Chapter 33: The Tide of Refugees
Deep beneath Dragonblood Castle, within the miniature plane secret chamber.
Linley sat cross-legged on the ground. On his thighs lay the black heavy sword, which he now nurtured and enveloped solely with his spiritual energy, not daring to use divine power. In Linley’s plan, the black heavy sword was meant for his future earth divine clone to wield.
It should be nurtured with earth-attribute divine power, but currently, Linley only had wind-attribute divine power within him.
“Thump!” “Thump!” The peculiar rhythm of the Earth Pulse echoed in Linley’s heart.
Having become a god and absorbed twenty million soul essences, Linley’s soul was now incredibly strong. His perception of the Earth Pulse had become clearer, and in his mind, a virtual image even emerged—within the depths of the earth, there were streams of unique fluctuations.
Each fluctuation spread outward like ripples on water.
It had taken Linley three months to transform from sixty-four layers of the Earth Pulse to thirty-two layers.
But from thirty-two layers to sixteen layers, Linley had spent a full year and three months, and this was after his soul had undergone a transformation, making his deduction abilities over a hundred times stronger.
“If I were at the Saint-level limit, it would probably take over a hundred years to transform from thirty-two layers of the Earth Pulse to sixteen layers.”
After breaking through to sixteen layers, Linley didn’t stop and continued cultivating.
From sixteen layers merging into eight layers, it seemed like a simple process of pairing and merging, doing this eight times. But the difficulty of each merge made Linley feel the strain.
In Linley’s mind.
Sixteen virtual black heavy swords continuously demonstrated and deduced. The speed of deduction involved countless variations every second, exploring all possibilities, then comparing them with the perceived “Earth Pulse” itself to confirm the correct direction of deduction.
Complex and vast.
“The final merge into one layer is the true Earth Pulse.” The more Linley cultivated, the more he marveled. “But the further I go, the difficulty of each merge increases tenfold. Transforming from sixteen layers to eight layers will probably take several years.”
Linley didn’t mind a few years.
But he had a feeling that going from eight layers to four layers would take even longer, and then from four layers to two layers, and finally the most important step—merging the two layers of the Earth Pulse into one, achieving the true Earth Pulse.
That final step was a threshold!
People like Desri had been stuck at that threshold for thousands of years.
“The final merge! I wonder when I’ll fully comprehend the true Earth Pulse.” Linley was very eager for the “Earth Pulse” profound mystery. He had a feeling that once he mastered this mystery, its power would be immense.
Since his conversation with Muba, Linley had cultivated for another three years.
In those three years, regarding the earth profound mysteries, Linley was still stuck at “sixteen layers of the Earth Pulse.” He was striving to break through to “eight layers of the Earth Pulse.” As for the speed profound mystery, although he had made some progress, compared to the vastness of the speed profound mystery, this progress was indeed insignificant.
“The War God was right. If one comprehends one percent of the elemental laws, then comprehending ten percent makes one a mid-level god. My current understanding of the ‘speed profound mystery’ is probably only ten percent of the mystery itself.”
Linley wasn’t impatient.
Having cultivated for decades and achieved this much, he should be content.
There were plenty of poor souls stuck at the Saint-level limit for millions of years.
In those three years, Linley’s biggest breakthrough was—
In terms of soul!
After absorbing twenty million soul essences, Linley’s soul had been greatly enhanced in essence, and his control over soul force had improved. Especially with faith force, nurturing it had tempered his spiritual energy, making it easier to control.
In the past, Linley could only make his soul force rise and fall in waves. Now, he could easily control his spiritual energy.
For example…
Soul defense!
Linley could control a large amount of spiritual energy, just like battle qi, to form a “pulse defense.” A large amount of spiritual energy formed a spherical membrane, protecting his sword-shaped soul. This “pulse defense” formed by spiritual energy was far stronger than his previous rigid method of using spiritual energy to block attacks.
“It’s not that I didn’t want to before, but my control over spiritual energy was insufficient.”
Linley sighed with emotion.
The strengthening of his soul and the transformation of his spiritual energy had brought about tremendous changes.
“Brother.” Wharton’s voice sounded as he entered the miniature plane secret chamber.
Linley opened his eyes.
“Brother, the day after tomorrow is the Yulan Festival,” Wharton said. Linley and Delia usually stopped cultivating during the Yulan Festival. Linley and Delia exchanged glances, then stood up and followed Wharton out.
The Yulan Festival was the most important holiday on the Yulan Continent.
Even during wartime, these few days were usually a ceasefire, allowing soldiers and civilians to enjoy the joy of the Yulan Festival. But now, the people of the Rohault Empire were filled with panic, pain, and anger!
“Don’t be afraid, child, we’re almost there.” A thin woman in tattered clothes, carrying her child on her back, kept fleeing northward.
“Mother, where’s Father?” The five- or six-year-old child behind her asked in confusion. “When will Father come to see me? I want to see Father.” The woman’s eyes reddened. “Be good, we’ll see your father.”
But the woman knew in her heart… she and her child would never see the child’s father again.
It wasn’t just this mother and daughter. Many others were fleeing as well. On the entire road, large numbers of people were escaping with their families.
A tide of refugees!
Today was the first day of the first month of Yulan Year 10044, supposed to be a day of celebration.
Now, the Baruch Empire and the Rohault Empire were facing off across the Chunluo River. The Rohault Empire had two Saint-level limit experts, while the Baruch Empire had Linley, who had reached the divine level. However, Linley didn’t want to hasten the war’s progress.
With both sides like this, the war had stalled.
For several years, the armies of the two empires had been facing off across the Chunluo River.
“Is this even a war?” A soldier on guard duty for the Baruch Empire grumbled. “I’ve been at the front for over two years and haven’t killed a single enemy. All I do is stand guard, train, and rest… It’s so boring.”
“Isn’t that good? War means death,” an older soldier nearby said, clearly disliking war.
“Dying in battle would at least be exciting. This kind of life is so dull,” the young soldier complained. Suddenly, he heard noise from the opposite bank and looked carefully. “Hey, look! What’s happening over there?” The camps of both empires were two or three miles from the Chunluo River.
These soldiers were on the front line.
“Refugees, so many refugees!” Both soldiers were shocked.
A massive number of refugees, bypassing the military camps from other areas, rushed toward a large bridge over the Chunluo River. The bridge was guarded by soldiers from both sides, but there were too many refugees, and some among them were quite strong.
Soon, the refugees broke through.
In truth, the soldiers on both sides hadn’t tried very hard to stop them.
“What’s going on?” The two soldiers were puzzled.
“Don’t worry about it. As long as the refugees don’t attack the camp, don’t meddle.” After years of stalemate, the two empires had little vigilance toward each other. Refugees who didn’t attack the camp were generally left alone.
Just some refugees.
But from that day on, waves of refugees continuously crossed the border between the two empires, moving from the Rohault Empire to the Baruch Empire. The numbers grew larger and larger, drawing the attention of the Baruch Empire. When they investigated, they discovered something horrifying.
In the main hall of Dragonblood Castle.
A few days after the Yulan Festival, Sweeney had rushed from the imperial capital to find Linley.
“Uncle, in the past few days, refugees have been pouring into our empire from the Rohault Empire. The numbers are staggering,” Sweeney said, taking a deep breath. “Most importantly, it’s not just civilians—many soldiers have also fled into the Baruch Empire.”
“Oh? What’s going on?”
Linley was puzzled.
Civilians might flee to his side if they felt danger, but soldiers were under strict control. Deserters caught were executed.
“Sweeney, explain clearly,” Wharton said from the side.
Sweeney nodded. “To put it simply, civilians, many soldiers, even entire units are fleeing. Some are escaping to our empire, some to the Yulan Empire. The morale of the entire Rohault Empire has completely collapsed!”
“How could this happen?” Linley was shocked.
A collapse of morale? People fleeing the entire empire? This was unheard of.
When he first arrived at the Chaos Territory, there had been constant wars, but there had never been a large-scale tide of refugees running everywhere. People generally had feelings for their homeland. They wouldn’t leave unless they had no choice.
“Have you found out what’s happening?” Linley asked.
“Not fully, but what we’ve found so far is already chilling,” Sweeney said, still with a look of horror.
Sweeney took a deep breath. “According to our investigation, many cities in the Rohault Empire have become dead cities, similar to what happened to our empire’s Bluesky City, but this time it’s a hundred, a thousand times worse… And this seems to have happened very recently.”
“Dead cities?”
Linley immediately thought of the divine-level expert he had killed.
“Could there be another divine-level expert practicing the laws of death, absorbing large numbers of souls?”
Linley was suspicious. Sethler had said that refining souls was extremely difficult, something even most mid-level gods couldn’t do. A god practicing the laws of death was rare enough in the Yulan Continent plane. Now another one appeared?
Besides…
If there was another god practicing the laws of death, wouldn’t he be worried that Linley would deal with him the same way?
“Or is this culprit supremely confident?” Linley was much stronger than he had been three years ago.
His soul was far more powerful, and he could use soul force to form a “pulse defense,” combined with the protection of the broken scale’s transparent membrane… Linley had some confidence when facing divine-level experts.
“Our rough estimates show that the populations of many cities in the Rohault Empire have been wiped out. The death toll has already reached nearly a hundred million,” Sweeney said, shivering as he spoke the number.
The death of nearly a hundred thousand people in Bluesky City had been shocking enough.
Now, a hundred million?
“I’ll look into this,” Linley said, filled with anger. “Those gods from other planes don’t treat the people of the Yulan Continent as human at all. A hundred million? How many people does the entire Rohault Empire have?”
With the War God and the High Priest absent, the only divine-level experts in human society on the Yulan Continent were Linley and Desri. The Yulan Continent plane was their home! Could Linley tolerate these other-plane experts slaughtering so wantonly?
“I’m going out for a while.” Linley couldn’t stay any longer. After instructing Wharton and the others, he flew straight out of Dragonblood Castle, heading south.