The holy girls weren’t too surprised by Jiang Chen’s resolution to depart for Eternal, though they were reluctant to see him go.
Despite the brevity of their time together, he had won them over with his miraculous feats time and time again. It felt much safer to have him around, given the delicacy of present circumstances.
However, neither girl asked him to stay. They knew Eternal was much more important to him than they were.
“Brother Jiang, aren’t you going to say your farewells to our two sacred lands’ executives before you leave?” Si Tong’s willowy eyes gazed at the youth.
“There’s not much time. I’d rather spare the formalities this time,” waved off Jiang Chen. He had no intention of delaying his trip.
If Forefathers Sunrise and Radiance were here, he would’ve spoken to them before he left, but they were stuck alongside the rest of Myriad Abyss’ main force on the offworld battlefield.
The others were hardly important enough to warrant his especial attention. He didn’t know them particularly well in the first place.
Si Tong was a little disappointed by the refusal.
“The executives still have no idea why the winged and fire demons retreated,” she sighed, “and I don’t think they’ll ever find out. If I told them that you’d come to help, they’d be disappointed at not seeing you in person, wouldn’t they?”
Jiang Chen smiled smoothly. “There’s nothing to be disappointed about. We are cultivators in pursuit of a higher truth, are we not? Oh, I do want to remind you that the ten demon tribes’ main force is gathering in Myriad Abyss very soon. The days ahead are going to be even more difficult and arduous. As much as it pains me to say it, you need to brace yourselves for things getting worse.”
Si Tong knew about this already, since the four sacred beasts had talked about it. Worry clouded her face. “The ten forefathers are on the offworld battlefield, and there’s barely anyone here who can take charge. If the demons launch a full-scale invasion, what is Myriad Abyss to do?”
“Myriad Abyss lacks the strength to compete flat-out,” Jiang Chen replied with uncharacteristic bluntness.
“Do you have any advice for us, Brother Jiang?” Si Tong asked expectantly.
“My opinion is: avoid them the best you can,” Jiang Chen suggested sincerely.
“Avoid them?” Si Tong looked even sadder. “The world is a big place, but the demons are everywhere. Where can we go?”
“The offworld battlefield isn’t a bad idea. You can rejoin the sacred lands’ main force. Or, you can go to Winterdraw. That place will be the site of a decisive battle against the demons in the near future.”
“Winterdraw? The island that you’ve stationed a lot of men on, yes?” Si Tong grew curious.
Jiang Chen nodded. “Indeed. The battle there will decide whether their invasion of the human domain gets off the ground or not. This time, Myriad Abyss Island will be the arena for our contest.”
“Okay! I’ll tell the executives exactly what you’ve said here,” nodded Si Tong.
Jiang Chen swiftly said his goodbyes before absconding.
It was a long way to Immortal Sacred Land from Sunrise, but there were already noticeably fewer demons roaming Myriad Abyss.
The golden demons were almost entirely wiped out, and the monster and titan demons were seriously injured. As for the winged and fire demons, they’d been forced to retreat with their leaders all gone.
In the time before the demons fully gathered in the desolate wildlands, there was a brief spate of peaceful idleness for Myriad Abyss.
Jiang Chen didn’t use Starfate to fly anymore. The Measure of Heaven had replaced it. It could not only accelerate, but tunnel through the fabric of space as well. Covering vast distances was even quicker upon it.
“All of my father’s treasures are really amazing. If I was stronger, I could very well travel from plane to plane with the Measure… I really would be measuring the distance between heaven and earth with this ferule then!”
Jiang Chen knew that his father had been extremely strong in his previous life, but he had never known exactly how to quantify that strength.
Using the treasures his father had left him helped him understand the astounding extent of his father’s abilities – power enough to warp creation itself.
Even the best treasure refiners in the heavenly planes couldn’t necessarily create so many masterpieces. That was limited to Taiyuan’s celestial emperor alone!
Currently, every expert from Martial and Abyssal was gathered in Eternal. These two sacred lands had been forced to take shelter from defeat after defeat.
The wood demons’ ravages had turned their divine nations into hell on earth. There had been, in fact, wood demon parasites upon some of Abyssal’s refugees. Those had already begun to spread in the half-month before Divine Kasyapa’s arrival.
Thankfully, he brought with him Jiang Chen’s antidote and Dragonwhisker Water, as well as a plethora of methods to deal with wood demons.
The latent threat was luckily neutralized, which allowed Eternal to just barely survive until now. The divine nation as a whole had wood demon infiltrators within it, but it hadn’t yet fallen entirely.
The appearance of An Kasyapa as well as the presence of Ziju Min meant that Eternal had multiple gods. Because of that, the wood demons couldn’t conquer Eternal via parasites or a frontal assault.
The situation was at a standstill.
The wood demons were dissatisfied with this; they felt that the Eternal Sacred Land was the toughest nut to crack in Myriad Abyss, and success would earn them a great deal of credit.
Therefore, they had persistently tried one trick after another over the past few days.
No matter what they did, however, Eternal held firm under its defending gods’ leadership. It was far stouter than any other sacred land had proved.
The wood demons hadn’t been able to obtain a decisive advantage. This upset every member of the tribe.
They were used to leaving a trail of devastation in their wake. How could they be held up for so long here at Eternal? What could they even do?
