Rise of the Demon God

"I already made her wait for so long. It's better if I don't delay any longer. As for the Law of Destiny, I doubt it can even increase my strength since it's related to destiny. After handling stuff with her land, I can comprehend it," Long Chen muttered.

"If the situation there is tough, I can at least help her parents escape," he continued.

"Yeah. After her brother's death, her parents are the only family she had left. I'm sure she'll be happy to see them alive," Ming Lan nodded her head, sighing. 

"I hope I am not too late," Long Chen muttered, looking at the distant horizon.

The warm winds brushed against his skin as he thought of the future that he might be facing.

He had thought that Tian Shen was trapped in the mirror, so as long as he didn't listen to Xun at the end, he wouldn't need to worry, but things weren't the same.

According to his latest information, the scheme was much bigger than he had thought. Tian Shen was not trapped in the mirror. Instead, he was the creator of the biggest scheme.

If Long Chen's luck was good, Tian Shen was going to be still sleeping and unable to know about him. However, If luck wasn't on his side, that guy was already up and keeping an eye on him.

That was the worst scenario possible, according to him.

He gazed towards the sky, wondering if Tian Shen was somewhere in this world, watching him.

He had never felt the need to get stronger as he did now, but he knew he had time. 

He hadn't awakened his bloodline completely. Only after awakening, his full bloodline was he ever going to fall in the eyes of Tian Shan. Until then, he was safe.

'I need to get as strong as I can before my bloodline fully awakens,' he thought as he gazed at his hand.

He had also thought of another possibility. If he gave up finishing the trials, he wouldn't awaken his Bloodline anymore. It will be limited if he fails so he could be safe.

But he dropped the plan as there were many complex elements involved. Firstly, if he failed trials, that was going to mean that his journey to awaken this amazing bloodline would stop, and he would lose an opportunity which he didn't wish to lose. 

Secondly, there was also no guarantee that Tian Shen wouldn't steal his bloodline anyway, even if he failed to update more. 

In any case, instead of being on Tian Shen's mercy, he preferred to opt for true strength to defeat Tian Shen.

If he could get truly strong and comprehend as many laws as he could while bringing his Cultivation to the true peak, then he could be confident to face Tian Shen. That's what he was going to try. Now he knew exactly what his goal was and where he needed to stop.

"Long Chen..." Ji Shan said, attracting Long Chen's attention.

"Yeah?" Long Chen replied as he gazed at Ji Shan. 

"You saw the strength of the Kingdom, right?" Ji Shan let out. "That Kingdom wasn't even the strongest Kingdom, yet it had so many Heaven Realm Cultivators. You know what I'm trying to say, right?"

Long Chen nodded his head as he answered, "I know. You're saying to be careful. If a lower Kingdom was already so strong, the strength of the Empires was going to be even more frightening."

"Exactly," Ji Shan said. " It's not something we can carelessly barge inside."

"I realize that, but we aren't going to be fighting the Empire ourselves. We're going to a friendly Empire that belongs to Mingyu. We can see if we can help them in the potential war. If we can't, we can simply take them and leave. We don't need to fight a lost war," Long Chen muttered.

"It's good that you understand that. That's the only concern I had," Ji Shan muttered as he relaxed.

He continued, "Oh right, now that we have some time, can you tell me what happened with Xu Liang? How did h-"

He was speaking when his words were cut by Long Chen in haste. Long Chen had lied to Ming Lan about what happened with Xu Liang, but Ji Shan didn't know that. Ji Shan was more curious about how Xu Liang had become so scary strong.

"Yeah, he just had to go his own way, leaving us alone. I'm missing him as well," Long Chen let out, trying to hint at Ji Shan. 

"It's fine. We might meet him again in the future," he continued.

Ji Shan felt like something was amiss. He could see Long Chen winking at him. From his words as well, he understood what was going on. 

"Yeah.  I will miss him," he said, agreeing with Long Chen.

He didn't bother asking what it was about again since he was sure that Long Chen didn't wish to talk before Ming Lan about it.

Ming Lan also looked at them suspiciously.

They flew straight according to the map, only stopping once in a while in forests where they hunted beasts and had their campfire before they continued search again.

****

" We haven't been able to find him. We searched every corner of the kingdom, but the boy isn't anywhere."

A guard provided an update to the King and the Envoys that came from the Empire 

"We already knew he wasn't in the city. Only a stupid will stay in the city after that, but he isn't in the entire Kingdom... That means he has already left, and we don't know where he went..."  Fu Min muttered as he pieced the information together.

"He most probably used some long-range Teleportation talisman to escape right before the attacks could land on him," Gu Yan pointed out.

"That's true, but there's also something else. I'm more curious about the person who seemed like his friend. The two of them disappeared at the same time. Did they both use the Talisman at the same time, or was it something else? The whole day was strange. I still can't understand half the things that happened," Du Lian also chimed in.

"We don't know where he went. It's possible he went back towards the kingdoms we already searched. The kingdoms all use the one portraits so he wouldn't be recognized even when he's there. It looks like we'll need to redo our search efforts again," Lim Yi said, frustrated.

"True. We need to inform His Majesty first since the whole search needs to be from scratch," Fu Min nodded his head as he agreed.