Returning from the Immortal World

Somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean.

The thousands of islands in the fog-shrouded vast expanse of the ocean were like countless pieces of colorful emeralds of various shapes engraved on the blue ocean.

Yama Island.

The island was located on a spot out of the coverage of any spy satellites. The area was covered by black fog all year round thanks to the various concealment arrays. This place was the den of the Darkwind organization as well as the place mistakenly regarded as the Darkwind’s center of command by outsiders. There was even someone in charge in every place here. The Darkwind used this method as an obstruction to confuse their enemies.

The entire Yama Island was forever shrouded by dark mist with a grim and creepy atmosphere. The castles were made of steel, some buildings shaped like long swords, while others looked like spears, triangular-shaped, diamond-shaped, and most of them were tower-shaped buildings.

In the central area was a roughly 100-meter-high building with 19 floors. Those who saw this Dark God Tower from the outside would find that the edifice was not built on the ground but rather floated 18 meters from the ground.

BAM…

The gate at the bottom of the tower suddenly opened and a mysterious man whose body was covered by a black robe stepped in the air and went into the tower, before the gate slowly closed.

On the 19th floor.

After the black-robed mysterious man stepped into the gateway, 18 men and women with various appearances and shrouded by black mists all bowed down and saluted. The man, however, didn’t pay attention to them and took off his hat, revealing a bizarre face. His face was pale, the green veins on it were clearly visible. The red mole at the center of his eyebrows glowed with a fascinating light, and there was a red crescent blade mark on his left cheek.

The man was eyeless and a dark cloud of smoke replaced the supposed eye sockets like a vortex. Afterward, he calmly “watched” a large number of virtual hologram screens in the surrounding before his expression finally changed and he said slowly, “The Pyramid, the League of Archcrusaders, and the Stygian Club… they were the world’s top three organizations, yet they have been eradicated and uprooted in just several days. Unexpected yet very interesting. Even House Dolan that is comparable to them has also been exterminated, all of which is beyond my estimation.”

“King Yama.” A burly, hulking man in a black combat suit raised his hand and stroked his bright bald head before fiercely saying, “We’ve checked through various channels and our database about the identity and origins of these armies of child soldiers. There was a clash between House Dolan and some parties from China roughly 2 decades ago. Accurately speaking, there should be a deep blood feud as the aftermath and, apparently, some people who were supposed to have died 20 years ago were spotted.”

The black-robed King Yama slightly creased his brows and asked, “Are they also in contact with Tang Sect?”

“Given the previous intel, we’ve proven that Tang Xiu, the Magnificent Tang Corp.’s owner, should have a deep relationship with Tang Sect. And his father, Tang Yunde, was seen among some people who appeared on the House Dolan battlefield.”

“No wonder our intel operatives in China, as well as the rest of many groups we sent there, one after another, were like stones thrown into the sea. There has been no news about them, either. The might of Tang Sect… truly exceeds our expectations.”

“King Yama, though these children soldiers are many in number, their individual strength is just average. I can completely wipe them out if you give me enough time.”

“Heh, you said you can kill them all relying on your own power, Black Tiger?” King Yama sneered. “Are you kidding me? Ants can kill elephants with their numbers, let alone that these child soldiers are not ants. The weakest among them is at the Golden Core Stage, and the stronger ones have power comparable to the Spirit Formation Stage!”

“What?”

The burly man’s expression looked dull before incredulity replaced it. He hurriedly cried out, “I’ve never found any Spirit Formation Stage expert among them. Are the officers of these three armies actually Spirit Formation Stage cultivators?”

King Yama no longer bothered to reply to him and looked at a petite female among the 18 people, asking lightly, “Black Fox, is there any movement on our side as of recently?”

The masked petite female answered, “Nothing abnormal happened after the bloodbath due to the attack of that mysterious female cultivator on the concealed 4th island 3 months ago. However, the Darkwind intel operatives in various countries sent us the news that they are being monitored and followed. Although I’ve ordered them all to go dormant, it is estimated that many of our people have been exposed.”

King Yama fell into silence for a long time. He then slightly creased brows and said fiercely, “Order the core members to completely withdraw and gather on the 1st hidden island and be on the standby! As for the other personnel… abandon all of them!”

“Abandon all of them?!”

The 18 people, including Black Fox, wore disbelieving expressions. They were well aware of how difficult it was for the Darkwind to form their organization. It took decades to form a comprehensive intel network on a global scale. Yet, they had to abandon it now? Wouldn’t it mean that their previous efforts just went to waste in vain?

King Yama forced a bitter smile and said, “I understand what you have in mind. But our purpose in founding the Darkwind was to monitor the cultivation forces around the world while making money to obtain cultivation resources, to begin with. We’ve already hoarded a lot of cultivation resources. But the situation now forces us to shrink our scope of surveillance. The emergence of this terrifying force is not something we can contend with, so the time has come for us to give up the rooks to save the king.”

Black Fox asked curiously, “Is this Tang Sect really that powerful?”

“This force is no longer called Tang Sect,” King Yama replied.

“What is it called now?” Black Fox asked again.

“The Great Tang Empire.” There was a bit of reluctance and unwillingness in King Yama’s tone, but he still answered slowly.

The Great Tang Empire?

The 18 people exchanged dismayed glances, incredulity filling their faces. From the name, they inferred a very fearsome conclusion. Did these cultivators want to found a country of cultivators? If this country was truly built, wouldn’t they be able to easily rule the entire Earth with its likely well-trained and powerful armies?

“How big their courage is, to think that they dare to build a country?” Black Fox murmured.

King Yama pointed to the holographic screen and said in a deep tone, “The number of 150,000 children soldiers itself is already a terrifying number. Who can guarantee there will be no other cultivator armies in the Great Tang Empire? Even with their current armies, once you give them a few more years, decades, or centuries, to what extent their power will be by then? The most important thing is the extermination of the top three major forces and House Dolan itself. They clearly used this campaign as a drill. They want to make these children soldiers experience the flames of war and transform them into true soldiers.”

Ding, ding, ding…

The loud bell rang the moment King Yama finished speaking, and the expressions of 18 people, except for King Yama, greatly changed in an instant.

It was the sound of the Underworld Bell.

King Yama had laid out a heaven-defying array, the Underworld Great Array, and the Underworld Bell was the early-warning demonic artifact placed on the outermost layer. Over the centuries, it only sounded four times. Each time was the coming of their archenemy which eventually caused their Darkwind organization to face a crazy battle that led to heavy losses.

King Yama slowly closed his eyes and muttered, “It seems that we’re their last target! Since we can no longer avoid them, we’ll open the Underworld Passage. We’ll keep staying in the human world if we win, but we’ll go back if we’re defeated!”

Suddenly, Black Fox’s expression sharply changed and she shouted while pointing to the holographic screen. “King Yama, take a look at this quickly!”

King Yama instantly opened his eyes. As his eyes shifted to the direction pointed by Black Fox, his body suddenly shuddered because he saw tens of thousand children soldiers and cultivators on the holographic screen, riding on Aerogliders in the air. He even found thousands of people laying out an overwhelmingly powerful array around the 1st concealed island with his spiritual sense, while 8 strangely-shaped tanks appeared behind that array.

The instant after, King Yama realized with his keen observation that this army of tens of thousands of cultivators was not the 150,000 cultivators that had previously massacred the top three forces and House Dolan.

“How many armies… do they have, exactly? How many cultivator soldiers do they have in their ranks?” Despite being well-informed, King Yama was still shocked by the number.

Coming from the Nine Nether Underworld, he was one of the most powerful men there. He knew that the number of ghost cultivators in the entire Nine Nether Underworld definitely did not exceed 200,000. Additionally, the Nine Nether Underworld was thousands of times larger than Earth, and the number of ghosts inhabiting the plane was thousands of times larger than that of humanity on Earth.

It was so much so that he was sure that the Great Tang Empire’s military strength would have enough power to invade the Nine Nether Underworld in just a few decades or centuries.

“Activate the arrays!

“We are to evacuate at once if the Great Tang Empire has Array Masters. But if they don’t have any, we can turn the tide by relying on the arrays!”

Feeling tense and restless, King Yama immediately began issuing orders.

****

The moon sprinkled down its hazy moonlight. The vast universe was shrouded in the darkness above the 1st concealed island in the vast sea. At this moment, the entire 50,000 soldiers of the Martial Army had surrounded the small island group.

A tank-like chariot quickly flew over the sea surface and soon appeared in front of the Martial Army. As the door opened, Tang Ahlang, who gave off a scholarly aura and holding a jade flute, appeared in front of everyone present with a smile on his face.

“Commander!”

Five figures flickered and quickly came to salute Tang Ahlang.

“What’s the situation here?” Tang Ahlang slightly smiled in response and asked, “Has anyone from the Darkwind appeared yet?”

The black-uniformed Tang Jin, who was now 13-plus-years-old, shook his head and said, “We’ve spotted a total of 162 people on the island through the recon drones, and all of them are gathering in the center of the island. Our thermal imaging equipment found a total of 142 cultivators among these people, the strongest of whom should be comparable to Golden Core Stage experts. However, no one has come out after we surrounded this place. Not to mention that this island is covered and protected by some arrays, so we haven’t mounted any attacks for the time being.”

“Arrays, huh?”

Tang Ahlang smiled in response. He had been studying arrays and learned quite a lot about this aspect recently. Thus, he wanted to test his accomplishments in arrays now.