Chapter 316 – Severing Mountains, Diverting Rivers—Harming Others for Self-Gain, Immortal's Corpse…

Among the student teams of Fire Toad Academy and Tianjiu Academy.

“What’s wrong, Xing Jiu?”

A female teammate asked curiously as she noticed Xing Jiu turning her head toward the spectator stands.

The girl named Xing Jiu was born congenitally blind.

Her eyes contained only whites, with no pupils.

Yet this blind girl from an ethnic minority stood at the very center of Tianjiu Academy’s formation.

Moreover, judging by the attitudes of those around her, they seemed to show her considerable care.

Clearly, this was rather unusual.

Following the direction of Xing Jiu’s “gaze,” her senior from Tianjiu Academy quickly spotted Lu Chen and Mu Xiaoye sitting in the spectator stands.

Although neither Lu Chen nor Mu Xiaoye wore Lihuo Dao Academy’s uniform,

as the strongest academy in the Southern District, Tianjiu Academy had naturally studied the roster of Lihuo Dao Academy’s team members for this competition.

Both Lu Chen and Mu Xiaoye’s names were prominently listed.

Though both were only freshmen,

among the ten selected for Lihuo Dao Academy’s team, these two undoubtedly ranked within the top three.

Particularly Lu Chen at the Golden Core Stage, who left a deep impression on Tianjiu Academy’s members.

After all, in previous inter-academy tournaments, there had never been a case of a Golden Core Stage student participating.

Let alone a freshman.

Thus, upon seeing Lu Chen in the spectator stands, Tianjiu Academy’s members immediately felt tense.

They were determined to win this inter-academy tournament.

Although they didn’t believe their academy could defeat the powerful Lihuo Dao Academy,

being noticed by Lihuo Dao Academy this early went completely against their plans.

Especially when they saw both Lu Chen and Mu Xiaoye focusing their attention on Xing Jiu,

Tianjiu Academy’s members felt their hearts leap to their throats.

Could it be that just with one glance, the other side had already detected Tianjiu Academy’s trump card?

However, this thought had barely surfaced before everyone dismissed it.

They believed the situation couldn’t be as bad as they imagined.

After all, even within Tianjiu Academy itself, very few people understood Xing Jiu’s uniqueness.

Not to mention that neither Lu Chen nor Mu Xiaoye were students of Tianjiu Academy.

Moreover, given that Xing Jiu had never made a move yet, they considered the possibility of her exposure to be extremely slim.

Despite this, the senior beside Xing Jiu couldn’t help but whisper: “Xing Jiu, why did you notice them?”

After thinking for a moment, Xing Jiu said: “It’s nothing, just a feeling…”

A feeling?

This vague response left the senior beside Xing Jiu somewhat confused.

But adhering to their intention to protect their trump card, Tianjiu Academy’s members chose to leave quickly.

After all, if they stayed longer, they feared Lihuo Dao Academy might uncover all their secrets before they even faced each other in competition.

They had been planning to catch Lihuo Dao Academy off guard during the Southern District inter-academy tournament.

Because according to past conventions, before advancing to the subsequent Hundred Academies Competition,

the Four Great Academies in each region typically wouldn’t field their main team members.

They usually let their secondary team members gain experience first.

Yet even these secondary team members were beyond what other academies could match.However, the presence of Xing Jiu and other non-human team members.

Gave Tianjiu Academy the idea and feasibility to make a stunning debut.

But all of this was predicated on Lihuo Dao Academy not taking things seriously.

Once Lihuo Dao Academy discovered the true situation of their Tianjiu Academy and became interested, sending multiple main team members.

Even with Xing Jiu as their trump card, their chances of winning would still be less than thirty percent.

Thinking of this, the members of Tianjiu Academy suddenly felt the pressure multiply.

They never expected the people from Lihuo Dao Academy would come to watch other academies’ matches on the very first day.

Weren’t the Four Great Academies said to be arrogant, never putting other academies in their eyes?

With this heavy heart, the members of Tianjiu Academy completely disappeared from the Drought Fiend Arena.

After these people left, Mu Xiaoye curiously asked Lu Chen, “Xiao Lu, the person you mentioned earlier should be that blind girl with deer antlers in Tianjiu Academy, right?”

Mu Xiaoye was very confident in her judgment.

Because among the ten people from Tianjiu Academy, only that person had the weakest aura.

This perfectly matched Lu Chen’s earlier description.

Lu Chen nodded, indicating Mu Xiaoye wasn’t wrong.

“Alright, let’s head back.”

They had watched the match between Fire Toad Academy and Tianjiu Academy, and a new instance had been activated.

Naturally, Lu Chen had no reason to stay any longer, so he got up to leave.

Seeing this, Mu Xiaoye, who was beside him, stood up and followed.

Although neither of them felt particularly affected by today’s match results.

The same couldn’t be said for the students of Fire Toad Academy and Tianjiu Academy who had watched the entire match.

The former hadn’t expected to lose, and to lose so badly.

The latter hadn’t expected to win, and to win so decisively.

Around this unexpected upset, the students of Nanli City’s academies soon engaged in heated discussions.

But Lu Chen didn’t pay much attention to these matters.

After all, for him, the academy competition was just a minor episode.

Not worth spending too much energy on.

And compared to focusing on the academy competition, he was more curious about the new instance he had just activated.

[You have unlocked a new instance·Thousand-Li Red Land, you have chosen immersive mode…]

Heat, boundless heat.

This was Lu Chen’s first sensation upon entering the instance.

He opened his eyes and found himself standing in the ruins of an abandoned village.

The village wasn’t large, probably just over a dozen households, totaling several dozen to a hundred people.

The entire village seemed to have just experienced a devastating mountain fire, with charred remains visible everywhere from the intense burning.

Amidst these charred remains, faint glimpses of bleached-white bones could still be seen.

Presenting a scene straight out of hell on earth.

Looking at all this, Lu Chen began calmly analyzing the situation of this instance.

According to the instance description, the origin of the Thousand-Li Red Land instance was an Immortal’s corpse that had suddenly fallen from the sky.

Though the Immortal was dead, this didn’t mean his corpse was equally peaceful.

After all, forget about Immortals—even Lu Chen, currently only at the Golden Core Stage, had to some extent achieved the state of Embodying Dao in his Physical Body.

In a certain sense, Lu Chen’s Physical Body was already part of the Great Dao of Heaven and Earth.

The effect would only be more exaggerated for an Immortal whose Realm far surpassed Lu Chen’s.Thus, the fall of an Immortal’s corpse to the mortal realm was not an opportunity for most people, but an unprecedented disaster.

For an uncontrolled Immortal’s corpse equated to a source of pollution that ceaselessly released its own ‘Dao’.

Most places where Immortals fell would, after some years, transform the surrounding environment into a landscape aligned with their ‘Dao’.

The Thousand-Li Red Land was precisely such a case.

Clearly, this place had not originally been the charred hellscape it appeared to be now.

If Lu Chen’s speculation was correct, the original Thousand-Li Red Land should have been little different from other regions—a place of lush vegetation, clear waters, and verdant mountains.

Because around the small mountain village where Lu Chen now stood, he could see a winding, dried-up riverbed.

In the distance, barren peaks were everywhere, littered with charred wood left behind after burning.

This was the influence of an Immortal’s corpse on its surroundings, commonly known as the ‘manifestation of Dao’.

However, the manifestation of Dao was only one aspect.

The fall of an Immortal’s corpse to the mortal realm had another significant impact…

“The Karma here… is so heavy.”

Lu Chen walked to the village entrance, frowning as he gazed into the distance.

In the eyes of ordinary people, the distant sky, though distorted by the scorching heat into waves of shimmering air, still appeared relatively normal, without much peculiarity.

But in Lu Chen’s eyes, it was entirely different.

The sky that seemed empty to ordinary people was, in Lu Chen’s view, filled with malevolent Karma.

This Karma, almost tangible, silently infected every living being within the Thousand-Li Red Land.

In contrast to the Karma in the sky, the ground was saturated with dense Death Qi.

If Karma was the natural enemy of Cultivators,

then Death Qi was the natural enemy of the living.

Staying in such an environment for extended periods, even if one could endure the various problems brought by the extreme heat,

the thick Death Qi and Karma would weaken the body and even cause mental abnormalities.

It was easy to imagine that within this Thousand-Li Red Land, there were likely very few living people left.

After all, not just ordinary people, but even Cultivators would find it difficult to survive in such conditions.

Yet, what was a Forbidden Land for the living was not so for the dead.

Lu Chen closed his eyes and soon detected an unusual presence.

Then he opened his eyes, his figure vanishing from the spot as he hurried toward the sensed location.

At a dilapidated small temple within the Thousand-Li Red Land.

A carriage stood in the open space before the temple, carrying an iron cage filled with children around five or six years old.

A remote wilderness, a crumbling temple, and a group of young children—

No matter how one looked at it, the situation was highly suspicious.

“Waaah, Mommy, I want my mommy!”

“Waaah!”

Listening to the chaotic cries and sobs around them, the two Qiu Kingdom soldiers guarding the ‘tribute’ looked thoroughly irritated.

The task of escorting the tribute to ‘Bloodflame Mountain’ was already distressing enough.

Now, they had to endure the loud wailing of so many children.

Tension, fear, irritation, guilt—

It finally overwhelmed the soldier standing by the carriage.

“Shut up, all of you!”

A young soldier roared, raising his Saber and striking the iron bars of the cage hard with its sheath.

Immediately, the seven or eight children in the carriage were frightened into silence.

They stared in terror at the soldiers outside the carriage, as if pleading to be set free.Though he had mentally prepared himself, facing so many innocent eyes still made the young soldier’s heart tighten with guilt.

But when he thought of the consequences he might face if he let these children go, he ultimately hardened his resolve.

He repeatedly told himself that if he failed to complete his mission, he and his family would be among those sent to Bloodflame Mountain next time.

With this thought, the young soldier finally calmed down and returned to sit cross-legged on the empty ground beside the dilapidated temple.

“Have a few drinks.”

As soon as the young soldier sat down, the elderly soldier beside him handed over a gourd of wine.

Without hesitation, the young soldier took the gourd and gulped down several large mouthfuls.

After drinking the strong liquor, he felt somewhat better.

Then he put down the gourd and said in a low voice, “When will such days ever end?”

Hearing this, the elderly soldier replied with a desolate expression, “Be content. If you knew what happened thirty years ago, you’d understand that our current situation is actually fortunate compared to the misfortune that could have been.”

His weathered eyes clearly held many experiences.

Yet these words piqued the young soldier’s curiosity.

“Old Ban, everyone avoids talking about what happened thirty years ago. What… exactly occurred back then?”

Hearing the question, the elderly soldier hesitated.

Perhaps because the current atmosphere was too oppressive, making him need some distraction, or maybe because the secret buried in his heart had been kept too long and needed release, he hesitated for a moment before whispering, “Just listen to what I say, and don’t spread it around. Most importantly, never say I told you. Understood?”

The young soldier nodded, indicating he wouldn’t talk.

With this assurance, the elderly soldier sat up straight and began recounting the events of thirty years ago.

“Thirty years ago, this place wasn’t called Bloodflame Mountain. It was a fertile land in our Qiu Kingdom known as Youbo River.”

“Back then, it wasn’t just bustling with people—its prosperity was renowned far and wide.”

“But everything changed completely one day thirty years ago.”

“That night, blood rain fell from the sky. A meteor descended from the Nine Heavens and ultimately landed in Youbo River.”

“From that moment on, the land within a thousand miles of Youbo River began to experience severed mountains, cut-off rivers, and dried-up waters.”

“Our court’s officials did try to investigate the cause, but no matter how many people they sent, none ever returned.”

“Even some immortal practitioners who heard about this came and entered the area, only to disappear within.”

“Over time, our court gradually abandoned this place, designating it as one of the Forbidden Zones and forbidding anyone from approaching.”

“Even the immortals were helpless?”

The young soldier found it hard to believe.

In his view, immortal practitioners were beings who could traverse heaven and earth, capable of anything.

If even they couldn’t handle this place, didn’t that mean whatever existed within Bloodflame Mountain was more terrifying than the immortals?

Hearing this, the elderly soldier seemed to recall some horrifying memory. His hand holding the old smoking pipe began to tremble uncontrollably.

“You… you’re still young. You have no idea how terrifying Bloodflame Mountain truly is.””Let me put it this way: within a thousand-mile radius of Bloodflame Mountain, once night falls, evil spirits roam freely, turning it into a living hell.”

“What we’re doing now is merely satisfying the appetites of some local demons, preventing them from leaving this place to wreak havoc in the nearby county town.”

“Only in this way can we maintain a semblance of peace.”

“Otherwise, if these evil spirits were to leave this place and enter the county town…”

“It wouldn’t be long before the entire town became the next living hell.”

Just as the old soldier was about to say more, the sun in the distance sank lower and lower.

Seeing this, the old soldier hastily said: “Alright, it’s about time we should leave.”

“If we don’t go now, we won’t be able to leave at all.”

With these words, the old soldier briskly stood up and headed down the mountain.

His urgent manner suggested he feared any delay would prevent their escape.

The young soldier beside him naturally followed immediately upon seeing this.

As for the cart full of children, they were left abandoned outside the dilapidated temple, completely disregarded…

(End of Chapter)