Five days later.
The people of the Gongsun Clan had not only experienced that mysterious space called the Ti-Space Division Formation but, within it, had also gone through the Yoga Tendon-Reversing Heaven-Dance Formation.
Even though their bodies had been remade to suit martial arts, the Gongsun Clan curiously showed slow progress in actually learning martial arts.
Thanks to that, Yeon Woo Jin extended the deadline from the original three days to five.
Going place to place like this, seeing people and then living inside the Ti-Space Division Formation, Yeon Woo Jin’s ti had passed far more than anyone else’s.
His actual age was only just over twenty, but counting the ti spent inside the Ti-Space Division Formation, it was no different from ten years having gone by.
But in the Ti-Space Division Formation, one does not grow old.
Ti flows, yet the people who stay there are beings of another dinsion, and thus unaffected by ti.
So even prolonged training inside it did not age them.
Yeon Woo Jin learned that later.
Once he realized it, he began to exploit the Ti-Space Division Formation all the more.
It wasn’t bad for him either.
He was training that much inside as well.
At present Yeon Woo Jin’s realm stood at Manifestation Realm, Eleventh Star.
Back when he’d been in the Transformation Realm, he already had no equals—so what of now, at Manifestation Realm, Eleventh Star?
Yet Yeon Woo Jin was not satisfied.
He believed he had to rise not just to Manifestation Realm but to the Mythic Realm.
So he did not slack in training.
That sight of Yeon Woo Jin spurred others on.
If even Yeon Woo Jin—who possessed overwhelming power—worked that hard, how could they dare take things lightly?
Thus the people who lived alongside Yeon Woo Jin never slacked in their training.
The sa held true for the Gongsun Clan.
Inside the Ti-Space Division Formation they had experienced Yeon Woo Jin’s power and seen just how strong he was.
And even so, he did not let up on training.
That was a powerful jolt to the Gongsun Clan.
After spending five months inside the Ti-Space Division Formation with Yeon Woo Jin, the Gongsun Clan leadership erged.
For the first ti in a while, they gathered in the clan’s great council hall.
The sight of the council hall after five months felt dear to them.
“Huh. We were in there five months, and out here only five days have passed.”
“It’s astonishing. How could anyone create such a formation?”
“He’s a god. If it is the work of a god, what could be impossible?”
They pondered what Yeon Woo Jin was.
Since they were a house of sharp minds, such pondering was only natural.
What conclusion did they reach?
It was simple.
Judging ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ by the totality of what Yeon Woo Jin had shown, he was not human.
These were the abilities Yeon Woo Jin displayed in the Ti-Space Division Formation:
He pulled objects out of thin air, fired beams from his eyes, and flew through the sky.
Then, at one point, he looked at the cave wall where the Ti-Space Division Formation was installed and suddenly said he could see a gold vein.
When Yeon Woo Jin stretched out his hand, hard rock opened as if it were tofu.
When he drew his hand back, he was holding a nugget of gold that shone with yellow light.
Because they hadn’t been active for a ti, the clan was under financial pressure—Yeon Woo Jin resolved that in an instant.
He is a god.
He must be.
He did with utter ease what humans could never do.
“When the forr Martial Alliance Leader said he was already that man’s subordinate, I was truly shocked.”
“That alone? Isn’t it even more shocking that most of the martial world is already under his banner?”
“While we were shut away, the martial world was upended. Now we must decide.”
“Agreed. We must decide whether to serve him or not.”
“What decision is there to make? The answer is already obvious.”
“Indeed. The answer is already set. We are gathered to affirm it.”
They looked at one another and nodded.
Then they turned to Clan Head Gongsun Chan.
Since everyone’s minds were aligned, it fell to Gongsun Chan to make the decision.
Receiving his retainers’ gazes, Gongsun Chan gave a faint smile and rose.
“There was no need for a eting in the first place. You all already know where my heart stands, don’t you?”
“Even so, it sets us at ease to hear it plainly from the Clan Head.”
“Hahaha. Very well. I’ll say it plainly.”
Gongsun Chan looked over the assembly and spoke.
“From today, our Gongsun Clan will follow Lord Yeon Woo Jin.”
“Waaa!”
At Gongsun Chan’s words, the retainers cheered.
Once the cheers died down, Gongsun Chan added a word.
“We joined later than others. So to earn his eye, we must work twice as hard as anyone.”
“Understood!”
“Also, we will go to the Central Plains Alliance and compete with the Zhuge Clan. Are you confident?”
“We are confident!”
“What do we lack compared to the Zhuge Clan?”
“This ti we’ll crush their pride flat!”
With their bodies toughened, confidence brimd in them all.
“Good! Let’s do it! And let’s beco the house that stands by his side!”
“Yes! We’ll give it everything!”
Thus the Gongsun Clan ca under Yeon Woo Jin’s banner.
****
The Southern Wilds.
If you go far south from the Central Plains, you reach a dense jungle that looks unfit for human life.
What’s more, that jungle teed with all manner of things that threatened human life.
Poisons as a matter of course, and all kinds of vicious beasts and snakes.
Though it seed an environnt in which people could not live, people did live there.
Where people live, power blocs exist.
The power that ruled this place was the Southern Wilds Beast Palace.
True to the na “Beast Palace,” they tad the beasts of the Southern Wilds and used them like weapons.
That did not an their martial arts were weak.
Bodies adapted to the hot climate could retain searing heat, and martial arts that used that heat had developed.
Because they accumulated the energy of the sun in their bodies to use it, they nad this martial art the Solar Divine Art.
Among all martial arts in the world, it was the art that used the hottest yang energy.
In truth, if you were struck by one who had mastered this art to an extre, the heat alone could lt your body.
They had no particular dissatisfaction with life here.
Food abounded in all directions, and living wasn’t bad.
Only one thing was lacking: it was boring.
They had no native enemies and no one to oppose them, so even if they trained martial arts and tad beasts, there was no occasion to use them.
They wanted to see how strong they were—yet going all the way to the Central Plains felt far too botherso.
They were lazy by nature, after all.
Even so, when it ca to training and beast-taming, they were more passionate and diligent than anyone.
It was their very way of life.
They too had a precious treasure.
The Palace Lord’s youngest daughter.
Everyone in the palace was utterly smitten with her cuteness and kindness.
Even the taciturn, strict Palace Lord Maeng Jong turned into a completely different person in front of her.
One day, that girl vanished.
As usual, she had gone for a walk in the jungle and did not return.
The Southern Wilds Beast Palace went on alert.
Everyone scoured the jungle to find her.
In doing so, they discovered the corpses of the guards who had been escorting her.
A letter was left atop those corpses.
Those who found it hurried it to the Palace Lord.
Maeng Jong read the letter—and burned with fury.
Unknown parties had kidnapped his precious daughter.
“Palace Lord! What does it say?”
“Those... damned bastards... If I want my daughter back, I am to invade the Central Plains.”
“The Central Plains, sir?”
“Yes...”
CRACK.
Crumpling the letter in his fist, the Palace Lord trembled.
“What do you intend to do?”
“What else! If I want my daughter back... I have to do it.”
Seeing the Palace Lord grind his teeth in bitterness, all wore faces flushed with anger.
“Prepare to march on the Central Plains... Whatever the case, the one who kidnapped her is clearly connected to the Central Plains. So the Central Plains cannot escape responsibility. And without fail... I will find the one who took my daughter and ensure they suffer the greatest possible tornt without dying for a very long ti.”
****
Yeon Cheon Baek was heading for the Southern Wilds, accompanied by Northern Sea Ice Palace Lord Buk Mu Gyeol and the Gale Sect’s Great Khan, Ya Yul Geuk.
They were en route at an easy pace when sothing like a voice touched Yeon Cheon Baek’s ear.
“What is this sound?”
“Sir? Do you hear sothing?”
“You two can’t hear this?”
At Yeon Cheon Baek’s words, the other two pricked up their ears.
They focused, but heard nothing.
“We don’t hear anything, sir.”
“Do you? Then is it only ?”
Yeon Cheon Baek cocked his head, lifted a hand to his ear, and concentrated.
The sound ca distinctly to his ear.
It was a little girl crying.
A ghost?
Why was he the only one hearing it?
He couldn’t tell.
He was going to ignore it and go on, but an odd prickle of unease rose.
“Tch! This is really getting on my nerves.”
Clicking his tongue, Yeon Cheon Baek looked around.
He ant to find where the sound was coming from.
He focused more and turned his ear toward the direction of the sound.
Then it began to co through more clearly.
“Sob, sob! Soone please, please save .”
He heard it clearly.
A plea to be saved.
It seed a girl caught by soone was crying as she spoke.
Or perhaps she wasn’t captured.
She might have fallen sowhere and been cornered.
If he hadn’t heard it, that would be one thing—but how could he just pass on now?
Fixing his gaze where the sound ca from, Yeon Cheon Baek kicked straight up into the sky.
He rose to an imnse height and poured strength into his eyes.
An island lay in the middle of a distant lake.
The sound seed to be coming from there.
From here, it was the only place likely to hold a person.
Everything else was lake.
“Wait here a mont.”
Leaving those words to Buk Mu Gyeol and Ya Yul Geuk, Yeon Cheon Baek shot himself toward the island in the center of the lake.
FWOOSH—
As he cut the air and arrowed in toward the island—
FWIP—
Sothing ca screaming in; Yeon Cheon Baek slipped past it.
An arrow.
And one laced with internal energy.
He sharpened his sight toward the island. Atop a hill, a man was aiming a bow at him.
Judging by the rippling force about him, he was no ordinary fellow.
TONG—
Another arrow snapped off the string and ca racing toward Yeon Cheon Baek.
There are limits to underestimating soone.
If a man is flying through open air at you, you should have so sense of what realm he stands in.
He should have been fleeing; instead, he attacked.
Bemused, Yeon Cheon Baek slipped past the incoming arrow with ease.
At that instant—
BZZZT—
Lightning flared from the arrow—
KA-BOOM!
—and exploded right beside Yeon Cheon Baek.
WHOOOM—
Yeon Cheon Baek stepped through the smoke that billowed with the blast.
He was smiling.
Interesting fellow.
As if he’d expected that, the man loosed again.
This ti, he fired three at once.
FWIP-FWIP-FWIP—
Judging by their movent, even if he dodged, they looked ready to chase.
In that case—
Blow them away.
Yeon Cheon Baek swept his hand.
“Hm?”
But the arrows ignored his force and kept coming on.
They were right in his face.
Yeon Cheon Baek slipped aside in a flash.
FWIP-FWIP-FWIP—
SHHHK—
The arrows that skimd past him hooked around and ca back again.
As if that weren’t enough, yet another arrow flew.
If I play along, this will never end.
With a faint grin, Yeon Cheon Baek chose to ignore the arrows and charge straight in.
Arrows could be stopped by a veil of protective astral qi, after all.
Whether they flew at him or not, he didn’t care—he hurled himself at the archer.
At that mont—
The arrow punched through his astral-qi veil and touched his skin.
A chill sensation pricked him.
Surprise.
It pierced his astral-qi veil?
There is only one person in the world who can do that.
Yeon Woo Jin.
THUD-THUD-THUD—
The arrows smacked into Yeon Cheon Baek’s body but, unable to pierce skin that surpassed Diamond Unmoving, fell away as they were.
Yeon Cheon Baek snapped one out of the air in a flash.
Sothing was off, and he ant to see what.
They didn’t have enough raw force to punch through a veil of astral qi—yet they had. Clearly, there was sothing about the arrow itself.
ZZZT—
As he gripped the arrow, a tingling ran through his hand.
What to call it?
A sensation like it was scrambling his energy.
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