Great Li Martial God

Li Musheng paid the greedy large black cat no mind. His figure shifted, and he appeared above the Qingxuan Temple.

He swept the area with a look. Both the Inviting Moon Palace’s First Palace Mistress and Theft Saint Bai Wuying, neither of whom had yet left, had been caught without exception.

The Inviting Moon Palace’s First Palace Mistress Wenyue’s eyes were unfocused and vacant, but her face wore a smile, and she was calling out her younger sister’s name in a soft, continuous murmur.

Clearly whatever illusion she had fallen into was connected to her sister. As for the specific details, that was something no one outside could know.

Theft Saint Bai Wuying had also been caught in an illusion. Though his martial cultivation was not weak, he had been no more immune than anyone else, and appeared to have sunk particularly deep into it.

Bai Wuying was laughing with great satisfaction, one hand hanging at his side in an empty grip, while his other hand seemed to have caught hold of something and was delivering vigorous strikes through the air.

”You dare covet my daughter, you demon brat? Little did you expect, eh, that the old man would break through on the spot and reach the Transcendent Realm.”

”What does it matter that your movement technique is impressive? What does it matter how much demonic cultivation you have devoured? Just watch how the old man strings you up and beats you within an inch of your life, hahaha...”

Theft Saint Bai Wuying’s uninhibited laughter rang through the night air, his hand gripping nothing but empty air and delivering its strikes with ever greater force.

Seeing this, Li Musheng narrowed his eyes slightly. He had a persistent feeling that this fellow’s illusion had something to do with himself.Even so, though Li Musheng could drive the Dream of a Thousand Autumns to trap people in illusions they could not escape, he had no way to know what was actually happening inside those illusions.

”Of course, it is not impossible. If I were to combine the Soul-Searching Technique with Dream of a Thousand Autumns, I might be able to see what these people are experiencing in their illusions.”

Li Musheng rubbed his chin, though he had no particular interest in peering into other people’s dreams.

With that thought, Li Musheng withdrew his gaze from Theft Saint Bai Wuying.

He then reached out casually and caught the jade pillow, still radiating its seven-colored halo and floating in the air, drawing it back into his hand.

Running the Grand Dream of a Thousand Autumns for the first time, he had been able to make Dream of a Thousand Autumns cover the entire Great Xuan imperial capital, with a duration of roughly one hour.

For as long as he did not take the jade pillow out of Taixuan City, or actively suppress the divine treasure’s power, none of these people would wake from their illusions.

And that meant every single person in all of Taixuan City had now been caught in an illusion.

To confirm this, Li Musheng moved through parts of Taixuan City’s streets and alleys, checking on some of the ordinary residents, and confirmed that everyone in the city had fallen into an illusion.

For one full hour, Taixuan City had effectively become a city of the living dead.

This also confirmed to Li Musheng that the ancient family’s divine treasure genuinely had something to it. And the crucial point was that Dream of a Thousand Autumns was an area-of-effect crowd control ability.

When you thought about it, this single divine treasure could trap the entire population of a city and bring the whole city to a standstill.

From ordinary commoners all the way up to martial world experts the caliber of Bai Wuying, none were immune. That alone demonstrated how formidable this thing was.

Of course, the reason it could cover an entire imperial capital was specifically because Li Musheng’s martial cultivation had reached the very apex. For anyone else, the scope would have been far smaller. Even Daoist Qingyu at her peak, having devoured the Demonic Patriarch’s cultivation and cultivated the Heaven-Devouring Demonic Art to the tenth level, would have been pushed to her limits covering even an area of one li with Dream of a Thousand Autumns.

After all, a thousand years ago, when the Meng clan and the other two ancient families faced the Martial God brought in by the Great Qi dynasty, even then it had taken an expert of their clans who had reached the half-step Transcendent Realm personally driving Dream of a Thousand Autumns to resist the Martial God’s attack.

”Though this thing is not particularly useful to me, at the right moment it could have effects beyond imagining.”

Li Musheng glanced at the jade pillow in his hand. The divine treasure was formidable, but for him it was somewhat of a luxury. And it was also a source of trouble, with two ancient families lurking somewhere behind it.

He thought about it briefly, then shook his head, ”Never mind. I will keep it. Letting something like this drift around unclaimed would not be a good thing either.”

In the end, Li Musheng decided to keep the divine treasure for the time being.

Though it might bring trouble from the two ancient families later, if they did not know what was good for them, he could simply take their clan divine treasures from them as well.

”While there is still time, I might as well deal with the Great Xuan emperor. That threat cannot be left any longer.”

At this thought, Li Musheng put the Dream of a Thousand Autumns away, glanced in the direction of the Great Xuan imperial palace, and in the next moment vanished from above the Qingxuan Temple.

...

Deep inside the Great Xuan imperial palace, an unremarkable hall was lit to brilliance by seven ancient bronze lamps, their flames illuminating every corner.

In this hall, with no lavish decoration to speak of, three figures were seated or standing.

One was Zhao Kuang, dressed in dragon robes. Another was the Great Xuan emperor with his imposing bearing. And the third was an elderly man, withered and white-haired.

The white-haired, withered elder sat cross-legged at the center of the hall. The Great Xuan emperor sat below and to his side, while Zhao Kuang stood before the two of them.

But all three of them had eyes that were blank and unfocused, their faces showing various expressions ranging from delight to laughter.

Before long, Li Musheng’s figure materialized without a sound in the hall.

His gaze settled on the Great Xuan emperor and he narrowed his eyes slightly, ”So the Great Xuan emperor in the passageway was also a puppet double. The real body has been hidden in the Great Xuan imperial palace the whole time.”

Drawing on the combined abilities of the Soul-Searching Technique and the Formless Puppet Technique, Li Musheng could naturally tell in a single glance that the person before him was without question the Great Xuan emperor’s true body.

Even so, Li Musheng did not kill the Great Xuan emperor immediately. Instead he drove the jade pillow to wake the three people before him from their illusions.

Very quickly, all three of them, including the withered elder, had the light return to their eyes. Though they were awake, none of them could move a single muscle.

The white-haired, withered elder seemed to understand what had happened and let his clouded gaze settle immediately on Li Musheng in the hall, ”Who are you?”

The Great Xuan emperor and Zhao Kuang naturally also caught sight of the suddenly appearing Li Musheng.

”He is the Eighth Prince of Great Li. He was the one who just devoured all of my cultivation.”

The Great Xuan emperor spoke with his face full of fury, his eyes fixed hard on Li Musheng, ”Old Ancestor, I beg you to act and kill this person.”

Zhao Kuang’s eyes shifted with unspoken thoughts. He clearly did not know why Li Musheng had come here, and his mind was still partially back in the dream he had just been pulled from, with no idea what had happened.

”Be quiet.”

At that, the white-haired withered elder snapped in a sharp rebuke at the Great Xuan emperor. He could not even move right now. How was he supposed to deal with Li Musheng?