Jing Qian nodded slightly at her words. So, the sea demons of the Vast Sea truly court death themselves.
If these creatures treated the human race with such cruelty, then whatever he did to them would be more than justified.
As for the old white-shelled tortoise blocking their path, its name had long since appeared on Jing Qian's list of targets along his Spirit Subjugation Path.
Meeting it ahead of schedule only meant one thing: there would be no mercy.
His figure flickered and vanished as he slipped through the water toward the old tortoise.
At the same time, a surge of deadly Bone-Peeling Sword Qi burst forth, driven by the second-grade Yin Sword, strengthened by his many sword-related Heavenly Mandates, hidden, silent, and fatal.
But this tortoise happened to possess a special fate of its own: the Turtle Divination, allowing it to sense calamity and fortune.
In the depths of the void, it felt a terrifying wave of killing intent.
Instinct took over, and it retracted its head into its shell with a whoosh!
But at that very instant, a shadowy human figure appeared behind it and extended a finger toward its rear.
From another dimension, an invisible sword thrust forward with unstoppable force and pierced straight through.
Explosive sword qi erupted inside its body.
The old tortoise stiffened in agony; its intestines shredded, its inner shell torn apart. The pain was unbearable; it reflexively thrust its head back out in shock.
A split second later, another invisible sword light swept across its neck, cleanly severing its head.
The Yin Sword's second-grade power was devastating.
A torrent of turtle blood spurted out, but Jing Qian gathered every last drop through a spatial rift, storing it carefully.
The third Star-Seizer–level demon on his path had fallen.
From its death, he absorbed three hundred and forty years of lifespan, truly the gift of one of the longest-lived species.
Revealing himself, Jing Qian turned to Ao Run.
"Let's go. Take me to that hidden grotto."
He then flicked out several threads of spiritual silk, binding the tortoise's massive corpse, and began rising toward the surface.
On Dingyuan, Luo Tian was the first to notice the enormous carcass breaking through the waves.
"A White Realm Tortoise?!" he shouted in disbelief.
"That's top-tier material!
Chi-ye, if you bring me some more Great Sun True Flame, I can process this beast and brew a pot of Turtle Yang Soup, a supreme tonic among tonics!"
Jing Qian nodded, then turned to Ao Run.
"Dragon girl, if you'd be so kind, lead the ship for me."
With that, he and Luo Tian descended into the cabin once more to begin drawing in the next round of Great Sun True Flame.
This was their third fire connection, and Luo Tian absorbed twenty times more flame essence than the first time.
As he continued to cook and refine dishes with the True Flame, his understanding of its nature deepened steadily.
Now, with enough fire essence stockpiled, he dedicated himself entirely to preparing the White Realm Tortoise, simmering it into a grand cauldron of Turtle Yang Soup.
Soon, the whole team would dine again and gain another tremendous boost from his craft.
Meanwhile, Jing Qian took advantage of the downtime and leapt into the Sumeru Dimension.
This time, he did not enter the Void Realm, but the Blood River Grotto Heaven instead.
After its change of ownership and extensive reconstruction, the grotto had undergone a total transformation.
Its area had shrunk by half, and the environment no longer reeked of blood and decay. It now resembled a clean, open plain.
The one responsible for this massive overhaul was none other than the tireless Ghost Phoenix.
Only a third-rank great demon of its caliber could reshape an entire realm in such a short span of time.
Though the Ghost Phoenix remained under the control of Good Corn, it was still heavily influenced by Jing Qian himself.
"Lord Feng," Jing Qian asked, "is this grotto ready to support living beings yet?"
The Ghost Phoenix bowed its head.
"Almost, my lord. But the spiritual energy is still greatly depleted; most of it was devoured by the Void Realm. It can't yet sustain mid-third-rank cultivators for long."
Jing Qian nodded, then said,
"Feng Lord, as per my previous plan, divide the area into villages and build the basic living facilities.
This domain is about to welcome new inhabitants."
Using a third-rank Phoenix as a construction worker, only Jing Qian would think of that.
He flashed and appeared directly beneath the two grottoes.
There, a lone Fragmented Star hovered in space, faintly bleeding spiritual energy into the void. A thin boundary membrane was already beginning to take shape.
This Fragmented Star had been born from the leftover wreckage of the Yutuo Root Realm, compressed by Good Corn. After Jing Qian nurtured a core of spiritual energy, it advanced into a Fragmented Star.
That star will be an important component of Jing Qian's Sumeru power. Once its membrane finishes evolving and he makes some basic modifications, life will be able to survive there.
Cultivating grottoes and stars alike was one of the ways he built up his foundation. Strengthening his Sumeru power benefits him in every respect.
Jing Qian used the rank of his Lord of Myriad Sumeru to move the Blood River Grotto onto the Fragmented Star, gradually fusing the two. The forces of grotto and star blended with clever precision.
The Blood River Grotto merged into the star's membrane; the membrane completed its evolution, and thin layers of vital energy began to spread beneath the star's atmosphere.
Then, with a single gesture, he opened a huge spatial wormhole above the Fragmented Star. The other end connected to the seabed of the Vast Sea.
Tons of seawater were siphoned through that wormhole and transported onto the star. A gigantic suspended river appeared before Jing Qian; not long after, it formed a great lake on the star's surface.
For the first time, life appeared on that once-barren star.
Countless unfortunate sea creatures were swept by the suspended river into this brand-new world.
Jing Qian was effectively using the resources of the Yingfu Tu Realm to cultivate his own Sumeru world.
The ocean, trivial in ordinary terms, becomes an extraordinarily valuable resource when viewed from a realm-building perspective. If the Fragmented Star had to evolve an ocean itself, it would take hundreds of thousands of years and an enormous amount of vital energy.
Satisfied with his handiwork, Jing Qian maintained the water-pumping channel with constant expenditure of power, then slipped back into the present world.
The Vast Sea, manipulated by him, erupted into violent turmoil: surface subsidence formed a massive whirlpool. The Dingyuan rode the waves like a fish and sped away.
As the ship moved, Jing Qian opened one spatial wormhole after another in the sea floor, tapping more and more channels to siphon the Vast Sea. The more he opened, the faster he drew water.
In the process, even higher-grade marine life was swept away with the torrents.
Such dramatic action could not escape the notice of the major sea demons.
Inside the Vast Sea Dragon Palace, the gold dragon perched on the Dragon-Drawing Stake bellowed in fury:
"Even if he is a Pure Yang Disciple, he may not humiliate the dragonkind of the Vast Sea like this!"
"Go beat the Drum of Muster! Summon every dragon-child and grandchild to unite and resist this Pure Yang Disciple!"
Besides Jing Qian, the dragon girl Ao Run was startled by his grand gesture and couldn't help asking:
"Daoist, aren't you being a little too conspicuous? This will bring the sea clans together against you."
Jing Qian smiled faintly. He had anticipated exactly that result.
He answered: "Dragon girl, the Vast Sea's defenses aren't impenetrable, but they won't tolerate me sweeping through one lair after another forever."
"Sooner or later, they will notice I'm hunting Star-Seizer and above demons."
"Their gathering to make things difficult for me is expected."
"For me, the specific combatants matter less than the battlefield I choose."
"If I can lure many dragonkin out of their dens, all the better."
When he finished speaking, Jing Qian's Three-Life Eye opened slightly, sweeping across the entire Vast Sea.
Except for one strange corner that even his divine sight couldn't penetrate, every movement of the true dragons appeared before him as clear as daylight.
Because the Pure Yang Heir hadn't acted openly in the mortal realm for so long, everyone's perception of Jing Qian was wildly inaccurate.
The dragons of the Vast Sea still believed that by gathering a few powerful great demons, they could surround and suppress this "lower-third-rank" Pure Yang disciple, never realizing he had already dug their graves in advance.
Before long, the Dingyuan reached the location Ao Run had indicated.
The dragon girl led Jing Qian beneath the waves. As they swam, she explained,
"Back then, to suppress my mother, the Dragon God nearly exterminated my mother's people, the Merfolk Tribe.
He was a second-grade Dragon God, the strongest in all the Vast Sea. No one could stop him.
My mother could only hide the last survivors within a secret grotto, concealed here in the depths.
I only ask, Daoist, when you claim this grotto, please do not harm my people."
Jing Qian had no objection to that. He followed Ao Run into the hidden Merfolk Isle Grotto.
The grotto wasn't large, barely a third of the Blood River Grotto's current size.
Inside, rippling blue waters filled nearly the entire space.
A single sweep of Jing Qian's divine sight revealed only four merfolk women, human above the waist, fish below, each extraordinarily beautiful but no stronger than the seventh rank.
Ao Run clearly knew this place well. She swiftly gathered the four little mermaids and led them outside, leaving Jing Qian alone within the grotto.
She was wagering everything she had.
A second-grade spirit treasure and an entire grotto heaven, either one could anchor the fortune of the entire Merfolk race, and she had staked both in one move, trading them for a chance to claim her own path to transcendence.
Only if Jing Qian truly won her the Vast Sea Dragon Palace and mastery over the true dragon clan would her gamble yield its return.
In the entire Yingfu Tu Realm, no one but Ao Run, who had once personally witnessed the might of the previous Pure Yang Heir, would dare risk such a colossal investment.
After all, the apparent difference in power between them was absurd.
On one side stood a mere seventh-rank cultivator who had not trained for long; on the other, the dragon clan, rulers of the Vast Sea, commanding countless living beings. On paper, the outcome was obvious.
But every Dao Scion of a great ancestral lineage existed to overturn common sense.
All rules were made for such people to break.
Jing Qian's task, like that of every Pure Yang Heir before him, was simply to impose his will utterly upon his enemies.
When he activated Sumeru and began transferring this new grotto into another dimension, twelve true dragons gathered in the Vast Sea Dragon Palace.
Each of these noble-blooded dragon scions was a direct child or grandchild of the late Dragon God, and none was weaker than the Star-Seizer realm.
The eldest prince, Ao Zhen, possessed the highest cultivation, third rank, Heaven-Mending Realm, and had already subdued the Dragon-Drawing Stake, effectively making him half a Dragon God himself.
Once all his brothers had assembled, Ao Zhen addressed them:
"The new Pure Yang Heir seeks to imitate his predecessor, descending into our Vast Sea to temper himself, treating our sea tribes as prey and our kin as his meat.
Already three of our comrades, Mud Tuo Dragon, Tide Coral, and White Realm Tortoise, have fallen by his hand.
Now that the Pure Yang disciple uses the power of his grotto to plunder the Vast Sea's resources, draining our realm's foundation. Such behavior cannot be tolerated!
I have called you all here so that, united, we may suppress this so-called Pure Yang disciple.
This matter concerns our dragon race's very standing; it is the key turning point since our father, the Dragon God, fall.
Brothers, lend me your strength!"
Ao Zhen's speech was passionate and clear.
But dissent rose among the ranks. The seventh prince, Ao Yuan, stepped forward and barked:
"Elder brother, are you mad to even think of opposing a Pure Yang Heir?
Have you forgotten the sword with which Ren Chong slew our father?
Or the recent battle where Shangxi displayed his strength against the Saints of the Ancient Demon Sea?
Even bound together, we would not survive a single stroke from him!"
"You beat the Drum of Muster, so I came, but if you truly plan to make trouble for the Pure Yang disciple, don't expect me to obey your command!"
Ao Yuan clearly suffered from serious Pure Yang PTSD; he hadn't even bothered to ask about the new heir's rank before refusing.
And he wasn't alone. Many other dragon sons shared the same thought.
In the end, not a single one stepped forward to support Ao Zhen's call.
Facing this awkward silence, Ao Zhen's face darkened, and he said coldly:
"I'm not a fool; I don't intend to kill the Pure Yang disciple.
But right now, Ao Run has attached herself to him, left her own palace, and follows at his side.
You all know her temperament. If she convinces him to fight for her and seize the Vast Sea Dragon Palace, what then?
I merely want us to stand together to pressure the Pure Yang Heir into withdrawing from our inheritance struggle.
This concerns every one of us. Don't lose your nerve when it matters most."
In the eyes of the dragon clan, Ao Run was nothing short of a ticking time bomb.
She bore an irreconcilable hatred toward her kin, and now she had the backing of a terrifyingly powerful Pure Yang Heir.
The dragons neither dared to kill her nor wanted to accept her.
Her aligning herself with the current Pure Yang Heir was the last thing any of the dragon princes and grandsons wanted to see.
The competition for succession among them, though fierce, was still a struggle of paths, not life and death.
But if Ao Run gained power, then blood would surely be spilled.
"Ao Hua, what's your take?"
Ao Zhen turned to ask.
Ao Hua was one of only two third-rank dragons within the clan, his status second only to Ao Zhen's.
The massive azure-scaled dragon snorted and spoke:
"Elder Brother speaks reason, this matter must be handled.
But as the one who commands the Vast Sea Dragon Palace, you're already half our leader. You can't expect to hide behind your brothers, can you?
If you take the lead in confronting this Pure Yang Heir, we'll naturally follow."
Ao Zhen cursed inwardly but found himself cornered.
"Fine then," he said aloud. "It's settled. I'll not fall behind any of you."
"The Pure Yang Heir and Ao Run are not far. Brothers, come with me!"
The golden dragon coiled around the Dragon-Drawing Stake let out a thunderous roar, rising into the air and stirring waves a thousand fathoms high.
One after another, eleven dragons of dazzling colors followed in his wake.
The entire Vast Sea quaked, tides surged skyward, towering waves rolled like mountains, and fish and crustaceans scattered in panic.
With the dragons' unmatched speed, they would reach Jing Qian in less than half an hour.
Of course, none of this escaped Jing Qian's Three-Life Eye.
He stood upon the deck of the Dingyuan, stretched lazily, loosened his shoulders, then turned and walked into the cabin toward the kitchen.
Inside, Luo Tian was still completely focused on simmering the Turtle Yang Soup, drenched in sweat under the blazing Great Sun True Flame.
"Old Luo," Jing Qian asked casually, "how much longer until that soup's ready?"
"Almost there! Three more days at most!"
"Perfect," Jing Qian nodded. "Once I've finished dealing with the dragon clan, I'll come back for it.
For now, find yourself a quiet spot to work, don't let anyone ruin this fine batch."
He placed his right hand lightly on Luo Tian's shoulder.
A burst of Sumeru Divine Power rippled outward, folding space, and in the blink of an eye, the chef and his cooking gear were transported tens of thousands of miles away, to a lonely island in the middle of nowhere.
Luo Tian blinked at the sudden change of scenery but quickly shrugged. Nothing mattered more than finishing his soup. He sat down and resumed cooking with full concentration.
Jing Qian could feel the Sumeru Power coursing through him, growing stronger and steadier, and he smiled with satisfaction.
This Heavenly Fate of Space continued to deepen as his inner dimension accumulated strength, one of the great late-blooming paths of cultivation, where power surged only after vast buildup.
He had only just begun to reveal the true majesty of the Lord of Sumeru.
Clapping the dust from his hands, he sealed off all the spatial channels that had been diverting seawater into the Fragmented Star. The celestial sphere was now a massive oceanic globe.
Then, with another wave of power, he transferred the Dingyuan and its ship-spirit into that watery world, leaving them floating upon its surface.
In the present world, only Jing Qian and Ao Run remained.
"Dragon Lady," he said, "your brothers have already left the Dragon Palace and are heading this way. Are you prepared?"
"Once the battle begins, there'll be no stopping it. If things go badly, I can escape, but your life or death will be in the hands of fate."
Ao Run's expression was cold and calm as she replied, her voice clear as a bell:
"Rest easy, Daoist. If I do die, I'll make sure to haunt you!"
Jing Qian laughed heartily, took the dragon girl's jade hand, and opened his Three-Life Eye once more.
In an instant, the two of them vanished from sight.
By the time the twelve dragon heirs arrived after their long pursuit, Jing Qian and Ao Run were already standing directly above the Vast Sea Dragon Palace.
A flawless tactical reversal, the ultimate change of battlefield.
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