76: Chapter 76 The Emperor Sheds Blood, Using His Body as a Wall!

Lin Yuan followed Zhen Hai across the empty academy square.

Behind them, the door of that simple tea room was tightly closed, cutting off the mountain-heavy gaze of that silent Sovereign.

The two of them remained silent the whole way.

At the edge of the academy was a landing pad shrouded by a special formation.

An all-black fighter jet hovered quietly, its lines sleek and filled with a sense of violent beauty.

It had no propellers or exhaust ports; the space around it distorted slightly as it silently defied gravity.

The cabin door was open, and ten warriors dressed in identical dark gray combat suits stood in two rows, their postures ramrod straight.

Their auras were heavy and steady, and each of them carried an indelible scent of blood.

They were all ruthless characters who had crawled out of mountains of corpses and seas of blood.

Upon seeing Zhen Hai and Lin Yuan, the ten people moved in unison, slamming their fists against their left chests.

Bang!

A dull thud.

Their gaze toward Lin Yuan was sharp, direct, and purely aimed at branding this young face into their minds as the highest priority protection target.

"Board."

Zhen Hai spoke concisely and stepped in first.

Lin Yuan followed closely behind.

The cabin door closed, the jet vibrated slightly, and then it ascended vertically with terrifying acceleration, instantly piercing through the clouds.

The scenery outside the window receded rapidly, turning into blurred patches of color.

After a dozen breaths, the jet reached an altitude of ten thousand meters and entered a steady cruise.

Inside the cabin, besides the cockpit, were rows of cold metal seats.

The members of the Emergency Support Group each closed their eyes to rest, long accustomed to this rhythm of heading to the battlefield.

Lin Yuan did not speak.

He turned his head and looked through the special porthole at the ground receding rapidly below.

From ten thousand meters high, the mountains and rivers were as tiny as a sandbox model.

However, as the jet headed north, the color of the land began to change.

Lush green was replaced by vast stretches of scorched black and deathly gray.

A shocking sight appeared at the end of the horizon.

It was a massive, pitch-black rift.

It spanned the entire northern land, like a wound that would never heal, hacked out by some unspeakable, terrifying existence.

Pitch-black demonic energy rose from the rift, turning into churning ink that corroded the sky and mountains, staining everything with despair.

Even from a great distance, Lin Yuan could still feel the aura of deathly silence emanating from the rift, enough to make all things wither.

"Do you see it?"

Zhen Hai, who had been silent, seemed to notice his gaze and spoke up for the first time.

In the voice of this iron-blooded King Realm Expert, there was a heaviness carved into his very bones.

"Forty years ago, in the Seventh War Zone—the place we are going now—this rift appeared without warning."

"It connects directly to another dimension, which we call the 'Nine Nether Demon Abyss'."

"That day, a demigod-level powerhouse of the Demon Race, the 'Nirvana Demon Lord', attempted to use this as a springboard for his true body to descend."

Zhen Hai's fist clenched tightly in a corner where no one noticed, the veins on the back of his hand bulging.

"That was the darkest day for the Three Northern Cities."

His voice revealed a bone-deep sense of helplessness.

"The sky was torn apart, the earth wailed, and millions died in despair."

"All resistance was as fragile as paper before that demigod."

"We... were helpless."

In Lin Yuan's mind, Mountain Sinking Deep Abyss's last low murmur surfaced.

Torch Dragon.

Nirvana Demon Lord.

So it turns out that sealed history was actually so tragic.

"Just when everyone thought the North would be annihilated, two people stood up."

Zhen Hai's breathing became heavy, and a flame mixed with reverence and grief ignited in his eyes.

"One was the Torch Dragon Sovereign of that time, Shi Huiming."

"That... man who was incredibly beautiful, and also incredibly crazy."

Zhen Hai closed his eyes, seemingly recalling that scene that made the world lose its color.

"To stop the Nirvana Demon Lord from crossing the boundary, he made the craziest decision."

"Sacrificing his eyes, sacrificing his divine soul, sacrificing his everything."

"At the cost of his own complete chaos and demise, he transformed into a sky full of stars, forcibly sealing that airspace and forever blocking the Nirvana Demon Lord's descent path."

Zhen Hai's voice was trembling.

"That night, across the entire north of Yan Country, the sea of stars lost its light."

The cabin was deathly silent.

Lin Yuan stared blankly at the pitch-black abyss below.

He couldn't imagine what kind of tragic determination that was.

An Emperor Realm expert, at the cost of the total destruction of his divine soul, exchanged for a glimmer of hope.

"The Torch Dragon Sovereign's sacrifice prevented the demigod's descent, but that rift could not be closed."

Zhen Hai's voice sounded again, pulling Lin Yuan's thoughts back.

"The demon army continued to pour out incessantly."

"To hold the breach, Dean Yue... the Prison Suppressing Sovereign at the time, made another choice."

"An equally crazy decision."

“He walked to the very center of the rift, and under the gaze of all of us, he sacrificed all of his cultivation, talent, and Emperor Realm Dao Fruit, smelting them into a stone tablet."

Zhen Hai closed his eyes, unable to bear the memory any longer.

"He turned himself from a person into a wall blocking the gates of hell."

"A monument... forever suppressing the mountains and rivers."

Boom!

In Lin Yuan's mind, something exploded.

He suddenly lowered his head, looking at the simple and unadorned Black Yellow Stone Tablet in his palm.

At this moment, it was no longer cold.

It was scalding hot, almost burning his palm.

Lin Yuan finally understood why, beneath Mountain Sinking Deep Abyss's mountain-like body, there was always a lingering sense of loneliness.

He also finally understood why he would say "protection is the strongest martial way."

Because he had done exactly that.

Using his everything to protect the human race behind him.

Lin Yuan slowly tightened his palm, pressing the stone tablet firmly against his chest.

A sense of heaviness weighed on his heart.

But this weight did not make him afraid.

Instead, it stirred the deepest madness and wildness in his bones!

The Sovereign bleeds, using his body as a wall.

How solemn and stirring!

How tragic!

And the source of all this, that so-called 'Nirvana Demon Lord', was still alive today.

Lin Yuan raised his head and looked again at the massive scar outside the window that pierced through heaven and earth.

In his eyes, that ultimate pitch-black was even deeper than the Demon Abyss itself.

"Instructor Zhen Hai."

He suddenly spoke, his voice very soft.

"Are demigods... very strong?"

Zhen Hai was taken aback.

"Very strong."

Zhen Hai squeezed out two words with difficulty.

"That is a level of life beyond the Emperor Realm; a single thought can shatter stars."

"They are truly... invincible beings beneath the gods."

"Is that so?"

Lin Yuan gave a soft response and stopped talking.

The Emperor Realm is also very strong.

Strong enough to suppress a region and be revered by millions.

But in the face of a true worldly catastrophe, even one as strong as the Torch Dragon still had to transform into stars, his divine soul completely destroyed.

Even one as strong as the Prison Suppressor still had to sacrifice everything to become a cold stone tablet.

The so-called Emperor Realm, in front of even more terrifying existences, was nothing more than a slightly stronger "consumable."

At this moment.

Lin Yuan's thirst for power climbed to its peak.

But he didn't want to become the Torch Dragon, nor did he want to become the Prison Suppressor.

Solemn sacrifice is essentially the helplessness of the weak.

It is the final choice when power is insufficient.

What he wanted was not to trade his life for peace.

What he wanted was absolute power that could completely devour and crush all threats, leaving not even a trace of ash!

What he wanted was to trample all enemies underfoot and turn them into food for his own evolution!

The jet roared, charging without hesitation into that dark war zone shrouded in demonic energy.