Insect Emperor Ancient Jade

When the Sword Butterfly True Spirit merged into the White Jade Sword Butterfly Puppet, Heavenly Insect suddenly discovered that the previously lifeless puppet had come alive in an instant.

Keen!

A soundless wave spread outward from the White Jade Sword Butterfly. When it swept over the aggressively approaching Flying Locust and Black-Feathered Star Locust, the latter plunged headfirst toward the ground!

Not only had Flying Locust, the target of the attack, failed to anticipate this, but Heavenly Insect and Demon Butterfly were startled as well.

A divine insect comparable to a Fourth Grade Sovereign had died just like that? That was far too surreal!

"Don't overthink it. That Black-Feathered Star Locust isn't dead. It's merely lost consciousness and will wake up after a while..." Spirit Butterfly Fairy stood there prettily and spoke in a coy voice.

Heavenly Insect suddenly felt his scalp crawl, and his toes nearly dug a three-bedroom apartment into the ground. Whether in his previous life or this one, he could never stand that affected, squeaky voice. Every time he heard it, his hands itched to clench into fists...

He glanced toward Demon Butterfly beside him and found an equally strange expression on her face. When she noticed his gaze, she even forced a stiff smile.

Clearly, even Demon Butterfly, a woman herself, found this side of her ancestor exceedingly uncomfortable.

Meanwhile, as the two people and one spirit spoke below, the battle overhead had already begun.

The revived White Jade Sword Butterfly had regained strength equivalent to a Fifth Grade Supreme. Facing Flying Locust, who was only a Fourth Grade Sovereign, was like a father beating his son.

Besides, Sword Butterflies were spirit insects renowned for their offensive power. Their razor-sharp sword qi was even more terrifying than that of sword cultivators at the same level in the Great Thousand World. Against a Spirit Insect Master who had lost the support of his life-bound spirit insect, it could beat him however it pleased!

"Yulang, kill him!"

Spirit Butterfly Fairy watched the battle in the sky with a smile, then sent out that gentle command.

Heavenly Insect could not help turning to look at her. Seeing the woman smile as she uttered words brimming with murderous intent sent a chill through his entire body.

Upon hearing Spirit Butterfly Fairy's command, the White Jade Sword Butterfly overhead instantly went berserk. Spiritual energy gathered madly around it, then transformed into sky-piercing sword qi that tore apart the entire sky.

"This is bad! Run!"

The threat of death instantly surged through Flying Locust's heart, leaving him trembling with terror.

He tried to make a tactical retreat without the slightest hesitation, but the towering sword qi behind him had already filled the surrounding space. Heavenly Insect and the others then watched in horror as countless black cracks began appearing throughout that space under the sword qi-the signs of space itself about to shatter.

Surely only experts at the seventh-grade Sovereign level or above could unleash such terrifying destruction?

"No!!!"

Watching that space-rending sword strike, Flying Locust had only enough time to let out one last desperate roar before boundless sword qi annihilated him.

Rumble!

The strike did more than annihilate Flying Locust. Its sword qi swept across the entire space, traveling thousands of miles and leaving a bottomless chasm through the ruins.

Those who had still been searching for opportunities on the outskirts were scared out of their wits at the sight of that heaven-destroying, earth-shattering strike. Countless people began fleeing frantically toward the perimeter, not daring to linger even a second longer!

After unleashing that fatal strike, the aura surrounding the White Jade Sword Butterfly in the sky rapidly faded. Finally, it turned to dust and slowly vanished between heaven and earth.

Heavenly Insect: "?!"

Heavenly Insect's head was full of question marks...

What was going on? Why had his Sword Butterfly Puppet, which possessed strength comparable to the Heaven-reaching Realm, ended up disappearing?

"Sorry, young sir. This Sword Butterfly Puppet was only refined from the corpse of a Heaven-reaching Realm Sword Butterfly.

"It was still extremely difficult for it to withstand Sovereign-level energy. And I'm merely a true spirit, utterly incapable of fighting, so I could only choose to sacrifice the puppet. Heehee..."

Heehee, my ass!

Rage surged through Heavenly Insect's heart. He had finally obtained a powerful fighting asset, only to lose it in the blink of an eye. And she thought a breezy apology would settle everything?

Unfortunately, even though anger was burning inside him, there was nothing he could do about the woman before him.

Besides, she was not wrong. Without the White Jade Sword Butterfly Puppet, none of them could have matched Flying Locust. Even the Ancient Sword Butterfly's true spirit had nearly been beaten apart. If they had truly waited until then, he probably would not have been able to make the White Jade Sword Butterfly Puppet perish together with Flying Locust even if he wanted to.

At that thought, Heavenly Insect let out a long breath.

"It's fine. It saved my life, after all, so losing the White Jade Sword Butterfly Puppet is a loss I can accept. But I hope you remember your earlier promise, Fairy, and don't grow fat swallowing your own words."

"Rest assured. A fairy's word cannot be overtaken by a team of four horses!"

Spirit Butterfly Fairy patted the towering peaks of her chest and declared boldly.

Heavenly Insect's gaze swept quickly across those peaks before his attention was drawn to the enormous body of the Black-Feathered Star Locust on the distant ground.

A divine insect in the Fourth-Grade Sovereign Realm. If I could subdue it, wouldn't that send me straight to the heavens in a single step?!

Heavenly Insect's heart immediately stirred.

Since the Black-Feathered Star Locust was Flying Locust's life-bound spirit insect, its master's death had cost it half its life and even robbed it of any possibility of further growth. Still, after recuperating for a while, it would remain a genuine Sovereign-level fighting force.

"Don't get any naughty ideas, young sir. I'm leaving that Black-Feathered Star Locust to the Spirit Butterfly Lineage..."

At some point, Spirit Butterfly Fairy had appeared beside Heavenly Insect, her soft voice sounding in his ear.

"Besides, you can't control a sovereign divine insect as you are now, young sir. A spirit insect's backlash can cost you your life..."

Heavenly Insect's eager expression froze, and he withdrew his gaze somewhat sheepishly.

"You're planning to leave this Black-Feathered Star Locust to the Spirit Butterfly Lineage, Fairy? As far as I know, the Spirit Butterfly Lineage doesn't have any Sovereign-level experts either... How will they subdue it?"

Spirit Butterfly Fairy smiled gently. "Well... naturally, that's because I'll lend a hand!"

"Although all that remains of me now is this tiny wisp of true spirit, I can still employ a few little tricks. Consider it the last bit of help I, their ancestor, can leave them..."

By the end, a trace of melancholy had entered Spirit Butterfly Fairy's voice.

"Ancestor..." Demon Butterfly approached, her face filling with emotion upon hearing Spirit Butterfly Fairy's words.

"Little Butterfly, don't be sad." Spirit Butterfly Fairy raised a hand and gently stroked Demon Butterfly's long black hair, speaking calmly. "I should have perished five hundred years ago. It's already a tremendous blessing that I could linger until today. Besides, now that Yulang has faded away, it's time for me to follow him..."

"Young sir, remember your oath. The Ancient Sword Butterfly Egg and supreme spirit liquid you want are both in this spirit pool. This Seven-Colored Glazed Glass Cup can help you collect and hold the supreme spirit liquid. Take them yourself."

Heavenly Insect's eyes lit up at the sight of the Seven-Colored Glazed Glass Cup floating before him, and he took it without hesitation.

Then Spirit Butterfly Fairy, who had already begun to turn translucent, continued, "As for that great opportunity, it's also at the bottom of this spirit pool. It's a piece of Insect Emperor Ancient Jade. Once you obtain it, you'll understand what it does. I hope you can claim that opportunity someday..."

After she finished speaking, Spirit Butterfly Fairy's presence had all but faded. Finally, no longer able to speak, she gave the two before her a radiant smile, then dissolved into specks of light that drifted into the air.

"Ancestor!" Demon Butterfly cried out in anguish, but she could do nothing to stop it.

Under Heavenly Insect's and Demon Butterfly's gazes, the specks of light in the sky transformed into two glowing butterflies. One flew before Demon Butterfly and merged into her forehead; the other slowly flew above the distant Black-Feathered Star Locust, then plunged straight into its enormous body.

Hum!

Two beams of golden light simultaneously shot skyward from Demon Butterfly and the Black-Feathered Star Locust. Demon Butterfly then felt a groggy consciousness appear in her mind-the consciousness of the unconscious Black-Feathered Star Locust!

Watching this miraculous scene, Heavenly Insect understood that Spirit Butterfly Fairy had traded her life for an opportunity for the Spirit Butterfly Lineage, and his remaining resentment vanished.

He glanced at the Seven-Colored Glazed Glass Cup in his hand, then turned toward the spirit pool with shining eyes.

He was very curious about just how powerful this supreme spirit liquid was and wanted to test it...

He acted as soon as the thought arose. With a single movement, Heavenly Insect appeared at the edge of the spirit pool.

His movement startled not only Demon Butterfly, who was trying to awaken the Black-Feathered Star Locust, but also the little emerald fish that had been swimming leisurely. They scattered as though frightened...

As they scattered, they immediately displayed astonishing speed. Heavenly Insect could only see streaks of emerald light flashing through the air, unable to make out their actual forms.

"So fast."

Heavenly Insect was startled. Then his hands rapidly formed seals, and the illusory image of a flying insect appeared beneath his feet. His speed instantly soared!

The Flying Insect Movement Technique was the only divine movement art the original Heavenly Insect had inherited from his parents, but he had never mastered it in all those years.

Cultivating this movement technique required the aid of a powerful spirit insect. When employed, it allowed the user to assume that insect's phantom form, increasing their speed to several times the insect's full speed. It was exceedingly powerful.

In Heavenly Insect's memories, his predecessor's father had used a Heavenly Flying Dragon Centipede to manifest the Flying Insect Method, achieving astonishing speed.

Unfortunately, because of his poor talent, his predecessor had never even grasped the basics of the Flying Insect Method. He also lacked a powerful spirit insect skilled at flying, so he had left it aside all this time.

The newly reborn Heavenly Insect had undergone a transformation down to his very bones. His talent was no longer remotely what it had once been, and he had never neglected his cultivation of the Flying Insect Method.

The only thing he still lacked was a powerful spirit insect skilled at flying. His plan was to wait until his life-bound spirit insect, the Golden Origin Heavenly Silkworm, emerged from its cocoon as a cicada, then use that primordial vicious insect, the Six-Winged Golden Cicada, as the foundation for his Flying Insect Movement Technique. At that point, his divine movement art would probably grant him speed comparable to other people's divine abilities...

With that in mind, Heavenly Insect had only been cultivating the most basic Flying Insect Method, which could at most double or triple his speed. He had used it several times before, and the results had been quite good.

But now, faced with this supreme spirit liquid that was not even alive, he had to exert himself fully just to barely keep up. That alone showed how extraordinary the supreme spirit liquid was.

After catching up to the supreme spirit liquid, Heavenly Insect unleashed a surge of spiritual energy from his hand. It formed a spiritual-energy palm that shot out as swiftly as lightning and seized a streak of emerald light.

Thump! Thump!

The instant Heavenly Insect caught the little fish, it began thrashing wildly!

Its tiny body struck the spiritual-energy palm, producing extremely piercing sounds. The glowing palm shook under the impacts as though it were about to shatter.

"What strength."

Feeling the impacts against his glowing spiritual-energy palm, Heavenly Insect immediately understood just how difficult it was to capture even a single drop of supreme spirit liquid.

Although one drop was not enough to overwhelm a Heaven Fusion Realm cultivator like him, there was so much supreme spirit liquid here. If he chased it down drop by drop, who knew what year of the monkey and month of the horse he would have to wait until before collecting it all?

Forget it. I'd better use the Seven-Colored Glazed Glass Cup...

Shaking his head, Heavenly Insect released the spirit fish formed from supreme spirit liquid that was struggling desperately in his hand, then activated the Seven-Colored Glazed Glass Cup he had received from Spirit Butterfly Fairy.

A seven-colored radiance flew out of the cup and, in the blink of an eye, spread across the entire spirit pool.

Then Heavenly Insect saw all the emerald spirit fish, which had been streaking about as trails of light, swim upstream along the radiance and obediently fall into the Seven-Colored Glazed Glass Cup.

Once all the supreme spirit liquid had been collected in the cup, the previously brimming pool of spiritual water quietly disappeared without a trace...

A milky-white insect egg the size of a human head appeared at the bottom of the spirit pool. Beside it lay an ancient piece of jade that looked utterly unremarkable.

Heavenly Insect knew these were the Ancient Sword Butterfly Egg and the Insect Emperor Ancient Jade that Spirit Butterfly Fairy had mentioned.

The insect egg was easy enough to understand. As a Spirit Insect Master, Heavenly Insect had memories of seeing quite a few. But the so-called Insect Emperor Ancient Jade looked to him like nothing more than an ordinary piece of ancient jade.

If there was anything unusual about it, it was the faint glow it constantly emitted. When an external light shone upon it, strange patterns appeared on its surface...

Under the light, those patterns changed as though they were breathing, alternately brightening and dimming, making them impossible to see clearly.

Insect Emperor Ancient Jade... Could it be something connected to an ancient Insect Emperor? Heavenly Insect silently speculated based on its name.

However, any being worthy of the title Insect Emperor had to be at least an Earthly Sovereign, and some had even reached the level of a perfected Earthly Sovereign.

Even the present-day Spirit Insect Tribe probably had fewer Insect Emperors than could be counted on one hand!