Pursuit of the Truth

Su Ming stood on the magma in the volcano. The mighty presence and the divine sense from the sky that had swept past him just now had made him feel as if his entire body had turned transparent and he could keep no secrets. Everything about him had been revealed to that divine sense.

This feeling turned Su Ming’s expression dark, and he came to a deeper understanding of what the old voice from Yin Death Vortex had meant when he said that the Barren Lands of Divine Essence were a gigantic jail.

’These True Guards are the guards that fend against the Barren Lands of Divine Essence.’ In silence, the gigantic Crimson Python Phoenix that had flown out previously stopped howling and its body fell limp, as if the roars just now had used up all its strength.

As a dull and lifeless expression settled on its face, it gradually sank into the magma and falling into deep sleep once again.

The bald crane stuck its head out of the magma at that moment. The terror in its eyes showed that fear still lingered within its heart. It flapped its wings and flew out of the magma before sprawling over the stone where it had been previously.

”Your Grandpa Crane was just about to suffocate! Damn it all, this place is just too hot. But why do I feel like there should be a place that is even hotter here?” The bald crane scratched its bald head, muffled.

After a long while, Su Ming closed his eyes and no longer bothered himself with thinking about the True Guards. After all, the True Guards were incredibly powerful, and they were not people Su Ming could hope to stand up to. The most important thing for him then was to continue training and increase his level of cultivation. Once it reached a certain standard, he could leave this place and search for the king of Yin Death’s Fragmented Worlds as well as the entrance to the fifth True Great World, and perhaps… he could even leave this place!

The brilliant light that shone in Su Ming’s eyes was hidden by his closed lids. He might have lost his ability to love and his sense of pain, but the beautiful moments in his memories still remained, and whenever he remembered them, he would feel numb. This numbness would cause anguish in the depths of his heart.

In silence, Su Ming began circulating his cultivation base, repeating the act of absorbing the hot air. It was something he had done without stop for the entire year. As he absorbed the hot air, he would also absorb the power of flesh and blood from the blue stone so that his body would become stronger.

Time passed. One month, two months… In the blink of an eye, another year went by.

The four seasons did not exist in Crimson Flame Planet. No matter what month it was, heat would always fill the planet. That heat could roast a person’s skin and evaporate sweat as well as blood. It could also gradually burn a person’s will to ashes.

During the past year, Su Ming had gone out once, but he did not move too far away. He could only move about ten thousand feet around the volcano. He could not go past that area because once he was close to that spot, a blue screen of light would immediately appear, blocking his footsteps.

Aside from that, once Su Ming left the volcano, he could sense that the spiritual energy in the world was incredibly scarce. He could release his power as he circulated his cultivation base but could not absorb anything. Because of that, it was difficult for him to replenish his cultivation base.

There might be quite a large number of crystals in his storage bag, but there would still come a time when he would use them up. That was why Su Ming seldom used them. He did not know how long he would need to stay in the Barren Lands of Divine Essence. Perhaps… he would need to stay there for the entirety of his life.

Su Ming did not know whether he would act like the others and commit acts of murder as well as carrying corpses around to search for the ’gods’ such as the Crimson Python Phoenix in order to obtain inferior crystals once all his crystals disappeared.

Fortunately, his current body was greatly different from other people’s. He could absorb the power of fire within the magma. This flame’s power might only have one single attribute, but in this barren Crimson Flame Planet, being able to absorb this crazed power of fire already put him a step above others.

Even when two years passed, Su Ming’s level of cultivation was still at the initial stage of Life Privation, which was the starting point of Earth Cultivation Realm. His cultivation level might not have increased even a single bit, but most of his Yin Death Aura had already disappeared. Most of the divine abilities he cast now centered around the might of flames.

And they also became his strongest divine abilities.

As he trained his physical body and devoured the heat, he would obtain quite a large amount of resources, courtesy of the people who were relying on the Crimson Python Phoenix. Due to those extra resources, his physical body’s training was going much swifter than it should have. However… as time passed and more people who relied on the Crimson Python Phoenix died, Su Ming’s training of his physical body also slowed down.

The one time he had exited the volcano was because of this. He had wanted to search for the blue crystals on his own.

On that day when there was about a month left before the time of the offerings, Su Ming lay with his body submerged in magma, exercising his breathing. He had his Atman spread out and cast around the area. This had already become a habit to him.

Yet at this time, not long after Su Ming had spread his Atman outwards, his eyes suddenly flew open.

At that moment, Yue Hong Bang was moving swiftly past the mountain range leading to the volcano with a forlorn and bitter expression on his face, his body covered in blood. Only the thin old man remained from the people who had been with him in the past. There was a wound on the old man’s chest that covered most of it. Blood flowed out in rivers, and the old man’s face was pale. If he did not have a True Breath of Live, he would have fallen dead long ago.

There were three figures giving chase. Two of them were men, and one of them was a woman. All of them were thin, but the light in their eyes was bright with bloodthirstiness as they chased their prey.

Among the three, besides an old man who had reached Heaven Cultivation Realm, the other man and woman, who were in their middle-ages, were at Earth Cultivation Realm. The speed at which they gave chase became faster with each passing moment, and evil snickers came from the old man.

”Yue Hong Bang, I’ve wanted to kill you for a very long time, but as expected of a third generation descendant of a criminal. The trap I set had only managed to injure the both of you badly. ”This time, I will definitely kill you! How dare you trespass the area of my cave abode?! You’re just asking for death!”

Killing intent and greed shone in the old man’s eyes. When he lifted his right hand, a string of incantations tumbled out of his mouth and echoed in the air. As he formed a seal with his left hand, he struck the air, and immediately, a gust of black wind appeared out of nowhere. It turned into a gigantic black-spiked mace that charged towards Yue Hong Bang with a loud buzz.

”I’ll kill you and use your corpse of a third generation descendant of a criminal to exchange for ten crystals from my god. It’ll be enough to cover up all the power I’ve spent to kill you!”

The black wind swept up the spiked mace and closed in on Yue Hong Bang with a loud whistle. Despair appeared on Yue Hong Bang’s face, and he coughed up a mouthful of blood as he turned his head back. Once he formed a seal with his hands, the mouthful of blood instantly gathered together before him and turned into a red hammer that swung swiftly towards the incoming spiked mace.

As a loud bang reverberated in the air, Yue Hong Bang’s body trembled, and he coughed up a large mouthful of blood. He tumbled backwards, and all the wounds on his body tore open.

The red hammer crumbled to pieces. As for the black wind that had swept up the spiked mace, it froze for a moment, cracking slightly, then charged towards Yue Hong Bang once again.

When it was close to the fleeing men, the thin old man beside Yue Hong Bang let out a loud roar and flew up to appear right before Yue Hong Bang so that he could use his body to block the incoming spiked mace. The two crashed into each other, and Yue Hong Bang’s eyes turned red as tears flowed down them.

However, he didn’t stop moving for a heartbeat. Instead, he used the time bought by the thin old man blocking the mace to charge towards the mountain range where the volcano was at full speed.

”Hmph!”

The old man who was in Heaven Cultivation Realm let out a cold snort. He did not even spare a glance at the person he had killed with his spiked mace. Instead, a freezing glare shone in his eyes, and he cast a glance at the volcano to which Yue Hong Bang was charging.

”The god Crimson Python Phoenix’s volcano… Yue Hong Bang, are you mad? How could you even dream of asking help from a god? The gods in Crimson Flame Planet have all lost their intelligence. As long as we don’t provoke them, they won’t attack us. I’ll offer your corpse to the god here, and it’ll save me the time needed to carry you back.”

The old man in Heaven Cultivation Realm laughed eerily and brought the man and woman behind him towards Yue Hong Bang. The black wind that had swept up the spiked mace became even faster, and it was now less than a hundred feet away from Yue Hong Bang.

At that moment of crisis, Yue Hong Bang let out a loud roar.

”God, please save me!”

Right at the moment he shouted, the spiked mace closed in. When it crashed into Yue Hong Bang, he formed a seal with his right hand, and red light shone around his entire body, helping him resist that blow, but once it did, he coughed up blood, and that blood was already his Origin Blood and Essence. This blow caused his entire body to tremble, and he was now on the verge of dying. His body fell backwards and landed with a bang on the mouth of the volcano. The spiked mace might have disappeared as well, but the three people were less than three hundred feet away. Despair appeared on Yue Hong Bang’s face.

”God, please save me! This person’s cave abode is made entirely of blue stones, please save me!”

”Another madman, I see. No one can save you today!”

The old man laughed loudly, but even though he was laughing, his heart let out a thump. He knew that Yue Hong Bang was not a fool. Since he had called for help from the god in this place twice, could it be that there was something off about this place?

There might have been uncertainty in the old man’s heart, but not a single hint of it showed on his face. However, he did slow down slightly and grabbed the man who followed behind him to toss him towards Yue Hong Bang.

”Kill him, and I will give you a crystal!”

The moment the man who was thrown by the old man was less than a hundred feet away from his target and Yue Hong Bang had almost fallen into total despair, a cold harrumph suddenly came from depths. At the same time, a red shadow charged out from the mouth of the volcano.

The shadow traveled so quickly that he arrived before Yue Hong Bang in the blink of an eye. At the instant wild delight appeared on Yue Hong Bang’s face in the midst of his despair, Su Ming lifted his right hand and threw a fist at the incoming man of Earth Cultivation Realm.

Before the punch even landed, it already stirred up a shocking boom. Even space itself seemed to have collapsed, and a wave of intense heat spread out from Su Ming’s body. There was even a layer of distortions that contained a law around his fist.

The expression of the man who was thrown out changed swiftly. Just as he was about to retreat, the world around his body seemed to have moved in reverse, keeping him frozen in place for a moment.

The price for that pause was Su Ming’s fist landing straight on the man’s chest.

There was no bang when that punch landed, only a muffled sound of hitting an empty sack. A shudder wrecked the man’s body, and with the spot where Su Ming’s fist had landed on his chest as the center, his body was instantly disassembled. In the blink of an eye, half of his body shattered and turned into dust…

Su Ming pulled back his right hand, standing before Yue Hong Bang. He cast his emotionless eyes at the old man around two hundred something feet away, his gaze aloof. A piercingly cold presence spread out from Su Ming’s body without his conscious effort. There was no need for him to even think about it.

The old man’s pupils shrank, and his body came to an abrupt halt.