Chapter 1779: Meeting Guoguo and the Demon Ape Again

A tiny amount of strength?

Zhang Ruochen did not know what to say.

Perhaps in Yueshen’s eyes, the power of a god’s left leg was almost insignificant. However, to Zhang Ruochen, it was an extremely potent power, a power many times stronger than his own.

If he were to compare the god’s left leg with something, it would be a peerless soldier who weighed in over two hundred pounds. Zhang Ruochen, however, was akin to a seven- or eight-year-old child. With his current strength, there was no way for him to utilize the soldier at all.

On the contrary, the peerless soldier was a burden to a certain extent.

It was obvious as Zhang Ruochen limped as he walked.

Zhang Ruochen still had a long way to go if he wanted to use the god’s left leg at will.

Nevertheless, having a god’s left leg was indeed a great thing. If he spent more time cultivating and refining it, perhaps he might be able to gain unexpected benefits in the future.

Zhang Ruochen then thought about another matter. “How is Kong Lanyou doing?”

He clearly remembered that before he fainted, Kong Lanyou was seriously wounded, hence he was very concerned.

Yueshen did not speak, and the atmosphere in Guanghan Temple became a little somber.

The more somber it got, the more worried Zhang Ruochen felt. “What happened? Tell me. No matter how bad the news is, I can handle it,” he said.

Yueshen sighed slightly. “Her immortal body was shattered, and her cultivation rank has dropped back to the that of a Saint King.”

Zhang Ruochen felt pain in his heart as he clenched his fists tightly. “Damn that Blackheart Demonlord. If I ever become a god, I will definitely kill him.”

For Saint Kings to form immortal Saint bodies, they would need to break through to the Supreme Saint rank. Not only did that demand unparalleled talent, but also the accumulation of various achievements.

Once successful, they could live for at least three thousand years.

Even after they died, their bodies would not rot for thousands of years.

However, once a Supreme Saint’s immortal body was shattered and her ranking fell, the difficulty of remolding another one would be a hundred or a thousand times more difficult.

Although there were prior cultivators who had successfully reshaped their immortal bodies, only a few had ever done so. Many more were relegated to mediocrity, never to return to the realm of a Supreme Saint.

Kong Lanyou’s path had pretty much been severed, and her journey of cultivation would be full of darkness and difficulties.

It all came down to the fact that Kong Lanyou’s cultivation as a Supreme Saint had only been a few years long. Hence, her foundation had yet to stabilize. She only ended up in such a miserable state because she had fought against the avatar of a god.

If she had been like Supreme Saint Manjian, who had cultivated his Supreme Saint realm for thousands of years, such an incident would have unlikely happened.

“Do not worry too much about her. Perhaps, it may not be a bad thing at all for her,” Yueshen said.

Zhang Ruochen thought that they were merely comforting words from Yueshen and did not even listen to her. He wanted to leave Guanghan Temple and rush to Chaisang Sanctuary to visit Kong Lanyou as soon as possible.

He knew very well how painful and discouraging it was for cultivators to have their Saint Path severed.

Kong Lanyou had waited for him for eight hundred years and regarded his hatred as her own, fighting against Chi Yao throughout that time.

In the past eight hundred years, she already had a hard time on her own, and her heart must have been extremely tired. She was obviously a peerless beauty, yet her hair was all white. Zhang Ruochen simply could not forget the sorrow in her eyes.

“If you plan on searching for her, I am afraid that you can only do so in the Kunlun Realm,” Yueshen said.

“The Kunlun Realm? She has returned to the Kunlun Realm?” Zhang Ruochen stopped.

“Not only has she gone there, but all of the Saint-rank cultivators from both the Celestial and Infernal Courts have also gone there!” Yueshen continued.

Zhang Ruochen’s heart trembled as his eyes widened. “Has the Altar of Heaven and Earth been breached?”

“Yes.”

“How long ago?”

“A month back.”

“That long?”

“The Altar of Heaven and Earth was breached a month ago, but the main armies from all of the great realms have only rushed over to the Kunlun Realm in the last few days. So, if there are people and matters that you cannot let go in the Kunlun Realm, you should go now because it is still not too late,” Yueshen said.

Zhang Ruochen breathed a sigh of relief as he tried to calm his garbled mind and sort out his thoughts.

He definitely needed to go back to the Kunlun Realm. His mother, Concubine Lin along with his fourth elder brother, ninth elder sister, and his old clique from the Shengming Central Empire—all of them—needed to be picked up and relocated elsewhere.

In addition, there were a few things that he had to find out.

Zhang Ruochen did not fully trust Chi Yao with regard to the great upheaval eight hundred years ago, and he did not believe that his father would be controlled by the Blood Empress. Even a god could never turn an outstanding emperor like him into a puppet.

If his father had become a puppet of the Blood Empress, how could he have possibly cultivated Buddhahood in the Western Buddha Realm and allow Fairy Cihang to bring him the Eight-Dragon Umbrella?

When that occurred to him, Zhang Ruochen’s thoughts came to a halt as he realized that he had seemingly misunderstood something in the past.

“Back then, Fairy Cihang only said that hundreds of years ago, an emperor in the Kunlun Realm had given her the Eight-Dragon Umbrella and asked her to bring it to me. But, hundreds of years back, Father was not the only emperor in the Kunlun Realm.

“Could it be that the one who attained Buddhahood in the Western Buddha Realm is actually not Father at all? Otherwise, why wouldn’t he come and see me?

“If the one in the Western Buddha Realm is not Father, where did he go? Is he still alive?

“Also, for Blackie to be an old acquaintance of Blackheart Demonlord and be very close with the Empress of a Thousand Bones… is it hiding anything from me? Was it really the Emperor Who Slaughtered the Heavens and Earth thousands of years ago? Why did Saint Monk Xumi seal its Saint Soul in the Sacred Qiankun Wooden Picture Scroll?

“Is my mother the Blood Empress?”

…

There were too many questions in Zhang Ruochen’s heart. He then closed his eyes and asked, “Mistress Yueshen, where is Blackie?”

“That phoenix?

“After the battle, it left Mount Yueshen and never came back,” she said.

“Bastard.”

Zhang Ruochen clenched his fists tightly and was furious. That pr*ck must have concealed a lot of information and was afraid that Zhang Ruochen would question it. So, it ran away and hid beforehand.

The next time he saw it, he would definitely pluck all of its feathers.

“I’ll head out for a bit.”

Zhang Ruochen called forth the Golden Dragon Carriage and commandeered nine golden dragons as he flew off Mount Yueshen.

Before he returned to the Kunlun Realm, there were some issues he had to clear up.

Four hours later, Zhang Ruochen arrived at a sanctuary that was surrounded by mountain peaks. Maneuvering the dragon carriage, he stopped it under a hump-shaped holy mountain and released a soundwave from his mouth. “Central Shengming Empire’s Prince Zhang Ruochen has come to pay his respects to the mountain.”

The Central Shengming Empire’s two sacred beasts were both at the Supreme Saint level, and they had occupied two sanctuaries in the Shatuo Domain, turning them into their territories. The Demi-Saints, Saints, and Saint Kings from the old Central Shengming Empire cultivated in those two sanctuaries.

Zhang Ruochen went up to one of the sanctuaries.

They were sacred beasts that protected the country and were also Supreme Saints in their own right. Not to mention, they had last seen Emperor Ming eight hundred years ago, so Zhang Ruochen refused to believe that they knew nothing.

A moment later, an earth-rattling sound came from the sacred mountain as two demonic monstrous auras rushed out.

Then, a rabbit and demonic ape charged at him from the direction of the auras.

“Zhang Ruochen, you are finally here. I thought that the gods had taken you out!” The rabbit, which was the size of a fat pig, sped toward Zhang Ruochen in excitement.

Zhang Ruochen quickly stepped aside to dodge it.

Bam!!

The rabbit crashed heavily into the ground and created a large hole in the process.”

“That is what you get for your impudence toward His Royal Highness.”

The Demon Ape rolled its eyes and performed a fist-palm salute as it said, “Greetings, Your Highness.”

The two beasts before him were the Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit, Guoguo and the Demon Ape that had stolen, as well as eaten, Zhang Ruochen’s sacred medicine leaves back in the Qiankun Realm.

The leaves were so precious that Zhang Ruochen could not bear to eat them.

A single Moonleaf was enough to recover fifty percent of Yueshen’s divine power.

These two had not wasted the sacred medicinal leaves at least, and both of their cultivation bases had reached the realm of a Six-step Saint King. On top of that, the auras they emanated were reminiscent of two demonic gods.

These two gluttons actually cultivated at a faster speed than Princess Bai Li who had also stolen the same sacred medicine.

However, Princess Bai Li was improving step by step, and she had also cultivated the Path of Truth. There were barely any foes who could match her in the same rank. Unlike the Mastodon-Devouring Rabbit and the Demon Ape, whose cultivations entirely stemmed from eating, there was still a large gap between the two.

When Zhang Ruochen recalled the fact that his sacred medicine had been stolen, he became furious.

“Why are there only two of you? Where are the two Golden Beast Kings?” Zhang Ruochen asked.

“An unprecedented catastrophe has befallen the Kunlun Realm, and both Beast Kings have rushed over to join the battle,” the Demon Ape said.

Zhang Ruochen frowned and replied, “Nonsense. Only beings below the Supreme Saint rank are able to enter the battlefield in the Kunlun Realm.”

The Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit got to its feet and patted the dust off its belly. “You may be correct about the battlefield in the Kunlun Realm being accessible only to those beneath the Supreme Saint rank, but you do not know that the stars around the Kunlun Realm are the battlefield for the Supreme Saints.

“Apparently, not only will they fight each other, but they will also snatch the Divine Planets left behind by the Kunlun Realm’s gods. Any Divine Planet would make a Supreme Saint salivate since it could help them attain godhood.”

“Damn it,” Zhang Ruochen hissed.

The planets amongst the stars around the Kunlun Realm were all relics left behind by the ancient Kunlun gods. Now, he could only watch as the Supreme Saints from both the Celestial and Infernal Courts took them away, and that made him really angry.

The Mastodon-Devouring Rabbit rolled its eyes as it said, “Actually, it is not that simple. Without precise coordinates, even a Supreme Saint would be hard-pressed to find the Divine Planets…

“Because after a god falls, a Divine Planet’s light would dim, and it would float within the dark space, which can only be detected using spiritual powers.

“The two Beast Kings have mentioned before that the stars around the Kunlun Realm are like vast oceans, while the Divine Planets are like small islands in the middle of the vast oceans. Finding one is about as difficult as climbing all the way to Heaven.

“Plus, many of the Divine Planets around the stars in the Kunlun Realm have been hidden away by an old baldie using dimensional means. They practically cannot be found.”

“A baldie?”

Zhang Ruochen glared at the Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit.

The Mastodon-Devouring Rabbit patted its paws and solemnly said, “Aye, that is what the two Beast Kings said.”

Zhang Ruochen then continued, “Since they are that hard to find, why did the two Beast Kings rush to join the fray?”

“The two Beast Kings told us that they wanted to create traps with a few Divine Planets they had already discovered and send some of the Infernal Court’s Supreme Saints to their doom.”

The Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit rubbed its paws together happily. If its rank had not been insufficient, perhaps it would have also joined the two Beast Kings in wreaking some havoc. If they managed to booby trap a Supreme Saint to death, the resources and treasures they gained would be unimaginable for such beings of the Saint King realm.

Immediately after, Zhang Ruochen took the Mastadon-Devouring Rabbit and Demon Ape to meet Grandmaster Taiyi. He wanted to find out what the Guardian Dragon Pavilion had built with the Central Shengming Empire’s treasury.

Unfortunately, no one was home because Grandmaster Taiyi had already returned to the Kunlun Realm.

In the end, Zhang Ruochen could only drive the Golden Dragon Carriage and return to Mount Yueshen. It seemed that he had no choice but to unravel the various mysteries from eight hundred years ago himself.