The Sovereign's Ascension

After four days of traveling, Lin Yun arrived in front of a spacious river. The river was covered in fog and shrouded with a mysterious dark atmosphere.

“It looks like I reached the Scarlet Ghost River,” muttered Lin Yun.

For over tens of thousands of years, the Scarlet Ghost River had been gathering demonic aura. Due to the heavy demonic influence, the demonic beasts in the river had undergone demonification, making it a dangerous place.

According to the map, one could reach the Azure Dragon Forbidden Realm by following the river. The river was littered with large ships from ancient times and could be used for travel. As long as one had enough astral pellets, they could activate the spiritual arrays on the ships and move them. Almost everyone in the seven astral lands were using these ships to head for the Azure Dragon Forbidden Realm.

Even Heavenly Soul Realm experts chose this method of transportation because flying was too exhausting. In reality, flying was normally used for fighting. Furthermore, it was safer and more convenient to travel by ship.

Then again, the same couldn’t be said for the higher realms. With their deep foundation, they didn’t mind exhausting themselves since they moved in large groups. After all, flight was the faster option.

At this moment, Lin Yun was half a step away from reaching the pinnacle Heavenly Soul Realm. However, he still wasn’t able to make a breakthrough. On the other hand, he had successfully reached lesser mastery in the Divine Sun Breaking Seal. Its power terrified Lin Yun because the potential of an advanced fortune martial technique was far beyond anything he could imagine.

Lin Yun’s figure flashed through the air as he headed towards the riverbank. When he arrived, he realized that the Scarlet Ghost River was a lot bigger than he had imagined. It even had waves that crashed against the shoreline.

What made Lin Yun even more shocked was the fact that the river’s demonic aura had reached a terrifying height. With just a glance, Lin Yun could feel his soul getting sucked into the river. Furthermore, there was also an irresistible smell coming from the river.

It was a baleful aura formed by corpses and blood for countless years. When Lin Yun looked at the river, he felt like he could see all of the corpses that were lost to the river. Evidently, a brutal battle occurred in ancient times that couldn’t disappear even after all these years. When Lin Yun thought about this, he became curious about what happened during ancient times.

On the riverbank, many geniuses from various astral lands were looking at the river with a grave expression. After recovering from their shock, they started to look for available ships. Most of the ships were extremely old and damaged, while the good ones were already full.

After recovering from shock, Lin Yun also started to look for a ship. The ships had thousands of people and all of them gave dozens of astral pellets to the control chamber. The spiritual array in the control chamber was automated and would activate after accumulating enough astral pellets.

As soon as the surroundings calmed down, the cultivators on one particular ship started chatting among themselves. The information they shared mainly involved news of the astral spirits, Azure Dragon Forbidden Realm, and geniuses on the Azure Dragon Ranking.

The Heavenly Path was only open for a short amount of time and a third of that time had already passed. During this time, many people became famous, especially when people learned of the Azure Dragon Ranking.

“Brother Zhao Feng, some of the higher realms were at Glorygold Land. I heard that a third of the geniuses on the Azure Dragon Ranking were there. Since we have nothing to do right now, why don’t you share with us how strong those geniuses were?” asked a grey-clothed youth.

The youth by the name of Zhao Feng was from the Balewind Realm. His strength was ordinary, but he had undergone his tribulation twice. His cultivation might not be strong among the higher realms, but most of the people on the ship were from ordinary realms. So he naturally stood out with his cultivation in the second soul Heavenly Soul Realm. Practically everyone on the ship had heard about him in less than a day.

“It’s fine. I don’t mind chatting about it.” Zhao Feng smiled. Since he had nothing to do right now, he didn’t mind being the center of attention. It was impressive that he was able to witness the might of the Azure Dragon Ranking, so it was natural for him to boast.

“The geniuses from the higher realms were the main competitors and rumor has it that the competition for the astral spirits was designed for them. When the Azure Dragon Forbidden Realm opens, it will most likely be dominated by the higher realms. If we’re fortunate, we might get some of the leftovers and survive the Heavenly Path,” said Zhao Feng. Everyone was intently listening to Zhao Feng with deep interest.

The Heavenly Path was basically a competition between the higher realms. Even if geniuses from lower or intermediate realms had a great boost in their strength, there was no way they could compete with geniuses from the higher realms.

Zhao Feng paused briefly before he continued, “The geniuses from the higher realms are terrifying, but the strength of those on the Azure Dragon Ranking cannot be described with words. The ones on the Azure Dragon Ranking can face ten other geniuses in the cultivation level and suppress them. Essentially, they’re invincible against those in the same realm. The only time they’ll lose is if they fight someone else on the ranking. It makes sense they’ve reached high stages in their martial intent. Plus, most of them have grasped an advanced fortune martial technique.”

“Advanced fortune martial technique!” Everyone started to shake when they heard those words.

Zhao Feng naturally noticed everyone’s expression and sneered, “Not everyone can cultivate an advanced fortune martial technique. If you run into one in the future, I advise you to be cautious. If geniuses from higher realms can damage their foundation from those techniques, what do you think will happen to you? My senior brother blew up because he tried to practice an overlord fortune martial technique.”

“They’re that terrifying?” Everyone felt like a bucket of ice water was dumped on their heads.

Lin Yun was some distance away from Zhao Feng, but he could hear Zhao Feng loud and clear. Lin Yun agreed with Zhao Feng’s words, advanced fortune martial techniques couldn’t be practiced carelessly.

Even with his talent, he was nearly burned to death by the Divine Glorysun Fist. But Lin Yun wouldn’t fear a puny overlord fortune martial technique.

“No wonder geniuses on the Azure Dragon Ranking are so terrifying. It turns out the threshold to cultivate advanced fortune martial techniques is high. But this is the first time I’ve heard about it…”

“Haha. It’s better if you stop thinking about it. You’re deluded if you think one of us will ever obtain advanced fortune martial techniques.”

“Yeah. Advanced fortune martial techniques are rare.” There was an uproar on the ship because it was the first time anyone heard what Zhao Feng said.

Zhao Feng had a longing in his eyes as he smiled bitterly, “I still remember when the Glorygold Spirit appeared. A battle broke out between the geniuses on the Azure Dragon Ranking and all I could do was watch from afar. Even though my cultivation is in the second soul Heavenly Soul Realm, I could barely withstand the shockwave of the advanced fortune martial techniques.”

Everyone was shocked by Zhao Feng’s serious gaze. Zhao Feng was already very strong in their eyes since he was in the second soul Heavenly Soul Realm. So exactly how terrifying were the advanced fortune martial techniques that made Zhao Feng so serious?

Zhao Feng didn’t say anything when he saw the doubt in everyone’s eyes. They don’t know the true terror of advanced fortune martial techniques. All of you are in for a rude awakening.

“Brother Zhao, who took the Glorygold Spirit in the end?” Someone asked.

“It doesn’t matter who obtained it in the end. The victor must have been a genius on the Azure Dragon Ranking. Even if it wasn’t, it would still end up in the hands of the higher realms. If anyone else took the Glorygold Spirit, they would meet a swift death. This goes for all the astral spirits,” said Zhao Feng casually. In reality, he was too far away to see what happened and didn’t dare to get close to the battle.

“Don’t be so sure about that. I heard that the Glorysun Spirit fell into the hands of a genius from the Profound Amber Realm.”

“Oh, that… I also heard about it. His name is Flower Burial and he claims that he only needs one sword to kill his opponent. He actually killed four higher realm geniuses that should have entered the Azure Dragon Ranking sooner or later. I heard that only one person managed to escape Flower Burial, but that person is practically crippled.”

“What a bold guy. I heard that a genius from the Bloodbone Realm was one of the three who died.”

“That’s still not the craziest part. I heard that Flower Burial treats the higher realms no different from ants. After all, he only used one sword to kill Bloodbone Realm’s Feng Wuji.”

“How’s that possible?” As the topic focused on Lin Yun, the ship’s atmosphere became lively. Clearly, everyone was more interested in an underdog from the lower realms than the geniuses on the Azure Dragon Ranking.

Zhao Feng was put in an awkward position. But just when he was about to refute those words, his face suddenly changed. The other geniuses on the ship also changed expression as they raised their heads.

They could see three figures flying over from a hundred miles as their torrential demonic aura tore the sky apart. Their aura was so powerful that even the water in the river was split in two.

“Geniuses from the higher realms!” There was no question that only geniuses from higher realms dared to travel in the Scarlet Ghost River in this manner.

Just when everyone exclaimed out, the three figures approached and landed on the ship while looking down at everyone. When Zhao Feng raised his head to see the person standing in the middle, his eyes were filled with shock because he recognized the newcomer. It was Yuan Hentian!