In the space disruption zone.
Zhao Shanling explained what they had seen in that strange heaven and earth on their way back.
The rivers of blood, the hybrids bathing in them, the burial grounds where corpses were being refined, and the Demons, Phantasms, and Bonebrutes that lived together…
Pei Qiqi chimed in occasionally at first, but gradually fell silent.
Confusion, doubts, and fear slowly filled her eyes.
Nie Tian and Dong Li gasped with astonishment after hearing Zhao Shanling’s description.
“A brand new world where hybrids and members of other races live together in peace?!”
“Cardy’s corpse is being refined into a Heavenly Corpse?! More ninth grade grand patriarchs like Cardy are waiting to be refined?!”
“That secret force is indeed behind all this!”
They were sure that if they brought this news back to the four great sects, it would shock the entire human world.
Even the outsider and Ancientspirit worlds would be shocked as well.
Soon, Nie Tian discovered that Pei Qiqi was being unusually quiet.
He slowly approached her and asked with a concerned tone, “Senior Martial Sister Pei, are you… are you upset because you didn’t find clues of the Void Palace Sect?”
Zhao Shanling turned to take a deep look at Pei Qiqi and asked, “Did you feel something in there?”
Pei Qiqi recovered from her daze. After a moment of hesitation, she said, “Yes, I felt a stir in my bloodline. But it didn’t come from the realm we went to, but another one. Even though that realm was extremely far away, that feeling was clear.”
Overjoyed, Nie Tian asked, “So does it mean that the origin of your bloodline lies in that realm?”
“If what I suspect is true, the Void Palace Sect has moved to that realm and started their new lives there,” Pei Qiqi said with a very complicated look in her eyes. “Perhaps my family is living there too. It’s… It’s just that…”
“What?” Nie Tian asked.
“I don’t know if I should go meet them,” Pei Qiqi said, looking deeply bothered.
Hearing her words, Nie Tian suddenly went blank.
“I could tell that the hybrids there were manufactured,” Pei Qiqi said, lowering her head. “All of those hybrids bathing in blood rivers were like Han Sen, results of some massive production. I, I’m not even sure what I am anymore. Did I come from there too? Was I a product ordered by someone in the Void Palace Sect?
“Those vile sects like the Heavenly Corpse Sect, the Nether Spirit Society, and the Death Curse Sect. They plagued numerous domains and killed countless people. My master told me about their horrible deeds. They simply made me boil with anger!
“If my parents were indeed part of them, or I’m just another product like Han Sen…
“I don’t know how I’m supposed to face my late master and the master who’s giving me so much care.”
Pei Qiqi seemed torn.
Nie Tian fell silent as well, his expression flickering.
These worries of Pei Qiqi’s had never occurred to him before. Now that Pei Qiqi had given voice to them, he felt suddenly enlightened.
He was a hybrid as well. His mother was from the Realm of Flame Heaven, and had a clean background.
However, he knew practically nothing about his father.
What if his father was also a member of that secret force?
That secret force was clearly hoping to overthrow the rule of humans, outsiders, and Ancientspirits, and change the landscape of the entire starry river. If that was true, then he would be stuck in the middle. Where would his loyalty lie?
Would he stand with the Ancient Fragmentary Star Palace, or his parents?
Having reached this point in his train of thought, he suddenly remembered the way Feng Beiluo had treated him, and felt that not only was his father probably a member of that secret force, but he might actually hold a lofty position in it.
According to Mo Heng, his father had been the pioneer of human-hybrid breeding.
It was his father who had first put forth the idea of mixing blood with outsiders, and then acted on it.
Who was the boss behind that brand new world, those blood rivers, and those numerous hybrids?
His father, who he had never met before, was the prime suspect.
Both Pei Qiqi and Nie Tian were lost in their thoughts. They didn’t say another word, and simply followed Zhao Shanling the rest of the way.
Their greatest worry, which was that secret force coming after them, didn’t happen.
Surprisingly smoothly, Zhao Shanling led the group back to the portal through which they had come, and they returned to the Realm of Unbounded Desolation.
Upon returning, Zhao Shanling left for the Bone Sect’s former headquarters where they had discovered wondrous spatial patterns previously, hoping to derive new understandings of spatial power from them and find out where they might lead to.
Pei Qiqi, however, said she needed some time alone, and left by herself.
Instead of returning to the Void Spirit Society, she went to the Realm of Split Void, where she wandered aimlessly in the Void Illusion Mountain Range and the Void Palace Sect’s old headquarters, trying to find answers.
Dong Li left for the Realm of a Hundred Battles, where she continued to derive enlightenment from the dark stone in an attempt to make rapid advances in her cultivation.
Nie Tian stayed in the Realm of Unbounded Desolation, where the shrunken Heaven-equal Vine soon flew quietly to him.
“Since you can’t find the place where I found that Tree of Life, how about I take you to the Floragrims?” Nie Tian suggested.
The Heaven-equal Vine agreed without hesitation.
Nie Tian remembered that powerful Floragrims had gone to the Dead Star Sea to witness his duel against Ophelia, Fata being one of them.
He knew Fata. He assumed that if he took the Heaven-equal Vine to him, he would take it back to the Floragrims’ ancestral land so that it would be able to fulfill its dream.
Over there, it would be able to leave seeds and pass on its legacy.
After reaching an agreement with Nie Tian, the Heaven-equal Vine further shrank until it was only the size of a regular tree.
Even so, it was wreathed in glorious light, along with an intoxicating, refreshing wood aura.
In such a state, it looked very much like a wood-attributed treasure.
It was just that very few people had the privilege of owning such a treasure.
Nie Tian put it away and left for the Realm of Split Void, where he teleported to the Realm of Fragmentary Star and then the Realm of Remote Heaven. From there, he teleported to the Dead Star Sea.
By the time he arrived in the Dead Star Sea, he discovered that ninety percent of the powerful experts of different races that had been gathered there earlier were gone.
Upon seeing him, Han Wanrong asked with a surprised expression, “How come you came now?”
“What happened to the duel between the grand elder and Grand Monarch Primal Demon?” Nie Tian asked.
“They moved their duel to the deepest part of the Shatter Battlefield long ago,” Han Wanrong said. “Only a few grand monarchs and God domain experts who still have access to the Shatter Battlefield went to witness that duel of our generation.”
Nie Tian then asked, “How long has it been since their duel began?”
“It’s been some time, but it doesn’t look like it’s going to end any time soon,” Han Wanrong said. “What? Do you want to go there? We have a way to get you there if you want to go.”
“I do.”
