Chapter 186: Luring the Snake Out of Its Hole

“Reporting to Your Majesty, there’s a severe drought in the south, causing famine. The common people have no food and are digging up roots and eating tree bark. Many have starved to death.”
The King of Qi sat high upon his throne, deeply confused. “Why are the people so foolish? If they can’t get rice, why don’t they eat meat porridge?”
The minister didn’t know how to respond, stammered for a bit, then had no choice but to say, “As Your Majesty commands.”
The King of Qi nodded and dismissed the minister. The people could be rigid in their thinking, lacking adaptability. As emperor, it was up to him to come up with clever solutions.
After the minister left, a black-robed figure quietly entered the palace and pulled back their hood—it was Lord Qingming.
The three red-robed Human Sovereign Peak cultivators didn’t know that Lord Qingming, famed across the martial world, was also affiliated with the Imperial Court.
Now that the three red-robed Human Sovereign Peaks were following Bu Jing’s orders and had severed ties with the court, Bu Wu City had become the base of Human Sovereign Peak cultivators. The City Lord had been imprisoned, and no information could get out. The King of Qi had waited endlessly for news and was growing anxious.
Fortunately, Lord Qingming found an opportunity to quietly slip away from the Bu Clan and return to the court.
He whispered into the King of Qi’s ear and handed over a copied version of the Shangqing Yellow Court Outer Realm Scripture.
The King of Qi had mediocre martial skill and couldn’t understand the scripture’s profound meaning. But from Lord Qingming, he had already learned that this book was essential for breaking through the Human Sovereign Peak and becoming Outer Realm. Its value was beyond estimation!
“In a few days, those rebels will all ascend to the Outer Realm. I ask Your Majesty to report this to the Heavenly Kings at once and seek their judgment.”
After explaining the matter clearly, Lord Qingming turned and returned to the Bu Clan to continue his work as an inside man.
He knew how powerful the Twelve Heavenly Kings were. In his eyes, talk of breaking through to the Outer Realm for self-preservation was nothing but delusion!
Before the Heavenly Kings, there was no chance of survival.
Standing with the Heavenly Kings might grant him a few more years of life. Standing with Bu Jing—he wouldn’t last two days!
Given that, he might as well pledge loyalty early.
The King of Qi paced in the hall for a while and realized the matter was beyond his control. He had no choice but to contact his forefather.
The King of Qi fell asleep the moment he touched the bed—and he could sleep for a long time. That was his greatest asset.
He was the best sleeper among Night King’s descendants. If Night King wanted to contact him, it almost always worked—because the King of Qi was always asleep.
…
“Forefather, a man named Bu Jing has appeared in Bu Wu City. They say he’s the son of Bu Wu, the Martial Alliance Leader from three hundred years ago—one of the Twenty-Four Young Lords back then!”
“Bu Jing… I can’t believe he’s still alive.” Night King muttered softly, not letting the King of Qi hear him. The King of Qi didn’t know the origins of the Twelve Heavenly Kings. He too believed they were truly from the Upper Realm, come to save the mortals.
Naturally, he believed himself to be the descendant of an immortal, with noble immortal blood flowing through his veins.
“I didn’t expect there to be another realm above the Human Sovereign Peak. I always thought that was the end of martial cultivation,” Night King mused. “Shangqing Yellow Court Outer Realm Scripture, huh… Bu Jing is indeed exceptionally gifted.”
Then he frowned in concern. Was Bu Jing really this powerful? Could there be a celestial being behind him, like the Envoy?
If Bu Jing had backing, then he absolutely could not leave the mystic realm.
He’d rather stay in the mystic realm for the rest of his life.
Night King asked the question, and the King of Qi replied, “According to Lord Qingming, this was comprehended by Bu Jing through observing the sun, moon, and stars. It has nothing to do with anyone else.”
Night King nodded and relaxed. He had probably been overthinking it. If Bu Jing had someone backing him, why would he settle for gathering just seven Outer Realm cultivators and fleeing to avoid his pursuit?
Heh—Soul Formation-level strength wasn’t something they could fathom. Did Bu Jing really think that seven Outer Realm cultivators banding together could stand up to him?
Naive. Childish.
The power of faith in the Huan Yu World was evenly distributed among the Twelve Heavenly Kings, allowing them to reach the peak of the Soul Formation Stage. If all that power were focused on one Heavenly King, it would be enough to make them a Fusion Stage cultivator. At that point, what could Bu Jing possibly use to fight him?
“Also, Bu Jing used underhanded tricks, causing a flood of old martial arts manuals on the market. The court now has to search door to door to stop their spread,” the King of Qi reported truthfully. If Bu Jing were only at the Human Sovereign Peak, he still had ways to block the spread of the old martial arts.
He hadn’t wanted to bring this up—it would lower his forefather’s opinion of him.
But he had no choice but to report it.
Now that Bu Jing had become an Outer Realm cultivator, forget stopping the manuals—he might not even be able to keep his own head.
“Tch, useless. Always causing trouble,” Night King scolded, and the King of Qi could only lower his head and take the reprimand.
Bu Jing wasn’t the real concern. The rampant spread of old martial arts was what troubled Night King.
If people discovered that the old martial arts weren’t as he described, and started to doubt the Heavenly Kings—
Then the image of the Heavenly Kings as saviors would collapse. When the apocalypse came, who would believe in them then?
Looks like they’d have to forcibly confiscate all the old martial arts manuals and see how that went. If it still didn’t work, then they’d have to do what was done three hundred years ago—
Kill a few troublemakers, shackle a few generations’ minds, erase that chapter of history, and then think about how to manufacture the apocalyptic disaster.
That latter option was something Night King didn’t want to see—not because he cared how many died, but because the process would waste too much time!
“I understand the situation.” With that, Night King exited the dream.
After Night King left, three figures appeared in the dream.
“I was hoping all Twelve Heavenly Kings would enter the dream so we could wipe them out at once.”
Bai Hongtu sighed. As the Dao Sect Master, it made sense he knew a little of the Dao of Dreams. Though he couldn’t compare to Master Dreamer who created the Mysterious Mystic Realm, invading the dream of some half-baked Soul Formation cultivator from a backwater world was effortless.
He saw at a glance that this so-called Night King had brute-forced his way up with pills. Calling him a backdoor practitioner was flattering.
As for Night King’s so-called mastery of the Dao of Dreams—maybe it looked brilliant to people of Huan Yu World, but to Bai Hongtu, it was full of holes.
If Night King dared say he had mastered the Dao of Dreams in the Nine Provinces, Master Dreamer would rise from the grave.
Bai Hongtu even had the power to flip the script and seize control of the dream—trapping Night King inside, never to wake again.
After learning the Huan Yu World’s history had been altered, the three had made their plan.
They didn’t know why the Heavenly Kings had changed history, but clearly it mattered to them. So if they restored the true history and made people doubt the Heavenly Kings, the Heavenly Kings would be forced to act.
As they expected, the matter in Bu Wu City was too big to ignore. The King of Qi contacted a Heavenly King, meaning the Heavenly Kings would have to leave the mystic realm.
If all Twelve had entered the dream, it would’ve been simple—they had ways to kill through dreams.
As long as they utterly erased the consciousness that entered the dream, the person would die. That was the killing technique of the Dao of Dreams.
Unfortunately, only Night King came. Killing him would tip off the others, and the remaining Heavenly Kings would be too scared to come out.
“But even so, things are getting urgent on their end. Within two days, they’ll have to come out of the mystic realm,” Jiang Li predicted.
Night King didn’t realize that because only he had entered the dream, he had narrowly escaped death—and bought himself two more days.
“This pig made it to emperor?” As a fellow monarch, Yu Yin looked with disdain at the still-sleeping King of Qi. She had thought the second-last emperor of Great Yong—Emperor Luo Zheng—was the lowest an emperor could go.
She hadn’t expected there to be someone even dumber. A ruler who didn’t even understand the conditions of commoners—how could someone like that possibly govern a nation?
The King of Qi had redefined her understanding.
Any emperor randomly picked from the Nine Provinces would be better than the King of Qi.