Chapter 252 - 245: This Sword is Destined for Me, Dao Fruit and Divine Techniques

Chapter 252: Chapter 245: This Sword is Destined for Me, Dao Fruit and Divine Techniques

To a Dao Fruit Realm Cultivator, four years was but a fleeting moment.

For four years, Ren Yelin had been focused on his Cultivation, never bothering with inspections.

After all, the members of the Celestial Eye Black Pupil were known for being low-maintenance. Once a task was assigned, they required little-to-no prodding or supervision.

「This day.」

Having completed his Cultivation, Ren Yelin noted the time. He walked out of his Cultivation Room, flew into the air, and looked down upon the entirety of Endless Island.

CLANG, CLANG, CLANG...

Ren Yelin took out a large bell and struck it fiercely a few times.

Hearing the chimes, the Cultivators on Endless Island stopped what they were doing and flew in droves toward the space below Ren Yelin.

Jiang Zuo had been working alongside two Array Masters, setting up an Array.

"Let’s go over together."

Hearing the chimes, Master Duan said calmly.

Jiang Zuo didn’t know what was going on, so he could only follow the others.

’This Ren fellow hasn’t made a move in years,’ Jiang Zuo wondered. ’Why summon everyone today? What for?’

But everyone around him seemed to know what was happening, so he couldn’t very well ask.

Hovering in the air, Ren Yelin looked down indifferently at the crowd below.

"There is one extra person among you!"

Ren Yelin suddenly announced to the crowd.

One extra person?

Many of the Celestial Eye Black Pupil Cultivators didn’t quite understand what this meant.

Jiang Zuo was rendered speechless.

’Are the higher-ups of the Celestial Eye Black Pupil really this idle? There are over a thousand Cultivators on this island, and he’s actually memorized every single one of them?’

’We slave away for this organization like cattle, and this is how they treat us?’

’Not a shred of trust!’

The crowd of Cultivators below exchanged glances, none of them knowing who the extra person was.

They came from several different Divine Ruins and hardly knew one another.

Even though they had been in the same place for four or five years, there were still many they didn’t recognize.

"Kneel, all of you!"

Ren Yelin barked.

At his command, the surrounding Cultivators dropped to their knees one by one.

The two Array Masters beside Jiang Zuo did the same.

Jiang Zuo, however, shot into motion, streaking toward the coast.

He didn’t think kneeling would allow him to blend in. It would be far too easy to pick out a non-believer from a crowd of Celestial Eye Black Pupil fanatics. Even the most primitive methods would work; it would just take a bit more time.

And since the Celestial Eye Black Pupil’s leadership was already on guard—able to spot one extra person in a crowd of over a thousand at a glance—they surely had a way to identify him.

"Where do you think you’re going!"

Ren Yelin roared.

Ever since the organization suffered grievous losses with the loss of a Divine Ruins Secret Realm over a hundred years ago, the Cultivation Realm had intensified its crackdown on the Celestial Eye Black Pupil. The chances of believers’ memories reawakening were also on the rise. Because of this, the Celestial Eye Black Pupil had decided to gather its followers every five years to reinforce their control using the Celestial Eye Divine Map.

Ren Yelin never would have imagined that a spy could have infiltrated a place like Endless Island.

There was no way he would let Jiang Zuo escape. He had to capture him, no matter what, and find out exactly how he had managed to get in.

With a furious roar, Ren Yelin thrust out his hand. A giant, cyan palm materialized and shot through the air, grasping for Jiang Zuo.

Before it even reached him, Jiang Zuo felt the air around him thicken and stagnate, making it nearly impossible to move.

Any other Three Flowers Realm Cultivator, even one at the late stage, would have been rendered helpless by Ren Yelin’s attack, able only to await their doom.

However, with a simple twist of his body, Jiang Zuo broke free from the invisible bonds.

’Hmph. So you do have some skill!’

Ren Yelin was a bit surprised that his attack had missed.

Few Three Flowers Realm Cultivators should have been able to resist that move.

"Absorb!"

He then took out a fourth-tier Gourd Spiritual Artifact and barked a cold command at Jiang Zuo.

A misty cyan light instantly surged toward Jiang Zuo.

The light was upon him in a flash, leaving no room to dodge.

At the very least, a Three Flowers Realm Cultivator could not have dodged such an attack.

However, as the Cyan Light coiled around his limbs, a faint layer of Tribulation Thunder Power surfaced on Jiang Zuo’s skin with but a thought.

He flexed his muscles slightly and easily broke free from the gourd’s restraints, continuing his escape.

’What? Even the Cyan Profound Treasure Gourd is useless?’

Ren Yelin’s expression finally changed. He realized the spy before him was truly extraordinary.

"You’ve refused the easy way, so now you’ll get the hard way!"

Enraged by his repeated failures, Ren Yelin’s patience ran out.

He slapped his waist, sending a Flying Sword hurtling toward Jiang Zuo as he gave chase himself.

The speed of a Dao Fruit Realm expert was far beyond that of a Three Flowers Realm Cultivator.

Jiang Zuo was fast, but there was still a considerable gap when compared to a Dao Fruit Realm Cultivator.

And a Dao Fruit Realm cultivator’s Flying Sword was faster still.

Within Jiang Zuo’s Divine Sense, he perceived the Flying Sword tearing through the air, arriving behind him in an instant.

’A fourth-tier Flying Sword Spiritual Artifact. Not bad!’

’Now that I’ve seen it, this sword is fated to be mine!’

’Come to me!’

With a flicker of his mind, Jiang Zuo’s powerful Transformed Divine Sense instantly enveloped the Flying Sword, layer by layer.

To control a Flying Sword, a Cultivator had to establish a connection with it using a thread of Divine Sense. The sword’s attack range could not extend beyond the reach of the Cultivator’s Divine Sense.

Normally, when Cultivators controlled their Flying Swords, they didn’t have to worry about them being stolen.

To do so required using one’s Divine Sense to completely sever the connection between the Flying Sword and its master.

This was only possible if the enemy’s Divine Sense was vastly more powerful than that of the sword-wielding Cultivator.

Now, Jiang Zuo’s Divine Sense had not only achieved Transformation but had also reached an extremely profound state, making it far stronger than Ren Yelin’s.

The fourth-tier Flying Sword instantly lost its connection to Ren Yelin. Jiang Zuo snatched it from the air with one hand and tossed it into his Pet Beast Spirit Garden.

"You dare!"

Ren Yelin was both shocked and furious.

For a moment, he couldn’t even comprehend how Jiang Zuo had managed it.

He would never, under any circumstances, believe that a Three Flowers Realm Cultivator’s Divine Sense could far surpass that of a Dao Fruit Realm Cultivator like himself.

He simply assumed that Jiang Zuo had used some unknown technique.

First, his Spiritual Artifact had been rendered useless, and now another had been stolen.

The theft of his Flying Sword, in particular, made Ren Yelin deeply hesitant.

He stopped using Spiritual Artifacts, instead furiously bombarding Jiang Zuo with various fourth-tier and higher Magic.

Although Jiang Zuo did his utmost to dodge, he couldn’t evade all of the magical attacks.

These were the attacks of a Dao Fruit Realm Cultivator, after all!

The Magic left gash after gash on Jiang Zuo’s body. Ren Yelin clearly saw blood pouring from his wounds.

Jiang Zuo’s figure swayed precariously, as if a few more attacks would send him plummeting to the ground.

Ren Yelin continued his frenzied bombardment, and Jiang Zuo suffered even heavier injuries.

But somehow, just when he seemed to be at his limit, he would manage to keep fleeing.

’Something’s not right! This guy is faking it!’

Seeing the coast just ahead, Ren Yelin finally sensed that something was off about Jiang Zuo.

There was no reason he should be able to withstand so many attacks when he was so clearly at his limit.

"Trying to escape from me?"

"Impossible!"

"Divine Technique: Cyan Profound Divine Palm!" 𝔣𝖗ⅇℯ

Sensing that ordinary Magic wouldn’t be enough to stop this person, Ren Yelin no longer hesitated, unleashing his Dao Fruit Divine Technique.

With a great roar, a colossal cyan palm descended from the heavens, slamming down violently toward Jiang Zuo.

Jiang Zuo once again felt himself bound in mid-air, unable to move a muscle.

But this time, no matter how hard he struggled, he couldn’t break free.

A Dao Fruit Divine Technique already involved some of this world’s Heaven and Earth Rules.

Against a Divine Technique, a non-Dao Fruit Realm Cultivator was utterly defenseless!

A scrap of information about the Dao Fruit Realm flashed through Jiang Zuo’s mind.

In that moment, he finally experienced the power of a Dao Fruit Divine Technique.

Any Cultivator who had not reached the Dao Fruit Realm could only await slaughter when faced with a Dao Fruit Divine Technique!

WHAM!

The giant cyan palm slammed mercilessly into Jiang Zuo!

Jiang Zuo instantly exploded into a cloud of blood mist and was blasted into the sea below like a cannonball.

’This guy is unusual, so that palm strike probably didn’t kill him... wait, why isn’t there any blood in the water?’

Ren Yelin had thought the palm strike had beaten Jiang Zuo half to death and was preparing to fish him out of the sea.

But then he noticed that although Jiang Zuo had exploded into a bloody mist before falling into the sea, there wasn’t a single trace of blood spreading across the surface of the water.

What he hadn’t noticed was that when Jiang Zuo was struck by the giant cyan palm, his body mangled and blood splattering everywhere,

all of that blood had fallen into the sea along with him.

The instant it hit the water, all that blood coalesced back onto Jiang Zuo’s body.

Jiang Zuo’s physical body was also recovering at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Furthermore, Jiang Zuo himself was using the immense force of Ren Yelin’s Divine Technique to flee like a phantom underwater.

As he fled, Jiang Zuo slapped a Concealment Talisman onto himself.

By the time Ren Yelin sensed something was amiss and flew down from the sky, Jiang Zuo had already fled a great distance underwater.

Ren Yelin hurriedly searched with his Divine Sense, but there was no trace of Jiang Zuo to be found.

He had actually let him escape?

Ren Yelin found it hard to believe.

For a mere early-stage Three Flowers Realm Cultivator to escape from the clutches of a Dao Fruit Realm Great Power was thought to be impossible.

Only a genius who had reached the Perfection of the Three Flowers Realm might have had a slight chance.

"Who was this man working for!"

Ren Yelin returned, his face dark, and roared furiously.

"Reporting to Elder Ren, that man was refining some array materials under our supervision,"

Master Duan and Master Chen replied respectfully.

"Go and check the Array you’ve been setting up! See if there are any problems!"

Ren Yelin was suddenly struck by a terrible premonition.

A moment later, the two of them came running back in a panic to report to Ren Yelin.

Listening to their report, Ren Yelin’s vision went dark, and he was so enraged he nearly coughed up blood.

’Four years of setting up the Array, and you’re telling me it was all for nothing?’

’Not only is the Array incomplete, but now you’re saying we might not even have enough materials left?’

’How am I supposed to report this back?’

...

’Dao Fruit Realm Cultivators really are powerful!’

’A few more palm strikes like that, and my recovery ability wouldn’t have been able to keep up. My life would have been in danger!’

Jiang Zuo had already reached a safe spot on the seabed.

He had taken a direct hit from a Dao Fruit Divine Technique, but his body had already almost completely recovered.

’But it seems that’s all Elder Ren is capable of,’

’If it weren’t for all the other members of the Celestial Eye Black Pupil, I might have even been able to put up a fight against him!’

Jiang Zuo thought.

He couldn’t say for sure about other Dao Fruit Realm Cultivators’ Divine Techniques, but it would be quite difficult for Ren Yelin to kill him with his own.

After all, he wasn’t the type to just take a beating without fighting back.

’Tonight, I’ll go take that Spirit Vein!’

Jiang Zuo made up his mind.