Volume 1, Chapter 408 – Battlefield

Great clans were everywhere on Yunyan Star, their roots deep and their branches flourishing. Although Tianyan Sect accepted disciples regardless of background, disciples from those great clans inevitably made up the majority.

If those disciples continued to grow in cultivation and became the new generation of people in power, Tianyan Sect would inevitably split into many factions internally.

In truth, this was unavoidable, but Shi Lan wanted to delay that day for as long as possible.

Opening a passage beyond the world and bringing in fresh blood from other stars or worlds was also one possible solution.

“Allow me to think it over.”

“This subordinate takes his leave.”

…

After Li Canglan withdrew from the palace, Shi Lan gradually began to form a few ideas.

The Illusory Star Domain was now engulfed in unending war, with Human Emperor clans appearing one after another. Linking to other stars carried enormous risk, whereas the remaining small worlds were instead within a controllable range.

While Shi Lan was deep in thought, a crisp fluctuation suddenly rippled out from the depths of her primordial spirit.

With a sweep of her hand through the void, four strands of soul-origin appeared before her. One had already snapped, while another was faintly glowing.

The primordial spirit within her sea of consciousness lit up with golden radiance, extending divine thoughts and perception. Someone beyond endless time and space was calling to her through that strand of spirit soul.

These four strands of origin belonged to those people from the Cube Space she had encountered in the Qinghong World. At the time, Shi Lan had only kept them on a whim, thinking they might prove useful one day. Now that one of the strands had already broken, its owner had clearly died.

Shi Lan pulled up the Empress-raising System panel and entered the section for spacetime coordinates.

“Can you determine the coordinates?”

[Searching coordinates…]

[Search complete. One medium world coordinate discovered. Constructing a spacetime passage will require 0.5 units of nine-star energy. Construct passage?]

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To the current Shi Lan, 0.5 units of energy was not a trivial amount. The system had less than 3 points of energy left in total.

In the span of a few breaths, the faint glow atop the spirit soul flickered more and more intensely. In the call being transmitted from it, despair gradually began to seep through.

“Construct the passage.”

In a medium world, there were no powerhouses capable of physically crossing the starry river. The upper limit of strength would not be too high, so there would not be much danger for her at present. Besides, this passage would be useful in the future as well.

Connecting to another world was no small matter. Before doing so, she also needed to gain some understanding of it first.

…

Yuanji World, Spirit Dao Canyon.

Three figures whistled through the air, two men and one woman, all dressed in fitted combat garb.

Behind them, a man in white followed at an unhurried pace, an extremely malicious smile hanging on his face. Every so often, he would raise a finger and send out bursts of force to drive the three into a desperate flight for their lives.

“Big Brother, if we’re going to die either way, we might as well fight him!”

Xue Qiong ground the words out through clenched teeth.

“Fight him with what?”

Liang Yunnan’s expression was dark as he turned his head to look at Xiao Jingchen beside him.

“Any response from that side yet?”

Xiao Jingchen shook his head, and a trace of anxiety showed faintly in his eyes.

Xue Qiong grew even more agitated. He glanced back at the white-robed man wearing a playful expression and could not help drawing the long saber on his back as he shouted sharply,

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“In her eyes, the few of us are nothing but ants. How could she possibly come?! If we keep running, we won’t even have the strength left to fight back!”

Liang Yunnan took a deep breath and said decisively,

“We wait another half-quarter-hour. If there’s still no response, we risk everything!”

Half a quarter-hour passed in the blink of an eye.

The three stopped at almost the same moment, and a trace of despair welled up in all of their eyes.

“Not running anymore?”

The white-robed man stepped in front of them in a single stride. The smile on his face gradually faded, replaced by a thread of killing intent.

“How boring.”

Boom!

The moment his words fell and he was about to make his move, a world-shaking explosion suddenly rang out in the distance. A deep pit appeared abruptly in the heavens above, black as ink.

“This is…”

The white-robed man’s expression froze. Before he could react, his vision blurred, and another figure appeared above the canyon.

Shi Lan stood in midair, her dark red hair stirring in the wind, a layer of precious radiance coiling around her body. She was like an immortal king descending to the mortal world, untouched by even the slightest trace of worldly smoke and fire.

She closed her eyes slightly and felt the world before her. After a long while, Shi Lan let out a soft sigh.

“What a barren world…”

The essence of heaven and earth in this world was not abundant. With her Innate Spiritual Body, which had transformed several times, draining this world dry would only be a matter of time.

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The white-robed man’s expression turned incomparably wary. He took several steps back as if facing a great enemy.

Shi Lan did not even look at him. She gazed at the three standing below and parted her lips.

“You owe me another life today.”

The three on the ground had escaped death, and all of them felt their minds relax. They dropped to their knees and spoke in unison.

“Many thanks for your mercy, my lady!”

“And why did the other one die?”

At Shi Lan’s question, Xiao Jingchen raised a hand and pointed at the white-robed man in the distance.

“Bai Ji died by his hand.”

The white-robed man had clearly understood the situation. He retreated a few more steps and spoke in a negotiating tone,

“He was only a third-rank cultivator. I can offer compensation. I’ve been around for many years. Who doesn’t have some connections behind them…”

By the end, a hint of threat had already seeped into his voice.

“Their lives belong to me. You should not have touched them.”

Shi Lan’s expression did not change in the slightest as she said flatly,

“You killed one of them. Then use your life to make up for it.”

Bang!

A terrifying wave of energy erupted instantly and condensed into a gigantic invisible hand, seizing the white-robed man, whose face was full of horror, and crushing him into a cloud of blood in a single moment.

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At most, the man’s strength was only equivalent to the Heavenly Astral Realm. To Shi Lan, he was far too weak.

The people below stared in stunned silence. The white-robed man had been very strong, already at the peak of the fourth rank, only a hair away from the fifth. He alone had forced the few of them to flee in panic.

And now, with the flick of a finger, Shi Lan had erased him on the spot.

…

The great pit in the void had already vanished without a trace, and the shattered space had already healed, but that spacetime passage was still there. Ordinary people simply could not sense it anymore.

Shi Lan took the three away from that canyon and found a city to stay in.

After sitting down in a private room in a restaurant, Shi Lan began asking about the entire course of events.

“This world is a team instance. It happens from time to time.”

Starting from the beginning, Liang Yunnan told Shi Lan some information about this world.

“There are ten teams here that slaughter one another. It’s arranged by the Cube Space and participation is mandatory. Once you die in it, your soul is truly scattered. There is no chance to start over again.”

“Killing members of other teams earns points.”

“If you get the highest score and achieve the final victory, you receive an extremely generous reward.”

Shi Lan fell into thought. The Cube Space was more like raising gu, letting the fittest survive. Those who lived to the end would certainly be the strong.

But for the development and growth of a power, this method was clearly contradictory, since what it consumed was its own strength.

“How many teams are left in this world? And how strong are they?”

“Four teams remain. In this battlefield, the strongest person won’t exceed the fourth rank… about the same as that man just now.”