Chapter 528: The Braided Girl and the Shadow Boy
“You are... the long-braided girl!”
Qin Mu sized up the girl with two long braids, involuntarily recalling the dark maiden he had encountered in the darkness of the Great Ruin. A surge of joy welled up within him. “Is it really you?”
The dark maiden had also worn two long braids. Because they existed in two separate worlds, they had been unable to communicate or clearly see each other’s faces—only their silhouettes.
They had once spent an entire long night together, fleeing from the pursuit of the Heavenly Demon Horde. When the sun rose and the darkness receded, the dark maiden vanished along with the Dark Realm.
And now, the girl standing on the shoulder of a deity before him also had long braids that hung down from her chest to her waist.
When she heard him utter the words “long-braided girl,” she was both startled and overjoyed. She quickly leaped down from the deity’s shoulder and, in a few swift steps, arrived before Qin Mu. Two small dimples appeared on her face. “You’re the shadow boy! Father, he’s that shadow boy who suddenly disappeared!”
The deity lowered his head to look at Qin Mu, a puzzled expression on his face. “You were originally a shadow—why have you now taken on a true form? We were behind the formation just now and saw you fighting fiercely, which was truly extraordinary. We were wondering where such an expert had come from! You’re at the Seven Stars stage, aren’t you? In the Supreme Heavenly Realm, there are only a handful of Seven Stars cultivators with achievements like yours. Impressive for a youth!”
Qin Mu’s heart trembled slightly. “Are there Seven Stars cultivators here who are even stronger than me? Are they Overlord Bodies?”
“Overlord Body?”
The deity led them forward, looking bewildered. “What is an Overlord Body? I’ve never heard of it. They are young people with the potential to become true gods—kings among spiritual bodies, naturally extraordinary. They are not Overlord Bodies.”
“Kings among spiritual bodies?”
Qin Mu blinked. He had never heard of kings among spiritual bodies, and a sense of confusion washed over him, but excitement also stirred within him. Kings among spiritual bodies, youths with the potential of true gods—this world was exactly where he needed to be!
Having sent himself here as a sacrificial offering, he had already witnessed the extraordinary nature of the Heavenly Demon Horde in the battlefield. The demons here were incredibly powerful; in the Yan Kang realm, they would be almost on par with figures like Ban Gongcuo. Of course, when it came to escape skills, Ban Gongcuo was still unmatched.
“The Supreme Heavenly Realm has undergone ten to twenty thousand years of war. The Dao techniques and divine abilities here must have advanced rapidly. Here, I might just find a way to defeat the First Ancestor Human Sovereign!”
He clenched his fist. Defeating the First Ancestor Human Sovereign had become his greatest goal. Since he couldn’t find hope in Yan Kang, perhaps he could find it here in the Supreme Heavenly Realm!
Even if he didn’t find it, witnessing more Dao techniques and divine abilities would help him improve.
Suddenly, the deity moved, charging toward the battlefield. His voice rang out from afar: “Stay here for now!”
In the distance, a rift tore open in space. Six enormous black hands reached through the spatial crack, struggling to widen the opening.
The deity rushed to the spot, drew his sword, and slashed at the black hands. He had just severed two arms when a massive hammer came whistling through the air, sending him flying. Another demon god had launched an attack.
The long-braided girl looked toward the battlefield, saw that her father was unharmed and had turned back to fight the demon god who had ambushed him, and breathed a sigh of relief.
Qin Mu asked, “Braided girl, you weren’t here originally. How did you end up in this place?”
He was somewhat puzzled. The place where he had met this dark maiden was deep in the Great Ruin, while this was the edge of the Great Ruin, separated by twenty to thirty thousand li. Logically, she shouldn’t have been able to appear here.
The long-braided girl’s face darkened. “After you disappeared, our city was breached. Many people died. My father rescued us and brought us here, to Ming Yi City…”
She rushed forward, and Qin Mu quickly followed. “When I disappeared last time, it was exactly when night turned to day. Didn’t the demons of your Supreme Heavenly Realm vanish along with the darkness?”
The long-braided girl looked puzzled. “Why would they vanish?”
Qin Mu was taken aback.
He had originally thought that the Supreme Heavenly Realm, like the Great Ruin, experienced the phenomenon of darkness invading. Last time, he had walked through the darkness, and when it receded, he had left the Supreme Heavenly Realm. Now it seemed that the situation in the Supreme Heavenly Realm was different from the Great Ruin. Those demons didn’t disappear with the change of day and night; they could remain in this world permanently.
“It seems the Heavenly Demon King was right. The barrier between the Supreme Heavenly Realm and the demon world has been shattered.”
Qin Mu’s heart tightened. “The Heavenly Demon King’s guess was entirely correct, so his other guess is probably right too. After the demons conquer the Supreme Heavenly Realm, they will perform a blood sacrifice, causing the demon world to collide with the Yan Kang realm! How can this be stopped?”
The long-braided girl charged toward the altar ahead, speaking rapidly. “You’ve been fighting for a long time. You should go to Ming Yi City and rest. I still have to fight with the army.”
“These injuries of mine are nothing serious.”
Qin Mu quickened his pace to keep up with her. “I’m also a medicine master. In my world, I have some small reputation. I’ve already given myself some basic treatment. This time, I came to seek stronger techniques. In my world, many methods have been lost.”
The altar, which loomed like a hill, had already been occupied by the Heavenly Demon Horde. The demon general who had sent Qin Mu flying over ten li was leading his troops from the high ground. Hundreds of Heavenly Demon Horde members were locked in a brutal battle with the Supreme Heavenly Realm cultivators who were trying to storm the altar.
At the highest point of the altar, the demon general was performing a technique. Clusters of zhang-six Yin thunder rolled down from the sky, scurrying across the ground like rolling balls. Wherever this rolling thunder passed, the flesh of the Supreme Heavenly Realm cultivators was dissolved on the spot, leaving behind skeletons still running in mid-stride.
Qin Mu narrowed his eyes. The ferocity and strangeness of the demonic techniques surpassed even those of many cultivators in the Heavenly Demon Sect who specialized in demonic cultivation!
The braided girl charged up the altar. “My father and I saw it while watching the battle from Ming Yi City. Although you are very powerful—your magical power is absurdly strong, your techniques are incredibly refined, your rune structures are exquisite, and your achievements in techniques are extremely high—it seems your cultivation method has a problem. You lack a true divine-level method. My father said your civilization has a gap.”
She met a Heavenly Demon Horde member, an Asura. His strength was immense, his physical body formidable, and his attacks were incredibly swift. With a sudden burst, runic marks appeared all over his body, as if carved into his skin.
But the braided girl’s physical body was also astonishingly strong. The two clashed at lightning speed, their techniques concealed within their palms and fingers. In an instant, the battle was decided, and life and death were determined.
The braided girl shattered his chest cavity and pointed at the center of his brow. The Asura’s skull exploded from the back, and his corpse fell, tumbling down the altar steps.
Qin Mu’s eyelids twitched. He could immediately see that the braided girl’s techniques were not more refined than his—in fact, they were quite crude—but her cultivation method indeed had extraordinary qualities.
The braided girl continued her assault up the altar, speaking rapidly. “My father said that in many aspects of your physical body, you are not inferior to young cultivators with the potential of true gods. For example, your hands, your heart, your dantian, your legs, and your eyes have all reached very high levels of achievement. But your hands are just hands, your legs are just legs, your heart is just a heart, and your dantian is just a dantian. Individually, they are highly accomplished, but when combined into your body, they haven’t been unified. Therefore, you haven’t reached the potential of a true god. Compared to a young true god, you fall somewhat short.”
Even as she spoke, she had already killed several more enemies, fierce and unstoppable, steadily advancing toward the top of the altar.
With her breaking through the enemy lines, the other cultivators were greatly inspired and fought wildly to charge toward the altar’s summit. However, more Heavenly Demon Horde members surged forward, blocking them and suppressing their momentum.
Qin Mu transformed into the form of the Town Star Lord. The Gate of Bearing Heaven swept forward, and any Heavenly Demon Horde member struck by it lost their soul and collapsed.
He looked around and nodded to himself. The braided girl was right. The cultivators of the Supreme Heavenly Realm indeed had an advantage that the cultivators of Yan Kang lacked.
Their techniques were not particularly refined, yet they were more powerful. Their move variations couldn’t match Yan Kang’s, but because their physical bodies were stronger, the power of their moves was also greater.
This should be due to their cultivation methods.
Even someone as powerful as the Butcher, the Mute, the Cripple, Granny Si, or the Blind Man each had their own strengths, cultivating one aspect to the divine level without achieving it in every area.
Even a freak like the Yan Kang National Teacher, a sage born once every five hundred years, couldn’t reach the divine level in every aspect.
However, the cultivators of the Supreme Heavenly Realm had higher-grade cultivation methods. Every aspect of their physical bodies was tempered and developed comprehensively, so their combat power was naturally higher than Yan Kang’s.
“No wonder the cultivators and demons of the Supreme Heavenly Realm are all so strong!”
A sudden clarity dawned on him, like clouds parting to reveal the sun. He had come seeking a way to defeat the First Ancestor Human Sovereign, and now he saw a glimmer of hope.
“But because your magical power is strong and your techniques are refined, even with all these shortcomings, you can still dominate the battlefield. In the entire Supreme Heavenly Realm, there are only a few people at the same cultivation level who are stronger than you.”
The braided girl shouted and fought, continuing to relay her father’s assessment of Qin Mu amidst the chaos. “Your cultivation method is too scattered. You train your eyes separately, your hands separately, your heart separately—dividing and training them individually. If you could unify every aspect of your body, training your physical form, magical power, primordial spirit, and techniques all at once, you would make another astonishing leap! However, precisely because your method is so scattered, unifying it will be incredibly difficult.”
Qin Mu exhaled a turbid breath. The braided girl was repeating her father’s view of him. She couldn’t possibly have such a broad perspective, but she had indeed pointed out Qin Mu’s shortcomings—or rather, the shortcomings of the entire Yan Kang realm.
In recent years, the cultivators of Yan Kang had achieved accomplishments in certain areas that could make them proud of the world, but they hadn’t unified these achievements. Their progress in cultivation methods was still unsystematic.
This was because they were all descendants of people who had fled here twenty thousand years ago, and there was a massive gap in the transmission of cultivation methods. Later generations trained hard, and the wise delved into techniques, but they could never break through the shackles of their methods.
Just then, they finally reached the top of the altar. Hundreds of cultivators held off the Heavenly Demon Horde members attacking from below, while others surrounded the demon general.
“A bunch of chickens and dogs!”
The demon general laughed heartily. His primordial spirit stood behind him, radiating overwhelming arrogance. His four heads scanned the surroundings, and the banners on his back flew up with a whoosh. He sneered, “Killing you is as easy as turning my hand!”
The long-braided girl and the others wore grave expressions. This demon general’s combat power was extremely high—even Qin Mu dared not take his attacks head-on. One strike could likely take any one of their lives.
“It seems that the next step in Yan Kang’s reform and change should start with the cultivation methods…”
Beside the braided girl, Qin Mu was lost in thought. He took a huge jade eye from his glutton sack and fiddled with something behind it.
“Do you think I could build a bridge connecting Yan Kang and your Supreme Heavenly Realm?”
Qin Mu asked. “I want to let the cultivators of Yan Kang come here to train and broaden their horizons.”
The braided girl was extremely tense, cold sweat streaming down her forehead. She said angrily, “Why do you have so many questions? Stop asking for now! The enemy is right in front of us—if we don’t kill him…”
A beam of light burst from the jade eye. The demon general leaped high into the air but suddenly split in two mid-flight.
Qin Mu closed the jade eye, pulled out a large pile of various calculation tools, and began clattering away at computations. He also took out stacks of thick paper, crouched on the ground, and scribbled down numbers and symbols. Then he produced a set of measuring spirit weapons, drew on the paper, and said without looking up, “I want to build a bridge connecting the two realms, but it requires a lot of calculations. Do you have any experts in mathematical calculations here? I think if we can balance the energy between the two realms, it might be possible… What’s wrong? Why are you all looking at me with such strange expressions?”