Chapter 99: How to Grasp Parting Sorrow (2)
The female cultivator’s name was Yun Feifei. Twenty four years old, she was a Dao Foundation stage cultivator between the foundation solidifying stage and the vitality restoring stage. It was possible that she had already reached the vitality restoring stage. She hailed from a small sect as the Swelling Water God Palace.
The Palace of Absolute Beginning actually had something to do with its founding. Four hundred years ago, a Palace disciple named Yun Xihe traveled to the west of Ning Province to expand the borders. After a fortuitous opportunity allowed him to become an Avatar, he left the Palace of Absolute Beginning and founded his own sect, naming it the Swelling Water God Palace. As the Swelling Water God Palace was founded on the belief of incense and divine worship, it did not align with the Palace of Absolute Beginning’s Dao orthodoxy or lineage.
After founding the Swelling Water God Palace, Yun Xihe lived another five years before passing away. Four heads succeeded him in the next three hundred years, all of them were high cultivators who were only a hair weaker than a World Ruler. That was why they were able to maintain their presence despite the fact that the west of Ning Province were surrounded by hostile races.
Three years ago, the Shamans launched a sudden, massive assault against Ningxi Commandery. The human race suffered a crushing defeat and had to concede over six thousand li of territory. One grotto-heaven and six small sects within this territory was destroyed, including the Swelling Water God Palace. Later, the human race launched a counterattack and reclaimed this territory. However, they suffered consecutive defeats within the next three months and were forced to retreat once more to the Yun Province. The Shamans themselves sustained heavy casualties and had to withdraw to their original territories to recuperate. Thus, the territory became ownerless.
Two wars had been fought in this six-thousand-li-wide territory in just the span of two years, shattering its earthly veins and throwing its heavenly mysteries into chaos. As a result, the shattered pieces of the grotto-heaven plummeted to the ground and spawned all kinds of treacherous badlands. Make no mistake, these fragments were no fortuitous opportunity. They were simply the graveyard of countless cultivators. It would probably take a century or longer before the spirit energies of this domain gradually recovered. The reason it came to be known as the Shattered Realm was because it held little to no value to speak of.
This great war—a conflict between the humans and the Shamans—involved two feudal states, Western Jin and Zhao. Many big sects had taken part to varying degrees as well. It would not be an exaggeration to call the tangled web of complex relationships between the various factions an absolute mess. After the Shamans withdrew, neither Western Jin nor Zhao had the strength or the interest to take over this region. Since the Shamans could potentially return any moment, neither big nor small sects were willing to establish mountain gates here either. Thus, thousands of li of land turned into a lawless frontier that was completely devoid of any law or order.
Originally, the Palace of Absolute Beginning’s attitude toward this battlefield was no different from all other battlefields. This lasted until a surviving disciple of the Swelling Water God Palace sent a message not long ago. They claimed that they possessed a major opportunity originating from Yun Xihe, founder of the Swelling Water God Palace, and they wished to exchange it for the right to send a couple bloodline descendants back to the Palace of Absolute Beginning. The message did not explain what the opportunity was, only that the clue was hidden on Yun Feifei. They claimed that the Palace would find out as long as they located Yun Feifei and took her back to the sect.
The mission details did not explain what the opportunity was or what the item Yun Feifei was carrying on her person was either. However, it had to be extraordinary. An Immortal Lord would not have gotten involved otherwise. For the same reason, they weren’t planning to place all of the burden on a newly ascended, Dao Foundation stage greenhorn like Wei Yuan as a matter of course. He was sure that he was just one of the many moves the Immortal Lord had made to see the mission through. He only wondered if he was a declared card or hidden piece.
After he was done poring over the mission details, Wei Yuan checked out the sash he was given next. The sash looked just like an ordinary silk sash, featuring a jade buckle at the center without any additional embellishments. However, the crux of the mystic artifact was not the highly conspicuous jade buckle, but a single silk thread within the sash. When energized with Dao energy, it could contain objects measuring approximately three square chi. Moreover, it was imbued with a fragment of the Immortal Lord’s divine thought equaling a single strike from an Avatar Trueman when unleashed.