"Huh?"
After listening to Su Min's grim description, Lin Yao felt her entire body tremble, a cold dread seeping into her bones. This was too terrifying, the idea that an entire realm, a world just like hers, could be completely devoured, stripped of all life until it was a barren husk.
This couldn't even be described as merely horrifying anymore; it was an existential nightmare. If the so-called "god" those shadowy people spoke of was truly such an existence, she could already foresee the grisly fate that awaited this planet.
"Should I... should I go report this to my superiors? Ask for help from the global alliance?"
"No. Don't."
"Hmm? Why not?"
"The strongest person in your world's military is only at the Divine Transformation mid-stage. They're completely incapable of fighting against such an existence. Telling them would only spread panic and potentially alert the enemy to our awareness."
"Ah... I see."
Hearing Su Min's blunt assessment, Lin Yao could only shrink her neck slightly, the reality of their situation settling heavily upon her. Indeed, they hadn't been able to deal with that single corrupted sea monster back then, even with their ultimate weapon. Now that she had reached the Golden Core level and seen classified briefings, she knew the full, humiliating details of that failure. So she naturally understood the sheer, unimaginable terror of the unknown being Su Min described. But if all that awaited was despair, who knew what desperate, foolish actions people might take if they knew.
"Don't speak a word of what happened today to anyone. Just carry on with your duties as usual. It seems the Kirin's disappearance is indeed connected to them. Honestly, dealing with such a creature now, in my current state, would be troublesome... sigh..."
As she spoke, Su Min couldn't help but rub her temples in frustration, a rare show of vexation. But her words made one thing abundantly clear to Lin Yao: Su Min intended to take action herself, to face this threat. In that case, there really was no need to say anything to the authorities. After all, no one knew what desperate people might do if they learned their world was a ticking time bomb, and it could easily alert the enemy before they were ready.
Su Min had always adhered to the principle of either not acting at all or striking with a single, decisive, fatal blow. Unless circumstances forced her hand, she could endure and wait patiently until the perfect moment arrived.
"Just do what you need to do. Your primary task for me is pretty much complete. You're now a stable Golden Core cultivator, and that ring I gave you is still intact and undiscovered. There's nothing more I need to instruct you on."
If this had been the Lin Yao of the past, the inexperienced and emotionally volatile teenager, Su Min would have placed additional mental restrictions on her before leaving. Not because she didn't trust her loyalty, but because she had been too green, too susceptible to pressure or trickery back then. Now, however, things were different. With a solid Golden Core cultivation and having survived the legendary Nine-Nine Heavenly Tribulation, she had undoubtedly matured enough in both strength and mindset to be trusted.
"Understood."
Hearing Su Min's words, which carried a tone of finality, Lin Yao could only smile bitterly. The underlying meaning was clear: she was still too young, too weak, and for the time being, completely unqualified to participate in matters of this apocalyptic level. In fact, not just her, but the entire world was in the same boat, blissfully ignorant frogs in a well that was about to be boiled. But just as the atmosphere inside the room grew heavy with unspoken dread, a rapid, urgent knocking came from outside the door.
Bang, bang, bang!
The sharp, insistent knocking shattered the tense mood inside. Lin Yao glanced at Su Min in confusion, as the latter was currently sitting cross-legged on her bed, looking utterly unconcerned.
She had no idea how Su Min had silently entered this heavily guarded, high-security fortress, but it was clear she didn't want to be seen by anyone else. Yet, seeing how completely calm and unruffled Su Min remained, Lin Yao composed herself and opened the door. She remembered the last time she had freeloaded at her family's apartment, her parents hadn't been able to see or sense her at all.
As for Su Min's nonchalance, it was justified; the spiritual sense of the person outside was just a Foundation Establishment junior. There was no need to worry; they wouldn't be able to perceive her presence at all.
"Instructor Lin Yao, urgent news! A coastal town and its defensive outpost about 300 kilometers from here have been attacked by a large swarm of Filth Beasts. Reports from the survivors indicate the presence of one leader equivalent to a Golden Core cultivator. Right now, you're the highest-level and most suitable person in the fortress to handle this threat."
"Understood. Leave it to me."
Looking at the breathless messenger and quickly scanning the mission file he handed her, Lin Yao nodded without another word. Having survived the Nine-Nine Heavenly Tribulation, even in Su Min's era where Golden Core cultivators were more common, she would have been considered a dominant force on the battlefield.
Even though she was only at the early Golden Core stage, her actual combat power, bolstered by her special physique and the Netherworld Ghostfire, already surpassed many late Golden Core cultivators. She could easily crush those mindless Filth Beasts and even hold her own against a nascent Nascent Soul existence for a short time.
"Uh... Thank you, Instructor! Good luck!"
Watching the messenger salute and hurry away, Lin Yao glanced back over her shoulder at Su Min. The latter had already made herself completely at home, having opened the small fridge, taken out a bottle of ice-cold cola and a bunch of snacks, and settled back on the bed with a laptop, browsing the local internet.
"..."
Seeing that Su Min had absolutely no interest in the matter or any intention to offer advice, Lin Yao could only shake her head helplessly before rushing out. Soon after reaching an open landing pad on the fortress roof, she summoned her personal flying sword, stepped onto it with practiced ease, and shot into the sky, vanishing from the fortress and disappearing into the grey, polluted distance.
Meanwhile, back in the room, Su Min browsed through various news sites and social media with great interest.
"Tsk tsk, this world really isn't having it easy either. The constant attacks, the economic strain..."
She couldn't help but mutter to herself. Having just entered the Dao Comprehension stage, there was no immediate, pressing need for her to focus solely on cultivation. Her progress in solidifying her realm wouldn't improve drastically in a short time, and if things really went south with the hidden threat, she could always cut her losses and flee.
Tian Hao had already taken her specially prepared essence blood back with him, which would serve as a spiritual beacon, allowing her to triangulate her home world's position and return at any time. As for this world's entertainment and internet culture, while it couldn't captivate her as it once might have in a previous life, it was still somewhat novel and enjoyable to browse through.
Meanwhile, outside the fortress...
Lin Yao stood atop her flying sword, speeding through the sky towards the coordinates. At the Golden Core stage, her flight speed was already incredibly fast, far surpassing the need for the slightly complicated flight procedures and air traffic control of this world.
That was one reason why there weren't many traditional fighter jets developed here; high-level cultivators like her had no practical use for them. But today, as she flew over a sparsely populated mountain range, something utterly unexpected happened,
Whoosh!
In mid-flight, Lin Yao's honed instincts screamed a warning. She suddenly jolted, swerving sharply to the side in a gut wrenching maneuver. At the same time, a dark, cursed spiritual blade, silent and invisible to the naked eye, slashed through the air where her neck had just been. Had she reacted even a fraction of a second slower, she would have been decapitated instantly.
But the next moment, as she stabilized her sword, her expression darkened into a storm.
She had been surrounded.
By three people, materializing from concealed positions in a triangular formation.
"Three Nascent Soul cultivators at once? You really think highly of me."
Her eyes swept over the black robed figures encircling her, and her face turned grim. Their attire and the sinister aura they radiated made their origins obvious. And they had sent three people. Not one, not two, but three.
Three Nascent Soul cultivators. She couldn't tell their exact stages with a quick scan, but the pressure they emitted was immense. This was already far, far beyond her limits to handle. At that moment, as if on a silent cue, the three simultaneously took out formation flags and a dark, shimmering net, activating them to seal the space around her in place.
"There's a traitor? A leak?"
Lin Yao's expression grew even colder, her mind racing. It was clear what had happened. The mission order itself had followed proper procedure, so the original issuer likely wasn't at fault. But the information had been leaked somewhere along the chain. And this wasn't even a highly classified mission; too many people in logistics and command would have known about it.
"Escape! Back to the fortress!"
Without a moment's hesitation, Lin Yao turned and poured spiritual energy into her sword, attempting to flee back the way she came. She wasn't far from the fortress. If she could just get close enough, trigger the perimeter alarms...
These cultists were usually arrogant, but they never engaged in direct, protracted confrontations with the military's main forces. But the next instant, the space around her shimmered, and she felt a tangible resistance, like flying through syrup. The spatial blockade was complete.
Lin Yao's face froze, a bead of cold sweat tracing a path down her temple.
"Little girl, blame yourself for being too talented. The Nine-Nine Heavenly Tribulation, a Golden Core cultivator under thirty... Given a few hundred more years to grow, you'd undoubtedly become a significant hindrance to our master's grand design."
"It's them. The Chosen of the Abyss."
Hearing this, Lin Yao forced herself to stay calm, pushing down the rising panic as she narrowed her eyes at the figures surrounding her. Their words confirmed it.
"A great existence from ancient times, one who slumbers, older than the recorded history of this world."
Seeing her reaction, the three seemed in no particular hurry, confident in their trap. Lin Yao could now sense their cultivation more clearly, among them were two late Nascent Soul cultivators and one early Nascent Soul cultivator. And these weren't the kind of unstable Nascent Soul cultivators who had relied on dubious pills or shortcuts to break through; their auras were solid and deep.
With this lineup, even Su Min, when she was at the Golden Core stage, would have struggled immensely. Back then, even with a divine artifact like the Nanming Lihuo, her combat power, while formidable enough to challenge higher stages, wasn't nearly enough to face such an overwhelming disparity in numbers and raw power.
For the current Lin Yao, this was practically a death sentence. The space was sealed. She couldn't send out any spiritual messages or distress signals. But curiously, these people didn't seem immediately eager to attack and finish her off. Instead, the one who seemed to be the leader began trying to recruit her.
"What do you say? Your talent is wasted on these doomed mortals. Join us. Swear a soul oath to our master, and you'll become one of us. Greater power, secrets of the universe, the boundless starry skies, all will be within your reach."
Their voices were cold, devoid of emotion, as if offering a business proposition. A genius like her, with her unique physique and proven destiny, would be extremely useful if recruited. Whether as prime nourishment for their master upon his awakening or as a future enforcer and leader, she would be invaluable. In fact, she could even become the perfect weapon to spearhead the overthrow of the current, fragile world order.
After all, in all these years, their world had only produced one cultivator who had survived the Nine-Nine Heavenly Tribulation.
"Haah..."
Lin Yao took a deep, steadying breath, her mind working furiously.
She had sworn a soul oath before, to Su Min.
She knew just how absolute and binding they were.
But the restrictions Su Min had placed on her, while strict, were mostly geared towards preventing her from revealing her origins and capabilities. These people's demands, however, would undoubtedly require her to pledge her very soul to their "master," to become a slave to its will. There was no way she would ever side with them. Especially after what Su Min had just told her about the true nature of their kind.
Even the "master" they spoke of perfectly matched the description, a once-glorious expert who, in order to cheat death or transcend his limits, had severed much of his foundation and cultivation, now relying on devouring the life force and souls of living beings to restore himself.
"I have to go all out. There's no other choice."
Instead of answering, Lin Yao began silently circulating the spiritual energy within her dantian to its absolute limit, preparing to burn her essence blood and core foundation for a single, explosive attack to break through the spatial blockade. Su Min was still back in her room at the fortress. If she could just create a large enough spiritual disturbance, it would surely draw her attention. In fact, she didn't even necessarily need Su Min to personally intervene; just causing a noticeable blast would likely activate the fortress's long range detection arrays and alert the garrison.
"She's going to burn her foundation! Stop her!"
Naturally, such an obvious and violent surge of spiritual energy didn't escape the senses of three Nascent Soul experts. In the next moment, all three attacked simultaneously, no longer holding back, unleashing everything they had. Dark tendrils of energy, soul piercing needles, and a wave of corrosive mist shot towards her. After all, this girl was a renowned, once in a century genius. Even those so-called Heavenly Spirit Roots couldn't compare to her potential for destruction.
Never, ever underestimate a true genius's last, desperate stand.
It could be terrifyingly potent.
But the moment Lin Yao released the built up power, intent on igniting her essence blood, she froze.
Because at that exact instant, a strange, familiar, and immensely powerful force erupted from a hidden seal within her soul, instantly suppressing and swallowing the burning essence blood she had been about to sacrifice.
Then, the world before her eyes turned monochrome gray.
Sound ceased. The violent spiritual attacks speeding toward her came to a dead, absolute halt in mid air, frozen like insects in amber.
"!!!"
Lin Yao was utterly stunned, her mind reeling from the sudden shift.
But the next moment, a figure appeared before her as if stepping out of the fabric of space itself.
"It seems the automatic life saving measure I left within your soul seal was triggered. Three Nascent Soul cultivators, in matching uniforms and using coordinated techniques... Do you know which faction they're from?"
Su Min's calm, almost bored voice rang out in the absolute silence. The moment Lin Yao had begun burning her essence blood, the remote trigger Su Min had woven into the soul contract had flared. Given how geographically close they were to the fortress, Su Min had crossed the distance in the blink of an eye, arriving just in time to freeze the entire local space time with her Time Law.
"Haah... haah... Senior... you..."
Seeing Su Min appear so effortlessly, Lin Yao let out a shuddering sigh of relief, a profound, limb weakening sense of survival washing over her. She took a few deep, ragged breaths to calm her racing heart, then realized with surprise that she could still move and speak within this frozen space, unlike the last time.
After reaching the Dao Comprehension stage, Su Min's control over the Time Law had grown far more refined and precise. So she could selectively allow Lin Yao to move freely within the frozen time, a significant upgrade from before where everything was universally locked.
"They're the ones from the 'Chosen of the Abyss' I mentioned earlier. They're afraid I'll grow too quickly and become a threat, so they want to eliminate me before I can reach my potential."
"I see. An assassination squad."
Su Min's eyes narrowed slightly as she clinically studied the three frozen figures. In that moment, she deduced a crucial piece of information from their actions,
That "master" of theirs definitely couldn't awaken anytime soon. Otherwise, they wouldn't take such a huge risk, deploying three Nascent Soul assets for a public assassination on the military's doorstep, just to kill a single Golden Core cultivator. No matter how talented she was, she was still just a Golden Core cultivator. It would take her at least a couple of centuries to become a genuine threat to a Mahayana level being. Their urgency meant their master couldn't afford to wait that long. This was both good and bad news.
First, the good news: she now had a high chance of finding the Kirin, since she knew it was almost certainly connected to that being. A creature like that, upon awakening, would need vast amounts of high quality spiritual nourishment, and what would be higher quality prey than humans? Divine beasts like the Kirin.
Now, the bad news: if it couldn't awaken yet, then there was no question about its original power level.
It had to be at least a Mahayana stage cultivator, possibly even peak Mahayana, knocking on the door of Ascension. Otherwise, it wouldn't have needed to seal itself away so thoroughly and for so long, requiring such extreme measures to recover.
"Just act as if nothing happened. Fly straight to your mission coordinates and complete the task. As for these three... I'll take care of them. They won't be reporting back."
Su Min's voice was calm, but it carried a finality that brooked no argument. Now that she had this crucial information, she could afford to be a little more aggressive in her own investigation. She needed to wrap things up quickly and leave this world soon. If they couldn't even give a talent like Lin Yao a few centuries of grace, they certainly wouldn't give her, an unknown Dao Comprehension expert, that time.
In a few hundred years, with her aptitude and resources, she would at least be at the Unity stage, if not higher.
There was nothing for her to worry about from a mere Mahayana Fallen One at that point.
"Understood. Thank you for saving my life, Senior."
Lin Yao bowed deeply, her gratitude sincere, then turned and flew away without another word, following Su Min's instruction to the letter.
This would make it easier to avoid suspicion upon her return; she would simply have completed her mission as assigned.
And the moment she flew a certain distance away, beyond the range of the frozen zone,
Snap.
Time resumed its normal flow.
The three Nascent Soul cultivators were momentarily stunned, their senses reeling as they found Lin Yao simply gone, the spatial blockade they had erected silently broken. And standing calmly before them was an unfamiliar, breathtakingly beautiful woman who radiated an aura that made their souls tremble. But before their muddled minds could even process a coherent thought or form a question,
Crush.
A suffocating, world ending pressure descended upon them, compressing space itself, and then...
They were gone. Erased from existence. Not even dust remained.
Three Nascent Soul ants were nothing before a true Dao Comprehension expert, less than insects.
"They must have soul oaths preventing them from revealing secrets. Direct interrogation is pointless. I'll need to use a forbidden soul searching technique before their spiritual signatures completely dissipate. Maybe I can find some useful fragments in the corners of their memories, a location, a name..."
Looking at the empty space where the three black robed figures had vanished, Su Min mused silently to herself. There was no point in trying to interrogate them directly; the oaths would trigger and destroy their souls. She would have to resort to alternative, more brutal methods. With that thought, she vanished from the spot, the three dissipated spiritual essences somehow contained and taken with her.
==
🎉 A Special Shoutout to Magn0lia! 🎉
Guess what? I just received my very first Ko-fi donation, and it's from you! 🥹✨
I can't even begin to explain how much this means to me. As a writer/translator, seeing someone enjoy my work enough to support it literally makes my day, no, my whole week. So from the bottom of my heart: Thank you, Magn0lia! You're officially legendary. 💖
This little boost of motivation is going straight into fueling more chapters (and maybe some celebratory caffeine). Again, thank you so much for the support. Readers like you make writing this story even more worth it. 🥂
(P.S. You're now eternally on my "Top Tier Humans" list. Just saying.)