Qianye jumped into the well and descended gradually, stopping at the previous place once more. He looked down and saw the seven polar stars vaguely visible in an ocean of star power. It would naturally be easier to sense the star power if he were to go a bit deeper, but Qianye knew that he hadn’t fully recovered. It wouldn’t be worth the effort if he had to spend too much energy staying afloat.
He released the Storm Pearl and observed it quietly for a bit. This wondrous object was a patch of neutral chaos in his vision, neither leaning toward daybreak nor Evernight.
Qianye thought back to the condensation process at this point, and recalled that absorbing small to medium stars would produce different results. His Venus Dawn wasn’t at its peak, and the large daybreak stars had been largely absorbed—it would be even more difficult to activate new large stars.
One could easily tell that this origin crystal was destined to be inferior.
It was at this time that Qianye came up with an idea as he shot out a wisp of dark golden blood energy. Surprisingly, the Storm Pearl absorbed it entirely!
A new horizon opened up in Qianye’s perception.
The world wasn’t just daybreak but also full of Evernight—this well was no exception.
As a human with daybreak origin power, it was only natural that he would put his focus on the daybreak side. Yet, wherever there was daybreak, there would be Evernight as well.
Qianye had only focused on the daybreak side during the condensation process, and under the effects of Venus Dawn, the darker stars turned even darker. Instilling the dark golden blood energy into the Storm Pearl seemed to have removed a shroud over the entire Constellation Well, revealing an entirely different scenery.
The dark-colored stars appeared one after another in Qianye’s vision. The already visible Evernight stars became even more dazzling and began to reveal their characteristics. Several stars expressed themselves in a cinnabar red hue, their colors flowing like blood.
Qianye counted seven such sanguine stars. They were vivid in Qianye’s perception and could be activated at a moment’s notice.
He had no idea that he had sensed two more stars than Anwen had calculated.
Qianye hesitated for a while because he didn’t know what effects a crystal condensed from the dark golden blood energy would have. Such a case was unprecedented.
But there were more than enough Storm Pearls, and there was no reason to stop now that he had already begun. Qianye stopped thinking too much and began injecting dark golden blood energy, consequently activating the sanguine stars.
The activation process went much smoother than expected. All seven stars were woken up in quick succession, and not a single one was left behind.
Qianye quickly understood after some thought. His vampire side was even more powerful than his daybreak side, and his blood energy would’ve reached the marquis-rank if he hadn’t been suppressing it. He wasn’t at all inferior to Edward, and his combat strength was far above his peers due to the dark golden blood energy.
In the wake of the surging star power, Qianye stopped thinking and focused his attention on the origin crystal.
A commotion had broken out above the Constellation Well.
“What’s that? Did I see wrong? He activated all of the vampire stars. Eh… a total of seven, two more than what Anwen said!” Basil cried out while glancing at Edward. “He’s clearing everything in one go! Edward, what will you do afterward?”
Edward looked away with a snort. He paid no attention to Basil, but his expression couldn’t help but turn gloomy.
All the vampires, including Twilight, were livid. As vampires, they had all sensed the wisp of aura that had leaked out from Qianye at the beginning of the condensation process. That degree of majesty and depth was virtually unheard of.
Those Edward had brought along were all elites, and most of them had seen the Lightless Monarch. Qianye’s aura might not be as tyrannical or wanton, but even Medanzo did not possess this degree of profundity and concentration.
Some vampires exchanged glances, reading the same thoughts from each other’s eyes: could the rumors be true? Was Qianye’s bloodline born of a certain prince? Only a handful of princes were active in the entire Vampire race, each of them a hegemon in their land. Even among the twelve major clans, there were only a few that could boast an active prince.
Edward’s thoughts, however, were different. Glaring at Qianye from afar, he couldn’t help but entertain thoughts of attacking. At this rate, the man would clear away all the stars beneficial to the vampire race. How was one to condense high-quality origin blood without star power from the large stars?
Edward had already accumulated enough experience. Now that most of the small stars had been cleared, he was planning to make use of his great monarch aura to activate at least one large star. Who would’ve thought Qianye would abandon all the daybreak stars and actually turn his attention to the vampire ones?
The Holy Son turned toward Anwen. “This won’t do, we must stop him!”
Anwen didn’t reply, but Eden said coldly, “What reason do we have to stop him?”
“He’s absorbing from the vampire stars!”
Eden shrugged. “There was no rule against that. Of course, you can draw upon the human stars as well… if you can’t take this lying down.”
“This joke isn’t funny,” Edward said in a gloomy voice.
Eden also turned serious. “I’m not joking, Your Excellency. If you can’t accept this outcome and feel like you must stop Qianye, please wait until the agreement is over. If you must take action right now, then I apologize, our demonkin race won’t be taking part.”
Edward’s expression was, of course, unsightly to say the least. The corners of his lips twitched periodically, but he couldn’t find a retort. Without the help of the demonkin, they wouldn’t even be able to defeat a single Qianye, let alone Zhao Ruoxi and her Red Spider Lily. Without the Demoness keeping her busy, that young miss alone could wipe out all the vampires.
Yet, having to give up just like that felt too stifling. He had spent a great fortune for these hexagonal blood rods and brought the best elites from his family. It was just that the demonkin were head and shoulders above them in the younger generation. Even Eden—someone whom Edward didn’t consider a threat at all—had gotten exponentially more powerful and become a threat on the battlefield.
Edward glanced at Basil and fell quiet thereafter. On the surface, it seemed like the vampires and arachne shared a fairly bad relationship, when in fact, the true upper echelon of the race had reserved the greatest degree of caution and hostility for the demonkin race. Edward only learned of this after passing the blood torture and becoming a part of the upper level.
It wasn’t certain Basil would know about this, and even if he did, there was nothing he could do. They wouldn’t be able to beat the Empire even with Basil on their side.
With no way out, Edward could only swallow his anger and glare down the well. Perhaps they would have to wait until the next opening of the Great Maelstrom in order to produce more origin blood. Watching the gradually dimming vampire stars, Edward’s mood became heavier and heavier.
At the bottom of the Constellation Well, the origin crystal in Qianye’s hand had already taken shape. He had never imagined that he could condense origin crystals in such a manner. A crystal formed of dark golden blood energy and star power from vampire stars—was it even usable? Either way, the only thing he could do at this point was to continue. He had already condensed a top-grade origin crystal, so there was no loss in it.
Qianye continued a steady injection of dark golden blood energy, continuing the absorption of star power. His blood energy was still abundant at this point, and the Book of Darkness could provide him with a near-endless supply of essence blood for his blood core to ignite. Hence, he could hold out for fairly long. On the contrary, the seven sanguine stars were insufficient in their star power, and looked like they would fail to hold out until the end.
After discovering this, in order to not leave any regrets, Qianye glanced toward the other Evernight stars.
Qianye saw a fair number of large stars along the way, but they gave off a feeling of impurity and seemed to contain a mixture of strange powers. These were arachne stars. The spiders were rather adaptive and famed for their vitality. Absorbing such a heterogeneous mixture of power wasn’t difficult for them.
Some of the other stars were too dark and incompatible with the vital blood energy of the vampire race. These were naturally demonkin stars. There were also some stars belonging to the werewolves, but the only lycanthrope here was under the firm suppression of Zhao Ruoxi and simply didn’t dare reveal his true appearance.
Qianye was shaken as his gaze swept past a certain star. This celestial body looked rather unassuming, even after he had started condensing his origin crystal with the dark golden blood energy. However, Qianye immediately realized the reason after noticing it.
Its star power contained a pure, unadulterated aura of darkness, one that was close to the peak of darkness origin power and a counterpart of his Venus Dawn. This type of pure darkness origin power was extremely difficult to utilize. Even though Qianye cultivated the Mystery Chapter, the darkness energy produced had to be absorbed by the blood core first, and then converted into dark golden blood energy.
Now that the vampire stars were insufficient, absorbing this darkness power wasn’t without its merits.
At the thought of this, Qianye focused his attention on this star and formed a connection after some time.
Anwen’s expression was full of shock, while Eden’s countenance was just like Edward’s a while ago.
“The dark star! He actually activated the dark star!” No one spoke these words out loud, only in their minds.
The dark star was considered to have been reserved for the Demoness’ use, and Anwen was the only one ambitious enough to even make an attempt. The dark star possessed enough star power to convert two drops of origin blood. Producing two drops of duke-grade origin blood was a big enough contribution for a great dark monarch to personally confer a reward.
Now, however, Qianye had begun drawing upon its star power. Having the carpet pulled out from under them, the Evernight crowd’s setback was self-evident.
Yet, people like Anwen were too prideful to break their word as that was no different from a direct forfeit. Besides, there was nothing they could do with Zhao Ruoxi overseeing the situation.
Their only hope now was that Qianye would leave some star power.
The latter’s endurance and blood energy capacity far exceeded everyone’s expectations. He only stopped after robbing half of the dark star’s power and flew out of the Constellation Well.
“Now what do we do?” All eyes were on Anwen.
