Trapped in the bloody rift, Cao Yun literally saw space close itself in front of him. He then knew that he wouldn't be able to go back. Five years ago, he had fallen to his death thinking he would never see his family ever again. This time, he didn't repeat the same mistake, he clung on to the certitude that he would come back. One day, he would come back to make things right for his family. He would come back to the Hongchen Kingdom and save his younger sister. He would slay Emperor Weide - no, Traitor Weide - no matter what!
The bloody rift had absorbed Demon King Mo Wang's blood and had fed on the blood of a few Spirit Warriors. But it was still very unstable. After all, even for a Sage, understanding the Dao of Space was difficult. Creating an opening in space was an incredibly arduous task. The Empyrean Asura Theocracy had been able to do so in order to send some soldiers throughout the Hongchen Kingdom, but creating a permanent doorway in the middle of the Imperial City was another story altogether. Even the portals they had built had taken them several centuries of work and decades of preparations. Despite all of that time, those didn't last even a full minute. Several powerful demons had been killed by those very doors.
In fact, a few of those portals had been so unstable that all the demons who tried to go through had simply been crushed into nothingness. But now, there were several powerful Accomplished Demons roaming free. The Silver Wolf General's forces would be the first one to notify the Imperial City. Then, it would take a few weeks to prepare an appropriate response. In the end, several months would pass by before anything was really done against such a threat. Because the Imperial City had been attacked and many officials killed, there was chaos in the administration. Thankfully, the Silver Wolf General had disregarded the official chain of command to act first.
If he had not done so, it could have taken an entire year before anything was properly done, because the demons would have not been discovered soon enough. However, killing several Accomplished Demons trying to hide within the Hongchen Kingdom while still maintaining a strict security over the border and the Imperial Palace was difficult. Although they had the military strength to get rid of those invaders, they couldn't mobilize all their troops and abandon the vast borders. After the plague of the demonic cultivators and their demonic beasts stampede, now they were faced with another internal threat. The Hongchen Kingdom was truly in a bad situation through and through.
Thankfully, Emperor Weide appeared in public again in order to help boost morale. He didn't hide his injuries. Instead, he used them as a symbol of this war. No matter how much humans would suffer, they would always win and prevail in the end. However, from this day forth, Emperor Weide would always wear his battle armor. He even personally helped in tracking down and killing all the invaders. There was a real atmosphere of paranoia throughout the Hongchen Kingdom. People were worried about demonic cultivators, human traitors who had been sent by the demons, and even the demons themselves.
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While all of that was unveiling in the Hongchen Kingdom, Cao Yun was trapped in the bloody rift.
As the bloody rift had been unstable and attacked by the fragment Sect Leader Xuan's soul used to make Cao Yun's protective charm, it had completely collapsed around Cao Yun. Thanks to this unwilling sacrifice, Cao Yun had closed off the gate. Under other circumstances, that would have meant his utter destruction. Thankfully though, Sect Leader Xuan's knowledge of the Dao of Space had been enough to keep him alive. Hongyu too was alive.
Now though, they were trapped in a disturbing place and air would soon be a problem. Indeed, some of the air from the Hongchen Kingdom had been taken with them, but it wouldn't last forever. The Insight Writings from the Dao of Space were forming some kind of strange bubble around Cao Yun, Hongyu and thus also trapping all this air. It was hard to say how long it could last though, some days, some months... Cao Yun had no way of knowing so he immediately began to restrain his breathing. On the other hand, Hongyu was unconscious. Ironically, this was a good thing as her breathing was very calm. As a 3rd-grade Mortal Warrior, Cao Yun could slow it down quite a lot, just like he didn't need as much food, water or sleep. But he was still a mortal and breathing was the most essential process to stay alive.
Unfortunately, this wasn't Cao Yun's most pressing matter.
The place they were in right now was no place at all. Quite literally, it was a temporary wound in space. In order to simply maintain it open, it had required a great amount of energy. In fact, that was why the bloody rift had been trying to absorb as much blood. Even the full blood and entire body of Demon King Mo Wang, even his very soul, had not been enough. They had been merely sufficient to open it in the first place. But it would have required the blood sacrifice of two or three late Spirit Warriors just to stabilize it.
And without Cao Yun's intervention, this might have really happened. Of course, he had not done so intentionally, but by being sucked into it while using Sect Leader Xuan's Spirit Condensation Barrier, he had put an end to the threat. Indeed, within the soul inside the artifact, Sect Leader Xuan had poured his understanding of space. After all, altering space around his disciple was the best way to protect him from any attack. Of course, the Insight Writings surrounding Cao Yun were not as developed as the ones in Sect Leader Xuan's sea of consciousness. Indeed, it was like the Insight Writings Cao Yun had read in 'Sealing the Seven Demons in the Nine Peaks'. Unless he truly mastered them, he couldn't reproduce them exactly.
Sadly, Sect Leader Xuan had not yet mastered the Dao of Space enough for that. However, they were still very powerful. Thus, they instinctively protected Cao Yun from the bloody rift. But as a consequence, it had completely collapsed. And now Cao Yun was trapped inside a fold of space as it was trying to repair itself. Without that barrier around him, Cao Yun would have been crushed in an instant and this bloody corridor would have been closed forever. In the Hongchen Kingdom, Sect Leader Xuan was the only one who knew exactly what had happened to Cao Yun, but even his connection with his soul could not endure such a trial. However, he would tell everything to the ones he truly trusted. In fact, he even had an idea on the place Cao Yun would reach, if he survived the process, which he was confident about.
"Boy, don't worry about air. You will be crushed by this place way before you run out of fresh air..."
"That's very comforting indeed..."
Cao Yun's sensation was truly strange. Within this place, there was no light except for the golden hue of the Insight Writings around the young man. Thus, he felt as though he was in a cave filled with blood everywhere and it was contracting around him. It truly felt as if space itself had a body and Cao Yun was swimming in its very bloodstream. Strangely, space seemed to be organic around him, but he knew this wasn't the case. No, all the blood around him was in fact Demon King Mo Wang's blood. Of course, there was also some blood from the Spirit Warriors who had been devoured by it. But only Demon King Mo Wang's blood had endured, probably thanks to the demonic arts he had discovered.
"Dian Mo, you know way more about space than I do. Could you find us a way out of this place?"
"I'm trying, boy. If I'm right, we literally left your world. We didn't quite breached through the veil between worlds of course, even Demon God Da Mo couldn't do so. But we're outside of the normal space. We're in some kind of wounds that's trying to repair itself. The blood of that Demon King is still feeding that wound. Otherwise, it would have collapsed around you even more. That Sect Leader's Insight Writings will protect you for a time. But as soon as space closes itself on you, they won't last more than a few hours. By using your soul to the limit, you could make it endure a bit longer, but you won't live longer than a week by then. And I can't know for sure when that blood will be completely spent."
"Could we make some kind of array formation to pierce through this place? If space is distorted and if that blood is powerful enough to keep it from repairing itself straight away, we might have a way, right? We could use this blood in combination with your knowledge of the Dao of Space from Sect Leader Xuan. What do you think?"
"Well, it's not impossible per se. But you don't realize how difficult it is. The moron who tried to establish a permanent bridge into your Imperial City was insane! Even a Sage specialized in the Dao of Space would have not attempted such a thing. Hell, even Demon God Da Mo wouldn't have tried something so foolish, unless he was desperate..."
"I'm sure I can use my Flying Poison to control Sect Leader Xuan's Insight Writings. Then we just need to get some of Demon King Mo Wang's blood. Even if our chances are small, we can't just wait for death! If I die here, you know what this bastard will do to my sister?!"
"Well, most likely, he will help her become a Spirit Warrior and then tear apart her Soul Embryo in order to refine it so he can become a Sage."
Dian Mo's words did not calm down Cao Yun at all. They fueled his rage and his desire to stay alive.
"I swear that I will feast on that traitor's blood. I will take his soul and inflict all of my family's pain tenfold on his tormented mind! Little Huiying, I will save you! Father, Mother, I failed your command once, but I won't fail it again! The enemies of our blood will all die in agonizing pain. The Hongchen Kingdom will be freed from that stench! I make this solemn vow on my Dao Heart! I won't die here in the void! I will come back and slaughter my blood's enemies!"
"Boy, this is all good, but even if we survive, you might not even be able to go back..."
"Focus on the task at hand! If I die, you die too, remember. Although I don't know much about the Dao of Space, you might find some interesting things in there."
Thanks to his reading of Sect Leader Xuan's 'Daydreams on the Heidai Peak', Cao Yun had the bare minimum when it came to knowing the Dao of Space. He simply knew what it was, but he had nowhere near the same understanding as he had about the Dao of Death thanks to Cleansed Asura's 'Death Verses'. If he couldn't understand much of it, maybe Dian Mo would get something more from the text. Thus, Cao Yun fully opened it in front of Dian Mo.
At the same time, Cao Yun tried to look for anything similar to the Insight Writings he was seeing outside within the documents left by Cleansed Asura. The God-Monarch had pierced through the veils between the worlds. Obviously, his knowledge of the Dao of Space was way superior to what anyone on the Piaolu planet could achieve. However, Cao Yun couldn't read anything. In his mind, he simply thought that it might be somewhat useful to help Dian Mo find a way. Dian Mo couldn't read the text either, but he might understand the Insight Writings a bit better than Cao Yun. Hell, maybe he might find some array formation in Cleansed Asura's documents that would give Dian Mo a bit of inspiration.
At this point, Cao Yun was just using any wild idea he had. In fact, he had several other wild ideas, but he was not yet desperate enough. As long as Demon King Mo Wang's blood was not fully digested by space itself, he had some time.
If someone on the Piaolu planet had opened, there had to be a way out. After all, no one could surpass the Spirit Warrior realm or the Accomplished Demon realm. Otherwise, the war between humans and demons would be very different from what it was today. If someone had tried to open that rift, that meant that there was at least another opening to go through. They had to find it. Since it was about traveling through space, Dian Mo might be useful. After all, in the Palace of Supreme Wisdom, he had been confronted with some alteration of space.
"Fine, boy, I'll try to keep us alive. Just show me everything you can."
Although Cao Yun didn't fully trust Dian Mo, he needed his help to survive. Of course, the Palace Spirit would probably try to take advantage of the situation to see more than what Cao Yun was willing to show him. But if they were to die, that would be pointless anyway.
While Dian Mo was working on finding some solution to their current situation, space was contracting again and again. Cao Yun could literally sense the blood around him getting weaker and weaker. With his own blood cultivation, he was now way more sensitive to those things. And since he had nothing better to do, Cao Yun focused on his cultivation. With the Frozen Fire pill's medicinal essence still within his Chamber of the Mysterious Elixir, Cao Yun had a reserve of Fire Qi to advance his Qi cultivation.
Cao Yun had decided on a method to fill his Middle Dantian that was known as 'Drowning One's Heart in Blood'. The concept was simple. In order to fill up all nine chambers of his Middle Dantian with Fire Qi, he would only focus on one chamber, the Chamber of the Mysterious Elixir. As it would slowly fill the chamber, the Fire Qi would naturally overflow in the other chambers without any effort on Cao Yun's end.
This method was nothing special or fancy. Because it was so simple, everyone knew about it. But it was still the best method known. Sometimes, simplicity was a virtue. Its only default was that it required a huge amount of Fire Qi, which Cao Yun had with this Frozen Fire pill.