Ever since the Western Emperor Pagoda had given him a fright, Feng Jiu had opened the door to a whole new world.
The Myriad Tribulation Reincarnation Lotus born alongside him became even more extraordinary. It breathed with Feng Jiu, shared his fate, and forged a deeper bond with him.
From then on, with the red lotus mark upon his brow, he could roam heaven and earth at will.
-Believe me when I say you can't outrun me?
In a mere instant, he could flee from the Southern Region of the Eastern Wasteland to the Northern Region of the Eastern Wilderness, or launch a lightning raid on the highest hall of the Assassin Heavenly Court from the ruins of the Nether God Palace.
He fought alone across hundreds of millions of miles, surpassing the limits of what cultivators at this realm could even imagine.
With nearly all the Assassin Heavenly Court's experts out in force, leaving it at its weakest, Feng Jiu finished blocking their escape route and descended upon their lair. A reincarnation avatar advanced at an unhurried pace, every bit as formidable as Feng Jiu attacking in person.
Blade light rose, and heads fell. Feng Jiu held nothing back this time. A rain of blood drifted through the air, and the Killer King guarding the Assassin Heavenly Court's highest hall died in an instant!
When speed reached its absolute pinnacle, even the realm barrier of Immortal Three, Severing the Dao, could not stop an Immortal Second Realm Mighty Figure within the divine forbidden domain.
After all, in later ages, an Immortal Second Realm Mighty Figure could already take on an immortal for a lifetime!
He could brave the Bronze Immortal Palace and charge into Qing Emperor's Tomb... how could the mere highest hall of the Assassin Heavenly Court bar his way?
Besides, Feng Jiu had come from this very assassin organization. He knew all its vicious defensive measures inside out, and he also possessed Nine Secrets: Xing, which he had cultivated to a level that left even Wushi helpless. Entering and leaving this place was like walking through an empty field!
Nine Secrets: Xing was simply too commanding a secret technique. Especially below the Ultimate Dao level, it was an indispensable supreme art for murder and arson, survival and escape.
Supreme killing formations could not stop him, and natural deathtraps could not imprison him. Feng Jiu strode calmly onward, passing five gates and slaying six kings. Everything happened far too swiftly: life and death were decided in an instant, then he crossed the dreadful restrictions and reached the next checkpoint.
Of course, he also had to thank "Wushi" for drawing all their hatred, bringing out every expert of the Heavenly Court-even the two Killing Saints had set off in person.
More importantly, the subsequent rumors of an Immortal Divine Medicine had drawn away still more of the Assassin Heavenly Court's strength, along with many of its heavyweight instruments of slaughter.
Perhaps this was also due to the current Lord of the Heavenly Court's confidence that no one could find the Assassin Heavenly Court's highest hall, much less seize upon a fleeting opening!
Unfortunately, he had no idea that all of this lay within someone else's design.
At last, Feng Jiu stood before the hall at the very center of a small world.
For the first time, he frowned.
The blood-colored hall ahead was frighteningly still, utterly silent, yet it faintly exuded a despairing oppression, as though someone had once died here in the most hopeless way imaginable.
"No... not just one person."
Feng Jiu half closed his eyes and unfolded a secret technique recorded in the Western Emperor Scripture. For an instant, he seemed to resonate with the Great Dao and vibrate in harmony with heaven and earth, seeing through the surface of all things, peeling away veil after veil to grasp the most fundamental Dao resonance.
Death, fusion...
A moment later, he opened his eyes.
"A Quasi-Emperor's lineage, yet no Saint has emerged in nearly eight thousand years. The old wither before the young can take their place, and many prodigious assassins have met untimely deaths..."
Feng Jiu murmured, "At its founding, it had only one purpose: hunt down King Bodies and reign supreme above all others..."
"It's time the waters receded and the truth came to light!"
As his words fell, blade light flashed. The blood-colored doors shattered, and the barrier that blocked divine sense was destroyed, revealing everything within.
At the same moment, something seemed to stir. Faint patterns appeared in the void and glowed, emanating wisps of a Quasi-Emperor's aura. It was very faint, as though worn down by long ages, long since stripped of its power at its peak.
Yet it remained terrifying, and it even seemed to suppress Nine Secrets: Xing!
Suppress, not counter... as though these were measures left behind by someone who had reached the summit of this field, interfering with divine speed and disrupting space and time!
The patterns intertwined into a Killing Formation, sealing heaven and locking down earth to destroy everything!
No Killing Saint needed to stand guard. Terrifying defenses already existed here; even a Saint could not escape and would die in this place!
Feng Jiu remained calm. Ignoring the mortal danger, he stepped deeper into the hall.
Inside, he saw motionless figures, each like a statue.
They had all once been living, breathing people.
But here, they had died.
Among them were peerless assassin prodigies who had dominated their respective eras in the Assassin Heavenly Court over these past several thousand years. They had severed the Dao to become kings, and their assassinations had frightened the great holy lands into silence!
Even holy lords from many holy lands had fallen beneath the swords of such terrifying assassins.
The Assassin Heavenly Court was, after all, a Quasi-Emperor's lineage, and it possessed Xing of the Nine Secrets. Such dominance was only to be expected!
Yet they had all died.
Not at the natural end of their lives, but with the brilliance of their existence cut abruptly short.
Feng Jiu's gaze swept across these statues before finally settling on their brows.
That was where their Immortal Platforms lay, the seat of their primordial spirits.
But their Immortal Platforms had already collapsed.
Still, Feng Jiu discerned something else. Within those collapsed Immortal Platforms lingered... traces of more than one primordial spirit's aura!
"Possession?"
"No, fusion. An outside primordial spirit forcibly fused with the body's own primordial spirit."
He grasped the subtle distinction, capturing the essence of those lingering primordial spirit auras.
Possession and fusion were different.
Possession meant replacement. The body was clothing, and the primordial spirit was the person wearing it: the same garment changed wearers.
But no matter how the wearer changed, they remained an outsider in essence. Some things could never be washed clean.
For instance... lifespan!
If someone possessed another person and acquired a new body, did that mean their lifespan would be calculated according to the new body?
Of course not.
Otherwise, attaining longevity would not be so difficult.
Lifespan and longevity were the weightiest karmic burdens in this world. The Heavenly Venerables of the Mythological Age, the emperors of the Primordial Age, the emperors of Desolate Antiquity... countless invincible beings had struggled within them. They had one Desolate Heavenly Emperor, who loved drinking beast milk above all else, to thank for creating such an excellent environment for becoming a Red Dust Immortal, where "human resolve could conquer heaven."
But fusion was different. If two primordial spirits merged into one, their lifespan could be reset!
Yet in that case, did the fused being truly still count as the person who had directed the fusion?
Feng Jiu wandered among the statues. Behind him, tribulation light filled the sky as the killing formation operated on its own, seeking to refine and kill every living being within the hall.
Feng Jiu was unafraid. He simply continued onward, examining every statue's Immortal Platform. These were the mysteries left behind by the calamity wrought when a terrifying expert of the past had experimented with methods of longevity.
"So that's how it is..."
"No, it is just as I thought."
"The first Lord of the Heavenly Court, that Quasi-Emperor... what he obtained back then was probably more than just Xing of the Nine Secrets!"
Feng Jiu reached the highest throne in the hall, where,
on a stone table, scattered drafts lay piled in a disorderly heap.
Feng Jiu exhaled, sending the pages fluttering up until they all danced in midair.
"You undying old bastard. Using young people as spare parts..."
He scoffed. "I curse you to be strangled sooner or later by a Sacred Body that rises from the dead..."
Before his words had finished, destructive tribulation light swept over him, dissolving him inch by inch until he withered away amid the dazzling radiance.