starts began to follow after him. He had used the Illusion of Stars, Sun, and Moon to its full extent.

Boom!

Su Ming pushed his right hand against the first finger that was descending on him. As loud booming sounds reverberated in the air, the finger was bounced thousands of feet away. Then, the second finger, which was right behind the first, came down on Su Ming.

Boom! Boom!

The sun and moon in Su Ming’s hands rotated as they crashed into the second finger. It was bounced off after the clash, and Su Ming became even faster. As he flew up, the third and the fourth fingers swiftly came down on him.

”Stars, sun, moon!”

Su Ming swung his arms forward, and the sun in his left hand as well as the moon in his right hand accompanied by the stars behind him rushed out together to crash against the two gigantic fingers.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Loud bangs surged into the sky. As the weather changed, the two fingers trembled so violently that they froze for a moment. Su Ming rushed out swiftly. Just as he was about to fly out of the ground made of that palm, the thumb descended swiftly on him as if the sky had collapsed.

The whistling sound was piercing to the ears. At the instant the thumb descended, the Divine Essence Runic Symbols immediately appeared around Su Ming’s body. They gathered on him, turning his body into a sharp sword that thrust forward at the incoming thumb.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

The world trembled. The sword pierced through the incoming thumb, but did not bring with it any blood.

Su Ming rushed out of the gigantic palm. At the instant he did so, he felt as if he had broken free of some sort of shackles. The runic symbols around him disappeared, revealing his body, and he looked downwards...

A smile appeared on Su Ming’s face.

He saw Dao Avenue Mountain, the five older members of the Yu Family sitting cross-legged not too far away while meditating, and also Yu Chen Hai.

At that moment, Yu Chen Hai’s face was filled with excitement. As for the five older members of the Yu Family, their faces were dark and sullen.

Su Ming smiled faintly. His body shrank swiftly, but at the instant he descended, his expression changed. A gentle voice spoke slowly by his ears.

”All beings in the world possess life. These forms of life cannot live long. However, my race unraveled the secret of nature by coincidence. If we offer up lives, we can obtain eternal life.

”Those who clear the Three Gates of Heavenly Dao can obtain eternal life. Thou hast cleared the first gate, and I shalt bestow upon thee the Art of Vitality, allowing thee to take others’ life to allow thyself to possess limitless life.”

The voice was coming from the mouth of the malicious ghost of Dao Avenue Mountain. When its word entered Su Ming’s ears, they turned into a vortex in his heart. This vortex turned slowly, and a great amount of life force spread out faintly from within it.

Su Ming was momentarily stunned.

During the time he was stunned, he descended from the sky and landed on the ground.

Yu Chen Hai immediately took a few steps forward and went before him. He bent his back to bow to him with an excited expression on his face, but just as he was about to speak after he bowed, his expression changed drastically.

”Senior Su, you… you…”

Yu Chen Hai’s voice turned into a shrill scream of pain in the blink of an eye. He retreated swiftly, and as he moved back, his body began decaying rapidly. Within an instant, he had already rotted away until he was only bones. When Su Ming looked over, Yu Chen Hai’s body completely shattered and turned into ashes.

Wisps of life force surged rapidly into Su Ming’s body. This life force contained years of life, and an indescribable feeling immediately rose in Su Ming’s body.

He could sense clearly that his life had become even more exuberant, but his expression changed. This was not what he wanted. In fact, he did not even want to kill Yu Chen Hai.

’How could this be? This is…’

Su Ming looked at Yu Chen Hai remains with a dumbfounded gaze. He spread his Atman outwards and found that he truly could not sense Yu Chen Hai’s presence anymore. All of this was telling him that… Yu Chen Hai had truly died.

At the instant Su Ming was shocked by this scene, the expressions of the five older members of the Yu Family in the distance changed drastically. They stood up swiftly and disbelief appeared on their faces, as if they did not expect that Su Ming would kill someone, and Yu Chen Hai, at that.

”How dare you kill a person of the Yu Family?! What nerve!” As the expressions of the five people changed, four of them charged towards Su Ming quickly. The other person lifted his right arm and swung it towards the sky. Immediately, the sky rumbled, and a layer of blood-red clouds appeared. These clouds came out of nowhere. In the blink of an eye, they turned into gigantic letters that formed the word ’Jade’ in the sky.

This was a clearly a signal to notify the other members of the family.

All of these things were happening too quickly and too suddenly. Su Ming was completely unprepared for it. At that moment, the four people closed in on him with low shouts. However, he moment they did so and Su Ming looked towards them, the four let out shrill screams of pain. With shock and pain on their faces, they immediately gave up on moving forward and instead retreated rapidly.

They had only retreated dozens of feet backwards when their bodies began decaying rapidly, like what had happened to Yu Chen Hai. In an instant, they turned into ashes, and their life force surged into Su Ming’s body, allowing Su Ming to experience that comfortable feeling of his vitality becoming even more exuberant while he was still at a loss.

This comfortable feeling was enough to make a person addicted to it. It was a feeling that was difficult to describe with words.

The only old man left had a pale expression on his face at that moment. As he retreated swiftly, long arcs appeared around him. They were the members of the Yu Family rushing over after they had seen the blood clouds.

’How can this be..?’

Su Ming held back the indescribably comfortable feeling in his body. He could already feel a slight addiction to it, which made him eager to obtain even more of it, but he held himself back forcefully.

’There’s something wrong with the power in me!’

Su Ming gritted his teeth hard and flew up to charge into the sky. He instinctively wanted to leave the place.

However, by the time he flew up, the members of the Yu Family had already arrived. Nearly one hundred people surrounded the area, and all of them charged towards Su Ming. Yet the moment they closed in on him, shrill screams of pain immediately escaped the lips of everyone within three thousand feet around him. While they screamed, their bodies turned into ashes. Wisps of life force surged into Su Ming’s body, and he could not help but let out a roar towards the sky as that comfortable feeling appeared in him again.

’Just what is this power?!’

Su Ming could feel that he had lost some control over his own body. He gritted his teeth again and rushed forward, but almost one thousand members of the Yu Family had come to surround him. While seething in anger, they executed numerous divine abilities.

”Don’t come here, leave!” Su Ming roared, but it was already too late. At the instant the near one thousand people around him got close to him, they let out screams of pain and turned into ashes. The comfortable feeling in Su Ming’s body seemed to have stirred up a windstorm in his mind, and it lost some of its clearness. The shadow of the gigantic bat appeared around him right away.

That shadow seemed to be laughing ferociously as it was forming swiftly.

Su Ming pressed his hands against his head, and red appeared in his eyes. The light shining in them was filled with greed and madness. His body swayed abruptly, and he immediately rushed towards the incoming members of the Yu Family.

Wherever he went, shrill screams of pain would ring in the air endlessly. The comfortable feeling in his body grew even stronger, and the shadow of the bat behind him became clearer.

However, the struggles in his heart also reached the peak at that instant.

’Something’s not right, could it be that I’m still in the illusion?!’ Su Ming’s face filled with a ferociousness. He forced his body to stop, and he trembled.

…..

Beyond Dao Avenue Mountain in Yu Family’s square within Black Ink Planet was Yu Chen Hai with a nervous expression on his face. At that moment, he saw a faint light shining on the bat in the malicious ghost’s palm.

The five old men from the Yu Family beside him were as white as sheets. Around them, there were hundreds of people from the Yu Family who had arrived after hearing the ghost’s voice. All of them did not make a sound as they looked at Dao Avenue Mountain.

Yu Family’s middle-aged Third Family Elder had a calm expression on his face, but a brilliant light shone in his eyes as he looked at the shining bat. No one knew what he was thinking about.