Chapter 21: End of a Period

Chapter 21: End of a Period It was during a certain period—the period when Xu Tao successfully arrived at the Starfire Lake’s central cave. Back at the top of Kunlun Mountain, the entirety of the Azure Dragon Sect was celebrating. It was, after all, an event worth celebrating. Sect disciples, be they inner or outer, were out in the open, drinking, eating, and being merry. The festivities went on for so long that weeks passed before it was all over. But nobody knew that that was the last moment they could ever relax again. GONG! The battle drums roared across the entire sect, rallying everyone at the Golden Core stage or above. Of course, nobody knew why the gong was sounded at first... until they saw a strange phenomenon in the sky. "What is that...?" One of the elders asked—meaning, nobody else could explain the events before their eyes. The sky split, parting the peaceful blue and instead filling with pitch-black space, sparkling with eerie light. From within that rupture in the sky, creatures began to appear... They seemed insectoid in build and appearance, but their stance and movements were very much humanlike. "Prepare for battle!" another elder shouted. "Activate the defensive arrays! Protect the disciples!" "We shall protect the sect from these invaders, whatever they are!" A battle sparked between them almost instantly. But to everyone’s surprise, the enemy... was weak. Too weak, in fact, that even a Body Refinement Stage cultivator could more or less handle themselves against them. The first wave lasted exactly 24 hours, resulting in about ten million deaths on the enemy’s side. On the Azure Dragon Sect’s side, most injuries were minor scratches at most. The fight was a landslide victory for them... But the next day—exactly 24 hours after the first— the same phenomenon occurred. The mysterious black rift with glowing edges, shaped like a large eyelid, appeared once more. The insectoid monsters appeared again, rushing forward without learning their lesson. "Haha! I’ll kill more of you pests than the last!" an elder growled, clapping his hands. As he did, a shadow of a blue dragon appeared behind him, engulfing his body. Then, he flew forward, as if he were the dragon itself, meeting the incoming monsters. "...!" But to his surprise, the lead monster—one that looked the same as before—stopped his fist. The monster didn’t even flinch. It caught the elder’s strike without fanfare. And in the next moment... the elder disappeared. No, it wasn’t just that elder. At random, people on the front lines began disappearing. Especially those who were locked in battle, and were losing, against the now stronger monsters. Due to this bizarre phenomenon, half of the fighters vanished without a trace. And that was a fatal crack in their defenses. The remaining elders fought hard, pushing back the waves of monsters, but in the end, they couldn’t hold. 24 hours after the battle began, just as they were fearing a wipeout, the monsters suddenly began retreating. Whether they had someone cornered, or were mid-exchange, all of them turned back without regard for safety and returned to the rift. But nobody dared to chase them. The damage the sect suffered was severe. Of the frontline troops, half had vanished. Of the remaining half, a quarter fell bravely in battle. The survivors, without exception, were injured to various degrees. It was a disaster. Rather than a war, this had become a massacre—not by the cultivators, but by the monsters. "We should call the Great Elder!" And due to the dire situation, voices were raised about summoning Xu Tao. Although this would interrupt his closed-door cultivation, it was better than letting the entire sect fall into ruin. "No, we shouldn’t!" another elder countered. "Rather, we should rally all the sects in the cultivation world! This isn’t just the Azure Dragon Sect’s issue anymore—it concerns the entire world!" "That’s true. We can’t rely solely on the Great Elder for this... Rather, we should send him away, somewhere he won’t be affected by the fighting." "You mean to let the Great Elder survive alone?!" "Even if we all fall, as long as the Great Elder lives, the sect lives on through him!" "But...!" Their opinions were split, but everyone knew time was short. In the end, a unanimous decision was made: to send the entire Starfire Lake into the chasm—the boundary between dimensions—where the laws of time and space did not operate normally. But this fact was kept secret from the disciples, and carried out only by the elders. All of them rallied their power to send the entire Starfire Lake into the interdimensional boundary, draining their strength to the limit. As a result, they couldn’t participate in the defense against the next wave 24 hours later. To address this, as proposed, the Azure Dragon Sect called out to the other sects around the cultivation world. However, there was one problem... nobody was left to respond to their call. Apparently, the waves of monsters didn’t just hit the Azure Dragon Sect—they struck the rest of the world as well. With similar strength. In similar numbers. Weaker sects fell in the brutality of numbers during the first wave. Moderately strong sects fell in the second wave with stronger individuals. Of the top-tier sects, the ones closest in power to the Azure, most suffered catastrophic losses. They weren’t in any shape to offer aid when they themselves were on the verge of collapse. It was then that the truth dawned on them... The cultivation world was fated for destruction. ???????????? "...And then, just as we were drinking our sorrows and despair away... when we woke up, we were already standing in this place." Shin Gaoshun’s story finally ended. Xu Tao, who had listened from start to finish, formed a few ideas despite not having witnessed the events himself—especially regarding the mysterious disappearances, and their sudden appearance in this place. ’Could it be that the Lost System kidnapped them? Sending them into an intermediary space, like the gap between dimensions, for safety...?’ Of course, Gaoshun’s story didn’t include anything about the elders’ secret actions, but Xu Tao wasn’t a fool. He could easily imagine what had been going through their minds. ’Those brats... They must’ve thought the sect would survive through me if I lived. So they sent me away to safety...’ Xu Tao called forth his System Panel, staring at the main menu for a long time. Him falling to Earth, discovering a trace of True Heavenly Qi, and entering this game world... definitely wasn’t coincidence. It was fate. Destiny had led him here. "But if it was truly the Lost System that took those who vanished..." he murmured. He looked at the five before him, who had most definitely also "vanished" mid-sleep. In that moment, an idea—and a goal—formed in his mind. To gather every single spirited-away member of the sect... and rebuild it in this world! The most uptodate novels are published on fre(e)webno(v)el.com