Several days later, news quietly spread among the upper echelons of the Hong Alliance: Founder Giant Axe had accepted Hong as a nominal disciple.
For Founder Giant Axe to take a Universe Level warrior as a disciple was exceedingly rare in the history of the entire Primal Universe.
The news wasn't made public, but those who needed to know still found out. When City Lord of Chaos heard, he merely remarked, "Giant Axe was quick off the mark."
Darkness Master chuckled quietly beside him, unusually refraining from any mockery.
Soon after, there was more news from within the Giant Axe Martial Arts Arena.
Void Gold Master personally took charge of Hong's training and instruction.
"From today onward, I'll teach Hong myself."
Void Gold Master's voice rang out in the core sanctuary of the Giant Axe Martial Arts Arena. "He follows the 'illusion warrior path.' When it comes to temperament and willpower, there isn't anyone else in the Hong Alliance better suited to my legacy."
His golden hair fell to his chest, and his eyes beneath his brows were filled with earnestness.
Meanwhile, Ancestor Tree Venerable, another top powerhouse of the Giant Axe Martial Arts Arena, accepted Lei Shen as a disciple at Founder Giant Axe's behest.
Ancestor Tree Venerable was one of only three Top Universe Overlords in the entire Human Race. His status was on par with Star Prison Devil Lord and Heavenly Eclipse Palace Master.
His trunk was gnarled and his crown spread wide like a canopy. When he saw Lei Shen's laid-back demeanor, his branches trembled several times before he asked in a low voice, "What do you want to learn?"
"Lightning! The more powerful, the better!" Lei Shen grinned.
Ancestor Tree Venerable's crown trembled again. In a message, Void Gold Master had described Lei Shen as "good-natured and unconventional."
But he didn't complain.
Founder Giant Axe had personally given him the task. He wouldn't ask questions.
He simply lowered a branch, picked Lei Shen up from the ground of the training field, and said, "Go strike three thousand six hundred Thunder Tribulation Stakes first. Come find me when you're done."
Within days, the last two members of Earth's trio had also become disciples of humanity's top powers.
Luo Feng was City Lord of Chaos's nominal disciple, desperately studying the Way of the Beast God to earn that "personal disciple" status.
Hong had become Founder Giant Axe's nominal disciple.
Lei Shen had joined Ancestor Tree Venerable's school.
This news was mixed in with reports of other human geniuses becoming disciples, and caused little stir beyond their circles.
After all, similar scenes were playing out throughout the Primal Universe during this period. The Universe Masters and Top Universe Overlords of every race were taking on disciples in droves, all pursuing the same goal.
The Sky Screen. The Genius Ranking.
The countdown had fallen below a million years.
At the Monster Race's ancestral grounds, Tremor Demon Ancestor pushed the eggs of the beasts with the purest royal bloodlines into an incubation chamber in his small universe, forcibly accelerating their development at the cost of burning his own blood essence.
Only three eggs remained in the chamber. The other seven had cracked during the process, their lifeless shells piled in a corner.
Dream Demon Ancestor glared as she lifted each of the three remaining young beasts and inspected their bloodlines. She even gave one small beast, its back covered in purple scales, the rare compliment, "Not bad."
It was the first time in tens of thousands of years she'd said that. But the beast still had to survive and claim a place on the Genius Ranking.
The Zerg Queen's selection was even more ruthless, though she concealed it behind a calm exterior. She used the hazy soul fluctuations released by the Eternal Pearl to blanket the first Mother Nest, selecting three elite individuals from among hundreds of millions of larvae. Their codenames were "Ren," "Shadow," and "Erosion."
She had fed "Ren" her own blood. The other two specialized in high-speed stealth and compound toxins, respectively.
Every day, batches of unqualified Zerg Warriors were painlessly destroyed in the Queen Palace, turned into Nutrient Solution for the Mother Nest and injected into the next round of selection.
Machine Father God, meanwhile, expanded the seed program to four million candidates being raised in parallel. While testing the prototype puppets for the new "Law Fusion Strike Module" in a War Factory, every prototype exploded into scrap metal at the same moment, scorching the outer walls of several War Factories.
He watched the sparks and fragments as he performed a brief logical self-check, then added a new designation: "Awaiting Evaluation: Law Fusion Project."
The Purple Moon Holy Land and East Emperor Holy Land were also making covert moves.
After the scouts dispatched by Purple Moon Ancestor were spotted by a human patrol fleet at the edge of the Primal Universe, they retreated into deeper cover.
East Emperor Ancestor remained unmoved. He merely told his subordinates, almost casually, to keep an eye out for any promising geniuses whose names might be worth remembering. He had lived too long to be in a hurry.
By comparison, the news that two human geniuses had been chosen by numerous Universe Masters as disciples hardly counted as big news.
Mountain Sitting Guest didn't see it that way.
On an unremarkable planet at the edge of the Milky Way Galaxy, Yang Yu sat cross-legged atop the mountain conjured by Jin King Palace, the Fire Dao at his fingertips slowly fading away.
He had just swept his mind over the Giant Axe Martial Arts Arena and happened to see Hong kowtowing to Void Gold Master as he formally became his disciple.
The black-clad young man's gaze was as calm as a bottomless pool of dark water. Even with a Universe Master standing before him, his heartbeat, breathing, and soul fluctuations were no different from usual.
It wasn't the forced composure of someone hiding nervousness behind a mask. It was a calmness that came from deep within.
Void Gold Master made an exception and asked him one more question. "Are you afraid of death?"
Hong nodded. "Yes. But even so, I have to keep moving forward."
Void Gold Master asked no more.
Yang Yu withdrew his spiritual sense, picked up his wine flask, and took a leisurely drink.
Time flowed like water. A million years passed in the blink of an eye.
To mortals, a million years was long enough for species to evolve and civilizations to perish.
But to the peak races of the Primal Universe, a million years was no more than one long seclusion for a high-ranking powerhouse, one cycle from strategic planning to reaping the rewards, and the path every genius had to travel to grow from a sapling into a towering tree.
Over those million years, the entire Primal Universe underwent a reshuffling amid an eerie calm.
Territorial disputes were put on hold, battles for Supreme Treasures were suspended, and even exploration of the Universe Ocean's many perilous regions fell to its lowest level in history.
All the peak races reached an unspoken understanding: until the Genius Ranking was settled, none of them would be the first to start an all-out war.
But the calm was only on the surface.
Underneath, the currents were more turbulent than in any era before.
Every peak race poured incalculable resources into nurturing the next generation. Universe Masters personally took on disciples, Top Universe Overlords held private lessons in seclusion, and inheritances from secret realms were opened to all.
Resources once reserved for core bloodlines were now freely supplied to anyone with enough talent.
Humanity did so, as did the Insect Race and the Machine Race. Even the battered Monster Race poured everything it had into its younger generation, eyes red with determination.
Everyone knew why.
The Genius Ranking would determine the course of the Primal Universe's power structure in the next cycle.
Initial Universe, Chaos City.
Luo Feng sat cross-legged on a cushion in the inner hall of the City Lord's Mansion.
A million years had passed, but Luo Feng's appearance had barely changed.
His bearing, however, seemed to have been repeatedly honed by time, like a whetstone. All his outward edges had been ground down into restrained sharpness, and his gaze was as calm as autumn waters, without a ripple.
He raised his right hand. A golden scale, about the size of his palm, appeared at his fingertips.
Unlike the trembling scale-shaped prototype he had first condensed a million years ago, this one took shape so quickly that it seemed to have skipped the process entirely.
With a thought, golden light and spatial ripples blossomed at his fingertips together, as if they had long agreed to arrive in perfect synchrony, without the slightest difference in time or measure.
The transparent patterns on the scale's surface, which had once given him so much trouble, were now smooth as a mirror. They contained the fusion of the Law of Gold and the Law of Space without leaving behind the slightest trace.
He had already mastered the first four changes of the Seven Changes of Yan God.
His mastery of the Fusion Law of Gold and Space was already comparable to that of an ordinary Universe Venerable!
City Lord of Chaos sat across from him, his golden robes trailing to the floor. He calmly watched his disciple draw the last trace of the fourth change of the Seven Changes of Yan God back into his body.
He had lived far too long and seen too many extraordinary geniuses. Some fell halfway along the path, some got stuck at bottlenecks, and some stopped advancing after making a breakthrough.
But from the very first day he had accepted the black-haired young man as a nominal disciple, Luo Feng had kept overturning his expectations.
By now, he had far surpassed everything City Lord of Chaos had once hoped for.
Chaos knew full well that when the Sky Screen opened before long, Luo Feng would certainly make the list!
Amid the surge of human geniuses over the past million years, the other two members of Earth's lineage had also made names for themselves.
Under the dual instruction of Founder Giant Axe and Void Gold Master, Hong had long since reached World Lord Level.
His fighting style was completely different from Luo Feng's. Luo Feng favored a broad, overwhelming approach, crushing his opponents head-on. Hong was more like a silent dagger tempered by darkness, every strike so precise it sent chills down the spine.
His willpower had reached the threshold of a Universe Venerable tens of thousands of years ago. After training in Illusion Sea, it had now improved to a level that even left Void Gold Master impressed.
Void Gold Master had once privately told Founder Giant Axe, "If he can claim a place on the Genius Ranking, the illusion warrior path of my Giant Axe Martial Arts Arena will have truly flourished."
Lei Shen, meanwhile, still seemed as laid-back as ever.
A million years had passed, and he too had reached World Lord Level, but his temperament hadn't changed in the slightest.
Ancestor Tree Venerable had been driven to shake his crown in frustration countless times, yet after every assessment, he would silently nod.
Lei Shen's Law of Thunder and Law of Wind had both reached Peak World Lord. Combined with his self-created "Thunderstorm Domain," they made him one of the very best among World Lords. But Ancestor Tree Venerable's assessment of him never changed: "Not bad." He had repeated those words more than ten thousand times over the past million years, each time with a subtly different tone, shifting from reluctant approval to quiet praise, and finally to firm conviction.
As for their Luo Feng, he had long since left the other two in a class of his own.
After breaking through to World Lord Level, Hong had once remarked, "Luo Feng's the one among the three of us who got stuck playing the monster."
Each of Luo Feng's three avatars followed its own path. His Golden Horned Beast avatar focused on the Law of Gold and had already pushed the Origin of Gold from Peak World Lord to the ultimate bottleneck.
His Mosha Race avatar devoted itself to comprehending the Law of Space and had mastered it to the utmost extreme, with only a hair's breadth left before complete comprehension.
His Earthling Main Body fused the paths of gold and space to wield the Seven Changes of Yan God, advancing the Way of the Beast God to its fourth change.
And that still wasn't the end of it.
During an adventure in the Ancestral God Secret Realm, Luo Feng discovered the Nine Nether Blood Sea, so vast that its size was breathtaking.
The Nine Nether Blood Sea had even given birth to a World Lord-level offspring.
Luo Feng tried something and discovered that his Golden Horned Beast could actually give birth to one!
And so, his Blood Sea Clone was born.
It was Luo Feng's fourth avatar, and his most unusual one.
Its size far surpassed that of the Golden Horned Beast, its Life Gene Level exceeded that of beings in the same rank by far, and its regenerative ability was nearly terrifying. The Blood Sea Clone was a heaven-defying trump card simply by virtue of its existence.
After observing it, City Lord of Chaos gave it a four-word assessment: "An undying body."
From then on, Luo Feng wielded four avatars. His Law Comprehension had reached the utmost limits of Domain Lord, and his combat strength far surpassed that of an ordinary Peak World Lord, enough to face any King-level Immortal head-on.
At the same time, the tide of geniuses among the other races surged just as fiercely.
Within the Demon Beast Alliance, Beast Ancestor discovered three geniuses: Lie Tianzun, Star Devourer, and Blood Fang.
All three had reached Peak King in Law Comprehension, and their consciousness was already strong enough to rival that of an ordinary Immortal.
They were geniuses the likes of which were rarely seen even once in hundreds of millions of years.
In the Zerg Territory, the three World Lord-level Zerg Mother Emperors personally trained by the Zerg Queen had each reached King Rank in Law Comprehension. Their wills could contend with those of Marquis Immortals, and their mastery of the soul was comparable to that of an ordinary Universe Venerable.
These three were the Queen's greatest source of confidence!
In the Machine Race's territory, few geniuses had emerged over the past million years. After endless rounds of selection and elimination,
only one World Lord-level member of the Machine Race named "Zero" had shown any promise.
The Monster Race had fared somewhat better,
producing two geniuses, Demon Wing and Frost Parasite.
Their Law Comprehension and willpower had both reached an extremely high level. Tremor Demon Ancestor and Dream Demon Ancestor believed they had a strong chance of making the list.
Deep in the Universe Ocean, Purple Moon Ancestor had paused for a long time while personally reviewing Hong's intelligence. He then compared Luo Feng's progress in the laws and, beside Original Ancestor's old growth curve, finally wrote a cold question mark.
East Emperor Ancestor remained as silent as ever. One day, while leisurely pruning the branches of the World Tree, one of his Universe Master subordinates casually mentioned that "that human named Luo Feng has gained another Blood Sea Clone." His hand paused for the briefest moment. A leaf fell into the misty sea at his feet, without even raising a bubble.
On the unremarkable planet, Yang Yu remained seated cross-legged atop the mountain conjured by Jin King Palace.
To a being at his level, a million years was no more than one brief seclusion, but those million years had been fascinating to him.
They had been every bit as eventful as Mountain Sitting Guest's memories of his experiences on the Origin Continent.
Over the years,
after the initial period when the various races and factions of the Primal Universe fought fiercely over territory,
the situation had stabilized, and they had shifted their focus to nurturing geniuses.
It was the best choice the various races had settled on after weighing the pros and cons.
There was no other way.
The Sky Screen was something they simply couldn't afford to ignore.
As long as they cultivated one genius capable of making the list, everything would be worth it!
Watching countless races and factions scheme and compete against one another,
watching countless geniuses emerge and fall,
Yang Yu found it all fascinating.
Especially when he secretly watched Luo Feng's progress, Yang Yu felt the satisfaction of watching someone grow.
After a long while, Yang Yu withdrew his gaze.
"Almost time."
Yang Yu drank the last drop of wine from his flask and looked up at the giant Sky Screen above the Primal Universe. After lying dormant for a million years, it was about to shine again.
Before you continue