655 Ten Years (2/2)
”Can the elderly not get mad at the way you treated uncle?!” Zhou Mu blinked and laughed.
”If you call her elderly again she'll appear in front of you immediately and give you a good lesson!” Zhou Bao laughed heartily. ”Let's go and visit the ladies of the family and see what they can do to me!!!” As he spoke, Zhou Bao tapped his son's shoulder, pulling him towards the backyard of his palace.
10 years was not long too for a cultivator, but it could also change a lot of things. For example, his daughter had grown from a toddler to a teen; a dynasty could die and a new one could be born, or another new generation of experts could grow and shine. It could also happen that the influence of the Divine Wind Palace could shrink totally.
This was what could have happened in 10 years.
After returning to Wuyang Region from Thunder Emperor's touring abode, Zhou Bao stopped asking about worldly matters. He had close relationships with the cultivators who were in contact with Wang She openly and with Child-endowing Buddha secretly. He did not care about the rest.
With him guarding the Wuyang Region, whether he was present or not, not a sane soul would come and cause trouble. The addition of a suitable pathway had made the Wuyang Region the northern lord. Just like the Northern Yuan back in the days, the whole Northern area fell under his feet. As compared to Northern Yuan, the capability of Wuyang Region was even much stronger and had more deterrence.
However, Zhou Bao hadn't taken the chance to unify and rule the northern area. If so, it would become an enfeoffed country. He had never wanted to touch the profits of the enfeoff elites. He even favored them a little at many instances. This led the northern leaders to take his orders. As for the Jin that enfeoffed them back then, these lords had already long forgotten about them.
The world changed very drastically, likewise for the world of cultivation. In the Thunder Emperor's touring abode, the Divine Wind Palace lost their lord. There was huge internal chaos.
When Yu Taixu used to be around, he could still control the fights between different gangs in the palace using his strong capabilities. But with him dead, internal chaos arose in the Divine Wind Palace and divisions started to appear. If it was not for the intervention of the Highest Elder who stopped the disputes using his thunderbolt hands, perhaps Divine Wind Palace, who had reigned the Heaven Realm for thousands of years with its power, would really fall into pieces.
Even though forcefully controlled the internal problems, there was increasing pressure from outside.
Mr.Feng IX, who entered the Thunder Emperor's touring abode with Yu Taixu, came back alive and told everyone all that happened in the journey. The remaining Four Great Sects, even the few greatest sects of Three Western Regions, all heard about how Yu Taixu, the lord of Divine Wind Palace had fallen. When they heard that a Supreme Fairy Weapon had also disappeared, they secretly sucked in a cold breath and started getting into action.
By losing multiple fairy weapons, a Supreme Fairy Weapon and a lord, without doubt, the capabilities of Divine Wind Palace must have fallen tremendously. Although no one was sure how much, at least they knew that the Divine Wind Palace was not all high and mighty like it used to be. Indeed, as expected, the heavily-injured Divine Wind Palace could not gain back their previous status. Their influence had shrunk tremendously. Apart from giving up the Central Mainland Region, the Divine Wind Palace also gave up another region in the Four Eastern Regions. That was how they managed to secure the Four Great Sects.
In the Central Mainland Region, Zhou Bao initially expressed with a stern attitude that he would give up the influence of the School of Five Virtues. The majority of the Divine Wind Palace and the royalty of Great Jin all expressed their anger. However, there was nothing the royalty could do. As for the School of Five Virtues, after Zhou Bao and Wang She jointly-fought for it, its influence had greatly declined and returned to its home base, the Divine Wind Palace. This lost influence had been supported on The Man of Honor Ji Zhongtang and The White Blademaster Lu Shaoyou.
The previous Chief of Tian Long Taoism was now the top Elder. The grudge between Wang She, The White Blademaster Lu Shaoyou and The Man of Honor Ji Zhongtang had already become the most talked-about in the Jianghu. It was not only passed by mouth, numerous busybodies even invented their own stories and spread them in restaurants. People were interested to find out what will be the ending of the trio's grudge.
However, they could not know that Wang She had revealed to Ji Zhongtang his identity 10 years ago. After leaving with a cold smile, both parties seemed to not have any more dealings. When Zhou Bao and his team returned from Thunder Emperor's touring abode and fought against the School of Five Virtues, Zhou Bao and Wang She displayed an overwhelming power. Eventually, the ending was marked by the recognition from the School of Five Virtues. There was no drama of any sort that the public wanted to see.
The influence of the Four Great Sects had expanded to two regions and it no longer pressured the Divine Wind Palace. As the internal chaos in the palace ceased, the Four Great Sects and Divine Wind Palace was, once again, at an awkward stage of balance. This was a fragile yet delicate balance that could be broken anytime. However, no one knew who would break it first.
In the past ten years, the largest events that had happened would be the seeping of Infinite Star Sea's influence as well as the exploration of the Ancient Ruins. In the second year since Zhou Bao returned from Thunder Emperor's touring abode, a series of strange events happened in the martial arts world of Jianghu. Many talkative experts emerged all of a sudden. Even Individual Immortals and Genuine Immortals started to appear in inexplicable places. Their strange appearances always caused a huge ruckus. Initially, the practitioners did not notice it. Once, a Level Nine expert was unconsciously drawn by a strange energy from a nearby mountain. He went to take a look and found a heavily-injured practitioner. This practitioner's attire was very strange. Being extremely hurt he was still trying to snatch the expert's body to be reborn again. Eventually, he failed to succeed because of his wounds. However, this expert managed to suck away a part of his memory, which revealed a big secret.
It turned out that these practitioners came from the Infinite Star Sea and have entered the Heaven Realm macro world. When the Four Great Sects from Four Eastern Regions picked themselves up from their previous defeat and entered the Infinite Star Sea to explore, the practitioners from Infinite Star Sea were attracted by the Heaven Realm. Behind the Infinite Star Sea was the Milky Way Star Area and the Purple Scorpion Star Area, as well as the strength of 14 macro worlds.
These macro worlds have been passed from antiquity times. They were not like the macro worlds from Heaven Realm that have been broken for generations, hence losing their inheritance. These ones have been passed down continuously. Thus, they were very clear about the secrets from antiquity times. They knew every single detail about many of the secrets in the Heaven Realm, just like how the guy who got possessed by Devil Fetus knew where the Thunder Emperor's touring abode was. There were even many schools of these macro worlds that started from the Heaven Realm.
Hence, after discovering the secret of the Heaven Realm, the strong sects and higher officials from these macro worlds started to come up with endless ideas to search for the traces of the Heaven Realm, which had been lost for thousands of years. Eventually, they found a clue in the Infinite Star Sea. They did some reverse engineering using the two destructed Transmitting Formation. Although they did not manage to calculate the exact location of the macro world, they luckily managed to recover one of them. They then worked on it and made it a one-way Transmitting Formation.
A one-way Transmitting Formation did not require to be connected to another magic formation from the macro world where you planned on going. By directly using the Law of Space, a one-way Transmitting Formation would forcefully transport the practitioners from the Infinite Star Sea to the Heaven Realm. This method was very dangerous. It could even be called a no-return method.
Unless necessary, no one wanted to do this.
But that was nothing to worry about for them. The highest officials from the two powerful Star Areas and 14 macro worlds have thought of a few methods. They provided a large sum of money and also equipped the people with secrets of the Ancient Ruins that were passed down from the sects and gangs from the antiquity times. There used to be countless inheritances from the sects in antiquity times. However, they were well hidden in the endless space-time mazes of the Heaven Realm. As long as one of the secrets was acquired, one could increase his capabilities tremendously. Precisely because of this, many practitioners who were unable to improve further were attracted. At the same time, they even thought of an extremely cunning method to get the most out of it. There were a large number of practitioners in the 14 macro worlds, plenty more than in the Seven-deity Regions. When the grass patch is big, you get all kinds of sheep. In the 14 macro worlds, there were many black sheep who have triggered many to be after their lives, or simply were failures. The highest officials actually allowed these people to enter the Transmitting Formation and even promised on their own name that they would be able to return safely. Their sins were washed away once and for all, even if they raped the favorite daughter of the highest official from each of the 14 macro worlds, they would still be forgiven. This made many bastards who had been pushed to the limit to choose this.
That Level Nine expert, for example, was a subordinate of the Dragon Thunder Palace. He understood the seriousness of the matter and immediately reported back. The palace did not waste any time and also notified the other Four Great Sects instantly.
This incident was sort of a breather for the Divine Wind Palace on a certain level. They regained their footing and from then on, the five biggest sects fought hand in hand to kill these practitioners from the Infinite Star Sea.
Initially, their tactic was very obvious but still effective. However, everyone soon realized that there were too many practitioners from the Infinite Star Sea. They also found out that the Transmitting Formation randomly chose the places where it transported the people into Seven-deity Regions. This caused the task of finding intruders much more difficult. Most importantly, because these intruders knew many secrets of the Heaven Realm, they would usually appear at places with ancient sect inheritance. This ancient sect inheritance was much more worth than the price of their intruding. Soon, the killing plan became a search-for-treasure kind of plan. After a Genuine Immortal found two Pure Yang Celestial Devices and a broken fairy weapon in an Ancient Ruin, the act of digging for ancestors' treasures became common in the Seven-deity Regions. Now, they no longer killed intruders directly. Instead, they would ask them for the secrets of the Ancient Ruin. In just a short 10 years, 23 Ancient Ruins had been discovered. Among them, seven were useless. However, the remaining 16 had things like Pure Yang Celestial Devices and Highest Heaven Celestial Devices buried in them. Many extinct mysterious objects like Spiritual Stones and medicinal herbs were also found there. The pioneers and leaders of this search for Ancient Ruins was marked by Child-endowing Buddha of Snow Mountain Great Wheel Temple, finding a huge medicinal garden and a fairy weapon in the ruins of a sect from antiquity times.
A Fairy weapon, it was a complete fairy weapon.
Although it seemed immoral, the benefits were very attractive. At least the few big sects from the Seven-deity Regions have more or less gained one or two fairy weapons, as well as numerous Pure Yang Celestial Devices. They even had countless new Magic Drugs and Spiritual Stones. In just 10 years, the whole Seven-deity Regions seemed to have returned back to the medieval period.
However, the situation had cooled down. Instead, the cultivation of the Four Eastern Regions had changed drastically.
A large amount of higher rank practitioners from sects other than the five biggest sects were coming out. They ranged from Level Seven experts to even Individual Immortals. The large number was far too big for the five biggest sects to be able to stop them all. For such a thing to happen, one of the reasons was Zhou Bao sinisterly releasing that few pieces of prescription of elixir. This made becoming an expert master of martial arts no longer an impossible feat for normal martial arts practitioners. Ten years ago, teen experts like Zhou Bao and Ji Yeyue were enough to cause a sensation in the Central Mainland Region. Now, however, in these 10 years, there were at least 50 teen experts rising from just Jin of Central Mainland Region alone. They were increasing by hundreds. As a result, the price of medicinal herbs required to make Bone-Forging Pill, Tendon-Changing Pill, Blood Exchanging Pill and Marrow Cleansing Pill all increased tremendously. The market for medicinal herbs in the Seven-deity Region was taken over by chaos for a period of time. As for Anyuan Store, it had already stockpiled a huge amount of medicinal herbs, hence earning a huge benefit out of them. Furthermore, with the support of Zhou Bao's Azure Big World, these low-level medicinal herbs were always obtainable to him. He could have whatever amount he wanted. However, there is always an extent to all issues. If the ground was made of gold, then gold would not have any value anymore. Hence, Zhou Bao did not sell his medicinal herbs.
The slow 10 years passed by in an instant. The Seven-deity Regions changed drastically. It no longer looked like it used to.