“Life Glyphs?” Lu Yun and Qing Han looked at each other.
They had indeed heard of that item. The Sovereign Meet was to be held in an unknown ruin from the ancient times, and one had to possess a specialized Life Glyph if they wished to enter the ruins.
Originally, all one had needed to do was to enter Destiny City and obtain a glyph from the city lord. However, the city currently strained at the seams with people. There was no opportunity for the two to enter and make their requests.
“That’s right.” Yi Tianling smiled amiably. “I just so happen to have two of them that I can gift to my two young friends!”
“Really??” Qing Han’s eyes lit up and desire floated across his face.
“Naturally! But the Life Glyphs are too precious to carry on my person. Even if we were in the city proper, we’d have to fight a qualification round to obtain one. Therefore, please come with me, my young friends.” Yi Tianling gestured with one hand.
Awestruck and dazed, like two country bumpkins entering the city for the first time, Lu Yun and Qing Han followed dumbly in the old man’s wake.
“Ah… those two young’uns are in for it!” A golden immortal sighed to see the two youths follow the elder.
“Why?” Someone else asked curiously when they heard the golden immortal.
“That Yi Tianling… heh. He’s a fiend who won’t bat an eye when killing someone. Those brutes from the Star Demon Sect can’t even begin to compare to his ruthlessness!” The golden immortal quickly stopped talking when Yi Tianling turned around and glared at him.
……
Plenty of structures had risen outside of Destiny City, forming numerous satellite cities of their own. The monster spirit’s dwelling was in one of these.
Creak.
A burgundy door creaked open to an inner room, sending a faint, pungent smell of blood and gore wafting into Lu Yun and Qing Han’s noses.
“My little sweetheart, I’ve found two more bags of good food for you. You should be able to take form after eating the two of them, hmm?” Yi Tianling waved a hand as soon as he set foot inside the room, activating the burgundy light of a formation that sealed off the premises.
Gurgle.
A strange noise sounded, like the sound of a hungry stomach rumbling loudly.
“This is…” Wide-eyed, Lu Yun’s eyes shot to the center of the room.
It was an enormous, scarlet ganoderma the size of a grinding stone—the kind used for soybeans and rice. Crisscrossing lines of dark gold patterned its surface.
“A Blood Ganoderma, it’s a Blood Ganoderma! Do such things still exist in the world of immortals??” Lu Yun shrieked with surprise, agitation coloring his eyes. Qing Han would be able to reach the void realm with this spirit herb!
Yi Tianling started, looking somewhat incredulously at Lu Yun. This spirit herb had gone extinct back in the ancient times, and even records unearthed from ancient ruins made no mention of it.
His specimen was grown from a seed he’d found in some ruins in a patch of sky outside the world of immortals. He’d killed countless youths with great potential over all these years, watering the Blood Ganoderma with their blood to nurture it to its current size.
Who would’ve thought that his latest victims would recognize it as soon as they’d set foot in the room?
“Die!” Uncommonly decisive on this day, Yi Tianling pointed at Lu Yun. A single point from a peerless immortal would be enough to destroy any cultivator’s nascent spirit and reduce him to a pile of ground meat.
Bam!
A delicate little fist poked out from the air in front of Lu Yun, smashing right into the finger pointing at the youth.
“It really is a Blood Ganoderma!” An absolutely adorable little girl of about twelve years old bounced out from the void, cheering when she looked upon the scarlet spirit herb in the center of the room.
Lu Yun had been able to recognize it thanks to Xingzi; Blood Ganodermas had been exceedingly precious even back in her time.
“With this Blood Ganoderma, me, Yuying, and Xiaoxiao can join hands and create a cauldron of Blood Restoration Pills. That way, the mistress—eh, um, Sir Qing Han will be able to immediately break through to the void realm!” Quickly realizing she’d made a mistake, Xingzi wrenched her sentence around and snuck a look at Qing Han at the same time.
The disguised girl was glaring up a storm at Lu Yun, who was utterly fascinated by his captivating shoes. Xingzi stuck her tongue out, wrapped her arms around the spirit herb, and skipped her way back through the Gates of the Abyss.
Cheeks incredibly flushed, Qing Han looked very uncomfortable with the sudden turn of events. What now?
Yi Tianling sagged on the floor like a sack of potatoes, all of his bones, and his nascent spirit, destroyed by Xingzi’s punch. However, he was still alive and goggling at Lu Yun and Qing Han.
Qing Han!
He’d heard that name loud and clear just now from that terrifying little girl. If one of them was Qing Han, the other must be Lu Yun!
Yi Tianling would choke himself on pills of regret right now if he could. Who would’ve ever fathomed that the two random bumpkins he’d picked off the streets would be those two harbingers of doom!
“Where are the Life Glyphs?” Lu Yun bent in front of the fallen monster spirit and asked softly.
Yi Tianling struggled to rise. However, Xingzi had perfectly controlled the amount of force she’d brought to bear. She’d immobilized him, but he was in no danger of dying.
“In, in my storage ring.” Giving up on his struggles, Yi Tianling chuckled wryly. “Just make it fast. Also, the Blood Ganoderma is about to take form…”
“Did you want to refine it as a replica for yourself when it did?” Lu Yun blinked.
Yi Tianling shook his head and refused to say anything else.
“Sir, the spirit herb is indeed about to take form, and there’s actually a tiny soul being nurtured inside. …it doesn’t seem like the old man wanted to refine it for a replica.” Xingzi’s voice sounded in Lu Yun’s ears.
Light twinkled past Lu Yun’s fingertips when he heard this, cutting off Yi Tianling’s head.
“Um!” The monster spirit immortal stood up again in the next second, staring dumbly at his new master with a bit of horror.
“Get in there and use your blood to feed the ganoderma.” Lu Yun deftly relieved his new Infernum of his storage ring.
“Under—understood!” Yi Tianling stammered to get his words out, then almost tripped over himself to enter the netherworld. He really was concerned that Xingzi would refine the entire spirit herb in a fit of impulsiveness.
“Are Beigong Yu and the Scaled-Dragon King the same as Yi Tianling?” Qing Han gathered her courage and asked.
“Those who I kill become my subordinates.” Lu Yun nodded.
Qing Han shrugged his shoulders a bit uncomfortably while Lu Yun crushed the storage ring, scattering a heap of glittering, jade-colored glyphs all over the ground—Life Glyphs.
“There’s so many of them! Just how many people did he kill??” Qing Han blinked.
“At least several hundred… the heavyweights of the world are seriously blind to allow something like this to happen beneath their noses!” Lu Yun laughed coldly.
People might not mind if it’d happened once or twice. But for several hundred to go missing at once and no one to investigate what was happening?
This could only mean that the major factions of the world were only concerned with their own interests. They didn’t care, as long as it wasn’t one of them who went missing. After all, everyone here was a competitor.
