Pursuit of the Truth

When Su Ming moved out of the dimension, it was just as he had predicted, he appeared on the Spirit Trudging Platform on the second border. The platforms had reduced from six to five.

The white-robed teenager’s death was reflected on the five Spirit Trudging Platforms floating in space, and at that moment, it exuded a brutal air.

While in control of the body of the supreme treasure, Su Ming walked out calmly and sat down cross-legged on his platform.

There were three platforms that were empty at the moment. Zhu You Cai was the only one who had arrived before Su Ming. He sat quietly with his eyes closed.

Su Ming scanned the area and frowned slightly. The yellow-browed man and Reverend Zi Long had not yet come.

‘It’ll be even more brutal from the second border onwards due to the appearance of dimensions with supreme treasures and because there will be less dimensions the further we go. That’s why it’ll become a common sight for many people to appear in one dimension at the same time.

‘Because of that, the fight over the treasures will become very intense.’

Su Ming pondered over this. His goal was not the supreme treasures, but the core of the fifth kiln. He wanted to see whether Su Xuan Yi was there.

If he was, then everything would become clear, but if he was not… Su Ming wanted to know whether his other guess would be true. In fact, when he thought of this, his heart clenched in pain.

Because his second guess was that there was a corpse in the core of the fifth kiln. It would be of a woman who held onto her child before death and wanted to protect her baby even after she had died.

That person was a mother. One who was unfamiliar but somehow vaguely familiar to Su Ming.

In truth, in the depths of his heart, the memories of his mother far surpassed those about his father. After all, the illusion of the memory he saw in Western Ring Nebula’s foreign ring had shocked his soul and caused him to be unable to forget even a single bit of it.

In silence, Su Ming quietly waited for the yellow-browed man and Reverend Zi Long’s arrival.

Time trickled by slowly. About two days later, two out of the remaining three Spirit Trudging Platforms suddenly shone brilliantly at the same time. This light attracted Su Ming’s gaze.

He saw two figures appear almost at the same time on the two Spirit Trudging Platforms. These two figures swiftly gained corporeal form, and several breaths later, when the light dissipated, Huang Mei and Zi Long came into view.

The yellow-browed man coughed up a mouthful of blood when he appeared. He staggered a few steps back and nearly stepped off his Spirit Trudging Platform.

As for Zi Long, his face was also pale, but the killing intent in his eyes was incredibly strong. When he appeared, he staggered back a few steps before he forced himself to stop, then he lifted his head and glared at the yellow-browed man.

When Su Ming saw this, he immediately came to an understanding. Clearly, these two had come to blows for a treasure, but Su Ming did not know… who had come out with a treasure.

However, based on Reverend Zi Long’s expression, an answer didn’t seem that hard to guess.

“Despicable!” Zi Long said slowly, his voice filled with frost.

“So what if I’m despicable?” The yellow-browed man wiped off the blood at the corners of his lips before laughing. That laughter was incredibly boisterous, and it looked like he found everything logical and as it was supposed to happen.

“As long as I get the treasure, it doesn’t matter if I’m injured by you!” As he spoke, the yellow-browed man lifted his right hand, and a jade bracelet appeared on his palm.

It was emerald green. Countless runic symbols were on it like small bumps. They surrounded the bracelet and spun around it, making the bracelet shine with a brilliant light. There was a powerful and mighty pressure that radiated off the treasure, and the others could not help but squint at it.

When Zi Long saw the bracelet, his expression turned even darker. He glared at the yellow-browed man coldly, but did not say another word. Instead, he sat down, closed his eyes, and exercised his breathing.

The yellow-browed man smiled and put away the bracelet. When he swept his gaze across the area, he ignored Zhu You Cai and looked at Su Ming. An amiable expression appeared on his face before he nodded with a smile.

He did not even bother asking about Flame Fiends’ Progenitor!

‘He’s searching for an ally.’

Su Ming knew this in his heart. If the yellow-browed man was not injured, he would definitely not let Su Ming off so easily for not having Flame Fiends’ Progenitor by his side, but since he was injured, he avoided this and expressed amiability towards Su Ming with the intention to work together with him.

As for Zhu You Cai, he was clearly ignored by the yellow-browed man, making it clear that he had misjudged the situation. Su Ming cast a glance at Zhu You Cai and discovered that this person had opened his eyes at some unknown point of time and was daydreaming while staring into space.

His appearance and the power he exuded made it understandable why others would not value him highly. However, after witnessing the scene in the dimension just then, Su Ming would definitely not underestimate him.

‘If my guess is correct, then among these people, the most frightening of them all… is not Yellow Brows or Zi Long… but this Zhu You Cai!’

In truth, among the three, Zhu You Cai’s attitude was pretty unclear, but Su Ming was about eight-tenths certain that his guess was true. This person definitely had some form of connection with Chang He, the owner of Life Inequity Spear, but he did not know how great was that connection.

As for Zi Long and Huang Mei, Su Ming leaned more towards Zi Long. The yellow-browed man might seem frank and straightforward, but Su Ming could sense an indistinct sinister air about him.

As Su Ming was immersed in his thoughts, Reverend Zi Long opened his eyes and stood up. Once he swept his gaze across the area, he lifted his right foot and stepped near the edge of the Spirit Trudging Platform.

A bang shot into the air, and it instantly echoed in all directions. Once that sound rang out, the yellow-browed man’s expression changed.

“All of us are already here, so why waste any more time lingering around this place? Let’s head to the dimensions between the second and first borders.” When Zi Long said these words, the space in front of him distorted, and a huge vortex appeared before him.

This vortex was naturally the tunnel leading to the dimensions between the second and first borders.

Almost the instant the Spirit Trudging Platform under Zi Long’s feet let out that loud bang, Fire Spirits roared in the space all around them, coming from afar. Clearly, the loud bang in the area had attracted their attention, and they were rushing over.

The roars drifted about, but there were only two explanations to the appearance of this sound within the spacious and empty space. One, there were few Fire Spirits that were coming forth, which was why the voice was so faint, but there the other possibility was that they were so large in number that their roars had begun echoing already, which was why this sound had formed.

“You were saying that I was despicable, but your action right now is the same as cutting down the time we use to regulate our breathing. If you’re just targeting me, you could have just said a word. Why did you have to trouble this fellow Daoist and fellow Daoist Zhu? You must know that the dimensions between the second and first borders are incredibly dangerous, and each additional breath we have to rest is incredibly rare,” the yellow-browed man said in a ghastly manner after letting out a cold harrumph.

Zi Long looked over coldly.

“You talk too much. If you want to stay, then stay. The one who doesn’t have time to regulate their breathing isn’t them, but you.” A fierce glare shone in Reverend Zi Long’s eyes, and he turned around to walk towards the vortex that had appeared beside his Spirit Trudging Platform.

A barely noticeable glint shone in Su Ming’s eyes. He did not feel any form of aversion to Zi Long’s actions. If Su Ming was in his place, he would have definitely done the same thing.

Zi Long’s injuries were lighter when compared to those of Huang Mei, which was why he could heal most of his injuries after just regulating his breathing for a few moments. As for Huang Mei, the most important thing for him was time, and he needed quite a bit of it to be able to recover.

Zi Long’s action of walking out of the Spirit Trudging Platform early and stirring up such a loud bang cut down on the time Huang Mei needed. This was a blatant plot against him, and it was done in an incredibly straightforward manner.

Once Zi Long left, Zhu You Cai also stood up slowly. After a single step, booming sounds came from the Spirit Trudging Platform where he stood. Once a vortex manifested beside him, he did not even spare a glance at Huang Mei before stepping in and disappearing without a trace.

Fire Spirits’ roars echoed in the air, and they were getting stronger. They arrived in no time, and it could be seen that the air around them was tumbling rapidly, exuding a presence that made it seem as if it wanted to devour the sky and earth.

Su Ming looked at the sullen looking yellow-browed man and put on an apologetic expression. He wrapped his fist in his palm towards Huang Mei and opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but in the end, it only turned into a sigh.

Huang Mei frowned, but he still nodded towards Su Ming. After all, he had already offended Zi Long from the four of them here. As for Zhu You Cai, he completely ignored him. If Su Ming had not expressed goodwill to him, he would have just started plotting on how to kill him so that he could prevent him from working together with Zi Long.

However, when he saw Su Ming’s expression, he forced down the other thoughts in his head. The idea of getting closer to Su Ming and forming an alliance rushed to the forefront.

Once Su Ming bowed to Huang Mei, he lifted his foot and stomped on the Spirit Trudging Platform. When a booming sound traveled through the air, a vortex appeared beside him. Su Ming cast an apologetic look at Huang Mei again, then stepped into the vortex and disappeared.

When the yellow-browed man could no longer see him, the apologetic look on his face disappeared, replaced by an aloof expression.

Since everyone was scheming against each other, Su Ming would naturally not face them head-on. The apologetic look just then was completely fake, since his goal was to have the yellow-browed man attempt to draw him to his side. Because of that, Su Ming’s existence would become incredibly important to Zi Long and Huang Mei.

Besides, since Su Ming knew some details about Zhu You Cai and they had interacted in the previous dimension, Zhu You Cai was at the very least much better than Huang Mei and Zi Long.

Su Ming chose to stand in a spot where he would not lose.

How could he dance around in circles among these powerful warriors and obtain the greatest benefits? With Su Ming’s intelligence, he could stand on equal grounds when in a fight against the scheming, calculative, and farsighted people.

‘We’re already very close to the core of the fifth kiln…’ Su Ming felt his life force flowing away in the vortex and looked at the chaotic state within it while resolve and a wave of longing rose in his heart.

He wanted to use the fastest speed he could muster to reach the core of the fifth kiln and see… whether… the mother he saw in his memories was there.

The complicated feelings, those of anxiety and longing, caused Su Ming’s heart to be slightly unable to calm down.

When Su Ming stepped out of the vortex with these thoughts and moved into a new dimension, they were all chased away from his heart by the sight before him. A fierce glare instantly appeared in his eyes.

In the dimension, he saw Zi Long and Zhu You Cai. These two people were the same as Su Ming at that moment, staring at the ground. Their expressions changed, and a solemn look that had never appeared before showed up.

There was a mountain that towered into the clouds on the ground. It was blue from an endless blue light that enveloped it. On the mountain, there was a stone platform that was about several dozens of feet big and held an iron scroll!

“In this book is an Art, the name of which is… Mountain Shifter,” an ancient voice said from the top of the mountain, its words echoing throughout the whole dimension.