“What?”
As if hit by a bolt of lightning, the queen of the Imperium trembled, and the invisible armor around her fell apart, revealing another “Li Linghai” that had been deeply hidden for a moment.
Li Jialing also exclaimed in shock as he looked at Li Yao in disbelief.
The queen only lost her calmness for a moment. When she was back to herself again, the dispersing determination to kill was condensed into a hundred times more aggressive than before. She shouted, “Liar! How can there be such a coincidence? What exactly do you know? Who sent you here, for what purpose? Speak now!”
The swords made of thousands of bolts of lightning all dashed to Li Yao’s front, hissing like cobras!
Li Yao could have defended himself, or even summoned his Colossus to escape, but his previous endeavors would be rendered futile if so.
Quitting halfway was never his style. Opening his arms to protect Li Jialing behind him, he bellowed, “I admit that the whole thing started as a coincidence, but the development later was very reasonable!
“From beginning to the end, the only coincidence was how I ran into Li Jialing. But you should know very well how similar he is to his birth father, my foster father? When I unexpectedly noticed a young man who was extremely like my foster father caged in a prison, receiving the most excruciating procedures, I naturally grew quite curious and wanted to rescue him to figure out everything. That was why I burst into conflicts with Wuying Lan, Li Lingfeng, and the rest of them, and I even accidentally blew up ‘Manjusaka, the City in the Sky’. The rest is history!
“Think about it, Your Grace. Nobody could’ve foreseen that you would be here. Even if it were a trap against you, there was no reason why I should’ve shown up in such a high-profile way, right?”
Li Jialing couldn’t help but ask, “Brother… Yao, is-is it true?”
“Of course it is true!”
Li Yao declared solemnly, “Everybody who is familiar with me knows that ‘Vulture Li Yao’ is most respected for his honesty and integrity. I never said a single lie in my entire life!”
Li Linghai took a deep breath, but she was still in apparent shock. The purple flames deep inside her transparent eyes gradually dispersed.
Her eyes that were at a loss moved between Li Jialing and Li Yao nonstop, but the furiously burning swords of purple flames could slash neither of them now. She mumbled, “His-His last words… He has died. How could he die? What-What was your foster father’s name?”
“My foster father never told me his name. He said that his name and his real life had long been left in another world to a woman, and that the man standing before me was nothing but an empty shell without a heart.”
Li Yao said, “So, my foster father only allowed me to call him ‘Pop’. Even at his deathbed, he never told me his name but simply asked me to find ‘Li Linghai’ in the Imperium. He said that Li Linghai would tell me everything.”
In his heart, however, Li Yao shouted at his foster father, Pop, please do forgive my horses*it. But speaking of which, fancy words to a girl cannot be counted as lies, right? Your son is trying his best to avoid an ethical tragedy in your family, to help you sustain your bloodline, and probably, to save the world by the way. You must understand and support my actions which boast such abundant significance!
“His name and his real life were left in another world…”
The sentence hit Li Linghai’s heart again like a flying sword, making her put on a half-weeping and half-laughing look. She asked in a shivering voice, “What-What else did he say?”
“Before my father’s death, his head had already become unclear, but he simply repeated that—”
Li Yao sobbed and said, “That I had to come to find Li Linghai in the Imperium no matter how many difficulties there might be. He said that Li Linghai was the gentlest and kindest woman in the three thousand Sectors, and she would love me, take care of me, and protect me like he did. As long as Li Linghai was there, I would have nothing to be scared of!
“Also, he said that he had countless regrets in his life, but even if all the regrets were combined and multiplied a hundred times, it would not be as great as the sorrow when he left Li Linghai years ago. Now that he was dying and it was impossible for his soul to fly to Li Linghai through the sea of stars, he demanded that I find Li Linghai and respect her as a mother. He asked me to do my best to protect and fight for Li Linghai on behalf of him in the evil Imperium even at the cost of my life!”
“Well—”
Li Linghai was caught in a trance. The purple flames on her fingertips were bouncing nonstop, and the electric currents were dashing to all directions beyond her control.
“Brother Yao, he… My birth father did say that?”
Li Jialing almost sounded like he was crying.
Li Yao secretly apologized in his heart.
But on a closer look, he was not exactly lying. He did see countless times how regretful and sorrowful his pop was after the man was drunk. It was probably what his foster father thought in mind but never spoke out.
If his foster father was too embarrassed to speak it out, it was certainly his responsibility to help his foster father confess it!
In the meantime, if his foster father knew that he and Li Linghai had a child, he would certainly be overjoyed and wish the whole family could be safe and sound and happy ever after.
He immediately nodded his head. “Of course. I was a poor orphan after the loss of my parents in my childhood. It was Pop who rescued me from darkness and raised me up. We were like a real father and son connected by blood. So, when I saw you, I saw my own brother. How could I have watched you suffer in Wuying Lan and Li Lingfeng’s place without doing anything?
“Although I had a father, I never had a mother. They say that the children without mothers are like weeds without roots. For decades, my greatest wish was to find a mother that I could respect and serve!
“After such a difficult long journey to the Imperium, my primary mission was to find Li Linghai and to respect her as a real mother.
“It was a great surprise to meet you, my ‘brother’, but little did I anticipate that the woman that my pop loved most would be… like this!”
Staring at the flawless armor and the dazzling sword on Li Linghai, Li Yao sighed and smiled in the most pitiful way, before he went on, “It seems that, unless the ‘Li Linghai’ that my pop mentioned is somebody else, and you two just happen to have the same name, the queen is too strong and ambitious to require the ‘protection’ of a Mr. Nobody such as myself. Or rather, our very existences are obstacles on Your Grace’s way.
“Your Grace, you have the heritages of the ‘Supreme Emperor’, the greatest expert of mankind in history. Although you and us may be similar in levels, we are absolutely no match for you at all. Even if we fight with all our strength, the best we can do is to seriously wound you. What’s the point?
“We can understand that you have your ambitions and your reasons. Come on, give us a quick death. When I see my pop in the other world, I’ll tell him that you live a great life in the human world and do not need his concerns or my protection. His soul will rest in peace, and I… I will be able to return the favors for bringing me up!
“Do it, Li Linghai, Your Grace!”
Li Yao held his head high and closed his eyes, as if he were determined to die.
But deep inside his head, he simply shrieked at the mental devil, “Hey, you must be prepared. If the queen so much as moves her little finger, you’ll jump out with Neltharion to block her attack, and we’ll run as far away as possible. You understand me? If I’m hurt badly, you will be equally hurt!”
The mental devil replied sullenly, “… Sometimes, I can’t help but wonder if I should just let you son of a bi*ch be slashed and die with you. Really.”
The queen’s sword of true dragon never did slash.
The brilliance flashing in her eyes was probably the ripples of her memories rather than the determination of killing.
The purple colors in her eyes and her hair were gradually gone, together with the raging and roaring lightning around her.
The overwhelming killing intents completely dispersed. Even the thunderstorm of the outside world that was blocked by her domain had resumed peace again, creating a small world that was absolutely tranquil.
“Hu…”
She exhaled a long breath in relief. After the things that she had held back for a hundred years were spoken out, she now looked at Li Yao and Li Jialing in an even more complicated way.
“Tell me everything about you, including your origin, your training experience, how you advanced into the Divinity Transformation Stage, where you found your Colossus, and who is helping you in maintaining it.”
Staring at Li Yao, Li Linghai said, one word after another, “I’ll keep you alive for now, but as long as I notice a single loophole in your statement, I guarantee that I will torture you in ways a hundred times crueler than Li Lingfeng and Wuying Lan’s ways for a thousand or even ten thousand years. Trust me. I do what I say!”
Li Yao couldn’t help but shiver. He struggled to say, “I never told any lies. How could there be any loophole?”
Li Linghai sniffed and said, “Fine. Tell me your name first. Are you an Immortal Cultivator, or a Cultivator as you claimed in the slaughter stream?”
Li Yao held his head high without any hesitation. “My name is Li Yao, and my nickname in the organization is ‘Vulture’. I’m a 100% Cultivator!”
“A Cultivator?”
With a feigned smile, Li Linghai played with the electric arcs on her fingers. “That doesn’t sound right. Are the mobsters of Starlight capable of raising an expert in the Divinity Transformation Stage and equipping him with such an advanced Colossus? Don’t tell me that you come from another noteworthy resistance group of Cultivators in the Imperium. I’m pretty sure that other shrimps are even more unworthy than Starlight!
“Or do you want to tell me that you are from a certain mysterious relic, where you advanced into the Divinity Transformation Stage casually through primeval treasures and picked up a Colossus by the way? Ha. Do you think that I’ll believe your crap like the idiot Li Lingfeng did?”
Li Yao frowned and said solemnly, “I never thought to deceive Your Grace with such lies. Like I said just now, I came to the Imperium to find Li Linghai after a long journey. Naturally, I am not a Cultivator from the Imperium.”
“Oh?”
Li Linghai rolled her eyes and asked with great curiosity, “Then, it is getting interesting. I know that… he absolutely could not return to the Covenant Alliance. So, besides the Imperium and the Covenant Alliance, there is a third magnificent force that can raise such a young expert in the Divinity Transformation Stage and which boasts Colossi? Tell me where your hometown is and its coordinate parameters for space jumps.”
Li Yao said with a bitter smile, “Although my hometown is indeed powerful enough to support someone in the Divinity Transformation Stage and maintain the Colossi, it does not have coordinate parameters for space jumps.”
Li Linghai furrowed her eyebrows. “What do you mean? Are you messing with me?”
“Please don’t be angry, Your Grace. Everything I say is true!”
Li Yao took half a step back and waved his hands, somewhat in a panic. “My hometown truly does not have fixed coordinates because we are nomadic refugees in space. I am the last Cultivator from ‘Firefly’ of the ‘Star Ocean Republic’!”
