Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

“Ow!”

The left and right heads of the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon screamed miserably at the same time. However, the head in the middle, which was larger than a mill, was floating in the river. A fracture a few meters in diameter was left where it had been chopped off. Black blood was spurting out, vaporizing into a venomous mist in the storm that covered the area!

Under the cover the venomous mist, the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon sank and fled toward the depths of the Sorcerers’ River.

“You want to go? Not so fast! Leave your demon cores here!”

Amid scary chuckles, a green shadow lunged toward the top of the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon like a vulture that had opened the wings. Of course, it was Li Yao who pretended to be Master Spiritual Vulture!

Storm, thunder, and flood!

The violent spiritual energy between the sky and the earth!

They were also rushing toward him overwhelmingly!

Such a magnificent view of the sky breaking apart and the lightning surging out reminded Li Yao of the happy period of crazy training in the thunderstorms deep within the Grand Desolate Plateau in the Star Glory Federation!

Fighting the sky and the earth brought him endless pleasure. He was a guy who could slay tornadoes!

“Storm and thunder, you can go to hell if you have come to me!” Li Yao shrieked. The green flames of spiritual energy around him condensed into two enormous, sky-blocking wings. After one flap, the lightning and clouds that were coming at him were all shattered!

Then, the two wings were closed together. Under the precise control of his telepathic thoughts, the spiritual energy in the wings reformed. A monolithic claw took shape, which snatched right toward the heads of the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon!

The Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon had just suffered a heavy blow and lost the most important head. It was in such agony that it did not notice the traps that Li Yao had hidden in the green fire at all.

Hardly had the animal escaped from the snatch of the claw when it was caught precisely by a trap made of dozens of monocular mica threads.

Chi! Chi! Chi! Chi!

As it desperately fled toward the Sorcerers’ River, Li Yao pulled hard. The molecular mica threads cut off its tough scales, rough skin, and sturdy flesh, deeply embedding into the bones all over its body!

The animal was like a fish that had bitten the hook. However hard it struggled, it would only make the hook even tighter!

Having been training for hundreds of years, the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon had long gained basic intelligence. It knew that now was a time of life and death. If it could not eliminate the weird threads that had been embedded into its body, there was no way that it could run away!

After struggling down for a moment, it changed the methodology and simply attacked backward toward Li Yao by hitting the surface of the river with its enormous tail.

Hiu!

Yan Liren’s second primeval sword was unsheathed. The two swords were like another two dragons when they fought the rest of the two heads of the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon!

Master Bitter Cicada took the opportunity to jump up from the moon-white cassock. Picking up the black staff, he batted the eighteen pearls out, which rushed deep into the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon’s body through its wounded neck with long exhaust flames like shooting stars!

Dong!

Master Bitter Cicada knocked the staff in midair. As if it had hit solid ground, a deafening noise was raised!

Centered at the point where the staff ‘hit the ground’, complicated and dazzling rune arrays appeared out of nowhere and stretched out. At the core of the runes were three overlapping swastikas ¹ , which were surrounded by eighteen buddhas in different postures!

As the eighteen buddhas glittered one after another, eight dull noises echoed inside the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon’s body. The parts where the noises originated bulged out violently at first as if they had swallowed an iron ball, before they quickly withered as if all the bones had been removed. The animal turned from a dominating dragon into a soft earthworm, losing all ability to fight back!

Shua!

Li Yao’s molecular mica threads cut off the remaining two heads of the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon easily. The body of the animal, which was essentially a mountain of meat, fell into the Sorcerers’ River and soon disappeared into the currents!

When Li Yao, Yan Liren, and Master Cicada, three super Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators of the Ancient Sages Sector, joined hands, a Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon could not get away despite the interference of nature!

“The demon cores are mine now!”

Li Yao burst into laughter on purpose, finding an excuse for his precious attack. Pretending that he was greedy, he controlled the molecular mica threads to pick up the three demon cores that were rotating in the air!

But after he raised his head, he discovered that Master Bitter Cicada did not bother to look at the three demon cores at all. He did not even catch his breath first as he dived deep into the Sorcerers’ River!

“What’s he doing?” Li Yao blinked in bafflement.

But he vaguely felt that yet another round of tides was sweeping close from further up the Sorcerer’s River.

Considering the vulnerability of the dams there, if the defense rune arrays were not repaired as soon as possible, perhaps the crash of the tides alone was enough to collapse the dams, and the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon was not even needed!

Is—is he going to crush the incessant tides on his own until the storm stops?

As if hit by lightning, Li Yao was utterly dumbfounded. He had never thought that such an extraordinary person as Master Bitter Cicada could be born in the world of ancient Cultivators!

Looking at Master Bitter Cicada marching toward the tides on his own above the Sorcerers’ River, Yan Liren frowned and asked, “What’s on your mind, Fellow Cultivator Spiritual Vulture?”

“I’m thinking…” Li Yao rolled his eyes for a long time and finally said, “Brother Yan, your unparalleled sword is already fast to the point that it can’t be any faster. It is enough to kill any person in the world!

“But I wonder, is it capable of slaying the incessant tides?”

“Slaying the incessant tides?” Touching his bald head and looking at the other bald head in the flood, Yan Liren’s nostrils flared. “Interesting!”

…

The overwhelming storm lasted a day and a night. It was not until the next day in the morning that the lackluster sun finally revealed itself reluctantly in the broken morning glow.

Thanks to Li Yao, Yan Liren, and Master Bitter Cicada, the canal that the members of the Purple Pole Sword Sect were on did not have a tragedy of collapsing dams, but other places were not so lucky. Dams collapsed seriously and less seriously everywhere. When Li Yao flew up hundreds of meters, everything that he could see had been drowned in water except for the relatively high places that had turned into lone islands and long bridges.

The victims whose homes had been destroyed by the flood were crammed onto the islands and bridges like ants, spreading out aimlessly. They were homeless peasants, the greatest headache for the court and Cultivators!

For the court, the homeless peasants were the greatest cause of riots.

For the Cultivators, when alive, the homeless peasants that were nothing more than ants and weeds were certainly nothing to be scared of.

However, should the evil warlords such as ‘Mother White Lotus’ Wan Mingzhu get involved and absorb the aggressive souls that had died miserably in the natural disaster, they might be turned into violent ghouls after a few battles, which would be quite a headache!

Therefore, resisting the natural disaster and appeasing the homeless peasants was not only the court’s responsibility but a responsibility for all the Cultivators.

It was especially so for the Cultivation sects that were rooted in the southeast because, if they did not do anything, they would be the first to be wounded by an insurgence!

Seeing that countless homeless peasants, with their ragged clothes and numb faces, had even lost the ability to cry and were simply moving with the crowd in desperation, Li Yao did not know what to feel.

There were of course natural disasters in the Star Glory Federation, too, such as floods, earthquakes, and tsunamis.

However, for the Cultivators of the Star Glory Federation, resisting the natural disasters was a duty as important as slaying evils. One for all and all for one was certainly not empty talk.

The central government had a thorough, well-tested emergency relief mechanism. When it was fully functioning, there was no way that the flood would be so severe. Even if there were homeless victims, they would be properly taken care of soon and certainly would not be left alone to count on themselves.

While he was sighing, Li Yao’s eyes were keen enough to notice a moon-white figure amid the dense crowd.

It was Master Bitter Cicada!

Li Yao was very curious about the mysterious monk.

The previous night, to resist the tides, he had marched into the flood time and time again until his spiritual energy had been exhausted, and a few high-level Cultivators of the Purple Pole Sword Sect had saved him.

It did not occur to Li Yao that the guy was out again after a rest of only four hours. What was he doing among the disaster-stricken people?

Li Yao’s curiosity was aroused. He landed near Master Bitter Cicada.

When the homeless peasants saw that a deity was landing from the clouds, they were so ashamed that they all fled away. Even if they fell into the dirty water, they did not dare to draw close to Li Yao.

Some of the white-haired old men were even kneeling before Li Yao, dragging the children whose hair was dry and yellow. Li Yao’s heart almost broke.

As ‘Master Spiritual Vulture’, it was naturally inappropriate to treat everybody as an equal. He could only frown and take the courtesies while forcing him to look at Master Bitter Cicada instead of the dirty faces.

Amid a bunch of muddy peasants, Master Bitter Cicada’s moon white robe was polluted, too. Even his bald head was blemished with sludge and dirt.

But his face was till as immaculate as white jade. It seemed to be glowing from inside.

He was sitting cross-legged in the middle of mud.

In front of him, however, was a skull that was monolithic and hideous and almost as large as an elephant. It was one of the heads of the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon!

Master Bitter Cicada’s fist-sized pearls were hovering above the head and emitting gentle light that was nurturing the head.

The vague aggression and brutality that lingered in the Multi-Horned Bizarre Dragon’s head gradually dispersed while Master Bitter Cicada was reciting the sutras.

He is appeasing the soul of the animal!

Li Yao was greatly awed.

I’m told that the Stupa Temple claims that everybody is equal and everything has wisdom, but I didn’t know that Master Bitter Cicada is so merciful that he would even go through the trouble of appeasing the soul of an animal.

What a remarkable monk!

“All done!” While Li Yao was secretly complimenting him, Master Bitter Cicada finished his technique. The eighteen pearls flew back to his shoulder, and he stood up, supporting his black staff. Stretching out his arms, he clapped his hands and smiled. “The poison inside the skull of the animal has all been eliminated by this monk. You are free to eat it now!”

After saying that, he waved his staff. After a crack, the bone broke apart, and the brains spurted out!

“…” Li Yao.