Pursuit of the Truth

The Vast Expanse was beyond Harmonious Morus Alba, and due to the existence of the gap, it filled the place with a large amount of aura from the universe beyond. It crashed against Harmonious Morus Alba’s world and formed… the booming sounds that would never disappear.

In the gap was a huge ship. A figure could be seen sitting cross-legged at its bow. The person was dressed in a gray long robe, which had a toad with a dragon head embroidered on it.

That picture had never been seen in Arid Triad, Harmonious Morus Alba, or Dark Dawn as well as Saint Defier. It was a picture that did not belong to any of them!

The person dressed in the gray long robe was an old man. He had his head lowered, which hid his face. The only thing that could be seen was his long gray hair. He was only described as an old man because when anyone cast their gaze on him, they would sense the ancient presence coming from his person. It was the most direct feeling that would cause others to think he was an old man.

Once the three black-robed men saw the old man in gray, they knelt down and worshiped him.

“Master, after he devoured seven-tenths of Dark Dawn’s Expanse Cosmoses, he entered the third marked board. He’s at the first layer right now. We’ve already spread the rumors based on your instructions in the Expanse Cosmoses whose wills he devoured,” one of the black-robed men said with a low, respectful tone.

“It’s still not enough…” After a long while, an old voice came from the gray-robed figure sitting on the ship.

It had a strange accent. The old man might have been speaking in the language used by all the lives in Arid Triad and Harmonious Morus Alba, but he seemed to not want to change his native accent, causing all those who heard it once to never be able to forget it.

The black-robed man remained silent for a moment before he spoke. When he did, a grim and murderous expression appeared on his face. “Yes! We’ll immediately go back and continue spreading rumors about this matter. As for Saint Defier… we’ll pretend to be this person and devour the wills of the Expanse Cosmoses in Saint Defier’s camp. We’ll even begin killing them.”

Once he finished speaking, his body immediately disappeared. The other two black-robed men beside him also disappeared with murderous looks on their faces. When they vanished, the ship sank into silence, but it was accompanied by the constant rumbles in the area, which never stopped.

In the relative silence, the gray-robed old man on the huge ship slowly lifted his head to reveal… a face with blue eyes. He was not at all old, but appeared to be nearing his middle age.

“When one Harmonious Morus Alba is destroyed, an anomaly will definitely appear! This is a destiny all nine Harmonious Morus Albas cannot escape… This butterfly is bound to perish in this aeon, and it means… that the strongest person of all aeons the butterfly has lived through will appear in this aeon!

“He’ll be just like me in the past…” the gray-robed man mumbled. A tormented look of nostalgia appeared on his face. He lifted his right hand and clenched his fist tightly.

“Since they will be the strongest of all aeons in this Harmonious Morus Alba, external forces will be unable to destroy him. Only… by using Harmonious Morus Alba’s own strength… will I be able to seal this person!

“I will seal you. Only once I seal you will I be able to fully execute my plan… How many times has it been?”

As the gray-robed man mumbled under his breath, a thought-provoking smile suddenly appeared at the corners of his lips. He brought his right hand up and swung his arm outwards.

With it, the rumbles in the Expanse Cosmos instantly grew much louder. At the same time, his ship gradually became indistinct amid the loud booms until it completely disappeared.

But it did not mean that the ship had left into the distance. Instead, it had hidden itself.

…..

Su Ming lifted his right hand and swung his arm. With a bang, violent gusts of wind howled in the first layer of Old Man Extermination’s tomb. They charged towards the thunder and rain and crashed into them, resulting in a loud bang. Ripples spread through the sky and made it tremble nonstop.

It was a sky plagued by thunderstorms.

As the wind Su Ming stirred crashed against the thunder and rain in the sky, a huge whirlwind appeared. Su Ming stepped into it, but when he touched it, booming sounds shot into the air, and the whirlwind disintegrated.

“This is the ninth time!” Su Ming stood in the thunderstorm and stared at the disintegrating vortex before he turned his head to cast a glance at Zi Ruo.

There was a gentle screen of light around Zi Ruo’s body. It blocked off the rain from touching her. At that moment, she looked at Su Ming with a slightly strange expression on her face. The whirlwind should have served as the entrance to the second layer, but they encountered them eight times before the last one, and to no avail. Each one was supposed to lead them out, but when Su Ming touched them, they would disintegrate.

It was the ninth time it had happened.

“This is…” Zi Ruo did not know what to say.

“Since there is someone who does not want to make my journey smoother and to let me step into the second layer, then…”

Su Ming cast a glance at the sky around them. He had long since noticed that there were spirits residing in the air. There were quite a number of them, hidden around them while they stared at Su Ming and Zi Ruo with greed.

“Then I will use my own method to open a gap.”

When Su Ming said those words, he lifted his right hand and seized the air in the direction of the sky. With it, the sky roared. The thunderstorm instantly tumbled backwards, causing the rain to shudder. Shrill screams swiftly rang out in the sky.

They came from all the spirits around Su Ming who had been staring at him with greed. Once Su Ming seized the air, they were forced to show themselves, as if Su Ming’s right hand had turned into a vortex that instantly sucked all of them towards him.

Su Ming let out a cold harrumph and spread out his will. His will instantly swept out in all directions and filled the raining sky, cloudy sky, snowing sky and all the other sorts of skies. He made them gather together, and the entire sky roared. All the spirits were herded by Su Ming’s will towards him. They had to come, because Su Ming’s will was like a death scythe. If they did not go towards him, they would surely die.

As the spirits in the sky continued gathering around him, their numbers gradually increased to an astonishing degree. Slowly, they grew to an amount where people could no longer calculate their numbers. Su Ming then pushed down with his right hand. With it, the innumerable spirits in the area charged towards him. They formed a whirlwind that was visible to the eye.

The whirlwind was shaped like a cone. At the instant it appeared, the booming sounds grew deafening. The whirlwind became larger and continued stretching to the area beneath them, as if it had turned into a spinning top.

As the booming sounds echoed in the air, visible distortions appeared in the area below them. Cracks instantly appeared, but they swiftly closed up. However, as the booming sounds became louder and the spirits continued swimming in the whirlwind while shuddering because Su Ming’s will forced them to do it regardless of all costs, the mending of the cracks could no longer catch up to the rate they appeared. Cracking sounds rang out, and as more cracks appeared, the sky was drilled open.

Doing such a thing was not difficult to Su Ming. He only drove all the spirits to move, forcing them to break open the sky. However, when Zi Ruo saw this, her breathing quickened. Her pupils constricted, and a hint of shock appeared on her face.

This was the first time she saw Su Ming’s true power, though she was a little unsure whether what he showed at that moment was truly the limits of his strength. After all, based on Su Ming’s expression, he looked incredibly relaxed… but to Zi Ruo, being able to manipulate all the spirits in the first layer already exceeded the limits of her imagination.

After all, while the spirits varied in strength, the powerful ones were extremely troublesome existences that could even make those in Avacaniya Realm frown. Yet right then, when she looked across the land, she found that there was no end to the spirits, and there were quite a large number of the powerful ones… but not a single one of them showed any signs of disobedience to Su Ming’s will. They were swimming around in the whirlwind, obeying his will to make the whirlwind become stronger.

This was enough to tell just how powerful Su Ming was. He terrified the spirits and made them tremble… but this was still not Su Ming’s limit. The impact of this truth was incredibly strong on Zi Ruo, causing her breathing to quicken, and when she looked at Su Ming, her desire to push him down reached its peak.

She gave up on the thought to tempt him, because the events before had already proved to her that those methods were ineffective. No matter how she tried to show off her beauty, it was nothing in Su Ming’s eyes. If that was the case, then it would be better for her to use other methods.

Zi Ruo forced down her excitement, and a hint of pink appeared in her eyes.

‘I can only use the Great Inversing Soul Art! Fortunately, I’ve already made my preparations before this. Judging by the time, the arrangements I made in the tribe should have already been activated.

‘Su Ming, I will definitely obtain you! Only the strongest of this aeon will be able to form the perfect life with me.’ Zi Ruo clenched her fists, and as she gave herself motivation, her expression grew more determined.

Su Ming did not know what Zi Ruo was thinking, but when he saw the determined look on her face, a crease appeared between his eyebrows. He constantly felt that this woman only had beautiful looks but no brains, but based on logic, it was impossible for a stupid person to reach Avacaniya Realm.

Yet Zi Ruo was constantly slow to react and daydreamed all the time. Yet right then, for some weird reason, she appeared determined. If she harbored any sort of killing intent, Su Ming would have been able to notice it, but no matter how he looked at it, the woman did not seem to want to kill him.

Since that was the case, he chose not to pay any attention to her. He averted his gaze and fixed his stare on the whirlwind. At that instant, it suddenly let out a bang, and the cracks filling the air suddenly increased in number. When loud booming sounds shot into the air, a huge gap was dug out by the spinning vortex.

At the instant the gap appeared, Su Ming swung his arm, and the vortex dissipated. The countless spirits in it elbowed each other as they rushed in all directions.

Su Ming took a step forward and charged into the gap.

Zi Rui quickly followed him. The two of them turned into two long arcs that instantly vanished into the gap into the second layer of Old Man Extermination’s tomb—the Layer of Earth.

At the instant he stepped in, Su Ming lifted his right hand without even looking around him. He seized the air above him, where the gap was, and when a great suction force spread out, the spirits who had dispersed swiftly come to a halt before they tumbled back towards the gap.

“Drill a hole through the second layer, and I will grant you freedom!”

As Su Ming’s voice echoed in the air, he seized the spirits with his right hand and pushed them towards the ground. With it, the spirits immediately started howling. They charged towards the ground in resignation and formed a whirlwind to drill open a hole through the second layer as well.