Chapter 2088: Provocation

At this moment, Lu Yin had succeeded in simulating 96,000 stars, which was just 3,000 stars away from the 99,000 stars needed to fully master the fifth level of the Cosmic Art.

Lu Yin looked down at his die in his hand. This was his last chance. If he did not roll another four right now, he would need to rest for ten days. And by then, the meeting of the Heavenly Gates would be about to start.

He tapped his die, and it slowly stopped spinning. He stared expectantly, but it landed on one pip. Bang! A strange yellow lump fell onto the ground. Lu Yin blinked and then was struck by a horrible stench. It was a piece of rotten fruit. Who kept trash in their cosmic ring?

Lu Yin quickly waved a hand to get rid of the nasty junk, and then he shook his head in a helpless manner. He had run out of luck.

He could only wait until after the conference to roll his die again, but since he was so close to mastering the fifth level of the Cosmic Art, Lu Yin really wanted to continue training despite the upcoming conference. Still, he was done for the moment, and he could only try again later.

During the ten days left before the conference started, Lu Yin intended to quietly remain where he was and observe the outside world. He had no desire to leave seclusion, as it would be fine to exit when the Dao Chosen selection started.

Lu Yin was currently the most curious about Wang Wen’s source of confidence regarding the team competition. He had actually claimed that they had a 60% chance of victory in the team competition.

…

Earth’s solar system had never seen so much excitement before. In the past, the solar system had been almost entirely empty, much like the rest of outer space. If Earth had not developed to the point where its inhabitants could reach out to the rest of the universe, then this solar system would have been an inescapable cage.

At this moment, Earth’s solar system was holding the biggest event in the entire Human Domain, and countless people were observing everything.

The Heavens Sect’s headquarters was still being built. It was naturally next to Jupiter, which was rather close to Earth, but the main plaza of the headquarters had already been completed.

The Heavens Sect’s massive gate was large enough to encompass numerous stars, and Ancestor Tortoise quietly lounged next to the gate while drowsily staring at the plaza with dull eyes.

The tortoise was present at Lu Buzheng’s request; otherwise, Lu Yin would not be able to watch the team competition.

The six Heavenly Gates revealed their representatives one after another around the plaza.

The Lu Heavenly Gate’s representative were naturally Lu Buzheng and Kui Luo, and they were accompanied by Liu Ye, Fei Hua, the Sea King, Liu Huang, and various other Envoys. Almost everyone present was once a top powerhouse of the Great Eastern Alliance, but there were several unknown people who were arrogantly standing next to the Sea King that others recognized. This arrogant group gave off a completely different feel, as they were also from the Heavens Sect era.

The current era was ruled by the six Heavenly Gates, but no one knew if it would be dominated by the people from this era. After all, of the gatemasters of the six Heavenly Gates, only Arch-Elder Zen and Jiu Yao were not from the Heavens Sect era.

Jiu Yao and Herb Immortal represented the Bloodlines Heavenly Gate, and they were accompanied by a group of people from the Sixth Mainland.

After the Progenitor of Combat’s death, the strength of the Sixth Mainland’s cultivators had sharply dropped. Since then, stellular energy had also disappeared, which meant that the Sixth Mainland no longer possessed even a fifth of the power compared to when they had invaded the Fifth Mainland.

The Honor Heavenly Gate was of course represented by Arch-Elder Zen, Highsage Grandmaster, and Elder Gong.

The Three Fatalities Heavenly Gate’s representatives were Hen Xin, Ni Huang, Xia De, and Xia Ji. They were followed by Chu Yuan and their ten member team.

Countless people instantly focused on Chu Yuan, who was the most popular candidate to become the current era’s Dao Chosen.

Jue Yi appeared for the Undying Heavenly Gate. He coldly glared at Lu Buzheng and the others. He was accompanied by Tian Dou.

Lu Yin saw Tian Dou from where he sat on Ancestor Tortoise's back, and a cold glint appeared in Lu Yin’s eyes. Sure enough, the Specter clan had decided to follow Jue Yi. However, such a decision could only be expected. The appearance of the God of Death’s disciple was no different than the Specter clan’s ancestor’s reemergence. However, was Jue Yi able to produce death energy? Or could he only do that when he became a Progenitor himself? Lu Yin really did not know what the difference between how the two of them cultivated with death energy was.

After all, far too many coincidences had had to align for Lu Yin to receive the God of Death Transformation; could such a unique series of events possibly be replicated? When Lu Yin met Jue Yi in the past, the Semi-Progenitor had given Lu Yin the same feeling as Tian Dou; he used death energy rather than created it.

The final group was the Divining Heavenly Gate, with Destina as the gatemaster. She was an incredibly mysterious woman, as no one had even seen her face thus far. She had always revealed herself as nothing more than a white cloud to all who looked at her, and when she arrived, everyone looked over. But as usual, they only saw a white cloud.

A smile spread across Kui Luo’s face. "One day, I’ll strip that away."

Lu Buzheng was startled by the comment, and he quickly scolded, "Don't say such ridiculous things, and don't mess with that woman! She’s crazy!"

Kui Luo just rolled his eyes, but he actually did not say anything further. In the end, even he had some reservations.

Destiny was an ever-changing concept, but regardless of whether or not people believed in it, it still scared people.

Two people stepped out behind the white cloud. Both were women. One was the beautiful Starsibyl, who was as gorgeous as ever, even after so many years. The only change in her was that there was an additional depth in her eyes.

As for the other woman, everyone who saw her was taken aback. Was that really a woman when she had such a massive Adam's apple? Yes, she really was a woman, and a beautiful woman, no matter what one’s tastes might be. Her clothes were very revealing, but how could anyone miss an Adam's apple that large? Additionally, there was something massive on her shoulder. Was it a mace? Many people rubbed their eyes, but they had seen correctly: it was definitely a mace.

Lu Buzheng, Ni Huang, and everyone else stared blankly at the person who seemed to be a woman. They had never before seen such an odd human.

The woman slammed her mace against the floor as she let out a contemptuous snort. There was a look of ridicule on her face, as though she was looking down on absolutely everyone.

Kui Luo showed his teeth. "Someone needs a beating."

"Senior, are you looking for Qian Zou?1 I'll go find him right now!" The Ghost Monkey suddenly appeared, and he instantly started sucking up to Kui Luo.

The Semi-Progenitor merely got annoyed. "Leave."

The Ghost Monkey quickly vanished.

Where the Honor Heavenly Gate’s people stood up, Highsage Leon stood behind Highsage Grandmaster, and the man excitedly looked at the woman with the mace. Unless he was completely wrong, she had to be Qingqing. Who else could have such a discordant appearance?

The woman looked over and met Highsage Leon’s eyes. She lifted a hand and made a specific gesture. It was something that only interstellar pirates would understand, but it indicated that everything was under control.

Highsage Leon let out a massive sigh of relief. As long as nothing’s wrong, he motioned back.

Big Sis just rolled her eyes and hefted the mace back up. She then looked at the Three Fatalities Heavenly Gate’s Chu Yuan. The young man sensed her eyes and looked over.

The two stared at each other for a moment, and then Big Sis sneered. She raised a hand with her thumb pointing up, but then suddenly turned it over. Chu Yuan was stunned by the woman’s antagonism, as no one had ever acted so aggressively towards him. He simply had no idea how to react to such crass behavior.

Hen Xin saw the motion, and his eyebrows rose. "Destina, take care of your people."

A pleasant voice answered from within the white cloud. "She’s just saying hello."

"That’s a heavy greeting," Hen Xin responded coldly.

Destina said nothing, but Big Sis nodded in response. "He needs a beating."

Elsewhere in the massive plaza, the Ghost Monkey popped out of the shadows. "Is someone else looking for Qian Zou? He seems to be very popular! It must be because of his Inverse Step. Someone from the Heavens Sect era must have recognized it and want to learn it."

Lu Yin had also noticed Big Sis from his position on Ancestor Tortoise's back, and he instantly recognized the odd-looking person as Big Sis. Seeing that she was safe and well caused a wave of relief to wash over him. If she was fine, then things were better than he had feared.

"Let’s not waste time—let's start the team battles," Hen Xin immediately said, showing his complete confidence in his people. Even if they were missing Xing Kai, it was not like the Three Fatalities Heavenly Gate had no replacements. Even though everyone else was much weaker than Xing Kai, they were still experts compared to the other Heavenly Gates’ representatives. Thus, Hen Xin had not lost any of his confidence.

Arch-Elder Zen asked, "How shall we determine the match-ups?"

𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

Hen Xin indifferently replied, "It doesn’t matter."

"Then you guys can face three teams!" Kui Luo shouted.

Hen Xin gave the man a cold look, but he said nothing. Instead, Xia Ji replied, "There should be a limit to how shameless a person can be, Kui Luo! You’ve been causing trouble this whole time, but the day will come when all your debts will be collected."

Kui Luo replied with a strange smile, "Then why don’t we see whose luck runs out first? You want to return to your ancestral clan and be acknowledged by your family’s Progenitors, but I won’t let you ever see them."

Xia Ji was so infuriated by Kui Luo’s comment that he took a step forward and was about to attack when he was stopped by Xia De. "There’s no need to cause trouble."

He looked across the plaza. "There will be a total of four matches, each between two teams. You can decide the matchups."

Lu Buzheng immediately stated, "My Lu Heavenly Gate will face the Honor Heavenly Gate."

Everyone looked over at Arch-Elder Zen, only to see the man agree.

Xia De laughed. It looked like the two Heavenly Gates had reached an agreement. They had most likely already compared the strength of their teams, and if one of the two teams simply surrendered at the beginning, it would help the other team preserve their strength for their next opponent. Meanwhile, the Bloodlines Heavenly Gate would be forced to wear themselves out.

Xia De’s guess was quite accurate. Since the Three Fatalities Heavenly Gate was doing everything that they could to monopolize humanity’s most common cultivation methods, all of the other Heavenly Gates had naturally banded together to resist. The five different Heavenly Gates had already compared their representative teams, and they had found that the Lu Heavenly Gate’s team was the strongest. Thus, a deal had been struck between them. The Undying Heavenly Gate and the Honor Heavenly Gate’s teams were the weakest, so they both intended to simply forfeit their matches to allow the Lu Heavenly Gate’s team to retain their full strength.

As for the Bloodlines Heavenly Gate, they fully intended to draw out as much of the Three Fatalities Heavenly Gate’s team’s power as possible.

While it was highly unusual for the Fifth and Sixth Mainlands to join forces, this was a matter that concerned the future of humanity’s cultivation systems.

On the back of Ancestor Tortoise, Lu Yin watched as a group of ten people from the Three Fatalities Heavenly Gate stepped forward. In Xing Kai’s absence, they had been forced to add someone whom Lu Yin did not recognize. Across the plaza, ten people from the Sixth Mainland’s Bloodlines Heavenly Gate appeared.

Lu Yin knew most of the people on this second team, as there was Toolwielder, Corpse Looter, Master Changbai, the Greenmen Duo, Xiao Qing, and Shang Rong. Additionally, there were three people that Lu Yin did not recognize, but most of the team members were former Realmlings.

After thinking about it, Lu Yin realized that this only made sense. Regardless of the cultivation method, these people were all talented individuals who possessed a much greater gift of comprehension and combat strength than their peers. As long as it was beneath the Envoy level, these people were extremely powerful.

Twenty years ago, aside from Lu Yin himself, out of the entire younger generation, only the Perennial World’s four Junior Progenitors had possessed the combat strength to fight against Envoys. Lu Yin was very curious to see just how much his old acquaintances had improved over the course of twenty years.

If it was simply a matter of competing in terms of power levels, then Lu Yin was certain that the team from the Three Fatalities Heavenly Gate did not have the upper hand. At the very least, the cultivation of Darkvoid, Coco, and Dai Ao were all behind that of the Sixth Mainland’s team. However, this was a competition where they needed to fight with battle force. Even before Lu Yin had left Sword Mountain, everyone on the Three Fatalities Heavenly Gate’s team had reached at least seven lined battle force, and it was quite possible that had improved even further.

The result was not surprising, though Lu Yin was surprised by the strength that Darkvoid and the others revealed. Only by seeing them all fight was he able to understand why they had been selected for the representative team.

Even disregarding the fact that he had achieved eight lined battle force, Darkvoid utilized his battle force in an entirely different manner than other people. He had added his innate gift that allowed him to detonate the void to his battle force, and the result was very difficult for most people to deal with. Darkvoid had even instantly torn his way through Shang Rong's battle force.

There was a large difference in the two men’s cultivation levels, and even in the absence of star energy, this gap led to a significant difference in physical strength. However, Darkvoid had easily overcome this difference.

Coco’s performance was even more surprising. She used her syringe to stab straight through Toolwielder’s eight lined battle force. Out of everyone from the Bloodlines Heavenly Gate, Toolwielder possessed the strongest battle force, but Coco had instantly broken through his defenses.

Dai Ao already had an impressive foundation of physical strength, and he had focused on his palm technique more than Darkvoid. On top of that, Wang Yi and the rest of the team had all managed to stabilize their battle force to six lines, but Dai Ao had focused specifically on stabilizing his battle force in his hands. Thus, he had managed to stabilize seven lined battle force, which even surpassed Xing Kai. Corpse Looter had been instantly struck down by Dai Ao’s palm, and Xiao Qing had not dared to face him head on after seeing how one blow had left Corpse Looter spitting out blood.

1 This is unfortunately a pun that's impossible to translate. Qian Zou, who's the guy Lu Yin learned Inverse Step from, has a name that is a homonym in Chinese for "needs a beating." Ghost Monkey isn't a complete idiot, I promise. ☜