The glowing jade pendant emitted a warm heat in Li Muyang’s hand.
Liu Lian’er had previously taught Li Muyang how to use the jade pendant, and now Li Muyang skillfully activated the spiritual power within it.
A pale cyan light rose from within the jade pendant, and Li Muyang reached out to touch the light.
When his fingers touched the cyan light, elegant text began to appear before his eyes.
The handwriting belonged to Shen Yan—it was her personal letter.
Li Muyang read carefully, his expression growing increasingly serious.
Shen Yan’s letter went into great detail about the current state of the Tianyuan Continent and the dire situation they were facing.
From the contents of the letter, the condition of the Tianyuan Continent was even worse than they had imagined.
After the collapse of the Tianyuan Dynasty, war broke out across the land. Rebel kings rose up one by one, seizing territories and engaging in relentless conflict.
In the south, the projections of the Ancient Resentment Well Evil God began appearing more frequently outside the Ancient Resentment Well. The Qintian Bureau exerted all their power but couldn’t control the situation. The range of the evil gods’ rampage expanded daily, with corrupted individuals screaming like madmen as they fled to the deep mountains or hid inside the Ancient Resentment Well.
These corrupted, deranged people gave birth to monstrous, sinister creatures within their bodies—creatures capable of freely roaming the Mortal World, possessing immense power.
The rebel kings of the Tianyuan Continent were drawn to the unique power of these abominations.
Except for the Rising Heavens Army, which depended on the Blood Demon Path, other rebel kings openly recruited these abominations, even referring to them reverently as “altered entities,” using them to strike down their strongest enemies.
These abominations eagerly joined the rebel kings, slaughtering living beings on their behalf, absorbing battlefield resentment and evil qi, and devouring the blood of the innocent.
This chaotic alliance caused wars in the Tianyuan Continent to escalate beyond mortal reckoning, with an ever-growing death toll.
Under the protection of the rebel kings, the abominations advanced to positions of power, entered grand halls, received high ranks, and garnered widespread fear and respect.
The sword cultivators of the Mysterious Sword Sect sought to end this madness, but the sheer number of abominations was overwhelming. Even when the Mysterious Sword Sect summoned all other cultivation sects to descend from their hidden retreats into the Mortal World and mobilized cultivators to hunt the abominations.
The number of abominations dwarfed the number of cultivators in the Tianyuan Continent.
This vast continent was divided among dozens of rebel kings, each occupying expansive territories and counties. When the few cultivators entered these lands, they seemed no more than droplets falling into a desert—the pace at which abominations multiplied outpaced the speed of their extermination.
Furthermore, the rebel kings feigned compliance while secretly concealing the existence of abominations under their control, forcing the cultivators to rely on their own investigations.
Such investigations were incredibly inefficient.
In the end, the sword cultivators of the Mysterious Sword Sect set up a massive Heaven and Earth Array in the south, dividing the continent and cutting off north from south.
Since then, the southern abominations found it difficult to cross the array to wreak havoc in the northern Central Plains, slightly alleviating the chaos. At least the number of abominations within the armies of the rebel kings was reduced significantly.
However, the cost of maintaining the Heaven and Earth Array was steep—eighty percent of the Mysterious Sword Sect’s sword cultivators were immobilized, required to stay near the array’s core at all times to maintain its stability.
This further spread the already thin ranks of cultivators, leaving them unable to intervene in the ongoing chaos of the Central Plains.
Fortunately, after the array was established, the abominations trapped in the south could no longer resist the extermination efforts of the sword cultivators.
Liu Li Fairy’s Glazed Fairy Sword had a unique ability to sense the presence of abominations, swiftly locating those hidden within a radius of a hundred miles.
Under the leadership of Liu Li Fairy, the cultivators united to eliminate the abominations in the south, driving them back into the Ancient Resentment Well.
Shen Yan mentioned in her letter that Liu Li Fairy had led the cultivators into the Ancient Resentment Well, and contact with them had been lost for a long time.
They were determined to eradicate the forces of evil spirits completely before returning to the Mortal World.
However, the weakening seal of the Ancient Resentment Well had caused the projections of the evil gods to manifest more frequently in the Mortal World.
Adding to this, the relentless warfare between rebel kings and the mountains of casualties had created immense resentment and evil qi, fueling the evil gods’ power.
The number of evil god projections appearing in the Mortal World was increasing daily, nearing the limits of the Imperial Heaven’s Demon-Suppressing Magician’s ability to respond.
Shen Yan urgently implored Liu Lian’er to find Li Muyang as quickly as possible, for his assistance was needed now more than ever.
The Tianyuan Continent urgently required stability in the Central Plains.
At the very least, the number of deaths needed to be reduced.
The ongoing wars and loss of life significantly amplified the power of the evil gods.
Presently, the only place untouched by war in the Tianyuan Continent was the distant northern counties.
Although rebel kings had also risen in the north to take advantage of the chaos, they were swiftly slain by the domineering Dragon Goddess.
Under the protection of the Dragon Goddess, the northern counties had become the continent’s sole sanctuary, distant from the chaos, safe from evil spirits.
Shen Yan hoped that Liu Lian’er could connect with Li Muyang, and through him, appeal to the Dragon Goddess for assistance.
After all, the Dragon Goddess had risen to power with help from Li Muyang.
Liu Li Fairy Chu Qingxue was aware of this matter and had evidently informed Shen Yan.
If the northern borders could be opened to allow refugees from the Central Plains to flee to the northern counties, the impact of the war in the Central Plains would be mitigated significantly.
The sword cultivators of the Mysterious Sword Sect had even proposed building temples dedicated to the Dragon Goddess in the Central Plains to increase her Incense Fire Vow Power.
Although the Heaven and Earth Array prevented transcendents from the north from crossing into the south.
If the Dragon Goddess could establish incense temples in the north, she could manifest her presence through the Incense Fire Vow Power collected at these temples.
Shen Yan’s letter left Li Muyang deeply troubled.
“…Has the situation deteriorated so severely?”
The Dragon Girl had sealed the northern borders, preventing refugees from the Central Plains from escaping northward?
That wasn’t characteristic of the Dragon Girl.
If circumstances allowed, the Dragon Girl would surely have welcomed refugees into the north.
In this time of crisis, for the Dragon Girl to seal the borders… could it be that the northern counties were facing their own troubles?
Was the Dragon Girl too overwhelmed to attend to other matters?
Li Muyang furrowed his brow in thought, then carefully composed a letter in response.
He informed Shen Yan that he was about to arrive in the Tianyuan Continent, entering from the north.
Once he reached the northern counties, he would immediately seek out the Dragon Girl and request her assistance.
He urged Shen Yan to remain patient and explained the situation in the northern counties.
After slaying the Bodhi Tree Demon, the Dragon Girl had become the leader of all northern abominations, but these entities were unlikely to remain obedient. Perhaps the northern counties were themselves in turmoil, rendering the Dragon Girl unable to open the borders.
In his letter, Li Muyang detailed the situation within the Ancient Resentment Well and advised Shen Yan to warn the sword cultivators of the Mysterious Sword Sect to avoid venturing into Great Zhou’s capital city.
However, Li Muyang understood that Shen Yan might not be able to reach Chu Qingxue.
The sword cultivators of the Mysterious Sword Sect were likely to continue toward Great Zhou’s capital and there, encounter Jie Zijiu…