Chapter 409: Chapter 56: Lu Zi Carries a Coffin into the Starry Sky

"Xiaoyan, even though it was all an illusion, do you remember what the Immortal I was charging at with my sword looked like in that final scene you described?"

As his voice fell, the Old Celestial Master, Li Changgeng, and Yan Huang all listened with rapt attention. The Old Black Bull also grew solemn.

Yan Jiangxue thought for a long moment, then said softly,

"He was a very, very powerful Immortal. In his left hand, there was a small, damaged bell that seemed to be ringing. In his right was a gourd, and from its mouth, Immortal Light billowed out, with a Celestial Blade floating within it..."

"Oh, right! At the very, very end, I saw a huge Daoist Palace smash down towards that Immortal. I saw a blind Daoist and a crippled Daoist, and they were both furious. One destroyed the Source of heaven and earth, the other refined the Celestial Myriad Realms. And there was a very beautiful woman, dragging Divine Chains, walking over step by step, weeping in sorrow."

The more Lu Xuan listened, the more solemn his expression became. A giant Daoist Palace, a blind Daoist and a crippled one, a peerlessly beautiful woman dragging Divine Chains...

’Something seems wrong. If what Xiaoyan saw was truly the past, a scene like this should never have appeared. It involves my three masters... and it involves the Lady!’

’There is a huge problem here.’

Just then, Li Changgeng, who was not far away, seemed to be pondering something. He then looked up and said in a low voice, 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

"A gourd that billows Immortal Light and contains a Celestial Blade... there does seem to be an Immortal that matches that description."

"Who is it?"

Lu Xuan snapped his head to the side.

Li Changgeng let out a long breath, a look of disbelief on his face, and said softly,

"Daoist Monarch Lu Ya."

"Lu Ya?" Lu Xuan’s expression turned incredibly grim. ’It’s this Lu Ya again?’

’It makes no sense.’

’This person isn’t in the Dao Fruit.’

His mind raced with a thousand thoughts, his gaze profound. He then gently comforted Xiaoyan,

"Don’t cry. Everything you saw was an illusion. Although there seems to be a secret behind it all, aren’t we about to get married? On the eve of our wedding, I’ll take you to meet someone. She’s an elder of mine, and she knows everything."

"Okay!"

Yan Jiangxue nodded emphatically.

Just as Lu Xuan was about to say more, a Golden Great Dao suddenly appeared from the horizon, arriving in an instant. Li Yutong leaped down from it, his face ashen.

"Speaker?"

Yan Huang was stunned.

"What happened?"

"The Great Wall! It’s the Great Wall!"

Li Yutong’s face was pale, his voice incomparably heavy as he spoke, enunciating every word,

"The Demon Race is storming the pass. The Immortal from the Death Tower has defected. The Great Wall is in grave danger..."

As he spoke, he subconsciously glanced at Lu Xuan, whose expression had turned frigid, and added,

"Commander Lu Xiuyuan... has also fallen in battle."

A brief silence fell over Dragon Tiger Peak.

Lu Xuan gently patted Xiaoyan’s cold hand and looked up. His expression showed no change, but his voice was flat—so flat it was terrifying.

He said,

"I understand."

"I’m going."

Hearing his emotionless tone, both the anxious Li Yutong and Yan Huang felt a sudden, inexplicable chill in their hearts.

It was a bone-deep cold.

The next instant, Lu Xuan took a step. A Golden Great Dao appeared, and as he stepped onto it, he vanished abruptly.

...

「The Great Wall Border」

The slaughter had temporarily ceased.

An old black dog had appeared from nowhere. With a single roar, it had driven back hundreds of millions of demons, tearing seventeen Demon Minor Saints and three Grand Grade Level Minor Saints to shreds.

Demon Blood rained down from the sky, a crimson mist, but compared to the rivers of human blood flowing on the ramparts, it was but a drop in the ocean.

The remaining seven Grand Grade Minor Saints retreated with the demon tide for three million li. But on the cosmic scale of the starry sky, this distance was negligible, and they still watched like tigers from the side.

"That dog..." The Grand Grade Minor Saint clad in a Divine Robe had an ugly expression, a mix of shock and fear. "It’s clearly also a Grand Grade, so how is it that strong??"

"And it’s a demon, no less!!"

The Dragon Horn Minor Saint gritted his teeth.

"That traitorous filth! Just like that Ao Chengzhong!"

Taking a deep breath, his face darkened as he said coldly,

"No rush. We’ll wait a moment for reinforcements to arrive. I just received a message. The Heaven-Reaching Demon Saint has given the order. This is a golden opportunity. We may not have to wait three months—we will breach this pass today!"

After a pause, the Dragon Horn Minor Saint narrowed his eyes.

"Our Demon Race is spread across the starry sky. The cosmos is vast, and a large-scale mobilization takes time. We just need to wait. We will definitely break the pass today and have a bloodbath. I will build a hundred monuments out of human heads!!"

All the Minor Saints roared in agreement. The demon tide surged, all of them staring hungrily at the Great Wall, all of them sharpening their teeth and claws.

A Grand Grade Minor Saint wearing a crown on his head grinned.

"Regardless of today’s outcome, we’ve had a hearty meal... I must say, the Human Race is truly worthy of its reputation. They are all born with Dao Bodies, and every one of them contains Innate Material..."

As he said this, he patted his round, bulging belly, his smile growing even wider.

The Grand Grade Minor Saint in the Divine Robe also laughed.

"Once we breach this pass and take control of the Origin Land, the Human Race will be raised by us in pens. From then on, we’ll have as much blood-food as we want, harvesting a batch every year..."

The seven Grand Grade Minor Saints began to discuss among themselves, all of them beaming with smiles, treating the Human Race as prey already in their grasp. Some demons even started debating the best ways to cook them.

Meanwhile, atop the Great Wall.

Broken corpses were being dragged down from the ramparts. The air was thick with unending sounds of grief and sorrow.

A young girl in tattered Battle Armor, covered in wounds, clutched a broken body, repeatedly crying out "Dad" as she wiped away her endless tears.

An old, dying soldier, missing an arm and a leg, crawled on the ground, dragging his grandson’s corpse behind him, leaving a long trail of blood on the floor.

Chong Shanhu, who had been severely wounded and knocked unconscious, had now awoken. His limbs had already regenerated, and he was staring blankly at Grandpa Lu’s body, his lips trembling slightly.

A human general, dragging his exhausted body, walked over and patted his shoulder, saying softly,

"After Commander Lu fell into the demon tide, he fought his way forward for three hundred li, cutting down countless demons before his strength was completely exhausted... Fortunately, the Commander was a True Immortal, his body as tough as Divine Iron, and was thus kept whole."

Chong Shanhu nodded blankly and said in a daze,

"So Grandpa Lu was a Commander?"

"Yes, he was."

A very flat, calm voice sounded beside him. Chong Shanhu jolted, scrambling to his feet and whipping his head around to look.

"T-Teacher!" he stammered like a young boy, his voice choked with tears.

He was, after all, just a young man.

Lu Xuan silently walked forward, squatted down, and stared blankly at the lifeless old man.

The Broken Armor on the old man’s body was completely shattered. His body was pocked with bloody holes, the result of being gnawed on by demons.

But his eyes were still wide open in fury, and even in death, he had not loosened his grip on the Broken Blade held tightly in his hand.

Lu Xuan was somewhat lost in a daze. He thought back to many years ago, to East Sea High School, to himself curled up outside in the wasteland, eavesdropping. He remembered the old man in the classroom, intentionally raising his voice for him.

After a long moment, he reached out. He did not close the old man’s eyes, but simply wiped the bloodstains from his face.

A large black dog padded over and said quietly,

"My strength was restricted, my realm suppressed to the Grand Grade. I rushed here immediately after taking the young master to a safe place, but..."

The threads of Cause and Effect flowed, and Lu Xuan had already understood the entire sequence of events. He said nothing.

Nearby, Li Changgeng felt a deep chill rise in his heart. Yan Huang and Li Yutong’s eyes were both bloodshot. A Divine Palace that had rushed to the scene floated in the Celestial Vault, and the Immortal within it trembled with fear.

After a moment, a young soldier screamed himself hoarse,

"They’re coming again... They’re coming again!!"

Everyone looked up. In the distant starry sky, an even larger demon tide was converging—a dense, teeming mass that blotted out the light of a million stars!

Lu Xuan reached out and silently activated his Mediation of Creation, forming a Divine Coffin cast from bronze. He then lifted the old man’s broken body and placed him within the Coffin and Casket.

He reached out, located the last remnant of the old man’s True Spirit within his skull, and carefully preserved it. He did not close the Coffin and Casket, but simply stared at the old man’s wide, unblinking eyes and said softly,

"Teacher Lu, I’m going to show you a magnificent spectacle."

As his voice fell, Lu Xuan raised the Coffin and Casket high with one hand and gave a calm command,

"Tell the soldiers to rest well. Have them lay down their weapons."

With that, he bore the coffin forward, stepping into the void and rising up. Gazing at the ever-growing demon tide in the distance, he said softly,

"I’ll handle this."

"I’ll do the killing."

As his voice fell, the young man showered down endless streams of Immortal Light, healing countless soldiers of the Human Race. He himself, bearing the open coffin, strode into the starry sky.

His Profound Robe billowed in the wind.

The wind came from nowhere.

(One more Chapter to follow.)