A Record of a Mortal's Journey to Immortality: Immortal Realm

Chapter 1134: Jin Tong Captured

The Dark Heavens Devilish Deity naturally wasn't interested in the conversation taking place between Han Li's trio.

At the moment, he was inspecting his surroundings in an excited manner, and all of a sudden, he crouched down in front of the crater as a contemplative look appeared on his face, then swooped down into the center of the crater.

There was a series of molten fireballs the size of houses situated on the ground there, and the Dark Heavens Devilish Deity seemed to be very interested in them, circling around them while reaching out as if to warm his hands.

Right at this moment, a burst of spatial fluctuations erupted out of the nearby space, and three more figures stumbled out of thin air.

Having just endured a grueling battle, Han Li and the others were still quite tense and alert, and they immediately prepared for battle at the sight of this unfamiliar trio.

The three of them seemed to be very apprehensive as well, and they were led by an elderly man with azure scales all over his body, giving off bursts of bone-chilling glacial qi.

He was accompanied by a tall man with dark green skin that was withered like tree bark, and he hurriedly darted away to the side, seemingly very fearful of this glacial qi. At the same time, countless green roots emerged from his body in the blink of an eye before plunging into the charred soil below.

The final figure to round out the trio was a gray-robed elderly man who was far closer to a normal human in appearance compared with his two companions. He stood on the spot with one hand clasped behind his back, and waves of golden ripples were surging out of his robes.

Right as a battle was about to commence, Liu Zizai suddenly called out, "Huai Yangzi! Is that you, Fellow Daoist Huai Yangzi?"

Everyone faltered slightly upon hearing this, and the gray-robed elderly man's brows furrowed slightly as he directed his gaze to Liu Zizai, upon which a surprised look appeared on his face as exclaimed, "Fellow Daoist Liu!"

"That's right, it's me! I didn't think we would be reunited here after all this time," Liu Zizai said with a wry smile.

"Indeed, fate is truly a cruel mistress," Huai Yangzi sighed with a shake of his head.

"Don't be alarmed, everyone. Fellow Daoist Huai Yangzi is an acquaintance of mine, not an enemy," Liu Zizai reassured, and Huai Yangzi also gestured for his two companions to stand down.

With that, the tension in the air was lifted, and everyone gathered together in a loose circle.

"Back when you went missing in the Ink Sea Immortal Region, I went there to search for you, but even after several centuries of searching, the only lead that I could dig up was that you had gone to explore a deepsea secret region in the Forgotten Sea. After that, no one heard from you again. What happened all those years ago?" Liu Zizai asked.

"Back then, I was invited by an old friend from the Ink Sea Immortal Palace to explore a secret area deep within the Crimson Wyrm Trench. However, that scoundrel betrayed me, and I was ambushed and captured by Immortal Palace cultivators under a whole host of arbitrary crimes.

“After that, I was thrown into the Immortal Prison, then ended up sealed in the Eon Pagoda, and only after all these years have I finally been freed," Huai Yangzi explained.

"You were also trapped in the Eon Pagoda? How did we not see each other in there after all this time?" Liu Zizai exclaimed.

"You were trapped in the pagoda as well?" Huai Yangzi asked with a skeptical expression.

"Do you not believe me?" Liu Zizai asked as his brows furrowed slightly.

"No, it's just that a cultivator of your caliber shouldn't have been able to preserve your cultivation base after being captured by the Heavenly Court. Did they not rob you of your law powers?" Huai Yangzi asked with a perplexed expression, and the same expression was also mirrored on the faces of his two companions.

"Are you saying the Heavenly Court robbed you of your law powers? No wonder your cultivation base hasn't regressed, but it seems a little unstable," Liu Zizai mused.

"Not only were my law powers taken from me, many cultivators in the Immortal Prison suffered the same fate as well. We were stripped of all of our law threads before being thrown into the Eon Pagoda," Huai Yangzi said in a resentful manner.

"Come to think of it, even though you didn't join the Heavenly Court, you've always remained on good terms with them as an itinerant immortal, so why did they decide to target you? Could it be that your law threads were special in some way?" Liu Zizai asked. n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

"Law powers are derived from each person's unique understanding of the Great Dao of heaven and earth, so strictly speaking, everyone's law threads are special in some way. However, I don't think the Heavenly Court cared about that at all. They captured many cultivators of all tribes and races, including even plant spirits, and no patterns can be gleaned in the law powers mastered by the captured cultivators, so the whole thing is very suspicious," Huai Yangzi replied.

"What did the Heavenly Court do with those extracted law threads, Senior Huai Yangzi?" Wyrm 3 asked, and Han Li was also very curious to hear the answer to this question.

"I don't know. We were never able to find out why they wanted so many law threads. I'm more curious about why your law threads weren't extracted, Fellow Daoist Liu," Huai Yangzi replied.

"I'm not sure. All I recall is that I wasn't in the Immortal Prison for very long before I was coaxed by Tai Sui into the Eon Pagoda. By the way, where were you imprisoned in the Eon Pagoda?" Liu Zizai asked.

"I was imprisoned in the seventh level of the Eon Pagoda along with many other cultivators, but we were all sealed away underground in a state of semi-hibernation. I can't recall exactly when it was, but some number of years ago, the restrictive forces in the pagoda suddenly began to loosen, and we attempted to slowly recover our law powers, but we were unable to move freely," Huai Yangzi replied.

"I see. I was imprisoned on the fifth level, so it's no wonder that we never saw each other in the pagoda. If we hadn't been freed, we would've never known that we were so close to each other," Liu Zizai mused.

Han Li's expression remained largely unchanged as he listened to the ongoing conversation, but internally, his mind was racing.

The Heavenly Court was the most authoritative power in the entire True Immortal Realm, and its primary objective was to maintain peace and order across the realm, so it shouldn't have been doing anything too out of line. However, if Huai Yangzi were telling the truth, then the Heavenly Court had to have been planning something massive and potentially sinister.

Unfortunately, there were too few leads for him to make any good guesses on what they were attempting to do.

After some contemplation, Han Li proposed, "Pardon my interjection, but I think we should focus on leaving this place as soon as possible. Everything else can be discussed after that."

"I agree. Given what's just happened here, I'm sure the Heavenly Court will be sending people to clean up the mess very soon, so we should leave this place right away," Wyrm 3 seconded with a nod.

"Do you have any future plans, Fellow Daoist?" Liu Zizai asked as he turned to Huai Yangzi.

"At this point, there's nothing that I'm too afraid to say anymore. Before my incarceration, the Reincarnation Palace tried to recruit me, but I refused for fear of pitting myself against the Heavenly Court. Right now, I have nowhere to go, and I wonder if the Reincarnation Palace is still willing to take me, or if the Reincarnation Palace still even exists, for that matter," Huai Yangzi sighed.

"If you want to join the Reincarnation Palace, I can perhaps have that arranged, Senior," Wyrm 3 said with a smile.

All of the High Zenith cultivators who were originally planning to follow Wyrm 3 were slightly alarmed to hear this, with some of them displaying some concern at her implied affiliation with the Reincarnation Palace.

"Does that mean you're a member of the Reincarnation Palace?" Huai Yangzi asked in a surprised manner.

Wyrm 3 merely smiled and offered no response, but the implication was clear.

"If it wasn't for them, we would still be imprisoned in the Eon Pagoda right now," Liu Zizai said.

Huai Yangzi was rather taken aback to hear this, and he said, "In that case, it looks like I owe my freedom to you. I'm willing to go to the Reincarnation Palace with you."

He then turned to his two companions as he asked, "What are your plans, fellow daoists?"

"We're in a similar situation to you. Even though we've managed to escape from the Eon Pagoda, I'm sure the Heavenly Court won't be willing to let us off the hook, so we may as well join the Reincarnation Palace too," the azure-skinned elderly man replied with a smile, while the tree-like man merely nodded in agreement, seemingly a man of few words.

"What are your plans, Brother Han? Would you like to return to the Reincarnation Palace with me?" Wyrm 3 asked.

"At this point, I'm only accumulating more and more bad blood with the Heavenly Court, so the sooner I go to the Reincarnation Palace, the sooner I'll have some allies and backers for my protection. Having said that, I hope that I won't be given another hollow Reincarnation Disciple status like last time," Han Li replied.

"Perhaps it's destiny, but your fate seems to be intertwined with that of our Reincarnation Palace, Brother Han. On top of that, you made a significant contribution to the completion of my mission, so I can assure you that you'll become a core member once you come back to the Reincarnation Palace with me this time. Our palace master also has a very high opinion of you, and perhaps he'll want to see you," Wyrm 3 said with a smile.

"That's all well and good, but I'm still waiting on an explanation about the situation surrounding Jin Tong that you brought up earlier," Han Li said as he switched to voice transmission.

"I can't elaborate too much on the matter for now, all I can tell you is that Jin Tong is currently being held captive in the Nine Origins Temple," Wyrm 3 replied after a brief hesitation.

"Why has Jin Tong been captured by the Nine Origins Temple? Surely you can answer me that question at least," Han Li said as his brows furrowed slightly.