Transcending the Nine Heavens

“Everybody hurried to ask: What’s your idea? Chouchang replied: The Heart Connection Technique. I believe all of us also remember how to use it. Everyone nodded. Chouchang said hurriedly: We will not be sealed up like this forever. Since he wants to use our spirits, he would definitely have to extract the spirits from the live bodies. But after extracting, though it is only the spirits and it has no power to attack, we will be under no restrictions for a period of time, after all.”

“Everyone nodded together. Chouchang continued to say: I’m guessing, he’s getting rid of us all together, so it has to be nine places that he needs to nourish the heaven at! Besides that, he has to send us into each position together for it to work. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have done this.”

“Chouchang said: We happen to be nine. That means one person has to be at the middle position. There’s no knowing who this person will be. It may be you, it may be me. But it will be the spirit of one among us. Right now what little time we have is that one instant when his hands reach out to send us in. That’s the only time we are out of his control. Let’s do this: all of us memorize our own positions, what number it is. In that split second, besides the middle person who doesn’t move, the eight at the side will try our best to turn our own spiritual power into the utmost purest power of the spiritual origin, and send it into that position in the middle! Do our best and send as much as we can!’ ”

“Then Chouchang said: Since it’s the spirits that are used to nourish the heaven, the power of the spirits are used, and there has to be power in the spirit, for the soul not to be broken into pieces. Therefore, only the person with the strongest spirit power will have a little bit of chance to survive. We will be trying our luck by doing this, there’s no assurance if it will work, but this is our only chance!”

At this moment, Chu Yang couldn’t help but say, approvingly, “He was one with the surname of Diwu indeed. He could actually come up with such a plan under that kind of circumstance.”

Zi Xieqing nodded too.

Almost anyone would simply wait for death in such a situation. But for this Diwu Chouchang, he apparently had long formulated a plan in his mind. He probably came up with it while that Nine Tribulations Sword Master was speaking. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be so organized.

To keep such a clear head at this kind of moment, this Diwu Chouchang must be an extraordinary talent in the world!

“At that time, all the brothers were saying that, whoever this person was, so long as with that little bit of hope he got out and survived, he had to avenge the brothers! At any cost!”

“And then Diwu Chouchang said: Stop talking now, you all. Focus all your efforts on nourishing your spirits. And don’t get angry. Once you get angry and the spirit loses its focus, more help can’t be given to that brother in the middle. Close your eyes, all! So we did, and focused completely on stabilizing our spirits… Ha, at that time, though I had no cultivation yet, I could feel that all my brothers were striving, like they had never done before, just to transfer their own spiritual power to their brother at that critical moment! Just for that really tiny bit of hope to survive.”

The Dharma Supreme spoke with great sorrow, and his eye socket turned red somewhat, and some blood emerged from his mouth. But this time, he didn’t wipe it away, but said in a low voice, “Indeed, after a period of time, he returned, and talked to us. But none of us bothered with us. He felt bored too, so used drugs on us, and then we fainted. When we woke again, we were already at a strange place. From the void, a series of strange noises came through. Nine mysterious caves actually appeared slowly.”

“And then, that bastard grabbed us without any hesitation, and with each hit, he ruined the physical body of one of us, and extracted our spirits. None of us spoke. We only had time to exchange one final look in the last moments. Diwu Chouchang spoke just one word before his head was hit and broken. That word was ‘Remember!’. And then, that person… that person killed us, and gathered all our souls together and threw them out. And I realized, to my astonishment, that it was exactly the cave in the middle I was entering!”

“In the split second when I entered the cave, eight waves of spiritual force was sent over with extreme force from eight directions. At that time, I could only capture them little by little. Those were all the lives of my brothers! Lives of my very own brothers!”

The Dharma Supreme fell silent, and tears emerged from his eyes slowly.

“I didn’t dare to waste any bit of those eight waves of spiritual power. Perhaps heaven had been helping me, such that I could actually gather all of them and absorbed it within myself. At that time, I could feel the comfort and happiness from these spiritual powers, and their expectations towards me!”

“And then, I was pulled by an unknown force into a strange space. I realized that there was another spirit in there, long broken. Only a small piece vaguely existed, and there was no way of knowing who that was. But I knew that was a senior of the Nine Tribulations who suffered the same fate as me! Which of the spirits who could die here wasn’t a good man with great bravery, iron-like strength, and indomitable spirits? But which of them didn’t die with immense grievances, being cheated, used, sold and eventually killed by the person that they trusted the most?”

The Dharma Supreme let out a tragic laugh. “I was just inside there, unable to get out. I could just stay there, feeling my own spiritual power being consumed little by little! I kept cultivating the spiritual powers, but it wasn’t enough to make up for the loss. But the consumption was extremely slow as well. Thinking about it, every spirit inside there must have stayed on for eight, nine thousand years. Hahaha, such days those were! My brothers, they were withstanding such torture as well.”

“I don’t know how long had passed, before I felt an emptiness in my heart. I knew that a brother of mine disappeared forever. Such a sensation occurred eight times in total… I knew that all my brothers were gone. Only I, alone, still existed, with their powers on me. I cultivated even harder. I wanted to live, I wanted revenge!”

“I had to live on behalf of them. At that time, I had already used up all my original powers, with only the spiritual powers sent into me before entering left. It was they who sustained me and kept me from dying!”

“Finally, one day, when I felt that I was almost going to fail, that cave suddenly opened up, and a spirit came in. Only then did I know that ten thousand years had passed.”

“I took that opportunity and escaped. I found a damp and dark place which saw no sunlight all year long, and cultivated there. With that, several thousand years passed. But, to enter and seize a body, it was so hard that it was almost impossible! Because even for an ordinary person his spirit was complete, and there was absolutely no way that you could chase his spirit away from his body! Unless you kill him. But after killing him, I still couldn’t use it.”

“Even for those who are dying, I tried and there was no way to succeed.”

“Finally, one day, I sensed a person with a missing spirit.” The Dharma Supreme looked up at Bu Liuqing. “That was Dongfang Badao! At that time, he must have just deleted his own memory, and his spirit was very much lost! This was my chance. But he was still very powerful at the time, and I didn’t have an opportunity, because once I was discovered by him, I was afraid my spirit would be dissipated.”

“So I followed him in secret, everywhere he went. Finally, with all the effort, I succeeded. He was a law-enforcement officer, and had very high cultivation, so he went on missions frequently to catch criminals. At that time, the three of them were fighting for the position of the Dharma Supreme, and it was measured based on their law enforcement. He chased after a Supreme Martial Artist intending to kill him, yet he was surrounded. Though he killed all of them, his own self was also on the verge of dying. He fainted and went unconscious. I took this opportunity and entered his body!”

The Dharma Supreme’s eyes fixed on Bu Liuqing. “Do you understand now?”

Bu Liuqing sighed. “Yes, I do.”

“Brother Bu, if you were me, would you kill Dongfang Badao, occupy his body, and wait for an opportunity to avenge those brothers at all costs?” asked the Dharma Supreme, his voice low.

“Yes!” Bu Liuqing breathed in deeply and said, “They must be avenged!”

“You are avenging your brother, and I understand you!” the Dharma Supreme said, “But I am also avenging mine, do you understand me?”

“I do! But it is my brother’s body you are occupying, so although I understand you, I have to kill you anyway!”

“I get it.” The Dharma Supreme laughed, and said calmly, “If you had given up on killing me because of this talking, that’s what will make me feel strange.”

Bu Liuqing said, “For revenge, you should go to that Elysium! Why did you come here?”

“I can’t reach up there!” the Dharma Supreme said frankly, “Only after I got out, did I realize that the whole family and clan of that bastard was actually already gone. I went through all the histories and couldn’t find even one family of the Nine Tribulations Sword Master! That made my hatred even worse. Those guys must have all followed him up?”

“About this, I really have no idea.” Bu Liuqing felt puzzled as well. In every generation, there were the Nine Super Clans, but why was there no clan of any Nine Tribulations Sword Masters?

“So I had to stay on, cultivate, and prepare to go up to that world for revenge! But, during this time, I also have to get rid of all the support that the Nine Tribulations Sword Master has, such as the Dharma Supreme, or… the new Nine Tribulations Sword Master!” The Dharma Supreme smiled slightly.

But in that smile, was immense killing intent.

“I just started to occupy his body and was unsure about the management of law-enforcement officers. I tried but failed to kill the Nine Tribulations Sword Master of that era. The fate energy of the Nine Tribulations Sword Master was too strong, ha, but he tried to end the bloodline of my brother’s Diwu Clan and I protected it. Right now, though the Diwu Clan is weak in power, it at least still exists.”

The Dharma Supreme spoke calmly, but deep emotions displayed in his eyes.

Chu Yang finally understood.

During the era of the last Nine Tribulations Sword Master, Diwu Clan apparently became the enemy of the Nine Super Clans and even the Nine Tribulations Sword Master, yet it actually didn’t die out. So this was the root cause.

Diwu Clan was a subsidiary clan of Zhuge Clan, but it still controlled enormous power. So this was the root cause.

…