Chapter 3965: Taking Root On Land

The contest between the hand and the intangible force continued without pause. Lu Yin looked up. In regards to physical strength, the only one he truly regarded as a rival was Chang, one of the four Insect Masters. Ni’s intangible power was nothing more than a mixture of various powers; what use could that really serve?

With that thought, the hand suddenly clenched, and the intangible power was shattered.

Ni’s massive body fell back, and the creature turned and fled without hesitation. Lu Yin clenched a fist and threw another punch forward. The void shattered as the fist rocketed past. There was nothing within the swarm of insects that could slow down the attack even the slightest.

Lu Yin’s fist slammed into Ni.

The snail-like body was sent flying, though Lu Yin suddenly looked over at Unbroken Time. At the exact moment that the fist struck Ni, Unbroken Time had interfered. Ni had been shrouded with a protective layer of time. That gray shroud of time was the same thing that had dissipated Lu Yin’s earlier punch; time drawn out endlessly to erase the force of all attacks.

While Ni had been knocked away, it had not suffered any real harm.

Of course, in the eyes of Ku Ji and the others, Lu Yin’s punch had been absolutely astonishing.

They had tried every conceivable method, but they had not managed to so much as budge Ni. In contrast, Lu Yin had sent the thing flying with a single blow.

However, Lu Yin was not content with merely sending Ni flying. He wanted to destroy the bug.

Tick

.

A soft sound rang out again, and Lu Yin’s expression changed and he looked back at Unbroken Time. The needle had shifted again; this time, it was pointing to the ninth mark.

Temporal silhouettes appeared around Lu Yin. He saw his own past, as well as the past of the location where he stood. Because of that, he saw the Immortal monster as it was thrown out of the Spirit Nidus, as well as Master Qing Cao chasing after it.

He saw various incidents that had left marks behind in time.

Lu Yin was not changed at all, but time itself was changing. It was becoming strange, and it made him nervous.

He was not in his own time. He was in a time that felt cold and unfamiliar. Time should not have any temperature associated with it, and yet Lu Yin could feel this chill deeply.

He had passed from one time into another.

The River of Aeons appeared before him.

Even this was not the River of Aeons that he was familiar with, but rather Unbroken Time’s River of Aeons. Could this thing actually summon such a river?

Lu Yin then understood; Unbroken Time intended to strand him on the River of Aeons, never to live again.

This River of Aeons was not the one from the Tianyuan Megaverse. It had to be a branch stream.

It was no wonder why no living being had ever defeated Unbroken Time before, and why none had even managed to survive such a confrontation. Clearly, some had not been killed, but simply banished.

Lu Yin watched as the River of Aeons drew closer. He released his inner universe, and beneath his feet, the land of his core Dust World spread out. Over his head, the Wordless Heavenly Book shone brilliantly, and the Karmic Dao revolved. It all served to keep him firmly fixed in place.

How could his original time possibly be taken from him and banished into this River of Aeons?

Lu Yin stared at Unbroken Time. “You underestimate me.”

A strange warmth then appeared; Lu Yin’s original time had been restored. He had returned.

He had received the entire Tianyuan Megaverse’s acknowledgment, and with the landmass of his inner universe so firmly planted, how could anything take him away?

His inner universe contained karma, time, and all the other aspects of a true universe. How could a mere branch stream of the River of Aeons wash that away?

The light of the alternating sun and moon on Unbroken Time suddenly grew dim, and the cracks instantly opened up wider. The needle was no longer able to move. Clearly, it had been injured by the backlash it had suffered.

It had never considered that any living creature could take root so deeply that it could not be swept away by the power of time.

Time was, in truth, all the same. However, Lu Yin had insisted on his own time, and Unbroken Time was unable to take that away.

Thus, it retreated.

With Unbroken Time falling back, the entire swarm of insects also retreated.

Lu Yin pursued and attacked Unbroken Time again, but the oddity instantly vanished before his eyes.

Lu Yin frowned. Was that the power of Luo Chan, or was it something else?

Far in the distance, the swarm of insects kept pulling back, until it eventually reached a point where those in the Nine Odysseys Megaverse and the Spirit Nidus could no longer see the bugs.

Lu Yin failed to find Unbroken Time, but he did find Ni.

He stepped forward to go after it. Ni’s massive snail-like body was far too conspicuous.

Ni glanced back and instantly fled in terror, but Lu Yin used Lightstream. How could he possibly allow his target to escape?

“Mr. Lu!” someone shouted.

Lu Yin looked back. Unbroken Time had appeared behind him at some point in time, and the needle struck the first mark as it moved towards the cultivators from the Nine Odysseys Megaverse. The gray color of the power of time spread out, crossing over the vast distance.

Lu Yin had no choice but to pull back. If he did not, all of those cultivators would be doomed.

He was capable of destroying Ni and the horde of insects, but likewise, Unbroken Time could destroy the human defenders of the Nine Odysseys Megaverse.

Unlike the endlessly reproducing insects, the human cultivators could not be allowed to die in vain. Even if everyone had only sent out their cultivated spirit seeds, those clones were still far more precious than the insects.

Lu Yin returned to protect the human army, but Unbroken Time never actually attacked. Instead, it simply disappeared again.

Its goal had always been just to make Lu Yin hesitant and leave him unable to act freely.

This was not the Nest civilization’s first time fighting against a human civilization, and they had a clear understanding of human nature.

Unless Lu Yin could deal with Unbroken Time, he would never be allowed to fight unconstrained. Even without the defenders behind him, Unbroken Time could simply attack the Spirit Nidus itself.

Unbroken Time fled, leading the swarm of insects far away.

Lu Yin watched in silence. Unbroken Time’s needle had only ever pointed at the ninth mark, but there were a total of twelve. How many more tricks did it have? How much had it kept hidden?

“I’m sorry, Mr. Lu. We only held you back.” A Dukkhan from the Fourth Night Pillar by the name of Xin addressed Lu Yin. They had met while returning from the Allsense Megaverse, even if Lu Yin had mostly interacted with Ming Zhuo during that time.

At the moment, Ming Zhuo was still with the Fourth Night Pillar, serving as a second line of defense so that the Nine Odysseys were protected both externally and internally. That was why Xin had been sent out.

Lu Yin waved the man’s apologies away. “What happened has nothing to do with you. We were merely testing each other.”

Before learning all of Unbroken Time’s capabilities, Lu Yin had no intention of trying to trap or kill it. He had only pursued Ni to confirm something, which he had accomplished.

If Lu Yin’s suspicions were correct, then the other three battlefields would soon stop fighting as well.

All of the insect swarms would soon retreat.

Perfectly in line with his speculations, after two days, the insects fell back. Humanity had been victorious on all three other battlefields as well.

In the battlefield where both Luo Chan and Ci Liu had been, the Second Night Pillar had not been able to hold out, but Qing Xing had suddenly joined the fight, and he had managed to suppress the entire battlefield.

The battlefield held by the forces of the Eighth Night Pillar had faced insects led by Shan Xiao, and Xue Lou used his Blood Tower’s Eight Styles to wound Shan Xiao, which had secured humanity’s victory there.

As for the western battlefield, the Third Night Pillar had been recaptured. Chang was incredibly powerful, but aside from Chang and Hua Yan, there had been no other experts of the Nest civilization, and so that swarm had been annihilated.

Recapturing the Third Night Pillar had greatly boosted their morale.

Seeing all of the insects retreat allowed the human defenders to breathe a sigh of relief. They all believed that they had finally seen a glimpse of victory.

In contrast, Lu Yin’s expression was far from happy.

“Are they purposefully retreating?” Master Qing Cao did not seem particularly surprised.

Lu Yin replied in a low voice, “I made a point to chase after Ni. That thing could have used Luo Chan’s power to escape, but it didn’t. Instead, it relied on Unbroken Time to force me back to protect the army. If I had been heartless and refused to help, I’m certain that Ni would already be dead.

“They are even willing to let Ni die and the Third Night Pillar be recaptured, so long as Luo Chan’s ability is kept hidden. This is no different from how we pulled back our defensive line to the Night Pillars after learning of Luo Chan’s ability.

“We are hiding the Awe Gates, while the Nest civilization is hiding Luo Chan. They retreated in order to expand the battlefront. The larger the area of this war is, the harder it will be for our forces to support each other. In particular, if they can drag things past the range of the Awe Gates, our efforts to compress the battlefield will be meaningless.”

Greater Sancte Awe Gate stared out at the stars. “Tactics.”

Master Qing Cao asked, “Do they know about the Awe Gates?”

Lu Yin shook his head. “I don’t know. It’s possible, but it’s also possible that they know nothing. Still, that doesn’t affect how they control the overall situation of this war. Trading the deaths of even an entire swarm of bugs to secure an absolute advantage with an expanded warfront would serve the Nest civilization perfectly, while leaving us complacent and thinking that we’ve won this war.”

“If we pursue them now, can we completely wipe out all of the insects?” Greater Sancte Awe Gate asked.

Lu Yin looked over at her. “Not likely.”

Master Qing Cao sighed.“That’s because of what we’ve learned about the four Insect Lords. Their presence makes it highly unlikely, especially since they are all hiding their strength. But if we didn’t know about them? We would certainly believe that we could win.”

“What if I eliminate the Insect Lords?” Greater Sancte Awe Gate suddenly said.

Master Qing Cao reflexively glanced at her wrist.

Lu Yin had the same reaction, and his voice dropped low. “Even a single attack from an Immortal can decide victory or defeat. If you use that one opportunity to eliminate the four Insect Lords, we may have to face the Immortal Lord’s attack next.”

Greater Sancte Awe Gate fell silent.

All three of them understood this logic, and it was why the human Immortals had never directly taken action.

Wiping out the insects would increase their karmic chains, which would leave them unable to face the Immortal Lord. Even just one strike from the Immortal Lord that the human Immortals could not counter would be enough to decide the survival of their entire civilization.

Lu Yin suddenly looked at Master Qing Cao. “Senior, you should attack.”

“...”

Lu Yin was only speaking hypothetically. How could Master Qing Cao possibly attack? Even ignoring how he had schemed against the Nine Odysseys Megaverse, even if none of that had happened, he would carefully preserve every one of his opportunities for the sake of the Spirit Nidus.

Even in the Tianyuan, when Ancient God had discovered that Master Qing Cao was the one behind the scenes and had attacked with his full power, Master Qing Cao only left the man gravely wounded. Yong Heng had been the one to actually kill Ancient God.

When meeting Jiang Feng, Master Qing Cao had again refrained from killing the man.

At the present moment, asking the Immortal to attack for the sake of the Nine Odysseys Megaverse was simply asking for the impossible.

“What I mean, Senior, is not to ask you to kill them. Rather, can you capture them?” Lu Yin clarified.

Master Qing Cao responded with a wry smile. “Do you think that we’re fools? That we haven’t thought of that?”

“And?” Lu Yin asked in puzzlement.

Master Qing Cao glanced at his wrist. “Any move we make will increase our karmic chain. Killing simply has a much steeper cost.”

Lu Yin said, “I understand that. What I mean is, would capturing the four Insect Lords be within the range of what you can accept?”

Master Qing Cao bluntly replied, “No.”

Greater Sancte Awe Gate spoke up, “Qing Cao already tried once. He wanted to capture Chang but failed to do so.”

This was something Lu Yin had not previously known about. He looked at Master Qing Cao in surprise. “You failed?”

Master Qing Cao gazed to the west. “When I saw that the Third Night Pillar had been completely wiped out, no matter how much I didn’t want to act, I knew that I should at least bring the Night Pillar back. However, you saw the final outcome. Chang protected the Third Night Pillar. When you said that the insects deliberately retreated, I did not doubt you for a moment. Gu Duanke and the people from Deathmound could not possibly deal with Chang, much less recapture the Third Night Pillar.”

Lu Yin’s expression grew grave. “Chang was actually able to hold onto the Third Night Pillar against you, Senior?”

Master Qing Cao met Lu Yin’s gaze. “He didn’t exactly protect it. That thing is capable of using Immortal matter and also Lifeforce.”