âThe Corpse Refiners? Again?â Lu Yunâs head ached when he heard the name.
He hadnât thought of them as real opponents when he first met them, and even fantasized about working together one day to excavate all of the tombs in the world of immortals. Who wouldâve thought that theyâd be his greatest enemy now?
Hongjun nodded with some resignation. âThis sect is very uncanny. Itâs extremely old and a constant presence in existence. They were there when the Moran Clan and dragons rose to prominence, and while the latter two have become the main voices of the chief worlds, the Corpse Refiners remain the same as they always were.â
âSo⌠I have a question.â Lu Yun took a careful look at Hongjun before asking, âWho might you be, senior? And are you alive or dead?â
âIâm alive,â Hongjun burst out laughing. âIâm alive and so are Pangu and God. My three disciples also walk among the living and weâre all from the grand worlds in the outside realm. At least, you can think about us in this way for now.â
Lu Yun silently committed the âchief worldsâ term to memory. Hongjun had mentioned it more than onceâthis was likely the name of the worlds in the outside realm. His last sentence was also indicative that Hongjunâs background and that of those associated with him were grander than even the chief worlds.
Except, they seemed to have fallen on tough times. They were akin to tigers thatâd left their hills and faced insults by dogs in the plains.
âI always thought that you were the manifestation of the owner of this land,â Lu Yun grumbled.
The owner of the Land of Reincarnation was undoubtedly a peerless powerhouse. Those who visited from the outside were limited by the rules and orders heâd set when he was alive; none of the outsiders dared put a toe out of line.
No one knew why heâd created this landâit was once the territory of the god of Mount Tai. The owner didnât set the endless loops into motion until after the godâs death.
Heâd later died himself, killed by another unparalleled existence.
âHim?â Hongjun shook his head. âCompletely dead a long time ago. He left behind only a body thatâs mutated into a corpse demonâthanks to the bitterness that he nursed in life. It wants to break out and run through the land. The Corpse Refiners seem to be in contact with it.â
âThe Dao King didnât send me here to kill the corpse demon, did he?â Lu Yun couldnât help a shudder. He looked at the star diagram and battle flag in his hands, suddenly feeling like they were hot potatoes.
He was just sixth level immortal dao sequence. While he was a mighty titan in the primary worlds, he didnât even qualify to be an ant when it came to a powerhouse of the chief worlds. Kill or seal away the corpse demon?
Lu Yun didnât want to die an early heroic death!
He finally saw the complete picture in this moment. With Mount Buzhou as the center, there was a formation around it that connected to the Mount Buzhou on the World Star. The entire strength of the Land of Reincarnation was required to suppress the zombie.
That meant it could kill Lu Yun with a twitch of its fingers!
Heâd calculated the future with formula daoâthe Tome of Life and Death wouldnât be able to save him if he dared visit the demon. His death was certain with no hope of survival! Just as Hongjun said, if heâd sealed away the corpse zombie before it obtained corpse dao, they would have a glimmer of hope. Just a glimmer, but hope nonetheless.
It was gone now.
Hongjun first shook his head, then nodded. âYou need to go with me to its tomb and help me break the layout so I can seal it.â
Lu Yun stared fixedly at Hongjun. âNo, you canât go! Youâll die too!â
âIf I donât, then when the true experts of the Corpse Refiners arrive in six hundred years, the corpse demon will return to full wakefulness and we still all die then.â Hongjun smiled brilliantly.
Lu Yun suddenly thought of Mo Yi once telling him to leave with everything he owned and starting anew in the outside realm. Perhaps⌠sheâd already seen the existence of the corpse demon then.
âSix hundred years?â Lu Yun dipped his head in thought.
âYes, just six hundred years,â Hongjun nodded smilingly. âQing Buyi, Chen Xiao, and even Lu Feng have all been by. Theyâre unable to do anything about the corpse demon too. Now with the appearance of the seed of nothing and revitalization of the ancestral planet, this mausoleum is stirring to life. In his Haotian disguise back in the day, the Dao King imprinted the star diagram into this section of the desolate void and rearranged the bodies of the connate demon gods into this layout.
âWe need to shift the tomb into the battle flag to utilize its power of slaughter so we can bury the corpse demon anew.â Hongjunâs eyes shone brightly. âI need to personally ensure that it stays under control during the process, while you call upon the battle flag with your treasure. Perhaps, some day in the far off future, the corpse demon will become one of your subordinates.â
Lu Yun shook as he suddenly thought of an extremely terrifying idea.
âWhen the great one of the original Hongmeng deployed the Dragonquake Scripture, he wanted to shatter the original Hongmeng so the worlds could prosper. But he failed, and when the Hongmeng broke, so did the worlds. After everything died in the original Hongmeng, they were buried in the stars beyond the Central HongmengâŚâ he recounted as he shook like a leaf.
âI did that,â Hongjun nodded. âHe shouldâve succeeded, but I broke the worlds so they would form the mausoleum outside the Central Hongmeng and eventually nurture the battle flag in your hand.â
He reached out a hand and displayed a tiny dot of black light. This was the ultimate concentration of retribution. If it landed on anyone else, even Meng Wang, they would instantly fly apart as dust.
âThe tree god volunteered to die when he discovered our plan, so that he could bear part of the retribution and resentment from my actions. It was outside our expectations that you would later use the remains of his body to cultivate hell dao.â
âAnd the tombs in the world of immortals? And the fact that the entire world is a tomb itself?â Lu Yun asked.
âThe great war of immortals a hundred thousand years ago was also to create tombs. With the world of immortals as a tomb, it connected to the mausoleum in the space around the ancestral planet to jointly seal away the corpse demon,â Hongjun sighed. âThe corpse demon unexpectedly stirred to life a hundred thousand years ago. The mausoleum and Mount Buzhou could no longer keep it confined. We were out of options and had to ignite that great war.
âThe ancient tombs in the world are all from the Dao King, whereas the Dao King and Fuxi jointly turned the world of immortals into a tomb. Tianqi and I wove together a narrative that concealed the truth of that time, making everyone believe that the war that ripped through the world came about because of the chaos, Hongmeng, akasha ghosts, realm monsters, and races thatâd once been ruled by the humans.â
Goosebumps of horror rippled over Lu Yunâs body.