translator: ahad
Proofreading: shaheer
Humanity’s Great Sage – Chapter 1017: Unexpected
Even before drawing near this place, the stench of blood rushed into his nostrils.
The Blood Pool!
This was also one of the ways the Blood River manifested outwardly in the Blood Refining World.
The Blood River was an underground river, hidden deep beneath the surface; it did not flow above ground. The Blood Pools scattered across the Blood Refining World were the pathways and entrances through which the Blood Race descended into the Blood River.
Lu Ye stood beside the Blood Pool, studying it intently, his brow furrowed deeply.
Although he had obtained some information about Blood Pools from the memories of the dead Blood Race member, intelligence was one thing; seeing it with his own eyes was another matter entirely.
The blood water within this pool, at first glance, was identical to real fresh blood in form, color, and even smell—exceedingly bizarre.
On the surface of the Blood Pool, bubbles large and small constantly rose from below, then burst, splattering blood water everywhere.
Arriving at this place, Zhang Julai’s expression grew even more solemn. Taking one step forward, his life or death would depend on his own fortune. But now, as Lu Ye’s soul slave, if he wished to remain by Lu Ye’s side for the long term, he absolutely had to take this step.
He drew a deep breath, turned around, and performed a Blood Race salute. “My Lord, I go now.”
Lu Ye nodded slightly.
Zhang Julai hesitated no longer. With a leap, he jumped straight into the Blood River, not even a single blood blossom splashing up.
Lu Ye activated his divine sense, wanting to probe Zhang Julai’s situation, but to his surprise, his divine sense could not penetrate even a single zhang deep into the blood water.
The blood water in this pool actually had the ability to obstruct divine sense.
However, Lu Ye was not particularly concerned about this. Although Zhang Julai was his soul slave, as a member of the Blood Race, how could he not have blood on his hands? Before encountering Lu Ye, there must have been some humans who fell victim to him.
So even if Zhang Julai died here, Lu Ye would not feel heartache. Soul slaves were things he could casually obtain another of; his cultivation had already recovered, and no Blood Race member below the Divine Ocean Realm could possibly be his match.
He bent down, channeled his spiritual power to wrap around one hand, and reached into the Blood Pool, sensing the mysteries of the blood water.
Soon, a look of surprise crossed his face. This blood water was undoubtedly highly corrosive, for the spiritual power shielding his hand was being rapidly consumed, emitting a sizzling sound.
He had encountered the Blood Race in the Soaring Dragon Boundary before, so this naturally came as no surprise.
What surprised him was that this blood water seemed to contain extremely surging energy, which could not help but remind him of the earth veins of the Nine Provinces.
In the Nameless Hidden Realm, when he had swallowed and absorbed the hidden realm’s earth vein, he had felt such surging power. But the energy here in the Blood River was undoubtedly even more abundant than the earth vein of the Nameless Hidden Realm.
The only difference between the two was that the energy in the Nameless Hidden Realm’s earth vein was more suitable for cultivation and absorption, while the energy in this blood water was not.
If a human cultivator rashly absorbed it, there would certainly be enormous danger. The corrosive power alone was not something a human cultivator could withstand.
If one truly tried to forcibly absorb it into their body, it would cause severe damage to their spiritual apertures and meridians.
Could this Blood River… be the earth vein of the Blood Refining World? A thought suddenly leaped into Lu Ye’s mind.
The more he pondered it, the more plausible it seemed. The earth vein of a world inevitably spread throughout the entire realm, which was why places like the Blood Pool, so peculiar, existed all across the Blood Refining World. And each Blood Pool was connected to the underground Blood River.
Truly, in a vast world, there is no lack of wonders.
“Wait here. I’m going down to take a look,” Lu Ye turned his head and instructed Lan Qiyue.
Since the blood water of this pool contained such surging energy, it would undoubtedly be of great assistance to his cultivation.
In this Blood Refining World, he had no way to connect with the Heavenly Secrets to exchange for golden spirit contracts to cultivate. Although he still had quite a few cultivation resources on hand, and swallowing Blood Crystals was also a method of cultivation, how could that compare to the convenience and speed of using spirit contracts?
But if he could rely on the Blood Refining World’s earth vein to cultivate, even if the speed was still not as fast as using spirit contracts, it would still be much faster than ordinary methods.
It had been over a month since he came to this world. Moreover, the process of his cultivation recovering from being suppressed to full restoration was also a period of settling; his Real Lake Realm seventh order cultivation could be considered more or less stabilized. Continuing to raise his cultivation naturally posed no great hidden danger.
In this alien world, he had to acquire stronger power as much as possible. He couldn’t rely on that simpleton Dao Thirteen for everything.
“Senior Brother, be careful,” Lan Qiyue could not help but feel worried, but she did not stop him.
Lu Ye nodded slightly, channeled his spiritual power to wrap around himself, and leaped down.
Blood blossoms splashed, and Lu Ye disappeared from sight.
Immediately, a sizzling sound came from all directions. His spiritual power was rapidly being consumed. Lu Ye attempted to disperse the spiritual power shielding him. The moment the surrounding blood water made contact with his skin, a needle-pricking sensation transmitted over.
Moreover, it was as if countless needles were stabbing into every part of his body.
Fortunately, it was still within tolerable limits.
The surging energy within the blood water, without Lu Ye even needing to activate any power to absorb it, actively burrowed into his body through his pores as if possessing a spirit of its own.
The pain intensified.
Suddenly, there was an unusual movement from the Talent Tree. Lu Ye sank his mind in to observe and saw that a large swath of dense gray fog had ignited on the Talent Tree.
This undoubtedly indicated that the blood water contained a great amount of substances harmful to him, which were being burned by the Talent Tree the moment they entered his body.
Lu Ye silently sensed for a moment, confirming that there was no great danger, only that the needle-pricking sensation needed to be endured.
This was the profound mystery of the Talent Tree.
One had to know that the Blood River was an extremely dangerous place even for adult Blood Race members; those who entered faced near-certain death, precisely because of the horrors contained within the Blood River’s water—let alone Lu Ye, a human.
Yet after being burned by the Talent Tree, all those horrors transformed into gray mist and dispersed, leaving Lu Ye only with a stinging pain all over his body.
He released his divine sense to perceive his surroundings, but it was still obstructed beyond a single zhang around him.
There was no sign of Zhang Julai in the vicinity; he had gone off to who knows where.
Lu Ye’s figure sank deeper. Several dozen zhang down, an undercurrent suddenly surged around him.
He waited quietly for a moment but dared not continue any deeper. In this place where divine sense was useless, if he were swept away by an undercurrent, it was highly likely he would be unable to find his way back.
Moreover, he discovered that while the method of relying on the Blood River for cultivation was feasible, it was difficult to sustain.
Because doing so consumed far too much fuel for the Talent Tree.
He had stored a great deal of fuel for the Talent Tree. Not to mention other things, in the Sword Artifact Sect’s hidden realm, he had activated the Talent Tree to absorb the earth lung fire for a full two months. All that energy was stored within the Talent Tree to serve as fuel for incinerating impurities.
But the amount of harmful impurities within this Blood River’s blood water was simply too great. Lu Ye had never seen such dense gray fog ignite on the Talent Tree before.
Judging by how things were progressing, Lu Ye felt that if he cultivated here for one or two months, the Talent Tree’s fuel would be completely exhausted.
This was undoubtedly a very poor trade. The Talent Tree was his greatest support. Lu Ye absolutely could not allow the Talent Tree to lose its ability to incinerate impurities—especially in this Blood Refining World, where he temporarily had no means of replenishing the Talent Tree’s fuel.
Thus, although he felt it was a pity, he could only helplessly give up.
He channeled his spiritual power and shot upward.
In moments, he burst out of the Blood Pool. With spiritual power shielding his entire body, he had not been stained by any blood water.
Landing on the ground, Lu Ye immediately turned his head to the side, his eyelids lowering.
Lan Qiyue was nowhere to be seen. Instead, a strange Blood Race member stood by the Blood Pool.
That Blood Race member was holding a blood fetus in his hand, apparently having come to send the blood fetus here for incubation. When Lu Ye emerged, he had been peering inquisitively into the Blood Pool.
Lu Ye’s appearance gave him quite a shock.
After clearly seeing Lu Ye’s appearance, the Blood Race member was greatly astonished, and then bellowed in fury: “Audacious blood food, daring to trespass into my Blood Race’s forbidden grounds!”
The Blood River was the foundation of the Blood Race, the hotbed for incubating blood fetuses. The Blood Race naturally regarded it with utmost importance.
In the Blood Refining World, humans were not qualified to set foot near a Blood Pool.
Thus, seeing Lu Ye actually rush out from within the Blood Pool, this Blood Race member was immensely enraged.
“Where is she?” Lu Ye’s voice was low.
There were no signs of a struggle in the surroundings, nor any bloodstains. Yet Lan Qiyue had vanished. As for her whereabouts, Lu Ye already had a guess.
He simply hadn’t expected that in the brief time he had ventured deep into the Blood River, such an unforeseen event would occur. For a moment, he could not help but feel a twinge of self-reproach.
Had he known this would happen, he should have taken a detour to send Lan Qiyue back after she had settled those two human surrogate mothers.
But at the time, he had thought that since it was on the way anyway, he would bring Lan Qiyue along. After investigating the Blood River’s situation, they could return together, saving time.
Yet now it seemed that Lan Qiyue must have spotted this Blood Race member approaching, and with nowhere to hide for a moment, directly jumped into the Blood Pool to find Lu Ye.
A place like the Blood River—even a pure-blooded Blood Race member who ventured deep into it faced near-certain death, let alone a human like Lan Qiyue.
And her cultivation was merely at the Spirit Creek Realm.
“Worry about yourself first,” the Blood Race member roared, raising a hand to grab at Lu Ye. The nails of his five fingers were razor-sharp and ominously cold.
A ringing sound rang out. A flash of blade light passed, and the Blood Race member froze in place, his clawing posture unchanged. Yet his arm had already been severed at the elbow.
The blade light had been too swift; for a moment, he could not even feel the pain, and even the blood had not yet had time to flow out.
But he clearly realized what had happened. For an instant, he stared at Lu Ye in stunned disbelief, utterly unable to comprehend how a mere piece of blood food had the audacity to strike at him.
Another flash of blade light swept by, and the Blood Race member’s figure stiffened completely.
He was but a Cloud River Realm Blood Race member; how could he possibly withstand Lu Ye’s slash?
Lu Ye turned around and leaped back down into the Blood River, releasing his divine sense to its maximum extent, searching for any trace of Lan Qiyue.
Only after Lu Ye had left did the Blood Race member sway slightly. His head suddenly tumbled from his body, the blood from his neck gushing skyward, and he collapsed to the ground with a thud.
A little less than half an hour later, Lu Ye burst out of the Blood Pool once more. His expression was so dark it seemed about to drip water.
He had not found Lan Qiyue.
The environment beneath the Blood Pool was far too harsh. Not only were undercurrents rampant, but divine sense was also greatly suppressed. In such an environment, trying to find a single person—how difficult was that?
When Lan Qiyue had jumped down, he should have been inside the Blood Pool at that time, yet even then he had not detected any sign of her, let alone searching for her after the fact.
A Spirit Creek Realm cultivator falling into the Blood River faced practically certain death, ten deaths and no life.
(End of Chapter)