King of Ten Thousand Years

"You are...? Steward Lü!"

Ying Long was a little startled.

The Tai Yuan Sect consisted of nine peaks, covering a vast area with numerous personnel. Not all stewards were equal in rank.

This particular Steward Lü held immense power.

But Ying Long had never crossed paths with Steward Lü. ’Why would he suddenly appear in my room?’

"Ying Long, if you want revenge, I can help you!"

The smile on Steward Lü’s wizened face was exceptionally sinister.

"I do!"

Recalling everything that had happened today, Ying Long nodded with furious resolve!

"Good..."

Suddenly, a boundless, dark spiritual aura burst from Steward Lü’s body. The entire room plunged into darkness, completely sealed off from the outside world.

"Become my slave... and I will help you achieve your heart’s desire..."

Steward Lü’s voice was like a demon’s whisper, both terrifying and full of temptation.

"A slave?"

Ying Long’s heart trembled, and he felt a wave of reluctance.

Anyone who could become an Official Disciple of the Tai Yuan Sect was a genius admired by thousands in the outside world. He refused to be anyone’s slave.

"You cannot refuse!"

Steward Lü gave a soft, cold laugh. He extended a withered, claw-like hand, releasing a vast, pitch-black mist that began to corrode Ying Long’s mind.

"No! I..."

Ying Long struggled fiercely, but he soon fell into a daze.

「Ten breaths later.」

Steward Lü released his hand.

"I... want revenge!" Ying Long’s eyes snapped open, now dark and glacial, radiating a biting killing intent!

’His mental defenses were full of holes. It was easy to take control.’

The corner of Steward Lü’s mouth curled up.

"From now on, you will follow my every instruction,"

he commanded, his expression cold and arrogant.

"Yes, Master!" Ying Long knelt and bowed.

’Luo Tian, oh, Luo Tian... your head is worth so much. If I weren’t forbidden from exposing my true identity, I wouldn’t need to borrow someone else’s hand to deal with you.’

A cold sneer hung on Steward Lü’s face.

In the Broken-star Realm, the three major powers kept each other in check while simultaneously plotting to devour one another.

He was a pawn planted in the Tai Yuan Sect by the Sea Demon Palace, a piece of tremendous importance. How could he risk exposing his identity just for Luo Tian?

"This is a Violent Spirit Pill. It can boost your Cultivation for a short period. Take it!"

Steward Lü took out a dark yellow elixir pill.

The pill also had strong side effects, but he only cared about Ying Long completing the mission, nothing else.

"Thank you, Master!" Ying Long knelt to receive the pill.

...

Back in his room, Luo Tian, who was in the middle of his Cultivation, suddenly sensed a looming crisis.

Although the feeling was faint, Luo Tian sensed an immense and subtle threat from it!

"Open!"

A crack of azure light appeared between Luo Tian’s eyebrows, from which a vertical, deep-green pupil opened!

He was using his Calculation Technique, supplemented by his Celestial Eye.

Faintly, Luo Tian’s Celestial Eye pierced through the room, catching a glimpse of a blurry figure rapidly retreating into the distance before vanishing.

’Who was that?’

Luo Tian found that his Inference was meeting with great resistance. It could be that his enemy was too strong, or that there were too few clues.

After a long period of calculation, he came up with two leads.

The first lead pointed to Ying Long.

The second, surprisingly, was related to Yue Linfei.

’Yue Linfei doesn’t seem hostile toward me... It seems I’ll have to keep an appropriate distance from her.’

Luo Tian murmured to himself.

’As for Ying Long, I just need to be on my guard.’

「A month passed.」

Luo Tian occasionally spent his Contribution Points to use the Eighth Peak’s special cultivation grounds, steadily improving in all aspects.

His Cultivation drew ever closer to the Earth Element Realm Fourth Layer.

One day, upon returning from the Celestial Bamboo Forest, Luo Tian saw a letter at his door.

’The Sect Affairs Sub-Hall?’

It turned out the Sect had strict requirements for Auditor Disciples: they had to complete at least one mission every three months.

Failure to complete any missions for six consecutive months would result in expulsion from the Sect.

It would soon be three months since Luo Tian had arrived at the Tai Yuan Sect.

’Perfect. I’ve been spending my Contribution Points pretty freely lately and only have three hundred left...’

Most Auditor Disciples started doing missions to earn Contribution Points as soon as they joined the Sect.

Luo Tian, however, had been lucky. The thousand Contribution Points from Elder Lu and the thousand he’d won from Ying Long in a bet had allowed him to live quite comfortably.

Luo Tian was never stingy with his Contribution Points, spending them all to increase his strength.

Otherwise, his Cultivation wouldn’t have progressed so quickly.

He left his courtyard and went to the Eighth Peak’s Sect Affairs Sub-Hall.

The place was crowded, mostly with Auditor Disciples.

The requirements for Official Disciples were more lenient; they only had to complete one mission every six months.

On both sides of the Sect Affairs Sub-Hall were several wooden boards covered with pieces of paper, each detailing a mission.

Luo Tian didn’t want to leave the Sect, especially since the Sea Demon Palace had placed a high bounty on his head.

After scanning the wooden boards, he frowned. ’The missions within the Sect are all menial chores or guard duty. The rewards are really low...’

"This mission has a generous reward, but it requires at least five people."

"We need to find two more skilled people."

The discussion came from a group of three disciples nearby.

One of them, a short-haired man, turned his head and saw Luo Tian. His eyes lit up slightly. "Luo Tian? Are you willing to join our mission?"

Luo Tian looked over. The short-haired man was also an Auditor Disciple who had arrived at the Tai Yuan Sect at the same time as him.

Luo Tian had a vague impression of him.

He recalled the day Ying Long was recruiting lackeys. The short-haired man had performed well and was chosen, but he had preferred to admit defeat rather than become one of Ying Long’s underlings.

"Xie Lei, why are you inviting him?"

"Yeah, a lot of the Official Disciples on the Eighth Peak have been threatening to teach him a lesson, especially Ying Long..."

the other man and woman in the group murmured.

"How do the Official Disciples see us? Don’t you know by now? Are we Auditor Disciples going to look down on each other too?"

the short-haired man, Xie Lei, said in a low voice.

"What’s the mission?"

Luo Tian walked over and took the mission sheet from Xie Lei’s hand.

"Kill the rogue disciple ’Yu Ding.’ Total reward: sixty thousand Contribution Points and one hundred thousand Spiritual Essence Coins!"

The reward was to be split evenly among the team.

The mission required at least five people, so each member would receive twelve thousand Contribution Points and twenty thousand Spiritual Essence Coins.

Combined with the added safety of moving as a team, this was a pretty good mission.

Luo Tian’s only concern was that he would have to leave the Tai Yuan Sect.

"I’ll take it, but please don’t tell anyone that I’ve accepted this mission or where I’m going,"

Luo Tian said calmly.

"No problem."

Xie Lei agreed.

The mission required five people, and they were still short one person, so they would have to wait.

But the very next day, Luo Tian received a message that the team was full and they could depart.

When Luo Tian arrived, he saw that the fifth member was, of all people, Ying Long!

"Brother Luo, I swear I didn’t reveal anything about you, and neither did my two friends..." Xie Lei transmitted, sounding apologetic.

Once a mission was accepted, an Auditor Disciple had to see it through. Quitting would result in severe punishment.

"Mm."

Luo Tian nodded.

He had already grown accustomed to Ying Long trailing him like a shadow, so he wasn’t too surprised.

"Junior Luo, although we have our grudges, I hope we can forget our unpleasantness for this mission and work together to complete it,"

Ying Long said with a smile.

Luo Tian nodded on the surface, but inwardly, he didn’t believe a word of it.

He knew exactly what kind of person Ying Long was, not to mention the results of his Inference from that day.

"Let’s set out!"

Ying Long had the highest Cultivation, so he naturally appointed himself the team leader.

He took out a Void Ship over forty meters long from his Storage Space.

"Senior Brother Ying has such a large Void Ship! That’s amazing!"

"This Void Ship must have cost at least two hundred thousand Spiritual Essence Coins!"

Xie Lei’s two friends showered Ying Long with praise and flattery, hoping to get on the good side of an Official Disciple.

"It’s nothing. Just some old spoils of war."

Ying Long waved his hand dismissively.

"Let’s just take my Void Ship instead!"

Luo Tian spoke calmly and took out his own large Void Ship. It was over seventy meters long, with an imposing design that resembled a colossal deep-sea shark, exuding an intangible sense of dread!

"It’s huge!"

Xie Lei’s two friends were stunned by the sudden appearance of the massive Void Ship.

Ying Long’s expression turned awkward. He forced a laugh and said, "Junior Luo, your family must be quite wealthy to gift you such a large Void Ship."

"My family didn’t gift it to me. It’s just a spoil of war."

Luo Tian stated matter-of-factly.

Ying Long’s face darkened, and a vicious glint flashed in his eyes.

Luo Tian hadn’t taken out his Void Ship to deliberately compete with Ying Long; he just wanted to save time on the journey.

He was, after all, planning to participate in the Main Peak Disciples’ assessment in a few months!

Besides, traveling in his own Void Ship meant he was in complete control, which was much safer and more reassuring.

「One month later.」

「At a Martial City Spirit Hall outside the Tai Yuan Realm.」

In a noisy tavern, Luo Tian and the four others sat around a table laden with food and wine.

"This smells amazing!"

Luo Tian took a small sip of wine.

"Luo Tian, you brought us to this Martial City Spirit Hall just to eat and drink in a tavern?"

Ying Long’s face was grim.

The other man and woman were also extremely displeased with Luo Tian’s actions.

They were here to carry out a mission, yet Luo Tian had brought them to a tavern to eat and drink, wasting their time.

If they failed the mission, the loss would be even greater.

"Quiet. Let’s go. Follow that man up ahead."

Luo Tian suddenly put down his wine cup and transmitted a message to the others.

Xie Lei’s gaze shifted to a man in white clothes swaggering down the street in the distance. His face was covered in pockmarks.

"That man... Could he be?"

Xie Lei began to speak.

"That’s right. That’s Yu Ding," Luo Tian transmitted.

"But that man doesn’t look like Yu Ding..." the female disciple said.

"Do you really think Yu Ding would show his true face so close to the Tai Yuan Sect?"

Luo Tian said with a hint of disdain.

The female disciple lowered her head in shame.

The group left the table and followed him.

「A short while later.」

Yu Ding left the Martial City Spirit Hall, boarded a small Void Ship, and quickly vanished into the distance!

"After him!"

Luo Tian and the others boarded their Void Ship and immediately gave chase.

Luo Tian’s Void Ship could reach a top speed in the Outer Void equivalent to that of an Earth Element Realm Ninth Layer cultivator.

Soon, they caught up to Yu Ding!

"You lot... are you disciples from the Tai Yuan Sect?"

Aboard the small Void Ship ahead, the pockmarked Yu Ding’s expression was grim!

"That’s right! Now surrender obediently!"

Ying Long shouted coldly.

"I surrender, I surrender!"

Yu Ding sighed in resignation, raised his hands, and assumed a posture of giving up all resistance as his Void Ship slowly drifted closer.

"The mission is complete!"

the female disciple in the team cheered, her face flushed with excitement.

The whole process had been so simple and free of any danger!

But suddenly!

"Little girl, you’re far too naive!"

Yu Ding’s expression changed abruptly, and a wicked smile curled his lips!

SHING!

A Curved Saber appeared in his hand, and he viciously swung it, unleashing a desolate, chilling silver gleam that shot toward the female Auditor Disciple!

"Not good!"

Xie Lei’s expression changed drastically as he prepared to help her.

But then the silver gleam’s trajectory suddenly shifted, targeting the other male Auditor Disciple instead.

SCHLICK!

Blood sprayed as a head tumbled to the ground. The male Auditor Disciple had been killed in a single strike!

"Heh heh, make me surrender? You really think too highly of yourselves!" Yu Ding taunted, swinging the Curved Saber in his hand.