Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

“Imagine you are a general of the Imperium of True Human Beings. You are in a dark, obscure, perilous battlefield where there are high mountains that pierce into the sky, forests with all kinds of dangerous creatures, and bottomless swamps. Everything in the battlefield is covered by a dense war fog.

“Right now, a flickering candle suddenly illuminates the darkness on the horizon. It blinks and sends you a piece of information.

“You read the information and realizes that it is sent from a scout who you lost contact with a long, long time ago. He tells you that he has discovered a very valuable prey.

“However, before he tells you the specific coordinates, the environment he is in, and the status of the prey, the candle dies down, never to be kindled again.

“That was the situation the Imperium of True Human Beings was in.”

Li Yao nodded, deep in thought. It was true that the star child was a scout and that he had been exterminated before he had the chance to send more information over.

Right now, the Imperium of True Human Beings only knew that there was a prey a certain distance away in a certain direction. Nothing more.

“As a general, you can summon a huge expedition army and assault the prey by way of ‘parachuting’.

“But it is very clear to you that 99.9% of the places around the prey are mountains, swamps, abysses, and deserts. Should your main troop ‘parachute’ to those places, they will be dead for sure.

“So, after careful consideration, you decide to let your expedition army walk and search for the prey the regular way by avoiding all the dangerous places.

“Although it will cost more time and effort, such an approach is much more safe. The army will certainly be not wiped out by nature.”

Si Koulie’s metaphor gave a detailed analysis on the advantages and disadvantages of the super long-distance space jumps and short-distance ones.

“However, just because a large-scale expedition army cannot parachute to the prey directly, it does not mean one or two soldiers of the special forces cannot go over, right?

“Before the army sets off, deploying special forces to the enemy’s base and investigating the environment is a common tactic.”

Li Yao realized where he was getting at. “Leader Si, are you suggesting that the minor apocalypse from the ‘Imperium of True Human Beings’ is like the ‘special forces’ who have come here for reconnaissance?

“But I’m rather confused. Can the apocalypses perform space jumps, too?”

“For the apocalypses that are the strikes a civilization launches toward another civilization, their attributes and appearances vary greatly and are quite unpredictable,” Si Koulie replied.

“Every apocalypse is produced in a different way for a different purpose. Some of the apocalypses focus more on destruction, some highlight infiltration, and some are good at blockage. Isn’t it quite normal that some apocalypses are fast enough to cruise beyond the speed of light?

“The apocalypses manufactured by the same civilization can be different, too. You wouldn’t carry bullets with all the same attribute, would you?”

Li Yao immediately understood it. It was quite right. In the case of bullets, there were sniper bullets, armor-piercing bullets, frost bullets, incendiary bullets… Every kind of bullet had its own special use.

The category, characteristics, and uses of the apocalypses could only be a thousand or even ten thousand times more than those of the bullets.

The apocalypse that the Blood Stripe Virus had caused five thousand years ago focused on ‘legacy’ and ‘destruction’. It could not perform a space jump.

The minor apocalypse that the Imperium of True Human Beings launched recently apparently focused more on velocity. It was not strange that the apocalypse could perform a space jump.

“Chances are that the minor apocalypse is an upgraded version of the star child. Although the Imperium of True Human Beings could not teleport a whole fleet over, it should be more than easy for them to send another star child to us.”

“An upgraded version of the star child?”

Li Yao shivered but did not speak.

“The Imperium of True Human Beings does not know our precise coordinates. Therefore, the ‘minor apocalypse’ was only sent to somewhere near the Flying Star Sector.

“However, it sensed the dazzling fire resulting from the collision of the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector the moment it arrived.

“Think about it. You have parachuted into an absolutely dark battlefield, and your task is to search for an enemy who is lurking in the darkness.

“You don’t know where exactly your enemy is hiding, but a bright torch suddenly appears in front of you. What will you do?”

Li Yao took a deep breath and mumbled, “I’m afraid that I would go over and check it first.”

Si Koulie smiled bitterly and said, “It must’ve been what the apocalypse thought, too. That is why it brushed past the Flying Star Sector and lunged at the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector.

“By our analysis, it is very possible that the apocalypse calculated that the two Sectors had abundant spiritual energy by the signs of the collision. The spiritual energy could be used to build a brand-new space gate, and the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector would be a perfect platform to attack the Flying Star Sector.”

Li Yao was dazed. “A platform?”

Si Koulie nodded. “Exactly. Maybe the apocalypse is carrying certain navigation magical equipment like a space gate that will automatically unfold when it absorbs enough spiritual energy. If so, the expedition army of the Imperium of True Human Beings can jump to the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector directly.

“If we look from the perspective of the whole universe, the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Flying Star Sector are only one step away from each other. Attacking the Flying Star Sector with the Heaven’s Origin Sector as the platform is much more convenient than crawling slowly for more than a hundred years.”

The hypothesis made Li Yao shudder.

With a bitter smile, Professor Mo Xuan said, “Maybe, the minor apocalypse was merely attracted by the collision of the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector in the beginning. But after it discovers that tremendous creatures live in both of the Sectors, the expedition army will certainly change their target and conquer the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector first.”

Si Koulie sighed and said in a low voice, “Fellow Cultivator Mo, the Heaven’s Origin Sector has been burdened by the Flying Star Sector. The disaster should’ve had nothing to do with you.”

Professor Mo Xuan waved his hands and said solemnly, “The Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Flying Star Sector are right next to each other. If the Flying Star Sector falls, there is no way that the Heaven’s Origin Sector can get away. We are in the same boat. The disaster is coming sooner or later.”

Watching the glittering stars on the dome, Li Yao asked gravely, with redness shining in the bottom of his eyes, “Then, how soon will the minor apocalypse arrive in the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector?”

“The apocalypse reached somewhere near the Flying Star Sector with a super long-distance space jump,” Si Koulie said. “Then, it rectified its direction after three short-distance space jumps and flew toward the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector.

“Right now, it has come to the end of its course, and it has been cruising normally. There is no sign of space jumps. Perhaps the previous four jumps have drained its fuel.

“Judging from the current speed, it will reach the Heaven’s Origin Sector and the Blood Demon Sector in five years!”

“Five years?”

Li Yao bit his teeth so hard that sparks were almost bursting out, but he simply swallowed all the sparks into his stomach.

…

One month later, in the hall of the Meeting of the Next Millennium in Heavenly Saints City, the leaders of all the Cultivation sects of the Flying Star Sector and the representatives of ordinary people in all the space zones, altogether 12,993 people, had been gathered. They were about to vote on a motion that could determine the future of the Flying Star Sector.

The motion was ‘Should the Flying Star Sector rescue the Heaven’s Origin Sector with its best?’

It was a tough choice.

The Heaven’s Origin Sector was at war with the Blood Demon Sector right now. The two parties were on par with one another. The Heaven’s Origin Sector even had a slim advantage.

When the two Sectors fully merged, a final battle was destined to break out. Perhaps it had already broken out.

The Heaven’s Origin Sector would certainly suffer heavy losses even if it won the war in the end.

If so, it was unlikely that the Heaven’s Origin Sector could resist the minor apocalypse that was heading toward it.

The result would be tragical unless the Flying Star Sector sent reinforcements to the Heaven’s Origin Sector unitedly, not sparing any efforts.

Defeat the demon race first, and resist the apocalypse together!

There was no doubt that a war across Sectors would consume a lot of resources of the Flying Star Sector, not to mention that the citizens of the Flying Star Sector would shed their blood or even got killed in a foreign land.

The Flying Star Sector today had barely recovered from the chaos of the Immortal Cultivators, which had lasted eight years. The choice naturally not an easy one.

In an ivory long robe that had an emblem of the Rising Dragon of the Nine Stars on the chest, a symbol of the Star Glory Federation and the Heaven’s Origin Sector, Li Yao stood on a round podium.

Behind him, pictures were flashing. Tremendous information about the Heaven’s Origin Sector was being displayed, including the major sects of the Heaven’s Origin Sector, the best magical equipment, the metropolises, and the people who live in cities, towns, and villages. There were also pictures of when the iron army lunged at the beast tide under the guidance of the Rising Dragon of the Nine Stars flag.

“This is the Heaven’s Origin Sector, a small, barren world at the edge of the sea of stars.

“This is the Star Glory Federation, a nation established doggedly against the plundering and slaughtering of the demon race!

“After five hundred years, we built the Star Glory Federation from a small tribe where the survivors huddled to warm each other into a powerful nation that has expanded to every corner of the Heaven’s Origin Sector.

“Every ordinary person and every Cultivator is fighting bloody battles and guarding the glory of the civilization of mankind under the flag of the Rising Dragon of the Nine Stars.

“Eight years ago, I arrived in the Flying Star Sector by accident and discovered, to my surprise, that human beings exactly like us live in this world that is entirely different from the Heaven’s Origin Sector.

“We have the same hot blood flowing in our veins, we believe in the same creeds, we persist in the same path of Cultivation, and we defend the same honor and glory!

“Now, as a common Cultivator from the Heaven’s Origin Sector, I beg my Fellow Cultivators of the Flying Star Sector to save the Heaven’s Origin Sector, the Star Glory Federation, and the billions of people living there—Billions of compatriots!”