noffsinger Chapter 169: The One at Fault
Chapter 169: The One at Fault
Chapter 169: The One at Fault
After the battle between Tianyi and the nine demons, City Lord Azure Leaf ended the banquet and sent the guest away. The guest, who had been shocked by the one-sided massacre dealt by Tianyi, had attained a new understanding of the power of immortals. They could understand why it was a calamity for the demons once every thousand years. Before, they harbored some suspicions on the veracity of the tales and legends, but not anymore.
Compared to the joyous and hope-filled emotions of the attendees that left, City Lord Azure Leaf was far more somber, despite the fact that he should be celebrating that nine great demons fell within his city’s territory. Such an event would no doubt boost the fame of his city and attracting more talents to immigrate. Yet, City Lord Azure Leaf couldn’t be happy at all.
After the guests left, City Lord Azure Left brought Tianyi, Daoyi, and Xi Ri into the main hall of his mansion once more. Only this time, he sent away all the servants and even his daughter, Ziye, away, which cast a gloomy atmosphere in the brightly lit hall.
“So tell me, why did the demons know of the matter of us killing three mere demons who have formed their cores?” Tianyi asked. His voice was light, but this just made City Lord Azure Leaf’s heartbeat quicken with apprehension.
“Grandmaster- Great Immortal, I really don’t know!” City Lord Azure Leaf began kowtowing before Tianyi as he explained while repeatedly banging his head on the floor, creating an audible sound with each bang. “When Di Gaoli returned, I ordered him not to speak of the matter. Perhaps he wanted to regale others of his story, so it leaked from his mouth and eventually became known throughout the city. The city is so big, I cannot control everything. The demons must have spies!”
“Is that so?” Tianyi lightly said once more. “But then, why did I not detect anyone suspicious? I already spread my spiritual sense and covered Azure Leaf City. Not once did I detect anyone within the city making or contacting anyone outside.”
City Lord Azure Leaf felt a great fright within his heart as sweat damped his back. Tianyi’s explanation was full of holes yet fear had blinded his thoughts. Furthermore, he recalled the first night where he felt something watching him, but after several days of nothing, he just thought it was his nerves thinking it up. However, after hearing Tianyi’s words, City Lord Azure Leaf realized he was not mistaken.
“Then it could be from the demon’s side! Humans had always been at a disadvantage against the demons. They have numerous means to scry upon us without us realizing it. Perhaps they left some method on those three demons Great Immortal killed!” City Lord Azure Leaf said, trying to find a reason, any reason.
“Perhaps for the native humans of this realm, such means are esoteric, but where do you think we come from? Even if a demon at the True Demon Realm were to scry personally, they would not be able to discover anything.”
After the experience with the Dragon Emperor, Tianyi had especially traded for immortal artifacts that helped conceal and defend him. Before, it was mostly immortal artifact swords for collection purposes because Tianyi didn’t think he’d actually need immortal artifacts. As long as he kept two or three, he would be fine, but now his thoughts had changed. When he set up the sealing formation, he had purposely used an immortal artifact to enhance the formation from prying eyes. He himself may not be able to detect it and defend against it, but his immortal artifact definitely could.
As a mortal, pathfinding or seamless immortal artifacts made no difference to him. Otherwise, he would have exchanged for a seamless immortal artifact to enhance his defensive means.
City Lord Azure Leaf opened his mouth, but no words came out. He honestly didn’t know if what Tianyi said was true, but seeing the confident expression on Tianyi melted away ninety percent of his doubts. City Lord Azure Leaf and the rest of the humans in the realm were frogs in a well, not knowing the means of cultivators of the Huang Realm, so they naturally couldn’t make an accurate judgment.
“Maybe it’s one of the three Demon Sages! I heard that there exist three great demons far beyond mere mortals!” City Lord Azure Leaf continued to deny any involvement. He knew that if he admitted, only certain death awaited him. And with his death, the other people of the city. How would an outsider who has to leave eventually be willing to protect the people of this realm?
“Demon Sages?” Tianyi snorted. “At most, they can be called demon lords. Those three don’t have the power and right to be called demon sages yet. I bet you don’t even know what kind of demons those three are.”
City Lord Azure Leaf looked at Tianyi with disbelief. He had only heard of the three great demons by chance. The humans of the realm only occupied a small portion of the land. They didn’t even qualify to know the existence of the three great demons. So for Tianyi to know even more than him was shocking to City Lord Azure Leaf. He had some arrogance believing he understood the realm better than an outsider like Tianyi, but he was wrong.
“Alright, I don’t want to waste any more time with you.” Tianyi snapped his fingers, and City Lord Azure Leaf was immediately immobilized by cuffed formed of lightning. “Why did you do such a thing, offering your fellow humans as tributes? To demons, the more promising a human’s potential is, the greater the benefits of eating them. You must have sacrificed a lot of talents to the demons this way.”
City Lord Azure Leaf’s face turned ashen. “How did you know?”
“It does not concern you how I found out.” Tianyi’s voice turned frosty, no longer hiding his displeasure. He didn’t consider himself a good person, but he despised those who would betray their own race.
Seeing as the City Lord Azure Leaf still didn’t get it, Tianyi continued. Oh right, it should be just Azure Leaf now. He would no longer be a city lord anymore.
“I sealed the information of the nine demon’s death. Although I’m not sure whether the one you called demon general has realized it or not, but such a thing can’t be hidden for long, even if the informant is killed.”
“Informant?” Azure Lead asked, but soon he found his answer as Dushe screamed in pain and died, his body charred from the lightning that struck.
Seeing this, Azure Leaf’s pupil shrunk. He understood how powerful Dushe was. The two were equal in combat power, but Dushe’s speed was at least five times greater than his, so Azure Leaf was powerless against this demon envoy.
“As for your future,” Tianyi waved his hands, and numerous silvery-white wisps materialized. The wisps flew out of the mansion towards all the cultivators in the city. The silvery wisps were created from Tianyi’s spiritual sense and contained his newly created martial cultivation method. Even Azure Leaf was got one.
Azure Leaf opened his eyes as he comprehended Tianyi’s martial method. His eyes widened in surprise and shock at Tianyi’s actions. His eyes began to tear up. Although Tianyi didn’t say anything, he knew that with Tianyi’s new method, humans would have a chance to enter the same realm as the demon commanders who attacked Azure Leaf City. It was something that could cause the strength of all humanity to rise to another level.
“Don’t thank me just yet. My method hasn’t been verified. There might be some problems. But it should be better than grasping in the dark as you’ve done before.” Tianyi said, his tone light.
Azure Leaf stood up, now that the cuffs had been released and kowtowed to Tianyi, this time with his full earnestly. “This is a gratitude that all of us humans can never repay.”
Tianyi laughed. “All of us humans? Don’t get over yourself. The humans of this realm are but a small percentage of all humans in the universe.” And perhaps beyond, Tianyi said to himself. He waved his hand. “You should hurry up and leave with the people. Who knows, the demon general might just rush over here in the next hour or so.”
Azure Leaf took one last look at Tianyi before bowing deeply and preparing to leave.
“Oh yeah, wait,” Tianyi said, causing Azure Leaf to turn around and look at Tianyi with confusion. “Although I can understand you doing this to protect your citizens, swallowing a betrayal isn’t my style.”
Before Azure Leaf could say anything, he crumpled onto the ground. So great was the pain that he felt his body would disintegrate from it. When the pain finally subsided, all his hair had grown white, and wrinkles covered his face. Azure Leaf went from a middle-aged man to an elderly-aged man in an instant.
“You have at most ten years left to live, that is, if you don’t battle,” Tianyi said. “Don’t worry, the three I gave pointers to should be able to ascend to the same realm as you as long as you pour resources into them. Even if you don’t, as long as you enter the next realm, your lifespan will increase. Those are my final words, take care.”
Without waiting for Azure Leaf to respond, Tianyi waved his hand and sent Azure Leaf out of the hall like a ragdoll. After all this was done, Tianyi melted in his chaired and released a sigh as he stared at the ceiling in a daze.
After a while, he turned his eyes towards Daoyi and Xi Ri, specifically Xi Ri, who had a complicated look on his face. “What’s wrong? Do you object to my actions?”
Xi Ri shook his head. “I just feel that the Buzhou Immortal Sect could do more. Couldn’t they have moved out the humans of this realm out instead of allowing them to suffer like this?”
Xi Ri remembered observing the harsh life that the people of the city lived. If this was the best possible life brought about by Azure Leaf sacrificing select humans every ten years, he couldn’t even imagine the lives of humans elsewhere.
As an outsider, it wasn’t the right of him to judge how Azure Leaf chose to protect the humans, although it didn’t stop him from disdaining Azure Leaf’s action. Xi Ri even had the urge to clap in agreement when Tianyi punished Azure Leaf.
“Who knows. Maybe they just don’t care.” Tianyi said. “In the whole Three Thousand Immortal Realms System, the number of humans is unaccountable. What do a few humans of the Demon Cage Realm matter?”
“It all comes down to the fact that we are too weak. Perhaps if you become an immortal, you can decide to migrate all the humans in the Demon Cage Realm out.” Tianyi said as he smiled at Xi Ri.
“I’m not that altruistic.” Xi Ri said with a hollow chuckle.