Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
After listening to Liu Lang, Zhou Donghuang did nothing but sweep a mild glance over the man. He ignored Liu Lang after that, focusing solely on making his way to the Guiyao planet.
Much like a flash of lightning, he disappeared from the sight of the Lightning Sword Sect in the blink of an eye.
“Liu Lang, do you take my little junior brother for a fool? Did you think he would bring a wretch like you with him?” He Mengxi mocked him when Liu Lang looked away in embarrassment.
But Liu Lang was not at all angry. He stared blankly at He Mengxi. “Senior Sister Mengxi, both of our fathers are one of the four Valley Heads of the internal sects. It’s not a stretch to say that our fates are intertwined. Or else—”
Before Liu Lang could finish speaking, he was interrupted by He Mengxi, “If you’re trying to make me bring you along, then you can save it.”
Under Liu Lang’s bitter gaze, He Mengxi called out loudly for Da Zhuang, and the pair quickly made their way to the Guiyao planet.
The Guiyao planet was a rather curious one.
The beasts on the planet were basically unable to move up to the Primordial Soul stage.
There was also this other issue: the beasts were not sentient, let alone able to speak like people were. This applied to all of the beasts, whether they were Connate beasts, Primal Core beasts, or even Dharma beasts.
This had something to do with the environment of the Guiyao planet.
And it was precisely because of this that the behavior of the beasts on the Guiyao planet was still dominated by the instincts of a wild animal, even if they were just Dharma beasts. They knew no fear, nor did they know how to flee.
As long they set their sights on something, they would bite and cling onto it like a rabid dog.
In such situations, a lot of people would die on the Guiyao planet during the Alliance Hunt, being killed in their prime years.
It was important to note that the people who were selected to participate in the Alliance Hunt were essentially the cream of the crop from their own sects. As long as they were not taken out prematurely, their potential was limitless.
That being said, not a single person has ever dropped out of the Alliance Hunt.
There were so many people who were qualified to take part in the Alliance Hunt—where one fell, another one would be there to take his place.
This was because the Alliance Hunt brought as many boons as they did risks. There was a chance they could change their future if they played their cards right.
The types of awards handed out after the Alliance Hunt were extremely attractive, but these were only the surface-level ones. As long as you could rank rather well during the Alliance Hunt, you would catch the eyes of the sect. In your days to come, you would definitely stand to benefit from an increase in the cultivation of your talents.
The Alliance Hunt was more like a stage for the disciples from all the allied sects to prove themselves.
“This Guiyao planet… It’s rather strange.”
When Zhou Donghuang stepped onto the Guiyao planet, the Spirit energy that filled the entire planet was actually at a normal level and not too overwhelming.
However, after an hour, he realized that the Spirit energy on the Guiyao planet had started to activate. Your inner Yuan would be disrupted upon inhalation of the Spirit energy. There would be a sharp, prickling pain filling your veins, and your organs would seize.
“Generally speaking, the Spirit energy on a planet would not behave like this for no reason… Unless there was some sort of force disturbing the Spirit energy on this planet,” Zhou Donghuang commented quietly.
Zhou Donghuang had come across similar situations in the thousand-year-long life he once led, and the cause for this was always different each time.
For some planets, disruption in Spirit energy was caused by a powerful adept forcing open the cave house in its birth. The disruption served as a warning to the residents of the planet, about the cave house being forced open.
Another possible reason was that the spawn of a demon had been born into the world. This sort of demon would definitely terrorize the people if left unrestrained.
There was also the case where a disturbance was caused by the birth of a rare treasure. This sort of rare treasure was different from a regular spirit weapon; they contained a frightening power within them.
…
“However, it is difficult to find the source of the disruption in Spirit energy. Although I’ve managed to tap into my Divine Will now, it’s still too weak. Unless I’ve been near the source of this disturbance, it’ll be difficult to locate it.”
Although he had accumulated a lot of experience from his past life, his Divine Will was too weak now, so there was little Zhou Donghuang could actually do.
“Guess I’ll finish what I set out to do for now.”
In this hour or so, Zhou Donghuang had entered the Guiyao planet and crossed paths with a few beasts, but he had not made a single move yet. Right from the very beginning, he had been more focused on analyzing the Spirit energy on the Guiyao planet.
As of now, he knew that it was difficult to properly trace the source of the Spirit energy disturbance, so he decided to redirect his energy towards the Alliance Hunt.
“I’ll start with you.”
In an instant, his attention was directed towards the patch of forest pooled under his feet. He could see a lake in the forest, and there was a beast—about as big as a small hill—lying in the lake.
This was a large wolf. Its entire body was covered in black fur, save for the patch of white on the crown of its head. It was lying by the lake, as if in slumber.
And at this moment, Zhou Donghuang realized that there were quite a few beasts loitering in the vicinity of the beast, but not a single one dared to approach.
Zhou Donghuang was fully aware that although there were no traces of sentience on the Guiyao planet, they still had some concept of territorial consciousness at the very least.
Territorial consciousness, this was something that even an untrained beast would know.
“Ultimate Dharma stage?”
Zhou Donghuang floated forward through the air. When he was floating above the surface of the lake, his Divine Will swept out. In an instant, it reached out to detect the level of training for the huge, black wolf that was lying lazily by the lake.
An ultimate Dharma beast.
This was the single strongest beast within Guiyao planet.
“Awoo—”
Although the wolf had no Divine Will of its own, it picked up on Zhou Donghuang’s Divine Will detecting it. Its eyes blinked open instantly, gleaming something magnificent.
Along with that came the clear howl of a wolf. There was a ferocious power that filled its body all of a sudden. Where had the slumbering wolf gone?
The moment it saw Zhou Donghuang, it leapt into the air and immediately charged towards the man with the intent to kill. There was bloodlust swimming in its eyes and a cold glint from its sharp claws as if it wanted to tear Zhou Donghuang to shreds!
Through all of that, Dharma Power about 100-meters tall manifested. It was clear that the manifestation of Dharma Power was an exact replica of the beast: its jaw split open and it looked like it could swallow an entire mountain!
“Awoo—!”
“Awoo—!”
Both the actual body of the wolf and the Dharma manifestation released howls in unison. Both of them, but especially so for the Dharma wolf, let out howls so loud it caused ripples in the surface of the calm lake.
The trees, flowers, and grass in the surrounding area also swayed with the impact of the howl.
“Die.”
In the face of the ferocious wolf, the ultimate Dharma beast, Zhou Donghuang remained rooted in the air with a calm look on his face. His gaze only froze over when the beast approached him.
In the next instant, his Divine Will lashed out and directly into the wolf’s consciousness.
The wolf had no Divine Will of its own, so it could not defend itself against the attack. As the hulking body started becoming sluggish, the 100-meter-tall Dharma manifestation that had once been sturdy slowly started deteriorating.
At the same time, Zhou Donghuang’s own manifestation—a White Tiger about thirty-meters tall—appeared briefly.
It appeared “briefly” because, just as quickly as it had appeared, the manifestation vanished.
Of course, it did not actually vanish; it had solidified into a white blade in Zhou Donghuang’s hand. The moment the blade manifested, Zhou Donghuang brandished it and swung.
Whoosh!!
The sword struck out with a whistle. The wolf had been caught off-guard, taken back by the disturbance Zhou Donghuang had caused when he lashed out with his Divine Will. Without enough time to defend itself, the wolf was decapitated by a swing of his blade.
Blood spurted out from the cut, and the Dharma Power disappeared from the wolf’s body. The head lay apart from the body.
And just like that, a beast so overwhelming strong—an ultimate Dharma beast that had taken up its own territory on the Guiyao planet—died.
Zhou Donghuang raised a hand and had the wolf’s head flung into the space ring he had prepared beforehand. As for the body, he had originally planned to loot anything that was of value from the corpse, such as parts that could be used to make medicine or weapons… But then he realized that the essence of all the most valuable parts of the body had been sucked away by the Spirit energy of the planet the moment the wolf died.
There was no further value to the corpse once it had been sucked dry of its life essence.
On top of that, the body of the giant wolf had completely shriveled up after a few breaths.
“If I hadn’t collected its head in time… It’d probably have turned to dust like the rest of its body,” Zhou Donghuang remarked quietly.
“The Spirit energy on the Guiyao planet can actually absorb the life essence of these dead beasts?
Zhou Donghuang’s eyes constricted after he realized this. “It seems like this is 90% of the reason why the Spirit energy on the Guiyao planet is so abnormal.”
Zhou Donghuang now had a grasp of the situation at hand, and he knew more or less what to do.
“It’s just too bad that my Divine Will isn’t good now… If I had the Divine Will from my past life when I was at the Immortal stage, I would be able to detect the place that the life energy was being sucked to, even if it the ended up merging into this planet’s Spirit energy.”
The moment the beast died, its life essence would be completely drained from its corpse.
Then there was the peculiarity of the inner Spirit energy of the Guiyao planet.
Zhou Donghuang had a lot of guesses, so all he needed was to be able to verify his conjectures.
“Moving on.”
After killing the huge wolf, Zhou Donghuang had moved on right ahead to finding the beasts who had been circling the wolf’s territory, fearful of moving too close. Those were all just mid Dharma beasts, so it barely took him any time before he had those killed.
After killing those beasts, he did not move to collect their heads. This was because they were only mid Dharma beasts, so there was no way for him to integrate them into himself even if he killed them.
“Just as I’d thought.”
At this moment, Zhou Donghuang had confirmed his guess.
This planet was the way it was because it was spawning a demon, and this demon was causing a disruption in the flow of Spirit energy with its absorption of Spirit energy. Even the absorption of the beasts’ life essence was all to provide the demon with life force.
“This Guiyao planet has probably been around for a long time, right?
“And that demon still hasn’t spawned?”
Despite all the knowledge he had accumulated from his experiences in his past life, Zhou Donghuang could not help the chill that ran down his spine at this point. The longer it took for the demon to spawn, the more abnormal it was.
It was possible that it would be sentient.
“A demon spawned by this planet, especially one spawned through such a process of absorbing, over years, the Spirit energy and life essence of the dead beasts on the surface of this planet… The spawning of this demon will be a momentous one!
“If it’s got a bad temper, blood will fill the entire Hengliu galaxy!”
Zhou Donghuang’s face had hardened at this moment.
