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Translator: Silavin & Sara
Translation Checker: PewPewLazerGun
Editor and Proofreader: Leo of Zion Mountain & Dhael Ligerkeys
Yang Kai’s mysterious power was far beyond the realm of what the Black Ink Clan thought possible.
A quarter-hour later, the dust cleared. Yang Kai raised his hand and a ball the size of his fist shot into it.
In the distance, those from the Black Ink Clan were looking on with widened eyes and gaping mouths.
Mo Na Ye sighed to himself, [I was mistaken!] He assumed that Yang Kai would use his Small Universe to retrieve Pure Yang Pass and never thought the latter would exhibit such an ability instead.
Meanwhile, Yang Kai fiddled with the Space-Time River ball in his hand as he secretly smirked.
He was able to turn a Universe World into a World Bead, so how difficult would it be to do the same to Pure Yang Pass?
Of course, there was a difference between refining a Universe World into a World Bead and what he just did. He had been able to refine those Universe Worlds because their World Principles had not perished yet. In other words, the Universe Worlds were still alive, so in a sense they were cooperating with him which allowed him to refine each one of them before leaving them with the World Tree. That was also how he managed to build a strange connection with the World Tree and use the power of the Old Tree to traverse the Void.
However, Pure Yang Pass was completely inanimate and could not be communicated with in any way, so Yang Kai could not refine it in the same way. He could only wrap the Space-Time River around Pure Yang Pass and slice away the local Space where it was before using the power of his Space-Time River to compress everything.
With his present command over the Dao of Space, it was well within his means to do such a thing; furthermore, after encountering those tiny Celestial Phenomena inside the Universe Furnace’s Infinite River, he had gained much inspiration from them.
It could be said that his Space-Time River was the most crucial part of this whole plan. Without the Space-Time River, Yang Kai would have a hard time cutting out such a huge piece of the Void.
Yang Kai played with the Space-Time River ball in his hand before looking over at Mo Na Ye, “Why don’t I take another Great Pass in exchange for staying away from the No-Return Pass for 60 years?”
“Get lost!” Mo Na Ye was incensed as he had abruptly realised that the more powerful Yang Kai was, the more outrageous he became. [How dare he make such a shameless request?!]
The Humans’ Great Passes were extremely lethal weapons of war. It was bad enough to let Yang Kai take one with him, so why would they let him take two?
What’s more, there was barely a difference between 30 years and 60 years.
“Stingy!” Yang Kai pursed his lips, but he had only made this remark off-handedly as he knew for certain that the Black Ink Clan would not agree to it. Even if they did, he would not be able to do it anyway. He only had one Space-Time River and could not pull out another one.
“You’ve gotten what you wanted, so hurry up and leave,” Mo Na Ye could not resist urging. In a single trip to the No-Return Pass, Yang Kai managed to cause the loss of a Pseudo-Royal Lord and a High-Rank Black Ink Nest. He even took the Pure Yang Pass with him. All in all, the Black Ink Clan lost quite a fair bit.
Fortunately, if Yang Kai kept his word, they would not have to see him for another 30 years, and in that time, they could hopefully find a way to deal with such situations; otherwise, if Yang Kai returned once the 30 years were up, they would still be unable to do anything about him.
“There’s no rush,” Yang Kai smiled faintly as he eyed Mo Na Ye and said, “I’d like to discuss a second business proposal with you.”
Mo Na Ye’s head was throbbing by now and immediately raised his hand and said, “No thanks. You said it yourself, the Human Race and the Black Ink Clan are irreconcilable enemies and the bloodshed between us is enough to fill even the deepest oceans. There’s nothing we need to discuss. Leave at once with what you’ve taken!”
Nothing good came out of anything that was related to Yang Kai. Mo Na Ye was on his guard and did not want to waste any more time on this Human.
He did not expect Yang Kai to ignore what he said entirely and carry on speaking anyway, “The battlefields between both sides are similar to what it was back then. Right now, 12 Great Territories are being fought over with quite a number of Pseudo-Royal Lords standing guard at each one, along with massive Armies. Even if you don’t care about the lives of those in your Army, you’d still have to care about the lives of the Pseudo-Royal Lords, right?”
Mo Na Ye’s heart skipped a beat and his expression darkened, “What do you mean by that?”
Yang Kai chuckled and took a step forward. With the use of Space Principles, he reappeared in front of the Territory Gate and looked down upon the Black Ink Clan Masters beneath him as he taunted, “Don’t tell me you have no idea what I meant by that. Do you insist on forcing me to spell it out for you?”
Mo Yu’s expression was as dark as night and Mo Na Ye’s was not any better, but the latter stubbornly refuted, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Yang Kai scoffed, “Seems to me you won’t admit it until I force your hand!” Then, he continued, “Why don’t I make a guess? When I left the No-Return Pass and all of you began prying open the Territory Gate, you must’ve gotten the word out at once for all the Pseudo-Royal Lords to retreat from the battlefields, right? Oh, wait. It won’t just be them. The Territory Lords and many of the Feudal Lords too, right? After all, you went through all that effort building them up, so it won’t be good if too many died. Based on the timing, the ones nearest to the No-Return Pass should arrive at the Barren Territory soon. Maybe I should head over there and greet them.”
Mo Na Ye’s eyes were flaming as murderous intent swelled up. He clenched his jaw and spat out, “You’ve known all along!”
Initially, he hoped that Yang Kai would not be able to figure this out, but the moment Yang Kai said it aloud, he knew he had been far too hopeful.
After all, with how shrewd Yang Kai was; it was impossible for him to not have thought of this possibility. Nevertheless, the fact that he did not show any signs of having thought about it earlier gave the Black Ink Clan a trace of hope.
That being said, the moment Yang Kai brought it up, Mo Na Ye knew that the situation was heading down the worst possible path for them.
Mo Na Ye instantly realised the severity of the situation when Yang Kai left the No-Return Pass and headed for the depths of the Black Ink Battlefield. The fact that Yang Kai could cause even more trouble at the No-Return Pass now was not the most serious issue. Although the Black Ink Clan could not be pleased by the way he messed around at the No-Return Pass, destroyed a Black Ink Nest, and killed a recovering Pseudo-Royal Lord, it did not have much of an effect on the fights out on the various battlefields.
On the contrary, Yang Kai’s ability to seal up the Territory Gate whenever he pleased was his biggest trump card!
The No-Return Pass was the foundation of the Black Ink Clan. They had two Royal Lords here and all of their High-Rank Black Ink Nests as well. Around 80% of the reinforcements sent to the battlefield came from the No-Return Pass. Even the injured Pseudo-Royal Lords had to return to the No-Return Pass to heal.
Therefore, the Territory Gate between the No-Return Pass and the Barren Territory was critical to their war effort!
If it was sealed up, the Black Ink Clan would not be able to send reinforcements to the various battlefields, and the Pseudo-Royal Lords who were on their way back could not return either.
Yang Kai could even seal up the Territory Gates across the various battlefields to keep all of the Black Ink Clan Armies caged up, then slowly eliminate them!
Considering how powerful he was now, no one would be able to challenge him out on the battlefields as there was not a single true Royal Lord overseeing them.
Yang Kai had also sealed up the Territory Gate at the No-Return Pass in the past, but at the time, he was only an Eighth-Order Open Heaven Realm Master. Even though he managed to seal up the Territory Gate, he did not have the power to kill off Royal Lords and Pseudo-Royal Lords and he would not be able to accomplish much if he relied solely on his Soul Rending Thorns.
However, the situation was different now. Yang Kai was a Ninth-Order Master and a Divine Dragon as well. The fight two months ago had allowed Mo Na Ye to realise just how powerful Yang Kai had truly become.
A Human as strong as Yang Kai with the tricky ability to seal Territory Gates to boot was an enemy that the Black Ink Clan could not go up against. His existence threatened to turn the tides on the Black Ink Clan despite the effort they had put in all these years to get things to where they were now.
Yang Kai using his ability to seal up the Territory Gate was the foreshadowing sign of the Black Ink Clan’s future possibility of devastating losses out on the battlefields.
Thus, while they were busy forcing open the Territory Gate, Mo Na Ye made sure the Black Ink Clan avoided suffering such heavy casualties by getting the word out as well. He instructed all of the Pseudo-Royal Lords out on the battlefields to retreat and return to the No-Return Pass as quickly as they could.
Doing this was the equivalent of dooming the rest of the Black Ink Clan Army. Though the Pseudo-Royal Lords could flee, the Armies could not. Mo Na Ye could predict that the Humans would certainly be able to massacre the Black Ink Clan Soldiers that remained on the battlefields.
Despite making all of the necessary arrangements beforehand, Mo Na Ye still had a hard time dealing with the fact that Yang Kai saw right through everything.
The losses the Black Ink Clan suffered this time around were irrefutably the worst since the Barren Territory War, but it was an unavoidable situation. Their goal was to invade the 3,000 Worlds, so naturally they fought deep within the 3,000 Worlds.
“Since you’ve already thought of this, why haven’t you done anything yet?” Now that things had come to this, Mo Na Ye was surprisingly able to keep a cool head.
“What are you referring to?” Yang Kai cocked his eyebrows.
“After claiming E-5 Territory, you could’ve easily helped out on the next battlefield. You could’ve also sealed up the Territory Gates to ensure the Human Race’s victory!”
This was something Mo Na Ye could not figure out. Yang Kai had made his move at E-5 Territory and helped the Red Flame Army slaughter a total of eight Pseudo-Royal Lords, but after having done that, he ran straight over to the No-Return Pass instead of lingering on the battlefield. Mo Na Ye believed that Yang Kai could have simply continued his efforts in the next Great Territory. The Black Ink Clan there would surely be defeated and at least a few of the Pseudo-Royal Lords would have died in the process.
Yang Kai chuckled and said, “Even though I could’ve taken over another battlefield by doing so, when word got back to you, you would’ve made the same arrangements as now. That means I’ll only get to kill a few more Pseudo-Royal Lords. There’s not much point in that.”
Mo Na Ye mulled it over and nodded lightly. As it was, the moment he received the report from E-5 Territory, he immediately thought about withdrawing all of the Pseudo-Royal Lords as it would be dangerous for them if Yang Kai began eyeing them too. There was no telling where Yang Kai would head off to next, so it had to be a full retreat.
However, the subsequent dispatches made it clear that Yang Kai did not head to any other battlefield and instead headed straight for the No-Return Pass, which was why Mo Na Ye did not immediately give the order to retreat.
That all changed when Yang Kai left the No-Return Pass. As Mo Na Ye surveyed the sealed-up Territory Gate, he finally realised how grave the situation was.
All of a sudden, Yang Kai’s expression hardened as he said, “The situation across the 3,000 Worlds is far too messy right now. All of the Armies are separated and your Black Ink Clan has established forward outposts throughout the various Great Territories. Don’t you think it’s better if we make the situation simpler?”
Mo Na Ye came to an understanding, “So, that’s why you’ve chosen to do this!”
Yang Kai nodded, “Soon, the Humans will reclaim the 3,000 Worlds, and the Black Ink Clan will have to all gather together at the No-Return Pass. The Humans won’t need to disperse their Armies to deal with you, they will simply have to keep their eye on the No-Return Pass.” As for the Pseudo-Royal Lords whose lives were threatened by Yang Kai, sooner or later, they would still die.
Mo Na Ye could not help but feel impressed, “That is indeed the best possible situation for the Humans.” Then, he followed up with a sigh, “The Humans are blessed to have you, Yang Kai!”
Yang Kai smirked, “Don’t think I’ll go easy on you just because you are flattering me.”
Mo Na Ye shook his head and asked with a forlorn expression, “Is this the second business proposal you talked about earlier?”
Hello!
Many thanks for the chapter, as always.