Martial Peak

Chapter 5437: Azure Void Remnants

Under normal circumstances, there were two criteria for determining if an Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm Master was a veteran or newly promoted, one of them was that the heritage of that person’s Small Universe had achieved a certain threshold.

Under normal circumstances, even 2,000 years after a cultivator advanced to the Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm, they could still not be counted as a veteran.

2,000 years was basically just sufficient for an Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm Master to stabilise their foundation and be able to freely exert their strength.

The second criterion was one’s experience in battling and killing enemies.

No matter how strong one’s heritage was, if they didn’t have any battle experience, they would be restricted in battle and wouldn’t be able to bring out their full strength.

Among all the Human Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm Masters on the Black Ink Battlefield, there were only a few newly advanced Eighth-Order Masters, while the rest were veterans. After they had advanced to the Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm, they continued cultivating while simultaneously battling the Black Ink Clan, slowly training themselves to master and enhance their strength. Therefore, situations like being unable to bring out their complete strength essentially never occurred.

However, Yang Kai was an exception.

He had a breakthrough to the Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm inside the Temporal Rivers of the Great Sea Celestial Phenomenon and then cultivated there for 2,000 years before exiting.

After Yang Kai left the Great Sea Celestial Phenomenon, he battled the sheep-headed Royal Lord and even decapitated him, but during that fight, he had constantly been going all out in a desperate struggle as there was a huge difference between his and the Royal Lord’s true strength, even using four Soul Rending Thorns, causing himself to become delirious due to his injured Soul. In the end, he didn’t even know how he killed the Royal Lord as he was already holding onto his head when he came to his senses.

This time, it was different.

With his current strength, a Territory Lord wasn’t too strong nor too weak, but rather just right for him to use as a polishing stone.

After he killed two Territory Lords one after the other, Yang Kai wasn’t in a hurry to end the third Territory Lord’s life. Instead, he wanted to borrow this Territory Lord’s strength to hone and familiarise himself with his newfound strength.

The many Grand Dao Strengths he had refined inside the Great Sea, especially, were unfamiliar to him. If he could hone them during an intense battle, Yang Kai could gain better control over them and would be able to use them more effectively.

That was why the fang-toothed Territory Lord felt that the Yang Kai’s strength was growing. Yang Kai now controlled so many Dao Strengths that he wasn’t able to skillfully wield them.

He desperately needed an opponent to battle against.

Therefore, he chose to quickly kill two Territory Lords, even if it meant getting hurt in the process.

Another half a day later, the fang-toothed Territory Lord felt despair because this battle, which started with them being on par with each other, then turned against him slightly, was now approaching the point where he was completely overwhelmed.

His heart was filled with bitterness.

The battle had now made a complete turnaround. Yang Kai’s attacks were calm and unhurried as he was still honing his strength while on the other hand, the fang-toothed Territory Lord was fighting back desperately as he knew that the longer the battle continued, the stronger his opponent would become. Once this Human had reached a certain limit, he would die.

But in battle, sometimes fighting with everything one had simply wasn’t enough.

Another half a day passed, and the fang-toothed Territory Lord’s aura had already weakened beyond recognition. His body was covered in every kind of wound imaginable, and his Black Ink Strength was leaking out from all those injuries. If this went on for much longer, there was a high likelihood that his strength would regress from that of a Territory Lord to a Feudal Lord.

At this moment, he felt envious of his two companions because at least their deaths were swift.

Meanwhile, he was like a piece of meat being slowly shaved by a dull knife, a torturous process for both his body and mind.

Knowing that he was destined to die today, the fang-toothed Territory Lord made a decision and completely gave up on defending before brazenly charging towards Yang Kai in a final, desperate struggle.

After a dozen breaths, a long spear pierced into his eye socket, and numerous Dao Strengths surged into his brain, grinding it into a paste. His originally fierce-looking expression gradually turned peaceful, feeling a sense of relief as the light in his eyes gradually dimmed. 

Yang Kai withdrew his spear and frowned slightly because he was quite dissatisfied with his current strength.

He didn’t consider the battle with the sheep-headed Royal Lord because he had completely lost consciousness during that fight, relying almost solely on his instincts to kill the enemy. 

After the battle with these three Territory Lords, he discovered his shortcomings.

Back when he was a Seventh-Order Master, he could crush those in the same Realm without any difficulty. No matter how strong a Feudal Lord was, they were no better than children before him and had no chance of fighting back.

But now that he had advanced to the Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm, his situation couldn’t compare to the glory he had when in the Seventh-Order Open Heaven Realm.

During this battle, Yang Kai had paid quite a large price to kill the seductive Territory Lord and taloned Territory Lord. It was even so for the fang-toothed Territory Lord he killed last. Although he had intended to use this Territory Lord to hone his strength, the time he took to finish the latter off was less than satisfactory.

According to the intelligence he obtained during the previous crusade, these three Territory Lords were considered Innate Territory Lords, ones who were spawned directly from a High-Rank Black Ink Nest. Therefore, they were stronger than those Black Ink Clansmen who advanced to become Territory Lords through their own cultivation.

Innate Territory Lords were already the strongest among all Territory Lords.

In other words, Yang Kai might still be invincible among his peers, but was far from being able to crush those in his Realm!

But after giving it another thought, Yang Kai understood that he had only been in the Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm for 2,000 years, so the heritage in his Small Universe hadn’t reached anywhere near its maximum yet. Once he reached the peak of the Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm, it wouldn’t be a problem to crush his peers.

On the other hand, he also discovered the biggest problem he was having now. 

He had too many Dao Strengths under his control!

To escape from the Great Sea Celestial Phenomenon, he had no choice but to absorb those undercurrents, which increased his attainment in many, many different Grand Daos.

It seemed now that he had absorbed and refined too many undercurrents, so his foundation, which comprised of all the different Grand Daos, was just too broad. With the ability to wield so many Dao Strengths, it meant he had more means of dealing with different enemies, which was a good thing; however, Yang Kai was finding it difficult to integrate all these varied Dao Strengths into a coherent force. While he had comprehension of many Dao Strengths, he did not know how to harmonize them to enhance his power and could only clumsily smash them all together at the moment.

Also, he had a vague feeling that if he could properly gather all these Dao strengths into one, the power he could exert would definitely experience an Earth-shattering change.

In his current situation, he could only think about these things because, among the variety of Dao Strengths, he did have attainments in some of them, but none were comparable to his mastery of the Dao of Space, Dao of Time, and Spear Dao. How could he gather all these Dao Strengths into one when he hadn’t even comprehended the true mysteries behind them?

Even with just the Dao of Space and Dao of Time, which he had focused on cultivating over many centuries, Yang Kai still hadn’t managed to achieve a perfect fusion.

Shaking his head to clear out such distracting thoughts, Yang Kai turned to look into the distance and stared for a moment before shouting, “Come out.”

From the cover of the messy battlefield, a few figures slowly emerged from the shadows. Each of them looked at Yang Kai with shocked expressions on their faces.

They had watched the battle just now, and the scene where an Innate Territory Lord was slowly being tortured to death was quite an eye-opener for them.

“Great Evolution’s Yang Kai greets fellow Martial Brothers and Sisters!” Yang Kai bowed.

He had already discovered that people were spying on him while he was battling the fang-toothed Territory Lord and could feel that they weren’t very strong, nor were there many of them. 

Clearly, they had been attracted here by the fallout from the battle.

Since these visitors kept themselves hidden nearby and showed no intention of coming out, Yang Kai couldn’t tell whether they were friends or foes.

It was not until this moment that he was certain that these observers were Humans!

“It’s Senior Brother Yang!” One of the Seventh-Order Open Heaven Realm Masters was elated after hearing Yang Kai announce his identity.

They were originally worried that the Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm Master that killed those Black Ink Territory Lords might be corrupted by Black Ink Strength, which was the reason why they didn’t show themselves even after Yang Kai had killed the fang-toothed Territory Lord.

But upon learning his identity, those worries disappeared. 

This couldn’t be helped, because every Human soldier in every Great Pass knew Yang Kai’s name. He was the one who brought them Purifying Light, so it was well-known he wasn’t afraid of being invaded by Black Ink Strength.

All those below the Ninth Order had the possibility of being corrupted by Black Ink Strength, but Yang Kai was an exception.

Meanwhile, the others also revealed happy expressions as they hurriedly approached Yang Kai. When they saw Yang Kai’s face, they could finally determine his identity.

Yang Kai also thought these people looked quite familiar, and after taking a closer look, he stated hesitantly, “You’re the Senior Brother who was always on guard duty at the Space Array.”

Having visited Azure Void Pass several times, Yang Kai naturally recognised the Seventh-Order Masters that guarded the Great Pass’ Hyper Space Array, and he was sure that this person before him was one of them.

That Seventh-Order Master seemed like he was about to cry from joy and choked out, “Sun Mao greets Senior Brother Yang!”

Then, Yang Kai swept his gaze over the others, and his face fell, “Are you… all that remains of the Azure Void Army?”

Sun Mao composed himself before answering, “There are a few other Fellow Brothers and Sisters, but they are currently in hiding. We came here because we sensed there was a battle happening and wanted to investigate.”

“How many of you are there?” Yang Kai asked. 

Sun Mao replied in an astringent voice, “Less than 1,000…”

Feeling his face twitching slightly, Yang Kai felt as if his heart was being torn out.

Azure Void Pass should have had 30,000 Human Masters stationed here, about the same as Blue Sky Pass back then. After the attack on the Royal City in the Azure Void Theatre, they undoubtedly suffered some casualties, but there should have still been more than 20,000 troops here during the second crusade.

Less than 1,000 of the original 20,000 survived, while even the Old Ancestor died in battle. It was nothing less than tragic.

“Senior Brother Yang, are there still any Black Ink Clansmen in the Inner Sanctum?” Sun Mao asked.

Yang Kai shook his head, “I didn’t make a thorough check, but there shouldn’t be any left.”

Since the three Territory Lords hidden here had been killed, any remaining Black Ink Clansmen would have appeared by now, even if it was just to try to flee.

Hearing that, Sun Mao felt relieved, “If that’s the case, then Division Commander Huang and the others can be saved.”

Yang Kai frowned, “Why did you say that?”

Sun Mao explained, “Division Commander Huang and some Fellow Brothers and Sisters were invaded by Black Ink Strength. Since we ran out of Purifying Black Ink Pills and didn’t have access to any Purifying Light, they were unable to eliminate that Black Ink Strength. Previously, Division Commander Hai led some troops here, intending to recover the Purifying Black Ink Battleship. Unfortunately, there hasn’t been any news from them since they left, so we assumed they ran into trouble.”

Quite a number of the remaining soldiers gathered here had been stained by Black Ink Strength and had been suppressing the Black Ink Strength inside their bodies over the years using various methods, but every once in a while, one of them could not hold on any longer and would have to commit suicide.

The battle 200 years ago not only destroyed Azure Void Pass, but also cut off the Humans’ supply lines. Even the Purifying Black Ink Pills and Evil Purging Divine Spears were all used up by now.

Although there were still Alchemists among their ranks, it was impossible for them to refine Spirit Pills without any Spirit Herbs or materials. 

Division Commander Huang Xiong was an Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm Master, so even if he was invaded by Black Ink Strength, he could still hold on for a time, but if too long passed, he would also find it difficult to cope.

Now, the only thing that could save them was the Purifying Black Ink Battleship that lay in the Inner Sanctum. Purifying Light might still be sealed inside the Battleship, so the only way they could survive was to extract it from the Great Pass.