“Heaven or hell, there is no one capable of forcing me to lower my head. What’s so great about a nine star heir? I, Long Chen, am Long Chen. No one can give me orders.” A heaven-shaking roar came from Long Chen and shook this world. It was like the roar from an ancient god.
This was an unyielding will that would not lower its head to heaven or earth. It would not bend to any pressure. This was arrogance from deep within his soul.
The current Long Chen was like a completely different person. His eyes were pitch black. He was like a devil god that had been sealed within hell for millions of years and had now escaped.
“How disgraceful. As a nine star heir, you have a duty to protect the lives of the universe, to save the world from its desperate predicament. But you have yet to condense the Hegemon Body Star Diagram even after reaching the level of the Five Star Battle Armor. You didn’t cultivate properly. As a fellow nine star heir, I died in battle three hundred and sixty thousand years ago, and a strand of my soul essence ended up attaching to this tower. While my body died, this soul essence was not destroyed. I’m unable to reincarnate or return to the battlefield. As a nine star heir, to die on the battlefield was my honor. This kind of undying unliving form is practically a humiliation. Furthermore, what do I see here? I see an absolute disgrace to the nine star lineage. You have such potential with the Nine Star Hegemon Body Art, but you cultivated it to this abysmal state. Are you trying to spit on our lineage? I’m going to clean up our lineage today.” The long-haired man charged at Long Chen, his voice full of both sorrow and rage.
The five stars behind him lit up like five blazing suns. At the same time, his hands, palms, and the space between his eyebrows began to shine, linking up with the stars behind him. The energy of the stars flowed counterclockwise, while the energy in his hands, feet, and head flowed clockwise, resulting in an intense twisting in the void. A whine rang out in the air as if the world was moaning when his fist thundered toward Long Chen’s head.
“A nine star heir? So what? You cultivate yourself, and I’ll cultivate myself. A hegemon body can be garbage. Power is to be respected, so what qualification do you have to say such big words?” Long Chen’s black eyes were icy cold, and his aura didn’t have the slightest emotional fluctuation. He also unleashed a punch.
BOOM!
Their two fists collided, and the stars behind both of them erupted with light. As a result, astral energy unfurled through this cosmos. The dust of the shattered stars in the sky began to reform, becoming giant spheres that seemed to be linking together.
The void fluctuated wildly as their two powers clashed. Countless fragments of spacetime danced chaotically around them as if they were fighting through a spacetime tunnel.
A roar came from both of them, and the stars behind them suddenly exploded at the same time. Long Chen coughed up a mouthful of blood and flew back.
Sovereign Yun Shang caught him. Long Chen had fallen unconscious, while one of his arms was a bloody mess and broken.
As for the long-haired man, his anger had been replaced with confusion. He stared at where his arm had been in disbelief.
His arm was no longer there. It had been destroyed by Long Chen’s power.
“What is going on? How could the power of the nine stars become so foreign?” he muttered.
“The same cultivation technique can have different paths. Whether or not the path is correct can only be judged by those who have reached the peak,” said Sovereign Yun Shang.
The man was silent for a long while before he nodded slightly. “Perhaps you are right.”
He then added somewhat regretfully, “However, his personality has already split. The devil block has formed, and it won’t let him go much further on his path.”
“Every person has split personalities. Even the kindest people have some evil in them, and so the wickedest people have a trace of good in them. People are innately conglomerations of contradictions. As for saying that he won’t be able to walk much further on his path, I disagree. My thinking just so happens to be the opposite of yours,” said Sovereign Yun Shang.
The long-haired man finally looked at Yun Shang closely. His pupils shrank. “So you’re a heavenly fate son, a son of the heavens.”
“In truth, every person is a son of the heavens.”
The long-haired man was startled slightly and then laughed. “How marvelous.”
Just at this moment, Long Chen woke up. He felt a sharp pain in his hand and circulated the energy of the primal chaos space to heal.
“Primal chaos energy!” Seeing the way Long Chen’s arm recovered, the long-haired man was further shocked.
“Hahaha, I understand, I understand!”
He suddenly laughed. All his anger and resentment vanished.
Long Chen’s head was still muddled. It seemed that something had happened, but he couldn’t remember.
The long-haired man walked over to Long Chen and patted his shoulder, suddenly becoming very friendly. “Junior brother, I was a bit impetuous. As members of the same lineage, in terms of seniority, I am your senior apprentice-brother. For a senior apprentice-brother to teach a junior apprentice-brother a lesson is normal, so I trust you won’t take this too seriously. Right now, I’m very happy. My soul has been locked here for three hundred and sixty thousand years, not alive but not dead. I’ve never been able to free myself. I’ve just been accepting this torture as punishment for not having properly cultivated and allowing myself to be killed in the end. As a nine star heir, I have my own pride. Our pride does not permit us to kill ourselves. That is a coward’s way out. Perhaps my punishment has finally come to an end. Your arrival has allowed me to see hope. It is time for me to leave this existence.”
Long Chen’s fury instantly vanished for some reason upon that person patting his shoulder. Perhaps this really was an innate closeness due to their lineage. Long Chen was unable to form any hatred for him. Instead, he could only feel respect.
“Senior apprentice-brother…” This was the first time these words sounded so sincere in Long Chen’s life.
“I know you must have many questions. But there’s not much time, so listen to me. The nine star lineage has a mission to save this world. From the day you started cultivating the Nine Star Hegemon Body Art, your fate has escaped its original trajectory. We are blessed but also cursed. Our lives are full of misfortune to make us stronger. We have to work harder than anyone else just to survive. But when you understand your mission, you will understand what pride is. Alright, there’s no more time. Within the Heaven Shrouding Mirror, there is something good. You can consider it my gift to you as an apology.”
The long-haired man suddenly punched the Heaven Shrouding Mirror. Countless cracks instantly covered the surface of the mirror.
Long Chen jumped. The Heaven Shrouding Mirror was not truly a material object. While it appeared to be a mirror, it was actually a condensation of some kind of law. It was an illusory object, but this fist had still shattered the laws of the Heaven Shrouding Mirror, shocking Long Chen. Why was there such a difference between the two of them?
The cracks spread, but even though it appeared to be on the verge of shattering, it did not break apart. In fact, at the edges, it began to recover, fighting against the long-haired man’s power.
“Damn, so much of my soul essence’s power was used up in that last attack.” The long-haired man’s expression changed. The last blow with Long Chen had wiped out a huge amount of his power. Now he was actually unable to break the Heaven Shrouding Mirror.
“It’s fine. I’m here too.” Sovereign Yun Shang stepped forward, pressing a hand against the Heaven Shrouding Mirror.
“Me too.” Long Chen took a deep breath. He had barely recovered from the last exchange, but he felt capable of unleashing one more attack.
“You can’t touch it.” The long-haired man immediately stopped him. “When the Heaven Shrouding Mirror is broken, the power of the past and future will mix. The reversal of karma will instantly turn us to dust. Junior apprentice-brother, work hard on your cultivation. When you arrive on the heaven region’s battlefield, make sure to kill some more devils. Return the humiliation that they’ve given us a thousandfold.”
“Also, tell Yun Tian I’m sorry,” said Sovereign Yun Shang.
“You…?”
All of a sudden, the Heaven Shrouding Mirror collapsed. Sovereign Yun Shang and the long-haired man also exploded, vanishing without a trace, leaving Long Chen dumbfounded.
The Heaven Shrouding Mirror transformed into fragments of spacetime that slowly merged together into a platform. Atop this platform was a crystalline mirror.
This mirror was much smaller, only the size of a palm. However, it gave off an incredibly ancient air. Countless runes were flowing around it, making it seem like an illusion.
When Long Chen reached out to touch it, the mirror unleashed a ray of divine light that enveloped him. His body instantly froze. He was unable to move.
