Chapter 1202: The Second Dream

This time, no accidents occurred. Under the gaze of the multitude, the rift in the sky closed into a white scar, eventually vanishing without a trace.

"Did the Divine Venerable succeed?" On the ground, many immortals looked up at the firmament. "This battle... we won!"

The living beings on the ground all let out long sighs of relief.

Flocks of birds landed on mountain peaks and tree branches, mourning in silence.

Many people collapsed to the ground, dazed for a long while before bursting into painful sobs.

Thick, heavy clouds rolled over, completely obscuring the clear blue sky and bright sun.

Green Jade Crown looked up at the western sky, his eyes filled with pity. "Billions of living beings have been reduced to dust, and seven or eight out of ten great powers in the world are gone. We cannot even call this a pyrrhic victory; we have merely driven away the Heavenly Demons. But the tribulation of the mortal realm has only just begun!"

The remaining crowd fell silent.

After a good while, someone whispered, "It is time for the next step."

Thus, the seven leaders returned to their respective sects to deploy according to their prior plans.

Three days later, the group gathered again.

The light screen emitted by the stone tablet not far away silently protected an oasis. The piece of dragon scale on the tablet was pitch black and gleaming.

This open space was already packed tight by tens of thousands of people, yet the seven leaders were followed by only a few dozen disciples each.

Six of them asked Green Jade Crown, "Immortal Shou'an, do you truly intend to stay? The spiritual energy of the world is already exhausted; even with your abilities, you will not be able to hold on for long."

Once they stayed behind, they had to be prepared for their bodies to perish and their Dao to vanish. This applied not only to Immortal Shou'an, but to everyone here.

"You are entering the Cave Heaven to ensure the Dao lineage does not perish; I am staying outside to ensure the same." Immortal Shou'an gave a faint, mocking smile. "You have been in seclusion for too long; who knows what accidents might occur outside? Perhaps the Heavenly Demons remaining in the mortal realm will still cause trouble. With me here to hold the fort, the wicked will not be able to stir up any storms!"

"With Immortal Shou'an here, the world is secure!" The six were moved. They bowed to him together, thanking him for his protection, and then said to their respective sects, "The task of educating the myriad living beings is entrusted to you."

Having said this, each of them chanted incantations. The air behind them rippled like water, revealing a small, jagged gap.

Inside was another small world, with green mountains and clear waters, exotic flowers and rare herbs, and surging spiritual energy. Just standing at the entrance, one could feel a moist, gentle mist brushing against their faces, refreshing the heart and spirit.

Compared to the purgatory outside the light screen, this place was an unadulterated paradise.

Tens of thousands of people knelt and cried out, "Immortal Venerables, go slowly!"

These six Immortal Venerables, leading their direct disciples, stepped into the small world without looking back.

The Cave Heaven immortal mansion slowly closed before everyone's eyes, as if it had never existed.

Ten thousand people prostrated themselves and wept.

This was the parting of life and death.

Afterwards, Immortal Shou'an waved his hand at the crowd. "Disperse. Your Immortal Venerables have already set your tasks; just set about doing them."

Seeing him stride away, his disciples hurriedly caught up. "Master, where are you going?"

"Just now, when the Divine Venerable struck the rift, a red light headed west. It is necessary to investigate." Immortal Shou'an said firmly. "That object must be related to the heavy treasure the Heavenly Demons used to fuse the world. Besides, the Divine Venerable sacrificed himself to strike the sky, and his whereabouts are unknown; I must rush over to see."

The black light that had just streaked across the sky must have been the Black Dragon.

He glanced at the crowd. "Why are you still following me? Why haven't you started on the tasks assigned to you?"

"We are about to begin, but Junior Brother Qu Yu has not appeared. We cannot calculate his situation."

Immortal Shou'an's footsteps paused slightly, and he casually summoned his long sword.

The tip of the sword was broken, and the blade was bare, yet it was still as bright as autumn water, engraved with a line of talisman characters.

Immortal Shou'an held the sword and whispered a few words, and the talisman characters on the blade lit up. He tossed the sword into the sky.

The divine sword flew without wings, turning into a faint light and heading west.

Only then did Immortal Shou'an say, "I warned him long ago that standing under the sun would be safe. He did not listen. Alas, such is fate."

The disciples were moved. "Junior Brother Qu Yu has already..."

"You do not need to look for him."

The disciples understood, and added:

"Your injuries are very severe. Please rest first; it will not be too late to go on a long journey later."

Immortal Shou'an sighed. "Time waits for no one. There must be Heavenly Demons remaining, and we cannot let them find it first. I have a premonition that the thing that fell from the sky is no simple matter."

A disciple smiled bitterly. "The mountains and rivers are shattered to this extent; the Heavenly Demons are hiding and barely surviving, so how would they dare to come out? Without subsequent spiritual energy replenishment, Master, please take care of yourself!"

Immortal Shou'an subconsciously slowed his pace.

The previous fierce battles had indeed caused him to overdraw too much, and he was covered in injuries. The young disciple was right; the spiritual energy of this world was exhausted, and even an Immortal Venerable could hardly replenish it.

From now on, he could no longer be as extravagant with his actions and spellcasting as before.

Seeing his expression soften, the disciple asked again, "Those Immortal Venerables entered the Cave Heaven to force a seclusion, saying that in as short as one or two hundred years, or as long as four or five hundred, the spiritual energy of heaven and earth will be abundant again, and they will come out then. But what if the spiritual energy of heaven and earth never recovers?"

Immortal Shou'an looked at him strangely. "Why think such thoughts?"

The disciple was insistent. "What if? If it were to happen?"

"Then it would not be optimistic. They can certainly hold on longer than us, but the spiritual energy in the Cave Heaven is also limited. Besides, two of the old fellows have injuries even worse than mine; did they think I couldn't see that?"

At this moment, a volcano closest to the oasis began to erupt with a rumble, magma rolling into the sea, and endless white steam rising.

How many more years would such an apocalyptic scene last? When would the spiritual energy that living beings were desperately waiting for recover? Immortal Shou'an gazed into the distance and sighed gloomily, "If your words prove prophetic, I fear that after a thousand years, the Dao lineage will be severed, the living beings will be ignorant, and there will be no immortals in the world."

Having said this, he felt listless. He waved his sleeves, and he was already a hundred zhang away.

The disciples looked at each other and smiled bitterly: From now on, spiritual power must be used sparingly; Master seems to have forgotten again.

&&&&& (For the convenience of those listening to the book, the separator ￥ will be changed to & from now on)

The scene shifted to another setting.

The Daoist sect between green mountains and clear waters was originally isolated from the world, but now the mountain stone at the gate, engraved with the two large characters "Yuyang," was stained red with blood.

On the winding mountain road, corpses lay in disarray, stretching all the way to the sect's main hall.

The Yuyang Sect had been defeated, most of its disciples were dead or injured, and the survivors had no choice but to surrender. The victors were an army of over two thousand. The leader ignored the captives kneeling all over the back hall and personally dragged the treasury manager to the back mountain, throwing him in front of the treasure vault gate:

"I heard you have a piece of precious armor here refined from the scales of an ancient Black Dragon?"

"Yes, but..."

"Open the door!"

The opponent held a blade to the treasury manager's brow, the tip still dripping with blood. The manager had no choice but to take out the key and undo the restrictions.

Red light flickered twice on the vault gate, and it slowly opened inward.

There were several magic artifacts and a small amount of gold and silver in the vault, but the leader didn't even glance at them, following the manager deep into the vault's partition.

Only a black battle armor was placed here.

It was unknown how long it had lain here; the armor plates were covered in dust, gray and lusterless.

The leader sneered, "A supreme treasure covered in dust, unable to be used to its full potential. You cultivators are truly wasteful!"

The manager stammered, "The Luo Sheng Armor is an evil armor our founder refined by mistake. It has flaws and is incomplete, which is why it was sealed..."

"Where does it have flaws, and where is it incomplete?"

"For such treasures, even the Immortal who refined it could not control the quality when it was formed; it is what is called 'a stroke of luck,'" the manager whispered. "Before the Black Dragon sacrificed itself for the Dao, its cultivation was transcendent and holy; it was the only Divine Venerable in the world and had already understood the ultimate principles of heaven and earth. The precious armor made from its dragon scales would become powerful due to the karma it absorbed, but what cultivators fear most is becoming tainted by karmic cause and effect..."

The leader interrupted him, "We soldiers are not afraid. What else?"

Leading troops to kill, how could one not be tainted by karma? He dared to do it, so he dared to take responsibility; he was not like those hypocritical so-called immortals who feared the evil consequences after planting evil causes.

Pretentious! "After the armor was refined, it was always missing a piece. Our founder spent a lot of effort and finally found the Black Dragon's heart scale to complete the armor. This heart scale is also called the 'Reverse Scale' by the dragon race. However—" His mouth was dry, and he coughed several times before continuing, "The first time this armor was given to the head disciple to use, the heart scale was inexplicably lost. Our founder calculated for a long time but could not figure out its whereabouts, and could only sigh that such was heaven's will, and there was no need to look for it again."

"Your founder was negligent; how could such a treasure be lost? Did it grow legs and run away?" The leader shook his head. "What function does this Reverse Scale serve?"

"I, I don't know." He was just a vault keeper who had heard a few legends and rumors, and they weren't even verified; how could he know everything? "The chest piece now is something that was added later. Later, this armor became increasingly evil, and the founder decided it should not appear in the world, so he sealed it up."

The leader walked straight to the black armor and tore off the seal above it.

So what if it was missing a heart scale? The treasure was still the treasure he urgently needed.

As soon as he reached out and pressed his hand on the helmet, a look of shock appeared on his face, as if the armor were extraordinary. But he immediately rejoiced: "Truly divine!"

He straightened his expression, bowed three times to the armor, and said solemnly, "I, Pang Yuan, now invite the divine armor to follow me in conquering the four corners of the world and creating an unparalleled legacy! When I conquer the world and ascend to the throne as king, you shall be the founding heavy weapon!"

This was the solemn promise he made to the Luo Sheng Armor.

When he touched the Luo Sheng Armor again, it disintegrated on its own, turning into a stream of black mercury that coiled around his arm like a python and onto his body.

In an instant, it transformed back into a black battle armor, covering Pang Yuan's entire body.

The man let out a loud laugh and turned to leave.

Pang Yuan did not break his promise; he later founded a vast empire and indeed used the Luo Sheng Armor as the founding supreme treasure.

But he ruled the country with tyranny and harsh laws, and uprisings occurred frequently within the country. Pang Yuan still donned the armor to go to the front lines, suppressing thirty-seven uprisings in ten years and stabilizing the territory.

By his old age, Pang Yuan became increasingly temperamental.

Before he died, he personally sealed the Luo Sheng Armor in Ke Mountain, forbidding his descendants from wearing it.

Time passed, and two hundred years went by.

The empire was on the verge of collapse, and the last emperor ignored the ancestral teachings and invited the Luo Sheng Armor out of the mountain again, but he could not stop the collapse of the empire.

From then on, the Luo Sheng Armor was lost in the mortal world, appearing every few decades and stirring up bloody storms.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 1203 =====