Tribulation of Myriad Races

“I only worry that their participation will awaken even more marquises from the river.”

The old turtle was still worried. This wasn’t a good idea. He much preferred to guard the tunnel himself.

Su Yu was of the same opinion. But he needed the old turtle on his side if he were to deliver a crushing defeat to the North Heavenly King. Marquis Lanshan had been improving rapidly, but not enough to reach the level of a heavenly king.

As for Su Yu himself, he was no longer sure about his current level of strength. He had grown considerably, but he doubted he was already at the level of a heavenly king. He couldn’t risk taking the book spirit and tea plant with him. There wasn’t even a need to talk about the white dog.

Who else could he take into the Death Realm? Great Zhou King? He was good at concealing his presence. But in a battle, he would be forced to expose his presence. Thus, pseudo death spirits would be the best choice for this job.

Should he get the South Heavenly King to convert a few of the Daofuses on his side? Forget it.

Su Yu felt greatly troubled by the matter. Eventually, he said, “We’ll go down and see what happens. We can avoid provoking the North Heavenly King directly. I doubt he has the courage to leave his domain. The moment he leaves, he will lose his greatest advantage over us.”

The old turtle nodded in agreement. “If you have to, it’s not a bad idea to let the North Heavenly Domain be for now.”

However, Su Yu disagreed. He said, “That will leave an unstable variable behind. He can attack after I remove my experts stationed here. With a surprise attack, he can kill all the new guardians and block the death tunnels. With that, we will lose our grasp over the entire Death Realm.”

In short, this strategy was essentially a bet on North Heavenly King’s courage. It was far too risky to his liking. The two continued their discussion, but they couldn’t reach a decision on what to do.

For now, they had to leave the matter aside. Su Yu would first meet Marquis Lanshan and discuss more there.

With their discussion over, Su Yu looked at the old turtle and said, “Senior, I saw your dao. It is very powerful. With your age, you should be just as powerful or even stronger than a heavenly king. You monopolize your dao. You should be a peak Daofuse or even a Master of Law…”

The old turtle gave Su Yu a level stare, wondering if this was a form of insult.

Su Yu laughed and said, “Don’t misunderstand me, Senior. What I’m saying is, I can take you on a trip to your dao. For now, you need to prioritize comprehending your dao or you will be stuck forever.”

The old turtle gave the proposal a thought and nodded, “In that case, I’ll be troubling you. But I’m not sure if I can actually comprehend anything.”

“Let’s try.”

Su Yu was unsure as well. The old turtle did not seem too…bright. After living for so many years, he was still so clueless about his dao. He had mostly been fighting by reacting on his instinct. Turtling was his strongest move–cough, cough. Well, that was a compatible move with his dao. Thus, his instinct was admirably accurate.

Soon after, Su Yu tore a rift into the River of Time and took the old turtle through it. He did not need to use too much power on this trip as the old turtle was more than strong enough to supply the power required for this trip alone.

***

Inside the River of Time.

It didn’t take them long to reach a certain massive tributary. The old turtle felt a little resonance with it, but not too strongly.

Su Yu did not mind describing what he saw to the old turtle. With a sigh, he said, “I believe you should call this dao the dao of mountain. You can’t see it, but it is essentially a mountain. A crouching mountain, just like your favourite move in battle. I believe this was a dao opened by an ancient grand dream turtle.

“It is a powerful dao. I have witnessed a lot of daos. The death spirit dao is the strongest, the physical body dao comes second, the pen dao comes third, the five elemental dao is the fourth, and the heavenly desolate beast dao is the fifth. Your dao is the sixth strongest dao I have seen.”

It was only a tiny bit weaker than the heavenly desolate beast dao.

It was stronger than the daos of many of the people he knew. Su Yu continued, “I believe your race does not lack the ability to sense the various daos. Do you know the pioneer of this dao?”

The old turtle couldn’t use his race as an excuse for his poor comprehension of the dao anymore. After all, someone of his race had pioneered such a dao.

After a long silence, the old turtle said, “I believe it was pioneered by my dao companion.”

“…”

Su Yu blanked out.

The old turtle explained, “Ages ago, there were only two turtles in existence. They were nameless. And raceless. Eventually, my name was used to name our race.”

Su Yu blanked out further.

“The other turtle was my dao companion, the Pseudo Emperor of the grand dream race.”

Su Yu blinked.

Holy shit!

Did that really happen?

That was…unbelievable!

But then, it was a logical story. He had thought that the old turtle had taken the name of his race as his own since he was the sole survivor. But no. The very race had been named after him.

The old turtle said, “My dao companion was killed a long time ago, during the primordial past. She was much smarter than I was. I was lazy. I did not like moving and thinking. Thus, she had always been stronger than I. I believe she was the pioneer of this dao.

“She was the only one who could have pioneered this dao. Eventually, even our descendants died off. And thus, I became the sole survivor of the grand dream race.”

Su Yu frowned and said, “I heard that there was a Pseudo Emperor in your race during the ancient past…”

“That was my son.” The old turtle said, “He died as well. He wasn’t too strong. He might be a Pseudo Emperor, but he wasn’t in the assembly. That was the reason for my low status in the ancient past. Then again, I never liked moving.”

With a self-mocking smile, he looked in the direction of the tributary even though he couldn’t see anything. Regret in his voice, he said, “My dao companion was powerful. But I was born stupid. Even after so many years, I can’t fully comprehend her dao.”

He looked at Su Yu and said, “But listening to you, I think I understand my issue now. I do have some comprehension of this dao, but it is mostly focused on the defensive aspect of it. However…no, you are wrong as well. You’re looking at a mountain, right?”

Su Yu nodded. That was what he saw.

“This mountain has never been meant to be used defensively.”

As Su Yu blanked out, the old turtle chuckled and explained, “You misunderstood due to me. That dao companion of mine specialized in the offensive. This mountain might be based on the Primordial Divine Mountain we saw back then.”

Offense.

Su Yu was still stunned. But that was true. He had assumed that this dao was defensive in nature after seeing its shape. But that was merely because he had been led astray by the old turtle.

The old turtle sighed and said, “No wonder. So offense is required. I have been wrong for ages. I have relied on time to accumulate strength, but at this rate, I will never gain mastery over this dao. I need to change. I need to specialize in offense as well.”

Su Yu stared at the old turtle. So the female turtle was good at offense, but this guy was only good at defense. No wonder he was stuck for so many years. So he had pursued the dao in an entirely opposite direction.

The old turtle smiled and said, “Well, this is a bountiful trip. I now understand what I need to do. Thank you for taking me here or I would remain lost for even longer. No wonder Martial King told Devote King to advise me that I needed to fight more back then. In fact, that was the main reason they had placed me on my current position. They were trying to help me, but I didn’t understand their intentions.”

The old turtle smiled and said, “Give me more time. Perhaps…I can change. I have fought a lot recently, and during those battles, my dao felt incredibly smooth. So that was why. I had spent the previous nine epochs with barely any battles. No wonder I was stuck for so long.”

In short, he was stuck because he was lazy. That was Su Yu’s conclusion. The old turtle had been this strong for many years, yet he had not grown much despite his age. But through this trip, Su Yu was able to learn a new gossip.

The old turtle’s dao companion was a Master of Law. The old turtle’s son was the Pseudo Emperor of their race during the ancient past.

Meanwhile, the old turtle had spent all his time sleeping. If it wasn’t for Devote King, he would have probably refused even this position. He might even reject an appointment into a marquis. He would rather sleep.

“Who killed your dao companion, Senior?”

The old turtle shook his head and said, “It has been too long. There’s no point in talking about it. That person is probably dead by now. My dao companion was simply too aggressive. If she had been as relaxed as me, she would have lived until now.”

Su Yu wanted to say that if his dao companion was the same, his race wouldn’t even have a dao to pursue. But he remained silent. Fortunately, the old turtle had discovered the correct path himself. After all, even Su Yu had been led astray by the old turtle.

Speaking of, imagine the sight of an aggressive turtle…

Wow. It would be a beautiful sight to behold.

Su Yu started imagining the old turtle shouting aggressively all the time like Heavendoom.

A turtle like that…the old turtle’s dao companion must have been quite an interesting individual. An aggressive turtle. What an interesting image.