342: Chapter 337 What use are you now?

A violent roar erupted from the depths of the Chaotic Star Sea, shattering several nearby floating meteorite belts.

The Formation of the Beichen Heavenly Palace fleet fell into obvious disarray under this sudden impact.

Su Hongling had already cleaved two main warships in half with her first strike, and before her second swing was even fully completed, the poison mist from Chu Weiwei's side had already silently spread into the ventilation Systems of three other warships.

Screams rose and fell one after another.

"Wh-what kind of background do these people have!"

The effeminate man sitting on the white jade throne could no longer maintain his aloof posture; he sprang to his feet, his folding fan creaking in his grip.

He tried to probe Su Lin's Realm again, but the same abyss-like sense of nothingness rushed toward him, causing a layer of cold sweat to break out on his back.

"Pass the order! Retreat! Retreat to the rear wing and regroup the Formation!"

The man roared hoarsely.

However, it was a step too late.

Luo Ximei's myriad soul banner had already quietly blocked the path the fleet had to take to retreat, unfurling a black and white intertwined canopy that enveloped their entire escape route.

"Want to run?"

She lazily tucked her folding fan into her sleeve, her white-gold right eye flashing with cold light.

"My myriad soul banner hasn't had a taste of flesh today, everyone, pardon me."

As the banner unfurled and rolled, the Divine Souls of nearly a hundred Earth Immortal guards were instantly ripped from their Physical Bodies, dragged into trailing afterimages, and vanished into the banner, leaving not even a complete scream behind.

Mu Qingxue soared directly toward the effeminate man; she was not fast, but every step she took was with absolute composure. Her pale blue eyes locked onto him, and the Law of ice spread from beneath her feet, freezing the surrounding ten-plus miles of the Void Realm into a crystalline, sealed space.

The effeminate man frantically mobilized his Middle Stage Heavenly Immortal immortal essence to break out, only to find that the flow of his Law had inexplicably slowed by nearly seventy percent.

"Extreme Cold Sealing Domain." Mu Qingxue's voice was clean, devoid of any emotion.

"In my Domain, your speed is not enough to be seen."

Inside the golden fortress, Gu Qiuyue held the crack-riddled Golden Abacus, standing blankly in place as tears slid silently down her cheeks.

The sounds outside quieted down bit by bit.

The explosions lessened, the screams diminished, and finally, everything returned to a suffocating silence.

Before long, the outer wall of the fortress began to vibrate slightly.

"Qiuyue, it's time to open the door."

Su Lin's voice came from outside, as calm as if he were commenting on the nice weather.

Gu Qiuyue's hand trembled, and the Golden Abacus nearly fell to the ground. She hurriedly cast a spell to remove the outer defenses layer by layer, then rushed toward the exit.

The moment the fortress hatch opened, she found herself locking eyes with Su Lin.

"Ma... Revered Master."

Gu Qiuyue choked up, as if something were stuck in her throat; she opened her mouth to speak, but only a long, trembling exhale escaped.

Her shrewd, bright golden eyes were now completely red, and even the skin around her eye sockets was flushed with an unnatural heat.

"I heard a rumor in the Upper Realm that the Heavenly Court does not allow ants from the Lower Realm to wander around as they please."

Gu Qiuyue sniffled, her voice still trying to maintain that casual air typical of a merchant, but her trembling was too obvious to fool anyone.

"So, Disciple thought that before Revered Master arrived, I would blow up a few of these rent collectors to serve as a warning… but the price was a bit high."

She smiled bitterly and looked down at the broken abacus in her hand.

Su Lin didn't speak; he simply raised his hand and gently patted her head.

Gu Qiuyue couldn't hold it back anymore; she buried her head into Su Lin's chest, hiding her face completely in his green robe, her shoulders shaking like a sieve.

Chu Weiwei snorted from the side and turned her face away, but the flush on her ears was caught red-handed by Luo Ximei.

"Third, are you jealous?"

"Mind your own business."

The effeminate man was trapped by Mu Qingxue's ice Seal, currently suspended in mid-air, unable to move.

His cultivation was not weak, yet he hadn't even managed to execute a single complete Divine Ability, which caused him to lose all face.

Su Lin walked up to him and scrutinized him for a moment.

"Which one from the Beichen Heavenly Palace are you?"

The man gritted his teeth, his eyes filled with unwillingness: "I am the Seventh Law Enforcer of the Heavenly Palace, Zhuo Xuanyue. If you harm me, the Beichen Heavenly Palace will never let this rest."

"I know."

Su Lin took over the conversation, his expression calm, as if discussing a meaningless trifle.

"You will come to find me."

He paused.

"But before that, tell me one thing—what is the current situation in the Primordial Yao Wasteland of the Extreme North Snow Plains? Are there people from the Beichen Heavenly Palace plotting there?"

Zhuo Xuanyue's eyes flickered slightly.

"You came for that Prodigy?" His voice lowered, revealing a hint of genuine shock, "That Primordial Vicious Beast… has swallowed the Bloodlines of all three Yao Kings. The speed at which the entire Extreme North Yao Race is submitting is more than ten times faster than what the Old Ancestors of the Heavenly Court predicted. The Elder council of the Beichen Heavenly Palace is already discussing whether to list that land as a forbidden zone and Seal it with a Golden Immortal level Formation…"

Su Lin remained expressionless, but his fingertips gripping his immortal sword tightened slightly.

"Youer."

These two words were spoken softly, as if he were sighing in his heart.

"What use do you have left?"

Zhuo Xuanyue froze for a second, then gave up and shut his mouth.

"If you have no use, there is no need to keep you."

Su Lin turned around, retracted the [destiny] immortal sword into his sleeve, and casually flicked a starry Seal onto the center of Zhuo Xuanyue's brow.

It was not to kill, but to completely Seal his cultivation and memories.

This method of handling him was more painful for the people of the Beichen Heavenly Palace than killing him.

Zhuo Xuanyue's body fell silently, crashing into a shallow pit on the surface of the nearest meteorite, where it lay quietly.

In the ruins of the Chaotic Star Sea, they simply cleaned up the battlefield.

Gu Qiuyue retracted the fortress as quickly as possible, clapped her hands, and resumed her shrewd and capable appearance, though her red, swollen eyes betrayed her honestly.

"Revered Master, this is not the place to talk." She spoke first, her tone returning to that of a merchant, "I heard there are seven main warships of the Beichen Heavenly Palace; four have been destroyed, and the remaining three have retreated. The news will soon reach the Heavenly Palace headquarters. We must leave this area as soon as possible."

"The Extreme North Snow Plains; Youer is there."

Su Lin said briefly and strode toward the Void-Breaking Shuttle.

"We'll pick her up first, then find a place to go into full seclusion."

Luo Ximei trailed behind, her eyes slightly narrowed.

"Revered Master, do you have an idea for a place to go into seclusion?"

"I do."

Su Lin stepped onto the gangway and looked back at everyone.

"In Xuanming's memory fragments, there is a blank area omitted by the map of the Taihuang Immortal Domain—existing between the cracks of these thirty-six great Domains is a special space called the Forgotten River Spirit Realm. The density of the Law there is extremely low, making it very suitable for consolidation."

"According to the description in the fragments, that place was left behind by an unnamed powerhouse who gave their life to hold up a pure land during the Primordial War of Gods and Demons. The flow of time inside is vastly different from the outside; one day is equivalent to three months in the outside world."

He paused.

"That will be enough. I need you to truly compress and solidify the fortune you've forcefully acquired there, and thoroughly stabilize your Foundation. Not the kind used to deal with external enemies, but the power that allows you to truly walk steadily in this world."

Everyone was silent for a moment.

Su Hongling was the first to nod; the usual drive in her red slit pupils had lessened, replaced by something heavy.

"Fine, I'll listen to the Old Man. After fighting all these battles recently, I feel a bit restless myself; my cultivation does indeed need to be sorted out."

Chu Weiwei hugged Su Lin's arm, rubbed against it gently, closed her eyes, and spoke after a long while.

"As long as Revered Master is there, anywhere is fine."

Her voice was very soft, rarely lacking those yandere-like probings, just a plain and simple statement.

The Void-Breaking Shuttle cut through the Void Realm again, speeding toward the extreme north.

The cabin was eerily quiet.

Cold Moon leaned against the back of her chair, her golden eyes gazing at the flowing star sea outside the window, silent for a long time. Mu Qingxue sat beside her; the two sat adjacent, occasionally exchanging glances, saying nothing, yet everything was understood.

This journey of hardship had worn away most of the indescribable barriers from before.

Surviving was more worth rejoicing over than anything else.

Gu Qiuyue held the Golden Abacus in her hands, examining it repeatedly, her expression thoughtful.

The cracks reflected the starlight slightly; she reached out her finger to gently stroke them and sighed.

"When I come out of seclusion, Disciple will properly repair this thing."

Luo Ximei leaned against the cabin wall, flipping her folding fan, and suddenly spoke.

"Revered Master, how hard is it to find that Forgotten River Spirit Realm?"

"Not hard," Su Lin said, "because it will sense Cultivators who possess an Inner World of a certain level. As long as we approach that crack zone, it will reveal itself."

"That's good."

Luo Ximei closed her folding fan, her white-gold eye revealing a rare hint of calm.

"Then let's hurry and pick up Fourth Junior Sister, and then we'll disappear for a while."

The Void-Breaking Shuttle broke through the obstructions, crossed the last patch of pitch-black meteorites, and the sky ahead suddenly cleared.

In the extreme north, an aurora was quietly unfurling on the distant horizon.

The color of the aurora was very strange, not the usual emerald green or cyan blue, but a deep ink-green, so heavy it looked like a color overflowing from some Primordial abyss.

"We're here." Su Lin stared out the observation window, his tone calm.

"That is not an aurora."

Several people in the cabin heard this and gathered at the window to look.

They were still far away, but the ink-green light was exceptionally clear because it was large enough—absurdly large, as if someone had painted the entire extreme northern sky in that gloomy color.

"…What is Fourth doing?" Su Hongling stared at the light, her tone carrying a hint of guilty respect, "She dyed the sky green."

Chu Weiwei patted the edge of the observation window and squinted to look closely.

"It's not dyeing, it's Demonic Qi." Her voice lowered, carrying the calmness unique to a professional making a judgment, "It is the Origin Qi of the [Abyssal Devouring] Bloodline leaking out in a state of extreme activation. This concentration… Youer has completely subjugated the Yao Race in this area; all the Demonic Qi is converging in her direction."

"This child," Cold Moon rubbed her temples, her expression hovering between emotion and a headache, "is just too fast."

The terrain of the Extreme North Snow Plains was extremely treacherous.

Continuous icebergs refracted a deep blue light under the aurora, and the wind swept ice shards across the bare rock faces, emitting sharp whistling sounds.

Normally, in this bitterly cold place, one would need to constantly circulate immortal essence to breathe freely.

But as the Void-Breaking Shuttle went deeper, the closer it got to the core of that ink-green aurora, the thicker the oppressive, stay-away-from-me feeling in the air became.

Birds and beasts were extinct; even the low-level Yao Beasts lurking in the ice crevices had disappeared.

The entire snow plain was dead silent.

"Revered Master, land here." Gu Qiuyue suddenly raised her hand, pointing to a relatively flat ice plain ahead.

Su Lin landed the Void-Breaking Shuttle slowly. The moment the hatch opened, a blast of warm air carrying the damp, earthy smell rushed toward them, completely out of place with the icy world outside.

Everyone stepped onto the ice; the snow beneath their feet was actually soft, even carrying a hint of warmth.

Within ten steps, the ice and snow melted, revealing the deep brown humus soil layer beneath.

And in that humus, it was densely packed with ink-green roots as fine as hair.

Chu Weiwei crouched down, pinched one, and shook it.

"The tips of vines." She stood up and looked into the distance, "Walk in that direction, it won't be too far."

After walking for another quarter of an hour, the scene ahead made everyone stop in their tracks.

Deep in the Extreme North Snow Plains, there was a large area of land that didn't look like it belonged in the Taihuang Immortal Domain at all.

That land was covered in a dense black jungle with thick branches and fleshy leaves, every leaf gleaming with an ink-green light. Countless vines as thick as a human arm intertwined and spread throughout the jungle, some hundreds of feet long, like nets spread out.

In the center of the jungle, there was a huge dome woven from vines.

Under the dome, three huge figures lay on the ground, lying obediently, not daring to even breathe loudly.

The size of these three figures, each of them looked at least dozens of feet tall, and the aura on their bodies, even in a prostrate state, was enough to make ordinary Earth Immortals tremble with fear.

Directly in front of them, a slender girl with black hair sat cross-legged, leaning against the thickest black tree trunk.

Her dress was torn in several places, and there was an unhealed scratch on her shoulder, but her expression was surprisingly calm, even carrying a lazy satisfaction of having eaten one's fill.

On her lap sat a translucent blood-colored crystal; it was the Inner Core of some Yao King.

She was gently licking it with the tip of her tongue, as if savoring a decent piece of candy.

"Youer."

Su Lin's voice came in from the edge of the jungle.

Ye You's ink-green slit pupils slowly opened and looked in the direction of the voice.

She froze for half a second.

The Inner Core rolled from her palm and hit the humus soil, but she didn't bother to pick it up; she jumped up from beside the tree trunk, stepped on the vines for leverage with her toes, and in two bounds, she was in front of Su Lin.

She didn't speak, just stared at Su Lin, the green light in her slit pupils flickering.