Legend of Swordsman

As soon as the jade token crumbled into pieces, a huge wave of energy rippled from within it, rolling furiously into all directions

The Dao Master warriors of Emperor Xiao’s forces could not help but feel a foreboding dread.

But Emperor Leng and Xia Yong instead wore an expression of maniacal delirium.

Far away from them, the soothsayer could hardly suppress a malicious smile. His eyes burned with bloodthirsty craving.

The Thirty Sixty Prefectures of the Tang Empire of the East.

This was the An Yong Prefecture, one of the Thirty-six Prefectures.

Situated hundreds of thousands of kilometers away from the site of the battle at the imperial city, the An Yong Prefecture was peaceful and silent.

Even the governor of the prefecture, despite having received word of the battle waging in the imperial city, had no intentions of dipping his finger into the murky waters by aligning himself with Emperor Leng or Emperor Xiao.

Yet despite the tranquil peace, suddenly…

“BUZZ!” The grounds of the An Yong Prefecture began to shake violently.

“What is happening?”

“W-what, what is going on?”

“There has been word of a huge battle taking place in the imperial city. Could it be that the scourge of war has reached us?”

Terrified cries and shouts resounded across the cities in the An Yong Prefecture.

Panic and chaos were everywhere, yet none knew what was happening.

Even the governor of the prefecture himself was bewildered and shocked.

But the strongest tremor took place in a huge castle in the middle of the An Yong Prefecture. Cracks began to form on the ground at the centermost part of the castle as if something was burrowing from the ground, fighting to see the light of day.

It did not take long for the unknown item to show itself, protruding from the broken earth.

It was a stone column, fully black in color with numerous mystic engravings and runic scripts adorning its structure.

The black obsidian monolith radiated an ancient and yet evil aura. It was so huge that it almost took up one-tenth of the entire breadth of the castle grounds. After rising sharply from the ground, it kept rising at an incredible speed, and finally stopped till it rose to tens of thousands of feet high.

Towering at tens of thousands of feet high, the huge, elaborately decorated obelisk stood silently at the center of the castle grounds. Its sudden emergence from underground attracted many bystanders and warriors who were defending the castle. In the midst of their confusion, it sparkled dangerously.

The flash of grey light began to enlarge and stretch further and further that the eerie luminescence engulfed the entire castle. But its hunger was hardly satiated as the evil brightness began to lengthen its reach farther and farther. Before long, the entire An Yong Prefecture was bathed in the creepy and uncanny illumination.

But the strange and eerie grey light did not stop, its penchant for more fueling its growth to expand larger and larger.

But it was not only An Yong Prefecture. Monolithic obsidian-black obelisks began to sprout from the center of each and every prefecture of the Thirty Six Prefectures, all of which were similarly embellished with mystical engravings and runic scripts.

Thirty-six obelisks for all Thirty Sixty Prefectures of the Tang Empire of the East.

Each of the gargantuan stone columns released the same grey-colored illumination that expanded wider and wider with a voracious zeal.

In the blink of an eye, the grey lights from each Prefecture overlapped and swallowed the lands of the Tang Empire of the East whole.

The multitudes of warriors in the Thirty Six Prefectures were shocked and startled as the gigantesque magical formation comprising of the huge blanketing lights came into shape.

Bewildered and astonished, the warriors within the vicinity did not know the purpose of the magical formation. But their answers were swiftly answered as they found that the magical formation was, in fact, an incredibly huge barrier that cut off the entire Tang Empire of the East from the outside world.

Those within the barrier could not leave the confines of the barrier, much less communicating with anyone outside.

“W-what, what is happening?”

Pandemonium swept the entire Empire as hundreds of millions of martial practitioners and warriors fell into panic and disarray.

As anticipated, the colossal barrier encompassing the Empire had also included what was left of the imperial city.

The sudden emergence of the grey, glimmering shrouds above their heads left many Dao Masters of both sides of the battle stopped in their tracks to look above at the sky, perplexed and puzzled. But both Emperor Xiao and Emperor Yun immediately grew alarmed and shocked.

“You evil bitch! How dare you!” Emperor Xiao roared, his eyes blazing angrily.

“Hahahaha! I have passed the point of no return! I will accept no defeat or failure!” Emperor Leng hissed insidiously.

“Blasted woman!” Emperor Xiao exclaimed as he felt himself shuddering violently.

Emperor Leng merely chuckled. Xia Yong had come over to her, standing right by her side. They stood together and looked into the sky, their eyes flickering with a deranged gleam.

“Long have I labored to have the Thirty-six Diabolic Pillars furnished and readied. Finally, it is time for me to reap the harvest!” Emperor Leng said with a deep and distant look in her eyes that hemmed with no less frenzy.

“Long have we waited! At long last!” Xia Yong cried passionately.

But around them across the battlefield, the horde of warriors and soldiers could not understand what was happening.

Until they saw a surging wave of golden aura rushing from the distant sky.

“T-that, that is…”

“Luck!”

“There is no mistaking it! That is luck! The luck and fortune of the Empire which has accumulated for centuries!”

Flashes of alarmed horror splayed across the faces of each and every warrior across the entire battleground.

Gu King’s voice rang with anxiety suddenly in Jian Wushuang’s mind, “Could that be? Luck?”

“Luck? What is luck?” Jian Wushuang asked, confused and surprised.

“Luck is an ethereal substance that exists in this world.” Gu King explained hastily, “Each and every one of us bears a certain amount of luck. It is the volume of the amount that varies between each person.”

“Those blessed with great luck will find themselves fortunate and bountiful in all their endeavors. More often that not, the opportunities they encounter will most likely be rewarding than detrimental unlike those that have lesser luck.”

“Your success in employing methods of Inverse Cultivation and the awakening of the Ancient Godly Bloodline as well as the abundance of martial skills and treasures that have been showered upon you are all due to your extraordinary luck.”

“To a warrior, luck has an extremely powerful influence. Yet, in a much larger proportion, luck itself holds the key to the rise and fall of a nation or an empire!”

“The luck and fortune of this Empire, accumulated and amassed for all the centuries it has endured is way beyond your imagination. These people you are fighting against are vying for it!”

“The luck of the Tang Empire? Was the betrothal arranged by Emperor Leng and the Xia Clan as well as the rift between her and Emperor Xiao part of this, a strife in pursuit of luck? But even with greater luck, she would at most endow herself with richer and more plentiful blessings? Is this even worth all the lives lost in battle?”

“That is because you have yet to reach the level of Dao Master. Your current powers do not allow you the heightened acuteness to fully perceive the substance of Luck. But when you are a Dao Master, especially who has reached the pinnacle of the Dao Master level, then you will know why.” The Gu King remarked cryptically.