Things were worse on the Alien Battlefield than anyone could have ever imagined.
The place was packed with countless demons. They were literally everywhere.
These demons had not been transformed by demon energy, hostile energy, or killing intents in the Demonic Abyss.
They were real demons of real flesh and blood.
Back in the old days, a war between the Flying Dragon Dynasty and the Dragon Rebel Kingdom had broken out here. Millions of people died. The Alien Battlefield became a field littered with corpses.
The dead soldiers nourished the demons, so that they could be reborn and start over again.
By the time the war was over, there were ten Celestial Demons with intelligence.
During all the intervening years, these Celestial Demons kept improving themselves. They had all become Mysterious Demons.
The dreadful thing was that no one knew whether there were demons stronger than Mysterious Demons.
On the Alien Battlefield, outside the planes channel, there was a hive of activity going on.
Numerous demons dashed into the channel, one after another.
The channel could identify demons and non-demons.
Once the demons entered, they would die and vanish immediately.
“Don’t stop! Open a way for me! When the Demon reappears in the Nine Realms, we will absolutely make all those races pay the price for all our deaths!”
An extremely strong demon was directing all the others to enter the channel.
He was sacrificing thousands of demons to try to find a way to open the channel to demons.
All of a sudden, a demon reported to him, “Evil Demonic King, the ward at the other end of the channel has been strengthened again!”
“Darn it! If I know who did this, I’ll make him pay!”
The Evil Demonic King was infuriated. His face distorted into such a hideous look that he looked like a ferocious ghost.
“Evil Demonic King, what should we do? Only seven days to go to the deadline the General Demon gave me.”
A Celestial Demon next to him questioned him anxiously.
“General Demon, General Demon, what General Demon?! I don’t accept his lead at all! Even though the deadline is close, I don’t care!” the Evil Demonic King shouted in a loud voice.
The Celestial Demon next to him was too scared to reply.
However, he also realized that the Evil Demonic King was not as confident as he tried to sound.
Getting back to Jiang Chen, he had had no idea what kind of effect his ward would have on the Evil Demonic King.
After improving the ward, Jiang Chen arrived at the Dragon Field, the First City in the Realm of Nine Heavens.
The Sacred City!
The last Sacred Institute in the Nine Realms and the Hero Palace were located here.
If Jiang Qingyu hadn’t made vigorous efforts to control the situation back in the day, even this last Sacred Institute would’ve been eliminated.
Since Jiang Chen had started to have adventures in other realms, he’d gradually learned about other realms’ attitudes toward the Nine Heavens.
It was generally thought that the backwardness of the entire Nine Heavens Continent was the reason that the Sacred Institute had not been overturned yet.
The Nine Heavens Continent had even failed to get rid of an outdated Sacred Institute.
Jiang Chen felt that this was all very sad.
In his eighth life, he had been a hero for whom the Hero Palace had erected a statue.
“When everyone is like a dragon, in the end, everything will only be like floating clouds. If there is no difference of classes and strengths, the world will become lifeless and dull.”
Jiang Chen couldn’t help but have deep, depressed thoughts when he returned to his homeland.
He disguised himself before going into the Sacred City.
He didn’t want the three great forces or the Ancient to know that he had come back to the Three Lower Realms yet.
“What a great change,” Jiang Chen ruminated to himself as he walked down the streets.
People came and went on the streets. The city was hustling and bustling. Jiang Chen, with his sharp eye, found that the Realm of Nine Heavens had improved a lot as a whole.
This could be the result of the competition the Ancient had caused.
At this moment, Jiang Chen passed by a giant house. He couldn’t help but stop.
It was the Gao Mansion. Or it used to be.
Since Jiang Chen had helped the Gaos escape to the Realm of Heavenly Martial Arts, no one should be living here.
However, Jiang Chen found that the gate of the Gao Mansion was open and servants were standing at the gate.
He glanced at it with his holy awareness and detected the general situation of the entire mansion.
This mansion had not been abandoned at all. Instead, it had a large family living there. The number of servants and maids was even greater than that of the Gao Mansion in the old days.
“Don’t loiter here, please.”
The servants at the gate shouted at Jiang Chen when they saw him standing there and peeping into the gate with curiosity.
Jiang Chen hadn’t intended to say anything, but now his interest was piqued. He stepped into the entrance.
The two muscular servants went immediately on guard. They grasped the iron sticks in their hands even more tightly.
“Isn’t this the mansion of the Gaos of the celestial phoenix?” asked Jiang Chen.
“Who are you?”
The two servants asked without answering him.
“I know many people from the Gaos,” said Jiang Chen.
“Look up and check it out for yourself.”
The servants answered rudely after exchanging a look between themselves.
Jiang Chen looked up. He saw it was Cheng written on the plaque instead of Gao.
“It’s the Cheng Mansion now?” Jiang Chen asked, puzzled.
He was wondering whether his grandpa or his uncle had leased the place.
However, the Gaos could not communicate with the Realm of Nine Heavens yet, except through him.
So it was impossible that he wouldn’t know if they had leased the place.
“Young man, you are ill-informed. Our lord is from the Three Middle Realms. There, he got to know Jiang Chen, namely, the grandson of the Gaos! By the way, have you ever heard of Jiang Chen?”
The servants started to talk to him since he was being nice and just curious.
“Jiang Chen? Who is he?” Jiang Chen asked, trying very hard to keep a straight face.
“Bumpkin, where are you from? You’ve never heard of Jiang Chen?”
A mean voice came from the mansion before the servants could answer.
Then a woman in green walked out at a very fast pace. She was pretty, but she was also very arrogant.
“If it please, my lady.”
The two servants greeted her with respect.
“If you see more people like this in the future, just drive them away.”
The young lady gave them orders concerning him, although Jiang Chen was right there.
“Let me tell you. Jiang Chen is a rare genius who everyone knows in the Three Lower Realms. He won first place in the Three Realms Competition once! His father even eliminated the Sacred Martial Arts Institute with only one sword strike.”
Not until then did this young lady look toward Jiang Chen. She continued complacently, “Jiang Chen went to the Three Middle Realms later. He met my father by chance there. My father valued his great talent and gave him some instructions. He should be a Star Venerable by now.
“By the way, have you ever heard of a Star Venerable? That’s a state above the Mental Wander State, the Reaching Heaven State, Martial Venerable, Spiritual Venerable, and Celestial Venerable. Now you know!
“If it had not been for my father’s kindness, he might not have achieved so much.”
The young lady sneered disdainfully after speaking. She didn’t even bother to cast him one more glance.
“So is that why Jiang Chen gave the mansion away to your father?” Jiang Chen was amused.
“He begged my father to take it. After all, Jiang Chen is a grateful person,” said the young lady.
“That being said, if your father is so great in the Three Middle Realms, why did he return to the Realm of Nine Heavens?”
Jiang Chen didn’t remember anyone whose family name was Cheng who had instructed him.
“Huh, I knew you’d ask this. The Ice Spirit invaded the Three Middle Realms. My father was fearless, but, with a big family, he had to move here with us.”
The young lady explained the situation to Jiang Chen.
Jiang Chen wasn’t sure whether she was knowingly lying.
“Okay. I see,” he answered. There was nothing he could do right now.
“That was a year ago, when the Ice Spirit was going to freeze the Three Middle Realms into a world of ice and snow?” Jiang Chen questioned her.
“As I’m sure you don’t know.”
His reaction caused the young lady’s disdain. She said, “Let me test you. Do you know who lifted the crisis of the Three Middle Realms?”
“That Jiang Chen?” said Jiang Chen.
“You are clever. Exactly. That Jiang Chen turned the tide. He’d grown into a very strong person by then. He shattered the Ice Spirit into pieces. And my father instructed him while he was growing up.”
“Great. Great. This Jiang Chen is really great. By the way, your father is great too,” said Jiang Chen.
