103: Chapter 101 Gathering

He simply turned his head and glanced at the Empress beside him.

The scars on her shoulders had completely healed, leaving no trace behind. The imperial sword returned to its scabbard, and her black dragon-patterned imperial robes rustled in the wind.

Sensing his gaze, she turned her face slightly, her Phoenix eyes meeting his for a brief moment.

There were no words in that glance.

Yet, in that gaze, there was too much that only they understood.

Chu Ye withdrew his gaze and looked toward Ao Yu.

"What I want," he said, "you cannot afford to give."

He turned around.

"I won't kill you today, so you can return to the Dragon Clan and tell your ancestors that the debt between the Dragon Clan and me has not yet been settled."

His figure vanished into the Void Realm rift at the end of the canyon. The Empress, Li Yue, and Cold Moon followed silently, one figure after another.

Silence returned to the Azure Dragon Abyss.

Ao Yu stood suspended alone in the Void Realm, looking down at the small, unhealable cracks on his dragon claws.

A long time passed.

Suddenly, he gave a short laugh.

That smile held many complex meanings: humiliation, resentment, anger, and a very faint trace of... awe, which he was unwilling to admit even to himself.

"Chu Ye..." he whispered the name as if chewing on a bitter fruit.

"The matter between us is not over yet."

He turned and sped away toward the Dragon Clan camp.

Behind him, the wind of the Azure Dragon Abyss swept through the canyon, blowing the remaining dragon-patterned Dao marks on the cliff walls into fine golden dust that scattered into the boundless Void Realm.

In the distance, on the summit of an unnamed mountain.

Xuanji withdrew the [Sword of Illumination], and the wisp of Sword Intent in her palm slowly extinguished.

She stood still for a long time, lost in thought.

Then, she looked down at her palm.

The weight of a broken sword had briefly rested there, and it had once been tightly held by another hand with rough, thick calluses.

She slowly clenched her fist, then released it.

Her plain white robes fluttered gently in the wind before falling still.

Far away, in the deeper reaches of the Void Realm within the Heavenly Road, some ancient existence seemed to have been awakened by this brief yet intense clash, slowly opening eyes that had slept for eons.

Xuanji raised her head and looked in that direction.

She saw an unprecedentedly majestic Luck gathering—like a celestial river hanging upside down, like ten thousand dragons paying homage to their ancestor.

It was an existence deeper, further, and more ancient than the Sword Immortal Ruins.

That was the true source of the "Death Tribulation" in Chu Ye's prophecy.

It was also the hexagram she ultimately intended to verify on this journey through the Heavenly Road.

Xuanji remained silent for a moment, drawing the last wisp of Sword Intent into the depths of her Divine Soul.

Then, she turned and took a step toward that direction.

One step.

And she was already a hundred miles away.

The wind continued to blow.

The unnamed mountain summit was empty.

News of the battle at the Azure Dragon Abyss spread through the Heavenly Road with startling speed.

The Dragon Clan's Crown Prince, Ao Yu, led a group to ambush Chu Ye but was severely injured instead, his dragon claws scarred, and three royal elites were left with one dead and two wounded.

The seven-man sword formation of the Myriad Dao Alliance War Hall was broken; the Personal Disciple of the Vice Hall Master suffered damage to his Dao Heart and spat blood on the spot.

Three remnants of the Shadow Pavilion were lost, while the rest fled.

This was the first time since the opening of the Heavenly Road that Chu Ye's camp had head-on crushed a joint encirclement by the top forces of the Middle Territory.

And this time, it was nothing but a blatant crushing.

In a tavern Secret Realm, people discussed in hushed tones: "What kind of Opportunity did that Chu Ye obtain?"

"Ao Yu is a battle Dao Prodigy that the Dragon Clan produces only once every five hundred years. With the seven members of the Myriad Dao Alliance War Hall joining forces, they could even fight an ordinary True Immortal..."

Someone sneered, "What Opportunity? Haven't you heard? Palace Master Li Yue, one of the two from the Guanghan Immortal Palace by his side, has achieved a Breakthrough."

"A True Immortal?"

"Absolutely true. In the battle of the Azure Dragon Abyss, she suppressed the Dragon Clan Bloodline with the melody [Moonfall], leaving Ao Yu without even the strength to fight back."

Silence.

After a long time, someone sighed softly, "The Guanghan Immortal Palace... after ten thousand years of pure cultivation, two generations of Palace Masters have ended up as his harem."

"Harem?"

Another person scoffed, "Have you ever seen a harem where the Palace Master personally charges into battle and protects him with her life?"

No one answered.

The occasional clinking of wine cups sounded, only to be quickly swallowed by a deeper silence.

Meanwhile, on the fifth level of the Heavenly Road, the Myriad Poison Abyss.

Witch Queen Jiu You slowly opened her eyes.

She had been lingering at the bottom of the abyss for three days.

The surroundings were littered with the remains of ancient poisonous creatures; some had turned into fossils, while others still held a final wisp of resentful toxic Qi.

An ordinary Immortal Realm Cultivator staying here for half an hour would have the poison seep into their marrow and damage their Dao foundation.

Yet, at the deepest part of the abyss, she had endured the erosion of ten thousand poisons with her Physical Body for three whole days.

For before her lay the complete remains of an ancient Poison Dragon.

The dragon bones were deep purple, a hundred zhang long, coiled as if in sleep. Even after being fallen for countless millennia, the dragon's remains were still surrounded by a thick toxic mist capable of killing ordinary Immortals.

The dragon's head was slightly raised, and a wisp of ghostly green light remained in its hollow eye sockets—the final condensation of the Poison Dragon's Origin, the last resentment toward this world that it refused to let dissipate even in death.

The Witch Queen stared at that wisp of light and licked the corner of her lips.

"I've waited for three days," her voice was lazy and husky, carrying an irrepressible excitement. "You're finally willing to come out."

The wisp of light slowly floated up, hovering before the dragon's forehead like a ghostly green, inextinguishable toxic flame.

Then, it "looked" at the Witch Queen.

Or rather, it "recognized" the Witch Queen.

Eons ago, the Poison Dragon clan and the Witch God Temple shared a deep history.

It was an ancient covenant lost even to the Western Region's Witch God sacrificial ceremonies, a memory carved deep within the Bloodline, far older than any written record.

The remnant soul of the Poison Dragon had no words.

But it bowed its head slightly—the highest tribute of the ancient Dragon Clan to an "ally."

The Witch Queen rose, her bare feet treading upon the venom-coated spine of the dragon remains as she walked toward the head step by step.

Her purple-black gauze robes rustled in the toxic mist, yet the pair of silver bells at her waist made no sound, for even the sound of the bells was corroded by the overly dense toxic miasma.

She stopped before the dragon's head and reached out her hand.

The moment her slender white fingers touched that ghostly green wisp of light—

Boom!!!

Beneath the Myriad Poison Abyss, a terrifying wave of poison erupted, enough to tear through the Void Realm!

The toxic wave surged upward, breaking through the mouth of the abyss and piercing straight into the sky of the fifth level of the Heavenly Road.

Every Cultivator within a thousand miles paled simultaneously; whether competing for opportunities or in secluded cultivation, all looked toward that soaring pillar of ghostly green light in horror.

A knowledgeable person said with a trembling voice, "Poi... Poison Dragon remains? Someone has refined the natal poison Origin of an ancient Poison Dragon?!"

Another person trembled even more violently, "The direction of that light pillar... it's one of Chu Ye's people, that Witch Queen of the Western Regions..."

Silence.

Then, someone whispered, "The Dragon Clan just suffered a huge loss at his hands, and now his woman has refined the Poison Dragon remains... is this a fucking coincidence?"

No one answered.

Because everyone knew the answer.

The fourth level of the Heavenly Road, the Sea of Illusory Dreams.

Su Qingyue had been wandering here for five days.

She did not like fighting and killing.

The Fox Clan's Legacy was never on the front lines of a battlefield, but in the cracks of the human heart, the folds of dreams, and the gray areas where desire meets fear.

Those talents, dismissed as "unorthodox" by the Myriad Dao Alliance and the Dragon Clan, were Sharp Weapons in her hands, more lethal than any divine armament.

At this moment, she stood upon a sea formed by countless shattered dreams, the phantom of nine tails swaying gently behind her, each tail connected to a dream fragment she was "digesting."