Chapter 756 – Nine Lands’ Disaster
Edited by Ea
Youshan Lingyu had indeed pulled those feathers from Feng Jiushao’s tail when he was still young and wet behind the ears. According to principle, he really should return them, but who let him refine the phoenix feathers into magic treasures and then lose the magic treasures? He wanted to return the feathers, but he’d at least need to know where they were ah.
Yan Tianhen was melancholy.
However, it was not long before his melancholy days were destroyed by Tu Feng’s big movements. What changed at first was that many demonic beasts died inexplicably. In the past, these demonic beasts would trample on spiritual plants and hurt livestocks, but now their corpses were stacked on the thick soil in the wilderness, with no trace of vitality left in them. This deeply pleased many villagers who had been suffering from frequent demonic beast disturbances.
Every family went up the mountain to cut open the corpses of these demon beasts, take the demon cores in their bodies, and sell them at the market. However, they soon realized that these demon beasts’ cores couldn’t be found everywhere. This was true regardless of their level, size, and ferocity before death.
Experienced hunters originally thought that these demonic cores had already been dug out by other people, but a few days later, when they saw the corpses of dead demonic beasts stacked continuously, they realized that things were not as simple as they thought.
“Although these demon beasts are dead, there are no wounds on their skin and flesh.” The old village leader’s voice was calm. He touched the goatee on his chin and continued, “What’s more, although it’s a good thing that these monsters died, we won’t be able to endure it. Hundreds, or maybe even a thousand, die every day. Those corpses are rotting in the mountains and forests. The smell can really come day and night, and it’s getting stronger and stronger. People can’t sleep. This looks suspicious, no matter how you look at it, so I can only invite you to investigate.”
Because this place belonged to a small village under the jurisdiction of the Purple Emperor’s Heavenly Capital, Lin Xuanzhi and Yan Tianhen came to investigate in person after receiving the strange news.
Yan Tianhen suggested,”Let’s go up the mountain first to see what happened.”
The village head said, “I’ll send someone to go with you two.”
Then the village head called his son and asked him to follow Lin Xuanzhi and Yan Tianhen into the mountain road.
The village head’s son said, “In fact, it’s not only these demonic beasts, but also the spiritual plants we planted. These days, they are also withering, but it’s just that it’s not obvious yet.”
Yan Tianhen raised his eyes. “When did the spiritual plants start to have problems?”
The village head’s son thought about it. “It started when we found out that the demonic beasts died suddenly and inexplicably.”
When they reached the mountain, Yan Tianhen saw the thick evil Qi that permeated the mountains and forests. His eyes couldn’t help sinking as they scanned over the place with the densest evil Qi. A long whip suddenly appeared in his hand. He lifted his feet and walked towards the place where the evil Qi was gathered.
Most of the villagers in this village had a low cultivation level. In addition, someone deliberately hid the evil Qi, so it was normal that they couldn’t see anything wrong. But for Yan Tianhen and Lin Xuanzhi, this simple disguise could be seen through at a glance. A rhinoceros was lying on the ground silently, lifeless. It was obvious that it had been dead for a long time.
However, when Yan Tianhen approached, the dead rhinoceros on the ground rolled over and jumped up with amazing agility, stretched out its limbs and claws, and attacked Yan Tianhen with a growl, about to bite Yan Tianhen’s head off.
Yan Tianhen’s expression didn’t change. With a flick of his whip, he split the rhinoceros into two halves.
The village head’s son was so scared that he sat on the ground and cried out. He seemed as though he wanted to flee as fast as possible.
An evil gu crawled out. Yan Tianhen quickly clamped his fingers in the air from a distance and pinched it with a little force.
“Evil Qi cultivator.” Yan Tianhen narrowed his eyes and turned to Lin Xuanzhi. “Dage, it looks like this place is no longer suitable to live on. We have to find a place for them to move to first.”
Since it was polluted by evil Qi, the villagers naturally couldn’t continue living here anymore. Otherwise, these people would be the ones swallowed up by evil Qi next.
Lin Xuanzhi said, “The demonic cores in the demonic beasts have all been melted by evil Qi.”
Yan Tianhen said, “My worst fear now is that the situation in this village is not a coincidence, but just a beginning.”
A sign that heralded the beginning of the evil Qi cultivators’ official declaration of war on the Nine Lands.
Reality proved that Yan Tianhen’s concerns were not unreasonable.
Just three days later, the same thing happened in all regions of the Nine Lands. First the demonic beasts and spiritual plants died, and then the evil Qi’s contamination spread to the land under their feet.
Most of the demonic beasts with low cultivations had their demonic cores melted. They didn’t even know how they died. Some demonic beasts with high cultivations could still resist for a while, but the entire Southwest Land’s beast clans had already fallen into chaos.
Deranged demonic beasts could be seen everywhere launching indiscriminate attacks on their companions.
“Heaven’s Wail has already spread to the Southwest Land.” Fu Li wrote in a message, “Although I can temporarily delay the influence of evil Qi on the beast clans when I cast magic in the divine palace, I won’t be able to hold it off for long. Ah Bai and Hu Po have not been affected. They have gone through the baptism of the tiger clan. Now their cultivation levels have risen sharply, which is enough to protect themselves. However, the plight of the Southwest Land is imminent. If it goes on like this, within a month, the Southwest Land will fall at the hands of its own people.”
The beast clans were indeed the most affected. Fu Li’s fears weren’t unfounded. Not long after that, the South Land and the Northeast Land also experienced problems.
Shuiyun Nishang sent someone to report, “The gu in the South Land are inexplicably dying in droves, and the water channels have become wider and wider. More and more purple evil Qi is overflowing from the gaps. I don’t know what’s happening. I was summoned back to the family.”
Rong Zhishui also sent a message to Yan Tianhen, and said in some frustration, “Many spiritual plants have died, and the trees have also been polluted. You can’t even see green plants anymore on many mountains — it’s all black. Let alone trees, even insects have been killed. What can we do ah?”
Overnight, the Nine Lands were attacked by evil Qi everywhere.
However, this was not the most frightening development.
On the morning of the seventh day, when people opened their eyes and woke up from their sleep but didn’t see the sun, they realized that the world seemed to be different from before. There were nine purplish-black dragons circling in the air, covering the sky and blocking the sun. They looked ferocious, emitting purple auras around them, and their black eyes were like huge black holes, staring down at all sentient beings from the sky. Whenever someone looked up and looked at them, they felt like they were stared at by a vicious gaze.
These dragons completely surrounded the sun. The whole world became dark. From then on, daylight ended and night began.
Yan Tianhen was at the top of the imperial palace. Looking at the terrifying sky, his eyes were gloomy.
“It’s terrible, it’s terrible!” A bodyguard rushed to their location quickly and knelt down on the ground, out of breath. “When checking the sparrow spirits in the treasury today, I found that one-third of the sparrow spirits had turned into normal stones overnight, and there was no spiritual Qi in them at all!”
The official guarding the warehouse was sweating so hard that he couldn’t stand straight. He knelt on the ground and said in horror, “Reporting to Your Highness, I’m definitely not neglecting my duty. I checked them myself before leaving the warehouse last night. This morning, it turned into this. I... I beg Your Highness to spare my life!”
Yan Tianhen was deeply worried. “It’s not your fault. Pay close attention to the consumption of sparrow spirits every other hour.”
He’s afraid the nine dragons were probably the grand arrays that Madam Jing Shui mentioned. However, Yan Tianhen didn’t have an intuitive concept of how many sparrow spirits there were in the treasury, and precisely because of this, Yan Tianhen could better understand the destructive power of these nine dragons. Tu Feng’s methods were on a much higher level than his methods back then.
Youshan Lingyu only directly attacked people, but Tu Feng’s move was akin to cutting away the very ground from under people’s feet. Once all of the Nine Lands’ sparrow spirits are sucked dry and reduced to evil Qi, then orthodox Daoism will officially come to an end in the Nine Lands will completely, and it will become the world of evil cultivators.
Yan Tianhen waved fiercely and flung some evil Qi towards the nine evil dragons in the sky. As a result, in a moment, the evil dragon facing the Purple Emperor’s Heavenly Capital suddenly opened its mouth and roared.
The smoke and dust rolled, and evil Qi rushed into Yan Tianhen’s body, making his evil Qi suddenly overflow and have a tendency to overwhelm the other two kinds of Qi in his body.
Yan Tianhen’s expression suddenly changed, and he immediately severed the connection. He took two steps back before managing to stabilize himself.
“How are you?” Lin Xuanzhi landed on the platform and held Yan Tianhen’s waist.
“Those dragons are full of evil Qi that can be absorbed directly.” Yan Tianhen’s eyebrows and eyes were more gloomy than the sky. He said, “But with my current cultivation level, I can’t fully absorb them directly, otherwise the balance of the three Qi in my body will be disrupted, and it will be easy to suffer a Qi deviation. However, for a pure evil Qi cultivator, it’s a great opportunity.”
Lin Xuanzhi looked at the evil dragon in the sky and asked, “What realm can he reach with this much evil Qi?”
Yan Tianhen answered, “If Xi He was still alive, then Tu Feng would be able to directly ascend after absorbing this much evil Qi.”
Lin Xuanzhi said, “Even if Xi He is not here, if he destroys all nine Pillars of Heaven, the sky will collapse and the earth will sink. At that time, he’ll be able to open a door in space and leave this place, step into the void, and go to a larger world.”
Yan Tianhen took a deep breath and paused. Suddenly, he thought of a vital person and looked at Lin Xuanzhi. “Dage, Cangdi Fenglang can also absorb this evil Qi. If he’s willing to help us, we can stall Tu Feng for a while.”
“Besides this, what else can we do to defeat these nine evil dragons?” Lin Xuanzhi frowned as he stared at the evil dragon that looked like visitors from hell. The ominous premonition in his heart grew stronger.
Yan Tianhen shook his head. “Heaven’s Wail still needs me to draw all the evil Qi into my body and then lose my life in order to repair heaven and earth. But I’ve never heard of or seen these nine evil dragons before, so I don’t know how to deal with them.”
Lin Xuanzhi: “Even you can’t do anything....”
Then this matter really is hard to handle.
The sky was getting darker and darker, and so were the Nine Lands.
It was like the end of the world. Ghosts and demons were rampant.
“Your Highness, someone sent a letter!” The chief steward ran over, holding an envelope filled with evil Qi in his hand.
Yan Tianhen lifted it up with evil Qi and scanned the words. Purple words flickered in the air one by one, and in the air, a man’s voice echoed in Yan Tianhen’s ears.
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