The large ship.
Within the banquet hall, the Lord of Total Distortion was enjoying his meal.
All the evil creatures stood silently in the hall without uttering a single sound.
Gu Qing Shan also stood among them, silently reading the blood-red text on the [Kindling] UI.
[Second Quest completed]
[Quest description: You’ve collected enough Soul Points to unlock the Soul Points level up mode]
[Special note: You have chosen the correct path and would definitely become the strongest existence through it, the System shares the same joy and honor]
After all the text disappeared, a Card appeared at the center of the UI.
The Card depicted Gu Qing Shan standing in mid-air wielding a sword in each hand.
——–Lapis-grade Character Card: [Sword cultivator Gu Qing Shan]
Below this Character Card was a grey long bar, apparently to display his Soul Points value.
The progress bar has been updated to display a number: [12,000/200,000]
Some blood-red text appeared next to the progress bar as a description:
[Gather 200,000 Soul Points to advance to the next realm]
[Attention: As your Profession is cultivator, you must face a Heaven’s Tribulation during your advancement, the Demon King Order cannot exempt you from it]
[Attention: Your next realm is the Void Wanderer realm, once your advancement begins, you will face the Wind and Fire Double Tribulation]
Wind and Fire?
After Gu Qing Shan read through all the text, he put his hand on his Inventory Bag and checked his cultivation scripture.
Xie Gu Hong had already compiled all the scriptures he needed into a mega-sized jade tag and bestowed it to Gu Qing Shan.
This jade tag included all the cultivation scriptures up to Three Thousand Worlds realm perfected stage, as well as all of Xie Gu Hong’s swordsmanship knowledge, including the scripture for [Enemy-killing Sword Technique] that he obtained from the Bygone Era treasure vault world.
Gu Qing Shan’s inner sight scanned the jade tag, skipped all the sword techniques recorded inside, and quickly found the detailed descriptions regarding the Void Wanderer realm.
——indeed, during this breakthrough, the Lightning Tribulation would disappear.
Instead, it would be replaced with the Fire Tribulation.
Among the four Pillar Elements Earth, Water, Fire, and Wind, Earth represented creation, Water represented growth, Fire represented destruction and Wind represented passing.
The Fire Tribulation was the trial of destruction that all living beings must face.
However, most living beings didn’t make it to the Fire Tribulation due to their short lifespan and skip straight to the ‘Wind’ phase: passing.
This time, Gu Qing Shan would have to face the Wind and Fire Double Tribulation.
During his next breakthrough to Void Revolution realm, he would face the Fire and Water Double Tribulation.
And then, his breakthrough to Three Thousand Worlds realm would pit him against all four Tribulations of Earth, Water, Fire and Wind.
This was the reason why most people described cultivation as going against the flow—— a cultivator had to surpass these four greatest Tribulations to finally achieve Three Thousand Worlds realm.
Cultivators at Three Thousand Worlds realm were already among the strongest within the 900 million World Layers.
Gu Qing Shan silently checked the preparations he had to make to face the Tribulations.
He then paused a bit and looked at the center of the [Kindling] UI, asking: “This progress bar is the amount of Soul Points needed for me to advance, but what should I do to make the [Order] evolve?”
[Are you so eager to help the Order evolve?] [Kindling] asked him.
“I am. I heard that the more highly-evolved an [Order] was, the more powerful its functions would become” Gu Qing Shan replied.
[Kindling] paused briefly before answering him: [Since you have expressed such burning desires for power, I shall make the following changes to the strategy:]
[As soon as you complete the first advancement, Kindling will issue an evolution Quest]
Gu Qing Shan nodded and didn’t ask anything else.
I need 200,000 Soul Points to break through to Void Wanderer realm——- so that’s what I need to worry about right now.
At this point, the Lord of Total Distortion abruptly put the food in his hands down.
At the same time, the howling wind outside the ship stopped.
The ship gradually grinded to a halt.
What happened?
Gu Qing Shan released his inner sight to scan through the entire ship and a few hundred miles under the ocean surface as well.
——–a Void Beholder realm cultivator’s inner sight could easily achieve such a thing.
He found that an iceberg was slowly rising from under the water about a few dozen nautical miles in front of the ship.
This iceberg seemed to be about the same size as this entire ship itself.
Under the ice, a gigantic head appeared from below the water and stared ferociously at the giant sailboat of the Lord of Total Distortion.
An ancient demonic sea creature!
Who could’ve thought a demonic sea creature would block the Lord of Total Distortion’s ship so quickly after their voyage began.
『 Another fellow who wants to devour evil creatures, 20 million years? No. Who can tell me exactly how many years that thing has lived? 』the Lord of Total Distortion spoke with a displeased tone.
A devil spoke up: 「 Master, I have seen it clearly 」
All the evil creatures in the hall looked towards the devil that spoke.
This was a humanoid devil without any eyes———- seems like he used some sort of unique ability to check the demonic sea creature’s exact age.
However, he was clearly not very strong, as his transformation was still incomplete with four hooves on his lower body.
The devil reported: 「 This demonic sea creature has lived for 37,679,861 years 」
Hearing that, the Lord of Total Distortion’s expression loosened slightly.
『 So it was a bastard just over 30 million years old. Not only did it not go dormant deep under the ocean, but it also dared to block my ship. It is clearly asking for death 』
He glanced over some evil creatures.
Those evil creatures immediately understood his gesture.
They bowed towards the Lord of Total Distortion and left the banquet hall.
As soon as they left, those evil creatures took flight and flew at full speed towards the iceberg in front of the ship.
The Lord of Total Distortion continued to enjoy his breakfast.
A few moments later.
Chaotic and intense waves of power fluctuation rippled across the ocean.
The battle had begun.
The other evil creatures within the banquet hall were becoming restless.
They wanted to participate in the battle as well.
Disrespectfully speaking, they were currently hungry, yet couldn’t do anything but watch as the master enjoyed over 900 hundred precious dishes, that was no different from torture.
Some of the evil creatures appeared impatient, a few others silently sensed the power fluctuations in the air to judge the battle situation.
Very few evil creatures were staring straight into the void of space in front of themselves as their expressions changed constantly.
It was as if they could see past all the obstacles to see the battle on the sea over a few thousand meters away.
Gu Qing Shan understood almost immediately.
——evil creatures didn’t have inner sight.
Unlike human cultivators, these creatures didn’t specifically train and hone their inner sight since the beginning of their cultivation.
They mostly rely on their instincts or inheritance to evolve and become stronger, the luckiest ones might gain one or two special abilities during this process.
This battle was being conducted over several dozen nautical miles away, and they were standing at least half a city away, so most of these evil creatures could tell how the battle was going at all.
But that wasn’t any of Gu Qing Shan’s concerns.
He released his inner sight again across the ocean, observing the battle that was taking place.
Within his inner sight, the battle and even the tiny details just underneath the surface of the ocean were as clear as day.
——–as expected, since these evil creatures managed to become the Lord of Total Distortion’s subordinates and stood within the banquet hall, none of them were mediocre.
All of them were purely offensive evil creatures that could fire flashy and chaotic attacks one after the other.
Very quickly, quite a bit of the iceberg was already destroyed.
The 30-million-year-old demonic sea creature was also bleeding from their attacks, quickly dying its part of the ocean bright red.
As he saw this, Gu Qing Shan felt silently surprised.
How strange…
An ancient monster who lived this long couldn’t have just came out to suicide.
He concentrated his inner sight to go past those evil creatures and enter the seawater below.
He carefully observed this demonic sea creature who carried the iceberg on its head.
To Gu Qing Shan’s shock, he found the demonic sea creature’s body to be so long that he couldn’t even see the shadow of its tail.
Compared to that, the gigantic iceberg on its head was nothing but a bit of snow that gathered after a cold winter night.
——-from its body, this thing seems to be a humongous sea snake.
A sea snake that lived for over 30 million years.
Such a terrifying body.
No wonder the Lord of Total Distortion wanted to know its age first before anything else, and why he calmed down after knowing the results.
The Lord of Total Distortion used its age to determine how many evil creatures he should send out and how strong they should be.
Normally, the Lord of Total Distortion wouldn’t have made an error in his judgement.
And from the battle situation so far, the results were as the Lord of Total Distortion expected.
However…
Gu Qing Shan looked back at the demonic sea creature.
He could see patience and cruelty within its eyes.
Such an ancient creature shouldn’t be too stupid.
On the other hand, there could only be one reason that a stupid creature would be able to live for over 30 million years.
——–it was too powerful.
At point, the Lord of Total Distortion also stopped his meal and muses: 『 Still not running away after being beaten that badly? It shouldn’t have given up so easily… Then it must be planning something, or it was a lot more impressive than it seems—— how interesting, a monster who only lived for 30 million years dared to scheme against my ship? 』
His expression turned a bit serious.
Gu Qing Shan silently nodded, so the Lord of Total Distortion managed to notice the creature’s oddity after all.
『 Dark Devil, Judgment, and Silent Ruler, ah, you as well, Xie Qi Ruler. All of you are great evil creatures with unique abilities, I need you to act 』the Lord of Total Distortion ordered.
Following his order, a man clad in grey burning flames, a man who carried a long guillotine as well as a woman who didn’t have a mouth all stepped out.
The two men knelt on one knee and replied: 『「 Yes, master 」』
The woman also knelt down and lowered her head towards the Lord of Total Distortion.
All three of them seemed eerie and strange, but their human form was perfect——– except the woman without a mouth.
But that seems to be a secret of hers.
As the Xie Qi Fiend King, Gu Qing Shan also stepped out and lightly bowed to the Lord of Total Distortion.
——–four powerful evil creatures with unique abilities were going to be sent out at once.
This showed just how seriously the Lord of Total Distortion was taking this.
『 All of you will aid the others. No matter what kind of tricks that demonic sea creature is trying to pull, kill it at the first chance you see 』the Lord of Total Distortion ordered.
『「”Understood”」』
Gu Qing Shan headed out from the banquet hall together with the other three evil creatures.
At this point, none of the other evil creatures expressed the desire to fight on their expressions.
They have also noticed that something wasn’t quite right.
