Star Odyssey

Chapter 2996: Departure

Ancestor Lu Yuan nodded and then coughed. "Just one quick question—how did you start cultivating divine energy?"

Lu Yin replied, "It was by accident. I encountered some divine energy, and it entered my body."

Ancestor Lu Yuan's face twitched. He thought for a long time and then quietly said, "Don't be so rash in the future."

He then left and did not look back.

Lu Yin laughed, but as he watched Ancestor Lu Yuan’s departing figure, he felt a heavy weight settle down on him.

Lu Yin had admitted to cultivating divine energy willingly, and yet Ancestor Lu Yuan still allowed Lu Yin to remain free. The man had to be feeling a heavy burden of responsibility as well, and he was likely in a very bad mood at the moment.

Lu Yuan returned to the Perennial World and immediately went to find Lu Tianyi, "Did you know that Little Seven has cultivated divine energy?"

Lu Tianyi nodded calmly. "He told me."

"What did you tell him?"

"That we trust him."

Ancestor Lu Yuan held his head. "What a headache."

Lu Tianyi turned to look at Ancestor Lu Yuan. "I really do trust him."

Ancestor Lu Yuan sighed. "I don't share your trust. You don't understand the characteristics of True God’s power at all. If it were so easy to break free from his control over all divine energy, why would Aeternus trust it so much? Divine energy is not merely a form of power, but also a form of belief."

"Then what do you want to do about this, Ancestor?" Lu Tianyi stared at Lu Yuan.

The older man shook his head. "Keep an eye on Little Seven. If he shows any signs of being controlled by divine energy, then capture him. My Lu family will be responsible for all of his actions. At worst, our family will take care of him for the rest of his life, and we will keep him in the Lu Sanctum."

"He likes his freedom."

Ancestor Lu Yuan remained silent for a moment. "If it comes to be a matter of life or death, then all of us will die before him, and he will be free once more."

As Lu Tianyi observed Ancestor Lu Yuan, he realized that the man had visibly aged.

Half a month passed. During this time, Lu Yin went to speak with Arch-Elder Zen, and he asked the man to join him on his journey to visit parallel universes. At the same time, Lu Yin had decided who would be going with him. The first party member he decided upon was the jiao, which would serve as Lu Yin’s mount. Additionally, Jiang Chen would join, and Lu Yin decided to take the Ghost Monkey as well. Ghost Monkey was able to hide in the shadows, and not even a peak powerhouse would notice the monkey without paying careful attention. Ghost Monkey was also not weak. After he received some of Progenitor Wushang’s memories and power, it was possible that Ghost Monkey might try to become a Progenitor after this journey.

One more person should go, and Lu Yin thought for a long time and considered many people before finally settling on someone: Zhao Ran.

This journey would likely be dangerous, and it would take a great deal of time. It would not be bad to have a beautiful maid who could brew some delicious tea tag along. More importantly, Destina’s fate made it so that Lu Yin did not dare to leave Zhao Ran behind. If she remained behind in the Heavens Sect, given her vague connection to Destiny, it was possible that something might happen, and that could create difficulties for the Heavens Sect.

Ancestor Lu Tianyi could not guard the Heavens Sect at all times, so Lu Yin would take this particular uncertainty along with him. This would pose some level of danger to Lu Yin himself, but he would rather keep Zhao Ran where he could keep an eye on her than leave her in the Heavens Sect.

As for Arch-Elder Zen, given his cultivation, his strength was only average most of the time. While his Progenitor’s world could occasionally create rather miraculous effects, it was useless against truly powerful foes. However, the Progenitor’s strength transformed when he went all out. One of his streams of Ancestral Qi could summon Lu Tianyi, which meant that Arch-Elder Zen was able to call upon the strength of a Sequence Progenitor, which would stun any enemy no matter how powerful they might be.

From everyone Lu Yin had selected, he only needed to await news from Jiang Chen.

Jiang Chen, as well as Jiang Qingyue, were the Lord of Lightning’s children, and both of them should have the means to protect themselves in a critical situation.

Before leaving, Lu Yin decided to go to the Ice Spirit Domain and say goodbye to Yan'er.

Lu Yin had cultivated for decades, and he had not spent very much time with Yan'er. Still, those days were representative of his ignorant youth, as well as the shock of love at first sight. She also represented the pain of life and death. Lu Yin had met many women, and what broke his heart the most was that the one whom he cared about the most and whom he could never let go of was Yan’er.

Lu Yin quickly tore through the void and arrived in the Ice Spirit Tribe’s universe.

The Ice Lord was expecting Lu Yin, and he quickly moved out to greet him.

Lu Yin was led to the Iceheart, and he stared at it in a trance.

The Ice Lord left, not speaking or bothering Lu Yin.

Lu Yin continued to stare at the Iceheart, his eyes filled with complicated emotions.

How many people had accompanied him throughout the unknown first half of his life? Regardless of whether he had been poor, rich, young or old, or even nearly dead from illness, those people would have never left, and there had always been someone with Lu Xiaoxuan whenever he had been the loneliest. Despite that, the smile and the face that he wanted to see the most was the one that he could not.

To be comforted after waking from a nightmare, to receive some warm porridge when he was hungry, to enjoy the occasional drink or dance to a song—this was all Lu Yin really wanted from life, and he felt that it was enough for him.

Lu Yin did not actually have grand desires. He had always pursued the most ordinary life, but that consisted of the return of the Lu family, peace for humanity, and having a wife by his side with whom he could raise many children. These might be the simplest of wishes, but often, the simplest were the most difficult to achieve.

It seemed that this was also a law of the universe. The more powerful a person was, the less they were capable of protecting those they cared for.

As Lu Yin stood in front of the Iceheart and stared at it in a daze, three days passed in the blink of an eye.

Finally, on the fourth day, a beautiful figure arrived, disrupting Lu Yin's staring.

"Brother Lu, you will meet your wife again one day," Jiang Qingyue said. She had been cultivating in the Ice Spirit Tribe’s universe.

Lu Yin let out a breath and gathered his thoughts before looking over at the woman. "Are you ready? Are you joining us on this trip?"

Jiang Qingyue said, "Jiang Chen isn’t able to go."

Lu Yin was surprised. "Why not?"

"My master said that Jiang Chen already wanders about various parallel universes all the time, and this trip is essentially just more of the same. For that reason, he isn’t allowed to go, and he needs to stay back and cultivate with Master," Jiang Qingyue explained. Lu Yin was not sure if he was hearing things, but he could swear that he heard gloating in Jiang Qingyue’s tone.

"Your master? Kong Tianzhao?"

"Mmhmm."

"And what about you?"

"Of course my young mistress is going! Aren’t you happy?" Dragonturtle climbed up from behind Jiang Qingyue, flicking his tail as he shouted proudly.

Jiang Qingyue frowned. "Do you want to go back into solitary confinement?"

Dragonturtle instantly pulled his head back. "I'm sorry, Young Mistress."

Lu Yin smiled. "I didn’t see you last time. Were you in solitary confinement?"

Jiang Qingyue calmly replied, "Master said that he was being too cocky."

Lu Yin looked back at Jiang Qingyue. "So you’re coming along on this journey with me?"

Jiang Qingyue hesitated briefly before nodding. "I rarely visit parallel universes, aside from the Sixth Mainland. Master has asked me to move around a bit more."

Lu Yin nodded. "Then everyone who’s going has been decided. In that case, let's head out.

"Right, I want to leave something for the Ice Spirits before we go."

Lu Yin went to find the Ice Lord and asked him for a few froststones.

The Ice Lord grew excited, as he knew that Lu Yin was able to improve items. By asking for froststones, it was clear that Lu Yin wanted to Enhance them. Even if they did not reach the same level as the Iceheart, any improved froststones would greatly benefit the Iceheart. They could even compensate for the losses caused by freezing the two people in the Iceheart.

One day later, Lu Yin handed four Enhanced froststones to the Ice Lord.

When the Ice Spirit saw the four froststones surrounded by frozen mist, his breathing quickened. "Dao Monarch, so many?"

Lu Yin replied, "I don't want anything to go wrong with the Iceheart."

The Ice Lord said, "I understand that, but to improve these stones by so much... What price did you have to pay?"

"A lot." Enhancing the four froststones had cost Lu Yin a total of 20 trillion star essence. There was no denying that it was a very steep price, but it was one that Lu Yin would gladly pay if it meant protecting Yan’er. He would much rather lose money than her, so he had decided to do what he could to protect the Iceheart.

While none of the four froststones were as good as the Iceheart, they were more than enough to strengthen the Iceheart.

It was not that Lu Yin did not want to Enhance the froststones to the same level as the Iceheart, but rather that, if he did, he could not predict how the Enhanced froststones would interact with the Iceheart. On top of that, there was no telling how the Ice Lord would react when faced with such temptation.

Lu Yin would never underestimate human nature. People could be both good and evil, and that applied to all other creatures as well.

Finally, Lu Yin had no idea what it would cost to Enhance a froststone to the same level as the Iceheart, or how many times he would need to improve such a froststone. It was possible that it would consume too many resources and ultimately be useless. Thus, Lu Yin did not want to suffer such waste.

For the moment, what he had done would be enough.

...

On the mountain behind the Heavens Sect, Lu Yin stood beside Arch-Elder Zen, Jiang Qingyue, and a blank-faced Zhao Ran. Ghost Monkey was hiding in a shadow, and Dragonturtle was perched on Jiang Qingyue's shoulder. As for the jiao, it was on top of Lu Yin's shoulders. This was the entire group that would be making this trip with Lu Yin.

He had already announced that he was going into seclusion, and he had never officially ended that seclusion. There had also been no hint as to how long Lu Yin might remain in seclusion.

"Everyone, traveling to unknown parallel universes might be very dangerous, or this could just be an easy time. We really don’t know. Still, thank you for accompanying me." Lu Yin spoke slowly before solemnly bringing out the compass.

In the shadow, Ghost Monkey grew excited, "If I can stay with you, Seventh Bro, I won't be afraid even if we face mountains of swords and seas of fire. Seventh Bro, Little Monkey is willing to die for you."

Arch-Elder Zen was rendered speechless. This monkey had lost his mind, and the way he flattered Lu Yin throughout the Heavens Sect was enough to make a person sick.

From his perch atop Jiang Qingyue's shoulder, Dragonturtle let out a disdainful sound.

"Who? Who’s challenging me?"

Lu Yin raised the hand that held the compass and stared at the needle as he slowly tore through the void. Throughout the entire process, the needle never twitched. The jiao dropped down from Lu Yin’s shoulders, and grew just large enough to carry everyone present. The beast then shot into the spatial tear, and the exploration of unknown universes officially began.

While this trip seemed to be to a distant location, they were not actually traveling that far, and they could return at any moment. More importantly, there was no way to know how much time would pass before they returned.

And most important of all, they might run into Aeternals or outsider powerhouses who were antagonistic towards humans. This was the greatest uncertainty and danger that Lu Yin expected to meet during this journey.

The jiao carried the group of people into the spatial tear, and they arrived in a parallel universe. This universe appeared to be perfectly ordinary, though a violent cosmic storm filled their entire line of sight.

Lu Yin checked the compass and then ordered the jiao to travel in the direction the needle was indicating.

The jiao grew larger as it charged through the cosmic storm. They quickly arrived at where the needle was indicating.

They found a meteor field. There were strange astral beasts crouched in the distance, but they were nothing to worry about. Lu Yin held the compass, and a faint light emanated from it. The light slowly spread out and filled the area.

"Qingyue, can you see the light?" Lu Yin asked.

Jiang Qingyue shook her head.

Lu Yin turned to Arch-Elder Zen, but he was also unable to see the light.

Lu Yin exhaled. It appeared that only people who could perceive sequence particles could see this light. This indicated that only sequence powerhouses could use the compass.

"Let's go!" Lu Yin shouted, and the compass dragged the jiao above the light with a powerful pull. It did not seem like they were traveling through the universe, but rather across multiple parallel universes. The sight of various parallel universes flickered by before Lu Yin’s eyes, and they soon arrived in a new universe. They had not even needed to move, but they had already arrived in a new parallel universe.