Stealing The Heavens
chapter-714

During the night assault in Greenwood Pass, Wu Qi had killed 795 immortals and itinerant cultivators while capturing 35 immortals and 452 itinerant cultivators. Except for Lu Buwei, who fled with his Heavenly Ghost Grand Magic, none of the attackers survived.

Apart from being able to provide some fresh flesh to quench Ao Buzun and the two dragon pythons' thirst for blood, Wu Qi's greatest gain was the thread of item spirit Lei Meng had stripped off the blood flag with his great power. What came with it was the complete Blood Sea Grand Magic, a vicious, cruel cultivation technique of the Fiend League.

After spending one whole night studying the Blood Sea Grand Magic, Wu Qi learned the reason why Patriarch Yuan Hua was colluding with Lu Buwei—the strongest technique in this grand magic was the eighteen Blood-draining Celestial Fiends, and the best materials that could be used to refine them were the variety of powerful heavenly ghosts from the Ghost Domain. And, as he carefully went through the various malicious and cruel mystic arts and divine abilities recorded in it, he was pleased to find out that he could merge them with the Dragon Kill, allowing his overall strength to be increased further.

He even thought of cultivating the Blood Sea Grand Magic himself.

Of course, if he were to do it, he would not follow Patriarch Yuan Hua's footsteps and slaughter countless living beings. He had his own way to obtain countless blood essence and souls required to cultivate this grand magic. In the Scroll of Stealing was a mystic art which he could use to open up a passage into the Yellow Springs and to the Dark Nether Blood Sea, where he could obtain an endless amount of blood. And, as the immortals of Fiend League were known for crafting all kinds of malicious fiend artifacts with the human souls, he could always kill them and seize those fiend artifacts, bringing himself all the souls he needed.

As for the source materials for the eighteen Blood-draining Celestial Fiends, what could be better than his eighteen celestial fiend puppets? Over the years, these puppets had consumed countless rare and precious materials and minerals, and the strength of their bodies had grown to a shocking level. By fusing a great amount of blood essence and souls with them using the Blood Sea Grand Magic, then refining them with his true flame, Wu Qi could make them at least a hundred times stronger than Lu Buwei's heavenly ghosts.

Currently, these puppets were still corporeal. With their mighty strength, they could destroy almost anything in a head-on battle, but they were weak when it came to some dirty works that needed to be carried out in the dark. However, once Wu Qi had them refined into Blood-draining Celestial Fiends, transforming them from corporeal entities to Celestial Fiends with incorporeal bodies who could freely and silently shift between forms, they would naturally be many times stronger than now.

These were the fruits Wu Qi had harvested from a single night's assault. But, he was facing new trouble now—King Yang Qiu, who regarded him as his future chief warrior, ordered him not to leave the field headquarters, and the reason he gave was simple: Wu Qi was assaulted by a group of immortals and itinerant cultivators, and although they were weak and had been defeated, it did not mean he was safe. He might be assaulted again, and the next batch of attackers might be Gold Immortals from the alliance who had escaped, or some stronger existences.

Before Wu Qi had the overall strength to protect himself, he was forbidden from leaving the field headquarters. The defenses had been increased ten times, and Yu Gu, who babbled all day that he wanted to wed one of his daughters, granddaughters, or great-granddaughters to Wu Qi, was following him everywhere, providing him close protection. The Supreme Oracle knew very well what bright future Wu Qi had, and so he spent most of his time beside the latter, ready to even sleep right next to him if Wu Qi had not rejected that generous offer.

It was under such high security and after thirty-six days in Greenwood Plain that King Yang Qiu ordered the army to decamp, board the flying ships, and head for Liangzhu at the fastest possible speed.

Nearly a thousand flying ships hovered in a huge circle in mid-air. Four Supreme Towers, including Yu Gu's, flanked this massive circle from four sides. Then, the four colossal towers shattered the void and brought the flying ships that carried King Yang Qiu's great army as they sped into the void, heading toward Liangzhu at top speed. With the help of Yu Gu and the three Supreme Oracles sent over by the Directorate of Celestials in Liangzhu, it took them only three days to arrive at You Xiong Plain from Greenwood Plain.

You Xiong Plain was the birthplace of You Xiong clan, the place where the Yellow Emperor Xuanyuan, the Central Great Emperor of Pangu Continent, grew up and thrived. In ancient times, after the human race was born, they settled in tribes across Pangu Continent. Later, it was the Yellow Emperor Xuanyuan who brought his clan members and spent thousands of years to pull all the tribes into a tribal alliance. This brought together the strength of all the tribes and gave the human race the power to fight against those ancient gods, demons, and fiends.

Because of such achievement, the Yellow Emperor Xuanyuan was bestowed with boundless virtues and honored by the human race as the 'Holy Emperor'. Relying on the boundless virtues, he survived from the ancient times to the present. Today, together with the Yan Emperor Shennong, he ranked among the five Great Emperors of the Pangu Continent, and became the supreme protector of the human race.

Because of the Yellow Emperor Xuanyuan's virtues, You Xiong Plain had become the most fertile and natural energy-rich land on Pangu Continent.

Measuring a hundred billion miles in circumference, You Xiong Plain did not have any energy vein. But under it was a colossal spirit cave which Wu Qi had never heard, seen, or even thought of before! Some said that this spirit cave was evolved from the Great Saint Pangu's heart, the largest spirit cave on Pangu Continent. The hundreds of millions of huge energy veins stretching out of it were the sources of the countless smaller energy veins spreading across the entire Pangu Continent.

When the Supreme Towers shattered the void and appeared over You Xiong Plain, Wu Qi, standing on the cloud platform, was greeted by a shocking sight.

As he peeked through his Chaotic Divine Eyes at You Xiong Plain, he saw a vast expanse of natural energy and purple energy under it. Right there, directly below the entire You Xiong Plain was a colossal spirit cave, so massive that his mind went completely blank when he saw it. Then he looked up and was rendered speechless as he saw what filled the sky above this amazing land. There were no ordinary clouds, but white clouds entirely composed of natural energy, and purple rays materialized of purple energy; half of the raindrops falling from the sky were pure energy in liquid form.

The level of natural energy in those so-called blessed lands and immortal abodes were nothing when compared to You Xiong Plain. And, although Wu Qi's eighteen-level cave abode in Mount Picking Star was considering a blessed land with abundant immortal energy, the level of energy in a random pit found here was at least a thousand times higher than that!

Spirit items, which were rare and precious in the outside world, could be found almost everywhere here. The stones the people of You Xiong Plain used to build their houses were supreme-grade immortal stones, and their hoes, plows, and other farming tools were made of valuable materials which could be used by immortals to craft supreme-grade Gold Immortal Artifacts.

Wu Qi finally understood why the Human Emperor had decreed that immortals should be forbidden from setting foot within ten billion miles around You Xiong Plain, and why whenever an immortal dared to approach You Xiong Plain, Great Yu would immediately do its utmost to wipe that immortal out. The reason was simple: if an immortal, who was so poor that he could not even afford to buy a pair of pants, sneaked into You Xiong Plain and took anything that he could find, he would become a super wealthy immortal when he left this place.

When the immortals in the outer heavenly realms were fighting and killing each other over an energy stone or an immortal stone, if an immortal could secretly cultivate in seclusion within You Xiong Plain for thousands of years, he could easily accumulate a cultivation base that he could never get even after spending several eons in the outside world. Therefore, with the exception of Heaven's Celestial Ambassadors to Great Yu, any immortals who dared set foot within ten billion miles around You Xiong Plain would be killed, so that none of the resources here would leak to the outside world and allow the immortals to grow stronger.

The cultivation resources contained in any of the mountains here were more than enough to turn a small itinerant cultivator clan into an immortal sect that was a hundred times stronger than Green City, within just ten thousand years. If the Human Emperor had not issued such an injunction, perhaps You Xiong Plain would have been turned upside down by immortals, and not even a single straw could have been found now.

To Wu Qi's horror, as they drew closer from the edge of You Xiong Plain to its heart, Liangzhu, the concentration of natural energy became higher, and the increment was exponential. When the army was less than a hundred miles from Liangzhu, the concentration of natural energy had reached an unbelievable level, such that Wu Qi could only shake his head and remain speechless.

Liangzhu, the capital city of Great Yu, a city that existed since the ancient times to the present…

Unlike the capital cities of those provinces under Great Yu, Liangzhu looked more like a farming city.

Standing along a river that was about a hundred miles across was a primitive-looking city built of earth. The city wall stretched about three hundred miles from east to west, and about two hundred miles from north to south. The top of the city walls was uneven, with the highest part measuring about ten feet tall, which made the city not look as dignified and majestic as the other provincial capital cities.

Inside, the city was littered with old, traditional palaces constructed of black boulders whose surfaces were spotted with moss. Outside, along the river and the mountains, the land was filled with crisscrossing farmlands and villages. A dirt road, with its widest part measuring only twenty feet and looking barely maintained, connected Liangzhu and the countless villages and towns outside.

There was no tall and magnificent building in the spacious Liangzhu. All the buildings looked almost identical, the only difference being in their size; they were all giving off an ancient, decaying air. From afar, Liangzhu looked like a dying old man who was laying lazily and dozing off at the riverbank.

But when Wu Qi carefully studied the air, he found out that under the cover of that lazy, almost dying appearance, there hid a fierce aura that made his flesh creep. It was as if this city could transform from a dying old man to a colossal beast who could destroy anything in an instant. Every ancient trace on each of the buildings in the city was giving off this unique fierce aura.

This was Liangzhu, the heart of Great Yu Dynasty, the dragon's chasm and the tiger's den, where even an intruding Primordial Immortal would be immediately torn to pieces.

This was Liangzhu, the capital city of Great Yu Dynasty which was as powerful as the Heaven, the mystical city from where countless legends and myths originated.

After spending countless efforts and going through numerous challenges, Wu Qi had finally arrived at Liangzhu.

A sonorous horn call rang out of Liangzhu as a welcoming parade rose up into the sky from within the city, flying toward Wu Qi and the company.