Chapter 770: The Struggle of the Dao Heart

"Trash, all of you are trash!!!"

A blood-colored blade light flickered across the land of Qinzhou, descending in an instant and causing the physical bodies of several military guards to explode.

"Chen Yan slaughtered hundreds of thousands of our people in Jizhou!"

"Where is he?!"

"He said the entire Jizhou could come to him for revenge; where is he?"

The young man holding the blood blade dashed across the flat ground like a streak of blood-colored rainbow, the long blade in his hand slashing incessantly, causing one body after another to explode completely, staining the earth with blood.

Blade scars covered the young man's face, his left eye was matted with congealed blood scabs, his only remaining right eye burned with wild fire, and his entire body was drenched in blood.

He slaughtered across the battlefield like a madman, his killing intent overflowing and terrifying to the extreme.

In front of him.

A group of Great Xia military guards looked at the other party with pale faces and screamed:

"Retreat!"

"He is Ji Tianhe!"

"A madman, a madman!!!"

The young man named Ji Tianhe saw that group of military guards trying to flee and instantly grinned hideously, the blood blade in his hand erupting with a brilliant, fierce blood light in an instant.

"I will kill until there is no one left in Great Xia!"

"I will have you animals all chopped into meat paste by me!"

Ji Tianhe roared madly, and the Allied Army behind him could not even keep up with his rhythm.

In the distant rear, a towering mecha walked, treading upon the ground.

The eyes of the massive mecha were giant blue floor-to-ceiling windows.

Inside the floor-to-ceiling window, Chen Qi stood with his hands behind his back, looking at Ji Tianhe below.

"This Ji Tianhe is the rising star of this campaign."

"It feels like he is about to reach the Creation Realm; with Blood Imprint in his hands, it seems it will soon be born into the world."

"The killing intent is too intense; an ordinary person simply could not withstand it. His murderous nature is even greater than Chen Yan's."

"It is rare to have a person with such murderous nature in a thousand years. Both his brother and father died in Jizhou, and now his hatred for Great Xia is rising day by day."

Behind Chen Qi, the high-ranking officials of the Allied Army commented.

Chen Qi also nodded quietly as he watched Ji Tianhe below, then immediately went to his office.

…………

Soon.

"The Great Xia army has retreated to guard Xiaoyang City. Yixian and Yunmeng have already been captured by us, and there are still Great Xia military guards in local areas waiting for us to encircle and annihilate them."

Chen Qi's voice rang out from the communication array disk.

Inside the room, Chen Zhu sat quietly on a sandalwood chair, the cigarette in his hand emitting curling wisps of blue smoke.

"Blood Imprint should be born into the world soon, right?" Chen Zhu asked.

"Soon. Blood Imprint has chosen Ji Tianhe as its blood parasite. Since the start of the war, Ji Tianhe has personally killed over ten thousand Great Xia military guards, his killing intent soaring to the heavens."

Inside the communication array disk, Chen Qi replied:

"Is Ji Tianhe the user of Blood Imprint determined by the Master?"

After Chen Zhu took a puff of his cigarette:

"Blood Imprint is the seventh divine artifact in the world. It nourishes the blade with blood; the higher the killing intent, the sharper the blade."

"Ji Tianhe is the parasite chosen to nurture the killing intent, not the master of Blood Imprint."

"On the day Blood Imprint is born into the world, Ji Tianhe will have both his soul and physical body completely devoured by Blood Imprint."

Inside the communication array disk, Chen Qi fell silent.

Blood Imprint is the seventh divine artifact in the world, but its last appearance dates back to the ancestor of Chenzhou ten thousand years ago.

Regarding the function of Blood Imprint, only every generation of Chen Zhu knows.

So, Ji Tianhe was the one being purely utilized.

Because Jizhou was destroyed, Ji Tianhe harbored anger.

His father and brother both died at the hands of Chen Yan.

He projected all his resentment toward Chen Yan onto Great Xia.

After the war began, Ji Tianhe slaughtered madly on the Qinzhou battlefield, his killing intent invincible.

Perhaps Ji Tianhe was also dreaming of the day he could completely wield Blood Imprint, never expecting that in the end, it would only be a tragedy.

"Is Ji Tianhe truly beyond saving?" Chen Qi asked.

"Beyond saving." Chen Qi shook his head slowly and said:

"He is only at the peak of the Sixth Rank; the lower the strength, the harder it is to resist the devouring of Blood Imprint."

"Unless he possesses an extremely powerful will."

Chen Qi paused for a moment:

"Ji Tianhe's will is very strong; he is the most outstanding one in the current Allied Army."

Chen Zhu laughed lightly:

"You misunderstood me. The powerful will I speak of requires at least one-tenth of Chen Yan's."

Chen Qi was silent.

One-tenth of Chen Yan's will.

How could will be described with numbers, but Chen Zhu's words also made Chen Qi understand.

Ji Tianhe had absolutely no possibility of resisting the backlash of Blood Imprint.

Even if the opponent's murderous intent were stronger, their willpower could not compare to even one-tenth of Chen Yan's.

"Chen Yan... is he alright?" Chen Qi asked.

He knew that Chen Yan's consciousness was right there in Chen Province.

"His Dao heart is currently damaged; I do not know if he can walk out of it," the Chen Lord said calmly, a flicker of disappointment in the depths of his eyes.

His words had actually caused Chen Yan to ponder deeply for a long time.

His words might not have been of any use to an ordinary person.

But if placed upon someone who took the world's affairs as their own responsibility, it would bring the other party great distress.

Especially someone like Chen Yan, a person with firm convictions.

Do not doubt why someone with firm convictions could be swayed.

Because the stronger the conviction, the more cautious one becomes, and the more one wants to exhaust everything to prove that their own conviction is correct.

Could the Lord of Blood Qi from back then not have hated the Lord of Hardened Body?

Yet for so many years, the Lord of Blood Qi had always been the light of the province.

He had endured it for ten thousand years.

That was because the Lord of Blood Qi had exhausted everything to refute it, only to discover that the person who brought him suffering was right.

This was cruel...

A battle of the Dao heart!

…………

At the same time.

"Your pancake and soup rice."

Inside a crowded restaurant, a waiter placed a steaming plate of soup rice and a pancake in front of Chen Yan.

Chen Yan gave a hum and began to use his chopsticks.

The waiter glanced at Chen Yan and left, full of respect.

Throughout the entire restaurant, regardless of age or gender, everyone glanced at Chen Yan inadvertently, and not one of them dared to speak too loudly.

Chen Yan chewed his food, the salty and fragrant soup slowly sliding down Chen Yan's throat, delivering the delicious meal into Chen Yan's stomach.

After his physical body was reshaped by the Chen Lord, although his appearance remained handsome, it was different from before.

Even so, Chen Yan was merely out for a meal, yet the spirit and energy that spilled out unintentionally were already awe-inspiring.

This was a temperament unrelated to strength.

Whether this physical body of Chen Yan's lived or died was no longer an issue.

That he still remained in the human world was merely because the Chen Lord wanted to thoroughly defeat Chen Yan.

The other party.

Wanted to negate everything about Chen Yan.

It was just that although Chen Yan's expression was calm at this moment, deep in his mind he was still pondering a question.

He had once said, if the heart has no dead end, the world has no dead end.

He believed that as long as one had not met an Ancient God, one could not assume the Ancient God was invincible.

This had always been his pillar.

This should have been perfectly fine.

But now, everything he did would affect an entire world.

His own stubbornness and refusal to give up might truly, as the Chen Lord said, bring disaster to the entire human world.

Only now did Chen Yan thoroughly understand one thing.

That was, he had launched a surprise attack on Ji Province due to his own anger, slaughtering all of Ji Province's high-level combatants.

That was because of the anger in his heart, that was because of the anger of Great Xia.

Did those people of the Ji Lord not deserve to die?

They deserved to die!

But if things continued this way, what would happen if the Ancient Gods awakened?

Chen Yan ate his meal quietly; inside the restaurant, the others gradually breathed a sigh of relief and began to converse.

"I heard the main force has marched into Qin Province."

"Good, let's break through Great Xia as soon as possible and end the future dangers."

"That Chen Yan is unforgivable; he was a war machine. Fortunately, he is dead; no one can stop our Five Clans anymore."

"Good, those animals of Great Xia are finally dead!"

"Great Xia deserves to die; if they don't die, we will!"

People began to discuss it incessantly; nowadays, the main topic of conversation for the people of Chen Province was Great Xia and Chen Yan.

It was just that these words were too filthy; if an ordinary person from Great Xia were here, they would surely be incredibly furious.

Chen Yan knew this was due to the education they had received since childhood.

In the textbooks of the Five Clans, Great Xia was ugly, sinful, and a scourge to the human race.

Chen Yan stood up, and the noise in the restaurant suddenly quieted down a lot.

However, Chen Yan simply paid the bill and left.

After he left, the sound of discussion rose again in the restaurant.

"Scared me to death; he was right there, I didn't even dare to speak too loudly."

"He must be a martial artist; only a martial artist would have such presence."

"Actually, it's not presence, it should be temperament; so powerful, so noble!"

…………

Chen Yan ignored these sounds of discussion and walked through the commercial street.

Passersby hurried along, and the sounds of hawking rose from the shops all around.

"Am I angry? Naturally, I am angry; naturally, I harbor thoughts of killing. But if I were to use this anger to think about these things, then fundamentally, I would have lost to Lord Chen."

Chen Yan murmured; if anger could solve everything, the human race would not be struggling and suffering so much today.

The enemy is also a teacher.

Lord Chen taught him that one cannot use emotions to think about all matters.

His words to Chen Yan made Chen Yan understand where his own problems had been.

He had accumulated endless anger deep in his heart, but this anger would make him powerful, and it would also lead him into the abyss.

He tried to view the current human race with a calm, objective attitude.

He just walked calmly, while the sounds of people cursing the Great Xia and expressing anger at what Chen Yan had done kept rising in his ears.

When people spoke of 'Chen Yan', they would subconsciously lower their voices, or even use 'that person' as a substitute.

Even though Chen Yan was already dead, it was as if the pressure of Chen Yan still hovered over Chen Prefecture.

For ten thousand years.

The only person to have slaughtered the high-end combat power of an entire prefecture was Chen Yan alone.

In the eyes of the people of Chen Prefecture, he was a butcher, a disaster, and the root of all chaos.

His existence was even more terrifying than that of an Ancient Divine Beast.

Chen Yan just listened quietly, viewing all the curses and anger with calm.

Until a certain moment, when a flash of brilliance suddenly appeared in his eyes.

"Not right..."

Chen Yan murmured:

"The Five Clans' idea is to destroy one generation of Great Xia to preserve the human race for ten thousand years.

Trading one generation for ten thousand future generations—this is trading the few for the many!"

He suddenly raised his head, his pupils shrinking like stars, his fingertips trembling slightly as they hung in mid-air. His lips twitched a few times, and his Adam's apple rolled with a soft sigh.

He suddenly realized the essence of the Five Clans' actions.

The brows that Chen Yan had previously locked tight suddenly smoothed out, and a clarity like mist clearing spread across the depths of his eyes.

His unusual behavior drew the attention of the passersby around him, but he did not care in the slightest and continued walking.

"Trading today for the future, trading the few for the many—there is nothing wrong with this in itself, and it is not wrong when used to describe other things!"

He opened his mouth:

"But people cannot be described by quantity; the life of one person and the lives of ten thousand people have never been a question of 'greater than or equal to'!"

As he spoke, face after face appeared in his mind.

Shen Yiwei, Chen Yu, Chen Yuhu, Luo Puxin, and finally...

Zhou Lu.

"Chen Yan, save me."

That painful cry from Zhou Lu seemed to appear once again in the depths of Chen Yan's mind.

"The human race..."

"The human race..."

"The human race..."

His murmurs, which seemed like those of a fool, caused the people around him to look at him with astonishment and strangeness.

"The human race is not a species, but a fire—a fire that can still burn even when deep within an endless abyss."

"When the human race begins to kill one another out of fear of the Ancient Gods, and trades the suffering of others for their own survival..."

Chen Yan's eyes widened:

"This fire has long since extinguished; there is no human race!"

He looked up at the sky and spoke:

"Why should I use the blood and tears of one generation of the human race to trade for a human race that no longer exists!"

"The foundation of how I acted before might not have been entirely correct, but the result I sought has never been wrong!"

"If I am a butcher, then so be it; if I am a disaster, then so be it.

I shall bear all the sins myself!

What I want is for the fire of the human race to continue forever; even if it is extinguished, it must be a flame that never changed its nature until it burned out!"

He stared straight at the vault of heaven with his eyes, his voice resonant:

"Chen Yuan, answer me!"

"Do I have the qualifications to enter the game today?!"

He spoke loudly, and the people around him looked at him in shock.

When they heard the two words 'Chen Yuan' that he spoke, some who understood the secrets had already widened their eyes, and anger gradually surfaced in their hearts.

And it was at this moment.

Whoosh!

It was as if an invisible, immense force had swept across the firmament.

The leaden clouds suddenly split into a silver seam, and immediately after, the entire canopy of the sky was torn open like a giant hand, and the shattered clouds retreated with a rustle.

Chen Yan's figure flickered, and when he appeared again, he was already in the depths of the firmament.

Lord Chen looked at Chen Yan calmly, with surprise:

"You walked out?"

He narrowed his eyes, continuing to size up Chen Yan.

The words he had spoken before were completely useless against an ordinary person.

But against someone like Chen Yan, who held principles in such high regard, they possessed extremely strong lethality.

He had originally thought Chen Yan would fall into confusion for a long time, perhaps never walking out at all.

Yet today, when he looked at Chen Yan's gaze again, his heart stirred slightly.

"You..."

He opened his mouth; he had naturally heard that speech Chen Yan just gave.

"You use good and evil to describe your own thoughts; how do you know that ten thousand years from now, the human race will all be bad people, that there will be no one left in the human race?"

Chen Lord's expression darkened; he actually felt that Chen Yan was quibbling.

"Ten thousand years is too long; I only strive for the morning and the evening," Chen Yan said indifferently.

"And you use numbers to beautify your own actions; you have lost even more thoroughly."

Chen Lord was stunned and fell silent.

Whether it was the Xia Lord or himself, both were, as Chen Yan said, trading the few for the many.

Yet Chen Yan was now saying that the human race should not be described by quantity.

"My way of thinking is to take the sin upon myself," Chen Yan stood with his hands behind his back, looking down at the human world below.

"And your way of thinking is to cast the sin outside of yourself; are you truly saving the world, or are you only doing it for your own selfish desires?

Stop being self-righteous; I am a disaster for the human race, but you are also slaughtering living beings—you and I are both evil!"

Chen Yan's voice fell, and Chen Lord fell silent once more.

The wind stirred in the sky, robes fluttering; Chen Lord remained silent for a long time.

This was originally a battle of the Dao heart; he intended to destroy all of Chen Yan's value.

But now, he actually did not know how to refute Chen Yan.

Perhaps Chen Yan was right.

Perhaps he was also right.

Perhaps the only thing wrong was malice, was this world!

But he had no way back.

His entire life had been spent preparing for this day.

He had no way back; the Chi Lord, the Lu Lord, the Ji Lord, and the living beings of the five clans were all waiting for him.

He stared fixedly at Chen Yan, remaining silent for a long time.

Until a certain moment.

Chen Lord's brow trembled slightly, the astonishment in his eyes receding like a tide, a faint arc slowly tugging at the corners of his lips, his tense shoulders and back relaxing as he let out a soft sigh.

"Chen Yan, I admit it, you are not wrong!"

He examined him earnestly:

"At this moment, you are qualified to be my opponent; you are qualified to enter the game!"

He nodded as he spoke, only from this moment truly affirming Chen Yan.

After speaking, he waved one hand, and Chen Yan returned to the earth once more.

Between the two of them, it was as if nothing had happened at all.