Chapter 52: To Be One With Dao

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“Don’t,” Lu Yun blurted out as Yuying trapped Formation Thirteenth with the Panorama of Clarity . “I’ll kill him myself!”

Yuying nodded and unfurled the painting . Formation Thirteenth fell to the ground, his energy constrained . The fear on his face was replaced by surprise when he heard Lu Yun’s words .

“You’re going to kill me yourself?” He c.o.c.ked his head derisively, despite the lingering fear in his heart . A qi realm cultivator wanting to kill an immortal? Hah!

Lu Yun ignored him and drew out a purple sword that glowed with an indistinct hue .

“Violetgrave!!” Formation Thirteenth cried out, stunned . Various situations up until now had made it plain that this sword was no ordinary ninth-rank weapon .

Swish .

Lu Yun slashed the man’s body and soul apart, and the soul that’d taken over Formation Thirteenth was devoured by the Gates of the Abyss . With another wave of the Dusk governor’s hand, a young man in his twenties, clad in green robes, reemerged to kneel before Lu Yun .

“Infernum Zhao Dianliang greets milord!” He was an unusually handsome and graceful man, manifesting utter n.o.bility with every movement . His expression, however, held nothing but humility .

“How do I extract the immortal fires from the three paintings?” Lu Yun cut right to the chase . He’d opted to make the man a nether soldier so that the third envoy spot remained open for Qing Han . This was his final option, in case all other attempts failed .

Moreover, Lu Yun couldn’t write Zhao Dianliang down in the Tome of Life and Death without his actual corpse . Given that, Lu Yun couldn’t access his new soldier’s memories and knowledge, so he had to settle for good old fas.h.i.+oned questioning instead .

“Draw the fires out with a more powerful flame!” Zhao Dianliang answered immediately . He was merely an august immortal, but he held a special position in the Exalted Immortal Sect . Thus, highly-regarded, he knew of even the top secrets in the sect .

“A more powerful flame?” Lu Yun frowned .

“There’s an extremely powerful fire in your dantian, sir!” Yuying said .

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Lu Yun was reminded of the strange black flame . “That’s right!”

The black fire in his dantian came from the Tome of Life and Death, so it couldn’t be anything but powerful . When he used his death arts, he wasn’t tapping into his own energies, but the black flame instead .

The nine shadowy dragons surrounding the book had disappeared . They’d been crushed by the Tiger Prince earlier, and the pieces left behind were devoured by the black fire . That had fueled Lu Yun’s qi and allowed him to break through in one fell swoop .

His mind made up, Lu Yun entered the Gates of the Abyss with Yuying and Zhao Dianliang . He needed the power of the netherworld to release the fire in his body .

Whoos.h.!.+

Black flames were suddenly burning furiously in Lu Yun’s hands . Yuying and Zhao Dianliang stumbled backward, too fearful to look at the fire head-on .

The three paintings that exceeded ninth-rank hovered in front of the young man and unfolded in their entirety . The Panorama of Clarity was a traditional ink painting of natural landscapes, the Portrait of Emptiness sketched different walks of life, and the Profile of Harmony depicted a vast blue sky .

Setting his black fire near the three paintings, Lu Yun could sense the three immortal fires within .  Emerald Mistfire, Lucent Voidfire, and Daevic Skyfire! They seemed to be sentient and clung to the paintings when they sensed the black flame, refusing to emerge .

“I wouldn’t be able to do anything to you if I was outside, even if I exhausted all of my qi . Here on my home turf, however, my wishes are your command . Come forth!” he growled . Two black flames blazed in his eyes as ripples undulated throughout the netherworld .

Swoos.h.!.+ Swoos.h.!.+ Swoos.h.!.+

Palm-sized flames of green, blue, and yellow burrowed out from the paintings and hovered in the air . Lu Yun exhaled lightly . “How long did that take?” he asked with a half-turn .

Yuying made some quick calculations . “Seven days . ”

Good thing we’re within the Gates of the Abyss .  Seven days had pa.s.sed by in such a quick moment! With a push of his hand, he sent the three fires to Yuying . “You can have them . ”

“Thank you for your generosity, sir!” Yuying said, her eyes glowing .

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Emerald Mistfire was why the Panorama of Clarity could be used to refine pills . What mattered to Yuying was the fire, not the painting . There were a great number of treasures in this world that could store living beings and inanimate objects, as well as create an isolated s.p.a.ce, but flames were far more rare . She gladly transferred the three fires into herself .

Without the immortal fires sealing the three paintings, they began merging . Mysterious, glorious light radiated from them, illuminating the dark world within the Gates of the Abyss . They overlapped, their images superimposing and blending together .

After an indeterminate period of time, the light dissipated and an empty scroll fell into Lu Yun’s hands . There was nothing but a blank canvas, and the scroll itself looked quite ordinary .

“This is what the three paintings turned into?” Lu Yun stared at it in confusion .

Yuying and Zhao Dianliang were at a loss as well, and neither of them could tell what the newly formed treasure was . Another quick time calculation showed that another month had pa.s.sed .  

Thankfully, five weeks within the gates were still a moment mere outside .

“Screw it,” Lu Yun pressed his lips, “what have we got to lose?” Upon exiting the gates, they immediately ran back to where they came from .

“s.h.i.+t!” Lu Yun cursed when they approached the clearing . As Miao had predicted, the t.i.tanic undead hag was back . She’d completely lost it and repeatedly slammed into the floating summit, desire flooding her eyes .

He shook his head at the hag . “An undead hag is a kind of zombie that’s stuck between life and death, abandoned by both heaven and h.e.l.l . Even if you get the layout of resurrection, you won’t come back to life . ”

However, the crazed hag only had eyes for the resurrection layout .

Feinie had set up layers of formations to protect the floating peak . What had seemed like an inert object, the Formation Orb had gained a life of its own in Feinie’s hands and enveloped the summit with its light .

No matter how hard the undead hag tried, she couldn’t break through the orb’s formations .

However, Feinie was also left vulnerable to the hag’s attacks . Her complexion paled and blood trickled down the corner of her mouth . She’d reached the golden immortal realm before her death, but having fallen to true immortal now meant a gap in strength existed, one that was as wide as the status difference between an emperor and a beggar .

“Slug it a good one, fatty!” Lu Yun yelled at Li Youcai .

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“I—” In full control of his mental faculties, since Yueshen had left his body, the fatty hesitated at Lu Yun’s words .  Slug it a good one?

The Dusk governor wanted him to put all his strength into his attack and fully tap into the Seal of Mountains and Rivers . The seal was a special eighth-rank treasure, and could rival a ninth-rank treasure when used at full power . However, if he deployed it to those depths, he would exhaust all of his strength—just like Qing Han—and wouldn’t be able to move .

“Okay, but you have to cancel my engagement to that male pig!” The fatty was still fretting over that .

“Deal!” Lu Yun agreed immediately . “But you have to leave Mo Yi alone from now on . ”

“Deal!” Li Youcai grimaced . “Remember to get me out of here afterward!”

Bam!

The seal quickly grew into a towering mountain and slammed relentlessly into the undead hag .

The hag’s full attention was on the floating summit, so the sudden impact sent her flying and cras.h.i.+ng heavily into the walls of the cavern .

“Break her limbs!” Lu Yun yelled again . The undead hag couldn’t die, but breaking her limbs would at least temporarily immobilize her .

His jaw set, Li Youcai tapped into his reserves of strength and attacked the monster’s arms and legs, breaking them in quick succession . The monster screamed and struggled, the ugly wounds healing at a visible pace .

Blood gushed out of Li Youcai’s mouth, then he toppled to the ground .

“Don’t leave me behind,” he muttered before losing consciousness . The seal automatically returned to him .

“Don’t worry,” Lu Yun said, relieved . “I won’t . ”

Yueshen obediently attached herself to Li Youcai’s body and took over .

“This man is a rare talent as well . He somehow manages to preserve his vitality even after being possessed by the ghost of an immortal,” Miao muttered with a shudder . “All of these people are freaks . No wonder they could find my body and rescue me . ”

Feinie opened up her formation and allowed Lu Yun to ascend the floating summit . Miao trailed after him .

“What should I do?” Lu Yun turned to Miao with the empty scroll .

“That’s it!” Miao’s eyes lit up when he saw the painting . As a fox spirit who had lived a long, long life, he had more experience than most . “So the legends are real . The most perfect of art is one with dao . This is a depiction of all things between heaven and earth . It’s the supreme division of the universe!” His eyes grew increasingly brighter .

“Cut the c.r.a.p and tell me what to do with it,” Lu Yun said with furrowed brows . “The painting isn’t going to control Qing Han, is it?”

“It won’t . What possessed the true immortal wasn’t the Portrait of Emptiness itself, but the fire spirit within,” Miao explained . “The fire spirit became the spirit of the painting, but the painting itself wasn’t sentient . ”

“Since he’s unconscious, we can only employ the most basic method—use his blood to bind the treasure to him . Cut his wrist and let his blood drip onto the painting . But you have to consider this carefully, kid . ” The fox’s gaze at Lu Yun turned serious . “Even when the immortal dao was at its most prosperous a hundred thousand years ago, powerful immortals and daoists fought over this treasure . Are you sure you’re just going to give it to this ugly eyesore?”

“Treasure can be replaced, but a life is forever lost when someone dies . ” Lu Yun nodded and cut Qing Han’s wrist with his finger, directing the young man’s blood to drip onto the empty painting . “In my eyes, a friend is much more important than this .

“Humans are sentimental and loyal . We’re the type willing to risk our lives for our friends, it’s why we reign over all beings in the world . Your kind may be intelligent and powerful, but your strength is still below the human race’s,” he sighed .

Both Earth and the world of immortals might be plagued with greed, but people would never lose sight of their humanity—their bond with one another .

With Yuying and Feinie’s memories and experience, he was far from the clueless novice he’d been when he first arrived . He knew there were races other than the human race in this world . The monster spirit race, for example, had always been at odds with the human race, and Miao was one of them .

“Humans are loyal and willing to risk your lives for others?” Confusion clouded Miao’s eyes . “So this willingness to sacrifice yourselves is how humans drove my kind out of the fertile lands?”

Power was the only thing that mattered to his kind . No one would ever consider the safety of the others . They cared only about themselves, and the strong fed on the weak . This is why Miao had continuously failed to understand Lu Yun’s behavior along the way . An injured monster spirit would immediately be abandoned, or perhaps even eaten .

Lu Yun s.h.i.+fted his attention from Miao to Qing Han . A soft glow was wrapped around the young man like a blanket .

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