Chapter 449 - 447: Heaven’s End Valley

Chapter 449: Chapter 447: Heaven’s End Valley

"Hurry up, hurry up!"

"If we’re any slower and others catch up from behind, we’ll be so late we won’t even get the hot shit!"

The uncle, a pipe dangling from his lips, hastily spoke up, anxiously pushing the young man’s back and urging him into the valley to explore.

The two of them were bottom-tier Loose Cultivators in the Tian Nan Domain’s Immortal Cultivation Realm.

They had no master and no connections.

They had managed their Qi Introduction Success through a bit of luck and had only embarked on the Path of Immortal Cultivation after obtaining a crude Basic Breathing Technique.

Although in the eyes of mortals, they were already lofty Cultivators, the Immortal Cultivation Realm was full of such bottom-feeders.

Without some great fortunate encounter, the vast majority would spend their entire lives struggling to survive at the bottom, never surpassing the Qi Introduction First or Second Layer before dying of old age.

Major events in the Immortal Cultivation Realm had nothing to do with them.

Their only purpose was to serve as the backdrop for this vast Immortal Cultivation Realm,

providing a sense of shock and awe for peerless, Heaven-defying Demons like Shen Changchuan.

The rest of their lives

were supposed to be just like that.

Never amounting to anything.

But several years ago,

at the behest of the Yuqing Immortal Sect, the major Immortal Cultivation Forces of the Tian Nan Domain formed an alliance and began a crusade against the Demon Dao of the Nanyue Kingdom.

To bolster their combat strength, the various forces recruited large numbers of outside Loose Cultivators.

Some Sects even drastically lowered their Entry Level requirements,

and hired numerous Loose Cultivators to fight on the front lines, offering inheritances of Magic, Heavenly and Earthly Treasures, and Elixirs as rewards.

The once-stratified Immortal Cultivation Realm of the Tian Nan Domain

had opened a path for upward mobility to the bottom-tier Loose Cultivators.

Over the years,

some Loose Cultivators seized the opportunity of the war, relying on the alliance’s resources to rise against the heavens, break through to the Extreme Realm, and advance to Soul Emergence.

Some obtained Immortal Cultivation inheritances on the battlefield, securing a future for their descendants to establish a family.

Others had Heaven-defying luck and became rich overnight...

...adding even more legendary tales of rising from the bottom to the lore of the Tian Nan Domain’s Immortal Cultivation Realm.

At the time, the uncle had actually been tempted as well.

But back then, although the front lines were short on manpower and combat strength,

the uncle’s Cultivation Realm was clearly not up to par. He hadn’t even reached the Qi Introduction Third Layer.

At such a Realm, he didn’t even qualify to be cannon fodder and was obviously looked down upon.

Even if he had the heart for it, he lacked the strength.

However, all of that

changed after the great victory at Broken Soul Mountain two years ago.

Because the occupied territory was so vast, Demon Cultivators could move freely throughout the enormous area around Broken Soul Mountain,

frequently attacking the Cultivators of the Righteous Alliance at Broken Soul Mountain.

To deal with this,

the Righteous Dao side of the Tian Nan Domain began to implement a targeted strategy.

They would sweep through the human settlements around Broken Soul Mountain,

either subjugating or clearing them out. In any case, the goal was to control those untamed rural areas as much as possible, compressing the operational space of the Demonic Alliance’s Demon Cultivators.

The method was a good one,

but it brought its own problems.

Although large swathes of the area outside Broken Soul City were uninhabited wilderness, swamps, and other such no-man’s-lands,

the territory was so immense that there was still a considerable number of scattered Human Race settlements.

And after subjugating or clearing out the original local Demon Cultivator forces,

they still needed people to Garrison the areas,

to ensure they wouldn’t continue providing aid to the Demonic Alliance’s Demon Cultivators.

But the large number of human settlements naturally and rapidly diluted the strength of the Righteous Alliance.

To solve this problem,

the various Righteous Alliance factions of the Tian Nan Domain lowered their recruitment standards again and again.

Until, not long ago,

it reached the point where as long as you were a Cultivator from the Tian Nan Domain’s Immortal Cultivation Realm,

and were willing to work for the alliance, to Garrison some human settlements and perform surveillance, communication, and warning duties,

then you could get a free ticket to the northern part of the Nanyue Kingdom...

This was why the uncle and nephew duo, despite their low Realms,

were able to be here.

"Xingzai, let your uncle tell you somethin’! For people like us, if we don’t fight for it, we’ll be stuck at the bottom forever."

"Didn’t we, uncle and nephew, run all the way to this Nanyue Kingdom to make a name for ourselves?"

"Just think about it! The world is full of small fry like us. If you don’t even fight when an opportunity comes, how do you ever expect to get ahead?"

"And hey, don’t think we’re not in any danger now. That’s just ’cause the alliance hasn’t sent our mission yet. Soon enough, we’ll have to go Garrison the nearby strongholds. Whoa, I hear those Demon Cultivators kill without blinking an eye! And they even make use of the corpses after they’re done killing!"

"You don’t want your uncle and you to bite the dust in this unfamiliar place, do you?"

The uncle rambled on, spouting all sorts of grand principles, his hands relentlessly pushing Xingzai forward.

"Er, Uncle, how about I keep watch out here, and you go take a look inside? After all, you’re the one with more experience!"

The simple-faced Xingzai looked conflicted, his mind rarely working so quickly.

"Whoa! What kind of talk is that? You don’t think I’m scared, do you?"

"Let me tell you, keeping watch is a highly technical skill! You’re young, you can’t handle it. You gotta let your uncle do it!"

The uncle straightened his slightly paunchy torso, widened his eyes, and boomed.

He then launched into another tirade of grand reasoning,

forcing the young man named Xingzai to slowly walk toward the valley.

Seeing this, the uncle glanced around, then shrank back into the bushes to hide, pulling his neck in.

’This is too dangerous!’

’I wonder if that great personage has left yet.’

"I don’t know which great immortal is up there, but we’re just common folk. Please don’t mind our intrusion..."

The uncle muttered, pressing his palms together and bowing toward the sky.

"Uncle, maybe we should just forget it!"

Just then,

a voice suddenly sounded from behind, startling him badly.

"AH!"

"You damn brat, don’t you know you can scare someone to death like that?!"

"And weren’t you supposed to be searching inside? Why did you run out?"

"Uncle, I’m scared..."

"Scared? What’s there to be scared of? That great personage just demonstrated their Magic a little while ago. The lingering aura is enough to make Demon Beasts and all that other riff-raff run for hundreds of miles!"

"No, Uncle, it’s when I went in. I was terrified!"

"When I entered that valley, I felt like my whole body was about to split apart. Like, the feeling of being split in two down the middle by a single sword strike!"

"Basically, it felt like the whole world had been split open!"

"Is it really that crazy? I don’t believe you! Come on, let’s go take a look!"

「A moment later,」

The two of them tumbled down the mountainside next to the valley, covered in dirt. After scrambling to their feet, they were still shaken with lingering fear.

If one had not faced that scene directly,

it would be truly impossible to imagine.

Just standing on the edge gave one the feeling that the world had been cleaved in two by a single sword, and that you yourself were about to be split in half along with it!

As mere Qi Introduction Second and Third Layer cultivators,

they had no power to resist that lingering aura.

Even now, their legs were still weak.

However,

after steadying his Heart Spirit slightly,

the uncle opened his right hand with a slight tremble.

At this moment,

his right hand was dripping with blood.

In his palm was a black stone.

On the stone,

was a fine sword mark.

From the sword mark, an incomparably sharp aura pulsed erratically.

This was the very reason his hand was covered in blood!

"Whoa! Uncle, why’d you pick up this broken rock? Your hand is covered in blood, hurry up and throw it away!"

"You stupid kid! You don’t even recognize a treasure when it’s right in front of you!"

"This thing has some of the lingering aura from that great personage’s Magic demonstration! If we can comprehend it before it dissipates, the benefits will be endless!"

"Forget it! It’s no use explaining it to a fool like you. Let’s go, quickly. And don’t you dare tell anyone about this, understand?"

"I know..."

Afterward,

the uncle took out a precious Jade Box and placed the stone inside. Then, as if cradling a priceless treasure, he held it to his chest.

The two of them then quickly departed...