Pursuit of the Truth

”I… hate it!” The eyes of the woman in green whose neck was seized by Su Ming turned red. She glared at Su Ming and suddenly began laughing shrilly.

There was hatred in that laughter, along with deep enmity.

Su Ming frowned, and purple lightning immediately erupted from his right hand and enveloped the woman in green from head to toe.

As crackling sounds echoed in the air, it looked as if a layer of skin was peeled off her body, and her true form was revealed.

She had a hideous appearance that looked like it belonged to a ghost. Her hair was a mess, her whole body was covered in scars, and blood poured out from all over her. She had the mark of a peacock at the center of her brows, but what made hers different from the others was that her mark was not an illusion. Instead, it was formed by nine tiny green feathers stuck between her brows.

”As expected, it’s injured. If you’re here in search for its feathers, then it proves that it’s heavily injured!

”My plan is a success, even if it isn’t here personally, it’s enough that you’re here for it!” There was a forlorn expression on the woman’s face, but her bloodshot eyes were shining with a brilliant light. At that moment, she looked as if she had become deranged.

”Three,” Su Ming stated flatly. He ignored the woman’s shrill voice ringing in the air. When he said that number, the purple lightning in his right hand shot up with a boom. A presence that could destroy all manner of lives instantly gathered. During that moment, he looked as if he just needed one single thought to kill this woman.

”I had my sword attendant bring that feather to Western Ring Nebula’s foreign land. If you kill Dao Ren, I will tell you the whole truth and give you all the feathers I own!” the woman in green immediately shouted.

At the instant she said these words, a boom rang out from Su Ming’s right hand, and the woman’s voice turned into a muffled groan. Once he loosened his grip, she coughed up a huge mouthful of blood. When she staggered backwards, his cold voice reached her.

”I am not a sword you can use to kill others.” Su Ming lifted his right hand and swung it in the direction of the woman in green. Immediately, an endless amount of Divine Essence Runic Symbols appeared on her body, covering her up as if sealing her.

”Neither do you have the right to use this to threaten me and make me attack… However, since you provided me with a clue, I will help you once, but you must pay the price for having me attack.” As Su Ming spoke plainly, he lifted his right index finger and tapped the center of the woman’s brows.

She started trembling violently. She could feel that the finger at the center of her brows was like a vortex that was rapidly devouring her life. In the blink of an eye, three thousand years of her life were gone. The woman might have an ugly face, but everyone could still see her becoming older. For the first time, fear appeared in her eyes.

The woman in green felt her life flowing away, and she immediately shouted out, ”I know Kong Mo, and it knows me as well. You are its friend, you should…”

”It is my friend, but you aren’t.” A barely noticeable glint appeared in Su Ming’s eyes, and once he absorbed another two thousand years of life from her, he lifted his finger away from the woman’s brows. If he liked someone, that didn’t mean he would also like everything that was associated with that person. In Su Ming’s mind, he could have all sorts of friends, but a friend’s friend had nothing to do with him.

When the woman mentioned Kong Mo, it was clear that she meant… the bald crane.

Su Ming turned around, and with a chilling gaze, he looked at Dao Ren, who was surrounded by fire. He had a feeling that this matter was not as simple as it seemed, and there was definitely some sort of secret contained within it. Based on the woman in green’s words and expressions, he had already formed some assumptions.

Dao Ren’s expression changed drastically. He did not expect that Wu Li Zi would want him to die, but this was not the time for him to think. Almost the moment Su Ming turned his gaze towards him, Dao Ren retreated, intending to flee without care for anything else.

He was feeling nervous, and his heart was filled with shock as well as terror. At that moment, the only thing in his mind was to flee at all cost. Intense hatred also grew within the depths of his heart for Wu Li Zi.

Right then, the entire Taia Planet shuddered, and a great will seemed about to descend from beyond the planet. This was the initial sign that the envelopment Su Ming had cast on this place was about to break.

Su Ming lifted his head and cast the sky a gaze, but he remained calm. At the instant Dao Ren took a step backwards, Su Ming lifted his right hand and pointed towards him.

A power that seemed like it could determine a person’s life and death, could change laws, and overturn rules shot out with a bang from that finger. Before Dao Ren could retreat more than a couple hundred of feet, purple lightning came towards him with loud booming sounds and instantly gathered on his body.

Those booming sounds continued without stop. Dao Ren let out a roar, and the mark of the flame at the center of his brows shone abruptly. The flames around him became even brighter and started burning even more furiously to fight against the purple lightning.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

As the purple lightning gathered on him and as the booms echoed in the air, Dao Ren coughed up blood. As he staggered backwards, all the flames around him dispersed. At that moment, the purple lightning was about to descend on him once more and destroy him.

”Lord True General, save me!” Dao Ren let out shout in despair. The mark of the candle flame at the center of his brows shattered at that instant. As it crumbled to pieces, Dao Ren’s body looked as if he had turned into a candle, and his soul as well as his life became flames.

From the distance, he looked as if he was no longer a cultivator, but had turned into… a burning candle!

The purple lightning came crashing on him and collided with the flames. As booming sounds surged into the sky, Su Ming suddenly walked out of the air beside the flames. He lifted his right hand. A power that felt like time gathered on his palm. It was a temporal divine ability formed by five thousand years of the woman in green’s life. He seized the flames.

”These flames should be extinguished.” At the moment Su Ming said these words coolly, the flames were snuffed out, and as wisps of green smoke drifted into the air, Dao Ren’s life was also put out.

This was one of Ecang’s origin divine abilities - Disaster Befalls All.

”Now, you can speak.” Su Ming turned around and looked at the woman in green coldly.

The woman’s face was pale and looked much older. This was not a gradual loss of five thousand years of her life, but an instant extraction. That was why she could not immediately regain her usual appearance.

”Sending out the feathers was my plan… and it was also something Huo Zhu… tacitly consented to.

”Our goal was to lure Kong Mo to this place. If it saw the feathers, then with how it is, it would definitely come to this place, and if it came, then it would fall into the trap Huo Zhu and I placed!

”But I am innocent, if I don’t do this, then I would have been trapped in this hideous form forever. This wasn’t what I wanted, all of it was imposed upon me forcefully by Huo Zhu.

”True General Huo Zhu managed to obtain a small portion of Kong Mo’s physical body from some unknown place and used it to train. She also fused Kong Mo’s blood and feathers in my body in an attempt search for Kong Mo’s secret.

”I had no way of fighting back against it and could only endure it quietly, that’s why I turned into this state, but Huo Zhu promised me that once she succeeded, she would return me my freedom.

”She wants to devour Kong Mo’s soul. She is the instigator for all of this, and she also had her will descend on Dao Ren to monitor me. If you want the feathers, then take all of the nine fledgling feathers at the center of my brows. However, these are just part of all the green feathers. The remaining ones are with Huo Zhu. If you want all of them, then you must kill her!

”You’ve destroyed her will that descended to this place and killed her messenger. So even if there was no Kong Mo in-between, there would be enmity between the two of you now. If you kill her, you will obtain all that you want.”

”If I kill her, you will also be free.” As Su Ming spoke calmly, he lifted his right hand and swung it before himself. The woman in green immediately let out a scream of pain, and the nine feathers between her brows flew out to land on Su Ming’s palm. During that moment, the sky rumbled, the ground trembled, and several great wills descended onto the land.

The strongest among them could almost cover the entire sky in this place. As those people descended, a sigh echoed in all directions.

”Fellow Daoist, why must you do this? This place… is not a place where you can come and go as you please.” The world rumbled. At the instant the wills descended, Su Ming lifted his head. As a freezing glare shone in his eyes, an intense fighting spirit burned within him.

Up to this point, Su Ming had yet to bring forth all his power in the place where True Sacred Yin World was stationed. He had only executed part of the might of his Ecang clone. However, this portion of power had already let Su Ming come to a deeper understanding of how powerful this clone of his was.

The danger when he was Possessing Ecang became all worth it once he verified just how powerful was his Ecang clone.

”A clone that can change my entire destiny.” As Su Ming mumbled, he put away the feathers. When he lifted his head, the divine thought from the old will echoed in the air, and all the purple lightning from those one hundred thousand lis at the spot where he was rose up from the ground and charged towards the wills in the sky.

There were six wills in total, and the weakest of them was in Solar Kalpa Realm. As for the strongest… it was the presence that had stirred up Su Ming’s will to fight… a Master of Fate, Lives, and Death.

’With them around, it’s impossible for me to head to the main camp and search for Huo Zhu. If I went there… with the power of my clone, it’d be impossible for me to leave.’ Su Ming sighed in his heart. It was not that he did not want to take this risk, but this was simply a dead end. If he took that risk, there would simply be no hope winning.

Besides, once he went too deep, it would become impossible for the Ecang clone to leave under the mysterious forces of power from the four Great True Worlds whose power he did not fully comprehend.

After all, only about thirty breaths had passed since Su Ming had appeared in this place. However, within this short time, so many powerful warriors had appeared. If he dragged this on any further, more powerful people would be lured out.

’However, that person isn’t really a Master of Fate, Lives, and Death. He is just close to that state.’ At the instant the purple lightning from the ground crashed against the will from the sky, Su Ming took a step forward and turned into the strongest bolt of purple lightning. He swept up the lightning around him, stirring up booming sounds that shook the sky and earth.

From the distance, the layer of purple lightning seemed to draw the outline of a big tree. The lightning served as the tree’s branches, and Su Ming was the trunk. He swept past the sky and crashed violently into the will up there. Booming sounds surged through the air, and as the entire planet trembled, the purple bolts of lightning dispersed, but the incoming wills were also forced to scatter.

It allowed Su Ming to rush out of Taia Planet and come back into the galaxy.