Star Gate

Chapter 574: What One Sees and Hears (I)

Dusk had fallen in Silver Moon, but it was very bright where he stood. Silver Moon’s roads were pitted and marked with potholes, but the roads here were broad and straight...

On the other hand, it wasn’t all good! Li Hao saw tattered structures along his way—a village by the sea had burned down. Sounds of crying traveled into his ears and Li Hao steered Panther closer for a listen. The language was the same, but the accent was slightly different.

“That damned Black Mountain Brigand... has taken all of our food at this time of the year! Aren’t they just forcing us to die?”

“Dad, let’s ask the Sacred White Army for shelter!”

“What bullshit Sacred White Army! They’re also rebels and bandits...”

“Dad, Skystar Dynasty is done! War is upon us! Don’t you see that it’s chaos everywhere in the world? Whether it’s the Black Mountain Brigand, Whirlwind Bandits, Starlight Pirates... Life is impossible these days! Those supernaturals and martial masters bully everyone, there’s no way to survive!

“So we rebel! The Sacred White Army will feed us at least. We can’t plant again in this season and our rations have been taken. The government is the same as the bandits... What are we waiting for if we don’t rebel? Death?”

A noisy din echoed in Li Hao’s ears as he heard someone say, “The Black Mountain Brigand is cruel and vicious. Since when did they just take things, burn the village, and leave without killing anyone? I say that it’s the blasted Sacred White Army pretending to be the mountain robbers to force us to join them!”

“Who cares, we need a way to survive! Out of all those bandits, at least the Sacred White Army treats humans like people. So we’ll join them! We’ve all got some skill to our name. We can work for them if they want us, at least we’ll be able to eat and feed our kids!”

“That’s true! C’mon, let’s go to them...”

“Ole Zhang’s second son is part of the Sacred White Army...”

“Damn it, the little bastard probably led disguised Sacred White members to attack us... Ah, forget it!”

“......”

The look in Li Hao’s eyes shifted when the voices traveled into his ears. Was there chaos in the world? This was a province in the north that was closer to the eastern continent. It was called Dual Continents as a nod to it spanning two continents.

Judging from the conversation, the Black Mountain Brigand, Sacred White Army, and Starlight Pirates were very active here. However, the government either seemed to be unable to exterminate these pests or unwilling to! Instead, they were forcing people to take to the hills and become outlaws!

A sudden thought struck Li Hao and he swiftly steered Panther past the burning village. There were some supernaturals dressed in white in a nearby grove. They were keeping an eye on the village.

“It’s all burned to the ground...”

“Good!”

“Ole Zhang is there, right? They’ll all join us with a bit of persuasion. The men of this village are very comfortable in the water, they’ll be an elite marine force with some training. I’m estimating that ninety percent of them will successfully become supernatural if we induct them and they’ll be water supernaturals...”

“Well done!”

“......” Those in white were celebrating their success, drawing a frown to Li Hao’s face. Indignation flared in his heart. Burning down a village, seizing their rations, forcing them to become bandits... They should die!

Just when he was about to put all of them to the sword, someone else spoke up. “Hurry up and lead those people away from here! The Black Mountain Brigand will be here before long and nothing will be left alive of that village when they get here!”

“Yeah, those guys are too brutal...”

Li Hao’s sword froze mid swing. After a long moment, he sighed softly to himself and steered Panther away. Right or wrong? There was no right or wrong!

The government was incompetent and bandits ran the show. None of the parties were anything good, not even the Sacred White Army. But when it came down to the lesser of two evils, at least Sacred White didn’t kill people. Judging from their tone, all of the villagers would die once the Black Mountain Brigand showed up!

If he took a stand for justice now and killed the supernaturals, Sacred White would probably take revenge on the villagers, to say nothing of the Brigand swooping in opportunistically. It wasn’t like he could send all these people to Hong Yitang from so far away.

“Right and wrong... is hard to determine! What I see may not be the truth!” Li Hao understood more of the world now. Why did cultivators have to travel the land? For precisely what he’d just witnessed.

A situation was first perceived as a sin at times, but intervening might be an even bigger sin. The young man remained firmly focused on the foundational reason.

“The underlying reason is that the government is incompetent! They are unable to eradicate these bandits, didn’t raise the proper defenses, and couldn’t protect the people’s livelihood. I can’t deem this Sacred White Army as the good guys just because they don’t kill people. I can only say that they’re kinder among the bandits...

Li Hao smiled and took out a jug of alcohol for a swig. The world was about to go to pieces; regular life was already falling apart. Who knew how much longer the status quo could be maintained? All of those local tyrants and hotly ambitious were probably waiting for this day to arrive.

“Panth!”

“Arf arf!”

“They all say that being a dog in a peaceful era is better than being a human in troubled times. Tell me, do you think it’d be more carefree to be a dog?”

“Arf arf!”

“Man!” Li Hao sighed. This was a dog that couldn’t speak. “The tree spirit, snake, and birds can speak. But you? You can’t at all. You should at least be able to transmit your thoughts, but you... you can’t do even that. You’re so dumb!”

The dog lowered its head with suffering. That wasn’t being dumb, it was just a different species. Who knew what the truth was?

“How about I teach you how to read and write?” Li Hao suddenly grinned. “If you knew how to read and write, you’d be able to write out your thoughts. Those transmission pendants are two-way communication devices since we can input and send words through them. If you and I create something similar, we’ll be able to communicate! We won’t have to guess then!”

“Arf arf!” Panther was terrified. No way! Its bloodline seemed to be terrified of reading and writing.

“You’ve agreed? That’s perfect. You’re the best, Panth! I’ll teach you when we have a moment!”

“Arf arf arf!” Panther barked its head off. You’ve misunderstood! I didn’t agree!

Li Hao threw his head back with laughter and ignored the dog. You agree if I say you agreed! Tell me your real thoughts if you have the ability to!

He chugged another mouthful of alcohol and stopped teasing the dog. He closed his eyes in meditation and began saturating his supernatural locks instead of honing the five auras. Would he be able to unseal himself if he saturated the lock of his heart and not of his limbs?

He Yong and the others started with their limbs; their battle strength rose greatly when those locks were saturated. Take He Yong, for example. He was the equivalent of mid Nova under normal conditions. He’d filled five locks total—the four limbs and one of his organs.

Would one be late Nova or even peak Nova if they saturated six locks? Light Sword seemed to have mentioned that she’d completed two locks of the organs. Under normal circumstances, she was the equivalent of peak Nova without unsealing herself.

A sealed Hong Yitang could face off with experts in metamorphosis, of that Li Hao was well aware of. He’d been so in Ash Mountain, which meant Earthturner Sword had saturated at least three locks of his organs, maybe even four!

“It’ll take at least another day before I reach Calm Borders province... Maybe I can fill my heart lock during this time...”

That supernatural lock had already absorbed a lot of energy—so much energy that it seemed a bottomless pit. The key thing was that the cultivator was hard pressed to know how much energy his locks had devoured. Li Hao could only measure it in terms of mysterious power stones depleted, which was several thousand pieces.

He wanted to try a different path. What would happen if he focused on the locks of the organs first? He had the Water of Life and sword energy in hand, so he wasn’t afraid of problems developing. The locks would just start breaking at the worst. He should be able to suppress those effects. This path might even enhance his battle strength.

At the moment, his five auras were temporarily stitched together. Properly fusing them was too hard. Li Hao felt that he didn’t have the potential to complete that in a day or two. That wasn’t achievable by a human. In that case... he could saturate his supernatural locks first.

A vast quantity of sword energy, mysterious power, and elemental energy surged into the lock. The confined tiger in his heart stirred restlessly. The lock shook without pause and seemed to be physically manifesting.

Li Hao ignored the changes and continued absorbing energy, prompting supernatural locks to materialize throughout his body. The four limbs, five organs, his forehead, belly button, and spine. Twelve locks shimmered in and out of sight—indeed, twelve.

According to modern general knowledge, there should only be nine locks. At the same time, everyone knew that there was one in the head. It was commonly believed that supernaturals with special talents were a result of shattering the lock of the head. As for why there were different attributes of supernaturals... perhaps it was a function of mutations.

Therefore, everyone knew that there were ten locks in the human body. And yet, twelve appeared over Li Hao’s body.

The spine as the bone, the shenque as body. [1]

The young man didn’t pay attention to this. Humans might have more than twelve locks in their bodies. When he advanced to subsequent cultivation stages, he had a hunch or insight into more. There should be more than twelve supernatural locks. It might be that his potential was too weak or he himself too weak to summon the others.

If the supernatural domain continued to develop as it did, it would be terrifying. Shattering one lock meant one cultivation level. Twelve locks meant twelve cultivation levels. The strongest supernatural of the modern world seemed to have only broken five.

Li Hao wasn’t aware of whether there were supernaturals stronger than Nova. But since Hong Yitang and the others kept such a cautious, low profile, there might be. The young man didn’t mind. As he continued to absorb power, various thoughts ran through his mind. If he could break a lock after filling it to capacity, should he try unsealing himself?

It’d be nice to enhance himself by a minor cultivation level, if not a major one. He could kill late Novas now. It would be great to kill peak Novas!

1. Shenque is a special acupoint located in navel that is connected to the twelve regular meridians and internal organs. ☜