Chapter 183: Tattling on Hong Yun!

Cloud seas reaching the sky, inside the Holy Fire Cliff.

In a palace so extremely hidden that layers of array formations concealed the heavenly mechanisms and karmic causes, only a single figure was seen lighting a candle and sitting upright before a desk.

That person's face was as if carved by knives and axes; at first glance, he radiated pure righteousness. More importantly, his supernatural powers were perfect and complete, now manifesting one by one, rampaging and surging within this palace. If this had fallen upon the outside world, upon the overseas lands, even crushing a whole overseas province would have been nothing more than a trivial matter.

A Great True Person at the peak of Foundation Establishment, Hong Ju!

And at this moment, Hong Ju sat upright and solemn; on the desk before him lay a book and a brush separately, his eyes slightly closed as if deep in contemplation.

Whoosh—whoosh—!

The wind blew, turning the pages.

The entire book was not thick, appearing to have only a few thin sheets; on the cover was a line of talismanic script outlined by seal characters like tadpoles.

【Script of Shared Fate and Transferred Luck】

A treasure of the Fruit Seat for overturning the lamp's outcome, unique under all heaven and earth, and since its appearance it had always been sealed here, never leaving this place.

To leave marks upon this talismanic book, one must use merit as the brush and fortune as the ink; the consumption is so great that even a Great True Person at the peak of Foundation Establishment could not afford it, and even if one could afford it, every use required extreme caution, lest one inadvertently trigger a backlash and lose more than one gains.

Therefore, Hong Ju had not used this secret treasure for a very long time.

And just now, he had written a line on the page: 【Wu Cang kills Lu Yang】; the moment the characters were formed, the killing intent of heaven and earth would naturally arise in response.

"Crack!"

The next second, Hong Ju's movements suddenly froze; he saw that on the 【Script of Shared Fate and Transferred Luck】 before him, the characters he had just annotated began to glow blood-red.

This is bad!

Before Hong Ju could react, a bolt of Lei Guang suddenly flashed within the hall, hitting his dharma body squarely, without missing, leaving no room to dodge, with a mighty boom!

For this was not ordinary Lei Guang.

This was heavenly punishment!

The Lei Guang lasted a full quarter-hour before dispersing, revealing Hong Ju's slightly scorched figure; although in the blink of an eye he activated his supernatural powers to restore himself to normal.

However, only the appearance was restored; in reality, his merit and fortune had now been reduced by a full one-tenth, all forcibly stripped away by the heavenly punishment. Although this would not affect his strength, for a Great True Person at the peak like him, the weakening of merit and fortune was even more severe!

"How could this be?"

Hong Ju's face turned ugly; he immediately began divining. After quite a while, he opened his mouth: "Mid-stage? Did Duanmu Yuan Tu break through to Foundation Establishment mid-stage?"

How is that possible!

"It makes no sense; I didn't calculate it beforehand at all. Could it be the legacy of the Witches and Ghosts Dao? Was the Witches and Ghosts Dao of those years wealthy enough to reach this extent?"

Countless karmic causes flashed through Hong Ju's eyes; his fingers rubbed so fast they almost sparked, yet he still found nothing, so he could only guess in his heart: "The Witches and Ghosts Dao possesses the skull mountain's earth vein; using the qi of the earth vein to derive the Earth of Wu... Although it is not absolutely impossible, it is far too coincidental. Could it be that the Fruit Seat is aiding it?"

Similar situations were not unheard of.

For example, True Person Master Chongguang: why could a later-generation disciple compete with Hong Yun, this Reincarnated True Lord, for the Fruit Seat, and even forcibly suppress the Reincarnated True Lord?

Favor of the Fruit Seat!

And as the only True Person whose Dao Foundation now points directly to 【City Wall Earth】, it is quite normal for Lu Yang to receive the Fruit Seat's favor and have fortune gather around him.

One might as well say this is the only explanation.

However, Lu Yang's breakthrough this morning, killing Wu Cang, brought him immense trouble; the fate he had previously annotated was directly exposed.

Fate is not omnipotent; in all things there is a thread of life.

After all, cultivation is going against heaven; it is like a species on the brink of extinction: it may become extinct, or it may undergo a brand-new evolution.

After the fate was exposed, he even suffered a backlash.

For the killing intent of heaven and earth targeting Lu Yang was catalyzed by him using the 【Script of Shared Fate and Transferred Luck】, and at that time, the Lu Yang targeted was only at Foundation Establishment early-stage.

The result was that Lu Yang broke through to mid-stage, causing unexpected changes in the situation, leading to the fate being exposed. To put it vividly, this is equivalent to him paying heaven and earth to start a project, but after heaven and earth invested, they discovered the project intelligence was wrong and the returns were fabricated; all the money was lost. How could this not invite heavenly punishment?

However, there was still room for salvage.

Hong Ju thought for a moment, wiped away the characters on the 【Script of Shared Fate and Transferred Luck】; merit and fortune flowed away like a flood breaking a dam, and in the blink of an eye he wrote a new line:

【Lu Yang dies overseas】

Boom!

The moment the characters were formed, Hong Ju's face showed several more signs of decay, but to eliminate Lu Yang quietly, this was the only method.

"Seal the cave dwelling; from today, I will enter seclusion."

Hong Ju shook his head, put away the 【Script of Shared Fate and Transferred Luck】, and said softly to the spirit of the array formations outside the hall. With his fortune damaged, he could no longer go out.

Only by sitting quietly in the cave dwelling, wearing down the calamity qi, could he emerge again once his mind was clear.

Otherwise, with his cultivation, he would inevitably be deeply trapped in calamities; if lucky, he might reincarnate to gain another life; if unlucky, he might not even have the chance to reincarnate.

"Duanmu Yuan Tu..."

In the dim hall, Hong Ju chewed over this name carefully; the voice spread softly within the hall but gradually faded, until it fell into complete silence.

Cloud seas reaching the sky, Mending Heaven Peak.

Until this moment, the surroundings were still utterly silent; 【Bao Shou Shan】 stood towering against the sky, and on the mountain wall a long trail of blood hung down like a waterfall.

That was Wu Cang's blood.

At that time, the situation was quite chaotic; a group of True Persons from the Holy Sects were gathered outside Mending Heaven Peak, originally planning to ambush Wu Cang from behind once he obtained the True Lord's handwritten letter.

Who would have thought that in the blink of an eye, it was Wu Cang who was beaten and fled with his head in his hands.

And while everyone was still immersed in the shock of Lu Yang's breakthrough to Foundation Establishment mid-stage, they saw Wu Cang suddenly charge violently straight toward the 【Bao Shou Shan】 directly ahead.

At first glance, it really looked like seeking death.

However, everyone present was a True Person of the Holy Sects, and each was more skilled than the next at striking with black hands, so at this moment most still harbored doubts, looking at Lu Yang with strange eyes.

"What? Do you all disbelieve?"

Seeing this, Lu Yang's expression did not change; he took out the Myriad Spirits Banner: "If I had intended to kill, how could I have used this 【Spirit-Protecting Banner】 to save the soul of Senior Wu Cang?"

"You call this a Spirit-Protecting Banner? That doesn't seem quite right?"

"Why is it still emitting black qi?"

Lu Yang didn't bother to explain. He tossed out Senior Wu Cang, who had already been reduced to a banner spirit, and let him fabricate a wild story about the mental journey that had just led him to a momentary loss of will to live.

The witness and the evidence were both present.

Under these circumstances, even the True Person who still harbored doubts could say nothing more—especially since this was the Holy Sect, where the truth of the matter was ultimately unimportant.

What mattered was that Lu Yang was still alive, while Senior Wu Cang was dead.

Just then, a voice suddenly rang out:

"Yuan Tu, come to the Sacred Flame Cliff and see me."

It was Master Chongguang, his tone urgent, carrying a barely suppressed delight—for a Perfected Mahayana True Person, this was undoubtedly a serious breach of composure.

Lu Yang had long anticipated this.

'I've broken through to mid Foundation Establishment, standing alongside Master Yinshan. Looks like I've just barely met his requirements. Just don't know what he needs from me.'

But very quickly, Lu Yang adjusted his thoughts.

After all, Master Chongguang needing something from him was to his advantage—especially at this critical juncture, Master Chongguang absolutely wouldn't ignore his demands.

So Lu Yang had already made his decision.

'I'm going to tattle on Daoist Hong Yun!'

'The overseas is so dangerous. Rather than me going alone to the Biyang Cultivation World to deal with that Dao Calamity, it'd be better to tell Master Chongguang and let him find a way to handle it!'

'Mahayana first-grade True Qi—I don't believe Chongguang won't be tempted!'

As for the gains, as long as Master Chongguang still needed him, and he possessed sufficient value, he trusted the master wouldn't mind sharing a share with him.

(End of chapter)