Chapter 1196: I’ll Use This Place For 300 Years
The meaning of the term ‘acting lord’ was self-evident. This person was temporarily in charge. He was a human with a Quasi-Immortal cultivation base, which was befitting of such a position.
“Your Majesty, the likes of us can only speculate about your identity. Presumably, the Nineshores Immortal Palace decreed that this universe was to be your personal property....” A nonhuman cultivator stepped forward who looked like an old human man, except that he had a third eye. Bowing respectfully, he continued, “From ancient times until now, the only people rewarded with this glory are pureblooded ascendees from the Immortal Capital. This seems to indicate that Your Majesty is an ascendee from the Immortal Capital.
“As for the exalted Kun Wu... well, he’s similar to yourself, Your Majesty. Supposedly, he was an ascendee from the Immortal Capital who had his own universe. But this place was apparently more suitable for his style of cultivation. So he came over here about a thousand years ago and never left.... He’s human, and the Nineshores Heaven is just so huge....”
At this point, the old man looked up hesitantly at Xu Qing in the immortal hall. “In the Nineshores Heaven, any universe with no lord in its immortal hall is considered unoccupied. And thus, human cultivators will often go into them to practice cultivation. Before the exalted Kun Wu came to the Inksun Universe, there were other humans who had settled down here. But they were all driven away when the exalted Kun Wu showed up.”
The old man was being very careful with his words. He clearly didn’t want to offend either Kun Wu or the new lord in the immortal hall.
Xu Qing thought about that for a moment. “In other words, you call him the acting lord, but that’s just a form of address, and not an official position?”
The old man hesitated but ultimately nodded. “Yes. The Inksun Universe’s immortal hall has been without a lord for many years until now. Because of that, a lot of humans have come and gone.... And so, for the past thousand years, we’ve just gone along with whatever the exalted Kun Wu told us to do.” He smiled wryly. “Truth be told... there are so many universes in the Nineshores Heaven that the likelihood of an ascendee being given the Inksun Universe was always remote. In fact, we were surprised when we found out Your Majesty was coming here. Presumably, the exalted Kun Wu is also surprised.”
Xu Qing’s gaze turned even colder. Now he understood some of the unstated rules in the Nineshores Heaven. The Nineshores Heaven was a huge place and had many, many universes. It wasn’t possible for all of them to have official lords ruling over them. As a result, many were unoccupied. The unoccupied universes would naturally be attractive to cultivators. And any human who entered one of them could basically do anything they wanted with them.
Perhaps the Nineshores Immortal Palace tacitly approves. After all, the Fifth Star Ring seems to foster intense competition to identify who’s strongest! It’s natural selection.
Xu Qing looked at the strange area known as the Inkland. If these nonhumans know about my arrival, there’s no way this human doesn’t know. Given that he hasn’t left, and even went so far as to destroy my divine will, I guess I have to treat him as a squatter. And the only thing to do with squatters is drive them away.
Paying no further attention to the nonhumans, he strode out of the immortal hall, left the asteroid, and made his way into the starry sky. Space-time flowed beneath his feet, and the void rippled. To the astonishment of the nonhuman leaders, he used his divine will as a guide to step onto the thread of the timescape in the Inksun Universe as if it were a string on an instrument.... There was a twang. He vanished.
The bowing nonhuman cultivators were all astonished to the core. That was especially true of the peak Imperial Sovereigns. These were extraordinary individuals. In fact, if they weren’t being restrained by the Fifth Star Ring, they would already have reached immortal ascension. It was only natural that they were extremely knowledgeable. And the more knowledgeable one was, the more astonished they would be by what they had just seen.