CHAPTER 864: CHAPTER 587: STARS NURTURING WONDERS

Time flies like an arrow, three years passed in a flash.

In the distant deep space, tens of thousands of astronomical units from Xia Star.

The Aurora Palace descends upon the surface of a small asteroid.

On the Compass, Lu Chenzhou sits cross-legged, a thousand Jade Scrolls floating around him.

Each Jade Scroll projects the image of a star into the void.

From small, three-thousand-kilometer orbital satellites to supergiant planets with diameters of hundreds of thousands of kilometers.

"Searched through 1,001 stars, not a single one nurturing an Oddity."

After inspecting the new planet, Lu Chenzhou set out on his journey once more.

He had no set destination, wandering wherever the Star Plate directed him.

Stellar cultivation, is loneliest of all.

Unconsciously, another two years slipped away.

He sailed out of the original Constant Star System; looking back, even the Sun had become a tiny dot.

This day, Lu Chenzhou practiced his cultivation on the Star Plate, studying inner strength methods.

Fine white sand slipped from his fingertips; a High Grade Primordial Stone was exhausted of its Primordial Qi and shattered to pieces.

A vast torrent of Qi-Blood washed through his organs, filling his flesh.

His surging Qi-Blood spurted from his pores, scattering the surrounding meteorite cluster like a solar storm.

Lu Chenzhou’s eyes flashed with brilliance, his Qi Mechanism no weaker than the Blood Flood Dragon Demon Venerate.

"2.01 million Qi-Blood, 2.02 million Prajnaparamita Spiritual Power—five years of bitter starry cultivation, and I’ve stepped into the Middle Stage of the Seventh Realm."

Every move and breath Lu Chenzhou made now bore an even deeper flavor of Unity of Heaven and Man.

After five years of insight, the starry sky within his Inner Heaven and Earth grew ever more connected with the starry sky of this real world.

He listened to the sound of his own heartbeat, and in it seemed to hear the eternal echoes of the universe’s birth.

Suddenly his gaze swept into the distance—a stream of light shot toward him, his figure flickered rapidly, and he relocated ten thousand miles away.

The stream of light passed close by, a chill condensing into frost upon his skin.

"A comet, orbiting the Constant Star System..."

Sometime later, the comet collided with a distant asteroid.

In an instant, a catastrophic explosion filled his vision.

This level of Energy would easily annihilate a Seventh Realm expert; only those of the Eighth Realm could escape alive.

The asteroid disintegrated, shattered into endless fragments.

Lu Chenzhou seemed to hear the wailing of the stars.

Suddenly, a new inspiration stirred within him.

He closed his eyes in meditation, consciousness ever rising, spirit transcending above all stars and nebulae!

He saw the Constant Star System from which he had come, and this strange star system... To the starry sky, they were but two insignificant points.

At some point, he saw ahead an abstract, metaphysical, ink-black heart, boundless and limitless, half-real, half-illusory.

The heart pulsed—each beat birthing blood like star clouds, carrying platelets and white-blood-cell-like stars out from the universe, becoming one star after another.

In this moment, he seemed to see the full visage of the starry sky, witnessed the galactic pulse, saw its boundless majesty swallowing and spitting out sun, moon, and stars.

The multitudes of life over millions of years—merely an instant of the starry heavens.

Boom! Violent waves burst from the ink-black heart, blasting Lu Chenzhou’s consciousness back to reality.

He woke with a start: "Was that the Will of the Xia Realm—or perhaps... the Will of the Stars—I just sensed?"

Lu Chenzhou’s soul was shaken—he’d seen High Class World Wills before, such as Kun Gu’s Will.

Yet compared to that fleeting glimmer of the Xia Realm’s Will, they were utterly insignificant!

Like a candle’s flame beside the Great Sun, the difference was vast as heaven and earth.

"Perhaps, in essence, the Will of the Xia Realm and the Kun Gu Realm are the same."

"But in sheer scale, the Will of the Xia Realm dwarfs all Three Thousand Worlds’ wills combined, second only to the Great Cosmic Will!"

The Great Cosmic Will—this was a concept Lu Chenzhou had heard from Ancient Emperor Lanshan.

It is the collective of all living beings and World Wills within this universe; in a sense, also the true lord of the Divine Court.

The so-called Divine, in truth, were merely "cosmic-level bureaucrats" selected by the Great Cosmic Will to keep the universe running properly.

In the Great Wilderness, nothing could escape the inscrutable Great Cosmic Will.

In his mind, the Martial Arts Tree quietly soared, stopping only after surpassing three million zhang.

That fleeting moment of Unity of Heaven and Man was worth years of insight.

Yet when he tried to immerse himself again, the feeling was gone.

"A fortunate encounter, not something to be forced."

Lu Chenzhou traveled on, beholding many wonders beyond mortal imagination.

In the blink of an eye, another three years passed.

This day, golden light from the Star Plate flashed, its radiance pointing toward a slumbering star deep in the darkness ahead.

"That’s a [Gold Star Artifact]."

...

Nameless Star.

In the Star Core Land, a swirling red ring floated in obscurity.

Here, magnetic fields ran wild and gravity was reversed.

Invisible ripples spread in circles, enough to shred anything below the Seventh Realm in an instant.

"I didn’t expect this place to hide a Star Oddity."

Crowned in black and cloaked in night, the Shadow Stream Dominator Achilles stood like a god atop the ring.

"No idea yet what kind of Oddity it is, but its value must rival a Seventh Rank Heaven and Earth Treasure. In the World’s First Tower, it’ll fetch quite the price."

In two years, the World’s First Tower would open.

This clone of Achilles was just one shadow- or space-element Heaven and Earth Treasure short of breaking into the Middle Stage of the Seventh Realm.

Then, his escape skills would ascend another level.

"Sigh, if Lu Chenzhou weren’t in the Xia Realm, with this seat’s shadow powers, would there be any need for such caution?"

Achilles conjured a gigantic shadow hand, grasping the red ring to capture it.

At that instant, the planet beneath his feet surged with violent rebound force.

The red ring hummed and trembled, shattering the shadow hand into dust.

"A mere dead thing dares to resist me!"

Achilles increased his power. Shadow Power turned to viscous black tar, wrapping the red ring.

"Get up for me!" Veins bulged on his arms, visage savage, as he unleashed an aura nearly at Middle Stage of the Seventh Realm. Fifth Rank Shadow Law erupted without restraint.

His brow split open—a withered broken finger poked out, suffused with incredibly dangerous Shadow Dao Essence.

The entire Star Core space began collapsing.

After a brief clash, Achilles had gained the upper hand.

The red ring shrank ceaselessly, subdued beneath the withered finger.

"A Demigod Relic truly is powerful, not inferior to an Eighth Rank Spiritual Weapon."

"Once I comprehend the Shadow Law within, stepping into Sixth or even Seventh Rank Shadow Dao will be within reach."

Achilles vanished into the shadow, disappearing from sight.

...

Soon after.

Lu Chenzhou descended upon the Star Core Land, brows furrowed.

"Nothing here?"

He opened his Dharma Eye—threads of causality tangled in a chaotic mass.

Suddenly, one faint red thread appeared, flickering in and out of sight.

With his current prowess, he could tell that the owner of this causality was of Seventh Realm level, with ties of grievance and enmity toward himself.

Combined with the evidence of brute destruction, it was clear someone had beaten him here.

"Ghost Empress, or Achilles?"

With the foe not far, Lu Chenzhou pushed his Dharma Eye to its limits and pursued at once.

...

Shadow Dimension.

Achilles hummed a little tune, in excellent spirits.

Suddenly, a strongman’s instinct made him glance back intuitively.

He saw a bolt of lightning splitting the cosmos, speeding swiftly toward his location.

"Someone else in this stretch of stars? Just passing by, or here to hunt me down?"

Achilles immediately changed direction.

The streak of lightning shifted as well, aiming directly at him.

"Damn, it’s him!"

Achilles at once recited a spell, contacting the Witch Master.

"Lord, I’ve been found by Lu Chenzhou."

"Weren’t you hiding in the starry sky? Even with the treasure Lord Toad gifted, how were you discovered?"

"No idea. Pure chance, maybe."

"Run. Hide if you can. If you can’t—self-destruct your divine soul..."

The projection of the Witch dissipated. Achilles’ heart sank to the depths.

"You want me to kill myself?"

A column of crimson light instantly ripped through a hundred thousand miles of void, pierced the Shadow Dimension, and Achilles was forced to dodge out.

Lu Chenzhou drew his long spear, the tip glowing ghostly again: Heaven and Earth Piercing Strike!

This time Achilles was too slow to dodge—his armor was pierced, blood spurting from his body.

If not for him shifting into a shadow-like void form in time, he’d have been blown apart.

"Shit, he can hit me from a hundred thousand miles away?"

Achilles put everything into his escape.

Yet Lu Chenzhou behind was drawing ever closer.

At three thousand times the speed of sound, even with Achilles’ mastery of Shadow Escape Technique, he felt only despair.

"Too fast... There’s no escape. Only a final desperate battle left. There’s still a sliver of hope—I must not self-destruct!"

If a clone dies, even the main body’s cultivation suffers.

Achilles was at a crucial moment toward Middle Stage of the Eighth Realm—far too precious to forfeit now.

Shadow textures solidified across Achilles’ skin, as Shadow Power from the Shadow Dimension surged forth.

Divine Power·Shadow Thousand Tribulation Blade!

As Lu Chenzhou drew closer, in the surrounding Shadow Dimension, a thousand black blades, each a hundred zhang long, manifested out of nowhere.

"Kill!" Achilles shouted, a thousand blades sweeping, slicing a murderous aura in every direction.

"Wind Thunder Golden Peng Transformation!" The might of Divine Skills—Lu Chenzhou would not take the blow head-on. Golden light descended from the skies, and with a shake of his body he transformed into the dazzling Golden Winged Great Peng. A slight flap of his wings took him ten thousand miles, dashing free of the Shadow Thousand Tribulation Blade’s encirclement with absolute speed.

Achilles was dumbfounded, eyes filled with that incomparably majestic Golden Winged Divine Bird.

"That’s a True Spirit?"

Transformation Divine Abilities are common enough.

But those who could transform into a True Spirit—within the Great Wilderness, were rare indeed.

The Golden Peng was too fast, a streak of golden light wantonly threading through the cosmos.

Achilles frantically tried to block with Shadow Thousand Blades, but it was futile.

His attack speed couldn’t even compare to the Golden Peng’s tunneling speed.

After nine wingbeats, the Golden Peng ghosted to Achilles’ rear.

"My mind can’t even keep up with his speed... Self-destruct, then."

Achilles, soul fleeing, blasted his body to pieces—becoming ten thousand shadows darting in every direction.

And in that instant, the Golden Peng returned to human shape; Lu Chenzhou, enveloped in nine-colored radiance, thrust down his spear like a Heavenly God.

The Nine-Colored Lotus bloomed from the void, the terrifying might of Heavenly Tribulation descending once more.

Beasts of Destruction, Wood Element Dragon, Gold Element Tiger... nine Primordial Spirit phantoms appeared in turn, sealing this stretch of starry sky.

The ten thousand shadows, before the grinding bloom of the Lotus, vanished into nothingness.

Lu Chenzhou tipped a lost soul, trapped in dream, upon his spear. With a gentle inhale, he refined it on the spot.

"Not worth a blow."